Infinity and Beyond

Birthday party? Yesterday might have been Disneyland’s 53rd birthday but we all know 7/17/55 was the invite only grand opening celebration. So, for all us regular folks, today marks the 53rd anniversary of the ‘Happiest Place on Earth’. Rumors, from the most untrusted source in Disney gossip, say that Disney will announce a new Hong Kong park after the Olympics. I’ll believe that when Al Lutz at Miceage.com leaks that, or its officially announced.

Amazon on Demand. Thursday Amazon launched the beta version of its new VOD service. It will have 40,000 movies and TV shows to rent only. No subscription charges are connected to the service and no special software is needed to play the videos. Each film will carry a rental fee and all of the major studios except Disney (including ABC) have agreed to provide videos. Disney isn’t about to turn their viewers away from their own sites, and from the highly lucrative set-up they have with iTune’s.

‘The Dark Knight.’That’s right, it’s here. Reviews claim it to be one of the best super hero movies of all time. Christopher Nolan is getting great acclaim for his direction and work on the script. Ledger’s portrayal of The Joker is also being heaped with praise. Both Jason T. and Jason D. will be seeing the movie on Imax tomorrow morning. It was the only showing not sold out.

Top of the Wii. Nintendo’s Wii console has now outsold the older Xbox 360 from Microsoft. 10.9 million units of the Wii console have now been sold since its launch back in November 2006 (has it really been that long?). The Xbox is hanging close behind at 10.5 million sold. Sony’s Playstation 3 might have gotten a boost from ‘Metal Gear Solid 4′ but is not even close in the race at around 5 million sold, but given the price they only have to sell about half as much to make the same amount.

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I’m predicting tomorrow I’ll be too busy for any sort of Friday Review so, here it is on a Thursday. Enjoy!

Selling out: Remember those Netflix set-top boxes I mentioned the other week? Well, they’ve sold out of the entire supply. The maker of the device, Roku, says they “will need about two weeks to fulfill current orders and eight weeks to begin fulfilling new ones.” No word on how many boxes this equates to but its clear that the demand is there. Consumer’s are scrambling for the latest gadget that brings them faster more convenient access to entertainment.

More movies online: You’ve been able to enjoy plenty of Fox and MGM movies on Hulu.com but now you’ll be able to enjoy some Disney full-length movies starting this summer. The movies will be available “for one week after they are broadcast on ABC’s Wonderful World of Disney.” Much like the options on several Hulu.com movies the Disney versions will feature one single ad before the beginning and then proceed commercial free. Disney, who normally safeguards its library extremely well, will be streaming such family hits as ‘Freaky Friday,’ ‘Peter Pan,’ and ‘Finding Nemo.’ I know I won’t be watching these on the ole teevee so I’m happy to see some Disney movies coming to a computer near me.

PBS goes commercial: The internet is changing the world of PBS. The not-for-profit television network is joining the rest of the broadcast world at Hulu. Shows like ‘Nova,’ and ‘Scientific American Frontiers’ are going to begin streaming soon. These programs will be pre-empted by 30-second spots and Hulu will be splitting the revenue with PBS. “We do not allow interruption of our programs” said Andrew Russel, the senior vice president who runs PBS Ventures. Russel also said that “by exploring digital distribution with the programs that the network does have right to, it hoped to build the case to show that producers should let it distribute their shows online.” The only show on PBS I watch is Rick Steve’s so, until that shows up online I’ll stick to the other shows on Hulu.

145,000 people: That’s the number of people who accessed the “World News” page on ABCNews.com which is the page that links to the webcast, according to a report from The Wall Street Journal.  This is in stark contrast to the 7.8 million page views tha ABCNews.com received. The 15-minute webcast includes “clips from the television broadcast as well as stories about technology and pop culture.” My guess is that people come to ABCNews.com for news articles, if they want to watch a video of the days news they’ll either turn on their tv or they’ll turn their browser to thedailyshow.com and get their news and entertainment all at once.

iWhat?: Yeah, we’ve been pretty busy around here which explains our lack of coverage regarding the new iPhone. I’m sure Jason T. will post something sooner or later.. but really, we all knew it was coming and we are all now going to buy one right? I know I am, I’m taking half of my stimulus check and paying down debt and the rest of it will go to a shiny new iPhone. Thanks IRS, you’re the best!

I’m at 5 hours already: Solutions Research Group is claiming that by 2013 the average American will spend 8 hours in front of a video-based screen. That’s up just 2 hours from the current average. The number was a mere 4.6 hours in 1996. It certainly isn’t from better programming on teevee.

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It’s Memorial Day Weekend starting in a few hours so that means we are all CO’d here at work so, here is all the news that’s worth checking out:

Facebook cleans up the clutter.  Your friends facebook profile starting to look too much like a myspace page? Too many apps have caused the sleek and clean feel of facebook to disappear, which was much of the appeal in the first place. I always avoided myspace because it was too ad heavy and it gave me high school flashbacks. At least facebook got the hint and will be reeling in some of the gaudiness.

Roku-who? Netflix and Roku combine forces to give us the best of the internet movie and mail-in movie rental business. For $100 you can buy a box that will play downloaded movies on your TV that have no 24-hour time limit, aren’t stored on the device and aren’t pay-per movies. This magic box created by Roku is also ready for high def. and has the potential to be supported by rivals such as Blockbuster.

Whip-lashing good. Indiana Jones returned to the big screen yesterday with ‘Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull’ and I know you want to be the first on your block to see the whip cracking archaeologist in action. Variety is reporting the sure-fire blockbuster made $25 mil on Thursday alone. Don’t worry, if you want to see it this extended weekend you’ll have 4,260 different theaters around the country to do so. If you find yourself in Tokyo this weekend might I suggest going on the ride that holds a suspiciously similar title at Tokyo Disney Sea.

Worst kept secret. AT&Tcontinues to annoy Steve Jobs by discussing future iPhone developments. This time AT&T’s CFO, when discussing the future 3G iPhone, told reporters “there hasn’t been any pricing decisions made.” Even the “rumor of a rumor” of the phone sends Apple’s stock flailing wildly.

‘Google Health’ steps into beta mode. I’m working on a separate post regarding this subject but Google stepped into the medical records world this week as ‘Google Health’ went public. It’s worth checking out just to confirm with yourself that it’s not something you want to be a part of.

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YouTube on the teevee. TiVo users with broadband Internet connections will be able to watch YouTube clips on their televisions by the end of the year.

AOL/Bebo and other slang. “If AOL can smoothly integrate Bebo with its AIM client and Platform-A ad network, great. Unfortunately, AOL doesn’t have that kind of track record.

Another Apple lawsuit. ZapMedia Services Inc. (who you’ll have to search for yourself if you want to know who they are) claim that iTunes and the iPod are ‘using a patented method of distributing digital media over the Internet.’

All things Disney digital. Not only is the company not looking to acquire AOL but Iger told analysts that the company expects to collect $1 billion in revenue from online content this fiscal year. Good thing the writers got the new deal they did, and good thing Iger was such an integral part of the process, $1 billion isn’t chump change.

Hollywood hat trick as Potter gets split. Not wanting to suffer the same fate as the publishing world Hollywood has decided to split the final film installment of Harry Potter into two movies. The first part is set to debut in December 2010 and the last and final installment Warner Bros. can rely on will show up a few months later in early 2011.

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While excellent movies exsist in theaters right now a lot of them are in limited release. Since it’s hard to keep up with what has come out and if it was a wide release or not here are a few suggestions that you may be lucky enough to find depending on where you live.

 ’Michael Clayton’ starring George Clooney opens in 15 theaters today. Word on the street so far is Clooney gives another stellar performance and it’s early but slow word of at least a nomination is buzzing around.

Ang Lee’s new film ‘Lust, Caution’ which was labeled with an NC-17 rating increases by 16 theaters to make its total 17. While the reviews are mixed I’d be interested to see this as Lee has a solid history of excellent filmaking.

‘The Darjeeling Limited’ ups its total to 19 theaters. I’m really looking forward to this one. Wes Anderson is one of my favorite directors and while his films aren’t for everyone they are for me and I’m eagerly awaiting his latest. Make sure to check out iTunes and get yourself a free copy of ‘Hotel Chevalier’ which is billed as ‘Part 1 of The Darjeeling Limited’. It stars Jason Schwartzman and Natalie Portman and sets the tone for the full feature. iTunes is the only way to find it (well, probably youtube at this point) but it’s free, so watch it.

Lastly ‘Into the Wild’ which was directed by Sean Penn. It’s not something I’m excited to see but it is based on a real story made famous by the book written by Jon Krakauer who is one of my favorite authors.

The award caliber films are slowly starting to spring upon us. So, I hope this breaks it down a little bit for now.

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Aside from anything in theaters or on tv you should all make sure to head on over to youtube.com and check out the new Chemical Brothers video for “The Salmon Dance”.

 If you are heading to theaters may I suggest “The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford” if for no other reason than Mary-Louise Parker is Zee James in the film and you can never go wrong with M-L Parker.

 I would stay away from most everything else out there. Many cities have Oktoberfest activities going on this weekend, so I suggest put the Salmon Dance on your new ‘iPod touch’ and get a little ‘Snoqualmie Brewing Co.’s Wildcat IPA’ and show everybody how the dance is done.

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What movie should you see this weekend, the remake of ‘3:10 to Yuma’ or ‘Shoot ‘em Up’?

 3:10 is hoping to keep the Western alive, and judging by the trailer and reviews it should do just that.

 While the Western might be staying alive most everyone will be dying in ‘Shoot ‘em Up’. Ebert says  he has “a sneaky regard for a movie that goes much, much farther than merely too far. This one goes so far, if you even want to get that far, you have to start half-way there.” Sounds like a winner to me.

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It’s been a rough day. It was my boss’s last day, and so works going to be strange for a little while. So, while I might have compiled a list of recent earnings reports I have failed to really give quality thought to the following articles. Yes, these both appear in Variety, but really aside from the Hollywood Reporter nobody else does it better.

The Discovery Channel is planning to expand its web service and stream selected programs.

Last week it was facebook, this week we move on. Most of the major industry players are suing youtube in the states, so why not in Japan too? Twenty-four companies have jumped on board, including the Motion Picture Producers Assn. of Japan. Something has to be done, and it’s going to be Google’s responsibility to be the leaders in this situation the way they have been with everything else they’ve done.

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Because I work an 8-5 I’ll be taking the weekend off, and that means no posts from me on the weekends either. Each Friday a few of the best stories from the week will be posted as links with brief comments about each. It’s hard to find new information over the weekend so why not read about something that’s bigger than the weekend.

- Simpsons go big.
18 years later Homer and the gang will finally be making it to the big screen. I for one will be seeing it in all its super sized glory at Seattle’s Cinerama theater.

-Facebook gets sued.
Former partners of Mark Zuckerberg are going after facebook claiming he stole the idea from them when they were creating ConnectU back at Harvard. The judge is giving the plaintiff’s some time to prove they aren’t just trying to get a settlement from the hugely successful social networking site.

-Disney quits smoking.
No more smoking in Disney branded films. Some may say Disney is setting the right example and proving they truly are the #1 family-friendly movie house in the biz. Others would make the argument of “nanny government”. As for me? I’m a bit mixed, I don’t like the way Senator McCain keeps trying to censor Hollywood. At least the aging senator finally found a target he could easily exploit. However, smoking is bad (thanks mom) and it’s not good to have cartoon characters smoke. However Cruella DeVille was ‘the devil’ and when Pinocchio smokes he turns into a jack-ass, so is it better to have no exposure to cigarette smoking than show it as a bad habit?

-HBO stops laughing.
Sony is jumping in just as HBO is getting out of the pool. Has UGC as a means to produce quality talent and creative material already seen its prime?

- Do you Youtube?
Continuing the theme. Has Youtube lost it’s cool and will it soon go the way of the Doritos girl (”who?” exactly).

-Digital upgrade:
Have an analog TV? Did you know it will be worthless without a digital converter in a few years time? Educate yourself here.

-Apple’s stock surges as profits soar, and Oppenheimer hints of an upcoming “product transition”:

-Potter fan fiction:
For all the Harry Potter fans, or haters, here’s a scary scenario, and for those of you who haven’t read the final book, this isn’t how the story ends.

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