9 Sep
2002
9 Sep
'02
8:41 a.m.
I gotta say that "functional" is a
relative term here. I won't argue
that "the producers" are pushing HARD for an inherently copy-unfriendly
format. However, if DVD weren't so very much easier to use, store,
ship, maintain, and produce -- let alone harder to ruin -- users,
vendors and rental shops would not be flocking to DVD. VHS cassettes &
players have always been a big, huge, clunky, temperamental-and-easily-
borked, slow-to-set-up PITA. DVD are none of those things.
No offense, but bull :-) My personal DVD player story involves the great
scourge known as Macrovision. I only own a 20" TV/VCR combination, which
means I have no choice but to connect the DVD player effectively "through"
the VCR. Thanks to Macrovision, the picture was then unviewable until I
got an additional $50 filter device.
Moreover, since Macrovision isn't compatible with a non-interlaced signal,
this means we get half the output lines we could get if we didn't have to
bother with that crap. (See
www-cse.stanford.edu/classes/cs201/projects-99-00/dmca-2k/macrovision.html
for a great explanation of how Macrovision works/sucks).
DVD is nice quality, yes, but the players are finicky, the technical issues
are legion, and the only reason I'm slowly converting at all is that my
beloved VHS tapes are starting to wear out and some just aren't carried on
videotape anymore. People have already discussed the other stuff that burns
my cookies like region encoding, so I'll just shut up for now. Anyway, the
marketroids behind DRM and likeminded cow patty policy should burn in hell
as far as I'm concerned.
--
----------------------------- personal page: http://www.armory.com/~spectre/ --
Cameron Kaiser, Point Loma Nazarene University * ckaiser(a)stockholm.ptloma.edu
-- They make a desert and call it peace. -- Tacitus ---------------------------