An interesting read today about business models, and how certain businesses look at their customers and how they treat them. Well worth a read. Via Daring Fireball.

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Ever notice you seem to be watching less TV these days? Want to know why? Well, if you read this article you might come to the conclusion it's because you're not drinking Gin...


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I offer the following link to a story on news.com. Basically, Apple's iTunes Music Store has become the #2 retailer of music in the US, after Wal Mart. Digital music downloads are up significantly last year, and CD sales continue to fall. If those rates keep up, the iTunes store will be #1 next year.

But this is not just news about a switch in the way people buy music, and it's not just a "good for Apple" kind of thing… I offer it also as, perhaps, more justification for the possibility I recently raised; that the result of the High Def DVD format war may, at some point in the future, be irrelevant. Again, if the music industry can, in a short period of time, go from distributing its wares primarily by moving shiny bits of round plastic in square plastic cases wrapped in plastic that is friggin' difficult to get off to a primarily digital download method… why can't movie sales and movie rentals go the same way?

Now I am not trying to be Nostradamus here (even if I think he was a total fake… but I digress); it's a fool's game to try to predict anything, much less how something as big as the movie sale and rental industry will go in the future… but the possibilities are there.


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There is an old army joke, originating from the days when NATO was prepared to engage the Warsaw Pact in "conventional armoured warfare in central Europe." The basic version of the joke goes like this (as so often happens, there are many variations. But I digress); two Soviet Army Generals meet in Paris, after leading their respective divisions through the NATO defences, flawlessly executing their invasion plan. One says to the other, "By the way, comrade; who won the air war?"

The idea was, the Air Force could talk about air superiority and dog fighting all day long, but in the end, it didn't really matter; wars are won on the ground.

Fast forward to today, and the recent announcement that Toshiba plans, essentially, to give up on their HD DVD format, ceding the High Definition DVD format war to the Blu Ray camp.

Thinking about this for a bit… and the recent development of Apple TV HD Movie rentals… I just can't help imagining a day in the not-too-distant future, which sees Steve Jobs looking around the members of Apple's Board of Directors and asking, "By the way, who won the format war?"

Now that the ability exists to, from the comfort of my own home, review a list of available movies to rent or buy, downloading them across The Intertubes, watching them on my big screen TV in full HD glory… without leaving the ass groove on my couch… do I really need discs? Blu Ray or otherwise?

In the end, disc formats don't really matter. Such things are "won" in the arena of public opinion. And if Apple makes it convenient and, more importantly, easy to rent and buy HD movies through Apple TV, it is very possible that people simply won't bother to buy discs.

That being said, I personally think the Blu Ray format is superior anyway, and I still plan to buy a Blu Ray DVD player… but I also plan to buy an Apple TV box, and only time will tell if I end up renting more often online or at Blockbuster.


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The Ottawa Citizen has a great interview with General Rick Hillier, the Canadian Chief of the Defence Staff; highly recommended. I don't have a direct link, but it is in the edition for 28 January, 2008. Some of the better quotes:

"I think you have to draw a line. Yes, you want to negotiate, discuss and without violence. But when you get to some of those men -- you know something? It's not about religion. It's not about extreme views.

"It always comes down to this: Men want power -- power to make money, power to enforce or inflict their views on others and power to remain immune from responsibility for, and accountability for, their actions. They take patriotism to the extreme of nationalism. They take religion to extremist views.

"Some Canadians don't understand the fact you can't just go and talk to people in Southern Afghanistan and say 'OK, now put your guns down and let's all come to an agreement that we're actually going to build some schools and we're actually going to have some boys and girls go to school and we're actually going to choose who's going to lead us here.'

"People start shooting and killing folks and children, women, older people or men --they don't care -- and at some point in time, you're just going to have to say 'We're not going to accept this'."

General Hillier is a man I admire, and not just because he is my boss (if only indirectly). Some Canadians seem to think our military is or should be intended for peacekeeping only. General Hillier disagrees.


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