DVD's and a man called Heff

We all love DVD's these day's. They are cheap full of great extras and they have excellent quality. It wasn't always like that. In the mid `90's when the DVD was launched it was a flop. Just one more new format that failed to take off. People who wanted high quality already had Lazerdisk players and wouldn't dream of another format. The average Joe was happy enough with VHS, which was cheap and you could record on it. The Hollywood studios were not that keen either with DVD. Only using the format to release a limited number of films. After all no one was buying DVD players which were three times the price of a VCR.
Then Sony came up with a way to get more DVD players into homes. The licensed the format to software manufactures and soon the DVD ROM took over from the CD ROM. Now most new home computers had a drive that could play DVD's. Still the disks were not flaying off the shelves and Hollywood was still backing the VCR. After all who wants to sit in a home office and watch a movie on a small monitor, when you can stretch out in your den and watch the same movie from a VCR on a large TV.
This was a problem, but one of America's largest film producers realized that there audience might like to be locked away in a home office while watching there output.
Playboy Inc.
Playboy were the first major studio to make all of it's releases available in DVD, and they flew off the shelves. Soon Hollywood started taking notice, and large sums of money started crossing the pacific to help bring the cost of DVD players down.

Just under a decade on and WH Smith has announced that it will no longer stock films on VHS. Most other retailers stopped before last Christmas, soon the VHS will be a thing of the past. Even in professional uses VHS is being surpassed. It's all down to old Heff realizing that a movie player in a home office is the perfect place for his films.

A week almost

Wow a whole week almost since I posted anything. I think that the main reason is that I have been just far too busy. And now today I have to sit and watch the test match.

Normal service such as it is will resume next week.

Bob Moog RIP

More sad news, Bob Moog the father of the synthesizer died peacefully at his home in Ashville N.C. last night. He was 71. Ironically he died from the same form of Brain Tumour as Mo Mowlam. Moog Synthesizers were the first to really harness the sounds of oscillators into a usable interface that anyone could use. Although even then some of the early models were very complex. The company hit some troubles in the 1980's and the name was sold which led to a very long legal fight. The Moog brand was back in the news with the launch of some great new products last year, with Bob himself touring to promote these. On that tour he spoke to Resonance FM's Magz Hall. Hopefully this interview will get a reprise in the coming day's.



Bob Moog
1934-2005

Mo Mowlam RIP

The former government minister Mo Mowlem has died, from a brain tumour. She had originally been diagnosed with the tumour in the late 1990's but had been in remission. She was for many years the nations favourite politician. As she married a fearsome political brain with charm, charisma and good humour. Unlike a lot of government ministers she was someone whom you felt you would like if you ever met them.



Marjorie "Mo" Mowlam
1949-2005

I guess I just don't like golf!

I don't know why this is. Golf seems to bore me. I'm very happy to watch it, and read about it when it is on the TV all the time. I even stayed up late to watch Tiger Woods win the Masters this year. But three weeks ago when I decided to do an episode of my show 'Sporting Legends' about Jack Nicklaus I had a hell of a time. The show took a week of research, and then almost two days to write the script. Even then the second day was long and I wasn't finished until well after 9pm. I thought at first it was the difficulty of profiling just one person, until then the previous shows had been about battles between two sportsmen. (Lauda/Hunt and Louis/Schmelling) neither of those shows seemed such a task to write. But the Nicklaus show was hard.
The thing is I thought I would like writing about golf for the same reasons that I like Cricket and Baseball. It's full of statistics and little story's that get passed down through the years. I just found it hard. Today I wrote a script about Babe Ruth, and it was easy for me to organize my research and get everything down in a reasonable way. Plus there are a lot more words. For the Nicklus show I was able to play in lots of clips of him playing, and winning. With the Bambino I couldn't do that until I got to the later part of his career. Simply because there are not that many audio recordings of sports events from before about 1925.
I guess deep down I just don't like golf that much. Which is a shame, perhaps someone would be kind enough to invite me for a round at a nice course. Then I might really understand the game. I have my own clubs!

To hear 'Sporting Legends' on Babe Ruth tune into Resonance 104.4 FM at 15:30 tomorrow. Or if you are out side London listen on your computer here.

Starfucker!

A man from Texas is aiming to visit every Starbucks in the world. A man calling himself Winter is out to get the record. He started the quest in 1997, and he is still going. Already he has visited quite a few in the UK, although he will have to make a return trip as he hasn't got the two new ones in Fenchurch St, or the new one in Bluewater. He did visit the old two in Bluewater but since then they have moved into a larger one.
The thing is, that I feel I have to ask, WHY? Not that it isn't an idea to have a goal while travelling the world. Just why Starbucks. I've only even been on two branch's. Both of them in Notting Hill. For those who don't know there are five Starbucks in a very small part of Notting Hill, I only ended up in two because I was meeting someone in one and inadvertently got the wrong one. I did have a cup of coffee, my normal coffee order. Black no sugar. It was terrible. Later someone brought me a coffee from a Starbucks when the kettle in work broke. It again was terrible. You would have thought he could have found somewhere to visit each one of that could do basic black coffee well. I'm sure that a Cocha Mocha Dopea Twata is fine, but I don't really like coffee with milk.
Anyway some bloke called Bill Tangeman is making a film about Winter. Which is due out in time for the 2007 Oscars. Perhaps if Winter reads this and thinks about a return visit to London he should pop two doors up from the Soho Sq. branch that he needs to bag, and instead visit Eat. Eat. is a wonderful little coffee shop which can do black coffee and has wonderful handmade organic food.
Although my personal favourite is the Café in Ray's Jazz at Foyles. Which again dose great coffee and you can literally look down your nose at the people opposite in Starbucks in Borders. While tucking into food and bread made fresh that day on the premises. If you have never been to the Café in Foyles you should treat yourself. The music from Ray's Jazz is of course always cool.

I've arrived

Finally I'm now a proper broadcaster. Today someone sent me an unsolicited press release.

How my mind works at times.

I was quickly looking in WH Smith today. Just seeing if they had anything in there DVD sale that I would like, I make it a rule never to spend over £10uk on a DVD unless it is something really worth it. Anyway I hadn't been in that store for a while and it had been reorganized. Where the classic cinema section had been was now fitness DVD's. you know the type Geri Halliwell standing on her head and Linda Barker's decorate to lose weight. I wasn't really paying too much attention until I noticed one DVD in the section had on it in big letter NAZI'S.
The first thought that ran through my mind was, "I cannot believe that some idiot has made a Nazi fitness DVD." I imagined that it was along the lines of the US Marine fitness course only with people in long leather coats and monocles.
Of course there is no such thing. Someone had placed a copy of the BBC documentary 'Nazi's a lesson from history' in the wrong section.
This isn't the first time that I have made a similar error. A while ago in the book department of Selfridges I noticed a section sign that read Humour, Toilet, Male, Female.
I thought it was a bit strange to sub divide the toilet humour section into genders. Until I realized that the sign meant to inform people that not only should you go that way for the humour section but beyond it you will find both the Gents and the Ladies toilets.
Anyway to finish off this here is a link to a confusing sign in Austria.