šŗ Ads in streaming, Apple, and the Fantastic Four - This Geek in Review for 2022-03-18
By goz
āWe have determined that weāll be able to fill 80% of the userās display with advertising before inducing seizuresā
When cable was first announced, one of the biggest obstacles to adoption was getting people to pay for something that they’ve always received for free. One of the perks of cable was that there wouldn’t be any ads. Over the years, ads slowly crept into cable programming, getting us to the point today where there are very few cable networks without ads.
Streaming started down this path, but ads have slowly started to creep into the programming. With Disney thinking about adding ads to Disney+, would other streaming services follow? Most of them already have an ad tier, notable exceptions are Netflix and Amazon Prime.
I’m not dead yet!
If it’s not new and shiny, it can’t be any good. There are people that base the quality of a computer solely on looks. I’ve had people replace their 3 year old laptop with a new model that wasn’t much faster because they felt their older computer was “running slowly”.
The other problem is that a lot of places don’t have a dedicated IT person, or that person is overworked and can’t troubleshoot problems. In that case, it is cheaper for the company to replace equipment instead of hiring more IT staff.
What this means is that if you are look at building out a home lab, or just want some additional computers to learn with, look no further than your local business replacing equipment!
I liked the first Fantastic Four movie
The first Fantastic Four movie gets a lot of crap, but I didn’t think it was that bad. Casting was good, it felt more in line with the comic books, and the plot was decent. Now that FF is part of the Disney empire, hopefully they’ll be integrated into the MCU sooner rather than later.
Internet Travels
Geek
- āGod of Warā TV Series Adaptation Eyed By Prime Video ā Deadline - And one of these days I’ll finish it on my PS2.
- Xash3D Emscripten Port
- I Presided at the Birth of Google - by Ted Gioia
- The Flash and Aquaman 2 pushed back to 2023 - The Verge - I’m hoping the wait will be worth it. DC movies seem to be the generic Great Value version of Marvel movies.
- Revenge of the Sith - The 4 Hour Siege of Mandalore Cut - 4K HDR Preview - YouTube - I need to find 4 hours to watch this.
- Elden Ring Speedrunner Beats Open World RPG In Under 37 Minutes
- Elden Ring Player Tricks Invader By Pretending To Be Enemy NPC
- When people notice you using vim - YouTube - Vim is amazing, I’m using it to write this article!
- Sonic the Hedgehog 2 (2022) - "Final Trailer" - Paramount Pictures - YouTube - I’m going to regret saying this, but I still haven’t watched the first Sonic movie. It looks like I better hurry up and see it though, because Sonic 2 looks pretty good!
Retro
- How much did VHS tapes cost in the 80s - An interesting look at the price videocassettes.
- Analogue says early Pocket preorders will ship by the end of March - The Verge - This thing looks really cool, but I don’t think I could bring myself to spend the money.
- BBSing / IRCing Photo Gallery | Flickr - An amazing collection of pictures of various systems accessing BBSes, taken in the present day.
- Atari has acquired game database MobyGames for $1.5 million | VGC - I’m glad to see Atari doing something other than yet another version of Centipede.
- 2002 iMac resurrected with Appleās M1 chip | Ars Technica
- Game Boy Emulator Recreated In Minecraft - eXputer.com
- Raspberry Pi Pico Becomes Commodore 64 Cartridge | Tom’s Hardware
- A Colorful "Peek" at the Graphics Performance of the Apple II - Byte Cellar
- A brief tour of the PDP-11, the most influential minicomputer of all time | Ars Technica - The PDP-11 came out a little too early for me to use, but I hear about it all the time.
Technology
- Russia mulls legalizing software piracy as itās cut off from Western tech | Ars Technica - That’s one way to bypass sanctions.
- Appleās M1 Ultra tapes two M1 Max chips together | Ars Technica - The technology sounds cool, but the names make me gag. We have the Pro, Max, and now Ultra. I’m hoping the new Mac Pro will have the M1 Max Ultra Extreme in it.
- Appleās Mac Studio: a new M1 desktop for professionals - The Verge - Take a Mac Mini and add the freshman 15 onto it and you get the Mac Studio. An amazing piece of expensive kit.
- Appleās new strategy is to give ā not tell ā users what they want - The Verge
- Valve does what FromSoftware donāt, thanks to Steam Deckās precaching update | Ars Technica
- Ford to ship and sell Explorer SUVs with missing chips - The Verge - So the chip shortage has come to this, vehicles with functions disabled due to lack of chips.
Pop Culture
- NVIDIAās Stolen Code-Signing Certs Used to Sign Malware | Threatpost
- Sarah Michelle Gellar Celebrates 25th Anniversary of Buffy’s Premiere | PEOPLE.com - It’s hard to believe it’s been 25 years (we don’t talk about Joss). The show is some of the best episodes of television I have ever watched. Maybe it’s time for a re-watch.
- CD sales just rose for the first time in almost two decades - The Verge
Pot Pourri
- Endurance, Ernest Shackletonās Ship, Lost in 1915, Is Found in Antarctica - The New York Times
- Walgreens replaced some fridge doors with screens. And some shoppers absolutely hate it - CNN
- Pete Davidson and five paying customers to fly on Jeff Bezos’ suborbital rocket - CNN - I’m sharing this one because I thought the headline was funny.