BunkBlog

Blu-Ray and HD-DVD disks will have DRM that is compatible. Isn’t that nice? Not that any DRM system has ever worked, but it’s great that they can find ways to funnel money into worthless technology that has the only end result the inconveniencing of their own customers. One piece of this technology, ROM Mark, is meant to stop the big pirates in Asia. Want to bet it won’t work?

The other piece is called BD+ and is geared to hindering attempts to crack the encryption technology shielding the content. Essentially, it allows the BDA to update the encryption scheme should the current technique be cracked. If a coder comes up with the Blu-ray equivalent of DeCSS, the BDA simply updates the format’s crypto engine on all future releases, limiting the volume of content that can be nabbed. Does that mean that the existing players will cease to work with newer movies? Hey, great way to punk your customers. Alternately, the system could force all DVD players to have an internet connection in order to have “updates” forced on them at the whim of the manufacturer or the MPAA. Um, yeah, good idea. How many people are ready to hook their television set to the internet?

Explain how it’s possible to protect things my eyes can see and my ears can hear from being copied in some way. Sure, you may be able to slow the adoption of technology that makes perfect copies. You won’t stop it. More importantly, the MP3 revolution has taught us one thing – people don’t care about perfect copies, just decent ones. Nobody can say an MP3 encoded at 160 kbps sounds just as good as the CD, but it’s good enough. Nobody can say that an XVID-encoded 1 gig video rip of a DVD looks as good as the original DVD, but it’s good enough.

So, why bother with DRM that won’t stop the big pirates in China, won’t stop people from making “good enough” copies at all, and just annoys the hell out of people who aren’t geeky enough to read the internet instructions on how to make those “good enough” copies? It’s an amazing waste of money, when the movie industry claims it’s low on cash. Ignore their record-setting box office numbers – if the MPAA says they’re hurting, those crocodile tears must be dealt with.

Went to see March of the Penguins with monkey boy today. Wow, what a fantastic film. I can’t believe the amount of time the crew must have spent on the scene during an Antarctic winter. Great views of the birds, especially close-ups of the fur-like feathers. Beautiful.

If you want to see a movie that is rated G and doesn’t involve talking animals, this is probably the only one that will come out this year.

This article neglects to mention facts contrary to this quote:

bq. “This (Foo Fighters) CD has a copy protection scheme that makes it totally useless to 30 million iPod owners,” wrote C. Anderson of Plano, Texas on Amazon.com’s customer review link.

You know, the fact that it takes about three minutes to break the copy protection on the latest Foo Fighters disk.

So, not only do they piss off millions of customers who can’t play their Foo Fighters in their iPods, they don’t actually stop the distribution of the music on the internet to begin with. What an amazingly savvy marketing move.

Adjectives on the typewriter
He moves his words like a prize fighter
The frenzied pace of the mind inside the cell

The man on the street might just as well
The man on the street might just as well
The man on the street might just as well be
Outside, outside the walls

But the steel eye, tight jaw
Out where you don’t hear the echoes and calls
Say it all, say it all
But the white paint, plastic saints
Say it all, say it all, say it all,
Say somebody’s got to say it all
Say it all, say it all, say it all
I said somebody has got to say it all

My heart can’t forget about this self-defense
I’m so nervous, I’m so tense
I thumb the cool blade but I know this can’t last
And the air is so hot and my breath comes fast
I thumb the cool blade but I know this can’t last
Outside, outside the walls

But the steel eye, tight jaw
Say it all, say it all
Out where you don’t hear the echoes and calls
Say it all, say it all, say it all,
Somebody’s got to say it all Say it all, say it all, say it all
But the white paint, plastic saints
Say somebody’s got to say it all

Conversation between father and son:

Son: Could you super glue this back together?

Dad: No.

S: But I want it back together.

D: Did I tell you that if you bashed your toys together they would break?

S: Yes.

D: Did you bash your toys together after I told you not to?

S: Yes.

D: Did they break?

S: Yes.

D: There ya go.

Someone sent me a package. I’m pretty sure it’s not something I ordered, but when I check the tracking information, it gets weird.

If you click that image and check it out carefully, you’ll see the origin of the package (Santa Rosa, CA) and then you’ll see its travels on its way to San Angelo, TX. Although it’s silly, I’ve grown accustomed to the “everything UPS has to go through Dallas” thing, so that detour was expected. The detour to Cerritos, CA and then back to the Bay Area before shipping it to Texas is a new one though.

Another interesting thing: The package left Santa Rosa on the 13th of June, went to Cerritos on the 15th of June, and then went to San Pablo on the 21st of July. Was it taking a vacation in Southern California? This is very odd.

I guess I’ll find out tomorrow, when I finally get the package. The UPS automated system won’t let you schedule a time to go pick the blasted thing up until they have made the three tries at the door thing first. What makes this amusing is they repeatedly attempt delivery at the same time every day. Most people are at work at 11 am, right? Do you think that if I’m not home at 11 am on Wednesday, not home at 11 am on Thursday, maybe I’ll be home on Friday? Nope, that isn’t very rational. But, when I call the number listed to “prevent your package from being returned to sender” the only option I am given is to listen to where the stupid thing IS, with no option to stop them from another fruitless delivery attempt on the morrow. *sigh* I hate stupid people.

The trailer for the upcoming movie V for Vendetta is pretty cool. Looks like a decent attempt at adapting the graphic novel, although Alan Moore publicly disavows any association with the movie, even telling the Wachowski Brothers to not use his name in any way related to the film. I guess “League of Extraordinary Gentlemen” really soured him on Hollywood.

We got a MiniDV camcorder for our recent vacation – the best thing about MiniDV over older analog camcorders is the ease with which you can dump the video to a computer for editing, without losing video quality in the transfer. Strangely, I’d assumed the transfer would be faster than 1:1 – maybe it’s just my camera, but maybe I’m just hoping for more than is commonly available.

I’ve got one clip built for the eventual DVD, but it’s the clip from after we came home – Independence Day fireworks at the lake. Added some cool songs to the soundtrack, without obliterating the booms from across the water.

Now, to tackle the hard part – Disneyland. It’s a world of laughter a world of . . . well, it’s not a small video, after all.

I pre-ordered the new Foo Fighters double CD set when it was first listed on Amazon over a month ago, and it showed up today. Wanting to listen to it on my Rio Karma, since that’s what I usually listen to, I tried to rip the CD. It wouldn’t rip because it’s been “protected” by Sunncomm’s digital restrictions. About five minutes later, I found exactly what to do to rip the CDs that I paid for so I can listen to them.

Of course, it’s faster to just go to Usenet and download them after someone else has gone through the trouble of reconfiguring their system to use their own music on their own computer, and then shared it illegally with the world. Interesting that it’s faster and easier to do the wrong thing than it is to exercise the fair use rights that I’m told are mine by legal precedents and Constitutional lawyers. Great.

Oh, and did I mention that the copy protection didn’t protect it from being copied? Just want to make that perfectly clear.

I finished archiving my digital music onto DVD (replacing the dozens of CDs I’ve got lying around). It took up fifteen DVD-ROMs, all 12339 tracks. As of this afternoon, I’ve got 12782 tracks on my hard drive, since I found a 12-disk set of Sinatra songs and a few other albums that seemed like I might like ’em.

Now to teach the woman how not to delete 3000 tracks from my Karma to add 150. Geez. Took me two hours to refill the darned thing.

The semi-return of the Friday Five.

1. How far do you currently live from the place where you were born?
About 5000 miles.

2. How many times have you moved in your life?
18

3. What was the shortest move, in terms of distance? The longest?
Shortest was probably moving from the apartment to the house in Sierra Vista. We just cut through a parking lot and drove half a block. Easy. The longest was moving from Korea back to Texas – almost 7000 miles.

4. Have you ever moved for school? Love? Work?
Sure.

5. Did your family ever move when you were a child? How did that make you feel? (either moving or not moving)
Where do you think the first ten moves came from? Didn’t particularly like moving, especially the “new kid” syndrome at school.

Nine Inch Nails Drop Out Of MTV Movie Awards Over Bush Dispute

bq. “While we respect Nine Inch Nails’ point of view, we were uncomfortable with their performance being built around a partisan political statement. When we discussed our discomfort with the band, their choice was to unfortunately pull out of the Movie Awards.”

What I find amazing about this is that MTV can, without any hint of irony, refer to a simple photograph of the President of this country as “a partisan political statement.” What does that say about the bizarre extremism that has gripped our public speech, when a photo of our leader is considered partisan?

Trent Reznor made this post on his site, NIN:

bq. Nine Inch Nails will not be performing at the MTV Movie Awards as previously announced. We were set to perform ‘The Hand That Feeds’ with an unmolested, straightforward image of George W. Bush as the backdrop. Apparently, the image of our president is as offensive to MTV as it is to me. See you on tour this fall when we return to play in America.

I guess MTV doesn’t trust their viewers to have opinions that aren’t spoonfed to them. If it’s not approved by AOL Time Warner Viacom Twentieth Century Paramount, it’s not a viable point of view. And, more importantly, the American people are apparently so stupid that they can’t decide what parts of a performance to pay attention to and which to ignore. I’m sure there are plenty of Republicans who like NIN, just as there are a number of Democrats who do. Who freakin’ cares what political party you belong to when you’re watching the MTV Video Music Awards escapes me, though.

Because Jenn tagged me and I’m a sheep…

Total books owned:
Somewhere upwards of 300, but I’m not counting them!

Last book purchased:
V for Vendetta (if non-comic book, Year’s Best SF 9)

Five books that mean a lot to you:
Ender’s Game
The Long Run
Foundation Trilogy
Lolita
Ape and Essence

Tag five others who you’d be interested in having do this meme:
Mike
Lysa
That’s all the people I want to torture. 🙂

Fox News Alert! Bizarre Sex Habits of The Extreme Right-Wing

Radical anti-abortionist assists in killing doctors, and admits to past beastiality. Also, hints at past gay sex. Oh, the hypocrisy! The humanity!

Hehe

Court has ruled against the broadcast flag, making many pieces of hardware legal again. Yay!

Once again, the challenge is to identify the lyrices without resorting to Google. Anyone?

Yo, I used to check out lyrics upon the format
Build with skill with technique. Computer A-DAT

My lyrical form is clouds on your brainstorm
I get hyped think thought flow. Acrobat, sink the track, pump the track

Dance missions,clubs like spores react by. Strong visions
And hurrying more. Reflects on the dancefloor

Flow it up and having now people showing up
Packing crowds jam packed venues
Needles collapse, while atmosphere continues

Sprinkle that,
Winnin’ like that, movin’like that, hittin’ like that
The melody is phat

Yeah, I’m on the energy source
The cosmic force

Remember that song stuck in my head?

That was (Even) More Human Than Human by the X-Ecutioners. Don’t you hate when songs get lodged in your brain like that?

Who can name it without resorting to Google?

I am the planet
The monster
Anti martyr
The balance of human
Constant fire starter
Pry apart your soul
Find the footprints
All of a sudden touch the button
Crash course and yesterdays out
The mathematics class until the last chapters mastered
Smile for the star wars one where the wild things are that hide from the sun
I am the truth – aint buried in your head
The proof you pretended to carry ‘til the end
Barely alive, but nowhere near dead
I’m still standing here instead
More than a fistful of issues, more than a misfired pistol
Click – click
My heart ticks
More human than human, more sicker than sick

Chorus: More human than human (3x)
(More human than human, more sicker than sick)
repeat

I am the nightmare
Right where the soldier over stands warfare
Caught in the crosshair
The moment when focus becomes more than what’s noticed by the starving locust
Burning of the pride
Turning of the tide
Searching through the fight
Snuck in with the shadow that broke that castle
Let’s take the cell
Let hell out of the capsule
I am the hunted that stalks my aggressor
I am neurosis
I am the measurements used when its time to choose which tools are proper for the opportunity to break it loose
When it breaks it’ll all come together now
Armageddon – just a change in the weather now
I am the one – I’ve come to let the pressure out
More human than human so you can feel better now

If anyone was thinking to themselves, “what would Gary like for an extravagent birthday present” – have I got the gift for you. The Virginia Edition by Robert A. Heinlein will be sold only as a 46-volume set, in a limited edition of 5000 copies. All for a mere $2500 – and, if you act now, you can get it for a 300 dollar discount. That’s right, $2200 for 46 volumes of RAH goodness. Just perfect for your favorite SciFi Geek (hint). 🙂

Rented Ray on Friday, finally got around to watching it last night. Great movie. I really liked the saturated look of the flashback scenes – interesting effect. I wonder if Ray Charles was really tormented by the nightmares as they showed, though. Can’t really ask him now.

The demons that possess many tremendously talented people still don’t stop them from producing fantastic work. And yet, many other people are tormented by the same demons and produce nothing of value. Guess correlation is not causation.

Yeah, I know it’s not deep. I’m tired. Daylight Savings Time is like a week of jet lag. And, of course, my job is so exciting I can barely keep up. 😐