Budget-less

Well, due to unforseen circumstances, I didn't make it to question period today, so I can't impart inside knowledge of the budget. Sorry to anyone looking forward to it. However, I did get to experience ESLs and FSLs debating changes to the student loan program in their second language (yes, all three of them spoke in their non-native languages... odd and frustrating). I can see why our government is so efficient. :S

On the brighter side, I got to see a tourist from BC whine about the Queen to a tour guide at the Supreme Court. Nice building, though.

Actually, despite my sarcasm, the trip to Ottawa has been great! And, since dusk has fallen long ago in our nation's capital, it's time for this blogger to hit the sack. Bon soir & good night.

Obscure film of the {timeframe}

I'd never heard of the The Canterville Ghost before it showed up on my doorstep in a care package. But I'm glad that I was able to share a light-hearted experience with Patrick Stewart and Neve Campbell. As a made-for-tv movie, it was a little coy, a little cliché, a little fast paced. But, the story definitely carried it through. Campbell's acting was acceptable, although she looked a little older than the 16 years of her character; Stewarts acting, of course, was amazing, although he'll always be Picard to me. Sorry Patrick - I have to imagine all of your non-Trek movies to be one of Picard's holodeck adventures so I don't suspend my disbelief.

Now, on to the story, which I said before, was great. It's based off of a short story by Oscar Wilde, so that probably explains it right there. Basically, an American family moves to Canterville Hall, a haunted castle in England, due to the father's research grant. It turns out to be haunted by the ghost of Sir Simon, Stewarts' character. The ghost tries to scare the family off, but the father is unflappable, since he's a genius physicist. Of course, he blames all the ghostly effects on his daughter Virginia, Campbell's character, and threatens to send her back State-side. After she falls in love with a local Lord. Oh no. So, basically, Simon offers to help her make her father believe, and Virginia offers to try to help him find peace.

And more stuff happens that you have to watch the film to find out about.

So there :P

Distributed Video Distribution

Video piracy is rampant. This is obvious. The video industry is losing money (even if you don't think they deserve it). This is obvious. The video industry needs to adapt to meet these new challenges. This is obvious. What's not obvious, is how they should do this, and how profitable they will be doing it.

I'd like to recommend that the video industry cease attacking pirates with litigation and legislation, and start learning a lesson from them: the lesson of distributed distribution. BitTorrent, the latest in a string of peer-to-peer electronic distribution systems, is more than capable of handling the load. A quick glance at pirate websites will see that the popularity is there. Thousands of television programs and movies are being downloaded every day.

Am I the only one who sees a market here?

Why don't video distribution companies leverage this? There's a low fixed cost, especially since most video is digitized at some point any way. There's a low variable cost, since BitTorrent users pay for their own distribution channel: internet access. A video distribution company who had the foresight to release high-quality digital copies of their content could destroy piracy of their content and increase their revenue in one fell stroke. Destroying piracy, that's easy to see. But how would they increase revenue? Well, they're not getting any revenue from downloaded copies anyway. So, release their copies with advertisements embedded in them. Or even, if they want to be less obstructive, on the website where you download the original .torrent file.

Now, at this point, a couple questions arise. 1) Why wouldn't people just skip over the ads? 2) Why wouldn't pirates strip the ads? and 3) Why wouldn't this distribution network cannibalize traditional television? Now, hopefully, some good answers will arise.

1) Apathy and the state of computer video viewers answer this quite nicely. Most people are so attuned to ignoring ads on television, I believe they'd just ignore them on their computers too. In addition, video software commonly available is not always easy to skip frames easily, due to user interface design. Sure, some people will skip the ads - but some people channel surf during ads too. I really don't think it's a big issue.

2) To answer the second question, we have to ask ourselves: what do pirates gain from distributing illicit media. Notoriety, "street cred", personal glory? What glory is their to be had in stripping ads from free video files? Right now, there's a certain romance to being a pirate, because you're "sticking it to the man," because you're doing something dangerous. Where's the danger in stripping ads? People will only flock to the stripped copies if it becomes easier to obtain them than the legit copies. To combat this, simple: make it easy for people to download legitimate copies by providing constant seeds, no registration requirements, on-time-release, etc.

3) I have no good answer for this. Yes, it might cannibalize it. That's unavoidable. But, TV marketshare and mindshare is already being eroded by piracy. Instead, video companies should work to realize the benefits of metrics cheaper, and possibly accurate, than Nielsen ratings, cheaper distribution, reduced oligopolistic tendencies of distributors, etc.

What's stopping them other than a rigid mindset? As a consumer, I'd be delighted to have greater access to on-demand content, without being tied to new, expensive hardware and poor service providers. Heck, I may even start watching the ads :)

Grilled Cheese Sandwiches

Grilled Cheese. Comfort food for some, staple for some, source of income for the lucky few. But, how does one acquire such an item? Yes, you could go to your local restaurant and order one. But, there's a certain satisfaction (and cost-saving) in making your own. So here's how:

Ingredients:
2 slices bread
4 half cm slices cheese
margarine

Butter both sides of both slices to taste. Brown one side of each on frying pan, George Foreman, or blow-torch. Place slices of cheese on browned side of one slice, cover with browned side of other slice. Brown remaining (outer) sides. Eat.

My tool of choice is the Foreman, and I use cheddar or marble cheese (medium or old, depending on how long I've had it).

Now, you too can be comforted, fed, or start a get-rich-quick scheme of your own. If you do get rich from this information, good for you, bad on society. Send me a percentage.

Pre-budget Post

Tomorrow at approximately 4:00PM EST, the Canadian Department of Finance will be releasing the 2005 Budget. This should be fun for the following reasons:

I'm a fiscal conservative, while the Canadian Government is historically... shall we say... not?

I'm a business student, so I should be able to actually understand the numbers ;)

I'll be attending Question Period on Friday

Personally, I'm looking forward to taking a good hard look at it. Let me know if you want to hear my thoughts on it, as opposed to whatever sources you get your political news from usually.

Our Friend NASA

In previous debates, the American space program has come up repeatedly as an example of bloated government, poor management practices, and basically a waste of taxpayer money. While some of these points may be true, NASA has indeed had an effect on our daily lives.

NASAsolutions is a site that details some of the day-to-day 2nd round benefits of the Space program. Yes, private space research is probably more cost effective. Yes, these products could've been developed cheaper privately. However, the fact is that space research was until recently, public only, and we should be glad we have these products, even if the American taxpayer overpaid for them.

Examples:

• Home Insulation


• Smoke Detectors


• Cool laser heart surgery


• Sports helmet padding


• Satellites

If you sit down and actually flip through the site, I think it'll be much harder for you to argue that NASA has no effect on your life, and that it was a complete waste of money.

Obscure song of the {timeframe}

Here's a song that should've, in my opinion, launched the career of a singer. "Tell Me" by Taylor. Made available on the by the Popnuvo label in early 2001, I found her lyrics touching and incisive. My favourite is the chorus:

"Never would have thought it so, never would have guessed that we had fallen out of love.
When we look the other way, when we turn our back to the truth, we're ok.
Still there's something on my mind, something I don't understand, so tell me once again."

It's available in two flavours: acoustic and pop. The former is my favourite, although the latter features an interesting rap section by one of Popnuvo's other artists from the time.

Since it was made available free as a demo song, if you want a copy, let me know. If you're from Popnuvo, or are Taylor yourself, and want to talk to me about this post, well, you know how to get ahold of me :)

Stereo

It was recently suggested to me that an expensive stereo was stereotypical (ha ha) of post-secondary students. And yet, I have never seen this for myself. Granted, mine was probably expensive new, but I'm not sure what it's worth now (Yes, for all you would-be house thieves, it's so old that it actually has phono-in with a built-in preamp. Not exactly what's hot on the market.) Maybe I'm a snob, but I've never seen (outside of the DJ-ing crew) a stereo more complicated than a standard 5.1 computer speaker system, with the subwoofer being little more than a old-style mid-range)

Far be it from me to pine for the days of analog stereo equipment, for the days where vinyl was the medium of choice, and cassettes were still called reel-to-reel, but to me the above is a a bit of a sad comment on the state of the modern ear. Not only can one argue that music is becoming increasingly formulaic, but entry-level stereos are increasingly designed for form (as seen by flat speakers with little-to-no sound depth) and for cost. I can see why those two are important in a fashion- and cost-conscious society. But, is not quality also important? What about quantitative aspects such as distortion, frequency reproduction and fidelity? Or qualitative aspects such as sound colour and depth?

What are your thoughts? What do you listen on? Am I just being a snob?