Network neturality is one of those topics that helps the individual by not creating artificial (i.e. greed-based) mechanisms that impede access to all network participants, and thus hurt corporations. As a result, look for this principle to fall by the wayside during the upcoming rewrite of the nation’s telecommunications laws.
I’m finally ready. I spent some time looking back, shocked to see I’ve seen almost 100 movies in all of 2005. When you think about it, a movie every 3.65 days is pretty damn frequent. And double-damn to B-dawg, who beat me to this by three weeks.
And lest you think this was easy, the following also merited consideraiton on the list.
The first of the Chronicles of Narnia adaptions was, much to my shock, a really well-done movie. It captured the same spirit and feel of the book without being either overbearing (something easy to do in an adaptation of these books) or superficial. The Station Agent was a curious piece of work, with an offbeat pacing and an ending that was a surprise in a world awash with movies where you can see what’s coming a mile down the track. Serenity is one that won’t make too many top 10 lists, but as a fan of the series FireFly it was a wonderful feeling to get closure on a TV series that tragically ended prematurely. Shaun of the Dead was a hillariously frightening take on the zombie theme, while Shaolin Soccer provided yet another take on the crazy-martial-arts-in-stylized-action genre, like Kung Fu Hustle. With soccer. Really, how could you go wrong?
I still find Natalie Portman adorable, which has as much to do with two of the movies considered as anything else. And Collateral was just a fun revenge flick with a whole host of violence that takes place south of the border, with Denzel Washington’s character finding his own form of redemption in the end. And while the latest Star Wars installment was the best out of Episodes 1 – 3, it paled in comparison to many of the good movies that I saw in 2005. Truthfully I only mention it because B-Dawg reminded me it came out in 2005. If you’re looking for action, Batman Begins is a much better movie, and Serenity was a much better Sci-Fi movie than Star Wars.
I couldn’t place Dodgeball or Napolean Dynamite on this list despite appreciating certain aspects of Napolean Dynamite. The horrible blandness of Napolean Dynamite, with its tediuous pacing, drove me up the wall as I watched it. Yet the same dysfunction was hillarious to observe.
I should do a top 10 list of the best shows cancelled before they reached their prime, but that would be too depressing. All I can say is Wonderfalls was actually a quirky show that would have been fantastic had it lasted.
You know we’re in trouble in Iraq-Iran when you read something like this.
Inside Iran, the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps runs a one month training and indoctrination course for members of the Iraqi Shiite militia the Badr Brigades, paying them 75 cents a day during training and 82 dollars a month once they return to jobless Iraq. The Badr Brigades is the militia of the Shiite Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI) political party. The SCIRI is one of the largest parties in the United Iraqi Alliance, which won a plurality in the December 15 elections and will control the largest bloc of seats in the new national assembly. On December 13 Iraqi border police seize a tanker truck filled with thousands of forged ballots that had just crossed over from Iran. Mr. Bayan Jabr Solagh of the SCIRI and Badr Brigades is the Iraqi Interior Minister, controlling Iraqi police and police commando units, which are thought to be heavily infiltrated by Badr Brigades fighters. Secret detention and torture centers and death squads, targeting Iraqi Sunnis, are all linked to the Interior Ministry. U.S. troops encounter sophisticated, factory-made devices utilizing armor-piercing explosively-formed projectile (EFP) technology, identical to those employed by Iranian-backed Hezbollah against the Israelis in Lebanon, in the hands of Sunni insurgents in Iraq.
Why is Bin Laden still around to offer up this dribble? If our President is really so concerned about his Global War on Terror shouldn’t he have removed this guy already?
“We have no objection to responding to this with a long-term truce based on fair conditions,” the speaker said.
“We do not mind offering you a truce that is fair and long-term… so we can build Iraq and Afghanistan… there is no shame in this solution because it prevents wasting of billions of dollars.
“Your president is misinterpreting public opinion polls which show that the vast majority of you support the withdrawal of your forces from Iraq.”
So far as this stupidity goes, I don’t see this as a ploy targeted to “Western” audiences as the BBC indicates but instead targeted toward Muslims. After all, support for the jihad is predicated on a widespread sympathy that Bin Laden is standing up for the interests of the common adherent. By extending this “truce” he’s working to maintain that image by contrasting himself with the big, bad US who invades Islamic countries and harms their citizens. He’s playing up that “we’re only hurting you (Muslims) because we love you” angle. If the US would be reasonable and declare a truce we wouldn’t have to engage in such a violent way.
All the chatter on the Medicare Part D debable starting to circulate jives with what I heard at work – the law really screws things up.
Michael Brown indicates that he was against a competent FEMA before he was for it.
Some recent articles combined with the tragic standing of the FireFly series had me thinking on money and the media (movies, mainly) lately. When you consider the source of most studio money no longer comes from the theatre box office, it becomes clear that the numbers reported and overhyped every Sunday evening/Monday about the #1 movie for the weekend is a load of hogwash. In all of 2004, theatre revenue totalled $7.4 billion. While not small change, that represented less than 17% of the revenue, with DVD sales along representing over $20 billion, nearly three times the theatre revenue. Theatre revenue may build buzz, but if we really wanted to find the #1 movie someone should give us the breakdown of DVD sales each week.
Which, as it turns out, is extremely difficult to find. After the release of Serenity on DVD, I did some searching to try to assess how the sales had progressed. Since DVD sales aren’t widely reported, I never did find the numbers for the disc. I was disappointed, to say the least, as any future movie opportunities are likely to rely not so much on the $40 million worldwide box office as the actual DVD sales result. If DVD sales were significant, expect another movie.
The real reason I was prompted to write this item was in response to this paragraph in a Slate article, from which I quote the following paragraph:
In October 2005, Google offered to provide a Wi-Fi service that would enable anyone in San Francisco to connect without charge to the Internet. Google would make its profit not from an access charge, but from the ad revenue an entire broadband-wired city would provide. If the experiment proves successful—and Google’s Wi-Fi platform proves stable—nothing will stop the company from rapidly extending this concept to other cities. Reportedly, Google has already lined up unused fiber-optic cable that spans the country. Such a free Wi-Fi network would mean that the Hollywood studios would no longer need to rely on cable operators—or even telephone companies—to have a two-way pipeline into homes. They could directly rent any movie to consumers and bill their credit card (like everything else is billed on the Internet) without paying a cut to cable operators or local televisions stations.
This may be the best experiment to date on my idea of a separation of the underlying network from the services being provided. That said network is both pervasive and free is more than I would have required.
Finally, for those series that can’t quite hack it on prime time but acquire dedicated, loyal followings. Why haven’t any of the studios given a thought to the iTunes TV model? Releasing episodes to a loyal fan base on the order of $2 – $5 each via iTunes may make the micro market possible. If an episode takes $1 million to procude, and $1 million individuals download it at $2 each, you’ve made $1 million. Shows like “Freaks and Geeks”, “FireFly” or “Arrested Development”, may have a home under this kind of model. If only there were some groups courageous enough (with deep enough pockets) to try this out.
I’m a little behind on my NJ news, but Codey signing the smoking ban is a wonderful thing so far as I’m concerned.
I read the article in Slate about a new registered traveler program, but couldn’t figure out what the hubaloo was about. Special express security screening lines already exist at many airports offered by the airlines for their best customers. Anyone who pays the $80/year and submits to the background check will still have to go through X-ray and the metal detector. And if you’re traveling enough to be willing to pay the $80, you would likely have enough accumulated travel and/or clout with the airlines to qualify for their express screening lines. If you don’t, your travel department and/or secretary aren’t doing a good enough job.
Edited to Add: I’ll expound on why I think every registered traveler program is destined to fail, at least as an economic venture. The target market is first limited to frequent travelers. Since most frequent travelers receive expedited screening privileges at the busier airports due to their frequent flyer programs, the reduction of wait time for your primary screening from 30 minutes down to 3 already applies in the most important cases. By receiving the benefit for free, there’s an instant reduction in the size of the target market. You can’t eliminate the primary screening for anyone without opening a gigantic hole in the screening process that makes the whole operation worthless.
So who would still be interested? Those on the do-not-fly list or are regular recipients of the dreaded psuedorandom secondary screening. These would be the travelers who most often have to be wanded down and have their luggage searched, either because their name appears on one of the mysterious government-maintained lists or due to certain travel patterns that trigger additional screening. A limited market exists where these travelers would appreciate relief from additional screening. However, these are also likely to be the audience most likely to be denied access to the program by the TSA.
So long as the program offers no relief from the X-ray and metal detector process, their adoption rates will not support a large market. To make matters worse, should the market fracture, with airports contracting with separate, incompatible providers, I would anticipate a further rejection of the idea from the marketplace.