Hollywood Still Hasn’t Figured Out That You Can’t Win At The Takedown Whack-A-Mole Game
Brian Deagon writes in to point us to an article he's written up for Investor's Business Daily about Hollywood's latest attempts to deal with movies being available for unauthorized download at various online sites. Basically, the gist of the article is that movie studios are now starting to face what the recording industry faced a few years back. What's amazing though, is that they don't seem to have learned a single lesson from what happened back then. Specifically, they haven't realized that every time you smack down one site that's sharing videos, you've pretty much guaranteed that five others will pop up -- and many of them will be harder to track and harder to shut down than the original sites. If anything, that's the lesson that came out of the recording industry's attack on Napster -- but apparently the movie industry is going to have to discover that on its own as well. The article quotes various consultants and industry analysts suggesting that Hollywood needs to learn to embrace these trends, but so far, it seems like all they're doing is focusing so much on anti-piracy efforts that it makes it impossible to actually deliver a good product to customers.
(Via Techdirt.)
Breaking: Iran to release British hostages.
“President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said Wednesday that Iran would free the 15 detained British sailors and marines as a gift to the British people. He pardoned the sailors and announced they would be released following a news conference at which he pinned a medal on the chest of the Iranian coast guard commander who intercepted the sailors and marines in the northern Gulf on March 23.”
(Via Think Progress.)
BREAKING: 8-Core Mac Pro released by Apple
Its 8:46 am. The Apple Store went down at 7:30 am and just reappeared online with the announcement that Apple has now released their Dual Quad Core Processors for sale. Thats right - 8 cores in one tower.
Go to the apple store for more Mac Pro info.
From the site:
Meet the latest addition to the Mac Pro family: The world’s first 3.0GHz, 8-core Intel Xeon-based Mac Pro. Consider the bar officially raised.Eight cores or four
Opt for the 8-core Mac Pro and you get the power of two Quad-Core Intel Xeon “Clovertown” processors running at 3.0GHz. Or choose a quad-core Mac Pro featuring two Dual-Core Intel Xeon “Woodcrest” processors and decide how fast they fly: 2.0GHz, 2.66GHz, or 3.0GHz. At 3.0GHz, the quad-core Mac Pro runs up to 2x faster than the Power Mac G5 Quad.
Should Chimps Have Human Rights?
An anonymous reader writes "A Brazilian court has already issued a writ of habeas corpus in the name of a chimp. And now an Austrian court may well decide that a chimpanzee is a 'person' with what up until now have been called human rights." From the story in the Guardian/Observer: "He recognizes himself in the mirror, plays hide-and-seek and breaks into fits of giggles when tickled. He is also our closest evolutionary cousin. A group of world leading primatologists argue that this is proof enough that Hiasl, a 26-year-old chimpanzee, deserves to be treated like a human. In a test case in Austria, campaigners are seeking to ditch the 'species barrier' and have taken Hiasl's case to court. If Hiasl is granted human status — and the rights that go with it — it will signal a victory for other primate species and unleash a wave of similar cases."
(Via Slashdot.)
I'm not sure what I think of this.
How Can New Satellite Radio Merger Analysis Be ‘Independent’ When The NAB Paid For It?
Research firm, The Carmel Group, has come out with a new report that supposedly tries to show why having XM and Sirius merge would be bad for consumers. The group also put out a similar report back when DirecTV and EchoStar tried to merge -- and some credit that report with killing off that merger. What the report apparently tries to highlight is that as Sirius and XM competed with each other, they continually tried to one-up each other with new features and services -- thus suggesting that competition between the two was strong. Now, obviously, we feel that competition like this does drive innovation, but it brushes aside the fact that competition also comes from terrestrial radio, iPods and other forms of entertainment. The folks over at Orbitcast point out that they could just as easily create a report highlighting how terrestrial radio has changed as it competes with satellite radio as well. Still, the silliest thing about this "research" is that the press is reporting that this is an "independent" report -- despite being funded by the NAB. We've already covered some of the dirty tricks the NAB is pulling in trying to prevent the merger, but to call a report that they funded "independent" isn't exactly realistic. The group is squarely against the merger, though the stronger they come out against the merger, the weaker their argument is. If they really believe that satellite radio doesn't compete with terrestrial radio (who the NAB represents), then why are they so concerned about the merger? If it would really lead to higher prices for consumers and less service, wouldn't that be a good thing for terrestrial radio? It would mean that more people would stick with good old fashioned terrestrial radio rather than bailing for satellite radio.
(Via Techdirt.)
Daylight Saving Change Saved No Power
Brett writes "Results from energy companies are coming in, and the word is that moving Daylight Saving Time forward three weeks had no measurable impact on power consumption. The attempt by the US Congress to make it look like they were doing something about the energy crisis has been exposed as the waste it is. But the new DST is probably here to stay — letting the bill expire would mean re-patching a lot of systems again next year. So much for saving energy."
(Via Slashdot.)