VenChar

Warren Lieberfarb and the DVD

From a Newsweek profile of Warren Lieberfarb, the father of the DVD, this succinct vision statement:

if movie discs were the size of CDs, were priced right and offered a better picture and sound than video, people would collect movies like books. The key was to make the discs cheaply, based on a universal standard.

Why America hates football

Football meaning soccer, of course. Interesting article in the Observer attempting to explain America's continued indifference to the sport, despite efforts to the contrary. Three principal reasons offered: (1) basketball, baseball and football already occupy most of the mindspace in the US, erecting a formidable barrier to entry, (2) basketball and football have similar characteristics and provide similar satisfactions to the viewer, so that they end up being substitutes, (3) soccer rules have not been revised to satisfy Americans' need for conclusive results - draws are not perceived as a satisfactory outcome.

Super-corrected DVD players

Via Umair, this link to an interestign article profiling a Chinese company pioneering a new category - "super-corrected" DVD players that will play pirated DVDs:

China's vast market in pirated movies is well known... China is still flooded with pirate DVDs that supply about 90 per cent of total demand and rob the US film industry of millions in royalties.

Now the world's electronics industry is about to face competition from Chinese brands of video disc players that have risen on the back of the pirate market. As any foreign visitor who has stocked up on China's cheap pirate copies will relate, the discs do not always play when you put them on your machine at home.

Enter the caoqiang jiuchuo or "super-correcting" Chinese model of DVD player. Developed by the Jiangsu Shinco Electronic Group and selling for about half the cost of brands such as Philips and Sony, it is designed to cope with the poor quality of pirated video discs.

Along with half a dozen domestic brands that have followed its lead, the company's Shinco brand has grabbed about 80 per cent of the Chinese market. Its factories produce 5 million DVD players a year, and, says Zeng Ming, a management expert who has studied the company, its annual sales are about $US1 billion ($1.35 billion).

The reason is simple, Professor Zeng says. "If you buy a Sony or Panasonic DVD player, you have to buy the real or authentic disc, and most people in China can't afford them." Licensed discs cost about 20 yuan, more than double the price of a pirate disc and a significant difference for people on a typical urban weekly wage of 1000 yuan. And with China officially importing only 20 foreign films a year, the pirate market offers a much more up-to-date and uncensored viewing menu.

Jiangsu Shinco is a secretive, unlisted company that refuses to divulge its financial figures. It does not deny its customers tend to use pirated software. "Where there is a need, there is a supply," said the senior manager, who gave his name only as Mr Fan.

Jiangsu Shinco even commissioned Sony to design and produce parts to its "super-correcting" specifications. Because their own players could not sell in China, Sony went along with this "outsourcing", Professor Zeng said. "The only way Sony can make money in this market is by supplying to Shinco the key components."