Download Hmmcast #34 (mp4)

Last night I watched my first Blu-Ray movie in 1080i via the Sony Playstation 3. It was of a movie I’d already seen but didn’t own on DVD. I could have bought the package in DVD format of all three movies for about half (or less) what we paid for the Blu-Ray format, but I wanted to watch something in Blu-Ray format.

Even though we received Talledega Nights in Blu-Ray format with the PS3, I wanted my first experience with Blu-Ray to be with something I actually bought separately. Might seem hokey, but hey, that’s the way I roll sometimes.

I’ve had my eye on the Mission Impossible set for a little while having just finished watching the first season of the TV series.

For those with PS3, I’m curious how often you’ll buy the Blu-ray version vs. the DVD. As mentioned in the video at the top of this post (if you don’t see it for some reason, clickthru to this post), Snakes on a Plane and Beer League came out this Tuesday and I did look for both on Blu-ray but neither we’re available.

Just got back from watching Rocky Balboa, the sixth and probably last one in the series.

Movies don’t work without a suspension of belief. In the best films you forget you’re in a theater and become immersed in the story. With Rocky Balboa I tried really, really hard to get over the baggage from the past films and just couldn’t. I kept thinking: how on earth could the Rock still be walking and speaking, much less getting a license to fight again? Stallone painted himself into a corner as a storyteller that was simply too great to escape.

With that said, Rocky Balboa is a better movie than a few others in the series. It takes the story where we should have gone after Rocky IV. It feels like a do-over for the series. Uncle Pauly and Duke are about the only characters besides Rock to keep the continuity alive. Pauly has a few signature wisecracks but doesn’t really get a chance to redeem himself; a character subplot hole that we may never see repaired.

Now onto the rankings before I come back and grade this one.

Ranking the Rocks
1. Rocky I - more a love story than a boxing story and one could make an argument that Adrian was the main character. Her power would endure through all six films but none stronger than here. When Rocky became more about boxing than love, Stallone lost the edge.
2. Rocky III - Mr. T was easily the best Rocky foe. Mean, a warrior. His line in Rocky 3 is priceless: “I live alone, train alone and I’ll win the title alone.” Also factor in Apollo Creed coming back to train Rocky and the drama surrounding Mick. This was the pinnacle of the franchise after the classic first.
3. Rocky II - My favorite boxing storyline of all the films. The interplay between Rocky and Apollo is outstanding. Burgess Meredith is at his best in this film.
4. Rocky Balboa - A better Rocky 5. Clearly Stallone has had time to think of the plot and the logical progression from Rocky 4. Too bad there is all the weight of the medical stuff. How on earth did he get a “clean bill of health” to be able to fight again?
5. Rocky IV - the blood doping Russian Ivan Drago is the most unrealistic fight of the series. From the beating Rocky took here the future films should have been with Rocky dead and not others. Recently I ranked this as the worst Rocky film but I’ve changed my mind and put this slightly ahead of Rocky 5.
6. Rocky V - This is the movie that tried to be Rocky Balboa and I think Stallone is grateful for the chance to get a rewrite. Even Stallone admits he made Rocky too human in this movie and paid the price. Rocky needed to be the hero and his inability to get into the ring spoiled this ring. When the fight does come in this movie, it’s too late to save it.

Grading the Rock
Despite the film’s shortcomings, Rocky Balboa is still a story worth telling and I’m glad Stallone fought to see this movie being made. It’s a much better ending to the franchise than Rocky V. It’s too bad the other flicks exist or it would be easier to appreciate. It feels a little bit like Rocky I and V hybrid without the love story and an over the hill Rocky. What the Rock doesn’t have in physical assets he still has in heart.

I haven’t read any other reviews — on purpose — before watching and judging this film myself but I’m curious now after seeing it and writing this what others have to say. I had a major curiosity in the film ruined by a comment left in an older Rocky-related thread. As it turned out that didn’t have as much bearing on the film as I thought it would. All in all, this is a respectable Rocky movie that had a full theater cheering at one point, but not the point one might expect. That’s what I remember about Rocky III in the theater. At the end a few people clapped which best sums up my feelings about the picture. Grade: C+.

Nathan covers the discussion around Forrester research suggesting that while the iPod continues to do well, sales from the Apple iTunes store for music have been slowing down. One reporter, perhaps needing some attention, called it iTunes “collapse.”

Apple has understandably taken exception to the media jumping on this as bad news for iTunes, prompting Forrester analyst Josh Bernoff to try and clarify the report:

Forrester Research on Wednesday tried to set the record straight after some media companies reported that its study on iTunes showed that song sales fell 65% during the first six months of the year. “For the record, iTunes sales are not collapsing.”

Sidenote: It doesn’t surprise me that a certain Register reporter would get the story wrong, especially with Andrew Orlowski penning the piece (it still hasn’t been updated, BTW). Orlowski would be wrong about reporting it wasn’t raining in the middle of a downpour. I long ago stopped considering The Register as a source to rely upon. If you think Orlowski is reliable, just Google the story about him, an email exchange and Scoble. Don’t take my word for it, read what others who have directly dealt with the man think.

Update 4:43pm PST: read Josh’s sobering blog post here, reminding us why having a fast trigger finger with publishing can be perilous.

With that in mind, let’s go with the worst case Orlowski scenario (a common occurence) and consider that indeed this Forrester report shows iTunes having problems selling as much music as they once did. Would that be such a bad thing?

No.

One thing I find fascinating about conversations with various music fans who love Apple or Microsoft too much (and strangely I’ve been accused of being in the latter crowd) is how too many of these same people sidestep or condemn the whole DRM discussion but don’t seem to hold either of these companies responsible. If you run a store that sells DRM-laced tracks you are part of the problem.

And yes, I think when I bought the Zune and paid the Universal Music tax it was crazy. Why Microsoft ever gave into them is beyond reason. Roll over and avoid going to court on the poorly named Zune sharing “squirting” function, maybe? Bad move on Microsoft’s part being extorted, IMO.

DRM still sucks — bad
It’s too convenient ignoring the fact that DRM sucks for us — music lovers and fans — and Apple, love ‘em or hate ‘em, currently is the major contributor to this broken DRM strategy. By buying DRM-laced music we are fueling the beast.

Ironically I was thinking the same thing earlier about oil. How everywhere I drive I’m financing in some small way oil companies that are doing little good on this earth making the wrong people rich. Hypocrite on the gas, but when it comes to DRM music I have largely said no. Yes, I’ve bought a few DRM-infected tracks but you can count the number over the last few years on your fingers.

And no, I don’t pirate media or support those who do. At the same time I’m not in the business of lecturing other people on their own ethical and moral compasses and would appreciate if others don’t try to do the same to me. I still believe DRM is better than piracy.

For those who care, my own conscience says stay away from accessing music, videos and TV that I haven’t purchased from somewhere (or have been given permission by the copyright holder / publisher to view for free). I don’t think there should be any problem with copying media I’ve legally acquired for to formats I can use elsewhere which I think should be offered to every media customer.

I like renting music as a sampler service
We have used the DRM model to our advantage and rented music plans in the past from Napster, Rhapsody, Y! Music and Zune as of late. I still feel strongly that paying $175/year to be able to sample whole songs and in most cases complete albums is a bargain. I resent that Apple’s Steve Jobs doesn’t think I’d buy that option if it was available in iTunes and instead would rather have me try to make up my mind on a purchase over 30 seconds that somebody else picked out. I would at least try an Apple rental music plan because they have some unique music that other services don’t have. So by him insisting that nobody wants to rent music, he’s missing $$$ he could be getting from our household. When most his competition is doing this, that’s a stupid, arrogant move, not being cooler than everybody else.

Watch what happens if other services really start biting into iTunes and see if Jobs holds the line.

We’ve done a little more business in the video/movie DRM sector to date, both through iTunes video and on the Xbox 360, but I’m even a bit reluctant there since a little patience will turn into a DVD that has loads of features and is much more portable than being only able to play on ___ device/computer.

Whether or not the iTunes store is starting to lose music sales, I know one thing, I won’t cry at the DRM funeral. And it’s coming. I don’t know when or how far off it will be, but DRM is simply too restrictive for most people to continue going on supporting it forever. Here’s a small, but easy prediction: DRM will continue to break down. I’d put DRM as the 75 year old grandfather that has a bad ticker.

When I’ve written about this before, I’ve heard back from others who say regular people (uncle Fred and aunt Alice) — the non-techies and hardcore media fans — don’t even think about DRM. Some don’t even know what it is. I imagine there came a time when these same people didn’t think about email or the web either. Progression.

I’m looking forward to the DRM funeral. In fact I’ll be ordering pizza and cold drinks when I learn of the news. That is of course if my ticker is still ticking.

DRM doesn’t thwart the pirates, we need to stop believing that line of crap. Instead, it shackles legitimate customers. I prefer not to wear handcuffs when I buy something for entertainment, don’t you?

Last night at dinner our family gathered around the TV, rented and watched a movie via the Xbox 360 for the first time. In retrospect it wasn’t a very different experience from renting a video at Hollywood Video and taking it home. In fact, the time it would have taken to drive to the video store, rent, and return we could just pay up the $1.92 (240 Microsoft Points) on Xbox Live and be on our way to watching. Online movie purchase and viewing when everything works is getting more convenient.

None of the movies we were interested in last night were available in HD format, so we had to go with standard format. I would like to see a movie in HD and compare.

We didn’t experience a long download time. Within minutes we could start watching the movie while it downloaded in the background. I think the whole 1.5 GB movie took a little over an hour to complete but most of this time happened while we were watching the movie, as you don’t have to wait for the full movie to download. Certainly not any of the all day downloading horror stories I read when the service first launched. Seems like Microsoft has added capacity, demand has subsided, or some combination of both.

There were some minor annoyances like notifications of gamertag friends appearing online during the movie. Would have been nice to be able to be logged out when watching the movie which if we had waited for the full download we could turn off. Is there any way to turn off those friends online messages that I’m unaware of? Those messages also get in the way of some games like Lumines where you are trying to figure out where to put pieces and the friend message pops up in the middle of the screen.

Overall the sound of the movie was great and picture quality was good. The film itself, Timeline, wasn’t as bad as the critics said (11% on Rotten Tomatoes). One of the main reasons we rarely select movies based on how the critics feel. It kept our whole family’s interest (mom, dad, three teen boys), although it’s not something any of us would want to see again. I like Michael Crichton’s stories and this one, a time travel piece, was merely OK. Better than Sphere, but definitely no Jurassic Park.

Will our family rent another movie from Xbox Live Marketplace? Absolutely. Maybe tonight for dinner.

Our household is not among the five million who splurged for “Dead Man’s Chest” when the DVD launched or among those who saw the hit movie in the theater.

“Dead Man’s Chest” also is on track to unseat the previous live-action record-holder for DVD sales, “Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl,” which sold about 16 million DVD copies and 2 million home-video units, a Disney spokesman said.

Maybe it’s just me but when I saw the new Pirates DVD I said to myself: wait for the special DVD trilogy set. We all know that’s coming and I’m certain it will contain all sorts of cool footage that makes the version in stores now look like an unwise purchase. Yes, I realize the third Pirates movie isn’t even out in the theaters yet, but I think this is one movie I’ll rent online or at Hollywood instead of buying the DVD.

I’m starting to think the same thing with some TV series sets too. Patience for the set and you can save big money. Costco, for example, had all 7 seasons of the West Wing for $150. These were selling for $40 a season for awhile, so that’s almost 50% off when bought as a package. There was also a package DVD set of all the Superman movies, including the newest Superman Returns and a special cut of Superman II at Costco for like $60. Compare that to $15-20 for only Superman Returns and the one off DVD purchase doesn’t seem like a good idea.

Hollywood is making suckers out of us for buying DVDs when they’re first released. I guess the same could be said for buying the first of anything which I’m guilty of doing, so this isn’t a major revelation. We picked up the Alien Quadrilogy for $30 the other day which I saw for $80 when it was first released. Patience, young Luke. We always pay for impatience, don’t we?

Are you like me, waiting for the Pirates set coming in the future? We’ve done the one at a time thing with other series movies and am starting to grow a little weary of being on the non-collector treadmill.

For those who don’t already know, the third installment of the Pirates trilogy is called At World’s End. It might be 2008 or later before the DVD hits shelves, but I bet this will be a smoking trilogy set based on the success of the franchise thus far.

Do you feel suckered as one of the five million for what amounts to buying part 2? Or did you buy it and will still buy the trilogy set? Conflicted marketing for non-collector’s anyway.

Today only you can download a free movie from AOL video. But you need to:

1) give them your credit card
2) download their video player software

#1 isn’t a problem for me, but #2 is a probable dealbreaker. I really try to keep AOL software off any of our systems. I’m sure their videoplayer isn’t as bad as the full AOL client but why can you only download with IE6?

AOL Video Delivery Manager can only be downloaded & installed using Internet Explorer 6.0. Support for Netscape browsers is not currently available. Support for Firefox and Windows Internet Explorer 7.0 are coming soon.

I’d have to downgrade just to watch movies like Nacho Libre or White Christmas? There are about 30 or so movies to choose from, so there might be one of interest to you.

Let us know if you give into the AOL force (doubtful I will, but I’m interested in reading about other folks experiences). Had enough computer problems yesterday that I really don’t want to mess around with anything from AOL + IE6 today, even if their video player works good.

Tenacious D’s movie Pick of Destiny hasn’t been very tenacious in the theaters thus far, but there is a small consolation prize in an online Guitar Heroes type game entitled Devil May Fry. Instead of jamming with a fake plastic guitar you use the ASDF keys and spacebar to rock out. Go ahead and take your keyboard pick to it during your next break.

This game is hard and I didn’t perform very well (need a guitar to map to the keys), but the music is alright. As for the movie? Thinking I’ll sit out seeing ‘Pick’ in the theaters and wait for it to hit the online stores and DVD. Anybody else see it? It has to be better than Nacho Libre.

Starting yesterday, people who buy the Superman Returns DVD at Wal-mart have an option of paying an extra $1.97 for the digital version download formatted for portable devices, $2.97 for computer-compatible version or $3.97 for a version that works on both. A 16 character redemption code is provided that looks similar to the code you enter to register Windows software and can be used to download the video from a beta walmart.com site.

Enter the cliche dragon.

As for compatibility, there is some fine print. The Wal-Mart downloads that are compatible with portable devices will be in Windows Media Player format, which means that they’ll play on all devices that accept that format–including Microsoft’s new Zune–but not Apple’s iPods. And the PC-compatible downloads will require the Windows XP operating system and Windows Media Player 10. Mac and Linux users, at least for now, need not apply.

So essentially we drop an extra four bones and still don’t get the ability to watch the video on our iPod 5g or PSP? Yay, we can watch it on our new Zune and our Windows PCs but not on the Linux workstation I just activated on our network. Weak.

Without an additional layer — say $4.97 for a completely DRM-free version that can be used on any platform — this isn’t anything groundbreaking.

This morning I read that in February 2007 Paramount Pictures, Liongate, 20th Century Fox, TV Shows from MTV and others will be offering downloads via BitTorrent. Will these files be DRM-encumbered too? I’m sure they will be but hopefully they’ll offer versions for every platform.

If they must load in a DRM-laced version, why not package in with the DVD a version that can be copied and played on Windows, Mac, Linux and portable devices? Making people wait for the download who just paid for it seems silly to me. Most DVD movies are overpriced at $15-25 anyway. Most TV Seasons are fairly priced but single movies I think should be priced at $10 and digital version with lower quality for $5-7. People would buy more movies at those prices, but Hollywood doesn’t think quantity terms. And while they are at it, for the people who pay to see the movie and buy the overprices popcorn in the theater, they should be given the DVD for free or for some token $1-2.

The needle is moving slightly, I guess. Maybe. Perhaps beyond testing a couple movies here and there, I doubt we’ll be paying an extra _.97 for any of the options any time soon, you?

With the upcoming James Bond movie Casino Royale this Friday, Cinematical is running a 7 days of Bond special on their blog. Today’s entry includes a Youtube collection of every Bond movie trailer. 45 years of Bond action.

Last week Cinematical posed the immortal Bond question: who is the best James Bond? My money is on Sean Connery, followed by Roger Moore. Remember Jaws, the metal-mouthed baddie? Pierce Brosnan was ok, although I think during his era some of the stunts went too over the top. I’d like to forget the whole Timothy Dalton period. How will the new Bond, Daniel Craig, fare? Back in March, I wrote that Craig seemed a little too sailor-looking to be Bond, but I’m still holding out until seeing him in the movie to see if he lives up to the character and does Ian Fleming proud.

Planning on catching Casino Royale in the theaters or waiting for it on DVD?

The Xbox Live Marketplace is going to get an HD injection in a couple weeks. The possibility of buying songs for Zune player with Microsoft points and HD movies and TV shows will become new options shortly.

Microsoft Corp. today announced agreements with CBS, MTV Networks, Paramount Pictures, Turner Broadcasting System Inc. (TBS Inc.), Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) and Warner Bros. Home Entertainment to bring an initial lineup of over 1,000 hours of hit TV shows and movies to Xbox 360™ gamers in the U.S. by the end of the year. Furthermore, Xbox 360 will be the first gaming console to bring standard and high-definition TV shows and movies via digital distribution over the Internet directly to the consumer.

The movie shows will be available for viewing in a 24 hour viewing period, rental style, within 14 days of download. TV Shows will be sold similar to iTunes. Whole seasons and season passes? Not sure on that one yet.

The problem with saved video content, especially HD content on the Xbox 360 is hard drive space. 20GB for HD video content is nothing. In the case of the rental movies, they will go away, but you’ll still need enough space available to watch. We already burned up our Mac hard drive with music and video content for Kara’s iPod and have another external hard drive on the holiday shopping list. Saw a 500GB external drive at Costco for $229 yesterday. Will we see TB drives for this price a year from now? It almost seems criminal that Microsoft and Sony are selling their systems with sub 100GB drives. I know they’re both losing money, but come on. This could become a major gripe this holiday season.

What others think
Angel also worries about hard drive space: “It would be great if we could transfer the shows to an external hard drive or to our computers in order to free up space, but unfortunately Microsoft has already stated that they will not support external drives.”
David Hunter ponders pricing, which hasn’t been announced yet but Microsoft says will be competitive.: “the only difficulty is that the user experience has been problematic and the cost effectiveness dubious compared to physical purchase or rental, or cable TV ‘pay-per-view.’”
Lost Remote: “The one advantage over iTunes is that the 360 is already connected to the TV. But in a disadvantage, the downloads aren’t portable.”
Davis Freeberg sees this as a blow to Apple: “With Microsoft’s ability to support HDTV downloads and having the ability to play video games on the system, it’s going to make it all that much harder for Apple to convince people to fork over $300 dollars in order to have the privilege of being able to pay for VOD films.”
Thomas Hawk calls the Xbox 360 Microsoft’s “trojan horse” in the living room. Hawk compares to the Media Center. Yeah, everybody wants their gadget in our living rooms and the Xbox 360 has a better chance than a loud, power-hungry Media Center PC.

Microsoft’s secret weapon: micropayment
I’ve mentioned several times here that I think Microsoft can make — and already is to some degree making — a splash with their Live Marketplace particularly in the micropayment area. This is unannounced and pure speculation on my part but just imagine if they wrap their Adcenter for webmasters — think Adsense, webmasters — to encompass the content on the Live Marketplace? Wow. Will they pull the trigger?

And let’s not forget the pipeline of indie games that will be making their way to the XNA Games Developers. How many, I’m not sure, but for $100 a year, this will give gamers a chance to make their own games and/or share games with others. This is a market that Sony has repeatedly snubbed on the PSP platform. Will Sony get their act together with the PS3 and offer something similar? Considering their history, doubtful.