Digital Rules

Oh I have seen this before and its panning out to be just like another boring weekend. Another boring Saturday. Waking up undecided whether to get out of bed or not, in fact as i write this blog, i am still in bed, and then i had a thought. I remembered some weeks ago I made a post about missing taking pictures because my digital camera was busted. Well, i just remembered, i got it back in tip top shape, ready to go with flashes a-blazing. And now i have something to do, but not before i marvel at how digital has changed the world we live in, through moments in recalled in vignette. ... last weekend i was in a conference, and i just got my camera back, but well, being without a camera for a year gets you used to "not remembering that you had one with you when you did." One of the people there was just taking pictures all over, wantonly snapping and flashing...shooting... i swear if that camera was a weapon of some sort everybody would be more than just departed... unidentifiable. ... that very night of the conference, we took the guests from out of town to a local bar, and just as today everybody has a cellphone, each one in the party seemed to have their own digital camera. You ever seen one of those scenes in a Hollywood movie premiere with the stars walking the red carpet, and there are flashes everywhere which don't seem to stop. It was that kind of scene all night. I wonder if the other bar patrons were annoyed with the flashes but, well we don't get that group together in the city that often. Bottom line is, and i know you have done this before... just stop and think for a moment, and see yourself in one of those scene taking shots, and having to change a roll of film after 36 shots. ---- When i was in radio some time ago, part of my job was to train the new DJs how to work the machine, say stuff on the microphone, do both at the same time, and well think on their feet... making sure you got something to say when things go wrong, when all your machines don't work, and all you got is that MIC ON button and your voice. But then at the time, they didn't have a whole lot of machines to work, nope no sir, all you had was just one piece of equipment --- the computer. Another digital marvel indeed, and one reason why man has quickened pace in creating newer and better technology. The computer, in my own little opinion, is just like any other tool man has had and used, but even better cos this think does chores for him, thinks for him and in the next few years, becomes him. Man becomes the computer. But before we get into that quasi-profound crap, lets go back to my point. The DJ, his microphone, and his machine. The machine being, a computer which simply plays all the music, has all the commercials ready, has all your station IDs on cue, and aside from the voice you hear, the computer delivered everything that comes out of the radio. What i couldn't get was, despite the technology at their fingertips, the comfort of just sitting almost the entire time and not running around looking for records or cartridges, these guys just couldn't avoid messing up on the air. While the old school guys did pretty spectacular shows with all those record players, cart decks, cassette decks, open reels.. analogue stuff; yet on the digital their performance was dismal. ---- A few weeks ago, i was surfing and i came across this online video demo of TiVO. It totally blew my mind. I remember back in the day when home movie entertainment was a luxury, when you had a betamax player the size of a tub (exaggeration to prove a point), then VHS, yet still like beta, you had a tape that played, and you groan and gripe when you come to a really great part of the movie and the picture and sound fuzzes and buzzes and you cant see a thing... someone who viewed the tape before you, had his beta/vhs player have a snack on the tape. And that was just a little over two decades ago. Today you have yourself your dvd players, dvd writers, the dvd's and rock bottom priced recordable dvd's. We get the best picture quality so far on TV watching a movie on DVD. If you want TV, forget cable, get hooked up to sattelite TV, more choices, and even better and a tad expensive is TiVO, where you can choose, record, watch later, and while watching... rewind, slo mo, enlarge... well, the works. Its just spectacular. Video quality and delivery using todays known technologies, is at its peak. It hasn't been any better in the past and in the coming years, it can only get even better. The same technologies that made it better however, are the same which cause certain industries to loss money. You have great picture resolution on DVD, and in the same breath, DVD technology, the ability to create DVDs is used for intellectual property violation and piracy. We marvel at digital... no doubt it has made our lives easier, better, and even more. But it also has been taken advantage of and abused by many, and taken for granted.