[geeks] Mac World announcements...

[Phil Stracchino]

Mark wrote:
> On 16 Jan 2008, at 01:15, Rick Hamell wrote:
> 
>>> [3] Apple TV price cut: http://www.apple.com/appletv/
>> Bleh, perhaps it'll push the Apple TV more, it's a product that  
>> really needs
>> it. Personally I have no use for it but I'm sure  a lot of people  
>> will geek
>> out on it.
> 
> Until Apple announced the Movie Rentals service on AppleTV it *was*  
> just a geek toy. It's ceased to be that now - it's a mode of getting  
> movies into the house from the internet easily and connected directly  
> to the TV. The key here is 'no computer required'. It will play ball  
> with iTunes if it's there, but crucially it's no longer REQUIRED to be  
> there. This is essentially an Apple set-top content delivery box.  
> Kinda like having a BLOCKBUSTER in your living room with no worries  
> about scratched discs, returning it on time, not having the movie you  
> pick in stock, or you having to get in the car/walk there. I can see  
> it being quite popular as an idea myself.

Huh .............

And it's a standalone device?  No Mac infrastructure required?  It 
sounds like it might be a better alternative than Netflix, for whom I 
have significant third-hand dislike.  (For things like "Unlimited 
rentals, only some are more unlimited than others", for one example, and 
various people's stories of Netflix apparently going out of its way to 
send them parts of series intentionally out of order.)


-- 
   Phil Stracchino, CDK#2         ICBM: 43.5607, -71.355
   Renaissance Man, Unix ronin, Perl hacker, Free Stater
   alaric at caerllewys.net            alaric at metrocast.net
           It's not the years, it's the mileage.