Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Technology Stocks : C-Cube -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: BillyG who wrote (31801)	4/4/1998 10:11:00 AM
From: John Rieman	Respond to of 50808

We can buy the 3 disc set of Titanic on VCD for $15. Nice VCD article in the Mercury news................ newslibrary.krmediastream.com -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Subject: Re: Titanic Widescreen VCD Set From: thad@thadlabs.com (Thad Floryan) Date: 1998/03/27 Message-ID: <6fft0e$b4l$1@nntp2.ba.best.com> Newsgroups: alt.video.laserdisc [Subscribe to alt.video.laserdisc] [More Headers] gekao@aol.com (GeKao) wrote: \| Update webpage. Friends of mine have indeed got their own copies of the \| Titanic movie on VCD from PiT VCD Store. Go to \| "http://members.aol.com/gekao/titanic.html" for info and screen shots. This \| version is the best VCD version of all 3-4 camcorder copied versions. \| \| Meng \| \| I am not selling the set nor endorsed by anyone to make this webpage. I am \| doing this so fans of the movie will be able to watch it from their jail \| cells before the commercial release in late 98 or early 99. Interesting 2-page article in the BUSINESS section of the Thursday, March 26, 1998, issue of the San Jose (CA) Mercury News about the VCD pirating business in China written by Jennifer Lin of the Mercury News' Beijing Bureau. Among some of the facts, besides sidestepping royalties, copyrights and licenses, are included: - millions of illegal copies of TITANIC on VCD appeared less than 2 weeks after the movie's debut in the USA - VCDs cost about $2 and the players about $125 - Warner is the only foreign studio making VCDs in China, though there are over 500 domestic (to China) producers - player sales jumped from zero to over 20,000,000 in less than 3 years - Sept. 4, 1993 was the date the founder of C-Cube Microsystems (of Silicon Valley) and Hyundai introduced the first VCD player; the founder now runs Digital Video Systems in Los Gatos, CA. - one (illegal) version of TITANIC has on its packaging a modern cruise ship and photographs of Western actors who are not in the James Cameron film. - another VCD movie's packaging featured promo pictures on the cover from PRETTY WOMAN, ROMEO AND JULIET, and PORTRAIT OF A LADY; inside was a little-known Australian film. - in China, no one seems to care about the often poor quality of VCD movies -- or about the heads of other moviegoers that occasionally pop onto the screen. The Chinese government permits only 10 foreign (to China) films to be shown at movie theaters, and VCD pirates are happy to fill the void by smuggling in hundreds of titles a year, mostly from suppliers in Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan. So, given that VCDs are jerky, blocky, artifact-ridden MPEG-1 pieces of crap, why are you advertising something in a laserdisc newsgroup that will send you and your customers to jail when they catch your sorry ass? Thad