"DVDs will be obsolete in 10 years: Bill Gates"

[FlamingTeddiz]

Well let me point out that technology is said to double every 18 months, so if you look at ten years, thats 120 months, devided by 18, and you get 6.66. so take our technology now and put it to the 6.6666 power. we will be able to have flash cards with 4GB^6.66666 =~ 10321GB. thats like 10 tera bites!!! so if you take that big jump im sure its possible tha dvds will be obsolete.

 

[akira888]

Well let me point out that technology is said to double every 18 months, so if you look at ten years, thats 120 months, devided by 18, and you get 6.66. so take our technology now and put it to the 6.6666 power. we will be able to have flash cards with 4GB^6.66666 =~ 10321GB. thats like 10 tera bites!!! so if you take that big jump im sure its possible tha dvds will be obsolete.

Actually 4GB^6.66667 = (1.03 * 10^55)GB.

But if data capacity doubled every 18 months (far from guaranteed) that would only be 4GB * (2^6.66667) = 406 GB.

 

[akira888]

Please explain to me the point of the whole "region" thing again?
what was/is it supposed to accomplish, other than screwing the customers?

Since time immemorial movie studios would release films on a staggered release schedule. US/CAN comes first, followed by Europe, then Japan/Korea, then Australasia, then the rest of the world. Note the region codes - these numbers align with the traditional timing of theatrical release (USA/CAN - 1, EU/Jap - 2, SE Asia - 3 etc..)

Why do they do this? It allows them to reuse physical assets, it allows the actors make more promotional appearances, it allows for tweaking the marketing of the film if it flops, among other reasons I can't quite recall right now. However, I don't see this lasting another 10 years, the Internet is making marketing a bad film more difficult than it used to be especially after half the USA posts on AIC about how horrible it was. (The Avengers comes to mind)

 

[Randell]

also it encourages piracy.

people will buy a pirate dvd here if its not available in the shops here but is in the US.

 

[Simon F]

Since time immemorial movie studios

... US movie studios ;-) ....

would release films on a staggered release schedule. US/CAN comes first, followed by Europe, then Japan/Korea, then Australasia, )

Actually, I've found that Australia often has movies earlier than the UK. Perhaps it's just convenient for the timing of school holidays. <shrug>