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The Clicker: The part of Blue that has me seeing Red.
Every week Stephen Speicher contributes The Clicker, an opinion column on entertainment and technology:99% of the time I'm just your average mild-mannered tech-writer. However, every now and again, when the conditions are just right, I stroll over to my bookcase, reach to the top shelf and gently pull the third book from the left, "Celine Dion: The Magic Behind the Singing Horse." This simple action puts into motion a Rube-Goldbergian series of events which eventually reveals the secret passageway to my lead-lined den. It is there where I don my tinfoil hat and assume the role of my alter-ego, Dr. Conspiracy Theorist. Oh sure, the realist in me understands that the motivations of large entities are, in truth, driven by the confluence of inertia and ignorance, and not instead by some deep-seated hatred of my hopes and wishes. However, it's an empowering (and self-aggrandizing) exercise to assume that large corporations, governments, and even dictators are all out to screw me, the little guy.Today, I contemplate the ongoing Blu-ray / HD DVD war, and as I sit in this windowless bunker with only the sound of my Remington striking the ink onto the page to keep me company, I ask the question that seems to be so often overlooked: "Why isn't there consensus on the red portion of the specs?"It's clear why neither the BDA (Blu-ray Disc Association) nor the DVD Forum (HD DVD) will raise the white flag, capitulate, and end the blue-laser war. In addition to having already invested years of research and development which they hope will lead to lucrative licensing fees, there are also the intangibles that come from working with the beast you know. Dumping your format and adopting that of your competitor is no small chore and despite the fact that we, the media and the consumers, like to pretend that a blue laser is a blue laser – the two formats are quite different.Having said that, without the extra "Conspiracy Power" of the tinfoil hat, I found little reason why the two governing bodies couldn't come together and peacefully co-exist on something as well-understood as the red laser. With the hat, on the other hand, it came to me – they're trying to kill independent content.But let's back up for a second.
AT&T to launch Homezone TV service
Just because AT&T's Lightspeed and the late SBC and BellSouth's nascent FTTH rollout (which they now own, in a manner of speaking) aren't yet ready to provide prime time IPTV to the masses doesn't mean they will be stopped from taking on cable companies every which way they can; enter their new Homezone service. Since the DSL they currently serve up wouldn't be quite broad enough to give AT&T what they need for a true live-IPTV experience, they're bundling it with live TV from DISH, movie downloads from MovieLink, older programming from Akimbo, and DVR functionality in a single 2Wire-built box. It may seem a little piecemeal, but we're a little surprised this kind of home entertainment hodgepodge angle hasn't already been explored -- our only real fear here is whether AT&T and 2Wire will nail it when bringing so many kinds of user experiences into a single livingroom box.
Orb works TiVo with DVR Everywhere
Orb (finally) just officially took a page out of the Book of SlingBox today with the release of DVR Everywhere, their TiVo-streaming and controlling Orb add-on (not to be easily confused with TiVoAnywhere, that other Orb / TiVo add-on which is now apparently DVR Everywhere). Basically you'll get the same easy-to-use no firewall adjustments necessary Orb experience steamed to your laptop or portable in Real, Windows Media, or 3GP, but with recordings culled from your Series2 TiVo (which is also controllable by said software -- something also available for a while). Not quite as versatile as your SlingBox, which can pull video from just about any DVR device you can throw at it, but hey, it's a start -- especially if you've been considering that new dual tuner TiVo that we've been dangling from a string.[Via PR Newswire]
TDK hard at work on 8-layer 200GB Blu-ray Disc
Since Sony, et al. hammered out the Blu-ray Disc spec, there's been speculation, theorization, and discussion of an 8-layer 200GB disc. Sony even supposedly had some working 200GB BRD demos way back in 2004. Well, now those mammoth coasters are in the works over at TDK, who apparently hope to commercialize the first presumably quad-layered dual-sided discs (or possibly octo-layered single-sided discs -- yeah, right). They're not giving it up as to when these discs could come out or how much they'll cost, but right now we're more worried about just getting our hands on some players, you know?[Via TechDigest]
Netflix taking Blockbuster to court
Well, you know how we do in America: if ya can't beat 'em, sue 'em. Netflix is taking Blockbuster to court in California over the latter's online movie rental service, which, while suspiciously similar to Netflix, is certainly not the second DVD rental service available to consumers. We're a little perplexed as to why Netflix would only now be taking Blockbuster to court over their business methodology (i.e. their forming a company that does subscription-based online DVD rental by mail) seeking payment for damages and not, say, Wal-Mart (oh yeah, because they already took over Wal-Mart), but something tells us they're not looking for recompense so much as they're looking for Blockbuster to get the hell off their turf.
Sharp's new 20-inch LC-20AX6 HDTV
Another day, another Sharp Aquos gets announced -- today it's the LC-20AX6, a simple livin' 20-inch LCD HDTV featuring a 1,366 x 768 panel with a brightness of 500cd/m2, 1,200:1 contrast ratio, 8ms pixel response, integrated digital and analog tuners, and VGA, composite, and S-Video ins, among others (sorry, no DVI / HDMI listed). No figure for a price tag on this thing (or if we'll see it in the States), but it sounds like a decent smallish mid-range set for broke city dwellers such as ourselves.
