TV production industry

What is it exactly that makes Lovefilm and Blockbuster the leaders of the DVD rental pack and streets ahead of their competitors? What is their secret?

To answer that let’s take a look at what Lovefilm and Blockbuster are doing right.

A website that looks good and is easy to use

Absolutely essential in this market is a website that is well designed and above all easy to find your way around, with films and genres quickly accessible and easy to find.

Lovefilm’s website is superb, in every respect. To begin with, its design is eye-catching in vivid colours of red, white and black which immediately grab your attention. Then, to make navigation simple it is divided into different sections covering films, games, shop and their extra offerings.

Films are classified initially by genre, but there is also a search bar option enabling you to enter the name of a film and find what you want that way.

Blockbuster’s website has recently undergone a face-lift and with its new bright blue and yellow colour scheme, it is visually attractive and a piece of cake to use.

Its website caters for their online and high street rental market, a distinct advantage for anyone who is an online customer and also a store member.

Blockbuster’s films are classified by every genre you can think of, such as actor, director, theme and chart, to list just a few. There is also a search bar enabling you to type in what you are looking for and this lets you narrow down the search considerably.

A massive selection of film titles

A bigger catalogue must surely, by the law of averages, provide a better DVD rental service and anyone who subscribes to a DVD rental site is bound to be a film fan. This time, size does matter.

Lovefilm has an enormous catalogue with a spread of more than 65,000 titles to choose from.

Blockbuster’s catalogue, while also huge, has a slightly smaller range of about 55,000 films on offer to their customers.

But Lovefilm lists their bonus discs as separate film titles in their catalogue and they are rented out as such, which is probably a little sneaky and goes a long way to explaining the lead they have on their rivals in terms of numbers. Blockbuster on the other hand sticks to the actual film titles only, so their catalogue seems slightly smaller but really there is probably little to choose between the two. Blockbuster does give out bonus discs in conjunction with related film titles, something Lovefilm doesn’t do.

When all’s said and done, the number of DVD films on offer in each catalogue is largely immaterial as the list of films available for rent is so vast that it would take almost 100 years to get through either catalogue. That’s much more than a lifetime’s worth of viewing.

A Free Trial to test out the service

The average length of a DVD free trial is generally 14 days. Blockbuster is way ahead of their competition here as they offer a generous 28 days to get hooked on their service. That’s a full month to test the service.

Be aware that as attractive as a free trial might be, a cancellation procedure, should you need it, ought to be as readily available as just signing up.

Lots of rental packages to suit all kinds of customer

DVD rental services must offer potential customers as wide-ranging a variety of packages as possible, to please all kinds of people with differing tastes.

Lovefilm DVD rental has a selection of six packages for customers to choose from, comprising 3 ‘unlimited’ plans and 3 ‘light use’ plans.

Blockbuster DVD rental customers can choose between five rental packages, ranging from a limited package offering only two DVDs per month with only one out at any one time, to unlimited packages allowing three out at a time.

Many stars sashayed down the red carpet last evening, many nominees for an Academy Award but they all could not be winners.

Sean Penn was the big Leading Man winner for his role in “Milk.” He used his winner speech time to insult those who voted against the gay marriage amendment in California.

Sean, to me, is a weird actor. He doesn’t look like a leading man like Gary Cooper or John Wayne or Tom Hanks or Michael Douglas. Yet, he is not wimpy and he adds an intensity to every role he plays. He is not my favorite actor, but sometimes I am mesmerized by his performance on the screen.

How could a face like Sean’s ever get into the movies?

Kate Winslet, for her role in “The Reader,” won the Leading Woman Award. Kate is such a great actress and she was expected to win. She said, “I’d be lying if I haven’t made a version of this speech before. I think I was probably 8 years old and staring into the bathroom mirror and this (Oscar) would be a shampoo bottle. But it’s not a shampoo bottle now.”

The Oscars are what some little girls and boys dream of. They are what some old men and women dream of.

The Oscar statuette is a knight with crusader’s sword standing on a reel of film. It weighs eight-and-a-half pounds. It is thirteen-and-a-half inches tall and is made of gold-plated britannium, a metal alloy. R.S. Owens & Company of Chicago makes the statuettes in excess of those needed because it is hard to predict the exact number that will be needed. One composition is: Sn : 93%, Sb : 3%, Cu : 2%. What, no high school chemistry? Tin, Antimony, Copper.

Despite the weight of the award, the actors carried them around later to the many parties that followed.

I always get a kick out the losers. They seem so happy for the actual winner although they are very disappointed not to win.

Stiff upper lip!

Sometimes you could see a “happy” face turn into a sorrowful one.

It is difficult to get nominated.

It is more difficult to win.

So, not winning might also mean giving up the only opportunity to win in ones life.

Yet, just to be nominated is very important and has its own commercial rewards. You will always be known as a nominee.

The Winning Picture was Slumdog Millionaire.

It was fun to watch the cast, producers and director during the presentations. When it was their turn to take the stand, about half of the audience went to the stand.

Nobody was left out.

O.K. Maybe it was not one-half of the audience, but close.

I noticed that the Japanese and the Indians wanted everybody to get some credit, so up to the stage.

The settings for this years Academy Awards was amazingly good. It was the best that I’ve seen and I am an old man.

David Rockwell, architect and designer, created a party-like setting that was at times to me comfortable and informal. Yet the new proscenium curtain comprised of approximately 100,000 Swarovski crystals in a variety of shapes and sizes, revealed the high-profile fashion associated with the event.

Something else that seemed new to me was parading out five previous award winners to comment on the five nominees. There was some contrast between the old and the new.

Well, some were not that old.

I always like to watch the presentation on those who have passed during the year. Unlike most of us, there is some lingering presence of dead actors. They continue to live in the movies they made.

Jerry Lewis received a special award for his humanitarianism. He gave a short, dignified speech showing no pretension.

Now, that was nice!

One image that will live with me is Meryl Steep who has been nominated fifteen times. She got a lot of praise from the podium and she always put her hands to her breast as if to say, “Little Old Me?”

She is such a great actress, knows she is a great actress, but tries to be humble. My favorite role for her was “Out of Africa” with Robert Redford who I did not see at the Oscars.

He was probably watching form Park City, Utah or such.

What a great show!

Fly Old Glory!

No peer pressure, but producers and broadcasters alike are seeing the importance of Spanish captioning to reach a broader audience.

Why all the hype?

Think of the statistics in the U.S.: Spanish is the second most common language in the United States after English, and the Spanish-speaking community in the U.S. is growing each year. As of 2007, according to the United States Census Bureau, Spanish is the primary language spoken at home by over 34 million people. An unbelievable fact is that the United States, with 45 million Hispanics, is the world’s second largest Spanish-speaking country in the entire world! Mexico is the first, but the U.S. has more Spanish-speaking people than Spain, Argentina, and Colombia! Why would you want to miss out on such a huge market? No matter what the content of your programming is, I can assume one of your main goals is to reach as many viewers as possible, and with Spanish captioning, your viewership will automatically be on the rise.

English Programming with Spanish Captions

If you are broadcasting in English, you already must broadcast your content with English captions. So you are probably wondering how you can also broadcast with Spanish captions. English captions are usually decoded through CC1 and Spanish captions are typically decoded on CC2. On your TV menu you can select CC1 or CC2. If the viewer is used to watching TV with Spanish captions, they probably always have CC2 selected. With this option, you are reaching the Spanish-speaking community in your broadcast area. If you are debating if captioning your English programming in Spanish is worth it, do an online search for the amount of Spanish speakers there are in the area that you broadcast.

Spanish-language Programming with Spanish Captions

Broadcasting your Spanish-language programming with Spanish captions is now being mandated by the FCC: In the United States, all Spanish-language programming that was first shown after January 1, 1998, must be captioned by 2010. I know it may seem like another burden, but the good thing is, by captioning your Spanish-language programming, you will reach the Hispanic deaf and hard of hearing community, and once again, broadening your viewership. As you can imagine, the deaf and hard of hearing community is not limited to the English language–there is a considerable number of deaf and hard of hearing in the U.S. Hispanic community that want access to your programming.

Spanish Subtitles for DVD and Blu-ray

If you are putting out a DVD or Blu-ray Disc for distribution, you can reach your target audience with Spanish subtitles, as opposed to captions. Subtitles are burned on the video and can be turned on and off through the viewer’s DVD menu, so they don’t need to be decoded through a decoder chip in their TV. You should choose subtitles instead of captioning when authoring your disc because they look much nicer and are easier to read.

In the 1990’s, I was a fan of the show Beverly Hills 90210. I watched it in college and during most of the decade. So, when a new 90210 came this season to the CW, I watched some of it as it had some of the old characters come back like Brenda and Kelly. The premise for this new show is about a family from Kansas who come to Beverly Hills to move in with their mother/grandmother who is an actress and getting older needing help from her son and his family. They have a adopted son and daughter who attend West Beverly High. This is the alma mater of the group who attended back in the 1990’s. I have only watched this show in spurts. However, from an anti-bullying perspective, I have to recommend this show as it is a good one.

There are four main female characters who I would say are friends but have had their share of problems. Two of them use to be best friends (Naomi and Silver), one is a child actress supporting her mother (Adriana) and the other is the one from Kansas (Annie). Naomi and Adriana are BFF’s while Annie and Silver (Erin Silver from the original 90210) have grown close. Naomi told everyone about Silvers parents divorcing in middle school which left Silver bitter. Adriana was sent to rehab for a drug problem and is now pregnant. Annie and Naomi have fought over a boy named Ethan who was Naomi’s boyfriend and is now Annie’s. There is a good chance that Silver will be diagnosed as bi-polar this season and she keeps a blog where she expressed her anger but she has stopped posting so much and channeled her energy into her boyfriend Dixon. Despite this drama, there is not any relational aggression going on in this. At first, I figured Naomi would be the mean girl but not only did she apologize to Silver for doing what she did but the girls are learning to get along. When Adriana was in rehab and became pregnant, Naomi turned out to be a loyal and supporting friend to her despite her strong personality and that she did get mad at Adriana while she was in rehab. Naomi did ruin Annie’s 16th birthday party because Annie stole Ethan from her. However, neither girl has allowed their angers towards one another out of control. As a matter of fact, the feud stayed between them alone. Naomi can be nasty but I have found that she reacts only when she has been offended. She shows her anger and moves on and does not dwell on the issue at hand. Also, Annie and Ethan were talking to a girl from their school who talked about have a devastating experience at the hands of mean girls at a former school and you could see the pain in her face. Instead of making it worse, Annie and Ethan both expressed compassion towards her, not rejection. Even though events occurred. The most important thing is that there are no queen bees emerging nor are there power trips and feeding into anyone one persons relationally aggressive behavior.

I will come out and say it. Despite Naomi’s strong will, need to be cool, the fact that she is spoiled and tends to seek revenge when offended, at the end of the day, she is not a bully and here is why. When two girls fight and hurt one another, this is not a situation of bullying. Even though Naomi hurt Silver with her words and Silver retaliated in her blog posts, Naomi took her responsibility in what happened and made things right between them. Even though Naomi and Annie fought over Ethan, this did not filter into other relationships or fester on involving bystanders. Bullies keep drama going and allow their power to get out of control while their targets do not retaliate. What has occurred on this show is typical adolescent drama. It is normal for girls to get angry over a boy. Both Annie and Naomi behaved badly towards one another. This is what happens when two people are in a fight. People are going to disagree and get angry. However, they keep it between each other and nobody is trying to overpower the other. Bullies also do not stand by their friends when they are in trouble unless it benefits them in some way. What does Adriana have that Naomi wants? Naomi comes from a much more affluent background. She lives in an upscale hotel unlike Adriana lives with her mother trying to help made ends meet each month. Maybe Naomi does not see Adriana as a threat but she has shown compassion and support to her and stood up for her. She does not seem to have any hidden agendas in this. I believe she honestly cares for Adriana. Bullies do not have this capacity within them.

Its important to understand these differences between strong personalities and outright bullies. People will probably say Naomi is nasty and yes, she can be. However, this is only when someone has angered her first. She is not targeting people to intentionally inflict pain for the heck of it. There is nothing wrong with being angry nor is there anything wrong with having a strong personality. Naomi is not perfect by any stretch and she has done some bad things. However, she took responsibility and right there that shows she is not a bully. Please, learn to distinguish between the two. Know that a fight is just that; a fight. Disagreement and anger between people is normal. What is not normal is when it festers, gets out of hand, people take sides, someone starts gaining power and queen bees materialize. On 90210, there is not a queen bee and for this reason alone, this show is much better to watch than others out there. On the anti-bully scale, I give it a thumbs up.