arstechnica.com — YouTube "advances democracy," bandwidth eliminates the need for network neutrality, and TiVo fears switched digital signals?those were just some of the comments made this morning at a House hearing on "The Future of Video," in which we also learned that Rep. John Dingell (D-MI) owns an iPod.
May 10, 2007 View in Crawl 4
t3soroMay 11, 2007
A congressman figured out how to use an iPod? Buried as inaccurate.
stubearMay 11, 2007
I listen to Metallica all the time and I don't feel like a criminal. Perhaps that's because I purchased all the CDs of theirs that I own and ripped the music myself. I'm so sick and tired of all you asshats crying for digital music downloads. Buy the f**king CD and rip it yourself to whatever format you want and whatever bit rate you want. And don't whine about $20 CDs because if that's what you paid for them then quit going to the big box stores. I haven't paid more than $13 for a CD ever; except for the box sets I bought recently and a couple Syd Barrett imports I bought like 15 years ago.
error601May 11, 2007
The future is on-demand video. Every show ever made at your finger tips. DVRs are just an enhancement on the VCR and will go obsolete in not too many years. Net neutrality regulation will just make sure you can only get a decent on-demand video from from the owner of the last mile until bandwidth gets large enough it doesn't matter.
dustin00May 11, 2007
The future is the internet.Canceled cable 2.5 years ago, they're still in denial that I left.Now back to World of Warcraft and my exercise bike!
drakensteelMay 11, 2007
I do agree with the advances democracy thing. Its a place where anyone can post a vid about whatever and discuss it with other people.Heck, Digg advances democracy as well. Though Youtube is probably more widespread.
the_wallbangerMay 11, 2007
You're right. The future is broadband access. We no longer need 3 pipes into the home (phone line, cable line, internet access) everything can be condensed to broadband access. Cable providers are scared of losing their neighborhood monopoly. Nothing is more threatening to providers than a consumer discovering that they only need to buy internet access and use Skype for phone and Joost for TV.
geekeeMay 11, 2007
Exactly. A company like Joost will fail miserably if they can't guarantee quality of service. They'll get steam rolled by the last mile provider, which will use their private network to deliver the video without hiccups. Net neutrality will kill competition in video over the internet for anything serious (i.e. not youtube 1 minute videos, but r4eal tv shows and movies)
error601May 11, 2007
Free speech on the other hand is a key part of democracy but people often confuse free speech with protecting every utterance. Lack of free speech would be the government banning specific subjects. The common one in the past have always been banning religion and criticism of government officials.
error601May 11, 2007
On the other hand, there's volumes of classical recordings that have been put in the public domain by the performers. I could sit down at the piano right now and knock a few out.