Put the knife down and take a green herb, dude. (c) Ruffin Bailey 2001-2018

The TV was taken up by a show we'll say is shooting for viewers younger than me today, so I took a new DVD I'd received (at Burger King, no less) and popped it into the Vostro 1400. No dice. What does the "Web Help" button tell me?

DVD Playback Options for Windows
If you are running the Windows Vista Home Basic, Windows Vista Business, Windows Vista Enterprise, or Windows XP operating system on your computer, you might need to install a compatible DVD decoder (also known as a MPEG-2 decoder) before continuing with the following activities.

* Playing a DVD
* Playing a recorded TV show
* Playing video files that were encoded with the MPEG-2 codec (.mpeg, .mpg, and some .avi files)

To purchase a compatible DVD decoder, visit Plug-ins for Windows Media Player.

Nice. This nickel and diming drives me crazy. It's my fault for not having downloaded VLC yet, yet isn't this something that someone like Microsoft or someone like Dell should have fixed before the laptop hit my door? I'll assume the random Vista tax system is also why my integrated webcam can't utilize all the compression choices in ye olde DELL [sic] Webcam Center.

In any event, we have three options at the Plug-ins for Windows Media Player, which are just humourous enough to capture here. They are, in brief, two to pay $15 to watch movies or, number three, shell out for a more expensive version of Windows Vista. Sure, Apple had a little egg-on-face when they made some users pay $5 to use 802.11n a while back, but at least their freakin OS allows DVD players to play DVDs. Crazy idea, that. *sigh* Having just ridden on the train for about 20 hours over the last 36 and seeing everyone and their brother watching DVDs on laptops, I can't imagine how aggravated I'd've been if I'd tried to do the same with mine and no way to fix the issue.

Microsoft's "Web Help"/"Merciless Mercantilism" system options for watching DVDs:

1.) $14.99: CinePlayer DVD Decoder for Windows Vista. The description cracks me up. Emphasis mine. The description is what's on the plugins page at Microsoft. Wonder how much it costs to adverti... ur, helpfully suggest someone use your software on this page?

CinePlayer DVD Decoder for Windows Vista enables instant DVD playback within Windows Media Player and delivers cinema-quality performance for your Windows Vista-based computer. The Roxio CinePlayer DVD Decoder is noticeably superior to other DVD decoders and DVD software products, showing full frame rate video with no frame drops — all in amazing clarity and detail.

Noticeably, eh? Yeah, on my 15" screen, I bet so.

2.) $14.95: Cyberlink PowerDVD SE. Not quite as humorous a description, which I'll omit.

3.) Lots: Upgrade your edition of Windows Vista. Nice. Here's the description.

If you want to take Windows Vista to the next level, you can upgrade to either Windows Vista Home Premium or Windows Vista Ultimate. DVD playback capabilities are included along with many other features.

Such "other features" include...

Have more fun on your PC with three new premium games: Chess Titans, Mahjong Titans, and Inkball

Sign me up. For a Linux distribution. Wonder if any support my webcam? Just as importantly, how many Titans versions of games are available?

Well, Microsoft's no marketing genius. There's even the suggestion on a linked page that you "Buy a new PC" if you're considering upgrading Vista. Not exactly the obvious move from being unable to watch DVDs...

From Daring Fireball: More on the Amazon MP3 Store:

Amazon’s single pricing is based on track length. Songs that are more than seven minutes long cost $1.94, songs more than 14 minutes cost even more. This isn't necessarily a bad deal compared to iTunes — Apple makes many of these tracks album-only. E.g. Pink Floyd's 23-minute-long "Atom Heart Mother": $3.87 from Amazon, album-only from iTunes.

This does, however, put a real premium on some songs, doesn't it? Want to grab a bit more for a popular single? Release it exclusively as a 7:01 version... Wonder how Amazon cuts royalties on those? More importantly, if you want to sell competitively, you'd better keep it under 7. I've got a recording of Bob Langford on WPTF 680 AM talking about how you could tell the "good" DJs years ago because they'd play the "birdies" at the end of Clapton's Layla. This seems similar somehow.

Interesting also that Amazon sells albums as albums if the artists/labels choose without a la cart tracks.

In any event, the competition from Amazon is, all things considered, welcome, I believe, though perhaps less so from my position as an Apple shareholder. By showing the viability of DRM-less music sales to the music labels, Apple's opened the door to some serious iTunes Music Store competition for those willing to leave DRM behind. If you can get 256k mp3s for 89¢ compared to AACs for 99¢ (and $1.29 for DRM-less ones), why not? Won't Apple eventually have to budge a bit? Offer albums for artists that don't want to sell individual tracks? Offer, eg, twelve track albums at a significant savings ($7-8) like Amazon is in many cases? Etc. The market's several years behind Apple, but it's finally starting to free itself up a bit.

In some ways, we're simply arguing over who will have dogs in the digital music fight. Music labels are in. Mp3 player hardware manufacturers are in. Online stores are in. DRM coders (listening, Microsoft?) are on the way out.

And finally, is it that Apple really doesn't care so much about selling music? Though I find it surprising, at this point, I'm not sure how else to take Jobs' letter saying that DRM-less music sales are the way to go. DRM'd AAC lock you in to iPods, and Apple wants to sell iPods. If you can't take your library with you to another device, you're more likely to stick with what you've already got when you upgrade. So DRM'd AAC libraries would seem to lock you into iPods. DRM-less music removes at least one barrier to entry to entering the mp3 player [hardware] market. Is Apple confident they can win on the player front, no matter what? I guess, thinking as I type, they're more likely to continue winning the player market than the music sales market, and would like to ensure that the standard way of distributing tracks is iPod friendly, but when you're winning, why concede anything? Probably because you, ultimately, don't have a choice. If you want your player to play tracks you rip from CDs, unless you're going to DRM them mid-rip (hello, Microsoft Media Player and/or Sony's rootkit player fun. Those worked grrrr-eat!), you'll always have an open door for DRM-less trackige.

Blather blather.

title: Put the knife down and take a green herb, dude.	descrip: One feller's views on the state of everyday computer science & its application (and now, OTHER STUFF) who isn't rich enough to shell out for www.myfreakinfirst-andlast-name.com Using 89% of the same design the blog had in 2001.
FOR ENTERTAINMENT PURPOSES ONLY!!! Back-up your data and, when you bike, always wear white.
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Monday, October 22, 2007
$15 DVD Viewing Tax on Windows Home Basic The TV was taken up by a show we'll say is shooting for viewers younger than me today, so I took a new DVD I'd received (at Burger King, no less) and popped it into the Vostro 1400. No dice. What does the "Web Help" button tell me? DVD Playback Options for Windows If you are running the Windows Vista Home Basic, Windows Vista Business, Windows Vista Enterprise, or Windows XP operating system on your computer, you might need to install a compatible DVD decoder (also known as a MPEG-2 decoder) before continuing with the following activities. * Playing a DVD * Playing a recorded TV show * Playing video files that were encoded with the MPEG-2 codec (.mpeg, .mpg, and some .avi files) To purchase a compatible DVD decoder, visit Plug-ins for Windows Media Player. Nice. This nickel and diming drives me crazy. It's my fault for not having downloaded VLC yet, yet isn't this something that someone like Microsoft or someone like Dell should have fixed before the laptop hit my door? I'll assume the random Vista tax system is also why my integrated webcam can't utilize all the compression choices in ye olde DELL [sic] Webcam Center. In any event, we have three options at the Plug-ins for Windows Media Player, which are just humourous enough to capture here. They are, in brief, two to pay $15 to watch movies or, number three, shell out for a more expensive version of Windows Vista. Sure, Apple had a little egg-on-face when they made some users pay $5 to use 802.11n a while back, but at least their freakin OS allows DVD players to play DVDs. Crazy idea, that. sigh Having just ridden on the train for about 20 hours over the last 36 and seeing everyone and their brother watching DVDs on laptops, I can't imagine how aggravated I'd've been if I'd tried to do the same with mine and no way to fix the issue. Microsoft's "Web Help"/"Merciless Mercantilism" system options for watching DVDs: 1.) $14.99: CinePlayer DVD Decoder for Windows Vista. The description cracks me up. Emphasis mine. The description is what's on the plugins page at Microsoft. Wonder how much it costs to adverti... ur, helpfully suggest someone use your software on this page? CinePlayer DVD Decoder for Windows Vista enables instant DVD playback within Windows Media Player and delivers cinema-quality performance for your Windows Vista-based computer. The Roxio CinePlayer DVD Decoder is noticeably superior to other DVD decoders and DVD software products, showing full frame rate video with no frame drops — all in amazing clarity and detail. Noticeably, eh? Yeah, on my 15" screen, I bet so. 2.) $14.95: Cyberlink PowerDVD SE. Not quite as humorous a description, which I'll omit. 3.) Lots: Upgrade your edition of Windows Vista. Nice. Here's the description. If you want to take Windows Vista to the next level, you can upgrade to either Windows Vista Home Premium or Windows Vista Ultimate. DVD playback capabilities are included along with many other features. Such "other features" include... Have more fun on your PC with three new premium games: Chess Titans, Mahjong Titans, and Inkball Sign me up. For a Linux distribution. Wonder if any support my webcam? Just as importantly, how many Titans versions of games are available? Well, Microsoft's no marketing genius. There's even the suggestion on a linked page that you "Buy a new PC" if you're considering upgrading Vista. Not exactly the obvious move from being unable to watch DVDs... posted by ruffin at 10/22/2007 04:50:00 PM
0 comments
Thursday, October 18, 2007
If Piracy Cost < DRM Cost, Then !DRM EMI says DRM-free music is selling well: If EMI manages to maintain increased sales in its post-DRM world, though, Universal and Warner may in fact be tempted to drop the DRM sooner than later. I think the title of the post says it all, if slightly inaccurately. If the cost of using DRM is greater than the gains DRM provides by making piracy more difficult, welp, it's gone. I think most of us short of the music labels understood that pretty quickly, saying DRM wasn't very effective long-term. Now they've had a go and are slowly realizing playing DRM leapfrog with DRM crackers isn't worth the extra cash. As I've said, the iTunes Music Store makes it at least a dollar easier to find a song I want than, say, Limewire. I'll pay you a dollar to find a good, clean, non-virused copy for me, now 89¢ with Amazon's mp3 service. The big difference between me and others? I won't illegally share it. With the availability of DRM hacks, there really wasn't a method of keeping hard-core online traders from trading anyhow. I take that back. There is one more effective way, and that's to sue the creeee-ap out of people you bust, usually settling for tons out of court. I'm not sure how I feel about universities, since they are the best playground for these "traders" with lots of music consumers with tons of extra bandwidth, cooperating so fully with this new means of generating revenue/discouraging online trading. It's not a coincidence to me, however, that the big suits are going on at the same time that DRM-less distribution is picking up. posted by ruffin at 10/18/2007 01:51:00 PM
0 comments
Monday, October 15, 2007
mp3 pricing: The swee7 spot. From Daring Fireball: More on the Amazon MP3 Store: Amazon’s single pricing is based on track length. Songs that are more than seven minutes long cost $1.94, songs more than 14 minutes cost even more. This isn't necessarily a bad deal compared to iTunes — Apple makes many of these tracks album-only. E.g. Pink Floyd's 23-minute-long "Atom Heart Mother": $3.87 from Amazon, album-only from iTunes. This does, however, put a real premium on some songs, doesn't it? Want to grab a bit more for a popular single? Release it exclusively as a 7:01 version... Wonder how Amazon cuts royalties on those? More importantly, if you want to sell competitively, you'd better keep it under 7. I've got a recording of Bob Langford on WPTF 680 AM talking about how you could tell the "good" DJs years ago because they'd play the "birdies" at the end of Clapton's Layla. This seems similar somehow. Interesting also that Amazon sells albums as albums if the artists/labels choose without a la cart tracks. In any event, the competition from Amazon is, all things considered, welcome, I believe, though perhaps less so from my position as an Apple shareholder. By showing the viability of DRM-less music sales to the music labels, Apple's opened the door to some serious iTunes Music Store competition for those willing to leave DRM behind. If you can get 256k mp3s for 89¢ compared to AACs for 99¢ (and $1.29 for DRM-less ones), why not? Won't Apple eventually have to budge a bit? Offer albums for artists that don't want to sell individual tracks? Offer, eg, twelve track albums at a significant savings ($7-8) like Amazon is in many cases? Etc. The market's several years behind Apple, but it's finally starting to free itself up a bit. In some ways, we're simply arguing over who will have dogs in the digital music fight. Music labels are in. Mp3 player hardware manufacturers are in. Online stores are in. DRM coders (listening, Microsoft?) are on the way out. And finally, is it that Apple really doesn't care so much about selling music? Though I find it surprising, at this point, I'm not sure how else to take Jobs' letter saying that DRM-less music sales are the way to go. DRM'd AAC lock you in to iPods, and Apple wants to sell iPods. If you can't take your library with you to another device, you're more likely to stick with what you've already got when you upgrade. So DRM'd AAC libraries would seem to lock you into iPods. DRM-less music removes at least one barrier to entry to entering the mp3 player [hardware] market. Is Apple confident they can win on the player front, no matter what? I guess, thinking as I type, they're more likely to continue winning the player market than the music sales market, and would like to ensure that the standard way of distributing tracks is iPod friendly, but when you're winning, why concede anything? Probably because you, ultimately, don't have a choice. If you want your player to play tracks you rip from CDs, unless you're going to DRM them mid-rip (hello, Microsoft Media Player and/or Sony's rootkit player fun. Those worked grrrr-eat!), you'll always have an open door for DRM-less trackige. Blather blather. posted by ruffin at 10/15/2007 07:44:00 PM
0 comments
Thursday, October 11, 2007
Want DRM with that? From Gruber on "The New Zunes": I.e. DRM-free songs, including those you ripped yourself, will be wrapped with DRM when shared. Nice. Please take my Furthurnetted content and DRM it without reason and without asking when I share it with my friends. Brought to you by your good friends at Just Trying to Make a Buck, Bless My Hearts. In other news, I'm disappointed Microsoft ditched brown. Stick to your guns, men. Make brown k3wl. posted by ruffin at 10/11/2007 10:23:00 PM
0 comments
Monday, October 08, 2007
Nike+iPod is to Accurate as 10k is to 8.7k I'd felt a cold blast of "reality" running with my Nike+iPod setup, which told me my pace, which I knew was sorry, was over 10 minutes a mile. I knew I was out of shape, but that was PAINfully embarrassing. Well, after a week of no runs whatsoever, I got the bright idea of running in an official 10k race. Turns out my virtual reality was more virtual than I'd thought. After finishing the 10k, complete with in-race weaves and wanders, Steve Jobs and friends told me I'd only run 8.70k! That's a pretty serious screw-up. Yes, you can calibrate the Nike+iPod setup, which I'll be doing as soon as I can make it to a track, but this shatters, for me, the idea that for most runners Nike+iPod does a good enough job out of the box. It doesn't. Calibration is an absolute requirement, and it's a disservice that Nike+iPod doesn't require it as part of its setup. (My mile pace for the 10k was under 9 minutes, thank you very much. Not great, but -- thank heavens -- it's ego reassuring after believing I was chugging in at 10+.) posted by ruffin at 10/08/2007 06:22:00 PM
0 comments
Thursday, October 04, 2007
Use Dialup? Review of VTISP.com Okay folks, it's going to remain pretty quiet on my blogging front, enough so that I'm not even shelling out for "fast access" of any sort, but I should, in fairness, pimp VTISP.com as a great dialup provider for $3.95 a freakin month. Kinda puts PeoplePC and NetZero to shame, eh? Granted, you "only" get 150 hours a month, but at worst you just shell out another $4 for 150 more. I haven't run over yet. Most importantly, the customer service has been incredible. Though they only offer help via email (kinda a catch-22 there, admittedly, but hopefully you can scare up some WiFi), the replies I've gotten are in-depth, well-written, and quite helpful. At $4 a month, I'm not sure how they do it. Very impressive. If you use dialup or would like it while you're traveling, I hightly recommend that you make this your ISP. Labels: pimpige posted by ruffin at 10/04/2007 11:58:00 AM
0 comments