Podcasts about HD DVD

In this episode we read some emails concerning mp3 bit rates and more on HDDVD. We also explain Dolby Surround. We finish with a TV Show Theme trivia game. 

Hey everyone, Alex here

We're taking a look at male-oriented rom coms with this week's episode on Judd Apatow's 2007 comedy hit Knocked Up! Join in as we discuss comedy drug scenes, the rolling series of scandals that engulfed star Katherine Heigl, our favorite Seth Rogen performances, and the wide-ranging discourse the film inspired. Plus: Why are Apatow movies so long? Why doesn't Allison have her own home? Why did Allison start dating Ben? And, most importantly, how do you get pink eye? Make sure to rate, review, and subscribe! Next week: Assassin's Creed (2016)----------------------------------------------Key sources and links for this episode:2007 New York Times profile of Judd Apatow"Giving the Last Laugh to Life's Losers" (New York Times)"For Apatow, Opportunity Knocks" (USA Today)Dana Stevens's review of Knocked Up at SlateRoss Douthat's response to Stevens in The Atlantic"The Politics of Shmashmortion" by Dana Stevens (Slate)Conversation between Emily Nussbaum and Adam Sternbergh about the film (New York)"Heigl's Anatomy" Vanity Fair cover story"Katherine Heigl Clarifies Knocked Up Remarks" (People)"Star Shuns Emmys, Angering Producers" (New York Times)Daily News piece documenting Rogen and Apatow's response to Heigl"Seth Rogen Talks Feeling 'Betrayed' after Katherine Heigl's Knocked Up Comments" (Hollywood Reporter)Seth Rogen and Judd Apatow discuss their experience with Heigl on Howard Stern in 2009Circuit City allowed people to trade in HD DVD players for blu-ray players

Our journey takes an intriguing turn as we explore the legend of Jesus Christ's secret life in Japan. Did Jesus really escape crucifixion by swapping places with his brother? We dive into this obscure tale, revealing how he might have lived under the alias Daitenku Taru Jurai in the village of Shingo. With references to Mel Gibson's epic films, samurai sagas, and even a cheeky nod to Kaiser Soze, we blend history with humor, creating a captivating narrative that will leave you both laughing and pondering.And what's this about Jesus and lasers? As we wrap up our episode, we speculate on Jesus' blue eyes being the source of blue lasers, driving Blu-ray's success over HD DVD. Amidst our playful banter, we remind listeners of everyday duties, like supporting local businesses and keeping things clean. So tune in, embrace the unexpected, and let your imagination run wild with the grand possibilities of Jesus' story.

Suzi and Jason take a nostalgic look at the Atari Jaguar, Xbox Kinect, HDDVD, Pebble Smartwatch, and Sega Saturn, have a chat with toyologist, Pete Jenkinson, about the growing trend of 'kidults', and they also take a first look at the Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Ultra! For more information on JBL's Tour Pro 3s: https://bit.ly/3BJrfKZTo get in touch with the Gadget Show Podcast, email: contact@northone.tvA North One ProductionProduced by Ewan Keil & Tom ClintSocial: @TheGadgetShowEmail: contact@northone.tvJoin our Gadget Show Patreon page to get exclusive content, listen ad-free and access to watch recordings in person!Membership Club: patreon.com/thegadgetshow#TheGadgetShow #retro #jbl Get bonus content on Patreon Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Podcast for a deep examination into the career and life choices of Eddie Murphy & Jim Carrey. Law and order breaks down due to a bad case of... flatulence. Patrick is forced to enact martial law. Ever the reactionary, Lev stages an audio coup. Will Joe step up to rescue his fraying co-host? Find out on this week's episode of 'What the Hell Happened to Them?' Email the cast at whathappenedtothem@gmail.com Disclaimer: This episode was recorded in November 2024. References may feel confusing and/or dated unusually quickly. 'The Nutty Professor' is available on Blu-ray, DVD, & HD DVD (ooh, la la): https://www.amazon.com/Nutty-Professor-Collection-BLU-RAY-Jackson/dp/B07WNZRJW4/   Music from "Hamtaro American Theme" and "Hamtaro Japanese Theme" by ??? (no one seems to want to admit to it?)    Artwork from BJ West   quixotic, united, skeyhill, vekeman, murphy, carrey, versus, vs, nutty, professor, klumps, godzilla, fart, lewis, flubber, landis, ebert, newman

This week Nate and Ian discuss HD DVD, arguably one of the last global format wars to be fought -- and lost. The Patreon extended version also includes a lengthy discussion about the hypothetical future HD DVD might have had, were it to have won the format war against Sony's Blu-ray.SOURCES:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HD_DVDhttps://www.reddit.com/r/HDDVD/comments/114cteq/hd_dvd_exclusives/https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-definition_optical_disc_format_warhttps://www.pcworld.com/article/535906/hddvd_bluray.htmlhttps://www.cnet.com/tech/home-entertainment/why-hd-dvd-will-beat-blu-ray/https://www.reddit.com/r/dvdcollection/comments/l1wz2r/any_love_for_an_obsolete_format_most_of_my_hd_dvd/https://www.britannica.com/technology/DVDhttps://www.reuters.com/article/technologyNews/idUSN1419176920070815/https://electronics.howstuffworks.com/hd-dvd.htmhttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_high-definition_optical_disc_formats#endnote_HDMC_table_note_hhttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dolby_TrueHDhttps://pioneer-blurayodd.eu/?lang=enBecome a supporter to go ad-free, unlock bonus content and listen live — join our Patreon.Full show notes, subscription options and more available at https://www.uktechshow.com.TECH'S MESSAGE IS:Hosts: Nate Lanxon, Ian MorrisProduction and Editing: Nate LanxonMusic: Audio Network & Pond5Certain Artwork Elements Designed By: macrovector / FreepikPublisher (Free Version): AcastCopyright © Nate LanxonAds (on free version) are not endorsements, nor controlled by Tech's Message. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Send us a Text Message.In this conversation, the hosts discuss the movie Tropic Thunder and share their personal experiences and opinions. They talk about the actors, the humor, and the trailers within the movie. They also mention other movies released around the same time and discuss the Blu-ray vs HD DVD format war. The hosts then review Jefferson's Ocean bourbon and describe its sweet and tropical flavors. Tropic Thunder is a comedy classic that is talked about just enough. It has a hit cast and is quotable and memorable. Ben Stiller did a great job directing this film, which is a masterpiece of comedy. The film pokes fun at Hollywood and has a string of hilarious scenes. The performances by Robert Downey Jr., Tom Cruise, and Bill Hader are standout. The film is controversial for its use of blackface and making fun of disabilities, but it is still widely loved and appreciated. Tropic Thunder is a hilarious and perfect comedy that tackles audacity in Hollywood and the practice of method acting. The movie received backlash for its use of blackface and the portrayal of a mentally disabled character, but it was meant to address these issues and poke fun at them. The performances by the cast, including Robert Downey Jr., Jack Black, and Ben Stiller, were outstanding and contributed to the comedic brilliance of the film. The last 20 minutes felt rushed, but overall, Tropic Thunder is an enjoyable and critically acclaimed comedy. In this final part of the conversation, the hosts discuss various comedic moments and characters in the movie 'Tropic Thunder.' They mention Tom Cruise's portrayal of Les Grossman and his ad-libbed dance moves, as well as the controversy surrounding his character. They also talk about other comedic roles of Tom Cruise and his involvement in the film. The hosts share their thoughts on the movie and its comedic elements, and the conversation ends with some playful banter.Support the Show.Subscribe to our YOUTUBE Channel to watch video versions of our showhttps://youtube.com/@barrelagedflickvideopodcast?si=XQtXR8xlhtxqlasfDon't forget to follow us on Instagram for show updates, plus behind-the-scenes photos of the drinks we've enjoyed on the show and pint review cards!"If you're enjoying our show, please consider leaving us a 5-star review on Spotify, Goodpods, or Apple Podcasts! Your support means the world to us."Don't miss out on our exclusive offers and ways to support the show:- Elevate your beard game with amazing products like Beard oil, Balm, Cologne, and more from https://copperjohnsbeard.com. Use code BAF10 at checkout for a 10% discount!- Fuel your day with kickass coffee from http://coffeebros.com. Use code BAF10 at checkout for 10% off your order!- Subscribe to our Patreon for access to UNCUT, RAW shows in video form, and early episode releases for just $5 a month! Click the link below to join: https://www.patreon.com/barrelagedflickspodcast- Explore our selection of T-shirts, Hoodies, Tank tops, and more at our new Barrel Aged Flicks podcast Store: https://whatamaneuver.net/collections/barrel-aged-flicks-podcastAnd don't forget to follow us on social media for updates:- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/barrelagedflickspodcast/- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/barrelagedflickspodcast- Twitter: [Insert Twitter handle here]...

Hurra Hurra der Stefan hat Geburtstag und Thomas Rotes Haar. Was noch Rot ist und wieviel Elektrische Pferdestärken Thomas dem sein neues Auto aus Wolfsburg hat, was Stefan sich zum Geburtstag wünscht und welcher der erste Film auf HDDVD war, erfahrt Ihr in der neusten Epifolge. Ausserdem erwartet euch ein ausführlicher Talk in der Flimmereckeeeee und Thomas verrückte Erfahrung bei seiner letzten Uber fahrt. --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/mystartalk/message

This week on the Super Fun Time Trivia Podcast we discuss making your peg leg out of teak, a centaur with human genitals, the hit film Alien Vs. Sexual Predators I've also started adding the written questions to episodes starting this week, hoping to increase our internet presence. Feel free to steal them for your own trivia, but if you're gonna steal an entire round, please make sure you mention our podcast, or I'll send Kevin to hunt you down and give you the old Greyhound Special. Music Round: Dreamer Patreon: Super Fun Time Trivia Facebook: superfuntimetrivia Instagram: superfuntimetrivia Twitter: @sftimetrivia Email: superfuntimetrivia@gmail.com Intro Music By David Dino White. Welcome to Super Fun Time Trivia: The known universe's only live improv comedy trivia podcast. Free pub trivia questions this week for you to steal... Round 1 1) With regards to mythology, what is the total number of arms and legs on a centaur? 2) What 7 letter B word refers to false but charming talk that often flatters the listener? 3) Who is the only actor who has been killed by a terminator, an Alien, and a Predator? 4) True or false, humans have a larger and wider penis than other great apes? 5) Found in Rhubarb, oxalic acid removes calcium from the body and what other common oxide 6) True or false, the playoff beard myth comes from player Jeff Humphries of the The Montreal Wanderers being trampled by a horse a few hours after shaving his beard before the last game of the year? 7) Which squirrel had a bad fur day in a nintendo 64 FPS? 8)What country's flag appears on the flag of Cook Island? 9) The town of Readlyn, population 858, elects someone to be the town what yearly? A) Vampire B) Grump C) Librarian 10) Who plays the main protagonist in the 2000 film Final Destination? A) Chad Donella B) Kerr Smith C) Devon Sawa Round 2 1) What 6 letter t word describes something as cheap and gaudy in appearance or quality, or something morally bad or distasteful? 2) What is another term for the galbladder? A) Veriform B) Nephrolia C) Cholecyst 3) Which singer has a real legal defence named after him, cited by judges, that regards to the defendant alleging no part, even after insurmountable evidence is levelled on them? 4) In the 1997 American science fiction comedy Men in Black, which actor played Agent K? 5) Is India in the Northern or Southern Hemisphere? 6) Whats the minimum number of functions of a modern North American Tail Light? 7) True or false, the first major studio release on on DVD was Twister, and the last major studio release on HDDVD was also Twister? 8) Which of the following is a segment of a cows stomach? A) The brellio B) The rumen C) The hoofen 9) How many times have the Seattle mariners won the World Series? 10) In 1998, what event was the first Google Doodle? A) Burning Man B) Maya Angelou's birthday C) St. Patrick's Day Round 4 1) What is the scientific term for all the plants that live in a particular area, time, period, or environment, and can also be used broadly to refer to plant, bacterial, or fungal life? 2) The R on the Team Rocket costume of Jesse and James from Pokemon is what colour? 3) What game series was releaed Arrowhead studios in 2015 and it's sequel in on February 3rd, 2024? 4) True or false, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has a party trick where he throws himself down the stairs? 5) Which of the following is a desert in southern Africa? A) Tatacoa Desert B) Kalahari Desert C) Little Sandy Desert 6) Which actor in cheers won a Best Supporting Actor Emmy in 1989? 7) Engineer, Wilhelm Conrad Roentgen was from what country? 8) What business did George Jefferson own in the TV show The Jeffersons? A) Auto Repair B) Vaccum Salesman C) Dry Cleaning 9) Scotland, PA is a 2001 film starring Maura Tierney, James Legros and Christopher Walken and a burger joint with a variety of murders. What Shakespeare play is it based off of? 10) Terms used to mean a wine is unsweet rather than sweet include dry, sekt, and what other 4 letter term?

Episode 769 (27 mins 31 secs) You trying to get rich with the GameStop Meme stock? Do you know the origins of the 69 funny sex number meme? What exactly interrupted Luka Doncic's press conference? Are you ready for some AI created erotica from ChatGPT? Why did Blu-Ray win against HD-DVD? Do you consider reading sexy? Albert and Jiaming have these discussions, plus they go over the sexiest countries. Show Notes and Contact Info can be found at… https://www.whowhatwhereswhy.com/stuffjunk/2024/5/14/769

What are early adopters, and why are they important? In this episode, we look at Everett Rogers theory of the diffusion of innovation and how new ideas get adopted by a population. Plus, we revisit the sad tale of the HD DVD format.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Jason is sick and sounds “great”. Some media corner for your enjoyment! What kinds of things would you like to see returning for round two? We love feedback! Keep it coming! Get your life right and get on the Johnny Decimal workshop! Andrew is filing feedback to make the world a better place! Using Apple Podcasts? All notes can always be found here (https://listen.hemisphericviews.com/110)! A Gallon of Cough Medicine 00:00:00 Cough Medicine (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cold_medicine)

A Morning News Update That Takes Into Account The News Stories You Deem 'Highly Conversational' Today's Sponsor: Robinhoodhttp://thisistheconversationproject.com/robinhood Today's Rundown:Over 300 detained in Russia as country mourns the death of Alexei Navalny, Putin's fiercest foehttps://apnews.com/article/russia-alexei-navalny-death-prison-putin-d0121f49840ee1cd6fbf94f6d7249e1bNASCAR teams tell AP they've hired top antitrust lawyer on eve of Daytona 500https://apnews.com/article/nascar-teams-revenue-sharing-antitrust-attorney-3d5d9a8f5c0367a5099c6cc316ca90e2 The US Department of Justice aims to scrutinize a sports streaming platform planned by Walt Disney, Fox and Warner Bros Discovery over concerns it could harm consumers, sports leagues and rivalshttp://reut.rs/4bFkI11 Kansas City woman's Donna Kelce mug sells like wildfire, helps pay off student lunch debthttps://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2024/02/18/donna-kelce-mug-sales-student-debt/72617754007/ George Santos sues late-night host Jimmy Kimmel for tricking him into making videos to ridicule himhttps://apnews.com/article/george-santos-jimmy-kimmel-copyright-lawsuit-41e1c2951945e11c069a41f9ea62281d Despite Getting No Salary From Iowa, Caitlin Clark Still Enjoys More Income Than 122 NBA Starshttps://www.essentiallysports.com/ncaa-college-basketball-news-despite-getting-no-salary-from-iowa-caitlin-clark-still-enjoys-more-income-than-one-hundred-twenty-two-nba-stars/ Trump's Truth Social nears Wall Street listing that could yield millionshttps://www.yahoo.com/news/trumps-truth-social-nears-wall-195119889.html Trump Receives Mixed Reception As He Launches $400 Gold Sneakershttps://www.businessinsider.com/trump-receives-mixed-reception-as-he-launches-gold-sneakers-2024-2 Charles Barkley calls out NCAA, NIL in question to Adam Silverhttps://www.on3.com/news/charles-barkley-calls-out-ncaa-nil-in-question-to-adam-silver-nba-commissioner/ Man who stuffed three Burmese pythons in his pants sentenced in smuggling attempthttps://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2024/02/15/burmese-pythons-in-pants-smuggling/72615892007/ Website: http://thisistheconversationproject.com Facebook: http://facebook.com/thisistheconversationproject Twitter: http://twitter.com/th_conversation TikTok: http://tiktok.com/@theconversationproject YouTube: http://thisistheconversationproject.com/youtube Podcast: http://thisistheconversationproject.com/podcasts #yournewssidepiece #coffeechat #morningnews ONE DAY OLDER FEBRUARY 19:Seal (61)Benicio Del Toro (57)Millie Bobby Brown (20) WHAT HAPPENED TODAY:1982: Ozzy Osbourne was arrested for urinating on The Alamo.1986: The Soviet Union launched the Mir space station.2008: Toshiba announced the end of HD-DVD, ending the format war between it and Sony's Blu-Ray Disc. PLUS, TODAY WE CELEBRATE: Chocolate Mint Dayhttps://www.nationaldaycalendar.com/national-day/national-chocolate-mint-day-february-19#:~:text=Recognized%20by%20the%20US%20National,favorite%20treats%20all%20day%20long.

Research by the charity Stamma shows that 8% of children will start stuttering at some point. Our listener Geri, a mother who's son has a stammer, got in touch with Woman's Hour and asked us to discuss the topic. Kirsten Howells from Stamma, Tiktok influencer Jessie Yendle and Geri join Claire McDonnell to share their own experiences and advice.Actor Emily Blunt found fame as the scene-stealing assistant in The Devil Wears Prada, and has since starred in many films including Mary Poppins Returns and A Quiet Place with her real-life husband John Krasinski. She is also in one of this year's biggest cinematic hits, Oppenheimer. As Christopher Nolan's blockbuster about the father of the atomic bomb is released on ultra-HD DVD and Blu-ray, Emily Blunt talks to Clare McDonnell about her role as Kitty Oppenheimer, Robert's wife.How do you keep long-distance friendships going? Clare talks to filmmaker Shannon Haly, who lives in New York and wrote a viral poem about missing her best friend. They are joined by the journalist Rose Stokes who, after having an 18-year long-distance friendship decided to move to live in the same city as her friend.What do women look for in a bra after breast cancer surgery? Clare is joined by Katy Marks, an architect by trade, who discovered after her single mastectomy that there was no bra on the market that was flat on one side. She didn't want to use a prosthetic and so designed her own, called Uno, which launched on Monday. She'll be joined on the programme by Asmaa Al-allak who won this year's Great British Sewing Bee and is a consultant breast surgeon who has made post-surgery lingerie for her patients.Today marks 100 years since the birth of one of opera's most renowned and influential singers of the 20th century: the iconic heroine, Maria Callas. But what is it about her talent that has transcended the decades? Two sopranos – Alison Langer and Nadine Benjamin – join Anita to describe Maria Callas' enduring star quality. Presenter: Anita Rani Producer: Hanna Ward Studio Manager: Tim Heffer

Actor Emily Blunt found fame as the scene-stealing assistant in The Devil Wears Prada, and has since starred in many films including Mary Poppins Returns and A Quiet Place with her real-life husband John Krasinski. She is also in one of this year's biggest cinematic hits, Oppenheimer. As Christopher Nolan's blockbuster about the father of the atomic bomb is released on ultra-HD DVD and Blu-ray, Emily Blunt talks to Clare McDonnell about her role as Kitty Oppenheimer, Robert's wife.The price of baby formula has been making the headlines this week. The main brands have been pulled up by the Government's Competition and Markets Authority for their high pricing. In fact, their research shows that the retail price is a lot higher than the costs to make the product. Joining Clare to discuss the high prices is Sarah Cardell, chief executive of the CMA and Kirsty Jackson, the founder of High Peak Baby Bank, a donation service for families in need up in the Staffordshire area. How common is it for a long relationship to end with a short marriage? What is it about formalising a union, or having a wedding that can be the catalyst for a split? And what are the legal pitfalls that couples might want to avoid? Clare is joined by Eve Simmons, US Health and Wellness Editor for the Daily Mail and Laura Naser, a partner in family law.As Ireland's first female state pathologist, Dr Marie Cassidy helped to solve murders and clarify unexplained deaths for over 15 years. She tells Clare what drew her to this career, how she deals with the emotionally taxing nature of the job and why she's now turned to writing with her debut novel 'Body of Truth'.Presenter: Clare McDonnell Producer: Rebecca Myatt Studio manager: Duncan Hannant and Neva Missirian

This Halloween episode is packed with chilling tales and thought-provoking discussions. We're thrilled to have Nick Espinosa, join us to shed light on some spooky tech topics. From the ghostly existence of  UNIVAC's early computers to Elon Musk's ambitious plans to oust cash, we've got plenty of intriguing corners of the tech world to explore.We also put the spotlight on some sobering realities in our digital age. The misuse of facial recognition technology, data breaches posing threats to national security, and the potential fallout of digital identities. With important entities like the UK Ministry of Defense and the US Department of Defense falling victim to breaches, we try to underscore the gravity of these issues and why they should concern us. Our whiskey of the week is a treat waiting to be discovered - will it get two thumbs up? We also dive into the quirky history of National Doorbell Day, the haunted Buffalo Trace Distillery, and more.  Plus, we take a trip down memory lane, revisiting tech failures - the HD DVD, 3D TV, Blackberry, Amazon Fire Phone, and 8 Tracks.Episode 177: Starts at 1:28 Welcome to TechTime Radio's 2023 Halloween Edition! With our special guest Nick Espinosa, who will help us explore the spooky side of technology. Our theme for today is much like "Five Nights at Freddie's," with scary mechanical robots taking over not just a pizzeria but the world. We will discuss some of the most spine-chilling topics in the tech world. First up, we will explore whether AI is Frankenstein's monster or just the introduction to Skynet. We will also discuss whether UNIVAC's ghost still haunts old computer labs, as one of the earliest computers ever built was considered the scariest predictor of future events. Additionally, we will be talking about the Zombie Internet, Elon Musk's attempt to get rid of cash, and vampire hackers who are sucking money from businesses and governments.TechTime Radio with Nathan Mumm, the show that makes you go "Hmmm" Technology news of the week for October 29th  – November 4th, 2023--- [Now on Today's Show]: Starts at 4:10--- [Top Stories in Technology]: Starts at 5:32Sam Bankman-Fried Denies Knowing FTX Money Was Missing, as he concludes his testimony - https://tinyurl.com/3syefn8f Universal Orlando Resort Tests Facial Recognition Technology for Guest Entry - https://tinyurl.com/mrxbwrmm Elon Musk gives X employees one year to replace their bank accounts - https://tinyurl.com/2p4bzrrx --- [Pick of the Day - Whiskey Tasting Reveal]: Starts at 21:43Colonel E.H. Taylor, Jr. Single Barrel | 100 Proof| $70 MSRP--- [Ask the Expert - Nick Espinosa]:  Starts at 25:01Nick talks about his three most scary technology breaches of the year in our Halloween Special.--- [This Week in Technology]: Starts at 40:17November 4, 1952 - UNIVAC Computer Predicts Presidential Election--- [Marc's Whiskey Mumble]: Starts at 43:14Marc Gregoire's review of this week's whiskey--- [Technology Fail of the Week]: Starts at 47:32This week's “Technology Fail” comes to us from The Technology Graveyard: With 5 Hunting Failures whose ghosts still haunt us today.--- [Mike's Mesmerizing Moment brought to us by StoriCoffee®]: Starts at 51:10Question: What was the scariest story of the year?--- [Nathan Nugget]: Starts at 53:34ZOMBIE Internet – The best two Wi-Fi Routers for 2023.--- [Pick of the Day Whiskey Review]: Starts at 54:41Colonel E.H. Taylor, Jr. Single Barrel | 100 Proof| $70 MSRPMike: Thumbs DownNathan: Thumbs Down

VHS යුගයේ සිට Blu-ray දක්වා Gappz & Dash film බලපු හැටි සහ ඒ කාලේ technologies ගැන කතා කරන්න අපේ පොඩ්කාස්ට් 4 වන කොටස අපි වෙන් කලා.

We're going to start taking the occasional look at a product that changed everything in its respective field, starting this week with the game console that redefined how consoles work in the online era, the Xbox 360. From achievements and cross-game chat to first-class downloadable games and controller standardization, evolution in game development and mainstream marketing, our memories of working with the system in the media, and not-so-flattering things like the red ring, HD-DVD, and Kinect, there's a lot to cover in this lengthy episode.Support the Pod! Contribute to the Tech Pod Patreon and get access to our booming Discord, your name in the credits, and other great benefits! You can support the show at: https://patreon.com/techpod

Podcast for a deep examination into the career and life choices of Jack Nicholson. Patrick takes a stand against a troubling trend in movies. Joe feels caught in the middle between his co-host and his cinematic love. Will Lev manage to bridge the gap between the two hosts? Find out on this week's episode of 'What the Hell Happened to Them?' Email the cast at whathappenedtothem@gmail.com Disclaimer: This episode was recorded in March 2023. References may feel confusing and/or dated unusually quickly. 'Reds' is available on Blu-ray, DVD, & HD-DVD (for you hipsters out there): https://www.amazon.com/Reds-Warren-Beatty/dp/B09G9GL2TH/ref=tmm_blu_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=1677911451&sr=8-5 Music from 'Revolutionary Etude - 7th Style' by dj Taka w/ Naoki   Artwork from BJ West   quixotic, united, skeyhill, vekeman, jack, nicholson, syzygy, young, rock, xfl, football, battlehawks, watergate, nixon, reds, beatty, keaton, stephers

This week on TechTime with Nathan Mumm® Today's show Tagline is Meta's Next Big Mistake, and how this impacts everyone on social media. Next, we have Microsoft's Bing chatbot offers some puzzling and inaccurate responses, and why is META trying to charge people to use Facebook and Instagram? Next, we ask the question, are you a money mule? Learn how technology is used to launder money and what steps you can take to alert the FBI if you are a victim. Crypto exchange Coinbase hacked, How Blu-ray won the last physical, digital media war over HD-DVD.  In addition, we have our standard features, including "Mike's Mesmerizing Moment," "This Week in Technology," and a possible "Nathan Nugget."Join us on TechTime Radio with Nathan Mumm, the show that makes you go "Hummmm" Technology news of the week for February 19th  - 25th, 2023.Episode 141: Starts at 1:35--- [Now on Today's Show]: Starts at 3:16--- [Top Stories in Technology]: Starts at 4:49Facebook parent company Meta Platforms Inc. is launching a subscription service called Meta Verified that will include a handful of additional perks and features, including account verification badges for those who pay. - https://tinyurl.com/yc8ddhkz Microsoft's Bing chatbot offers some puzzling and inaccurate responses - https://tinyurl.com/mfj59hrh GameStop manager shares what working at the store is like, says the company has started layoffs --- [Pick of the Day - Whiskey Tasting Reveal]: Starts at 26:14Redemption High Rye - Single Barrel Select | 105 Proof |$44.95  --- [Protect Yourself Today]: Starts at 28:14What is a money mule? A money mule is the scapegoat for the criminals. - https://tinyurl.com/46uf3pm4 The FBI has guidelines of what you should do if you think you're being used as a money mule. They include:Stop communication with the scammers.Stop transferring money or any items of value immediately.Document all communications with the scammers, including emails, texts, chats, etc. and keep all physical evidence like receipts.Notify your bank or whatever money service you used to conduct transactions.Notify law enforcement. You can report the suspicious activity to the FBI's Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3) at ic3.gov, and contact your local FBI field office.Sensitive US military emails spill online. - https://tinyurl.com/4epdbzk4Crypto exchange Coinbase hacked, sensitive data stolen - https://tinyurl.com/yvdk8mad --- [This Week in Technology]: Starts at 45:24February 19, 2008, the battle over the High Definition successor to the DVD ends when the supporters of the HD DVD format discontinued. The Sony-backed Blu-ray format had garnered the support of many players in the industry, leading to the demise of HD-DVD.--- [Marc's Whiskey Mumble]: Starts at 49:35--- [Technology Fail of the Week]: Starts at 51:21Google Stadia was a big failure. --- [Mike's Mesmerizing Moment brought to us by StoriCoffee®]: Starts at 52:28--- [Nathan Nugget]: Starts at -T-Mobile - MLS free subscription--- [Pick of the Day Whiskey Review]: Starts at 53:46Redemption High Rye - Single Barrel Select | 105 Proof |$44.95Mike: Thumbs UpNathan: Thumbs Up

On the 64th episode of the Skids Podcast;- Intro- Justin Roiland Controversy- OnlyFans/Porn: VHS vs. Betamax/DVD vs. Laserdisc/ Blu Ray vs. HD DVD- The Cadence Boyar Incident Revisited- Continuing the Justin Roiland discussion- Workaholics- Hasbro/Wizards of the Coast: Dungeons and Dragons OGL backlash- New D&D movie/ Mazes and Monsters/ Dungeons and Dragons (2000)- The Last Of Us pilot episode discussion- "I haven't had a Thesaurus in ME in a long time..."Opening Theme -Title: Garage - Topher Mohr and Alex Elena (No Copyright Music)Video Link: https://youtu.be/JQMpl4Peln8Genre Music: Rock - CountryOpening Video -Dumpster fire Brighton Fire 04-18-13https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8n3ZzWKXaU4Velvet Alley Designs -https://velvet-alley.com/Coffee Brand Coffee -https://coffeebrandcoffee.com/Use the coupon code: gps1 to receive 5% off your purchase.  You will be supporting an independent, growing company, as well as our show in the process!!The Fat Steven Seagal Dancehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LfZklpW6Ca0 Steven Seagal Dancinghttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GYVWnSybQQ0 Sarah Death comparison - The Last Of Us Game VS Serieshttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y678owyc6Wk#skidspodcast #skids #garbagepailskids #comedy #podcast #workaholics #thelastofus #hbo #rickandmorty #justinroiland #danharmon #highonlife #hasbro #wizardsofthecoast #wotc #dungeonsanddragons #d&d #ogl #opengamelicense #tabletop #gaming #dungeonsanddragonshonoramongthieves #marlonwayons #justinwailen #coffeebrandcoffee #thesaurus #onlyfans #bluray #dvd #hddvd #laserdisc #vhs #betamax #chrispine #oned&d #magicthegathering #naughtydog #velvetalley #mazesandmonsters

In this episode of the Premiere Liensbrooke Lore Podcast, Chadd and Sean assess how NaNoWriMo went, where they ended up, and the lessons learned. Other topics include Chadd's powerful feud with reddit, the weakness of HDDVD as a format, and the question of how many of us are currently ghosts (hint, Billy Zane). https://linktr.ee/onriting is where you want to be, as you watch Twitter implode and reddit be just the worst.

Phil and Dave visit the criminal underworld again as Dave takes 2007's American Gangster off his shelf. The guys discuss the star power of Denzel Washington and Russell Crowe. Phil remembers seeing this in the theatre and being disappointed, then buying it on HD-DVD with high hopes and being let down again watching the extended version. Dave watched the theatrical cut and found it to be entertaining enough but feels a little let down at the overall experience.

We're all Golden Eagles here. Gemma is away on festival assignment, so filling in for her we've got Letterboxd senior editor and Weekend Watchlist co-host Mitchell Beaupre! Slim and Mitchell are joined by Julian Higgins, director and co-writer of God's Country—his neo-Western debut feature which premiered at this year's Sundance Film Festival and is hitting theaters September 16 from IFC Films. We also dive deep into Julian's four favorite films: Rashomon, Chimes at Midnight, The Return and Foxcatcher. Plus: Julian growing up with college professor cinephile parents; why he's never seen a single Star Wars movie (hint: those two things are related); why is everyone in Rashomon sweating so much?; Toshiro Mifune is the last 30 seconds of a bag of Skittles; Slim (still) isn't a Shakespeare person; the relentless pursuit of making a juicy period epic; going “full on Orson Welles”; Thandiwe Newton having bigger balls than Slim; “We all gotta play by the same rules if this is gonna work”; Julian being afraid of reading reviews from writers he loves; Mitchell watching Foxcatcher in the heart of Du Pont country; rich people can get away with anything; ornithologist, philatelist, philanthropist; nostalgia for HD DVD and how they made Slim's dad cry and Julian's childhood hero Basil Rathbone. Credits: This episode was recorded in Los Angeles, Delaware and Pennsylvania, and edited by Slim. Facts by Jack. Booker: Brian Formo. Transcript by Sophie Shin. Art by Samm. Theme: ‘Vampiros Dancoteque' by Moniker. Lists and links: The Letterboxd list of films mentioned; The Emperor and the Wolf: The Lives and Films of Akira Kurosawa and Toshiro Mifune by Stuart Goldbraith IV; The Criterion Collection's HQ page; Julian's Instagram, Winter Light by James Lee Burke; New Novel, New Wave, New Politics: Fiction and the Representation of History in Postwar France by Lynn A. Higgins—Julian's mother Reviews of Rashomon by Esther Rosenfield and DallasFrance, Chimes at Midnight by Alyssa Heflin, God's Country by Brian Tallerico, The Return by Marcissus

Episode 372: Video Home System Killed the Betamax Star This week Host Dave Bledsoe gets all nostalgic with some old home videos only to discover something unspeakably horrible on a tape labeled “David's 12th Birthday” (Actual footage of his 12th birthday, god he was a fat little kid!) On the show this week we tell the tale of the most brutal conflict of the 1980's, the war between VHS and Beta (So…Much…Blood) Along the way we discover why Dave isn't allowed in any movie theaters anymore. (It would be better if it were a Pee Wee Herman thing) Then we dive right into the creation of home video, from its absurdly British beginnings to the mighty Titan that was Sony striding across the land. (Spoiler: Sony loses). Then we dig into General Curtis LeMay's porn preferences for reasons never truly explained, only to veer back on topic with the tale of two tape formats and the brief but bitter fight over which one would dominate the world. (It turns out to be the one that is slightly cheaper.) We wrap up with a delightful but completely irrelevant tangent on why people called Montgomery Ward department stores Monkey Ward. (Are there monkeys involved? You'll have to tune in to find out, or, you know, Google it.) Our Sponsor this week is Mondo Fast Eddie's Home Video, we got the tapes, you gotta have the machines. We open the show NEC's brand new video cassette machine and close with Lucy May Walker eulogizing the Radio Star. Show Theme: https://www.jamendo.com/track/421668/prelude-to-common-sense The Show on Twitter: https://twitter.com/TheHell_Podcast The Show on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/whatthehellpodcast/ The Show on Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCjxP5ywpZ-O7qu_MFkLXQUQ www.whatthehellpodcast.com Give us your money on Patreon https://www.patreon.com/Whatthehellpodcast The Show Line: 347 687 9601 Closing Music: https://youtu.be/-6WWO6c7ud8 We are a proud member of the Seltzer Kings Podcast Network! http://seltzerkings.com/ Citations Needed: The quest for home video http://www.terramedia.co.uk/media/video/telcan.htm Sony CV Series Video http://www.smecc.org/sony_cv_series_video.htm The Decline and Fall of Betamax http://keyboardaerobics.blogspot.com/p/the-rise-and-fall-of-betamax.html Wikipedia: VHS https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VHS#VHS_development Porn industry may be decider in Blu-ray, HD-DVD battle https://www.macworld.com/article/179767/pornhd.html Wikipedia: Videotape format war https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Videotape_format_war Uncited Additional Reading:  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Videocassette_recorder https://www.mediacollege.com/video/format/compare/betamax-vhs.html https://www.thrillist.com/vice/how-porn-influenced-technology-8-ways-porn-influenced-tech-supercompressor-com https://www.aei.org/carpe-diem/christmas-shopping-for-a-vcrdvd-1981-vs-2009/#:~:text=Cost%20of%20a%20Sears%20VCR,%247.42%20(total%20private%20industries). https://keepthatshort.com/how-much-did-a-vcr-cost-in-the-80s https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/innovations/wp/2016/07/22/rip-to-the-vcr/ https://kodakdigitizing.com/blogs/news/5-things-you-might-not-know-about-betamax-tapes https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Betamax https://www.sony.com/en/SonyInfo/CorporateInfo/History/sonyhistory-d.html Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

TechTime Radio with Nathan Mumm, the show that makes you go "Hummmm" Technology news of the week for June 5th - June 11th, 2022.Today on the show, Elon Musk threatens to walk away from the Twitter deal. What would you do if a neighbor constantly monitors you 24/7 with a Ring Camera? Gwen Way joins the show in our "Gadgets and Gear" segment, and we review the new iPhone features in iOS 16. Then Phil continues his third part of "Phil's Electric vs. Gas Vehicles" segment. We have an in-studio interview with the founder of Candidate, a startup company using technology to help companies find employees. In addition, we have our standard features, including "This Week in Technology," | "Mike's Mesmerizing Moment," and, of course, our "Pick of the Day" whiskey tasting. So, sit back, raise a glass, and welcome to TechTime with Nathan Mumm.Episode 104:  Starts at 1:40 --- [Now on Today's Show]: Starts at 3:28 --- [Top Stories In The First Five Minutes]: Starts at 6:32Neighbor uses his Ring camera to look into neighbor's home's windows, like a peeping Tom. - https://tinyurl.com/nhes8h77        Elon Musk has threatened to walk away from his $44bn takeover of Twitter. - https://tinyurl.com/yc4x8b2j  Four exciting new iOS 16 features that make your iPhone feel brand new - Apple Announced Yesterday. - https://tinyurl.com/mrx9558c --- [Pick of the Day - Whiskey Tasting Review]: Starts at 18:00 Old Ezra 7 Year Barrel Strength | 117 Proof | $69.95 --- [Gadgets and Gear with Gwen Way]: Starts at 19:12Smart-Box: Wireless CarPlay & Android Auto Adapter. Wirelessly connect your smartphone to CarPlay or Android Auto and enable phone mirroring, TV cast, USB player, customized boot video and more. --- [This Week in Technology]: Starts at 26:12 June 4, 1977: VHS Comes to AmericaThe VHS videocassette format is introduced in North America at a press conference before the Consumer Electronics Show starts in Chicago. Long before the battle between Blu-ray and HD-DVD, there was another home-video standards war that pitted Sony against another Japanese company, JVC. It was VHS (Video Home System) vs. Betamax.  --- [Marc's Mumbles Whiskey Details]: Starts at 30:20--- [Ask the Expert - Phil Hennessy]: Starts at 32:16Phil's Electric vs. Gas Vehicles Technology Insights Part 3 of 5. As we continue our series of Phil's Electric vs. Gas Vehicles Technology Insights you can recap his first two segments on Episodes 101, and 102 of TechTimeRadio, (you can visit our website and listen to or watch this segment in its entirety), We have talked about the difference between Electric Vehicles (E.V). vs. a Hybrid vs. Hybrid Plug-In vehicles, and the range of miles you can travel for each vehicle. We last looked at the charging time and charging stations around the USA. Today we are spending more time on technology elements of the EV batteries in "Phil's Electric vs. Gas Vehicles Technology Insights.”  --- [Interview: Ryan Agresta founder of Candidate.co ]: Starts at 42:23 In January 2020 driven by a desire to cultivate positive change in hiring practices within the tech industry. Candidate.co, a dual-sided tech platform, makes it easier for employers to find talent in order to build more inclusive and diverse teams. --- [Mike's Mesmerizing Moment brought to us by StoriCoffee®]: Starts at 50:17 --- [Pick of the Day]: Starts at 53:03Old Ezra 7 Year Barrel Strength | 117 Proof | $69.95 Mike: Thumbs Down Nathan: Thumbs Down

New season! New obsolete format! For this episode we take on the wonderful world of HD-DVD with the interesting failure that is the 1984 film Streets of Fire! Streets of…

Subscribe to Quotomania on Simplecast or search for Quotomania on your favorite podcast app!Eric Idle was born on March 29th 1943 in Harton Hospital, South Shields, County Durham, U.K. His mother was a nurse and his father was a Sergeant in the RAF who was killed hitch-hiking home on compassionate leave and died in Darlington Hospital on Christmas Eve 1945. As a young child he lived in Manchester, attended his first school St. George's, Wallasey (Liverpool) and in 1950 was sent to The Royal School Wolverhampton where his education was paid for by the RAF Benevolent Fund. Leaving school in 1962 with 10 O levels, 3 A Levels and 1 S Level he was accepted by Pembroke College, Cambridge, to read English Literature, in which he took his B.A. in 1965.From 1964/5 he was President of The Footlights Dramatic Club (founded in 1883) and changed the rules to accept women members, the first of whom was Germaine Greer. After touring with her in the annual Footlights Revue My Girl Herbert (1965) which ran for a brief time at The Lyric Theatre, Hammersmith, he spent a season in Leicester Rep before moving to London, appearing in two BBC TV Movies: Jonathan Millers Alice in Wonderland, and Ken Russell's Isadora, and then starting to write professionally for BBC Radio's I'm Sorry I'll Read That Again and BBC Television's The Frost Report, which won The Golden Rose of Montreux.In 1968 he began writing and acting in two series of a children's TV hit, Do Not Adjust Your Set, with Michael Palin Terry Jones and Terry Gilliam, which won The Priz Jeunnesse, Munich for Best Children's Television. The success of this show led to four series of Monty Python's Flying Circus for the BBC from July 1969 through 1973, with the addition of John Cleese and Graham Chapman. Also in that month he married actress Lyn Ashley, by whom he had a son Carey (b. 1973). The Pythons made several stage appearances, Monty Python's First Farewell Tour, (UK and Canada, 1973) Monty Python Live at Drury Lane (1974) Monty Python Live at City Center (1976), and several movies, And Now For Something Completely Different (1971), Monty Python and The Holy Grail (1975), The Life of Brian (1979), Monty Python Live at The Hollywood Bowl (1982) and The Meaning of Life (1983).After Python he created Radio Five the first comedy music show on BBC's Radio One. He then wrote and starred in two Series of Rutland Weekend Television (with Neil Innes) which led to writing and co-directing The Rutles, in All You Need is Cash, for NBC, produced by Saturday Night Live's Lorne Michaels, a show which he hosted four times in the 1970's. In 2001 he made a sequel called “Can't Buy Me Lunch” which looked back on the Rutles and their influence on people's lives. In 1975 he published Hello Sailor his first novel. His first play Pass The Butler was produced at The Globe Theatre, London 1983 where it ran for five months. In 1977 he met Tania Kosevich in New York, and married her there in 1981. They have one daughter, Lily (b. 1990.)He has appeared in several films including Baron Munchausen, European Vacation, Yellowbeard, Nuns on the Run, Splitting Heirs, Casper, Wind in the Willows and has voiced Transformers, Shrek 3, South Park (the movie) and four episodes of The Simpsons. In 1986 he appeared as Koko in Jonathan Miller's production of Gilbert and Sullivan's The Mikado at The English National Opera, a role he repeated at The Houston Grand Opera in 1989. In 1994 he moved to Los Angeles, where he currently resides.Publications include The Rutland Dirty Weekend Book (1976) a children's audio book The Quite Remarkable Adventures of the Owl and The Pussycat (1996) and two novels Hello Sailor (1975) and The Road to Mars (1999.) In 1978 he began collaborating with composer John Du Prez, writing and recording songs for Monty Python, the signature tune for One Foot in the Grave and a musical Behind The Crease for BBC Radio Four (1990.) In 1991 his song Always Look on the Bright Side became a hit single in the UK.His collaboration with John Du Prez led to two live stage tours of North America (2000 and 2003) and a book The Greedy Bastard Diary which details life on the road for three months, fifteen thousand miles in a rock and roll bus. Their musical Spamalot, directed by Mike Nichols, opened in Chicago in December 2004 and then Broadway on March 17th 2005 at The Shubert Theater, where it ran until January 2009, breaking all house records, garnering $175 million at The Box Office, winning three Tonys (including Best Musical 2005) a Grammy for Best Broadway Album and a Writers Desk Award for Best Lyrics. It subsequently toured North America for three years, opened in the West End of London for two years at The Palace Theater, and played The Wynn Hotel in Las Vegas (2007), Melbourne (2007), Barcelona (2008), Cologne (2008), Madrid (2009), Hungary(2009), Paris(2010), Sweden (2010), South Korea (2010) Holland and Belgium and Mexico City (2011.) Spamalot is currently touring both the UK and the US. A comic Oratorio Not The Messiah (He's a Very Naughty Boy) based on Monty Python's Life of Brian, written with John Du Prez “for Choir, Orchestra and Sheep”,premiered in Toronto (May 2006) conducted by his cousin Peter Oundjian. Subsequently it was lengthened and performed on tour in Australia and New Zealand, including two sell out nights at The Sydney Opera House, Wolf Trap (Washington), Houston and two nights at The Hollywood Bowl 2009 (with fireworks to the Galaxy Song) all conducted by John Du Prez. Idle appeared in all performances singing “Baritonish.” In October 2009 as part of the celebration of forty years of Monty Python it was performed and filmed at The Royal Albert Hall, London, with guest stars fellow Pythons Michael Palin, Terry Jones, and Terry Gilliam, plus Carol Cleveland and Neil Innes. It was released in HD DVD by Sony in 2010.In 2009 at a special presentation in New York City Monty Python received a BAFTA lifetime achievement Award. He is apparently not yet dead, but his final words will probably be “Say No More.”From https://ericidle.com/my-life/. For more information about Eric Idle:“Eric Idle - Always Look On The Bright Side of Life”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SJUhlRoBL8M “Always Look On The Bright Side of Life”: https://genius.com/Monty-python-always-look-on-the-bright-side-of-life-lyrics“Monty Python's Eric Idle Breaks Down His Most Iconic Characters”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qbchmshpsz0“Eric Idle: A Monty Python Legend Looks Back”: https://www.rollingstone.com/culture/culture-features/eric-idle-monty-python-interview-autobiography-732335/Photo by Eduardo Unda-Sanzana: https://www.flickr.com/photos/grimorio/14579015076/

This tidbits episode rapidly got out of hand. We take a look at big format wars in history and why they are important. We also look at how format wars can cause confusion and frustration for consumers.  See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Paul is Senior Vice President at Access Advance LLC where he is responsible for business development.  He has been involved in multiple patent pools and licensing program during his 25+ years as an intellectual property attorney, including for MPEG 2, MPEG 4 Part 2, AVC, HDDVD, BluRay, HEAAC, HEVC and now VVC. Paul started his career to work for General Electric's licensing department. He went on to work for General Instrument, first as the IP Portfolio Law Director, and then as the Broadband Sector IP Law Director (for Motorola after it purchased GI) managing the IP law department and IP related matters.  After that Paul worked for Microsoft as a Business Division Patent Counsel to then work for Acacia Research Group identifying, valuing, and purchasing patent portfolios. Since 2015, Paul has worked for Access Advance, first as Senior VP of Licensing building their HEVC Advance licensing program, and now as Senior VP of Business Development developing, launching and now building their VVC Advance licensing program. Paul believes that patent pools are important to facilitate standardized technologies such as HEVC or VVC. Paten pools reduce the transaction costs for all implementers. Havening more than just one patent pool (HEVC is subject to 3 patent pools, VVC currently has 2 patent pools set up), also will in his view not hamper standards adoption. Also, two or three patent pools still reduce the number of licensors. There has been criticism that HEVC was not as successful as AVC, where Paul argues that there is a lot of data tell a different story and that provides evidence of the success and wide adoption of HEVC. In his view the HEVC patent pool situation supported that success. Also, the recent litigation between Access Advance and Vestel was no setback for Access Advance, Paul argues. Here media did not tell the whole story. What is true due to a substantial number of overlapping patents in the HEVC Advance Patent Pool and MPEG LA's HEVC patent pool to which Vestel was licensed to, the German court In Düsseldorf found the Access Advanced HEVC license not FRAND. Access Advanced in March 2022 therefore revised its policy responding to the Düsseldorf District Court's December 21, 2021 ruling. Importantly, the court once again did not express concerns with any other facet of the HEVC Advance Patent Pool, including its royalty rates.One reason why more than just one patent pool was formed for VVC is that not only the licensing rates and licensing models differ across the pool programs, but also the internal revenue sharing policies can be very different. At Access Advance Paul states that the pool considers the internal royalty sharing counting patents on a patent family basis so that there are no incentives for patent pool licensors to file e.g. multiple divisional patent applications that cover very minor inventions just to increase their share in the patent pool. The different rules and licensing rates therefore attract different SEP licensors to either join Access Advance or MPEG LA's VVC patent pool.

When tech goes obsolete, it can cause problems. Sometimes they are relatively minor -- you bought into HDDVD when you should have gone Blu-ray. But sometimes it gets much more serious. We take a big picture look at the problems of tech going obsolete. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.com

Welcome back film fans to another exciting episode of Not A Bomb! This is the podcast where we take a second look at your favorite movie bombs. We are still watching films from the comedy group Lonely Island! This week, we dive into 2007's Hot Rod. This absurd comedy was both a financial and critical flop but became a huge hit when it landed on home media, including HD DVD!Hear Troy and Brad decide what makes a “man-child” film, reminisce about their favorite stunt men and discuss the mental health benefits of punch-dancing. Hot Rod is directed by Akiva Schaffer and stars Andy Samberg, Isla FIsher, Jorma Taccone, Bill Hader, Danny McBrdie, Sissy Spacek and Ian McShane.If you want to leave feedback or suggest a movie bomb, please drop us a line at NotABombPod@gmail.com. Also, if you like what you hear, leave a review on Apple Podcast.Cast: Brad, TroyRemember the podcast safe word is whiskey!

The 16:9 PODCAST IS SPONSORED BY SCREENFEED – DIGITAL SIGNAGE CONTENT Going back roughly a decade, there were a couple of digital signage vendors talking up and marketing their capabilities for a technology called SMIL. That's short for Synchronized Multimedia Integration Language, but you probably knew that. OK, probably not. It's a bit like HTML, in that it is a programming language developed and supported by the same global entity that developed and continues to support and evolve HTML. If you don't know what HTML is, then this podcast edition is one you may want to pass on. It gets a little nerdy. SMIL, going back 10 years, was being touted as a next big thing for signage, but that didn't happen. However, there are companies using SMIL for managing digital signage networks - particularly companies who have some technical chops in-house and want something that's flexible and in their control. I stumbled recently on a little company in Hannover, Germany that has been squarely focused on SMIL. I had a good, albeit technical, chat with Niko Sagiadinos, one of the two partners in a firm called SmilControl. He walked me through what SMIL is all about, and the advantages he says the technology brings to digital signage. Subscribe to this podcast: iTunes * Google Play * RSS TRANSCRIPT Niko, thank you for joining me. Can you tell me what your company is all about and when it got started?  Niko Sagiadinos: We started in 2011 with a content management system based on SMIL, and I was a developer years before and one day a friend of mine came up with the idea of 101 Signboard and told me that he desperately needs a content management system. So I had at that moment a content management system and I developed two models for this system, one to administer the playlist and one to administer the player, and so it began. I liked SMIL and the open nature of ideas at that time. I often used open source software and that's a concept I personally liked very much and so I stuck with SMIL and I saw that there were a lot of things possible with SMIL, and I liked it and I stayed with it.  So there will be people listening who will already be going, what is he talking about? What is SMIL? Over here, it's sometimes called “smile.” I know it's an acronym for some sort of a language. Can you explain?  Niko Sagiadinos: Yes. SMIL is an acronym for synchronized multimedia integration language. You can also call it the HTML for digital signage or multimedia presentations and SMIL makes it possible to create a multimedia presentation, interaction with time synchronization. That's where the first word synchronized comes from, and just like you can build websites with HTML, you can build presentations or digital signage presentations with SMIL.  So I know that SMIL has been around for several years. I can remember a competitor of yours, SignageLive, talking about SMIL and working with ideas over in Taiwan, on their devices as well. They made a fair amount of noise about it, and then it just dropped off, and Jason and his team moved on to other stuff seemingly. What's the distinction between SMIL and HTML5?  Niko Sagiadinos: SMIL is focused on presentations and the arrangement of media, while HTML is more focused on the arrangement of information and the implementation for the media, but SMIL can synchronize them. So you can position a media to play first, then second, then the third, then repeat, go to one and then continue. These are things which are not natively possible with HTML. You can do it with HTML, but you need to program with JavaScript, and that's easier to do with SMIL. SMIL also has some orders to control how a presentation runs and the presentation is not the thing for HTML. With websites, you can do interactions with the website but you cannot synchronize media sequentially, parallelly, or what happens when a special time comes, for example, at 5 o'clock, a video has to run an, and then another playlist starts. There are a lot more complicated things focused on presentation which are better solved by SMIL. So why has the digital signage industry migrated more to HTML5 and those kinds of web services and JavaScript as opposed to SMIL?  Niko Sagiadinos: Now I have two theories. The first is it is easier for most to make a web design and it seems to be easier to make its own thing. This is one, it seems to be easier to make a website, but it has some disadvantages because it's a browser, you need a digital signage player. You can integrate a browser in a digital signage player, but you also need commands to administer this player and this is with the browser a little bit more complicated.  The second thing is that every company wants to do his own thing. So you need to buy a software from company X and you need to buy a digital signage player software or hardware from company X, and this is what we call a window lock in. Every company wants to lock in their customers to use their product and so they have established this connection between an authoring system and the player system, and with SMIL, this connection can break up so you can use any player from any company or even my open source player, and you can write your own SMIL authoring software, if you like, and that's something companies don't want. They want to have it all together and sell a solution, and that's the reason, in my opinion, they stuck more on this product.  In the early days, they tried to establish SMIL as low-cost signage also, but it was a mistake from my point of view, because SMIL can do much more than what they were focused on. They focused on the media player only and said, okay, this is only low cost signage, but you can run a SMIL software even under a mobile and computer, and this is a way to do more high cost signage for example, and there's another reason. Companies don't want to cannibalize their own product. For example, if you get a market leader and they have their own system, and now you come to SMIL, and they have a feature that has low cost signage, because if they said, okay, they can do the same things like our enterprise product with SMIL, they'll lose money.  So your company is SMIL Control. What do you offer? I know that recently you introduced a free software player as well that works with SMIL.  Niko Sagiadinos: We started in 2012 officially with only a content management system and most of our customers used players from IAdea but some of our customers wanted to create their own player. They were not satisfied with the player from IAdea for various reasons, because there was no company, they wanted to have more control, maybe they got some cheaper devices from Asian manufacturers and so they started to write their own SMIL software and that caused some problems. When three or four of our resellers started to write software, and put a lot of resources to develop this player, but they didn't focus on marketing and to make sales, and just focused on developing and in 2015-16, I decided, okay, we have now some success with our content management system, I tried to develop a player for those who want to create their own hardware. And the only target for me is to create an open source player, and this player is the Garlic Player, and now after five years, increasing companies are showing interest in this player to brand it under their name or to use it in their player and to make their own hardware around this player. That's the goal. To be clear, this is the software that plays out the media and there's a hardware player, which is not what we're talking about here?  Niko Sagiadinos: At SMIL Control, our focus is only on software. You can take our software and use it as you want and this is the same with the  . The Garlic Player is a piece of software that you can use on a Windows PC, on a Linux PC or an Android device. You can even name it on Android as X Player, and you can sell it at X Player by making a service out of this, and that's the goal. You can use our software, and the only consistent way to publish the software is to open source the player software so everybody can take part of it.  I apologize, I'm not overly technical. I'm probably more technical than a lot of people, but I have my limits, sometimes severe.  You were describing how IAdea, a great little company from Taiwan. I'm good friends with them, they had a SMIL based hardware player, and I think you mentioned that there are some other companies that also have SMIL based hardware players, but you're saying, your garlic player doesn't need to be on one of those devices, it could run on a Windows or Linux box, or even on an Android box and I think I read that it doesn't even need to be rooted, right?  Niko Sagiadinos: You can use this on an Android together with a launcher, and the launcher is another software which works together with the player and the launcher does not need the device to be rooted. I know this is a little tech focused discussion, but yes, at the end of the day, there's only software running on hardware. Even with IAdea and the other players, there's just software which is running on the hardware, and the goal is that if someone wants to offer his own hardware, they can use our software.  So if I'm an end-user or a solutions provider, I'm listening to this and getting the explanations around the advantages of SMIL over HTML5 and so on. I'm wondering if they're listening and thinking, “This sounds interesting, but I don't know anything about that particular programming language and how much of a curve do I have to get up,” or is if I'm an end-user, is it invisible and you don't need to know anything about it?  Niko Sagiadinos: This is a valid point. Our products are not for end users. They are for resellers who have a technical background and know what they have to do. For example, there are a lot of companies in Germany who want to offer digital signage products and have tech support, but they don't have knowledge in digital signage and have possibly two opportunities.  The first opportunity is to build everything from scratch by themselves, or to get someone who sells them a complete package, a full service but if you are between that, you will have your own hardware maybe, and you want to use your own hardware, but you don't have the software for it. You have knowledge of hardware and PC, but you don't have the software and you need software. That's our customer.  The end users will be totally overwhelmed because they will run into problems because of the technical nature because you have to know a lot of things, but a company which has a technical background, like a solutions provider for PCs or someone else that has this technical background, and so they can work together.  And would there be a lot that they need to learn or would it be pretty straightforward if they're already working with web technologies? Niko Sagiadinos: They won't have much to learn because the software is from us, and the only thing they have to learn is how to control the software. Of course we can offer bandwidth with this. We can offer that you can take it and use it or maybe you can do more things. If you need your own CMS, and you want to use only the player, we can help you, and the two documentation for SMIL and everything is open so there is no need for NDAs and things like that and we'll make the things to learn much easier, so you can learn, but you can only start to use it and install it.  So you could be trained on it. It's just like any other piece of software, you just might need some training?  Niko Sagiadinos: Exactly. We are computer nerds and we can show them how to use this software,  how they can use these concepts. So if this is for our solutions providers/resellers, that sort of thing, I gather something about what you're saying is this gives them the ability to control it, maybe put their own front-end skin on it so it looks like their product, and as you say, you're the nerds, you guys are just sitting in the background. Niko Sagiadinos: It can be digital signage companies too, or companies who want to be digital signage companies, but they don't want to reinvent the wheel and they get used in other industries.  We are something intermediate. You can take a full service provider, that's okay. But if you don't want this full service provider and you don't want to develop everything by yourself, you can use our products. So we are in the middle.  Do you get pushback from companies who say, this sounds really interesting, but I don't know much about this language. I know I asked this already, but this makes me a little nervous in that it's unfamiliar to me. Why wouldn't I just go with something with one of the established products out there that's using more familiar technology?  Niko Sagiadinos: Yes, of course, we get this feedback, but for me, it's a matter of time. There are customers for this because we get requests and these requests started coming in even a year before I started marketing. The last few years we got some big customers and we didn't even need to get out. So it was a secret. We had no real website and my partner and I know how to get customers and they have commissions for software, and so we started last year to make websites to do marketing. And in this year, the requests began to increase from other companies, and we have started to work with companies in Eastern Europe, for example, who use the Garlic Player and even join the programming and the coding.  To go back to your question, there are companies that say, okay, that's too complicated for us. We want to use some other things. But our goal is to get these companies who want to do these complicated things, because they see more effort to do this, then using something from someone else, which they can't control. And it sounds like what you're saying as well as it could be complicated to people who aren't around programming, don't do coding or anything like that, they are end-users or whatever it may be. If you are a technical company by nature and have software developers within your staffing, this is not complicated. It's just another way of going at it?  Niko Sagiadinos: Yes. For example, with a room booking software. If you want to have room booking software, you can develop your own room booking software and implement it transparently in our system via a widget which is a bit technical, but you are able to control and make use of what you have written with our infrastructure. So you can use a software like a media player, for example, and say, okay I will run a playlist from 10 to 3 o'clock, and from 3 o'clock, this room booking software will run on this or any other kind of software, and that's possible because we have these open technical features. So is it a bit like the kind of emerging idea of headless CMSs? Niko Sagiadinos: Yes, a little bit. You can compare it to a headless CMS a little bit.  Because you're the control platform and distribution platform, but somebody could write a front end and use their existing room booking tools or whatever and it's going to flow through there? Niko Sagiadinos: Exactly, and another thing to say is that we are at the beginning at the moment. We started to get open, to get published and to imagine the SMIL player, the garlic player which I have written in 2016, the first three years did not even get any interest, because we are a small company in Germany, but we try to make our infrastructure step by step and build a SMIL based ecosystem and this ecosystem will grow.  At first, we had only the content management system. Now we have a player, a launcher, even the proxy, and this ecosystem grows and grows. The next step we have to do is to deliver more information on how to use SMIL?  There is a website from IAdea, but it hasn't been maintained for over six and seven years and so we have to do something to teach people. That's our goal.  Not only we have to teach people how they can use these things for their businesses, and this is a way we have to go. At the moment, we can not give a solution for everything, but we are on a way and time by time we can offer more and more solutions, more and more information, and the product gets “round” so to say in German.  I would imagine it's important to stress that this is not some little side project on GitHub or whatever. SMIL is something that was developed by the world wide web consortium, they are the same people who came up with HTML, right? Niko Sagiadinos: Yes, and it is used in industry. The HD-DVD started with SMIL, the MMS also uses SMIL, a new eBook standard also uses SMIL. That's not something we developed with a few students. This is an industry standard. It's no joke. It's global and I'm wondering why IAdea ten years ago didn't put more power to show the world that it's possible to make amazing playlists, produce amazing products with this language, and accept it as low-cost signage and went with that if you want to do real signage, you have to get other products and that's, for me, a reason why SMIL in the last 10 years did not get accepted. And is this a standard that's standing still or is it evolving just in the same way that HTML is evolving?  Niko Sagiadinos: It's now standing still, it's not evolving at the moment. It's stuck on SMIL 3.0, which is from 2008, but I've contacted the inventors of SMIL in the Netherlands, some professors and I contacted them because we need to evolve. There are some features that are missing in SMIL, and we tried to wake them up.  The standard is okay, but since 2008, nothing has happened like HTML, but on the other side there are many things you can do. HTML evolves because a lot of things have to come in, for example, 50 years ago HTML was not able to play video without plug-ins and things changed a lot. Internet Explorer was a market leader for much too long and had blocked the evolution of HTML for years and now with other browsers, Firefox, Chrome and Safari, there's much more moving in the web browser markets. And we are trying the same thing for SMIL. At the moment, it fulfills our needs more than we expected. My partner at first was skeptical too. But when I developed more and more features into the Garlic Player, he was stunned seeing what is possible and what only expensive digital signage systems are able to do, we can do with SMIL. So there is no reason to call it low cost signage.  Okay. What are the business arguments around working with SMIL versus an HTML5 based platform or some other developed platforms. Are they going to be more reliable? Is it gonna be less expensive? Is it gonna last longer? Niko Sagiadinos: Well, you are asking a developer a business question. (Laughter) You gotta sell it down the stream.  Niko Sagiadinos: Selling is more my partner's job, but I will try. The interesting thing is that HTML is okay for what it has to do. SMIL is another part and the web browser is not a digital signage player so as we say in German, we are comparing an apple with a pear and those are two different things. You can do digital signage with HTML, but you can even ride a bicycle to Tokyo. That's possible too.  I think SMIL is much more of a fit for the digital signage age than HTML. The business side is that with SMIL, you don't have any dependencies and HTML won't fulfill the needs of digital signage.  Your company's based in Hanover, Germany, and it's privately held, I assume? You guys own it. You're not owned by a larger company or a venture capital company? Niko Sagiadinos: We are a bootstrapped company, we started as two people and now we are a kind of German limited, GmbH, because we want to expand next year.  How many people work for SMIL Control? Niko Sagiadinos: At the moment, we are two people. My business partner and I so yes, we are a little company, but we also use external developer, and last time I started to work with Bulgarian developers and Greek developers, and because I'm a digital nomad, I'm commuting between Germany and Greece, because I like the weather in Greece much more and the food. You don't like Hanover or Northern Germany in February? Niko Sagiadinos: No, it's extremely cold and to be honest, November and December are the ugliest months because in Germany, everything is gray here and cold and Greece is so much better.  If somebody wants to find out more about your company, where would they find you online now that you have a website? Niko Sagiadinos: Yes, we have a website, smil-control.com. But the company name is Camel case. All right, that was terrific. Thank you for spending some time with me and explaining what SMIL is all about.  Niko Sagiadinos: Thank you for allowing me. I hope it was understandable. I know I was a little nervous and that's complicated because I'm not a salesman or a businessman. We are technically focused and I'm very stuck on this technical thing and I have grown up in 30 years of technology. So maybe for one or the other, it was a little bit hard. Sorry!  Oh, that's okay. There's lots of technical people who will be intrigued by this and want to know more, so I'm sure it'll work out. Thanks again.  Niko Sagiadinos: Thank you very much, Dave.

We are back in the swing of things with classes, so we talk about some of our favorite teaching evaluations! Plus some discussion about VHS vs. Beta was like HD-DVD vs. Blu-Ray, some overly-specific questions from Reddit, and more!

¡Hola de nuevo en este caluroso verano 🥵! ¿Estás preparad@ para el capítulo 1️⃣8️⃣ del podcast? En este episodio encontrarás la historia de las guerras de formatos multimedia mas famosas de la historia. 📼 VHS vs Betamax vs video 2000 📀 HD-DVD vs Blu-Ray y ¡muchísimos más! También encontraras algunas que no conocías Así que pasa, coge tu refresco favorito 🥤y disfruta del siguiente episodio!!
 Encontrarás los enlaces necesarios aquí 👇 https://fugamemoriapod.blogspot.com/2021/08/s01e18.html

The show starts with a recap of the restaurant meeting the guys had earlier.  We talk about Micah's steroid use.  Suicide Squad talk.  Dave still has an HDDVD player.  Dave's trip to Vegas.  Maplewood Chamber of Commerce golf tourney.  

Joined by Guest Tangler Jon Armstrong:  This week the Tanglers head back in time 13 years to the Cinesphere Theater in Toronto, Canada for the premiere of Iron Man.  The Tanglers round out their 2008 research by examining Usain Bolt, Charlie Sheen, Seth MacFarlane, Big Bang Theory, One Tree Hill, Celebrity Wife Swap, Super Nanny, the Flobots,  Metro Station, Sex and the City the Movie, Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, and Speed Racer. Also, they somehow managed to make the entire Star Wars catalog available on HD DVD only, while also eliminating bitcoin and increasing the value of legacy media by 10,000%.

1000 Episodes in Review It's our 1000th episode so we thought it would be fun to go down memory lane. It has been so much fun getting to know all of you. Some we know well and have developed personal relationships with. Others came and went as things in their lives changed. To Industry members, thank you for your support! To our listeners, thank you for subscribing, downloading and listening to our show. It's because of you that we are here today and will be here tomorrow!   There was a big gap in our records between 2005 and 2007. We switched to Google Docs in 2007 and have been able to keep everything we wrote archived there. But from memory some highlights were: We became the official podcast of AVS Forum and were introduced to members at their CES Party We had an affiliation with HDTV Magazine Met Mark Cuban (owner of HDNet at the time) and Interviewed the President of Syntax-Brillian at the HDTV Conference in Beverly Hills Dolby Flew us to San Francisco to demo some of their projects they were working on. While there we recorded two shows of their now defunct Dolby podcast Oppo and Monoprice were big supporters of the show early on as was Olevia TVs Sonos - The first real product we reviewed on the show back in 2005 A few of our day job colleagues mocked us for doing a podcast. LOL jokes on them   HT Guys TV Tech Timeline Braden (Sony CRT...) ->  Panasonic Plasma 480p EDTV ->  JVC LCoS 1080p Rear Projection ->  Epson 1080p Projector(s) ->  (Lots of 4k TCLs) ->  Sony 4k LED Ara  RCA CRT -> Samsung DLP-> Panasonic Plasma-> JVC Projector-> Vizio 4K TV Optoma UST Reviews of all the Rear Projection TVs from 2007 - JVC HD-61FN97 61" HD-ILA Our bottom line at the time - The JVC HD-61FN97 is an excellent value.  It looks great, does a wonderful job with HD content, a great job with DVDs and a pretty good job with standard definition TV.  Blacks are good, contrast is solid, colors are excellent and detail is vivid.  We try to look for great values to help you (and us for that matter) get a little more out of each hard earned dollar. You'd be hard pressed to find a better looking 61" TV at its price. At an online street price of $2125 this is an awesome TV for the money.  It really helps bring the big screen home. Our first mention of home automation was in March of 2007. We wrapped up our discussion with - One day home automation will be standard.  We'll wonder what people ever did without them.  But for now your options are somewhat limited.  You can spend a lot of money to get it custom built and done just right, with a system like Crestron, AMX or Control4, or you can try to put it together yourself if you don't mind the occasional hiccup that comes with a home made system. This can be one of the most fun home projects you've ever worked on.  And it lasts forever - it's the gift that just keeps on giving. Our earliest “Kaleidescape Killer” comment was also in 2007 when we showcased a $2500 Linux based machine with full DVR and DVD server capabilities. The company was called Interact-TV and they are no longer in business. Our Top Ten shows in HD from 2007: Ara: American Idol (Fox) Dancing with the Stars (ABC) Football/Basketball/Sports Center/Etc on ESPN Planet Earth/Sunrise Earth (Discovery HD Theater) Lost (ABC) CSI Miami (CBS) CSI (CBS) Bikini Destinations (HD Net) Heroes (NBC) NHL Hockey on HD Net Braden: The Unit (CBS) Las Vegas (NBC) Numb3rs (CBS) Monday Night Football (ESPN) Lakers Basketball on KCAL 24 (Fox) I Shouldn't Be Alive (Discovery HD) Destination HD (Discovery HD) Planet Earth (Discovery HD) CSI Miami (CBS) SlingMedia VS Major League Baseball Issue: Slingboxes infringe on the local cable company's right to broadcast the content. Interactive TV Still not a thing  DVDpedia In an attempt to build a video server or “Kaleidescape Killer” out of a Mac Mini Ara used DVDpedia to catalog and display album art and id3 data about his library. It worked OK but was quickly abandoned for Boxee and then eventually Plex. Plex is indeed the Kaleidescape Killer! Vudu Movie Download Set Top Box ($399) - October 2007 What we liked: High quality movies on demand Large selection with more coming every week Easy to use remote and easy menu navigation Up and running in five minutes   What we disliked: No lease option to defray $400 entry price Not a large selection of Dolby 5.1 Downloads interfered with VOIP telephone service Bottom Line: This is the best home video on demand system the HT Guys have seen. The video quality is first rate! The user interface is clean and simple. You will have the system up and running in no time. All of this is with the initial release of the system software. With more movie releases coming, HD, external storage, and new software updates this product will only get better. At $400 for the Vudu box its not for everyone, but you will get a very good video on demand system for the investment. HDDVD - Bluray - a comparison Conclusion Blu-ray clearly has an advantage in specs, higher storage capacity and higher maximum bitrate.  HD-DVD seems to hold the edge in "market readiness" if that's a real term.  All the features you want were required in the spec from the beginning, so you know your player supports it.  Man it would be nice if the studios would create discs in both formats so we didn't have to buy two players... Netflix Watch Instantly Technology Minimum Requirements Computer running Windows XP with Service Pack 2 or higher, or Windows Vista Internet Explorer version 6 or higher Windows Media Player version 11 (DRM version 5145) or later An active broadband connection to the Internet 1.0 GHz processor 512 MB RAM 3 GB free hard disk drive space Recommended in addition to minimum requirements An active broadband Internet connection of at least 1.5 Mbps 1.5 GHz processor 1 GB RAM The Death of Rear Projection TVs - Jan 2008 Harmony One Universal Remote - As with any Harmony remote, the One is a great choice for your home theater.  It's new, sexy and easy to use.  The touchscreen is cool and the larger buttons make it a bit easier to use.  But overall it doesn't represent a huge departure from the 880.  Of course we're gadget freaks, so we'll both be using them, but if you want to save some money, the 880 remains a great option.  Bang for the buck, the 880 is still probably the way to go.  For the coolness factor, the One is where it's at. Mobile Digital TV Standard - Although ATSC 3.0 has a provision for this most people are just using IPTV over the Cell Networks Orb Speaker Review - we did a review of these cool spherical speakers that sounded pretty good at the time. The cost for a 5.1 system was $1597 in June of 2008. The company is still around and today you can get an improved 5.1 system for $740. Is TidalTV the Next Big Thing? - a new service that mimics the Cable or Satellite experience over the Internet. So the answer is No and Yes! This was in 2008 Popcorn Hour A-100 Review Not a week goes by that we don't hear something about the Popcorn Hour A-100 network media player.  We tried relentlessly to get a demo unit for review, but to no avail.  Finally, slightly weary but committed whole-heartedly to the show, Ara decided to pony up the cash and purchase one.  It arrived last week and we got a chance to play with it.  All in all, not a bad little unit. If you want an inexpensive network media player that can play anything, the Popcorn Hour is the best we've seen so far.  It requires some IT expertise to get it up and running and to use it on a day-to-day basis, but it works like a champ.  Even streaming 1080p HD content over the network looked good, granted it was all that was happening on the network at the time, but it still looked good.  If you want something with a little more visual appeal, stick with AppleTV, the PS3 or the Xbox 360 (or Vudu when it adds local network playback).  But all of those options are a bit more expensive and not quite as flexible. Vudu HDX Movies Black Friday Roundup 2008 Panasonic Viera 50" 720p Plasma HDTV 899.99 min 10 per store Sony 40" 1080p LCD HDTV & Sony Blu-Ray Player Bundle (Model # KDL40V4100 and BDPS350) - $1,199.98 Sony Blu-ray Player (BDP-S350) -- $179 (with a firmware upgrade and a 1 GB USB stick this will be come BD Live Compliant) Mitsubishi 65" Home Theater 1080p DLP HDTV (Model # WD65735) - $1,199.99 IPTV - Can it replace Cable and Satellite?  Note- This was us just talking about the subject LONG (2009) before it was even dreamed of in it's current state -  If you had to, you could cut the cord between you and your cable company and not miss a beat. But in reality if you won't have the same video quality. The other thing to consider is that the Cable or Satellite box has an simple well understood interface. Connecting a computer to the TV requires using a keyboard and a mouse and there are no channel numbers. You'll have to bookmark your sites. Companies like Apple, Netflix and Boxee are all trying to provide a ten foot interface that is Grandma proof but we still have a ways to go. Finally, cable companies are not going to be happy with subscribers that watch a lot of Internet streamed content. So even if the quality improved you may not be able to stream a months worth of TV into your home. If you are a light TV watcher that is computer savvy then you may be able to cut the cable cord completely. But in actually, for most of us, IPTV is a good way to augment what we already have. If you are on the road you can watch something on your terms. If you forget to record something then its a great backup. Its also a great way to watch old TV shows that are no longer aired. What if AppleTV Replaced my DVR?  The concept at this point in time was to buy subscriptions to your favorite TV show. But as we see today, that's not even required. Plus we now have boxes from Apple, Google, Amazon and Roku. It's safe to say that the AppleTV type STBs have replaced the DVR Zune HD The Zune HD is a powerful portable media device. It has a beautiful OLED screen, small form factor, smooth touch screen menus, and wonderful 720p output to a TV. However, for Microsoft to steal some iPod users, more apps and video content need to be available in the Zune Marketplace. The Zune HD has solid hardware that is almost as sexy as the iPod. What would make this device perfect for a home theater would be Hulu and Netfilx support. Microsoft has also stated that they will release games for the Zune HD, since Xbox Live and the Zune Marketplace already seem to be linked, the possibility of it being a good portable gaming device are great. The Zune HD is a solid device. With future updates it may take a run at the iPod's dominance in the market. RedEye Universal Remote Control (MSRP $190) 2010 - This remote eliminated the need to be in the same room with your gear and will work with your iPod Touch or iPhone. LED TV Technology was just coming on the scene in 2010 Quartics(2010) Quartics Inc. is a semiconductor company based in Irvine, CA, with offices in India, China and Taiwan. Quartics was formed in 2003 to focus on semiconductor architecture for video-based media, aiming to overcome a raft of modern digital challenges. To date, the company has been granted 10 patents, with 40 pending, in media processing architecture, video and graphics processing and QoS algorithms.  We don't know if these patents were sold or even used. But the company does not seem to be in business any longer Life|ware Today as part of our ongoing series on home automation we discuss Life|ware.  Life|ware™ is software developed by Exceptional Innovation that allows you to seamlessly merge control of your home along with your world of digital entertainment.  Life|ware lets you control your home through your TV with a Media Center PC, Media Center Extender or Xbox 360™, from your home or office PC or notebook, or from a Life|point touch screen. You can even use your iPhone or iPod Touch and iPad as a Life|ware client with full two-way functionality. One of the biggest draws to Life|ware is that it works with numerous third party devices. Life|Ware provides bridges to lighting, HVAC, Media and more. The system will go from IP to IR, RF, or RS-232. Life|ware is OS agnostic as well. The control software will run on Windows, Mac OS, and LINUX machines.  But if you don't want to mess with loading the software on your own equipment Life|Ware sells a complete line of home automation controllers, servers, and bridges.  We can't find a trace of this company any longer. It may have been sold or merged Are High End Audio/Video Retailers a Dying Breed? “If the AV business cannot more clearly illustrate why specialty audio is in fact special, then expect more stores and regional chains to fold in the coming months even as the economy improves, simply perhaps fueled by the fact that mainstream home theater gear is just too good.“  Crystal LED HDTV Technology So when can I have one and how much will it cost? Sony isn't answering any of these questions. Our hunch is that it will cost about what an OLED TV will cost. And if Sony wants this technology to have a chance it needs to come out at about the same time as OLED. We know that Samsung will be releasing their OLEDs in the second half of the year. Our prediction is that you will be able to buy a Crystal LED TV from Sony by the summer of 2013 and it will run about $6,000.   The best we can tell is that this tech never made it into consumer TVs. Sony still has a page dedicated to it but more in the commercial side of it's business. Revolv Home Automation Hub 1/2013  The beginning of the “Year of Automation” The best we can tell is that Revolv was bought by Nest and lives on in their products Conclusion When we first learned about a device that could unify all the various home automation and control devices out there we were sceptical. But after putting the Revolv Home Automation Hub through its paces, we can say, yes you can control everything regardless who makes it. Well maybe not everything yet. But we are sure the engineers at Revolv are working diligently to make that happen! Is a 7.1 System Worth it? Bottom Line - A properly installed 7.1 system with 7.1 content will take your home theater to the next level. You will definitely be able to hear a difference, especially with good content like the movie Super 8 . However, if you are not watching Blu-rays or your room doesn't support proper placement of the rear surround channels, a better approach would be to upgrade your 5.1 system or just save the money. This was from 2013. Consistent with our ATMOS recommendations too Netflix SuperHD (6/2013) Netflix SuperHD claims to provide superior 1080p video quality for the same price as regular streaming. But not everyone is eligible.  Requirements Netflix Super HD requires an internet connection with at least 5Mb/s download. Not all devices can play Super HD. Super HD is only available via Internet Providers that are part of the Open Connect network. Supported devices include Sony PlayStation 3, Apple TV with 1080p, Roku with 1080p, Nintendo Wii U, Windows 8 App, TiVo Premiere DVR Blu-Ray Players, Smart TV's, Home Theaters, and Streaming Players with existing Netflix 1080p support Bottom Line Netflix is really pushing the streaming frontiers and they have come a long way. We can now sit on our couch on any given evening and find a high quality movie at a moment's  notice. We anxiously await the day when we will be able to stream Blu-ray quality movies whenever we want. From what we have seen that day is not too far away! Is Blu-ray a Dead Format? Also from 6/2013 Ask anyone who knows something about home theater what is the highest quality audio and video available to mere mortals today and they will tell you Blu-ray. Blu-ray video is stunning and the audio is simply amazing. But we don't have to tell you that. So does Blu-ray have a future? The following are some reasons why Blu-ray may not be around for too much longer. . . . Time to Bury Blu-ray? Its probably too early to put the last nail in the Blu-ray coffin right now. There needs to be one or two more paradigm shifts before Blu-ray goes away. The first is the studios realizing that DRM is more hassle than it is worth. Once this hurdle is crossed in-store Kiosks or online downloads will soar. Prices will come down and the world will be saved from all that plastic being created. The second is a jump in online speeds. Once gigabit Internet is ubiquitous there will be a shift to storing content in online lockers and again the world will be saved. The big question is when? Based on what we are seeing we are betting on within 5 years.   ZyXEL 500 Mb/s Fast Ethernet Powerline Wall-Plug Adapter We reviewed almost a dozen powerline Ethernet adapters. They never achieved their advertised speeds, but they did work and depending on what you needed them to do they were an excellent solution. However, with faster mesh network Wifi it's not really a thing any longer. Aereo  In April of 2014 we interviewed a broadcaster who opposed our stance on Aero's business plan. He felt Aero was making money off of the local broadcasters. We felt Aero was providing a service to allow us the viewer to watch our local stations. The Courts agreed with the broadcaster. But today we have Locast. And so far they have been in business for a couple of years. SmartThings Home Automation Hub And so continues the many years of “The Year of Automation”. This was before Samsung bought the company. A full year after we kicked off the “Year of Automation” Pono Player (1/2015) Neil Young's "high resolution" PonoPlayer is on sale for $400. PonoPlayer, a triangular portable music player that promises only the highest of fidelities.  We were Skeptics from the beginning: The point is that you don't need fancy hardware to make music sound good, and that no amount of hardware will make your ears hear better than the limits of biology and physics. Ara's first DIY Speaker project was in Jan 2015 Axiim Q Wireless Home Theater System 2/2016 The first Wisa system we reviewed. We are happy to say it's still around today! Conclusion Many of our listeners have asked us to recommend wireless solutions for their home theater over the years. We have tested and rejected all but a few and the acceptable solutions still required some speaker wire from an external amp. Not exactly wireless! The Axiim Q Wireless Home Theater System is the first one that delivers on the promise of a truly wireless system that is simple to install, looks fantastic and sounds great! We hate having to send it back! It would be so easy to bring 5.1 to your master bedroom that we are seriously thinking about buying one! What is HDR? (4/2016) To Sum it Up Getting the best picture from an HDR TV will require HDR content.  To guarantee your TV will support HDR look for the “Ultra HD Premium” label. If you really want a UHD TV that does not have the “Ultra HD Premium” label buy a TV that has or comes close to 1000 nits brightness.  HDR from cable, satellite, and OTA are still a bit off. We will stop here in 2016 because we'll save some for the next 1000 shows. Along the way we have had dozens of interviews, product reviews, buying guides, and lists that were not mentioned in this episode. Some weeks we struggled to come up with show ideas, some weeks we had too many. But we always managed to have a show ready for your Friday morning commute. 

"This rationale also completely demolishes the “blockchain not Bitcoin” mantra as the Schelling point is purely based on bitcoin the money, not blockchain the technology." - Willem Van Den Bergh Why do communication protocols tend towards monopoly? What is it in the nature of networks that lends dominance in a single medium, in the way VHS killed the very existence of BetaMax, how Blu-ray pushed HD-DVD into obscurity? What can Schelling Points, the Lindy Effects, and what we know about networks inform us about these unique systems, and do they demonstrate the limits of free markets? Don't miss this incredible piece from Willem "On Schelling Points, Network Effects, & Lindy." https://medium.com/@willemvandenbergh_85885/on-schelling-points-network-effects-and-lindy-inherent-properties-of-communication-c4eb69b55c60 A great listen to accompany this one is Nick Szabo's "Shelling Out": https://anchor.fm/thecryptoconomy/episodes/Reboot---Shelling-Out-The-Origins-of-Money-Nick-Szabo-e9omme Sleep comfortably tonight, stack sats automatically with the lowest hassle, lowest cost Bitcoin savings plan. SwanBitcoin.com/guy --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/bitcoinaudible/message

在这期节目中，我们探讨了以下这些内容：是什么给了盗版碟致命一击？蓝光（Blu-ray）是如何发展到现在的？购买蓝光机需要注意什么？CC、Arrow、Eureka……哪个才是最佳厂牌？我该去哪里寻找权威碟评？……本 期 对 谈 嘉 宾Peter Cat 深焦DeepFocus 联合创始人，前主编qw0aszx 影迷加碟友，既爱布拉哈格也爱汤米·韦素，有时候也会拍点自己的短片1990年代早期，有两种高容量光盘标准进入研究阶段；一个是多媒体光盘（MMCD），支持者是飞利浦和索尼。另一个是超高密度光盘（Super High Density Disc），支持者是东芝、时代华纳、松下电器、日立、三菱电机、先锋、汤姆逊和JVC。由于电脑业界坚持他们仅支持一种统一的规格，两大阵营于是将标准合并成为DVD，并于1995年推出。在中国，DVD盗版碟滋养了整整一代电影爱好者，可以说没有盗版D5、D9的20年地下发展，就没有现在的迷影文化生态。其后，蓝光光碟出现。蓝光光盘是由索尼及松下电器等企业组成的蓝光光盘联盟（Blu-ray Disc Association）策划的次世代光盘规格，并以索尼为首于2006年开始全面推动相关产品。2008年2月19日，随着HD DVD领导者东芝宣布在3月底结束所有HD DVD相关业务，最终由索尼主导的蓝光光盘胜出，持续多年的下一代光盘格式之争正式划上句号。随着家庭录放设备、存储介质和电影修复技术的不断发展，电影碟片厂商也如雨后春笋般成长起来，标准收藏（Criterion Collection）、箭影（Arrow）、尤里卡（Eureka）等厂商纷纷推出全新修复、配备花絮的影碟，影碟收藏和电影爱好者们竞相购买，迷影文化也在新一代影迷和介质中延续。

Episode 15, 2001 Eminem “Lose yourself” from the motion picture soundtrack 8 Mile. Go over to www.Etsy.com/Shop/ThebobbyCoutoshow now and get your gear! An episode for the ages. Join on this next installment of the Bobby Couto Show with a very special guest AJ. We discuss a plethora of topics including what's hot and what's not this holiday season. Are you confused about what video game system or platform to purchase? We've got the down and dirty for you .Reminiscing about the days of my video game experiences. Are you confused about Virtual reality? We will enlighten you. Remembering 9/11, being at the hospital and how the world changed the day AJ was born. He will never know what a pre 9/11 world was like. The day was bittersweet. Benjamin Netanyahu is being charged with corruption charges. Really?! Like things aren't bad enough over there this asshole is stealing from his people. It makes me sad. What would happen if we shut off the internet? We use AI everyday and all the time. What can we do to save ourselves from Artificial intelligence? Imagine a world without the internet? Back to 0 and starting fresh. Building a new safe internet. We remember Napster and P2P software. How great free music was and the birth of the MP3. The release of iTunes and the iPod changed the world. Do you remember the Microsoft Zune music player? I had one and it was terrible. The Blu-Ray and HD-DVD wars, what side where you on? I was on the wrong one. Goerge Bush and the Iraq wars, How do we feel about that today? Is the world a better place without Sadam Husan? We continue to evolve and are taking our furry friends along for the journey. What it means to be a pet parent today. Stop pretending like your dog is a service dog. Just because you buy a vest and certificate on Amazon does not make your pet a service animal. You're making everyone uncomfortable and putting everyone in danger. It's not fair to the general public and it's not fair your pet. PSA! Do not throw your lit cigarette out the window of your moving car! It's an asshole move! NASCAR racing and remembering the legend Dale Earnhardt passed 18 years ago and all the safety improvements that have been made. Space tourism in 2001 Dennis Tito paid $20 million to travel to ISS. Did you know you can fly in a Russian MiG for $1500 US dollars. Would you do it? We would! You can't say no to that! We are asking the important questions. Battery life or Music quality? Which would you choose? Remember POP UPS? There was a time when the internet was almost impossible to navigate. Remember typing www.thewhitehouse.com ? Don't do it its a porn site. It was another great week for @Bobby_Couto on Twitter! Thank you everyone! Remembering JFK and the Bay of Pigs Cuban Missile crisis. Amazing how close the world came to nuclear fallout. Is there life on Mars? We talk about it and try to make sense of this age old question. Dinosaurs didn't go extinct I believe they evolved into modern day birds. In 2001 the oldest human is found in ethiopia 5.5 million years ago. Did Jesus ride a dinosaur? He might have. Enjoy episode 15, one of the best podcasts to date. I'm so proud and humbled that AJ joined the show. From start to finish, this is one of the greatest podcasts to date! "All Roads Lead Here™" Happy Thanksgiving! The Bobby Couto Show --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/thebobbycoutoshow/message Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/thebobbycoutoshow/support

Episode 15, 2001 Eminem “Lose yourself” from the motion picture soundtrack 8 Mile. Go over to www.Etsy.com/Shop/ThebobbyCoutoshow now and get your gear! An episode for the ages. Join on this next installment of the Bobby Couto Show with a very special guest AJ. We discuss a plethora of topics including what's hot and what's not this holiday season. Are you confused about what video game system or platform to purchase? We've got the down and dirty for you .Reminiscing about the days of my video game experiences. Are you confused about Virtual reality? We will enlighten you. Remembering 9/11, being at the hospital and how the world changed the day AJ was born. He will never know what a pre 9/11 world was like. The day was bittersweet. Benjamin Netanyahu is being charged with corruption charges. Really?! Like things aren't bad enough over there this asshole is stealing from his people. It makes me sad. What would happen if we shut off the internet? We use AI everyday and all the time. What can we do to save ourselves from Artificial intelligence? Imagine a world without the internet? Back to 0 and starting fresh. Building a new safe internet. We remember Napster and P2P software. How great free music was and the birth of the MP3. The release of iTunes and the iPod changed the world. Do you remember the Microsoft Zune music player? I had one and it was terrible. The Blu-Ray and HD-DVD wars, what side where you on? I was on the wrong one. Goerge Bush and the Iraq wars, How do we feel about that today? Is the world a better place without Sadam Husan? We continue to evolve and are taking our furry friends along for the journey. What it means to be a pet parent today. Stop pretending like your dog is a service dog. Just because you buy a vest and certificate on Amazon does not make your pet a service animal. You're making everyone uncomfortable and putting everyone in danger. It's not fair to the general public and it's not fair your pet. PSA! Do not throw your lit cigarette out the window of your moving car! It's an asshole move! NASCAR racing and remembering the legend Dale Earnhardt passed 18 years ago and all the safety improvements that have been made. Space tourism in 2001 Dennis Tito paid $20 million to travel to ISS. Did you know you can fly in a Russian MiG for $1500 US dollars. Would you do it? We would! You can't say no to that! We are asking the important questions. Battery life or Music quality? Which would you choose? Remember POP UPS? There was a time when the internet was almost impossible to navigate. Remember typing www.thewhitehouse.com ? Don't do it its a porn site. It was another great week for @Bobby_Couto on Twitter! Thank you everyone! Remembering JFK and the Bay of Pigs Cuban Missile crisis. Amazing how close the world came to nuclear fallout. Is there life on Mars? We talk about it and try to make sense of this age old question. Dinosaurs didn't go extinct I believe they evolved into modern day birds. In 2001 the oldest human is found in ethiopia 5.5 million years ago. Did Jesus ride a dinosaur? He might have. Enjoy episode 15, one of the best podcasts to date. I'm so proud and humbled that AJ joined the show. From start to finish, this is one of the greatest podcasts to date! "All Roads Lead Here™" Happy Thanksgiving! The Bobby Couto Show --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/thebobbycoutoshow/message Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/thebobbycoutoshow/support

Prediction Review for 2016 It's hard to believe that another year has gone by! With that it's time to see how we did with our 2016 predictions. This year's scorecard: Ara ⅖ 40% Braden ⅖ 40% Ara's Predictions: Competitor to Sling.com Sling.com was the first into this market but they won't be the last. Look for one of the major cable or sat providers (or even Apple) to offer competitor to sling.com. And if it's Apple look for local channels as a bonus.   This one happened! We have Playstation Vue and DirecTV Now! Off to a great start! UHD Blu-ray player will be available for less than $500 This one is simply a shot in the dark. Rumor has it that the first UHD Blu-ray players will go for more than $1,000. But lack of demand and memories of the whole Blu-ray/HD-DVD debacle will drive prices down. But don't expect to see this until Black Friday. Well this was no contest! The rumors were false. The first players came out at under $500. But hey! I'll still take it! Two for two! There will be a 100 inch 4K UHD with HDR and wide color gamut for less than $10,000 This is my shoot for the moon prediction. If this comes true, I may never upgrade my projector and opt for this solution instead! But realistically, this has about a 10% chance of coming to pass. But I like to dream! You know what they say, 75 is the new 100! No?? This was a long shot. But Sony did release a 100 inch 4K UHD with HDR and Wide color. The only issue is that it's $60K. Two out of three is great if it's your batting average. So I'm still doing OK. Samsung will re-enter the OLED market This is kind of a gimmie. Samsung did have an OLED (KN55S9CAFXZA) but we haven't seen anything commercially available since. With the success of LG's OLED TVs Samsung won't be able to stay out of the market. We'll have a good idea if this is correct next week at CES. Samsung has hinted that they may get back into the OLED game but so far they haven't. So I'll have to say no. Two for four. Apple to stream Hi-Res Audio With so many music streaming platforms out there Apple will look for a way to differentiate itself. It already has the Mastered for iTunes program. Why not Apple Hi-Resolution? Also, look for more radio stations like Beats 1 in the higher resolution audio.    No “Hi-Res” Audio from Apple yet. And this may not ever happen with all the streaming they are doing. Why send more data through the pipes to iPhones? Maybe they will offer a special service add on for the AppleTV some day.  I started strong but ended up two for five. A solid 40%!! Braden's Predictions: The following review of Braden's predictions is written by Ara in Braden's absence. HDTV and VR mashup With the popularity of the Oculus Rift and the Growing investment by other firms such as Microsoft and their HoloLens, someone will produce video content that takes full advantage of the immersive experience of Virtual Reality. There are apps that allow you to watch movies on the Oculus Rift, but nothing (that I know of at least) that has been produced to provide a native 3D experience within a VR headset. probably nature footage, but it'll happen. And we have a winner! There are at least 7 virtual reality movies that are available now:   The Martian Hunger Games The Lion King Wild Batman the Animated Series School of Rock Star Wars Starting out strong… but so did Ara :-) Somebody *will* get into the live TV streaming game, but still no locals Amazon, Apple, Google or Sony - one of them will offer native television streaming from their platform to match the service offering of SlingTV. So you'll either get an iTV app on your Apple TV, or a TV app on your FireTV, you get the picture. Once you pay your fee, you get access to everything on TV right now for a select set of cable channels. And maybe, if you're lucky, a national feed from the major broadcasters. Well yes… But it's important to do your own work. By the way, Playstation Vue and DirecTV do carry locals. Two for Twoish 80” Televisions for under $2000 This is a carry-forward from last year; I think I was just one year too early. Both OLED and 4K will push prices down for 1080p TVs. Wanting to capitalize on the desire for a larger screen, Manufacturers will push prices down for the big 1080p sets to get them flying off the shelves. So the price for a starter series 80” TV will drop to under $2000 at some point this year. Maybe Black Friday, maybe for another event, but it'll drop. I could not find a new 80 inch TV for $2,000. Will we try for three years in a row?? Two for three. Lightbulb speakers for Surround Sound The best way to get the height channel experience from sound formats like Dolby Atmos it to actually have them in the ceiling. The up-firing speakers that bounce sound off the ceiling are cool, just not quite as precise. It isn't always easy to cut holes and run wires to add speakers to your ceiling. Somebody will create a box, either an add-on for your amp, or built into the receiver itself, that lets you send audio from specific surround channels to specific bluetooth devices. Bluetooth light bulbs are a perfect fit. There are plenty of light bulb speakers out there but none that have any sort of device that allows them to work as surround or Atmos speakers. We'll hold at Two for four. Proliferation of Home Automation Glue Platforms/Hubs Apple is already working on making HomeKit the central hub that glues all your automation devices together, but it won't be the only one. Google will release one, maybe based on Nest/Thread, maybe not. Others will want into the game as well. The underlying idea? Any device, one platform. Buy any smart bulbs, locks, sensors, gadgets you want, regardless of the underlying protocol: Insteon, Z-Wave, ZigBee, WiFi, Bluetooth, etc. and plug them into your home. They become part of the system as if they all spoke the same language. Google Translate for Automation devices. Well not exactly. Yes there is Echo and Google Home but I wouldn't exactly call it a central hub that ties disparate products together a la Homekit. And it's a tie! Two for Five.

Highlights from NAB 2016 Faithful listener and long time contributor to the show Ed Stouffer graciously agreed to be our “man on the street” - or “man on the convention show floor” if you prefer, at this year's NAB Show in Las Vegas. The show just wrapped up, running from April 16-21. For those who aren't familiar, NAB is the National Association of Broadcasters and the NAB Show is their annual gathering to see, learn about and talk about all the latest innovations in audio and video production, broadcasting and distribution. TV Trends – some of my views from NAB 2016 show Edward Stouffer 4K going wide and deep in the broadcast market with a big push to consumers building. This has several components, so I will try to describe them, and what they mean. Original Content. Several presentations talked about 35mm motion picture film stock having a native resolution right about 4K. Decent prints can be scanned with minimal cleanup. Older prints will take some work, just like what happened when HD versions of older material were released. As for new material, there was a general consensus that most mainstream content is moving to 4K capture or is already there. In many cases, the editing is either downconverted to HD or that is the export In the Canon “mega-booth” – which spanned 2 levels and had amateur, pro-am and professional cameras on display - they showed excerpts from several 4K movies shot partially or entirely in 4K, along with some TV episodes, such as “Homeland.” Distribution. The net is that while broadcasts are not 4K today, 4K streaming via Amazon and Netflix will have more options as less work in the future is required when the original material is in better shape. As for fixed media, the UltraHD BluRay players have cracked the $500 price point, with the Samsung generating a lot of interest at $399. Christmas 2015, they were $5,000, so the start toward commodity is rapidly coming. Manufacturers I talked with showing the under-$500 players said they generally expect a $250 UHD BluRay player for Christmas 2016. Also, the manufacturers expected that most of the UHD BluRay players will support 4K clients for Netflix & other services, so consumers will also use them as streaming devices for 4K. Broadcast. The chicken's egg has hatched! ATSC 3.0 is the new specification and it includes support for 4K broadcasts, including HDR, 24-channel audio, etc. I talked briefly with a technical director for a major US network and they are actively looking for a pilot at one affiliate this year. As I understand the spec – not close to being a SME by any measure – it takes the equivalent of 2 HD digital channels for one broadcast, depending upon compression used. (The folks in the ATSC booth said twice that it only needed a single digital channel…using the prototype CODECs and laboratory environments.) The network I was talking with said their pilot will likely be an affiliate who has unused spectrum or who multicasts some additional channels who would be willing to interrupt that for the test period. To that end, I saw an LG TV set at the show with the first ATSC 3.0 chipset included. I read through the press briefings a bit and it looks like all major manufacturers announced either future models or lines with ATSC 3.0 shipping by Christmas. Versions of 4K. HDR displays were everywhere. “Ultra HD Premium” was being promoted - as well as HDR branding - which includes HDR, WCG and other requirements for improved black levels and luminance. I asked Sony, Samsung and others about when we could see HDR for HD TVs, and as I expected, they seemed reluctant to talk about it, with one telling me it might hurt 4K sales. One manufacturer said it could cost between 25%-50% for “true HDR” on an UltraHD set. I asked what that meant, and he said that it really required the correct display, software and enough on-board CPU. To that end, he said some “lower tier” brands would say they offer HDR, but to look at their displays beside a top-tier manufacturer and there would be a big difference. I guess one test is to look at the new Vizio 50” 4K TV with HDR and see how that stacks up.  As much will be lost as made There are a lot of big – and costly – bets being made on the future path and as some are against one another, they cannot possibly all succeed. I saw multiple DRM systems being advertised. While some use the same encryption standard, they are incompatible with each other, as things like key distribution infrastructures are sold as a whole system. One prediction I heard from an architect at a major encoding vendor was that “Netflix was the next MySpace.” Think about that for a moment: when is the last time you used MySpace? I asked for more and he said to compare what happened to HD-DVD. He said it was the better format, was cheaper to produce media, but when Sony flexed its muscle on content, it lost. So, he said, if one or more studios either raise prices on content to Netflix or deny it altogether in favor of any company, Netflix can get starved out. Private Copy cDVR cannot stand Private copy – having your own copy of a recorded show stored in the cloud - gets very expensive very fast. In Europe, shared copy is widely used. It allows a single copy to be recorded, with pointers to each customer who indicated the desire to “record” that content. You can cache shared copy. The technology to splice ads into playback of a DVR recording is already here, so a provider could either restore the original ads, insert new ones or do a hybrid per market, per customer. Now it's a matter of the carriers/MSOs to stand up as a group and say they cannot afford to install exabytes of storage in support of private copy, as the US content owners are against shared copy generally. Ericsson estimates that each 100,000 customers using Cloud DVR require about 33 Petabytes of storage. Line between TVs and Projectors continues to blue I watched Leyard's 31' wide 8K TV and wanted to take it home. It was made of 64 panels, meticulously assembled. Not to be outdone, a new generation of short throw projectors is out, which allows them to be 2' from the front of the screen and still do a 100” image. Also rear-projection versions of them exist. Epson has said they hope to get this down to 1', which is getting close to putting a projector inside a closet or small recess behind the screen, rather than 5-8' today.   3D still a novelty, sort of One manufacturer was showing a 50” 3D no glasses TV. If you sat just right, 2 rows of 3 folks in the demo, it did look pretty good. If you did not, it looked distorted and made me dizzy. There has been at least one of these at every CES for the last few years, and while there's a lot of consumer interest, going beyond the prototype has been the challenge. Sharp also showed a model, but didn't give many details on price or availability. Since their business has essentially been sold, it's unclear what the future of R&D is on items like this. I also looked at the Nokia Ozo demo, which is a 360 degree camera (16 cameras on a sphere) designed to pair with VR goggles. I looked through a pair of Oculus Rift and was able to watch the live concert being held outside and noticed the soundstage moved around as I turned my head. The camera has a pretty high bitrate, so likely a high bandwidth satellite application, or it will light up the fiber to your home. I also watched a higher-resolution movie where I went 40km up in a weather balloon with full 360 degree view and it was outstanding. For gaming and special events I could see wearing the goggles is compelling. For continual TV viewing, I think the “no glasses” TV is the only option, but they have to fix the viewing angle and price point.   Bit Rates Seesaw When you try to take into account where bitrates are going, it is very much like a seesaw. Sony had this gorgeous display of compressed 4K sources being played. They said this was 4K with HDR at under 10 Mb/s using HEVC encoding. When I asked, they admitted this was multi-pass processed, and yes, this was not suitable for live TV. I further asked about what HDR was doing, and their answer was “well, if the source material gets bigger, then the output will too.”  To which I asked if the improvements in HEVC were offset by the HDR movement and they simply smiled at me. If 4K VOD goes there, it would be a big improvement for that, at least.   So what of 8K? Commercial tests start in Japan on August 1 with the Olympics, with NHK expecting full deployment by 2018. NHK was showing a prototype camera, TV and projector. Besides the Leyard uber-tron, I spent some time looking at the 85” NHK OLED protype with a live feed and it looked pretty darn good. I pressed for a price target, but got nothing in return, except that it could be “millions of yen.” If it follows some of the early OLED and 4K, I predict a $100K entry price. I also sat through an 8K recording of a symphony with the NHK 8K projector, using 22.2 channel sound. While it was not the most dynamic content, the audio was good and 15' from the screen, we could see the conductor's individual hair and scratches in the wood stands. Ikegami, not to be outdone, was showing both an 8K handheld and an 8K studio camera they said was in production. Canon showed 2 8K prototype studio cameras. This was my one disappointment with Canon: their 8K demo content was disappointing, not looking much better than 4K demos they showed. For the US market, it looks like 8K will appear in large venues and in digital theaters. Sony said they were working on 8K cinema systems with theaters now, and they believed this would become the new standard within 18 months for new installs and upgrades. With commercial large-venue 4K projectors starting around $125K today, this will not come cheap. NHK also had a demo 8K streaming and believes they can get it down to 33 Mb/s by commercial launch.  Drones Drones were also in the house. In fact, they were a good part of an entire pavilion. Also, there were some spread throughout the main venues. These went from the smaller, entry-level products to big ones that looked like they belonged to SkyNet. I asked about the price on one of the bigger ones – 6' across, 8 rotors and a full-on commercial 4K camera cradled by it. The response I got was that it was “price upon request.” I said, “OK, I'm requesting the price.” The guy rolled his eyes at me and said $26,000 plus shipping. I asked further why 26K, and he pointed and said, “See that camera and lens? That's $150K and 11 pounds sitting there, and we don't want our drone to drop it or crash. We hand assemble and test each component, including making sure that this will autobalance if one of the rotors fails.” OK, a $26,000 for a $150,000 camera – I guess I get it. There was also this crazy off-road vehicle with caterpillar treads and a 360 degree arm with a camera mount. I asked what this beast cost, and the answer was, “up to $325,000, if you want the armored version.” OK, an armored version. I had to ask. He said, “If you're out in a place such as Afghanistan and are filming and this thing comes over the ridge, it can look like an assault vehicle to the locals. They often shoot first and ask questions later. We can only protect the camera so much since it needs a lens opening, but if you lose the vehicle, you certainly lose the camera.” A few more manufacturer notes Black Magic couldn't be missed, even if you wanted to. They had large display ads and a good-sized booth by the doors. Much closer to what I could afford, their 4K cameras started at $1,300 and they had a number of companion products, including an SD card replicator they said would “change 4K distribution.” I had to ask: how, exactly. They said this 1RU unit would create 24 duplicates for 4K, so if you shot a wedding at 4K, you could give the guests an SD card when they left. …Now I'm not sure about the listeners, but most of my video needs editing, so I don't think I'd shoot video and pass it out right away…. I admired one of their displays of their slightly more expensive camera as it looked fabulous – but then the guy next to me, who was professional cinematographer, said, “Look closer at the display – that's the Dolby at $40K each. My bad takes look pretty good on that…!” Epilogue I ended up going last-minute, and I do wish I had more than 48 hours to prepare. But after sore feet from walking the massive displays, I also wish I had a bunch of discretionary money to buy some of the items on display. CES may be more appropriate for the average end-customer, but the NAB show sures gives some insight into what is coming and exposes the production side of film and video. I did get to meet and listen to some directors, editors and broadcast engineers talk about their side of the business. 21 years ago, I attended the Western Cable Show and remember going to the launch party for The History Channel. The show was all about coax versus satellite, large systems versus small systems, and who owned which sports content. Last week, looked very different: it was all about new advances in digital TV, mobile video, the continued decline of filmed productions…. I don't think it will take anything close to 21 more years to see dramatic changes, and a redefinition of what a “broadcaster” is.  

What is HDR? For more than a year now we have been talking about 4K TVs and how they are supposed to be the next big thing. But in actuality the increased resolution is only mildly better than equally spec'd 1080p HDTVs. We have pointed to case study after case study that says you need very large (100” or more) screen to see a difference between 1080p and 4K when sitting at normal viewing distances. This alone is not a good reason to upgrade. What has us really excited is what is coming along with these new UHDTVs, HDR (High Dynamic Range) and that IS a good reason to go out and buy a new UHDTV. We have mentioned HDR on previous shows but we we never really talked about what HDR entails in any detail. We thought it would be a good idea to explain what HDR is and why you will want this on your next TV. First we need to differentiate between HDR in photos and HDR in TVs. Photo HDR combines multiple images with different exposures to create a single image that mimics a greater dynamic range. TV HDR expands the TV's contrast ratio and color palette to offer a more realistic, natural image than what's possible with today's HDTVs. Photo HDR can make a picture look unrealistic whereas TV HDR actually makes the picture look more realistic. HDR capable TVs coupled with HDR content will display a more realistic color range, higher contrast ratio which in turn yields deeper blacks and brighter more vivid colors. HDR is far more important to your next TV purchase than 4K but at this point in time it is unlikely that there will be a 1080p HDTV that supports HDR so you will end up with a 4K TV regardless. A TV's ability to display a wider and richer range of colors, brighter whites, and deeper, darker blacks gives the TV picture a more ‘dynamic' look, which is where the name comes from. Format War There are two HDR formats vying for your dollars, one from Dolby and one from Technicolor. However this format war is not like Blu-ray vs HDDVD. You will unlikely be stuck with an orphaned UHDTV. Both of these formats support the HDR-10 specification which is supported by UHD players. Streaming services will more than likely support the HDR-10 format although Netflix has some support for Dolby Vision on some of their original content.   Some TVs manufacturers are supporting both so it's unlikely that you will be stuck with a TV that won't support HDR content. If we had to choose between a TV that supported only one format we would pick the one that supports Dolby Vision. Dolby has always been out front with it's support at the point of content creation. They are at the studios working with sound mixers and video professionals to make sure their format looks and sounds best. We heard this with Dolby TrueHD and we expect the same with Dolby Vision. How Do I Know Which TV to Buy? At CES, the UHD Alliance, a 35-member consortium released a standard called “Ultra HD Premium” which is supposed to make it easy for consumers to identify UHDTVs that meet their specification. To be certified Ultra HD Premium a UHDTV must achieve a brightness of at least 1000 nits. There is no specific HDR specification but there are for black levels and color gamut which will guarantee a minimum level if HDR quality. What about cables? You won't need new cables for HDR. Current High-Speed HDMI cables can carry HDR content. The source device (a 4K Blu-Ray player, say) and TV must be HDMI 2.0a to transmit the metadata, however. If you have a receiver and want to use it for switching, it will need to be HDMI 2.0a as well. HDR content (the key) All these new features won't really do anything to enhance your experience unless you have content that takes advantage of it. HDR content is starting to trickle out now and more is on the way. Amazon has a few titles in HDR (Mozart in the Jungle, Red Oaks, and a few others) and Vudu is offering HDR content in Dolby Vision. Netflix streams Marco Polo and Daredevil in HDR. There are also UHD discs that support HDR so if you have a UHD TV that supports HDR you should be able to find something to watch and show it off! To Sum it Up Getting the best picture from an HDR TV will require HDR content. To guarantee your TV will support HDR look for the “Ultra HD Premium” label. If you really want a UHD TV that does not have the “Ultra HD Premium” label buy a TV that has or comes close to 1000 nits brightness. HDR from cable, satellite, and OTA are still a bit off.  

DTS Play-Fi We had a chance to check out the WiSA standard in our review of the Axiim Q Wireless Home Theater System on Podcast 728 a couple weeks ago. On top of that, Ara is a big AirPlay fan for whole house audio and Braden is invested in Sonos.  Since we can't have just one, or even four, standards, it looks like another competing technology, this one from DTS, is hoping to fulfill our dreams of wireless audio around the home. The technology, called DTS Play-Fi, looks pretty promising and has some solid companies in its corner. What is it? DTS markets Play-Fi as a premium, whole-home wireless audio ecosystem. They are quick to point out that the technology is open and available to anyone. Not open as in free, but open as in unrestricted access. They claim to have the largest ecosystem of brands in the world, allowing you to build an AirPlay or Sonos like system, without the restrictions that come with those platforms. Since all Play-Fi products are seamlessly interoperable, you have the freedom to select the perfect speaker for each room, and know that they will all work together as if they came from one manufacturer. With AirPlay from Apple, you get a lot of freedom to select the right speaker, but you're pretty limited on the control side. Apple really wants you to control the system from one of their products. There are third party apps that allow you to stream to AirPlay devices from an Android phone, but nothing like the native support you get from an Apple device. Sonos is the complete other side of the spectrum. You have total freedom in how you control your audio system, use a Mac, a Windows PC, an iPhone or iPad, or any Android phone or tablet. But you have to buy Sonos speakers. There aren't any non-Sonos speakers that will work in that system. DTS actually came by the technology via their acquisition of a company called Phorus in July 2012. Phorus was using the technology in their PS1 speakers. Staying consistent with how DTS tends to operate, they decided to open the platform and license it, hoping to get on as many devices as they possibly could. They didn't want to make the devices themselves, they wanted to build a technology to allow their partners to enable wireless, whole-home streaming and take a little cut. It has worked out pretty well for them with other technologies. What does it do? In a nutshell, it allows you to essentially build your own Sonos with any devices you like. Prefer the tonal quality of one speaker brand over another? Go for it. Buy their Play-Fi speakers. Prefer the aesthetic look of a particular speaker, have at it. Want to control it from an Android phone? iPhone? Windows PC? Go for it. All with native support. Bottom line, stream your favorite content at high audio quality from every device that you've got. Like Airplay, Play-Fi sends audio from your devices to speakers throughout the home over WiFi using their proprietary streaming, synchronization, and authentication technology. Features include: Lossless audio transmission Multi-room, multi-zone, multi-user options Advanced Left/Right speaker configuration for stereo speakers Support for high-resolution audio (24bit/192kHz) New features and services delivered wirelessly Works over standard Wi-Fi, Ethernet, and Powerline networks For Android, iOS, Kindle Fire, and Windows PCs Just like Sonos and AirPlay, Play-Fi works over your home WiFi network. If you have spotty WiFi coverage in some rooms, this could be an issue. And you need to make sure your router is up to the task of streaming all that music simultaneously. Play-Fi support streaming the same source to up to eight devices simultaneously. Of the three, only Sonos offers the ability to create its own dedicated network by connecting one of your devices via hard-wire to your router. In this mode each Sonos device also operates as a wireless repeater, extending the range of the dedicated network and helping you overcome spotty WiFi issues. And, of course, Play-Fi comes with a bunch of music options from around the world.  The native app has support for Spotify, Pandora (enabled for select Play-Fi products only), Amazon Music, iHeartRadio, Deezer, Songza, Sirius XM, KKBox in Taiwan, QQ Music in China, and multiple others. They also support DLNA for access to content from your local network. And they're adding new sources all the time. Since the sources come from the control devices, the speakers don't need to be updated to support new ones as they come out. Doing a feature for feature comparison, Sonos and Play-Fi are fairly neck and neck, while AirPlay lacks a few capabilities they both offer. We already know Apple doesn't do Android, but AirPlay also only supports multi-zone streaming from an iTunes collection on a computer, not from your iPhone or iPad. AirPlay can't stream from multiple sources, and doesn't support left/right stereo pairing, while both of the others do. Play-Fi differentiates itself from both of the other options with support for High-Resolution (24bit/192kHz) files and a 5GHz Wi-Fi option for interference-free playback on most devices. What doesn't it do? WiSA gives you up to 7.1 surround sound, all wirelessly. Sonos provides a surround sound experience by pairing two Play:1 speakers for rear surround with a PlayBar sound bar for front L/C/R and a Sub to make it go boom. Not really a full surround sound experience, but absolutely better than a sound bar all by itself. Like AirPlay, Play-Fi does not have an option right now for wireless surround sound in your home theater. They have sound bar options from a few manufacturers, but nothing for the rear or side surrounds.   To be frank, this really surprised us when we started looking into the tech. We naturally assumed that a company best known for surround sound would use their wireless technology to enable that in your home theater. No such luck. There are even a couple receiver and processor options from Anthem that have native Play-Fi support. Just not for surround sound. You can use them to stream music to your home theater speakers, but only in stereo. Device Options Play-Fi has an impressive lineup of technology partners. Anthem offers two receivers and a pre/pro. There are speaker choices from Definitive Technology, MartinLogan, McIntosh, Paradigm, Phorus, Polk Audio, and Wren. Many of whom also offer a sound bar option or two. Other partners include certain Hewlett-Packard tablet models and Fusion Research who make the first multi-source server designed specifically for the custom installation market so you can integrate Play-Fi into your home automation system. They have partners announced with products to come in the future like Klipsch, Rotel, Dish Network, Acer, Arcam, SVS and more. Conclusion We aren't looking at another VHS vs Beta, Blu-ray vs HD-DVD format war for wireless audio protocols in your home theater just yet, but it could happen. Right now for whole-house audio, much like automation protocols, if there are enough devices, or more specifically the right devices to meet your needs, in the technology camp you select, you should be fine. With the relationships they already have from licensing surround sound technology, and the established expertise in audio, DTS should be able to build a solid ecosystem that only grows over time. They already have more options that just about any competing technology.

Predictions for 2016 Time for the HT Guys to look into our crystal ball and try and predict the HDTV and Home Theater landscape for 2016. Our crystal ball is never as clears as a good HDTV but we give it a shot nonetheless.   Ara: Competitor to Sling.com Sling.com was the first into this market but they won't be the last. Look for one of the major cable or sat providers (or even Apple) to offer competitor to sling.com. And if it's Apple look for local channels as a bonus.     UHD Blu-ray player will be available for less than $500 This one is simply a shot in the dark. Rumor has it that the first UHD Blu-ray players will go for more than $1,000. But lack of demand and memories of the whole Blu-ray/HD-DVD debacle will drive prices down. But don't expect to see this until Black Friday.   There will be a 100 inch 4K UHD with HDR and wide color gamut for less than $10,000 This is my shoot for the moon prediction. If this comes true, I may never upgrade my projector and opt for this solution instead! But realistically, this has about a 10% chance of coming to pass. But I like to dream!   Samsung will re-enter the OLED market This is kind of a gimmie. Samsung did have an OLED (KN55S9CAFXZA) but we haven't seen anything commercially available since. With the success of LG's OLED TVs Samsung won't be able to stay out of the market. We'll have a good idea if this is correct next week at CES.   Apple to stream Hi-Res Audio With so many music streaming platforms out there Apple will look for a way to differentiate itself. It already has the Mastered for iTunes program. Why not Apple Hi-Resolution? Also, look for more radio stations like Beats 1 in the higher resolution audio.    Braden: HDTV and VR mashup With the popularity of the Oculus Rift and the Growing investment by other firms such as Microsoft and their HoloLens, someone will produce video content that takes full advantage of the immersive experience of Virtual Reality. There are apps that allow you to watch movies on the Oculus Rift, but nothing (that I know of at least) that has been produced to provide a native 3D experience within a VR headset. probably nature footage, but it'll happen.   Somebody *will* get into the live TV streaming game, but still no locals Amazon, Apple, Google or Sony - one of them will offer native television streaming from their platform to match the service offering of SlingTV. So you'll either get an iTV app on your Apple TV, or a TV app on your FireTV, you get the picture. Once you pay your fee, you get access to everything on TV right now for a select set of cable channels. And maybe, if you're lucky, a national feed from the major broadcasters.   80” Televisions for under $2000 This is a carry-forward from last year; I think I was just one year too early. Both OLED and 4K will push prices down for 1080p TVs. Wanting to capitalize on the desire for a larger screen, Manufacturers will push prices down for the big 1080p sets to get them flying off the shelves. So the price for a starter series 80” TV will drop to under $2000 at some point this year. Maybe Black Friday, maybe for another event, but it'll drop.   Lightbulb speakers for Surround Sound The best way to get the height channel experience from sound formats like Dolby Atmos it to actually have them in the ceiling. The up-firing speakers that bounce sound off the ceiling are cool, just not quite as precise. It isn't always easy to cut holes and run wires to add speakers to your ceiling. Somebody will create a box, either an add-on for your amp, or built into the receiver itself, that lets you send audio from specific surround channels to specific bluetooth devices. Bluetooth light bulbs are a perfect fit.   Proliferation of Home Automation Glue Platforms/Hubs Apple is already working on making HomeKit the central hub that glues all your automation devices together, but it won't be the only one. Google will release one, maybe based on Nest/Thread, maybe not. Others will want into the game as well. The underlying idea? Any device, one platform. Buy any smart bulbs, locks, sensors, gadgets you want, regardless of the underlying protocol: Insteon, Z-Wave, ZigBee, WiFi, Bluetooth, etc. and plug them into your home. They become part of the system as if they all spoke the same language. Google Translate for Automation devices.  

Is Virtual Reality the Next Big Thing in Home Theater? Many of us are constantly on the lookout for the next big thing in Home Theater. When the HDTV revolution hit, we couldn't get enough. Then there was HD-DVD and Blu-ray, followed by a flop or two, like 3D. Right now it looks like it might be 4K HD. But what if 3D was just the precursor to the real next big thing, Virtual Reality. What is Virtual Reality? When you think Virtual Reality, you probably imagine yourself on the holodeck of the USS Enterprise, hanging out, perhaps, in the old west with Captain Picard. That's the idea, but we probably won't see that full implementation anytime soon. The wikipedia definition is: “a computer-simulated environment that can simulate physical presence in places in the real world or imagined worlds.” It's you, inside the movie or the game, playing or watching from within - and being an active participant. Current Technology A company called Oculus VR is building a VR mask you can wear, called the Oculus Rift. It resembles a black, blacked-out ViewMaster you strap to your head. Once you've strapped on your VR goggles, you're instantly transported into whatever world, time or place you can image. It's like 3D, if the 3D didn't stop at the edge of the screen. We haven't used the device ourselves, but have seen similar demonstrations at CES in the past, and it's pretty cool. Oculus VR is very focused on the gaming market, and that makes sense. It's really the only technology that could embrace Virtual Reality anytime soon. The vision is to let gamers feel like they're really driving the car, throwing the ball or carrying the gun through the battlefield. Imagine taking the microsoft Kinect technology to the next level. Instead of just having your body control the action you see on screen, your body controls the action you see all around you, the action you're right on the middle of. Another company, called Avegant, is building a wearable Virtual Reality headset that projects images directly onto your retina. At first this sounds painful, then scary, then super futuristic and cool. It's like beaming images directly into your brain. A technology like this requires very precise alignment, which is why most companies aren't pursuing it. But Avegant thinks they have it down. If they do, the visual experience will be unparalleled because the beamed image should cover your entire visual experience. Limitations Processing power is an issue for current Virtual Reality systems, and would prove to be very challenging if anyone tried to scale it to a large format like the holodeck. It takes a lot of CPU and graphics processing to produce what amounts to any potential view of any reality at any time. The computational decisions on what to render, and the graphics ability to render it in real-time are a big limiting factor in how pervasive VR can become, even for gaming. Like 3D for home theater, VR also suffers from physical side-effects like motion sickness and headaches. In the industry it is known as simulation sickness. Like motion sickness, it occurs when your brain and body don't agree on what's actually going on. You brain senses movement, but your body doesn't. This can lead to some serious queesyness. And of course, there's the issue of space. If you've played a Wii or used the XBox360 with Kinect, you know it's easy to run out of space pretty quickly. This isn't an issue if you happen to be driving a car or flying a plane, but if you're running through a battlefield, or across a football field - how do you run without really running? How do you get from here to there, when ‘there' is bigger than the room you're in? Applications for Home Theater When you imagine watching a movie as if you were in the film itself, it sounds amazing, until you start to look at the limitations. But there may be ways to introduce Virtual Reality concepts into home theater and make it work. It could be like what 3D should be - the movie is actually occurring all around you. Movement might be tricky, and there may be some scenes where placing the viewer would be tricky or awkward, but that's solvable. Imagine if, when a character walked onscreen, the actually walked right past you.  Or if something was going on to the left, or to the right, or above, you could turn your head to get a better view. There may be some movies that VR wouldn't be good for. It sounds cool for action films like Saving Private Ryan, but would you really want to be that close to the action? Sometimes viewing from a distance, as a removed observer, is the only way to reasonably experience something. Most of us wouldn't really want to storm the beach at Normandy and see the devastation that close. But for nature documentaries, like we see on Discovery or NatGeo, sitting in the middle of a pack of lions or walking inside an ant colony, it could be amazing. Sports could be fun in Virtual Reality as well.  The amount of cameras required to make it happen is probably unfeasible. But it would be great if you could move closer to a play on the football field. Or place yourself on second base to watch a baseball game. Do your own replay on something you saw and move around to get a better view. Or zoom closer to see it first hand. These are all things Oculus VR and Avegant are trying to enable for gaming, but maybe, in the future, we'll be able to apply them to home theater as well.

Welcome, and thank you for participating in the soft launch of the Arrow Pointing Down Podcast! This week, Ryan and Jeff ramble pointlessly over Skype about Gatorade, HD-DVD, GDC, and more!This show is part of the Spreaker Prime Network, if you are interested in advertising on this podcast, contact us at https://www.spreaker.com/show/5928697/advertisement