DVDs are Here For a While Longer

I keep seeing predictions of the demise of the DVD and Blueray disks. I am here to tell you it is bunk. CDs are a goner though.

So how do I rectify the two? Three little letters, DRM.

When I download a song from Amazon or iTunes I can move it to any player I have, no restrictions. This means that I can have it on my phone, regardless of manufacturer, on my Notebook, and on my multimedia center PC. I can also choose the interface I use to play that music, regardless of manufacturer or operating system. Because of this flexibility the reasons for maintaining physical copies is pretty much done for.

Actually, I had some music I purchased from iTunes back in 2006 that I lost the CD I had made to play it in my car. I went to iTunes, and there it was, waiting for me to download a fresh copy of my lost purchase. Try that with a CD.

The pricing of CDs have even made buying used a losing proposition.  Unless you are buying something not available as a download (Really? Pop Goes the World by Men Without Hats is not available for download?) you really don't save any money.  The one advantage of CDs is that you have something physical you can sell and get some of the money back, but if you look at it as a deposit on the music, you still are ahead on the downloads based on the paltry amounts they will give you for CDs these days.

Unfortunately videos are a completely different story.  Downloaded videos are so locked down that your ability to use them becomes severely compromised.  In reality you can only play downloaded video files on some of your devices, and certainly you are limited in which players you will view it.  So if I download Reckless Kelley from iTunes, I can watch it on my iPad, or in iTunes, but I can't import it into Plex, my main media player.  And so I am stuck.

This leaves you with two options.  You can buy the DVD (which takes time, but is the route I have chosen), or you can download it off of some of the free torrent sites.  Honestly, the pirated video is actually the most useful in that you can have it immediately and just move forward.  I buy the DVD, rip it to a format that my iPad is happy with and upload that to Plex.  It will often take several days to get the DVD, and then 3-6 hours to actually rip the files.  What a pain.  But by going this route I have the option of using the file as I see fit.

And that is the downfall of video downloads.  So long as they are hampered by DRM, pirating and DVD/BR disks will be around to stay.  Maybe that is how they want it, but it is a dumb model.  I just purchased a used DVD of Johnny English Reborn for $7.  With shipping it was $10. It cost me the same (or less) than a download, and if I wish, I could resell it and get most of that money back.

What the market demands is easy access to content on our choice of device and interface.  I'm willing to pay a fair price for that, but I must be able to use it where I see fit.  Until then don't get too worried about the immanent death of your videos on DVD or Blueray.

Oh, but CDs are a goner.  No doubt about that.

TED.com

I added TED to my video channels on my Plex media server, and have begun spending an inordinate amount of time watching these really nifty videos.

If you don't know what TED is, it stands for Technology, Education and Design.  Speakers who are influential within their respective spheres are asked to speak, and they are given a notoriously short 20 minutes to opine on their topic.  What ensues is like the modern day Cliff's Notes of just about any topic you care to mention.

For instance, one video is Neil MacGregor: 2600 years of history in one object, a fascinating look at the Cyrus Cylinder and how it's influence has come down through the past 2600 years, and will continue doing so well into the future.  It is something I never would have known about, but it was really interesting to stumble upon it.

Another interesting video is Susan Cain: The power of introverts.  This is a very interesting and insightful look into the value and marginalization of the introvert in modern society.  It made me want to go and unashamedly curl up with a book.

I guess that is what is great about TED.  You can stumble upon all kinds of interesting things from the humorous to the truly jaw-dropping.  No really.  They are actually classified that way.  Need a laugh, look it up.  In the mood to think, click on a fascinating one.  There really is something for everyone.

The best part is that TED doesn't take itself too seriously.  If you think it does, watch Lies, damned lies and statistics (about TEDTalks).  I love when people use statistics in unexpected ways!

Enjoy!

 

OSs and Going Forward

Despite my art background I have been a Windows guy most of the past 20 years. It has its shortcomings, but I know it and work well with it. I have been, due to work mostly, stuck in an XP world, and it is getting to be time to move forward. The problem with me moving forward is that I have to bring my extended family along, kicking and screaming.

I have found myself becoming somewhat computer agnostic over the past few years. First I started running my own web server, and settled on CentOS. I started with the GUI, but have become quite comfortable in VI and Pico. I now understand all the uber-geeks saying you have to command line if you REALLY want to run Linux. Even in my brief dabbling in Ubuntu, you need some familiarity with command line functions or you will be very limited and frustrated.

And there is the rub with Linux. No matter how ready for prime time it gets, it will always be, at it's core, command line centric. That means you either have to be a geek, have an IT department to support the deployment, or be cheap enough you are willing to mow your way though it. This is not the OS for family based tech support.

I have an iPad (on which I am writing this post), an iPhone, and two iPods. I love them all, and thought it was time to revisit OSX. I bought an old Mac Mini with the latest Snow Leopard installed and set it up as a media server with Plex.

I've been endlessly tinkering, and have come to some conclusions there and I am horribly frustrated with it. Really. A modern OS you can't change the OS font size? OK, there is a hack, but it doesn't work well because it isn't uniformly manifest, and the header bars don't resize, so anything over a couple of points bigger and it is a mess. This means as your resolution increases, your font size decreases to the point that on a 55" hd screen you have to be within 6 feet of the screen to have any hope of knowing what you are doing. You can go to a lower resolution, but that defeats the beautiful interface.

I also find myself having to click multiple times to do simple tasks that take one click in Windows such as closing a program. Why does clicking the red X not kill the program? Why do I have to control-click the item in the task bar and click "quit".   Doesn't it believe me? And why are the eject buttons right next to the network folders so that when you finally manage to add one it causes you to disconnect drives if you even stutter your finger on the trackpad while going over to select it?

I love Apple hardware. I genuinely believe they have the best hardware in the business, but OSX is a frustrating mess. If you don't think so, it is because you don't know any better or just have very different priorities than me in an OS.

So, it is back to Windows. I am eying Windows 8 very carefully and, while I have some significant concerns, I think it is the only real option going forward. Actually I can see me on a MacBook Air or Pro with Win 8 in the next 6 months or so. That has its own issues of an incompatible keyboard, but I think you may end up with the best of all worlds that way. I just hope Apple does a better job with their Windows drivers because I really don't like virtual machines. Dual boot is the only option, and too many things break when going down that road.

Here is hoping the next six months are good to both Apple and Microsoft.

It is May 25th. Do you know where your towel is?

If you were suckered by the title, then you probably already know what Towel Day is.

Keep yours with you.  Show the world you are a hoopy frood that really knows where their towel is. I've got mine!

Go HERE to find out more about Towel Day.

Ties: Essay 1

Being somewhat adjoined to ties for the better part of my life, I have learned many things that apparently have slipped what seems to be the majority of the tie wearing public's attention. As I am so opinionated on this, I can't help but think that I will have more to say on the topic, thus this is Essay 1.

That said, guys... figure out how long a tie should be and deal with it!

In as simple of terms as I can make it, here is what you should aim for. The bottom of your tie goes to a point. The corners of that point that meet the sides of the tie should be between the top and bottom of your belt when you are standing erect.

No. It is not acceptable to have three inches of shirt showing below your tie, no matter how keg-like your belly is. Likewise, it is inappropriate (though somewhat less egregiously so) to have it hanging down and covering your fly.

A tie that is tied too short or long expresses one of two things, ignorance or indifference. Neither of which are desirable qualities.

I promise, if you take the extra time the first few times you tie a new tie to get it just right, it will come easily from that point on. If you are wearing a tie it is because you care enough to dress up. Care enough to know how to dress up then.

'Nuff said... for now.

Memorial Day is coming. Are you ready?

I usually work Memorial Day, but we always take time to go to the cemetery and put flowers on family graves.

Over the last year I have gone pretty crazy with the family history stuff, and I found several dozen people who are my direct ancestors at our cemetery. One of my plans this Memorial Day is to take my children on a bit of a family history tour around the cemetery, and introduce them to a few of the people who made it so they could be here.

This actually isn't so hard once you have the information available. I took a map of the cemetery and put a highlight mark where each of the markers are, and it pretty much routs itself. The thing that is fun for the kids is having stories about these people. I am amazed at how much information is available about even mundane things about these people, and I want my children to know what sacrifices were made so they could live the cushy, techno-centric, freedom-loving life they enjoy.

Has it taken some time to pull it together? Sure it has. But the ability to give my children a sense of their place in history is well worth it.

So take some time and prepare for this Memorial Day. Don't just throw flowers at blocks in the ground. Make them real people so we really do remember them. Isn't that what Memorial Day is supposed to be?

A Rant About Sales Taxes & SST

I have nothing against sales tax. In many ways it is the most fair form of taxation we have. If you spend more, you pay more. It is (more or less) equitable.

To date sales taxes were collected based on the location of the store where the items were purchased. That is no longer the case. Now there is the "Simplified Sales Tax" which is supposed to cure all our ills.

'Cept it doesn't.

The theory is sound, but the practice is extreme. If you tax based on the location of the end user, you defeat the benefit of buying online because it levels the playing field.

Does this sound like one of those letters you get where it starts out, "In order to serve you better..."?

Let's take one of the more extreme examples of the lunacy this will impose as of July 1.

We mail brochures. In the past we paid sales tax at our local rate because we were the "end user". Now that it is based on the final location it changes everything.

You see, the mailers get printed and then sent to the mailing house. The mailing house puts the names on them and then ships them. Our clients then get these scrumptious little pieces of paper in the mail, and come running for our wares.

We are at X location, so we pay the tax at that rate. End of story.

Now it gets complicated. Oops. I mean "Streamlined".

Now if they go directly to the mailing house, and are then mailed directly, the individual customers become the points of taxation. This means that the taxes need to be calculated for every brochure that goes out based on the Zip+4 it went to. If you are sending 25,000 of these things, that means you have to figure out the Zip+4 for each of them, then calculate the tax rate for each of them, then calculate the taxes for each of them. You must then report the disposition of each Zip+4, and the amount taxed for each.

Look at Utah. One of the least populated states has over 400,000 Zip+4 routes. Is it even practical to figure out all that even with computers?

But it is done, and there will be no going back. The theory is sound. The execution is going to drive people to drink.

You can see if your state is on the hit list by going to http://streamlinedsalestax.org. I hope you have a good accountant on staff if you are in one of the 20 states that are going with SST!

SPAM & POPFile

About six months to a year ago my email traffic spiked to about 500 emails a day with around 98% SPAM. It made my account almost useless, but it was not an account I wanted to lose.

I initially tried filters (a miserable failure), and then gave Mailwasher a try. A good program, but I spent so much time working it, the advantages were almost lost.

In a frenzy of despair I finally came upon Bayesian filtering, and found POPFile to be a popular choice.

Within a day it was over 95% accurate and rising. After a week it was 98% and closing in on 99% accurate. Since December 23, 2003, I have classified 19,479 messages with an accuracy of 99.59%. It dropped a little bit lately as some of the more savvy Spammers are learning tricks to get through the filters. Even so, it is down to no more than a half a dozen a day.

The downside is minor yet worth noting. First, if you are expecting a message from someone who has never emailed you, be a bit paranoid and pay good attention to your mail for the next couple of days. Odds are it will end up in the SPAM folder the first couple of times.

Do not set your email up to empty your trash folder on exit. Every couple of days you will want to go through and check to make sure something didn't make it through. Usually they stand out like a sore thumb so it isn't hard, but you need to do it. If you don't you may lose a half dozen messages in a given month after it is well trained. It isn't bad if it is a newsgroup posting, but if it is your ebilling from your bank, you could have an issue.

All in all I would have to totally revamp my entire email account structure if it were not for POPFile. It still takes a while to download all the messages, but I don't have anywhere near the problem getting through them as I did.

Not only that, but it is free to!

Catch it at http://popfile.sourceforge.net/