Cool News
DIVX (I told you it was a bad idea !!!)
Glen here...
No, I haven't forsaken the site.
I'm still awaiting the finalization of a sponsorship arrangement which should bring Coaxial back
on-line (with regularity) almost immediately. In this downtime, I have made significant headway
in upping the ante in advanced coverage of things like home vide titles, thanks to my man THE
ORACLE (who prefers to be called something like THE AMAZINGLY SEXY KNOW-IT-ALL
DUDE & TECHNICAL SUPPORT KING - but that's just a tad too much for my sensibilities...)
I'm tired today, so I'm not going to re-cap the history of the evil DIVX format - but it should be
pointed out that today...June 16, 1999....DIVX has died.
If you don't know what DIVX is, well - that just doesn't matter anymore. If you do know what
DIVX is, I'm guessing you're probably bouncing off the walls with glee now that this wickedest of
video formats has crashed and burned.
To paraphrase The Lost World: DIVX was the worst idea in the history of bad ideas.
It was invasive, violating, awkward, and created an intrinsic divisiveness within the video disc
industry. And now it is gone, gone, gone.
I extend my middle finger in salute to those who supported the format, and to those who
financed the format. I'm hoping this will actually be a lesson to the people who invested a
considerable amount of money in this lame brained, confusing undertaking - but that may be hoping
for too much.
None the less, let this day serve as a reminder that sometimes the right ideals persevere;
common sense can still win the day; and that consumers still wield the greatest power of all over
merchandising - the power of life and death.
You can access articles about the long-awaited death of this abomination by: HREF="http://biz.yahoo.com/prnews/990616/va_circuit_3.html">clicking here, or HREF="http://www.zdnet.com/zdnn/stories/news/0,4586,2276806,00.html">here, or HREF="http://www.divx.com">here.
Apparently, consumers who got suckered into buying DIVX will get some sort of credit or
rebate. If you own one of these things, I'd check the above-linked sites - and / or contact the place
from which you bought your DIVX technology at once...
Glen
If you send a message to the above address & bounces back to you, HREF="mailto:glenoliver@hotmail.com">send mail to a back-up address!
Or call:
(512) 347-1992
Mail can be sent to:
Glen Oliver
P.O. BOX 160812
Austin, TX 78716-0812
USA
P.O. BOX 160812
Austin, TX 78716-0812
USA
Austin, TX 78716-0812
USA
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DIVX may very well be one of the worst consumer products ever invented by greedy corporations wanting to rip people off by presenting their product as a favor to the buying public. Good riddance to exceedingly bad rubbish.
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Only a bunch of show business lawyers and corporate suits could have come up with an idea as inherently stupid and anti-consumer as DIVX. Lets hope that DIVX's fate will stand as a warning to others that rampant greed is no substitute for common sense.
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DIVX was corporate America's wet dream: Get the customer to purchase software that they have to keep paying for. It was just like selling lollypops to children but charging them a buck a lick thereafter. My hope is that this will never be brought up as a viable concept again. My fear is that now, being the king of the hill, standard DVD will jack up their base software
price(s)... On an unrelated topic...
STAR WARS: EPISODE 1 PASSES $300 MILLION
Star Wars: Episode 1: The Phantom Menace passed the $300 million mark at the box office Tuesday, doing so in just 28 days -- faster than any previous film. (It took the previous record holder, Titanic, 44 days to steam past that mark). Take that, you stinkin' sinkin' ship!
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Sorry to go off topic, but since Glenn mentioned that he would be bringing news of upcoming releases, I was just wondering -- Is Excalibur EVER coming to DVD?
Why are the titles still so slow in coming, DVD has been around for several years? VHS seemed to skyrocket once BETA died, I hope the same happens with DVD now. -
As of 9:00 pm eastern on Wednesday, Circuit City was _STILL_ running adverts for Divx. Oops!
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Finally, It took way too long. I was terrified of another VHS/Beta wars. Now that the stupid of the new formats is officially dying, we can get on with "Ushering in new aera for the republic" Now let's get Lucas to put the holy trillogy on our beloved format. Any ideas on how to get him to speed things up. Best time is between EP I and EP II.
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Hurrah and pass the mustard.
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Maybe Divx players will become heavily discounted, and we'll be able to pick one up for real cheap (less than the price of a good DVD player) at Circuit Shitty. It could be a deal -- after all, Divx players can play DVD, too. And, oh, yeah, there was NOTHING good at all about the Divx format. Thanks to Divx, Disney, Paramount and Fox delayed putting their movies on DVD for over a year. Even in the bitter end, spokespeople for Divx still have the gall to champion the format: In news reports I've read, one of these shitheads stated that without Divx, DVD prices for the both the player and discs would go up. Right. Competing MEDIA FORMATS do NOT reduce prices for the consumer, idiot! Competing formats fragment the buying audience and put off those not wanting to choose between formats, thus, causing prices to go UP for each format: Look at the various formats for removable large media storage in PCs. Prices only go down when several companies are allowed to provide their own name-brand, competing hardware and software for a standard format. But, of course, all the people working on Divx failed to understand the real-world economics of consumer media, which is how Divx came about in the first place.
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Praise be to Allah! We win! Woo-hoo! It's now safe to shop at Circuit City! This will be a day long remembered... Hail the conquering geeks! Long live DVD! (At least until HD-DVD...)
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Long live and God bless DVD.
P.S. Haha to all the dopes who were dumb enough to buy into it. -
Thank God this fucker's dead. They make great coasters, and some cheap producer could use them as props for some disc-shooting weapon like in I Come In Peace or Hellraiser III...
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Just wait until the people who "silvered" their discs get the shocker.. (Those are the people who paid the extra $25 per disc for 'unlimited' play).
According to what I'm reading in the paper, those disks will turn into coasters on 6/30/2001 - you'll no longer be able to play them.
So Divx is giving $100 rebates.. I wonder how many 'silvered' discs will no become worthless? -
There was this guy who used to always show up in the talkbacks screaming the evils of DIVX. I would like to send a hearty thanks to this guy for saving me from the evils of DIVX that I almost fell into, in my ignorance of what DIVX was. (It was, according to a salesman, a "special feature";what )
It's so embarassing,*sniff*, I almost purchased a DVD with DIVX, how can anyone *sniff* ever forgiver me? -
Jun 17, 1999 5:46:09 AM CDT
Um... 'terror' goes up there somewhere, I think you all know wh
by yossarian
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May the people that came
up with this crappy idea rot in
the eternal flames of hell.
And I say that includes the suits
at Disney because they supported
Divx. Stupid corporate greedy ugly bastard small-dicked pea-brained hairy-assed shits. -
Not one industry analyst, buyer or technology journalist I know of has been even remotely in favor of DIVX. The whole thing reminded me of the old Donald Duck comic where, drunk on the possibility of power, Donald dreams up a mad scheme to tax people for breathing. ("A deep sigh would be a nickel -- a gasp, a dime!") DIVX had the same kind of peabrained insanity about it -- but all the alleged conveniences of the format were safely on the side of the suits, while the consumer got left with the triple whammy of planned obsolescence, invasion of privacy, and incompatibility. Sounds like a no-win deal to me... and I'm glad it's dead 'n buried. Now we can get down to the real business of supporting and promoting DVD.
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and I'm so glad that Divx won't be around, sucking away new releases, as I'd heard it had been doing. Divx had Big Brother written all over it. If Divx were for the good of the consumer, then why was I able buy a DVD-ROM drive and a decoder card with tv out jacks for $100, and a Divx-"enhanced" player would have cost me $350 or so more?!?!
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I would just like to say, on behalf of the little poeple, to all those nice big people in their neat suits and tall buildings that put all their effort, blood, sweat and tears into creating the maginificent creature known as DIVX:
SCREW YOU ASSHOLE!!!!!!!!!
Damn I feel good today... -
I thought it was strange that recent Circuit City ads didn't mention DiVX. Glad to see it go, but I'm even more glad and surpriesd that they're offering rebates to the people that actually did buy the format. Sony never did that with us Betamax customers! ;)
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But let's not blame corporate suits, they're just either stupid or seeing dollar signs everywhere. DiVX was just a bad idea, a very bad thing, and a really truly bad format to begin with. I'm glad we wouldn't see any more VHS/Beta War II. DVD will last a good long time but at the same time, there could be a future product that will replace DVD in say, maybe ten years or so. This future video product could be a holodisk or something.
Now the biggest question: with the popularity surging on DVD, just what the fuck are we going to do with the rest of our VHS tapes at home or elsewhere? I do NOT wanted to see a huge pileheap of VHS tapes rotting somewhere (really bad for the environment, the case is all plastic with magnetic tape).
I still remembered reading Howard Chaykin's America Flagg! comic books, the VHS tapes were the main thing for desolate America in 2030, it was always interesting to know that VHS format could lasted that long. :) -
Yea haw! Ding dong the witch is dead, lalalalalalalalalala!
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Wow, I remember about a year ago when I was looking to buy a DVD player and what not, after a friend REALLY showed me the difference between it and VHS. I was hooked! So, as I was doing my consumer research and pooling everything, one of the mistakes I made was going to Circuit City. Now, since they usually don't have the best prices anyway, I had no intention of buying anything from them regardless. I simply used them as a window shopping tool. So, I am looking around and looking at the DVD players (I think they had 3!) and a few of these DIVX players. So, naturally I am like "What the hell is this?" and I am already thinking Betamax. So, I went ahead and read the descriptions on the back of some of the discs, and was apalled! I laughed my ass off! So, to enterain myself even further, I confronted the nearby salesman and asked him what DIVX was and why the hell anyone would want to buy one. I mean, I am really gonna buy some discs that I can only use when I pay for them with EACH VIEWING. Otherwise, they are glorified coasters and doorstops. So, this guy really tries hard to sell it to me, and I have the time of my life using simple logic to absolutely blow this guy away! I also ruined a few potential sales for him, because I was talking kind of loudly, and a bunch of the customers talked to me outside afterwards.
I can't imagine how or why anyone would have or could have bought this horrible gimmick. At least Beta had some kind of potential. I mean, you pay $15-$30 and change and you own the DVD movie FOREVER!!! You can watch it 100 times each day. No comparison in value. Anyone who bought DIVX, you have my pity but I gotta kind of wonder about you... -
Oh yeah, Disney showed their idiocy for sure! HA! HA! HA! HA!
As it is, DVD is kicking ass without them anyway, and there have been some Disney films that looked like they made it. In time... -
Even the crappy free ones I got from Best Buy (Sphere, Lost in Space, U.S. Marshalls, City of Angels and A Perfect Murder) Were better than a VHS cassette any day! I can't wait for June 29!!! Who Ya Gonna Call?! GHOSTBUSTERS!!! GHOSTBUSTERS!!! GHOSTBUSTEEEEEEEEEERRRRRRRRRSSS!!!
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I KNEW there was evil afoot...and it makes sense that it was Circuit City. I used to have friends that work there so I can tell you all the skinny. Their sales people are REPRIMANDED if they do NOT sell you the higher up model (if it is advertised) on anything. If you see their flyer for a $200 VCR, they will try to get you to buy the $250 one with VCR plus which you will never use. That is the plain truth. They actually get written up for it. And if you don't buy a warranty with it (which actually is not a bad idea...warranties are always a good way to go because..well...shit happens) but they get written up for that as well. It makes sense that these evil bastards were behind this thing all along. FIE ON YE CIRCUIT CITY, AND A POX ON THINE HOUSE. FEEL THE WRATH OF THE VIDEO GODS AND REAP THE TUMULTUOUS SHITSTORM THOU HAST CULTIVATED WITH THY GREED. *whew* End Transmission.
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Just the other day as I was strollng the local circuit city I met this very friendly sales person and we started up a nice little conversation. You see i was interested in getting some equipment for my new camcorder so i could transfer digital video back and forth from my cpu and camera. So guess what my friendly salesperson does?!?!?!?! He makes up a story that is complete B.S. about some product sony makes that doesnt exist just to get me to buy some crappy firewire!!! Then after complaining to ANOTHER employee, he tells me the same load of crap! All i know is im never usin another circuit city in my life. P.S. I blow my nose at all you silly DIVX buyers, your mother was a hamster and your father smelt of elderberries!
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now that the evil bastard is finally dead, maybe we'll see Disney Fox & Paramount DVD prices drop to a reasonable amount more in line with Warners.
Gee Disney Fox Paramount all supported Divx and charged way more for DVDs, Warner & others who didn't charged a price only slightly higher than the VHS version of a title.
Looks like competition RAISED prices in this case. but Circuit City wouldn't lie, would they? -
Burn in hell, Divx! What a shitty idea, huh? Worse than polyester leisure suits if you ask me. When I purchased my DVD player last December, the guy at the appliance store kept trying to sell me a player with DVD and Divx. Only this much more, he assured me, and you get two formats! Before I got my player I did research on the best brand, etc. I knew all about the horrors of Divx well before I stepped into that store, so the salesman wasn't suckering me in. Who in their right mind would buy a movie on a disk without widescreen, without trailers, and without all the cool extras that DVD contains? With a Divix disc you get...a movie. Saves you the hassle of driving two miles to the video store to a tape for about the same price. I knew this format wouldn't last, I'm just surprised at its early death. I figured it would be around for another year or so. Guess all those discs will make interesting little frisbees, eh?
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About 3 months ago my friend and I were walking around Circuit City looking at some of their TV's, receivers, etc. Well, we get some of the things we needed and as we are checking out we get into a little discussion regarding Divx. We began to jab at the manager serving us concerning the ludicrous idea that you have no widescreen on Divx(he said Pan-n-Scan is basically better), it offers no computer support (he said Dell, Gateway, Compaq and other computer companies aren't intelligent enough to get on the Divx bandwagon), and the fact that you need a Freakin' phone line plugged into the back to watch a damn movie that will collect your viewing data to let you know what movies you need to watch (he said that data was market research only). We poked fun at him, his store and their stupidity over backing such a freakin' moronic technology. Oh, congrats to Steven Spielberg. Steve, a little advice: Next time you are thinking of endorsing a new type of media, follow George's lead.
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Jun 17, 1999 3:45:20 PM CDT
DIVX IS DEAD? AWWWWW, MAN!! I CAN'T BELIEVE IT! THIS IS TERRI
by hellthought
To think I've spent time, effort, money, (Lots and lots of money) planning to bomb the Hell out of DIVX dealers all over America and now they go and discontinue it!
Well, you may have escaped this time, you corporate bastards, but this C-4 just gets better with age. Beware the next time you get together and try to blatantly and royally SHAFT THE AMERICAN BUYING PUBLIC!
Oh and Disney, what the Hell? Do they suck or what? -
Speaking as a former cast member and Complex Trainer of Incredible Universe I must say that seeing CC get it up the rear is so sweet. At least we lasted five years and made you quake in your pants for awhile. You couldn't even take it through a full year adn did very little to stop the awesome power of an open format.
Now as someone who is almost THX Certified and runs an Ultra THX system...HA HA HA HA!! I can't believe ProScan made a player for this joke of a format.
I will have to use old DIVX discs as kneepads when I go skating at Tandy Center. At least we found someone to buy up our mistakes. Go get em Fry's.
BTW RoboGeek..I agree with you 100%. How long do you guess it will be untill we see one of theos HDDVD players? -
Warner Brothers and Columbia/Tri-Star supported DVD from the beginning. Paramount was actually one of the late-comers to the DVD ranks along with Fox and Disney which began releasing films on DVD only since last year. When I started collecting DVDs in March of '97, I remember hoping that Paramount would jump on board soon so that I could get some of their great action/sci-fi films like the Star Trek and Indiana Jones series. Even now, I'm still waiting for Indy on DVD, and Paramount has been really slacking on the anamorphic releases. They've still got a ways to go before they're as consistently excellent as Warner Brothers and Columbia/Tri-Star have always been. And don't even get me started on those ass-holes at Fox.
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...yeah baby!
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Yes, life is sweet. I was actually getting kind of afraid that this day would never arrive. It's very scary what greedy corporations can do when they band together to screw consumers like this. First DIVX, then pay-per-use CD-ROM software and games, and eventually pay-per-listen CDs for your home or car. And don't think for a SECOND that the bastards wouldn't have done it if they had half the chance. The funny thing is that Circuit City sucks so hard anyway. Right when you walk in, you can tell that they sell shitty products. DIVX was just the cherry on the turd. I'm just glad that consumers were intelligent enough to sniff this fart of a concept, and turn away. And much praise goes to we geeks, those who fought the good fight, and defeated the minions of evil. Be proud. Be very proud!
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Jun 17, 1999 10:44:56 PM CDT
"I've seen some dumb bastards before, but DIVX takes the cake!"
by uncapie
I didn't take a rocket scientist to figure this wasn't going to work from the get go! Who do they have in upper management? Shaved apes? I hate Circuit City anyway. The muckrakes!
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Wow, this looks to be the CC-Sucks talkback now. People bitch about how Best Buy and Fry's have lousy service -- except when you're buying, returning or exchanging items -- but at least these places have excellent selection and prices. All the CC stores I've come across have neither. You're better off going to Sears or Wal-Mart to buy your electronics, and I am NOT being facetious when I say this. A friend of mine used to go to CC because he loved being fawned over by the sales rep, and I think that's the consumer demographic the chain goes for -- naive, consumer tech-deficient types who like "friendly and helpful salespeople" to cater to their whims. I really do hope CC or some other chain that sold Divx players will heavily discount the remaining inventory of players soon -- $99 perhaps? If that happens, an announcement should be made here on Coax so that we geeks can raid them and get cheap DVD-compatible players but, most importantly, keep this evil technology away from the hands of the relatively clueless masses for their own benefit. On other notes: I thought DVD already was compatible with HDTV. Doesn't the signal extrapolate to HDTV quality through the S-Video connection when hooked up to an HDTV set? And Fox is pretty good now with its DVD releases. The studio is bringing out most of its new video releases at the same time as their DVD counterparts. They've also released the Alien films (the best one is the original Alien with Ridley Scott's commentary). They've also been quick in bringing out The X-Files flick and Romeo + Juliet, and Titanic is supposed to be coming in July. So the studio should be commended for quickly bringing out this year their movies that have the most DVD-audience appeal.
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...long live the king of media.
DVD BABY!!! -
In your FACE, Circuit City! I hope you lost your ass and get bounced to bankurptcy! LOVE LIVE FREEDOM!
AND MP3 WILL NEVER DIE! -
Now I don't ever talk back...EVER! But this subject made me dig out my TalkBAck password, it was just worth it. It's about time DIVX died. I bought my DVD player in Aug. of 1998, and DIVX hadn't hit hard...yet. That September/October, DIVX hit hard, and to tell you the truth, I was scared. Not that i would EVER ON MY MY GRANDPA'S GRAVE EVER BUY A DIVX, it's just that I didn't want DVD releases to slow down, or for DVD to...(GASP)...DIE! When I herd this press statement, i pulled an Anakin "Yippeee!" Later that day i went out and bought "METROPOLIS" THE OLD VERSION with good music. Well, i'll be going, gotta watch "Apt Pupil" DVD...I can't wait to see McKellen's smiling face in that scene with him in the SS Suit...brilliant! LONG LIVE DVD! AND GO OUT AND BUY THE STANLEY KUBRICK BOX SET JUNE 29th ON DVD! DO IT FOR STANLEY!
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One of the folks above asked about what to do with all the VHS tapes. I wouldn't worry for a while. VHS is still going to be around as long as people want a realtively cheap way to record TV shows. And if you want to give up VHS altogether, then I suspect that there will be (perhaps there is already) companies that will transfer VHS tapes to DVD discs. Maybe I've given a few of you an idea about starting a new business. And I don't doubt that recordable DVD will come along in due course for the average user. And I for one will be glad to get rid of VHS. Why? I've spent a fortune building a VHS library, only to find out (a while back) that the images will degrade over time (such is the volatility of magnetic medium), so that in 15 to twenty years my money will have been invested in blank tapes, making my collection virtually worthless, aside from the original slipcovers. DVD now makes collected and storing films for posterity a reality. And with digital projection and digitized films, the AFI can make some real headway restoring all the old films it wants. As for DIVX, I hated the idea, and wouldn't rent those pieces of crap. Besides, my only DVD player, which is in my computer, didn't support DIVX (Devilishly Insidious Video Extortion). And NOW I'll be able to buy (I hope) some of the classic titles that companies like Disney and others have withheld. DVD has really spoiled me. I love the extras that come with most discs, and it is a hoot to watch the film dubbed in French.
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I was confused about reading all you people complaining about Circuit City scamming people out of extra money by convincing customers to buy combination DIVX/DVD players. I bought my DVD player a couple months ago and the cheapest one I could find just happened to be DIVX compatible. I'm rather indifferent about the whole thing; DIVX never really got to my small part of the world (PEI, Canada) and now that it's dead I'll never even get to try it out. I guess I'm forever stuck with a DVD player with a phone jack.
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I don't think it's good enough that they lost their money.
I think we find the highly paid executives responsible for DIVX and go beat the shit out of them.
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Just thought you guys might be interested that a friend of mine went into a Circut City yesterday and was kind of suprised to find that there is NO mention whatsoever that DIVX is dead. Nothing. Nada. He even went so far as to ask a salesperson "So.. This DIVX thing... will it hold out in the long run?" The employee allegedly denied any truth to the fact that DIVX was dead. Interesting.
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I am writing a paper about the introduction and subsequent removal of DIVX format disks and players for a graduate level business class.
As a result, I would like to get my hands on an old brochure (or even just a copy of a brochure) for DIVX. I've called around to various Circuit City stores in my area, but they say that they've thrown away ALL of the brochures.
My paper is due August 2, so I'd like to get the brochure ASAP to incorporate it into my thoughts early in the process. If anyone by chance has one they can mail or fax, please contact me at Wendy_Massey@hotmail.com
Thanks. -
www.dailymovies.com is starting a petition to say yes to VHS format of
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Coaxial (love your name :p)... I couldn't find anything "invasive and violating" about the DIVX standard. The complainers I hear are already renting movies... not applying their rental $$$ toward buying the movies (which aren't released for sale on VHS or DVD at the time they can be rented, if I'm not mistaken).
So in this case they get the same deal as renting a movie, but don't have to make an extra trip to return the video. Oh, this isn't much of a problem to most people, right? Wrong. I've read estimates that 50% of the revenue coming into video rental stores is in late fees. Kinda puts a different slant on the issue, doesn't it? But let's examine it even closer.
Sure, a double standard is a problem, assuming that the distribution companies couldn't go with both (which they could have - this is modern technology people). But why would the distribution companies like Paramount, owned by Viacom, support a format that takes half of the profits of Blockbuster (also owned by Viacom) in the form of late fees? Hmm...
And I wonder why DVDs are released at such discount rates compared to their VHS counterparts? Do I smell a monopoly? DIVX was a good idea that at least one super-mega-monolithic entertainment company wanted to see fail at any cost. Even if it meant losing $70 per sale of DVDs in order to corner the market... like to see the comparison between the losses by Blockbuster and the losses by DIVX-maker Circuit City.
So hoo-ray for DVD renters everywhere. Enjoy paying the late fees that you wouldn't have had to pay with DIVX. And thank the corporations who bring you DVD for not being consumer-friendly enough to incorporate the DIVX method into their distribution.
Guy Montag
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