Monday, January 15, 2007
Blu Balls
There is a home entertainment war a-brewin', though it might be off the radar of most of y'all. It has (or had) the potential to be a VHS vs. Beta type of situation. For those of you who still answer survey questions on MySpace like "have you ever kissed someone, or taken a drink" in earnest, you may need to go to Wikipedia to find out what I'm talking about.
This time the two competing formats are HD-DVD and Blu Ray. Both are flavors of the next generation of DVD that can deliver Hi def. content to your TV. They both have big names in the industry backing them, tons of money and resources, and though both have slightly different tech specs, neither, when looked at objectively, seem to tilt the scales as far as just being able to deliver better quality or usability.
The form factors (size and shape) of VHS and Beta were different enough that they could not have a hybrid machine to play both, and we may find this to be the case with HD-DVD and Blu Ray.
The disks, to the naked eye, look precisely the same. But at the teeny level, they are different. Radically different. The HD-DVD uses a laser very similar to current DVD players, but the disc itself is arranged differently, and the software is compressed differently. Blu Ray uses a laser that is, predictably, BLUE. The shorter wavelength allows the disc to pack the little pits much closer together. HD-DVD and Blu ray are different enough that producing a dual format player, would pose a challenge on a technical level. But the technologies are just a part of it. It seems the companies backing the two flavors are against a hybrid player as well because, "hey consumer, fuck you!" Note; dual players have been announced, but not delivered, and may never be delivered. And one company is even looking into a disc that is dual formatted by using substrate layers.
The release and implementation of these two formats have been...I think it's safe to say "disastrous" so far. The fit, finish, and quality has not been there. Players have taken up to a minute to load discs without any activity displayed. The picture has not been all that good. The menu systems are kludgy. And America doesn't care. Those who do remember the VHS vs. BETA crap want no part of anything simmilar. And they don't want to re-buy all their movies in a different format. Most TVs can't reap the benefits of the revved up disc resolution, and the conservative entertainment companies (I thought they were all supposed to be lefty liberals) are not releasing their best titles, necessarily. (Except you can get Serenity on HD-DVD). And to add insult to industry (pun!), the delivery times have been laaaaaaaate. by more than a year. And those few titles available have trickled out like a glacier in a mixed metaphor.
Most of the serious pundits backed Blu Ray. it seemed a better, or at least more innovative spec (but only slightly--and that was subjective). A lot of the HD geek sights I visit liked it, and Apple computer did as well (though they have hedged their bets and the Quicklime architecture can do both).
But there were a lot of Important things that happened last week. Apple had an expo. And even bigger for the electronics world was the Consumer Electronics Show...but strangely, the most important event that may decide the fate of HD-DVD vs. Blu Ray: The Adult Entertainment EXpo. I'm not kidding.
Adult entertainment goes where no one else dares to go. (Scrub that visual out of your head) If there is a delivery method that just hits the market, no matter how improbable or goofy a model it may be, the artificial-cherry scented ooze of pr0n will leak its pseudopodia into that...crevice.
Without pr0n, your internet would be a shell of what it is. The adult entertainment industry, also, chose VHS over Beta. There were other factors, but pr0n made it happen. And last week, those Lords and Ladies of sleaze chose HD-DVD.
Blu Ray, we hardly knew you.
This time the two competing formats are HD-DVD and Blu Ray. Both are flavors of the next generation of DVD that can deliver Hi def. content to your TV. They both have big names in the industry backing them, tons of money and resources, and though both have slightly different tech specs, neither, when looked at objectively, seem to tilt the scales as far as just being able to deliver better quality or usability.
The form factors (size and shape) of VHS and Beta were different enough that they could not have a hybrid machine to play both, and we may find this to be the case with HD-DVD and Blu Ray.
The disks, to the naked eye, look precisely the same. But at the teeny level, they are different. Radically different. The HD-DVD uses a laser very similar to current DVD players, but the disc itself is arranged differently, and the software is compressed differently. Blu Ray uses a laser that is, predictably, BLUE. The shorter wavelength allows the disc to pack the little pits much closer together. HD-DVD and Blu ray are different enough that producing a dual format player, would pose a challenge on a technical level. But the technologies are just a part of it. It seems the companies backing the two flavors are against a hybrid player as well because, "hey consumer, fuck you!" Note; dual players have been announced, but not delivered, and may never be delivered. And one company is even looking into a disc that is dual formatted by using substrate layers.
The release and implementation of these two formats have been...I think it's safe to say "disastrous" so far. The fit, finish, and quality has not been there. Players have taken up to a minute to load discs without any activity displayed. The picture has not been all that good. The menu systems are kludgy. And America doesn't care. Those who do remember the VHS vs. BETA crap want no part of anything simmilar. And they don't want to re-buy all their movies in a different format. Most TVs can't reap the benefits of the revved up disc resolution, and the conservative entertainment companies (I thought they were all supposed to be lefty liberals) are not releasing their best titles, necessarily. (Except you can get Serenity on HD-DVD). And to add insult to industry (pun!), the delivery times have been laaaaaaaate. by more than a year. And those few titles available have trickled out like a glacier in a mixed metaphor.
Most of the serious pundits backed Blu Ray. it seemed a better, or at least more innovative spec (but only slightly--and that was subjective). A lot of the HD geek sights I visit liked it, and Apple computer did as well (though they have hedged their bets and the Quicklime architecture can do both).
But there were a lot of Important things that happened last week. Apple had an expo. And even bigger for the electronics world was the Consumer Electronics Show...but strangely, the most important event that may decide the fate of HD-DVD vs. Blu Ray: The Adult Entertainment EXpo. I'm not kidding.
Adult entertainment goes where no one else dares to go. (Scrub that visual out of your head) If there is a delivery method that just hits the market, no matter how improbable or goofy a model it may be, the artificial-cherry scented ooze of pr0n will leak its pseudopodia into that...crevice.
Without pr0n, your internet would be a shell of what it is. The adult entertainment industry, also, chose VHS over Beta. There were other factors, but pr0n made it happen. And last week, those Lords and Ladies of sleaze chose HD-DVD.
Blu Ray, we hardly knew you.
Saturday, January 06, 2007
A man walks down the street in that hat, people know he's not afraid of anything.
I pretty much hate hats. They slide off, look awkward, and hide my hair that work so hard to make so pretty. But walking around every where downtown, I wanted something to keep a bit of the warmth in on occasion, not that I needed it this year.
So, I says to myself, "Self, if you know hats look goof on you anyway, you might as well go for the king of goofy, the hat Jayne's mom sent him in Firefly, "The Message."
Today, it and a my new snap shot digital camera came. So here is the unearthing.
Some notes before: If you're not a Firefly Fan, you will not care about this post. And, thank you for the hat and attention to packing detail from Heather. You can get your own Jayne hat at Wear with Style.
The Box.
it had labels from several ports of call some brown-coats might recognize.
and look, stuff inside!
and, my still-sick-self wearing it.
Jayne: (wearing ugly homemade hat) "How's it sit? Pretty cunning, don'tchya think?"
Kaylee: "I think it's the sweetest hat ever."
Book: "Makes a statement."
Jayne: "Yeah, yeah!"
Wash: "A man walks down the street in that hat, people know he's not afraid of anything."
Jayne: "Damn straight."
So, I says to myself, "Self, if you know hats look goof on you anyway, you might as well go for the king of goofy, the hat Jayne's mom sent him in Firefly, "The Message."
Today, it and a my new snap shot digital camera came. So here is the unearthing.
Some notes before: If you're not a Firefly Fan, you will not care about this post. And, thank you for the hat and attention to packing detail from Heather. You can get your own Jayne hat at Wear with Style.
The Box.
it had labels from several ports of call some brown-coats might recognize.
and look, stuff inside!
and, my still-sick-self wearing it.
Jayne: (wearing ugly homemade hat) "How's it sit? Pretty cunning, don'tchya think?"
Kaylee: "I think it's the sweetest hat ever."
Book: "Makes a statement."
Jayne: "Yeah, yeah!"
Wash: "A man walks down the street in that hat, people know he's not afraid of anything."
Jayne: "Damn straight."
Labels: Firefly, hat, Jayne, knitting, Serenity
Tuesday, January 02, 2007
UFOs? NIMBY?
via BOINGBOING:
UFO over Chicago airport
On November 7, a dozen United Airlines employees spotted a UFO hovering over Chicago's O'Hare International Airport. Airline officials deny any knowledge of the sighting but a supervisor from United did in fact call the Federal Aviation Administration's control tower asking whether anyone there saw the elliptical object or spotted it on radar. From the Chicago Tribune:
Like United, the FAA originally told the Tribune that it had no information on the alleged UFO sighting. But the federal agency quickly reversed its position after the newspaper filed a Freedom of Information Act request.
An internal FAA review of air-traffic communications tapes, a step toward complying with the Tribune request, turned up the call by the United supervisor to an FAA manager in the airport tower, (said FAA spokeswoman Elizabeth Isham Cory.)
Cory said the weather might have factored into what the witnesses thought they saw.
"Our theory on this is that it was a weather phenomenon," she said. "That night was a perfect atmospheric condition in terms of low [cloud] ceiling and a lot of airport lights. When the lights shine up into the clouds, sometimes you can see funny things. That's our take on it."
UFO over Chicago airport
On November 7, a dozen United Airlines employees spotted a UFO hovering over Chicago's O'Hare International Airport. Airline officials deny any knowledge of the sighting but a supervisor from United did in fact call the Federal Aviation Administration's control tower asking whether anyone there saw the elliptical object or spotted it on radar. From the Chicago Tribune:
Like United, the FAA originally told the Tribune that it had no information on the alleged UFO sighting. But the federal agency quickly reversed its position after the newspaper filed a Freedom of Information Act request.
An internal FAA review of air-traffic communications tapes, a step toward complying with the Tribune request, turned up the call by the United supervisor to an FAA manager in the airport tower, (said FAA spokeswoman Elizabeth Isham Cory.)
Cory said the weather might have factored into what the witnesses thought they saw.
"Our theory on this is that it was a weather phenomenon," she said. "That night was a perfect atmospheric condition in terms of low [cloud] ceiling and a lot of airport lights. When the lights shine up into the clouds, sometimes you can see funny things. That's our take on it."
Labels: Chicago, IL, Rockford, UFO
