explodedlibrary.info

mini-rant about indispensable remote controllers

Why do some manufacturers of TVs and DVD players design their products so that the device is virtually useless without the remote? *sigh* My flatmate has an otherwise cool DVD/VCR but because he's lost his remote, we can't do anything with it but the bare minimum. Samsung says as much on its website. How many other people have equipment which has been orphaned from its remote and is thereby maimed? Having just been through a major move, I can say that it's fairly difficult to lose a DVD player, but quite easy to lose a remote controller, especially when there are so many of them around. The easiest solution would be if manufacturers always provided a way to access the menu on the actual machine.

region free DVD viewing

As I mentioned earlier, I'm returning to Australia on February 1. I have my tickets, I'm now in the process of working out what things I should take with me, and which things I should sell, give away or throw out. I was thinking that I might as well give away my small DVD collection, because it was going to be too difficult for me to view them in Australia, thanks to DVD region encoding (the link is a good summary - albeit slightly biased in favour of regioning). It is so frustrating that a technological solution is deliberately blocked like this.

I've decided that I will bring US DVDs with me in the hope that I'll eventually get a Region-free DVD player in Australia, or I'll find region-switching software for my iBooks's DVD player that will work, that will at least set my iBook's region-switching-counter back to zero.

Fresh Air fails O'Reilly's "fair and balanced" test

I actually heard the interview and spat between Bill O'Reilly and Terry Gross on NPR's Fresh Air last night. This was not a hatchet job on O'Reilly. He wasted this opportunity for him to have a genuine dialogue with some of his critics on the left ...

following up on the investigation of Fox

Well, I guess that they got off. I'm not too surprised. The idea that they have a conservative bias isn't what bugs me about them - it's that they claim to be "fair and balanced." Of course nobody takes that seriously any more, especially after the Franken lawsuit debacle. They need a new slogan that admits their bias - what about "NeoCon Mouthpiece of the Bushies"?

not all is insane in the world: Fox is being investigated for biased war coverage in Britain

Fox News facing investigation in Britian. Fox News is facing an investigation in Britian for providing biased coverage during the war.The Fox News Channel could be forced off the air in Britain if an investigation currently under way by the watchdog Independent Television Commission determines that... [different strings]