Monthly Archives: September 2005

We're big fans of TiVo here at newsfromme.com but we're also uneasy about something. Recently, the TiVo folks rolled out version 7.2 of their software and my various TiVos received it in the last week or two. It has two new features — one a minor plus, one a major minus. The sorta-good one is for those of us who have our TiVos networked to our home computers. "TiVo To Go" already allowed us to use our network connections to transfer a recording from the harddisk of the TiVo to the harddisk of a computer. The new software makes it possible to go in the other direction. You can take any properly-encoded MPEG-2 video file on your harddisk, transfer it to your TiVo and play it on the TV set connected to that TiVo.

I'm not entirely sure when I would want to do this but I suppose it has its applications. It certainly isn't useful enough to compensate for the downsides imposed by the other new feature. Put simply, as of version 7.2, it is now possible for the copyright holder of a TV show (i.e., the network or producer) to encode a show so as to restrict TiVo's ability to record or save it. Welcome to the wonderful world of copy protection.

There are three categories of copy protection involved here. The TiVo website describes them thusly:

• Copy Never – This content is not allowed to be recorded by a TiVo DVR.
• 7 Day Unlimited – These programs can be recorded and viewed as many times as you like within 7 days of their original recording date.
• 7 Day / 24 Hours – These programs can be stored for up to 7 days but once you begin watching the show, you must complete viewing within 24 hours.

These restrictions obviously suck. The middle one sucks a lot, the last one sucks even more and the first is the suckiest of all. For those of us who have a TiVo with a built-in DVD burner, there seems to be yet another quite-sucky category, which is that the show can be recorded normally on the TiVo and kept there indefinitely but it cannot be copied onto a DVD. TiVo indicates that a show has a specified restriction by putting a little red flag on its listing. We are told that these will appear only on pay-per-view events and video-on-demand material and that it is almost inconceivable that the broadcast networks will stop us from recording their shows or saving them as long as we want. And at the moment, I do think it's premature to be worried that you won't be able to record or archive The Simpsons or CSI: Boise or Conan O'Brien.

Who should be worried? Well, if I operated a movie theater that depended on current releases, I might start wondering how to convert the place into an Olive Garden. The studios are already making noises about getting rid of the exclusive window for theatrical exhibition and when that happens, a lot of theaters will probably suffer. Ten years ago, the average length of time between the release of a new movie and its availability on home video was around 200 days. Two years ago, it was 180 days and recently, it's been around 136 days, though Sony has put out DVDs of theatrical releases that opened in theaters some 95 days earlier. You don't have to be a statistician to see where this one's going. "Day and date" is the wave of the future, and TiVo is obviously gearing up to deal with that kind of marketing.

Right now for us, it's more of an annoyance. How much of an annoyance it will be will depend on which shows are flagged, but I must say it would discourage me from purchasing a pay-per-view program to be told I had to watch it within seven days. I think the real pain for me is that it reverses the whole psychology of TiVo. As you know if you're a friend I've harangued into buying one (not a small group), the great thing about TiVo is that it enables you to own television instead of the other way around. You watch what you want when you want to watch it. You pause it when you want. You can live your life without fear of missing a favorite show or having to run home and catch it because you forgot to set the VCR. Once I post this, I'm going to take a walk over to a nearby Souplantation where, through this Friday, they're featuring a terrific Cream of Tomato soup. Whenever I get home, tonight's installment of The Daily Show with Jon Stewart will be waiting for me.

I've come to trust my TiVos. I don't like the whole idea of them saying no to me…telling me they won't do what I want them to do. This year marks 18 years since the TiVo company was founded. In other words, TiVo has become an adult and I can no longer control it. Next thing I know, mine will be drinking and smoking and even recording Bill O'Reilly against my explicit orders. It's very sad.

In the meantime, to perhaps foreshadow the inevitable, TiVo owners are reporting that some normal broadcast shows, mainly on Fox affiliates, have been "flagged" by TiVo as not-to-be-copied. For example, folks in some cities who recorded a recent King of the Hill were informed by their TiVos that the show would be deleted in seven days and could not be copied to another medium. This, we're hearing, was a mistake. Depending on which report you read, it was either due to a bug in the TiVo 7.2 software or to an encoding error by someone at Fox or some combination of screw-ups. Either way, everyone agrees it was an error and that ordinary, non-pay-per-view broadcast television is safe. The question is, once this kind of copyguard technology is widespread: For how long?

Starting next week, it will cost money to read some sections of The New York Times online. They say "News, features, editorial and analysis" will remain free but it will now cost $50 a year to belong to TimesSelect, a new subscription service that will basically give you the columns (opinion and otherwise) and access to the Times archives. This, they've announced, will include articles back 25 years at first, eventually to expand all the way back to 1851 when William Safire's worldview was more or less current.

The archive service, depending on how complete it is, could be quite valuable…but I'm guessing that most people who would care about it already have subscriptions, perhaps through their employers, to Lexis/Nexis or some other such service. Some folks might pay for the columnists but the question is how available this material will be for websurfers who don't cough up the subscription fee. I'm guessing a number of political websites will start pirating and posting the words of Paul Krugman, Thomas Friedman, Frank Rich, etc. If they don't, those columnists are going to become highly irrelevant in a hurry. I mean, why pay for Maureen Dowd when you can get Molly Ivins for free? Why pay for David Brooks when a hundred free sites will give you David Broder? Why pay for Safire's occasional columns when you can go to a crooked psychic and get predictions that don't come true? The importance of an opinion columnist has a lot to do with how often they are quoted.

I'm going to spring for the fifty bucks just to see what you get, but I'm guessing very few individuals will, and the Times probably knows that. They've got to be betting that companies will subscribe in sufficient number; that the income from that will seem like a decent trade-off for stifling the reach of their columnists. And I'm betting that they're betting wrong and that before the year is out, the columnists are moved to the free area and the Times either issues partial refunds or gives us something to make up for the change in service. We shall see.

As you may have heard, there was a big electrical outage today in Los Angeles. Apparently, Michael Brown's new job is working for the Department of Water and Power.

My area was only out for a while but my Internet connection was out most of the afternoon. When it came on, I had about thirty messages telling me my website was down. I assume that's because my I.S.P. has its servers located in downtown L.A. As you can see, all is now working.

I wasn't going to link to any more articles about what went wrong with the emergency efforts in New Orleans and thereabouts. But this piece in The Wall Street Journal seems like a pretty good record of what happened with regard to the levees breaking down and news of this being spread. Once again, the National Weather Service was spot-on accurate and timely with reporting it but some newsfolks and government officials didn't seem to get the message for a very long time.

Andrew Ferguson offers an interesting view of how the conservative movement has evolved in this country. This is from the Weekly Standard, which claims to be the foremost voice of conservatism.

While your browser is pointed to the right, you might like to also read an article on that site by Larry Miller. It's about…well, it'll read better if I don't tell you what it's about.

I have written a number of posts here about government incompetence relating to Hurricane Katrina. In fairness, I should acknowledge the one department that seems to have performed with uncanny precision. That is the National Weather Service.

We joke a lot about bad weather forecasts and about how if the guy on the TV says it'll be clear and sunny, take an umbrella. In truth, while forecasts do sometimes go awry, the N.W.S. does a very good job. I just read over their forecasts leading up to and during the hurricane (archived on this page) and I was impressed, as you might be if you go there and root around. The early bulletins, issued when there were still different tracks Katrina might take, were cautious but they put everyone on alert. By the time a Category 4 (or maybe a Category 5) seemed likely, the forecasts were firm and accurate. In his weblog, NBC newsman Brian Williams wrote…

I will never forget one particular moment: I was on the phone with my wife while at the checkout area when a weather bulletin arrived on my Blackberry, along with a strong caveat from our New York producers. The wording and contents were so incendiary that our folks were concerned that it wasn't real…either a bogus dispatch or a rogue piece of text. I filed a live report by phone for Nightly News (after an exchange with New York about the contents of the bulletin) and very cautiously couched the information. Later, we learned it was real, every word of it.

Here's a link to that whole weblog entry by Williams. And if you read up on the page as far as this entry, you'll learn a bit about the folks who made the predictions and wrote those important announcements.

Why does the N.W.S. do such a good job when other agencies fail? Well, I'll suggest two thoughts. One is that it's the kind of bureau that can't be surrendered to cronyism and hiring one's old buddies. You apparently don't need a background in emergency services to work at or even run FEMA but to be involved with the National Weather Service, you have to know a lot about science and the weather. Also, there's no way to use the department to transfer large sums of money from the government to the private sector. No one gets wealthy working for the National Weather Service. No one makes their friends wealthy and then leaves to go into business with them, which leaves the opportunists out. Instead, the people at the National Weather Service just do the job they're supposed to do. More arms of government ought to try it.

One of Washington's long-time lobbyists says that Hurricane Katrina has prompted him to rethink what he does for a living. Go read.

There are a lot of interesting articles out there about Hurricane Katrina and the response to it. None but the most partisan seem to suggest that any party with any responsibility was blameless. Some come down to the technicalities of arguing things like how culpable Governor Kathleen Blanco was because she told the Feds, "I need everything you've got" but wasn't more specific. My feeling is that we're in trouble if any emergency system relies on any mayor, governor or even president being 100% on the job and letter-perfect in time of catastrophe. We should have a system of checks and double-checks that works even if these people are unavailable or swamped; where if they drop the ball, there's someone else to pick it up.

That said, I'm going to link to a batch of articles on the aftermath. I don't suggest that any one has total command of all the details but as a whole, you sure get a sense that the response could have been (Correct that:) should have been more effective.

• Here's the main New York Times overview of the response. I think the Times too often errs on the side of listening to "unnamed White House sources" but this piece seems relatively free of that.
• The Washington Post gives us "The Steady Buildup to a City's Chaos" while the Los Angeles Times has a piece called "Put to Katrina's Test."
• An article in Time magazine entitled, "Places Where the System Broke Down" and one in Newsweek called "How Bush Blew It."
• The Knight Ridder newspapers are running this article headlined, "Failure At Every Turn."
• And for another perspective, here's a piece by Christopher Ruddy called "Don't Blame Bush for Katrina."
• Lastly, Andrew Sullivan is a conservative commentator who hasn't sounded much like one lately. His slow conversion from being a champion of George W. Bush parallels that of a few friends of mine.

About ten minutes after America learned of the 9/11 attacks four years ago, people started saying, "Nothing will ever be the same again." I think a lot of us are amazed how little some things have changed.

If there was one sure bet back then, it was that this country would spend whatever it took to make this country safer, especially in terms of airport security. A lot of money has been allocated and it's been a long time since I've heard anyone claim it has spent wisely or even that it's achieved much of the stated goal. Even before the Katrina disaster exposed the inadequacy of FEMA and the Department of Homeland Security, there were reports of waste; of cash that had been earmarked to improve security going for the customary government pork instead, lavished in states and on locations that are on no terrorist's itinerary. Here's an article about how so much of it went to low-interest loans for small businesses like pet salons and Dunkin' Donuts stands. At the same time, no one seems to think that our nuclear plants are guarded as well as they could be…but, hey, at least you can get a cruller in Seattle.

In the weeks after 9/11, I wouldn't have imagined that anyone — Democrat, Republican, Independent — would have accepted that kind of thing. But we apparently do.

Catching Osama and bringing him to justice seemed like the most important thing in the world at the time. On September 13, with the rubble of the World Trade Center still smoldering, George W. Bush said, "The most important thing is for us to find Osama bin Laden. It is our number one priority and we will not rest until we find him." Eighteen months later, that same George W. Bush said, "I don't know where he is and I really don't care. It's not that important. It's not our priority." I wonder if Bush lost one supporter because of that switch. But those who think he's been a strong leader have apparently decided that he's right; that it's not our priority. That's quite a change from four years ago.

I don't blame Bush for that. It's the whole country. Most Democrats don't care either, and the few who've brought it up — primarily as an election issue, not a real concern — haven't been able to get any traction.

We talk tough and then we confuse talking tough with actually doing something. If on 9/12/01, you'd said, "Four years from now, Osama will still be free and most Americans won't care much," everyone would have said you were nuts, unpatriotic and disrespectful of all those who'd perished on 9/11. But now bringing him to justice is no big deal. Some of the Iraq hawks seem more interested in pursuing that war because of tenuous, arguable connections to Al-Qeada than they are in pursuing Al-Qeada.

This is not to suggest that we would be safer if we'd captured and killed Bin Laden. That would not have stopped his movement any more than the death of Colonel Sanders meant an end to fried chicken. I'm just amazed that four years after we declared him the worst enemy and murderer of Americans that had ever lived, most people really don't care much. Just before Martha Stewart was sentenced, a friend of mine said to me, "If you gave most Americans the choice of seeing Osama Bin Laden brought to justice or Martha behind bars, I think a lot of them would have voted for Martha."

Dwayne Hickman, who played Dobie Gillis, remembers Bob Denver, who played Maynard.

Every so often, I like to direct your attention to the stunning output of a company called Electric Tiki Designs, which issues superb little figures of classic characters. I have them all over my house as I'm impressed with the workmanship and care that goes into their design and manufacture. They're soon to come out with little busts of ElectraWoman and Dynagirl from the Sid and Marty Krofft TV series of the same name. As some of you may know, I own (but do not wear) the original ElectraWoman costume…and the head of the company, Tracy M. Lee, actually came over here to take a look at it and check out the color scheme so his statue would be as accurate as possible. That dedication shows in his product and no, I don't own stock in the company. I just recommend their products.

Here's a nice little piece by Meghan Daum remembering Bob Denver or, more specifically, Maynard G. Krebs. One quibble: Gilligan's Island was on for three seasons, not four. [Los Angeles Times, means you gotta register.]

I'm hearing/reading two phrases over and over in the coverage of the Katrina aftermath — "This is no time to play the Blame Game" and "Mistakes were made." Generally, the latter is a variation on the former, with the speaker admitting the undeniable and sticking to the passive voice until he or she can figure out how to fill in the blank in the active form of that sentence — "___ made mistakes" — with something other than "I" or "we."

Employing the first phrase is roughly similar to Dennis Rodman, late in the fourth quarter with his team down several points, trying to do a lay up and get the ball in the net while at the same time trying to convince his opponents, "This is no time to shoot baskets." There is no one suggesting we suspend the Blame Game who isn't out there, one way or another, playing the Blame Game. No one. What's interesting is that a lot of them seem to think this is a winner-take-all competition, meaning that if you can get the greatest amount of the criticism to fall on someone else, your own screw-ups will be overlooked.

Actually, we already have one acknowledged winner in the Blame Game: Michael Brown, head of FEMA. In a rare display of bi-partisanship, folks from all sides declared him inarguably negligent. Some were probably just trying to divert responsibility from their team but Brown seemed so inept, at least in TV interviews, that he quickly became the one thing everyone could agree upon. In a way, he's more or less been eliminated from the Blame Game, much like a few years ago when everyone agreed that John Larroquette had won the Best Supporting Actor Emmy so many times that it wasn't fair to keep giving it to him. If Brown had any class, he would have made a little speech like Larroquette did, announcing he was dropping out of the competition so somebody else could get what they deserved.

Which is not to say we won't be hearing a lot about this man. Brown retires undefeated from the Blame Game to determine who should have/could have done more for the victims in the Gulf Coast, but there's still the other Blame Game. That's the one to decide who's responsible for Michael Brown and for the incompetence and cronyism that had FEMA not doing any of the things they were expected to do.

In the meantime, back at the Main Event, people are writing articles that argue that Blanco erred more than Bush, or that Bush was more negligent than Blanco, or that Nagin did everything right or everything wrong. Those on the national level seem to think that they can emerge relatively unscathed if they can just direct the anger towards the State and/or Local level, and the State and Local folks are blaming the Feds and sometimes each other.

It's kind of like The Three Stooges destroyed your house and Moe thinks he can get off scot free if he points the finger at Larry and Curly. Personally, I think this disaster is so large that the Blame Game can and should have multiple winners, starting with everyone who's now saying "This is no time to play the Blame Game" and "Mistakes were made." And I don't think anyone should come away from this looking innocent just because they managed to manipulate the press and the facts to get themselves into second or third place.

My friend Mike was in this commercial. See if you can spot him.

The New York Times has a nice article about the late Nudie Cohn. Isn't that a great name? Nudie Cohn. And no, he was not a guy who made Jewish porn films. Nudie was a flamboyant designer who customized cars and wardrobes, and he was one of the great "media celebrities" in Los Angeles in the sixties and seventies. He turned up in parades and on talk shows and he'd make great entrances at events, often putting Liberace to shame in the category of glittering apparel. He had a store out on Lankershim and I went in there a few times and paid way too much for very nice western shirts that I wish I still had and could fit into.

From the article, I see that there's a website with the history of Nudie Cohn, and I see on the website that his family has closed down the store. He was a colorful gent and you might enjoy reading about him.