What Are You Watching?
The DVD industry has just wrapped up its 10-yr. anniversary as a retail service. Actually, I think they were on the market a little earlier in 1997, but the industry decided to pick a month and make a publicity splash with it.
It doesn’t seem like it’s been that long, does it? Although, it’s been a long while since I’ve reached into that assemble-it-yourself cabinet and pulled out a VHS tape to watch. I don’t think I’ve actually looked at a VHS in 4 years or more. The last thing they were handy for was to record a program off the tv to be looked at later. But now those TiVo-type gadgets have completely eliminated that. No more punching in code numbers or setting start and finish times. Just go to the program guide and press…..done.
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A couple of years ago I bought one of those combo. machines that not only plays both VHS and DVD’s, but will also record from the tape onto a blank dvd. In other words, you can transfer your favorite tapes onto disk and not worry about losing the ability to enjoy them after your tape player quits working. But it’s a cumbersome affair. It works well, but you have to be dedicated to getting it done. It’s a slow process to get through them all. But I’ve learned that a lot of those “favorites” aren’t all that special because after I recorded them I never looked at them again.
Now with the entire TV business undergoing a total conversion to High-Definition production, there is the classic industry struggle over two competing recording formats, Blu-ray and HD. It looks like everybody’s sitting this one out until the winner emerges. With most of the dvd players now offering the “upconvert” feature, we’re not under pressure to toss our disks and switch over. Fortunately we can keep all those nice new dvd’s and use them for years yet.
The next “big thing” that will affect us common rabble is the instant download of product. The bugs have been worked out with the outfits that provide the copy-protection encryptions that will allow individual downloading and burning onto dvd’s of copyrighted programming. Walgreen’s pharmacies will probably be the first places that you see these kiosks pop up where you just order and pay for any movie, etc., that you wish and the vending machine downloads it and burns the disk while you wait. They’ll start showing up after the first of the year, along with some high-end home computers that will also accept and copy encrypted programming. Within a year or two you’ll be able to sit at home and create dvd’s for almost anything you want to add to your video library.
What does this have to do with the Fire and Rescue service? Not much. I’m just fascinated with progress.
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So let’s get the equipment checked out. I’ll see you at the coffee table.
