HomeAgain, sorry for the hiatus last week. I know this is becoming far more common than I would like, but I did have a genuine excuse last week. Apparently, you’re never too young to have your first bout of vertigo. First, and I really hope last for a while if not forever, because having the whole room spin every time you move your head, is not a pleasant experience.
So this week’s Weekly News Roundup is more like a Fortnightly Roundup, or Bi-Weekly if you prefer that terminology instead. I promise not to make a habit of it!
(One positive from my confined bed rest was how I managed to catch up on my Netflix a bit. Also good timing that Stranger Things 2 just came out! Tubular! I’m currently working my way through Mindhunter.)
Here at Digital Digest, we’ve always been waiting for the day that common sense prevails when it comes to DRM. In that, we look forward to the day that everyone sees just how worthless and counter-productive the whole thing is and either it stops being used, or if needed, legislation is put into place to prevent its use. What’s happening in Portugal falls short of this, but it’s at least in the right direction, with the European country deciding to inject a bit of common sense into digital copyright laws.
No longer will fair use have to play second fiddle to laws protecting DRM, and so if you need to rip something for research or personal use, there are no legal repercussions for doing so. And the use of DRM is now completely banned in Portugal when it comes to protecting content that shouldn’t be protected, such as works in the public domain.
The only things Portugal doesn’t do the right thing on is in relation to obtaining the tools to rip and remove DRM. Distributing these tools will still be considered unlawful, despite their use being legal in many cases. How this will work, I don’t know (probably a “turn a blind eye” kind of deal), but it just goes to show that, despite progress being made, there’s still a long way to go before “the folly of DRM” is consigned to the history books.
HEVC wins an Emmy!
One things I found out last week was that it is actually possible for a video codec to win an Emmy. Or rather, the super smart people behind the HEVC codec won an Primetime Engineering Emmy, and I think well deserved too. Without HEVC, the 4K revolution really wouldn’t have been possible (imagine if Netflix 4K required a minimum bandwidth of 50+ Mbps, instead of the current 25 Mbps requirement).
Now, you could enter the argument that without the existence of HEVC, some other codec, maybe even an open source one, could have taken over. But one that is as efficient as HEVC, and also at the same time totally free of royalty encumbrances, might be nothing more than just wishful thinking – paying for something some times gives you a peace of mind that not paying for something and then getting sued later on for it does not.
The Nintendo Switch is selling like hot cakes. Better, even!
Things get better and better for Nintendo. The Switch is dominating the PS4 and Xbox One in the NPD results, and this has translated to a upgraded profit results for Nintendo. And if you ever needed a comparison to how well the Switch is doing and how poor the Wii U was, all you need to know that in just a year, the Switch will most likely have sold as many units as the Wii U managed to do in its entire lifespan of five years. In other words, the Switch will outsell the Wii U by next March!
I don’t know if this says more about how popular the Switch is, or how poor the Wii U was, but probably a bit of both.
The next couple of months will be very interesting. Not only do we have the usual holiday sales peak, there’s also a new console out from Microsoft. The Xbox One X somehow manages to be the most powerful console ever made, and heaps smaller than the original Xbox One (and even smaller than the Xbox One S). Its price tag, however, is not that small, and that’s its main weakness.
Going back to the Switch, it will be interesting to see if sales hold up during the holidays, whether it’s the “must have game console” for the holidays, and if so, whether Nintendo can ensure there’s plenty of stock for everyone.
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Alright, that’s it for the week. Time to finish off Mindhunter and then move on to the next binge target. See you next week.
