OpsanBlog

Theatre and DVD: Mind the Gap

The early release of “Sin City“ to DVD sparked a few thoughts for me. Here are some fun facts:

• There will always be a New and Improved release of the DVD you’re just dying to own. I just noticed I have three copies of "Fellowship of the Ring" and two copies of "The Usual Suspects".
• The first DVD released will always be the one with the fewest special features.
• The gap between theatrical release and the first DVD is shrinking (note that "Sin City" is still in theatres at the time of this writing).
• The price of a theatre visit for two now far exceeds purchasing the DVD.

Hollywood et, al. is compressing the gap between theatrical release and the first DVD. My guess is to solve two goals: leverage the ad campaign for the theatrical release and any resulting buzz and for anti-piracy purposes; if the "real" version is available straight away, why burn the bandwidth for a crappy copy?

For those who are infrequent visitors to theatres, the first view of a film may well be in the comfort of our homes, following a visit to CostCo. Granted, there are films for which the grandest of home theatres cannot possibly complete (the "Lord of the Rings" and "Star Wars" sagas come to mind), but what of the rest?

Hollywood is aware of this; there are talks of releasing that "first" DVD at the theatre, with others to follow (presumably near the gift-giving season). Director Rodriguez speaks about the initial DVD release on About.com, citing it is bare bones. Of course, spoilers abound; specifically, spoilerspodcast.com who released the director’s commentary as a podcast to be enjoyed in an MP3 player while watching the movie.

Does this make theatres less relevant? Probably. Who wants to pay for overpriced snacks, be a slave to a schedule, have to arrange child care and more? Perhaps, in the future, theatres will simply be an extension to the marketing campaign for legitimate, downloadable content.

The usual caveats apply; these are just my thoughts.

"Sin City" commentary released as a podcast

"Sin City" commentary released as a podcast. This page also has the printed commentary; many fun facts about the film.

Update: Note that this highlights an interesting development, which I’ll cover more in a future post: the desire for studios to leverage the ad campaign associated with the theatrical release of a film by releasing a “bare bones” DVD soon after the release to the theatres. As we’ve all observed, richer extras can be had by waiting a few months before purchasing a DVD of a favorite film.

Delay for the .XXX domain?

Maybe I’m nuts, but I always thought the .XXX domain had a place on the internet.  Let there be a domain type reserved exclusively for adult-only sites, and let those of us with kids exclude the domain type from our routers.  Give us back WhiteHouse.com and don’t penalize us for inadvertently clicking craiglist.com!  Note: don’t navigate to either of those sites.

Of course, the way the internet grew (I don’t mean how fast; I mean the way it grew virally .. more like mutation), there was chaos and little organization.  I remember when .net domains were “supposed” to be for ISPs and .org domains were “supposed” to be for non-profits.   This all changed when we “ran out” of .com addresses: companies scurried to collect .org and .net, just to protect the body / root name of their domains.  I even recall when the .cc and .tv domain types were introduced in an attempt to give companies an option.  So many domain names and types; so many opportunities to hijack them.

I digress: just wanted to spout.  This post is actually a meme about how ICANN is being encouraged to delay the availability of the .xxx domain (again) by the feds.

Wired: “Feds urge delay for .xxx domain”
SlashDot: “Top Level .xxx Domain Concept Under Scrutiny”

.. and the article on the June 1, 2005 approval from News.com: “Porn-Friendly" ‘.xxx’ domains approved”.

WiFi "Roguing"

Not that I’ve ever done it, but the practice of “Roguing“ (as in being a rogue; connecting to an available, non-protected WiFi signal) is now considered a legal gray area and could land you in jail.

News.com provides a FAQ on “WiFi mooching and the law”.

Here we are, legislating technology again. Bah. Secure your networks people.

Use 128-bit Wireless Encryption Protocol (WEP) keys. While a WEP key can be hacked (although typically not in the time of the average drive-by rogue), there are other, stronger protocols such as WPA.

For larger organizations, certificates are an option.

If you have a small home network, use a wireless access point or router that allows you to restrict access only to the known MAC addresses of your network cards; this will prevent anyone sitting outside your house (including your neighbors) from connecting to your network.

SOA Building Momentum

Developer.com: Services-Oriented Architecture (SOA) is building momentum. The article notes that business leaders, not IT departments must take the lead in SOA deployments. This is in line with my views in my “Services Orientation – the Architecture formally known as SOA” series. Speaking of which: I need to get back to that series. Link for additional chapters.

It’s About the Business, You – The “Wow” Factor (Part 2)

This post continues my previous discussion regarding the “wow” factor and business cases.

Developers
Ask yourselves: what have you done to make a business owner say “wow” today? Meeting a milestone, overcoming a bottleneck or reporting a success are great places to start as delivering on current commitments is vital. But meeting commitments will get you an “attaboy” (and a continuing income stream) at best.

Demonstrating how data acquired from a legacy Line of Business (LOB) silo can be consumed by a desktop application and made accessible to the business audience should get you a “hmm”. “Hmm” from an enlightened business owner could lead to the opportunity for a big “wow” down the road. Some notes:

• Sell the idea as it really should be: an ongoing effort toward enterprise systems integration.
• Select tools with momentum: tools and platforms with community, history and ongoing support.
• Plan incremental success milestones that add business value: it’s important to show tangible progress.
• Plan to minimize impact on the users of the applications: it’s best to work with the back-end plumbing before you introduce change to the desktop.
• Show your work! Expose prototype components that let business owners see data they’d not seen before. Please note: I said data, not more application layers or widgets.
• Continue searching for the “hmm” factor, but be mindful of adding any scope until you can show successes.

Business Owners
Ask yourselves: have you opened your mind to think outside conventional wisdom in solving a ticklish business issue? Have you cultivated an environment in which those with technology knowledge can present you with potential solutions or opportunities?

There are reasons that either (or both) answers could be “no”. One possibility: you’re already fully integrated, and in this case, kudos. Another: you feel you lack the budget for another project. Still another is you may not see a value in integrating back-end data. If the latter two are your reasons, take a careful look at your environment and your data.

A well-planned and well-executed integration will not cost you money; it will make you money. Yes, you’ll have cash outlay, of course, but there is ROI potential in improving both the top and bottom lines.

Your data is valuable, and not just because your applications run on it. Your data has value outside regular business operations. You can mine your own data to:

• Identify business and customer trends.
• Recognize waste and redundancies.
• Uncover process improvement opportunities.
• Reduce business risk.

Further, access to your data has value to others within your organization. If users could see relevant data in fewer interfaces (eliminating “screen hopping”), you have the opportunity to increase productivity and reduce errors through automation and integration.

Next: Integration – The Brainstorming Process.

It’s About the Business, You – The “Wow” Factor (Part 1)

You’ll note that while I had the opportunity, I resisted the temptation to borrow from the Clinton-for-President first-term slogan, adding the word “stupid”. I don’t consider readers (especially of this stuff) stupid.

I don’t consider technical people stupid. Sometimes we can be too focused, though. I don’t consider business or product people stupid, either. Sometimes we can be too set in the status quo of business operations.

One of my favorite things to say in life and work: “we all have our gifts”. Combining our gifts leads to successes. Hence, no one is “stupid”; we can all make a contribution.

The use of the trailing “stupid” in the original quote was uttered as an insult and later became the motivation for the staff running the Clinton campaign. I used it because it was an attention-grabber, and in a way, lets me crystallize your attention on the real content of this article series.

I say this a lot too: software development is not the solution to a business problem. Yes, software can contribute to business solutions; including task automation, security, integration across boundaries and the like. However, software, platforms and developers don’t solve business problems by themselves. It is the careful design and orchestration of business assets, applications, processes and users that solve business problems.

I’m also fond of saying that it is of critical importance that those involved in the software development process demonstrate business value (i.e., ROI) to our business owners; these are the folks who buy us these wonderful tools and toys that stock the playgrounds in which we work every day. Do developers get this? I think they do most of the time, but definitely not all the time.

Let me ask this question: Is it easier to get a developer or a business owner to say “wow”?

The answer: Developers, by a long shot. It’s not that we’re all that easily impressed, or simple, or anything the least bit negative. It’s also not that business owners are difficult to impress: there are just different factors that activate our “wow reflex”. Most developers get this, I think.

So, what is the “wow” factor? A developer can prototype a developer “wow” somewhere between minutes or hours. Some “wow” candidates are available for download in seconds. It takes a village (okay, now I’m teasing), that is, a team of developers a number of days to prototype a business owner “wow”.

Two things to note:

• The business owner “wow” at the prototype stage may be more like “hmm”.
• To get this “hmm” will likely include multiple projects, integration with back-end systems, a fair amount of research and a small amount of pain.

The real business owner “wow” comes when a system is fully designed, built and integrated with other business systems. This can take weeks, months or years from concept to completion, and requires the ongoing support from the business owners for the project.

Next: Questions developers and business owners need to ask themselves in improving communication and uncovering the “wow” factor.

Mercury and Autism

While I’m not a big believer in conspiracy theories or cover-ups, I tend to be a big fan; think the X-Files (the series, not the movie), Wag the Dog and Capricorn One. However, I admit to harboring a certain suspicion when it comes to my middle son, Hunter.

Hunter is a beautiful, charming and brilliant little boy. He is seven years old, reads (and understands) a wide variety of chapter books and does math like a madman. Computers and DDR Max are his favorite pastimes, and he’s always discovering some new way to challenge me with a fix or a dance move. His current delight? Knock-knock jokes.

Hunter falls “in the spectrum”; a nice way of saying “he has autism”.

His development was normal for his first year-and-a-half or so. He didn’t speak a lot, however, he had an older brother and parents who would anticipate his needs, so we didn’t think too much of it. Sometime between his first birthday and our noting changes in his behavior, he had his childhood shots.

A popular theory among some parents of autistic children is the concern that children received vaccines that contained a mercury-based preservative called thimerosal. Thimerosal has since been removed (or reduced to trace amounts) from vaccines, giving rise to a fair amount of suspicion in the interested community.

A note on childhood shots: we had them, you had them and our oldest had them. However, the timing of the shots and the apparent changes in Hunter’s behavior (which led us to seeking diagnosis) has left us wondering.

My belief? I believe Hunter’s intellect will propel him above the challenges he faces. I think that eventually (and we are making progress), he’ll be able to understand the social reasons to minimize his stimming (the act of stimulating himself through voice and action), be taught to recognize the subtleties of facial expressions and learn to not feel so deeply when something (like a video game or a cartoon) goes “wrong”.

Anyhow, I told you that story to provide a link to an article by Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., a senior attorney for the Natural Resources Defense Council. It was posted on the Common Dreams Newscenter and is called “Deadly Immunity”. Quite an interesting read, and really doesn’t make me feel any better about the possibilities described therein.

I think I’ll go give him a hug.

Applying BizTalk Server 2004 Service Pack 1

No warranties; this is what I did to install the SP on a NEW system (that is, one on which no prior development / implementation had been performed).

Read the ReadmeSP1.htm. That’s why it’s there. In it, you’ll see a reference to KB890673, "Availability of the .NET Framework 1.1 Post-Service Pack 1 XML Web services and XML Messaging hotfix rollup package 8". If the files listed below (located in C:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v1.1.4322) match (or are later than) the versions below, you are good to go to apply BTSP1:

Date Time Version Size File name
———————————————————————
02-Dec-2004 21:55 1.1.4322.2051 573,440 System.web.services.dll
02-Dec-2004 21:55 1.1.4322.2051 1,355,776 System.xml.dll

Otherwise, you have to contact MS for the hotfix. Note: Win2kSP1 and subsequent patches have an acceptable version of these files.

The other updates are XML and .NET related (should have been prerequisites for installation):

• Microsoft® Windows® XP Service Pack 2, if you are installing on Windows XP, available at http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?linkid=39455.
• Microsoft .NET Framework 1.1, Service Pack 1 available at http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?linkid=39456.
• SQLXML 3.0, Service Pack 2 available at http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?linkid=39457.
• Microsoft XML 3.0, Service Pack 4 available at http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?linkid=39458.

Test this on a disposable box first. Hope this saves you some time.