Standard? Why? Remember when we had three video formats? We had Betamax (Sony), VHS (Video Home System, by JVC) and Video2000 (Philips). VHS became a standard format for consumer recording and viewing in the 1980s and 1990s after competing in a fierce format war with Sony’s Betamax and, to a lesser extent, Philips’ Video 2000. Since none of the systems worked with each other, millions of consumers that didn’t choose VHS initially, wounded up with a non-standard product (and loads of shitty videos). In short: it sucked. When the DVD came out in the mid-90’s, at least every DVD player […]
E-ink applications going mainstream in 2006?
Lexar USB stick Since I’m in the IT-business working for a premedia/prepress firm, I have always been interested in E-ink or digital paper. Ever since I started working for an Internet firm in 1995, it has been my strong belief that paper (except maybe toilet paper) will be replaced by something else. After all: chopping down trees just to make paper from it seems so archaic and political incorrect to me. In fact I always said that trees will become what those fluffy white baby seals where in the 80’s: it is political incorrect to kill/chop them down. Off course […]
Another Xmas, another New Year
Xmas presents: oh joy! Once again I am back home after a Christmas in Tallahassee with my girlfriend Carrie. And what a great time did I have! I think this must have been the best visit I had in years. I think it was just what we needed: some quality time. I can’t wait till summer vacation: we very much would like to visit Italy and drive there and make it a great trip down the south of Europe. But here I am again: back in cold Holland. Going from some 18-20 degrees to just 0-5 degrees isn’t a pleasure! […]
Bloggers@large wishes you a Merry Xmas & a Happy 2006!
Bloggers@large wishes you a Merry Christmas & A Happy 2006Hope to blog you again next year!
Driving home for Christmas
Happy Xmas Oh yes: three more days to go and then I’m driving home for Christmas! This friday I’ll be on the plane and then I grab a rental for my last stretch to Tallahassee. I have spend a lot of christmases with my girlfriend, but for some reason this year feels special to me (for several reasons). What – to me – surely is going to be weird about it, is the fact that for the first time ever, my girlfriend will not be home when I arrive; she is working at a different time now and she probably […]
“I Robot”
Honda Asimo The Japanese never cease to amaze me. They are doing a lot of research with robotics and it seems they are years ahead of the Americans. Just take a look at the new Honda Asimo robot. It is awesome to see this thing move! Fluid motion and a perfect balance. Just check out the little flash movies they have on the website. You can see by the way this robot moves so fluid like and the way it interacts, that a lot of progress has been made: previous attempts to have a robot with two legs were pretty […]
YouTube: put your videos online
YouTube rocks! Ok, here is a cool new service: YouTube. It lets you put all your video’s (with a maximum upload of 100mb per movie) online and converts them into Flash movies. You can then view them from anywhere in the world or you can add the video’s to your own webpage (like I just did), e-mail them etc. etc.. I think this is going to be the next cool thing that will sweep the web. This really rocks!! Check out the video that I attached here for fun! It is a spoof on the Dutch Scarlet One commercials that […]
DVD rot!
Rotting away! For the first time since I have started to buy and use DVD’s I have come upon a DVD (a Dutch documentary called “I’ts magic time”) that doesn’t work anymore because of oxydation (aka “dvd rot”)! A scary thought because this DVD is from 2002 and it’s 100% legit. It is a welknown fact that DVD’s (or CD’s for that matter) that you burn yourself, have a shell life that is less than a regular DVD. Since I have over 375 DVD’s (about 90% I burned myself) it makes me wonder what will happen the next few years. […]
“Get the checkbook. It’s Domino’s”
$5000 delivery? Ok, I don’t know what PR genius came up with this contest, but apparantly someone at Domino’s Pizza’s thought that it would be fun to sell a hypermodern “Ultimate Man Cave Couch” to the first person “to call 1-800-521-8274 (ask for Scott Senne) between 12-2 p.m. EST on Wednesday, Dec. 14, so devotees of this divan should work on their dialing dexterity. All major credit cards are accepted.” Now, the couch will set the “lucky” owner back for a mere $30,000 (I would say; about a life-time supply of Pizza). But, the clincher is: “Some nit-picky details: The […]
Making the Web “2.0”
AJAX: enabling Web 2.0? Recently I wrote about my last 10 years online. When I wrote that article I felt that, in comparison with those first 5-6 years (’95 – 2001), nothing ‘radical’ or really ‘new’ was going on. Well, I need to revise my opinion because I completely left something out: Web 2.0. I guess it completely skipped my mind because a lot of what is hyped to be “Web 2.0” has been around in some way or form, but was pretty dormant, so to speak. But with something like AJAX popping up all around us, it seems that […]