Ciao.
But, it's quite difficult for one person to have an argument. It takes two to tango. I'll pass this dance, thank you.
Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
Steve Jobs Suggests Blu-ray Not Coming to Mac Anytime Soon
- Thread starter MacRumors
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
- Status
Ciao.
But, it's quite difficult for one person to have an argument. It takes two to tango. I'll pass this dance, thank you.
No, I just wanted one simple answer: Macs have and support DVD, thereby acknowledging optical drives, and their general use for data and video. Macs don't support BD, which does exactly that, but better. In light of that, why don't Macs support BD and be done with it?
Then I run into some asinine drivel that claims that "the internet" is a far more popular medium than BluRay, in every possible sense. In every possible sense.
I know, this is why I politely pointed out to you that you were rather rudely wasting our collective time with such meanderings. That you fully admit that, doesn't make it any less impolite.
Indeed, I noticed that was your premise (as wrong as it is) but more importantly irrelevant. How does that enter into the discussion on why DVDs are supported on Macs and BD isn't? Discussing youtube is beyond a waste of time, but feel free to start a topic about it somewhere.
No shifting goalposts, indeed not possible with a sentence like: "the internet" is a far more popular medium than BluRay, in every possible sense.
I'm saying that BD/DVD (pick one) is the indisputably most popular method of delivering professionally made content to viewers. Youtube doesn't even enter into that in any significant sense and purchasable downloads are only a fraction of BD sales.
Indeed in that very conceivable (and very real) way, "the internet" is a far less popular medium than Blu-ray.
Oh it's part of the internet, but just doesn't have anything to do with BD. For what it is, it sure is more popular to watch cats on Youtube than BD, but then again it is far more popular to watch movies on BD than through the internet. Thus, again, in that very conceivable (and very real) way, "the internet" is a far less popular medium than Blu-ray.
Yeah, I don't think I need to post a photo of the sky if some user claims it is brown with pink ribbons on it. Besides, the claim that the internet is a far more popular medium than BD in every conceivable way, does not need data to disprove. Just common sense. (which I provided in spades)
See, the first part is true: That the internet is without a doubt more popular medium in general than BD. It is, as you say not highly unreasonable. Now, add to that claim the qualifier; "in any conceivable way" and bingo, that claim is now completely unreasonable and patently wrong.
To distribute through sales a finished professionally made video product, with unlimited access and a hardcopy backup included (actually you can even skip the last two qualifiers, but they do deserve to be mentioned when discussing BD).
Does this mean that part of the BD licence restrictions explicitly prohibit the printing of any classical Three Stooges or Marx Brothers comedies? What about Mel Brooks or Jerry Lewis? Afterall, a lot of people would opine that they're "nonsense" too.
No, I am pointing out that things like Youtube are in no way shape or form in a direct competition with things like BD. Youtube is excellent for what it does and probably a fine business model for Google, and on the other hand BD is excellent for what it does and a fine business model for those who publish their material on BD.
I agree with all that, but I don't agree with the statement;*that the internet is a far more popular medium than Blu-ray, in any conceivable way. I also don't agree that the internet (downloads or streaming) and BD are in a zero-sum game. I think it is fairly obvious that they co-exist and cater to very different things.
These are very interesting thoughts and all, and I'm sure we don't disagree very much on the holistic issue. The holistic way of looking at things doesn't explain why Macs come with full DVD support and no BD support, despite there being a solid market for it and the fact that it is a trivial technological matter to achieve. That is unacceptable, especially from Apple, with the World's most Advanced Operating System.
Some say Flash is dead, and it very well may be or will be gone in 5 years, but I'd be very displeased (as would a whole lot of others) if Apple just didn't support it on the Macs today, by making the OS somehow completely incompatible with Flash.
Whatever, that post you are thinking of, didn't contain much of intention of comparison, just a statement that the internet was a more popular medium than BD, in every conceivable way. That was followed with a bunch of generic graphs and some nonsense about researchers and universities. Nowhere a comparison of anything, which would have been rather inappropriate anyway, since it doesn't explain the topic at hand. Namely, in light of Macs having a DVD support, why is there no BD support?
Don't expect people to interpret everything the same way you do and certainly don't expect people to respond very kindly to you when you ask them to substantiate with quantitative documentation, when they point out that some unsubstantiated piece of drivel is just that.
You probably don't realize how impolite that is (or at least surreal).
A. The earth is flat.
B. No it isn't, that's a stupid thing to say.
C. How can you say that's stupid, you don't substantiate your contrary position with quantitative documentation.
B. (rolls eyes)
Last edited:
Arrivederci.
Indeed. Especially, if nobody starts one.
But it only takes one to suelta salsa.
Cute guy...
But, why shouldn't Apple offer the *option* of BD to those who believe that it is the only high-definition format that is currently viable.
If BD is dead in five years, that means that Windows users have five years of true HD options available - and Apple users have to watch fuzzy upscaled 307K Pixel video.
Very true, and that's a big *if*. BD may well serve for the next decade. Makes no sense to declare something "dead" in the future, and ostensibly claiming that's the reason to refuse it today.
Additionally some have argued that it is somehow better to access downloaded movies if they are less than moderately popular, but seeing how convoluted and restricted licensing of movies is between countries, it is by far easier to simply order the movie one is interested on a BD/DVD instead of constantly getting an unfriendly "this video is not available in your country".
All BD/DVD are available in all countries, if one just orders them - plus one gets this nifty hardcopy backup of the movie and can lend it to friends as needed. Downloads are in reality quite a headache, while in a perfect world of infinite bandwidth, constant uptime and no licensing issues, downloads would be nice.
But then, there's more chance of peace on earth than that to happen.
That answer was known ~11 months and 5900 posts before you joined MR. Did you not perchance dutifully read the entire thread before you jumped in with your opinions?
To reiterate, there are allegedly provisions to the BD licensing which Apple leadership considers to be unreasonable and/or onerous and for which they are apparently unwilling to compromise and/or constrain the current or future capabilities and configuration of their cornerstone product, OS X.
Or in layman's terms, "Steve Jobs said that it is a Bag of Hurt" (tm).
Which you consider to be asinine, but haven't articulated why.
I suspect that it is because BD is high quality image & sound whereas the Internet rarely is so. However, the criteria wasn't quality but popularity, so the analogy of McDonald's burgers vs. Porterhouse Steak would seem to apply.
So, could you please explain exactly why you consider the original statement to be "asinine"? Claiming that it is obvious is inadequate.
Unfortunately, said "That" refers neither to an admission of being rude, nor an admission to meandering.
The facts are that this topic would simply not already be 6,000 posts long if not for many reasons...which includes exploration of tangential issues.
Oh, so is that is all that you were trying to say?
Would it be now inappropriate to be sarcastic to ask you why couldn't you have not "...rudely wasted everyone's time..." by simply being more clear by making this simple statement twenty paragraphs ago?
And to your point, after you've put on this "delivering professional content" caveat on your claim, I'm initially inclined to wholeheartedly agree with you...
...but after thinking about it for just a minute, I can't agree.
The reason because I recognized that I had incorrectly jumped to a conclusion that equated "professionally made content" to only movies, but the term "professionally made content" isn't just movies. It is a larger set which also encompasses other modalities, the biggest of which would be radio and Broadcast TV. And as per Nielson, the average US household views ~3 hours/day of TV ...that's a heck of a lot of DVDs per week.
Perhaps you should have narrowed your definition even further to just full length movies instead of all "professionally made content"?
I suggest this because there's a 2009 Nielson report which claims that their average US Household is already viewing ~30 minutes/day of TV (which is a 'professionally made content' source) via the Internet.
FWIW, since there's TV catalogs being sold on optical media, to exclude non-movies from your definition will require better DVD/BD sales data than is likely available to the public. This ratio of product type is an interesting tangential question in of itself.
Understood, but fundamentally, you've built the logic of your entire argument around having found an exception to a secondary claim. If the original claim has its "enthusiasm" language removed (the source of the secondary claim being the "in every conceivable way" addition), then the statement to refute is simply "The Internet is more popular than BD" and to that statement, you have utterly no successful counter.
Frankly, I ignored the secondary qualifier as merely being literary hyperbola.
Of course, it is your right to be a literalist, but while you might win by that sword here, in the long run, you'll die by that sword far more frequently, since this medium is fraught with the potential for miscommunication.
I understand what you're saying, but you've chosen to build a highly restrictive box which merely illustrates that while you found a niche exception, the original claimant was indeed correct for the other 95% of the use cases.
I agree that they cater to different segments. However, that doesn't somehow create a day that has more than 24 hours in it to be able to prevent the different forms of entertainment media to not be "slicing the pie".
Do keep in mind that the "technological" factors are explicitly being constrained by legalities. Perhaps it is simply not possible to be in compliance with the requested DRM restrictions and also remain the World's most Advanced Operating System?
*sigh* Due to your choice of a literalist posture, you've now died by your own sword.
-hh
Ah, thank you for defining irony.
Have you tried those with the lossy DVD tracks? You might be amazed, at least, with an adequate audio system. Movies are already overcompressed fake sound, or just speech, which is frickin' simple to transfer in almost any format. You think they bent a real wall to record what it sounds like in the Matrix? Hmm....Try watching "The Matrix", "Inception", "ALIEN", "X-Men", "Resident Evil" "Godzilla" or "The Dark Knight" HD audio soundtracks at loud volume levels, and you will definitely be amazed by the "natural" crystal-clear aural experience that only a lossless soundtrack can give you.
Speaking of being impolite, pedantic and patronizing, I think that pretty much sums up why I didn't give you much patience to begin with - you're full of it. While I actually have read every single post in this thread, not seeing an answer to my question that makes sense, I pose that question once again. However, in no way, shape or form, should I or anyone else be required to read every single post in the thread to participate in this discussion.
In fact, I noticed that many here who subscribe to your opinion or agenda have posted in this thread - evidently not having read more than a handful of posts - and you've not mentioned once to any of them that they should "dutifully read the entire thread before they jump in with their opinions". You, sir, should tone down the patronizing and the assumptions.
That's just empty tautology; i.e. Apple doesn't want so support BD, because Apple doesn't want to support BD. As has been demonstrated many times over in this thread (which I suggest you should dutifully read every post of) there is no technical contraint or compromise of the Mac OS involved by introducing BD support. In fact, Apple already implements similar technology in their own FairPlay DRM of movies and music. As for the reason that the Apple leadership considers BD licensing to be unreasonable and/or onerous doesn't appear credible in light of their support of their own equally unreasonable and/or onerous DRM licensing and the fact that no other similar company (even Microsoft) sees any particular problem with BD licensing.
Steve Jobs did say that, then the BD licensing was changed to something much more reasonable and easy to implement, and Jobs then claimed it was mafia-like. Seems to me he's just being difficult and doesn't want to take yes for an answer.
Steve Jobs said:
http://www.hardmac.com/news/2011/01/03/rumors-some-rumors
But looking at Apple's own restrictions, they are arguably even more draconic and even more non-competitive than BD licensing. In light of that, it seems Steve is has started to believe his own rhetoric, which in no way serves the customers of Apple. In other words, yes BD licensing is restrictive, so is DVD licensing and no less restricting is Apple's own licensing.
I have not perhaps been clear enough on that, but it is because Apple's own DRM is more restrictive than BD, since Apple's licensing is tied to individual accounts and follows the BD hardware restrictions to the letter as well.
Oh, so is that is all that you were trying to say?
Would it be now inappropriate to be sarcastic to ask you why couldn't you have not "...rudely wasted everyone's time..." by simply being more clear by making this simple statement twenty paragraphs ago?
I don't know why you think it serves your argument and bald faced agenda to act willfully obtuse, I wrote in the context of the nonsense Youtube tangent that "I was saying.." not "all that I was saying". My core point and indeed position is easily enough found (if you dutifully read the entire thread before you jumped in with your opinions) only a few pages back here.
Yeah, that would be too reasonable a reaction.
I never mentioned one word about broadcast TV or radio, but there's no argument that these are both more popular than anything else for distributing professionally created movies and TV shows. However, the ill-thought out hyperbole was about "the internet" being far more popular medium than BluRay, in every possible sense. If the argument had been broadcast TV is far more popular medium than BluRay, in every possible sense, well that's different and a reasonable claim. Does the popularity of broadcast TV mean optical media is dead? Or using the same logic, downloads are stone-dead (being even less popular than BD/DVD)? Of course not.
In respect to BD versus "the internet", no - see next paragraph.
If the argument had been: "the internet" being far more popular medium than BluRay, in every possible sense in the USA; again that's different and perhaps more reasonable. All this TV content you mention Americans watch on the internet ~30 minutes every day is "not available in your country" outside the USA. The world is bigger than the USA. Perhaps not to you or Apple, but Nielsen ratings of TV shows distributed through the internet inside the USA do not make "the internet" far more popular medium than BluRay, in every possible sense.
There's a difference between a "second claim" and a qualifier. E.g. "America is the most innovative country in the world and it has really beautiful nature" ... and; "America is the most innovative country in the world" ... and; "America is the most innovative country in the world, in every conceivable field".
First sentence is two claims, second contains only one claim (perhaps arguable, but within reason) and the third also only one claim, but with a qualifier that gives the claim further meaning. (equally absurd meaning as the one you're all up in arms about to defend).
I don't agree that this is being literalist, and would maintain that on a forum where the only means of communicating is through the written word, every written word is as important as the next - as is our ability to read, comprehend and parse the meaning. Granted this is sometimes difficult, but for anyone with even a fundamental grasp of the english language, it is easy enough to understand the meaning of the one sentence claim without having to be called literalist.
Anyway, since you choose to ignore some words (at your convenience) I don't see why we are having this discussion. I think we can agree to disagree on this, and leave it at that - I will not ignore words, just because they are obviously nonsense, the least I can do is read the things people write - even if I do not agree.
I almost agree with this, except I maintain it wasn't I who built the highly restrictive box, it was included in the original claim. Other than that I agree, in general terms the internet is much more popular medium than BD. Just not in every conceivable way. And that's the crux of my argument and perhaps why I can be bothered to reply to this, because in that niche BD has a viable economic model, it works and is popular. Perhaps it is just 5% as you suggest, but not even Macs can reach that popularity worldwide and everyone expects other machines to be able to interact with Macs. It is not unreasonable.
I'm actually not sure understand you correctly, so in order to reply to this, I would prefer if you could perhaps elaborate.
Perhaps, but perhaps not. I'm no expert in implementing the BD DRM, but I do know two things: The hardware part has already been implemented and is used on the software side by Mac OS for the iTS DRM (which is no less invasive than BD DRM) and that is one reason Apple has never mentioned, officially or off the record. So, a big big perhaps there. In other words, I find that to be unsubstantiated. But anything can be imagined as a reason, I suppose. I was just looking for a substantiated, logical reason for including DVD support and even Apple DRM support in Mac OS X, but not BD DRM support.
*sigh* that doesn't even make any sense. You're from Holland, right? (according to the location anyway) Now I claim that Holland is the best place in the world, for criminals.
Will you agree with that, ignoring the qualifier, interpreting my claim as flattering to Holland? Will you dispute it, and will you do so with quantitative documentation? Or will you just say that it is a nonsense claim and leave it at that?
Some things just don't need documentation. They are self-evident. (Holland is a wonderful country, btw!)
Last edited:
Actually the important difference is that BD has lossless 24-bit audio.
Movie soundtracks are mastered at 48kHz 24-bit, that's what's on the master and that's the best you get theatrically -- and on your Blu-Ray.
I have about 100 discs and rent 1-3 a week. Very few discs have a lossy soundtrack (DD 5.1) and if they do they're often very early releases (and more likely launch titles that used HDTV MPEG-2 transfers). There are a scant few releases that use uncompressed PCM, but the vast majority are lossless Dolby True HD or DTS HD-MA.
To see anything better than 48-24, you have to leave the realm of movies and go into music releases.
Not true. Apple still doesn't offer lossless songs on iTunes, but the alternative music sites have largely embraced FLAC, especially for multichannel and high-resolution music. HDTracks.com, for example. There have also been recent Blu-Ray music releases that also offer free FLAC downloads with a code in the package (Tom Petty and Rush, for example).
First, a lot of DD soundtracks are a very low bitrate. I think 384kbps is the lowest rate (for multichannel), most DVDs seem to max out at 512kbps. I think "Dolby Digital Plus" can go to 640kbps. This is why, before Blu-Ray, getting a DTS soundtrack on a DVD was a big deal, a feature that people often paid extra for. Because DTS sounds better and can go up to 1.4mbps bitrates.
Secondly, when it comes to a soundtrack that is intricately constructed, or something beautiful like a John Williams score or the 2001 soundtrack, well, we're back to the 128kbps MP3 comparisons and a 512kbps lossy version doesn't do full justice. 2001 in 1080p and lossless audio is soul-stirring (though ironically I think it's only 16-bit).
Worse, a lot of people leave their Dynamic Range Compression (DRC) on, I think it's the default setting on many devices, and that may be why you think movies are all over-compressed.
The newer lossless codecs (Dolby True HD and DTS HD-MA) allow you to output a "core" lossy track, so if you want to compare a lossy version versus the full blown lossess 24-bit, you can do it.
Over the last year or two, I've gotten into high res and multichannel music from all kinds of sources -- Vinyl, DVD-Audio, DVD-Video, Blu-Ray, SACD, downloads, even Quad vinyl and tapes. When you listen to music-only, in an environment and mindset to only listen to the music, it's clear that the stuff I have sourced from DVD-Video is very often the lowest quality material, sonically. Given the lossy, low-bitrate nature of Dolby Digital, it's no surprise. Sonically, it's not a good choice for quality. Not to bash it, it did the job for the DVD era, and sadly we're stuck with it in broadcast HDTV, but there's much better quality out there.
Last edited:
According to blu-raystats.com about 85% of known blu-ray releases have lossless audio. That was 85% of approximately 3200 titles, with about 1000 titles unaccounted for.
Also, DD+ isn't used on blu-ray as far as I'm aware... it's an optional codec and I think few players support it and I know of no discs encoded in it. DD+ if used, can go up to ... 1 or 1.5mbps. Most lossy blu-ray encodes use DD at 640k. There've been some that used a DTS codec, I think DTS-HC or something like that. HD DVD supported DD+ and vudu HDX downloads can as well.
Stolen from blu-ray.com:
Last edited:
But they were wrong about that. I defy you to compare the Dolby and DTS 5.1 tracks on any disc with both and identify the difference solely based on the codec used. Keep in mind that DTS is recorded 4db louder, and virtually all such tracks were mixed differently. Perception is everything for movie soundtracks.
I'm trying to remember, there were a couple discs where I preferred the Dolby due to odd mixing of the DTS. Still not the codec's fault.
Isn't that what I said? How exactly, do you take something like the Norah Jones SACD and compare it to the Matrix DVD? Sure, SACD sounds better, but around half of the movie experience is watching something, where your focus is not even on the audio. It's just not as important for that usage scenario. That's all I'm saying. People like to talk about lossless in movies as if DVD is obsolete, but half of them forget to even check if they are on the lossless track, or are using TV speakers....it's hilarious.
Don't get me wrong, I watch the BD over the DVD anyday. And I select the best codec each time I watch something. (unless there's some other factor like language) But even the video resolution is more important when watching a movie, and that's about the 3rd most important video issue.
I thought I allowed for that by pleading the case for the extraordinary examples (John Williams, 2001). Quite frankly I'm not that bummed out if I can't get a 7.1 lossless soundtrack on disposable garbage like MacGruber.
I know the Matrix had a cool (at the time) soundtrack but I'm not the one using it as the example. And I have to disagree that audio isn't important -- that's why we (the ones who care, the audiphiles/videophiles) got 5.1 setups in the first place. We aren't the ones listening through TV speakers. THX used to promote itself by saying that audio is half the experience. While I might argue with the actual ratio, it is an important part of the experience (at least to me). I think to de-emphasize it is an injustice to the Ben Burtts of the world and all those brilliant score composers (Williams, Goldsmith, et al). 2001 without the music is not the same movie. I'm sure we'll all agree to this when Star Wars hits Blu-Ray in a few months.
I've mentioned before to Linux2Mac that watching Battlestar Galactica in Blu-Ray was a treat, and having Bear McCreary's score in DTS HD-MA was an additional treat that enriched the experience over all the other viewing methods. (Bear is also one of my favorite up-and-comers). It added more than zero to the experience.
Last edited:
Behaviorally, it is often quite interesting to watch an animal's reaction to a mirror.
While Fairplay's DRM may be similarly "onerous", the difference from Apple's perspective is that they're essentially the jailer with the keys and not the prisoner in the cell. Thus, Apple has retained their freedom through this degree of control.
It seems that what you're really complaining about is that a corporate Exec isn't willing to lay down every last one of his cards on the table for the entire world (including his competitors) to see. That's not how Poker is played.
Which carries what implications? Would it be plausible to consider that perhaps one of Steve's cards is that he wants to try to promote Apple's Fairplay as a replacement DRM for BD? (FWIW, this is pure speculation on my part).
You've not ever previously noticed that internet discussions are often overwhelmingly Americanocentric?
Of course the ROW is larger than the USA; the Nielsen data was merely a reference of convenience, not a pedantic literalism of total comprehensiveness. As such, it was adequte to offer insight into consumer trends & behaviors...and the fact that some US-centric sources aren't available elsewhere in the ROW doesn't mean that local equivalents cannot exist.
My position is that if I want an audience to read my words, it is my responsisbily as the writer to be understood and not make the reader's job any harder than it really has to be.
If I fail to do this, I am functionally disrepecting the audience. And if I don't respect the audience to solicit their responses, then why am I bothering to engage with them in the first place?
It isn't a "convenience" element: it is a philosophy of seeking to understand the writer's intent even if his literal choice of words & phases failed to convey his intended message. Communication as a process has four steps (Idea-Encode-Medium-Decode-) where any step can cause a failure. The process only becomes more robust and reliable when it is purposefully fault-tolerant instead of intolerant.
This "pie-slice" was an abbreviated restatement. You had previously disagreed with my statement that the internet and BD are in a zero-sum game, and went on to say that they could co-exist since they catered to different things.
My point wasn't coexistance, but rather that both are forms of "entertainment" and since the demand is effectively finite (there's only 24 hours in a day for a human to sleep, eat, work, poop, be entertained, etc), the sum of all sources of supply actually consumed is invariably constrained because it cannot exceed 100% of demand.
Granted, this is a simplified view: there are longer term trends where we may very well be getting less sleep on average which then makes more time on the daily 24 clock for other slices of the pie (such as liesure). However, these longer term trends are glacially slow in comparison to transformative elements within segments such as due to technology. For example, fifty years ago, the entertainment slice was predominantly radio, but this then shifted with the advent of TV. Where did TV's time allocation portion come from? Did people suddenly had 2-3 extra hours of liesure per day, or was it straightforward canibalization of radio's slice of the pie? This, if someone watches an extra hour of BD, he's going to have not done something else to make that hour exist. This is where my "Zero Sum Pie Slice" statement was essentially coming from.
I'm sure that there's a logical reason, even if we don't personally agree with it. Afterall, a business isn't supposed to spurn opportunities to make a profit for its shareholders. All that we can really say for sure is that the full reason isn't known to the public...but given that CEO's aren't required to lay all of their playing cards on the table for all to see, we have no legitimate basis to complain about this.
...and on that note:
-hh
I'll take your word for it. Now can you stay on topic?
I'm sure they're happy with their own internal logic, but it demonstrates quite reasonably that invasive DRM is neither a problem for Mac OS X, nor is Apple against such a scheme. It also demonstrates that it has no effect on the OS, a reasonable person would conclude.
You are overanalyzing everything, from Steve Jobs to me. I'm only asking one thing (or complaining as you would spin it); namely, why do Macs support DVD and invasive and onerous DRM on the system level, but not BD? The optical drive is there, the DRM is there (certainly in hardware and something analogous in software).
When you don't understand Steve Jobs, it's not doing anyone a favor and pretending he's playing poker. I don't know what he thinks he is doing, but it isn't being strategic. The absence of BD support doesn't enter into any particular Apple strategy. Calling a spade a spade, I'd say Steve Jobs is showing all indication of a brainfart.
An honest question: why would Steve want that? If you could elaborate, that would be wonderful.
Yes, I have. Indeed many things are americano-centric. Like the aforementioned Youtube that just went head first into the video streaming market à la Apple and others. Only available in the USA. - Anyway since BD is a product without any borders, it is hardly reasonable to peg the discussion around what happens in the USA.
Seeing as streaming TV service like Hulu or whathaveyou in the USA doesn't exist in many other countries (in fact very few, perhaps Canada and a handful of others), it is hardly an adequate insight into consumer trends in other countries. I know of no service here in Europe that offers TV shows at-will through the internet. I guess the closest thing would be the limited streaming services from government channels and apparently BBC has a decent player for their own material.
I'm sorry, but the fact is that the service being offered in Europe is nothing like in the USA, so it is not possible to extrapolate. And that's just Europe, then there's Asia, Africa, Australia, S-America. Thinking you can extrapolate data from an US survey is just bonkers.
Very good, though I see it slightly differently - we don't have to do everything. Thus the allocation of the time comes naturally.
e.g. TV, internet, home video, movies (people still go see a movie in a theater), radio even.. to name a few; they all coexist, without problems.
Internet can't replace them all, nor should it have to. Broadcast has advantages that the internet can never have. So has physical media. So have movie theaters. So at our convenience, we use some of the time on the internet, but only for the hard-core basement dwellers is that the most convenient situation.
As a customer, I'd say I have the legitimate basis to complain about any and all shortcomings I see in a product. But I'm sure that's not what you meant. Surely, you complain when you feel short-changed or find a product lacking that you have paid good money for? Or do you honestly say to yourself,
"ah well, a business isn't supposed to spurn opportunities to make a profit for its shareholders and given that CEO's aren't required to lay all of their playing cards on the table for all to see, we have no legitimate basis to complain about this."
Anyway, I do agree with you on that there is probably some logical reason, but neither of us sees it.
Does the Mac support optical drives? Yes, all except the ultrathin notebook.
Does the Mac OS support DRM? Yes, quite onerous and draconian, invasive DRM.
Does the Mac hardware support HDCP? Yes, like a champ.
... so logically the Mac supports BD!
No. It doesn't. That fact bother me, but you are fine with not knowing why.
Very good, thanks for the lively discussion. Didn't get the toilet picture, but perhaps you were showing the neat patterns you have on toilets in Holland. I guess.
___
If Steve Jobs is playing poker, I'd prefer that he quit that and start delivering some Insanely Great™ Macs again, with top-of-the-line AV support on the World's most Advanced Operating System (before that description of the Mac OS becomes too ironic to bear)
Well, that's pretty much what I'm saying.
Do you ever feel lost amongst these giant posts??
Well, even though it takes an extra 90 seconds or so to set up, I actually enjoy watching commercial Blu-ray movies straight from disc on my 30" ACD via VLC on OSX... just because I can, because it allows others to use the other TV, and because Steve would rather I use iTunes.
Come to think of it, it's actually faster than using the home theater, because I don't see a single bit of extra garbage when I play it via VLC... no previews, no menu-locked anti-piracy warnings to suffer through, no extra menus to navigate - - just the beginning of the actual movie. Seems like it takes five minutes to reach the actual movie these days when you play it on a proper player. Maybe I'll time both ways and see.
Come to think of it, it's actually faster than using the home theater, because I don't see a single bit of extra garbage when I play it via VLC... no previews, no menu-locked anti-piracy warnings to suffer through, no extra menus to navigate - - just the beginning of the actual movie. Seems like it takes five minutes to reach the actual movie these days when you play it on a proper player. Maybe I'll time both ways and see.
Sadly this is true.
I do not understand why someone could be willing to pay more for movies with a much lesser picture and sound quality, carrying an even more restrictive DRM!
And if you live in a non-english speaking country you might also run into the movie aficionados' worst nightmare: Dubbed audio tracks!
iTS movies give you about 30% convenience-boost over BD, but only 50-70% picture and about 30-50% of Blu-Ray's sound quality.
While in the U.S. you still might save a buck or two with iTS, here in Europe you'll have to pay even MORE for this crippled fast food crap!!!
Isn't Apple all about the 'Total Customer Experience' and the way that they've gone about implementing that is through control, often through the vertical integration of their product?
This change in perspective is what makes this thought process incomplete:
As such, the issue as Apply may then see this is not that (BD's) DRM is "Bad", but rather that Apple is fine to have DRM so long as it is Apple's DRM. That's the vertical integration (and control) aspect.
From there, it is my speculation that a possibility is that Apple has considered proposing to the BD Standards Board for them to accept FairPlay (Apple's DRM product) as an alternative (or replacement?) for their in-house DRM product.
Let's not neglect to remember that BD is still tweaking BD's DRM and there's a cost incurred by that...it is in their interests to find a way to lower these expenses, and Apple would certainly want BD if it could be done on their terms (ie, with Apple's DRM system).
It bothers me too, but I also know that I'm not in a position to have the right to know: I'm not Apple's business partner, I'm merely a customer.
As a customer, I'd say I have the legitimate basis to complain about any and all shortcomings I see in a product. But I'm sure that's not what you meant. Surely, you complain when you feel short-changed or find a product lacking that you have paid good money for? Or do you honestly say to yourself,
"ah well, a business isn't supposed to spurn opportunities to make a profit for its shareholders and given that CEO's aren't required to lay all of their playing cards on the table for all to see, we have no legitimate basis to complain about this."
Anyway, I do agree with you on that there is probably some logical reason, but neither of us sees it.
Yes, there's a difference. As a customer, I have the right to complain about a poor product.
But as merely customer, I also recognize that I don't have the right to know all of the detailed reasons whys the manufacturer has chosen whatever particular set of trades that he chose for that product (or customer service).
For example, awhile back, I took my one car back to the dealership because of some rust on the body. The car was out of warranty so they weren't contractually obligated, but I figured that it wouldn't hurt to ask them to fix it for free, since considering that the car wasn't that old (IIRC, ~6 years), it was a disappointment to me that it was rusting at all. Not too surprisingly, they declined. Was I surprised? No. Was I upset? No (just modestly disappointed). Did I demand to have copies of their manufacturing records from when my car was made ~6 years earlier to see if Hans had messed up the galvanizing dip on my particular car? Of course not.
Even before I asked, I knew that my only real chance of getting the work done for free was if the Factory had issued a "Silent Recall", and this was the easiest way for me to test for that. Sure, there was also a remote possibility that the Dealership would pay for it out of their own pocket, but that's also a business decision for them to make, namely the speculative risk of spending some real & tangible money in the hopes that by improving my customer loyalty, the expense might provide a positive return in the TBD future through future business. Not surprisingly, they chose not to do this because from their perspective, I'm high risk (I don't have a long history of consistently giving that dealership profits)...and from my perspective, I not only don't blame them, but I probably would have made the same decision. Thus, I did not take the rejection personally, and I'll continue to give them business. And ditto for the Factory because my car was out of warranty.
Likewise. Insofar as the picture, having a copy of Wisdom of the Netherlands probably won't at all help, since you didn't recognize the pattern, nor the point.
-hh
- Status