I've begun wondering recently if we will end up going full circle and ending up with cartridges again as part of whatever next-gen or next-next-gen gaming consoles, this time based solely on generic flash memory. The cost of flash would have to start going down even more drastically than it already is to ever come close to matching the manufacturing cost of a DVD or even a Blu Ray disk, but I would think there would be a point where the value/$ would make it worth it to the consumer. Faster loading times, more durable games (ie no disk scratch errors), no real space limit on the games, extra room for game specific DLC, and I'm sure other advantages that I can't think of now that would be cool.
Street Fighter 2 super dooper HD remix might only need 5-10 gigs worth of memory, so they just throw in one 16 gig module (or two 8 / four 4 gig modules for data striping and faster loading times) and ship it. Metal Gear Solid 7 and its over 9000 hours of CGI might need 200+ gigs, so they just throw in as much flash memory as they can and go to town with their high res textures and lossless a/v.
Lets say Rock Band 5 ships with 80 songs at approximately a half gig a song, as well as 20 gigs of everything else, for a 60 gig total footprint. They then could ship the game on a 120 gig flash cartridge, mark half of it writable to the console, and boom. Now instead of having to carry around your xbox hard drive when visiting friends for RB parties, you just take the cartridge and it has the DLC on it.
I doubt it. A bought a 16GB SD card a little while back, and it cost maybe $30. A Blu-ray disc holds 25GB single-sided, and 50GB double-sided, and probably costs well less than a dollar to press.
Just checked at Amazon.de, the price for a writable blu-ray disk seems to start from 5€, for a 25GB disc. 16GB USB sticks were around 23€. It does not seem that far away?
Also, I suppose Blu-Ray will be stuck at it's size because of the norms and patent hell, whereas sticks can just continue to grow. Flash drives are becoming popular, so the price of Flash in general might come down.
But as a content producer you're not burning stuff onto writable Blu-rays. You're pressing them in a factory at a cost well less than $1 a disc.
Whereas a USB stick, even bought in large volumes, can only be so cheap.
You don't care if memory sticks can grow - you have, say, 20GB of content you want to deliver to your customer. It's just extra cost if you buy a 40GB memory stick to carry it.
I just don't see any incentive (other than marketing/coolness) for distributing anything on a USB stick.
You are correct but you are looking at it from the wrong perspective.
Who cares about reprogramming your stick: for blu-ray, you want to buy a movie. The movie studio is the one wanting to make a profit, so most of the sale price of the movie should not go into the media.
Therefore, mass producing blu-ray movies, at around $1 (or less) per disc is very effective (the studios will sell you the movie at $9.99 or more).
When will a USB stick for 20GB cost less than $1? It's still quite far off.
The assumption, of course, is that you will have 20+gb of content on a Blu-Ray disc. I am not convinced this is often the case, and an independent could produce these slightly-higher-cost items for distribution and put all sorts of material on them.
I don't know if it would be cheaper or not, but since they don't need to be written to they could just use read-only solid state memory instead. I think it could easily more durable and convenient and I'm surprised this hasn't happened yet.
Without major changes to optical media (like the holographic stuff we've been hearing about for decades), I'm sure the lowering price of flash media will slowly kill optical.
Besides saying "fuck" over and over again, was the whole point of that post to complain about licensing? If you don't want to deal with licensing issues don't use any proprietary technology. Release your work online in OGG format.
These types of whiny posts don't contribute much of anything. There's no real solution proposed. Other than "I want to use proprietary technology but I don't want to pay the fees".
I'm not sure why vulgar language is becoming so acceptable and commonly used . Am I just old school (even though I'm 30) when I find myself turned away from people who talk in such a manner or do others feel similar to me?
I'm new school (if 19 isn't too old to call myself that), and swearing's becoming such a huge trend because of how natural it feels. It's part of the huge trend towards the unprofessional.
That's a good thing. While it's got some irritating side effects, the overall idea is getting rid of bullshit attitudes towards one another. Swearing is a part of language. There's nothing wrong with its being used.
There's nothing wrong with it being used well. But a single unnecessary curse word can sour the tone for the rest of the work.
What do I mean by "unnecessary"? When it doesn't communicate any information. Example from the essay:
They’re fucking breaking the functionality of shit just because they can and you’re fine with this?
"Fucking" and "shit" don't impart any information. The following is a better version of the sentence because it communicates the same amount of information with less words:
They’re breaking functionality just because they can and you’re fine with this?
Calling something "bullshit" on the other hand, communicates information since "bullshit" is a concept we are all familiar with. There are alternatives - "bullcrap" or just "bull" - but that just invites the reader to think "They mean 'bullshit' but don't want to say 'shit.'"
An interesting side effect of the trend towards bad language (which I feel is most often the result of laziness) is that its emotional context is being degraded, at least for me. For instance, if someone calls something "bullshit," it seems casual, or I'll be suspicious of the reasoning. If somebody uses the word, "nonsense," instead, it gives me pause and I immediately think more highly of the motivation of the speaker/writer. Again, I can't defend this rationally; it's just an emotional reaction I have.
I've noticed something similar as well. For a few years now, I've favored calling something "silly." In context, it's connotations are just as bad - if not worse - than harsher alternatives, but it doesn't trigger people's curse word sensor.
On the other hand, using harsh words rarely has power. If someone you've never heard curse before calls something "bullshit," you'll take notice. This only works, though, if you swear so rarely that people take note that when you do, it has meaning.
In other words, swearing casually removes the power of swearing.
I think both sentences are ugly, but I think that's because "breaking functionality" offsets the simpler words in the idea. "They fuck up their shit just because they can", however, is smoother and faster than either of them. Swears have a certain poetry to them in writing, kind of like how oohs and aahs work in music. (This is my own opinion, mind you.) On their own they convey nothing, but placed neatly into a sentence they help the whole message flow.
I'm in agreement with your assessment that the trend is towards unprofessionalism. I live in the US, and have been to Japan three times. My first time there I was totally shocked with the effort put into dress to look as clean and professional as possible. Top notch suits that were perfectly pressed, nice shoes, a nice brief case (very few backpacks), and a very polite attitude. I wish our trend was towards the Japanese attitude towards the way we present ourselves in public.
Off topic: it's so refreshing to come here (HN) and read a reply that isn't some kind of verbal attack towards me for the opinion I presented. I thank you for that, for stating your opinion with insights without attacking me.
The pressed suit is a nice touch, but I think with North Americans you'll find more of a focus on results rather than presentation. Presentation is great when it follows substance, but it's no substitute.
I personally find that kind of professionalism to be stodgy and counterproductive. If you really care whether someone uses a briefcase or a backpack, your concerns are misplaced.
(Excepting politeness, of course. I consider that to be an important component.)
Wandering off on to the Japan topic. The suits, briefcases, shiny shoes, etc. is the uniform of the "salary" man, typically working in a bank shuffling paper back and forth. This is simply packaging with no real thought put into what it really means. Even during the heat of summer at 30dC at 80% humidity, they will be wearing the same uniform.
The polite attitude sometimes blocks on getting things done. They have a very hard time openly disagreeing. Instead they would state their position over and over. Ask you for your thoughts and if they do no match, repeat the process.
This is what makes Westerners great IMO. They take a position, scream about it, and action on it. The Japanese will be stuck in a planning committee and not get things done.
Of course this is just generalizations. Just seems in general that Japanese are polite spectators and Westerners are rowdy spectators that are more likely run on to the field to make a change.
Absolutely! I love that HN lets me have civil discussions with people whose worldviews are different than mine.
I'd like to visit Japan and see what the culture there's like. I'd like to visit anywhere that's not the US, for that matter, but Japan's the place that I've heard is radically different in nearly every way.
d) Rather than thinking through what I have to say, I'd rather slip down to the lowest common denominator expression because it's easier, without regard to the large percentage of my audience that may be offended.
e) For me, emotion trumps reason.
f) Has an immediate effect, although not the one I might hope for.
hn is a great place for technically minded people to share ideas on achieving success. Discarding x% of your audience for no apparent reason is hardly a perfect form of anything.
As much as I agree with your points, I'm going to side with GMB here in saying that swears are useful in achieving certain things. I see both sides of the story: I'm a writer (and more than that, a stylist) by choice, but I'm also foulmouthed to a fault. There's a time and a place for each.
Jason Scott, the writer in question, is known for using lots of swears to achieve an emotional effect, but he's excused for that by working really fucking hard on the projects he's chosen to care about. So for me, the context of who he is justifies his swearing, because I know where he's coming from.
As for discarding audience: absolutely get rid of them if you want to! That's the choice of the writer. Maybe I don't want the sort of audience that still gets childjitters when I say the word shit in front of them. I had a professor last semester who told me he didn't approve of my describing another student's project idea as "fucked-up", because it conveyed a lack of respect for the idea. Fact was, the idea was disrespectable—but if I'd used that word, I'd have implied in my politeness some respect for the idea, when in fact I had none.
Jason Scott isn't writing to give constructive criticism. He's writing because he thinks the idea of BluRay needs demolition. In the past, when he's critiqued things, he's shown a restraint of language; this deserved none. (I'll also respond to your manner of responding by saying that I find snarky sarcasm as much of a turn-off as you find my crude mouth, and that I'm much less likely to respect snark than I am swears.)
> Discarding x% of your audience for no apparent reason
Not necessarily 'no apparent reason.' Maybe you just don't care if your audience is offended, because people that are so easily offended are people that you don't want as part of your audience. Granted we're talking about people and blogs here, not corporate/startup communications with the public/customers.
If I start talking about my support of gay marriage I immediately offend x% of the population that view gay marriage as some sort of 'affront to God.' I am probably ok with this if I'm in support of something that offends them, but from a company/startup perspective, I probably don't want to talk about gay marriage if it will alienate potential customers and has nothing to do with my underlying business (e.g. it would be appropriate if my business was in selling gay marriage accessories or gay wedding planning services or something).
It's always been acceptable and commonly used (by certain peoples). It's just now with communication revolution aka The Internet, everyone's speech is potentially seen by millions. So, what was hidden and obscure is now only a click away.
That's not the same as asking: "Is 'fuck' a rude word?" Everyone accepts it's a rude word - it would hardly be used if it weren't. The disagreement is about whether using it (and other swearing, but "fuck" is the Gaza Strip here) is an offensive act.
I don't think it is. I don't think it matters a shit, damn or piss if someone says "fuck" or how many times they say it. My friends and colleagues unthinkingly use it all the time and, as far as I can tell, it hasn't resulted in the poisoning of their souls or their becoming unable to express themselves because of the effect of linguistic inflation.
Ignoring the grannies beneath this reply, the main reason I wrote this entry was because I'd written a previous entry about how Blu-Ray was not going to be used for my film, because the restrictions were so heinous that they overshadowed the power of the technology. A little while ago, the restrictions/costs were changed a bit, and people were starting to ask me "so, does this change things?" and I wanted to make it clear that they didn't change things and all.
While it's nice to talk about all sorts of OGG hippydippery and how it should be released online, the fact remains that many people who'd want to see someone's "film" will own or use blu-ray and wonder why the film isn't being released on a 'real' format that can be bought on a nice disc and put into the components in their home. And my bringing these subjects up the way I do is an attempt to explain why that is the case.
The more I think about this the more I am determined to simply boycott Bluray in its entirety. I already watch most things on my laptop attached to a large monitor. Going forward I feel an obligation to throw my consumer support behind open (or at least reasonably-licensed) streaming formats. Devices like Boxee should be supported and nurtured to help do an end-around on these cartels. I can't stand the thought that future technology could be crippled by a few mega corps without the first intention of doing any innovation. All that's needed are the right devices and a critical mass of good content and the cartels will not be able to secure a monopoly.
Good idea. In a nice, friendly note to the consumer, spell out the outrageous fees and mandatory crippling, and say 'we can't afford this and frankly, we think you deserve better.' If you succeed commercially, it puts pressure on the big boys to change their nasty ways.
Like anyone besides some code junkies here and young soul rebels will give much of a shit about your explanation - they'll just read it and think 'Hmm, he says he spent $x thousand making the film but he doesn't want to spend a grand or two on licensing for release? Whatever, more like he can't get a distributor to take it'. I accept the copy protection and so on is intolerable to you. It's totally your right to avoid patronising or promoting a distribution medium you dislike and the administration of which offends you. And I respect too your right to post about it online, although I don't think your 'fuck blu-ray' approach is going to convince people of anything more than the intensity of your feeling.
Look at it from the customer's point of view. They really don't care about you or your worldview in 99% of cases. To paraphrase Dov Simens, nobody says 'let's go see a Sony movie tonight, or would you prefer a Paramount film?'. People care about the distribution company even les than they care about the studio, which to say hardly at all. From a distributor's point of view the licensing requirements and costs to release on blu-ray are trivial operating costs, just like there has always been a fee to use the DVD logo on DVD cases and small fees for use of the MPEG codecs, h.264 codecs etc. OK, so the fee is more expensive with blu-ray. You object, I see your point - it doesn't make economic sense if you expect to sell under 3-5000 copies.
I know, you hate distributors. They take a chunk of your money and have overly cosy relationships with theaters and video rental businesses, and this is one reason among many that you market directly. On the other hand, distributors have the funds and expertise to advertise and otherwise promote a film to increase its chances of commercial success, and thus increase your future possibilities for obtaining production financing and having more negotiation power the next time you are looking at a distribution deal.
It seems to me that people who might be interested in your film won't be very exercised about the format (not least because 99% of text adventures employed graphics well below the resolution of DVD anyway), and the people who are merely curious rather than enthusiastic about IF etc. are going to read 1 paragraph of your rant and decide you're a computer geek with a chip on his shoulder.
Most indies will treat these expenses as just another line item. $3000 to buy a lifetime blu-ray reproduction license? OK, I've been on no-budget projects that racked up similar amounts of money just on beta duplication fees for an eventual release to DVD because the distributor didn't have a digital pipeline. Me, I'd rather pay it and have some chance of getting a review by submitting copies of the movie to every little film magazine/website in hopes that they'd work the 'anyone can release to blu-ray now' angle and promote the damn film...which might even get a wider audience for your (valid) thoughts about the licensing costs involved if you mentioned to an interviewer how filmmakers should be prepared for some sticker shock and it's holding them back.
tl;dr valid perspective, but ultimately you're choosing to limit your own distribution.
Eddy, I respect your position and the work you've done, but we're in two different worlds here.
For one thing, I just don't see distributors as a necessary evil to large-scale success and I certainly don't think they are necessarily more capable of promotion and advertising around properties than a particularly-driven filmmaker/producer in the modern era. I don't think this has been the case for some time, and certainly not in the five+ years you've been doing your pro work.
And for the kind of people I am talking about, yes, 5000 copies or less is the goal, and $3000 is terrible, terrible money to lose. That's the "indies" I mean, not the "indies" I read about in Entertainment Weekly or on the Sundance weblog.
BBS Documentary got reviews in Wired, Film Threat, and a pile of other locations without paying for a distributor or out to other such organizations. As a result, I sell a bunch less, but all the non-production costs go to me, not to someone who gave me a nice dinner four years ago.
I'm going to give you a pass for indicating IF enthusiasts would tolerate a standard definition film because they once or currently liked games with scant graphics.
Like I said, different worlds, and in my world I really do think Blu-ray is a cancer and that this sort of treatment needs to be pointed out.
It's too bad you're in Texas and hard to visit. I am much closer to your world than you suspect and yes, $3000 is a horrendous amount of money for an individual at the bottom of the film food chain to lose to an avoidable expense. I absolutely appreciate the financial pain involved for a niche product which will struggle to break even. Believe me, if I was earning enough to just shrug about such a sum I would write you a check to help.
When I compare that dollar amount to a line-item expense for digibeta tapes, the particular example I was thinking was for a sub-$50k DVD-bargain-bin film, which basically didn't (and won't) make a penny for most of the people involved...but the release of which by [Well Known Company] has been enough to get the maker into a project with a proper budget: in other words, it looks as if someone else will pick up the tab for the next one, and he'll earn a respectable paycheck at least, which is a step forward in my book.
What I'm trying to say comes down to two issues: first, would you rather bank half the proceeds from selling 5000 copies or bank 10% of the proceeds from selling 50,000? and second, will your approach help you sell more or fewer copies - that is, are you fighting a useful battle?
Let's say that between the licensing and other factors it would cost $4000 to be able to sell GET LAMP on Blu-ray. OK, that's the suck. But at $45, which is what you sell the BBS film for, that would start to be profitable after 100 extra copies. So when the question is 'Could you sell more than 100 extra copies by putting it onto a single BR disc'? If the answer is yes, which I think it might be, then there would be benefits in doing so.
As I said, I am completely with you about the (lack of) ethics of this licensing scheme and the resulting financial headache it creates as you try to please both your potential customers and your bank manger. But I feel that merely shaking your fist at it may not be the best strategy.
If this were a game, and in a maze of twisty passages, all alike you met a gnome who was offering you a magic key but demanding an excessive amount of your gold, possibly even more than you have... would you assume it was a red herring and just forget about it, or at least entertain the possibility that paying off the gnome would turn out to be worth it later?
I'd very much like to continue this conversation by email and/or telephone. I can't help with money but perhaps I can assist you with some aspect of production or post.
I would DEFINITELY go for the half of the 5000 over the 10% of the 50,000, if it cut out distributors and middlemen overselling and mismarketing the film to the wrong people. I've never had a return. Never. And I've not been defrauded for a sale or had a chargeback. Not once. It's been good.
I completely mixed you up mentally with someone in Austin I was talking to earlier today :-) I can't really make out your perspective that distributors and middle people are the enemy. I've never held it against someone if I watched their film and wasn't into it.
I think they raise awareness at least. By convincing more people not to use the product, you leave a larger gap for a better product to come along and fill the void. What else can a consumer or producer do, if not complain?
What better product? This kind of thing costs a fortune to commercialize. YES, in a few years solid-state memory devices will become sufficiently cheap to make distribution a possibility...and people will find ways to complain SS-ROM. Network distribution will allow us to throw 40-50GB files around...eventually...at least in large urban areas.
Personally I like what Blu-ray does now and can live with the restrictions. It's preferable to me to both watch and potentially distribute that format than to sit around waiting a decade for the infrastructure to catch up with the leading solution for low-cost bulk media.
Ok, complaining is one solution. Many times it's the best option for consumers. However producers like this guy should work with the owners of the technology and negotiate a better deal.
Get support from other independent producers, get a following, get some press, and eventually get your way.
Instead he chooses to just complain. That's just lazy.
> However producers like this guy should work with the owners of the technology and negotiate a better deal.
You really think an independent film producer, hell, even all independent film producers as a group, have any negotiating power with the Blu-Ray licensing people? Seriously? If anything, the owners are deeply in bed with the big studios, who have a vested interest in keeping anybody but themselves off the platform.
I'm not sure why negotiation with and appeasement of the Blu-Ray people would be that productive. Explaining to consumers why Blu-Ray, as a technology, sucks, and encouraging them to use something else -- which right now might be "stick with DVDs" -- so as not to give their money to Blu-Ray's owners, seems like perfectly a valid strategy, since it might result in something better than Blu-Ray down the road. Working with Blu-Ray won't do that.
Blu-Ray may be the "winner" of the HD format war, but they're not gaining traction very fast. If adoption can be slowed down enough -- if users can be convinced it's a shitty format run by a would-be cartel who want to crush independent cinema beneath punitive fees -- then it'll be that much easier for a new format to succeed.
Of course it's the economy more than anything that has slowed down Blu-Ray adoption, but I don't see how telling people about the weaknesses of the format and its backers is a bad thing. The more people who know about it, the better, and the greater demand they'll be for an alternative (whether it's USB sticks, SD cards, or some form of online distribution).
No, it's presumptuous. You made no mention of ongoing negotiation, and I assumed a post entitled "Blu-Ray Still Blows" would muddy up negotiations if they existed.
Since you're here, correct me. Are you working with the owners of the technology to get this solved for independent producers?
I am not going to "negotiate" with Sony, Panasonic, IBM, and the other three members of the consortium for a "better deal". The Copy Protection is baked into the spec and cannot be removed - that's already a deal breaker for me. The terrible fees on top of it for even utilizing the copy protection you can't even choose not to use make it even worse.
My tactic has been to release my work under open licenses (www.bbsdocumentary.com is one, www.getlamp.com is about to be), give presentations in which I discuss this situation, and write weblog entries about such, which, as you see, do garner attention.
I donate to the EFF and their occasional efforts to improve the situation on a legal basis.
I question the seriousness of this post if you think that it is possible to have 'reasonable' negotiations with the AACS, the MPAA, Sony, etc about their licensing policies.
Large companies/organizations usually dictate their licensing terms downwards. They only make exceptions if they view you as a large enough group to be talking on their level (i.e. a major movie studio).
This won't change. In fact, most independent authors and musicians I know would kill for a transparent, workable DRM system that effectively stopped casual piracy. Without it, 0-day piracy would become ubiquitous. For Hannah Montana that won't matter much because Hannah Montana's shit is going to be bought -- and pirated -- in massive volume anyway. For the local musician it could mean not getting the big break he was hoping for because he didn't cross the threshold of 50,000 or 100,000 albums sold necessary for the record company to heavily market him. In the worst case it means not being able to feed his family with the income from his music.
So no, DRM is necessary if you want small independent creators to succeed in the age of the Pirate Bay. And it's not going away anytime soon.
I'm sorry but I can't even read this. It is hard to look at, textually awful and filled with needless coarse language. If you want to write a longish essay that people will read, learn to edit.
Agreed. We've got this great, robust network for shuttling data around the world and keeping redundant distributed copies, yet we buy spoonfuls of information on breakable discs with restrictions on how we can use them.
Sony is going to fight tooth and nail for this one. It's the first time that one of their proprietary formats became an industry standard. They rest are failures (ATRAC,BetaMax,MemoryStick,MiniDisc,etc). They still won't cater to independents though.
Yeah, but... smooth green antialiased text on a crisp LCD display? Shit's WEAK. It's like listening to Britney Spears cover "I Can't Get No Satisfaction". The soul is gone. I know you did the best you could with what you had, but I'm yearning for a CSS stylesheet option that changes the text into an 8x10 chunky pixely aliased monospaced font, rendered in fuzzy green phosphor dots that don't turn black immediately when the text is scrolled but rather fade to ghostly lingering afterimages.
As I've mentioned a couple times before, I always use chunky pixely fonts to code in, though the wheat-on-dark-slate-gray I used for my first Red Hat install gives me t3h warm fuzzies. It just feels namby-pamby typing your code in Lucida Console.
