Television Should Be On Demand

Something interesting has been brewing in the world of television: young adults are actually responding to television shows being on iTunes. The shows that are at the top of the Neilsen ratings (which I personally don't put much faith in since it's merely a survey) don't match what's at the top in iTunes. What we're seeing here is that the audiences for these shows don't want to mold their schedule around weekly time slots and prefer to just watch their television programming on demand by purchasing it on iTunes. Of course, this doesn't even count the rampant piracy from people who use YouTube alternatives to get their boob tube fix. I firmly believe that a huge change is brewing for these television networks. I wonder how long it is before they realize that Neilsen ratings aren't going to cut it anymore. How many more shows have to become huge successes on DVD and iTunes past their cancellations and induce cult followings before they realize that the current model is inherently flawed and wasteful. They would make so much more money if they gave people more choice for how and when they watch their television. The Internet is a great medium to do that, and yet it seems quite available for more options and programming and such, especially with devices like the Apple TV and Windows Media Center machines becoming more well-known. I personally believe that IP TV will catch on before long, and it will be the nail in the coffin of broadcast television as we know it today. Let's see how things develop though, because that's a rather bold statement.

It turns out that the 3 week increase in Daylight Savings Time was completely useless, as was predicted beforehand. Actually, it did accomplish one thing: pissing off a lot of programmers who had to write patches so that server clocks and device clocks would adjust appropriately. I wonder how much time congressmen waste on this crap.

Have you ever thought about what makes a logo appealing to you? I actually hadn't until I read this article, and it's amazingly true. I didn't realize how unimportant color should be for a logo but scalability is huge. Plus, of course, it must be memorable. One of the comments pointed out that uniqueness can be important, and I'd agree with that as well.

It looks like airplanes are getting outfitted for WiFi now thanks to a company called AirCell that purchased a radio frequency from the FCC on which to broadcast Internet access and will provide it to consumers at no more than $10 a day. Sounds like a good price considering how expensive the equipment and frequency is, but I have no idea why they're restricting VoIP on it.

There's a new Mac Pro on the market with 8 freaking cores. You could take over a small country with that kind of power. Ok, maybe not, but at $2500 it's obviously focused more towards research and server usage (and nerds even more hard core than me).

I know that I posted about a similar list a few months ago, but here's another list of the top tech flops. I like that they remembered Microsoft Bob and Internet currency, but they totally forgot about that stupid audio format that Sony had invented for their Walkmans. I'm honestly amazed that Sony manages to stay in business with all the missteps they've had in the past decade.

Nearly all the movie news I have to day is related to Grind House, what with its release being this weekend at all. Too bad I probably won't get to see it this weekend though! Anyway, if you're confused as to its origins, IGN has a list of some great movies to look into to understand the inspiration. Yahoo Movies picked up another clip from the film, and actually has some cast interviews as well that I didn't notice before. Rose McGowan looks like she's really going to stand out in this film. In fact, she already stands out on the new cover of Rolling Stone with Rosario Dawson. That's probably the raciest cover they've had in a good while, in my opinion. Rose McGowan hasn't been in many good movies (probably why Tarantino picked her), but I love Rosario Dawson as an actress, for some reason.

The only other thing is that a sequel to Spider-man 3 may not be out of the question as previously assumed. It turns out that Kirsten Dunst and Toby Maguire could both be reeled in with a worthwhile storyline, so I hope that Sam Raimi will chose to revisit the series in a couple of years if they can bang out a good script. There is plenty of material in the series, after all.

Now for a Wednesday Mind Hump:

Name your favorite citrus fruits and your favorite dishes, drinks, desserts, etc. using citrus.
I guess I really like oranges and limes. Oranges are just so sweet and awesome, and limes go great in Coronas. Nothing is better in the summer for relaxing than laying outside, poolside, drinking a Corona that has a lime soaking in it. As far as favorite drinks: Tequila Sunrises are good as are Screwdrivers. I'm sorry, but plain old orange juice is just boring. Desert wise, I'm not really sure? Chiffon is pretty good stuff.