[78-L] A word of warning concerning playback of Warner "Big Band" set Re: They are practically Giving away the Vitaphone DVD set!

[Jeff Sultanof]

Oh, boy, do I remember how much these sets cost. I got good prices on them,
but wound up selling them when the DVD was introduced.

Jeff Sultanof

On Mon, Dec 14, 2009 at 4:07 PM, David Lennick <dlennick at sympatico.ca>wrote:

> Remember when we'd pony up hundreds of bucks for those laserdisc sets? I
> still
> have my discs and the player was repaired a year ago (it got zapped by too
> many
> power outages) but I haven't even plugged it in.
>
> dl
>
> Jeff Sultanof wrote:
> > I gotta say, I am so thrilled to have these as one boxed DVD set. I had
> the
> > laser disc boxed sets that had the great majority of them, so it is great
> to
> > have them again. I've been watching this set on and off since it came on
> > Friday, and I love what I see and hear. It was an incredible thrill to
> see
> > the 1945 Jan Savitt Orchestra, one of the great big bands with strings of
> > that period, which is very poorly documented.
> >
> > I hope sales are good on these sorts of items, because I'd love some
> > Vitaphone shorts sets from the films that have been restored by UCLA
> thanks
> > to The Vitaphone Project. The Ben Pollack short that can be found on
> YouTube
> > would be wonderful to have. There is a Vitaphone Fred Allen short that I
> saw
> > years ago at the Museum of Modern Art that I'd love to see again, etc.
> etc.
> >
> > Jeff Sultanof
> >
> > On Mon, Dec 14, 2009 at 12:47 PM, Michael Biel <mbiel at mbiel.com> wrote:
> >
> >> I brought this exact thing up last week, although not in the message you
> >> reprinted.  I found it would not play in the Sony drive in my computer
> >> nor in my Discmaker copier (which we use to duplicate Leah's
> >> documentary), but would play in a Magnavox recorder, and a Philips
> >> player.  I did not test it in my Ilo or LiteOn recorders because I do
> >> not trust them anyway.   They obviously do not want them being ripped in
> >> computers, and this might affect how a stand-alone recorder's drive see
> >> them, but it makes no sense to purposefully disable their playback in a
> >> recorder, since it is the recorder you would use to take the signal from
> >> a player!!    Actually, the copier's play-only input drive did read the
> >> disc but said it was RCC protected and would not proceed.  So that is
> >> the answer of the other question about what would happen if you do get
> >> it to play in a computer.
> >>
> >>
> >> Frankly it would be a pain for some people if they can't play it in
> >> their computer because that is some people's entertainment center.  The
> >> RCC copy protection should be enough to protect ripping by most ordinary
> >> people, so why did they have to go the extra step.  In the past there
> >> have been threats by the disc authorities to demand trademark removal
> >> from discs that have things that restrict PLAYING, such as when the CD
> >> authority threatened Columbia when they put in some programs that
> >> damaged computers that merely played certain CDs a few years ago.  Note
> >> that these discs contain a DVD "Download" trademark.  This must have
> >> some allowance for how these discs act.
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> Mike Biel  mbiel at mbiel.com
> >>
> >>
> >>   -------- Original Message --------
> >>
> >>  From: "Martin Fisher" <wmfisher at mtsu.edu>
> >>
> >>
> >>  Just a note concerning the playability of this set.
> >>
> >>  The back of the box is flagged with this statement, verbatim.
> >>
> >>  "This disc is expected to play back in DVD video "play only" devices,
> >> and
> >>  may ot play back in other DVD devices, including recorders and PC
> >> drives."
> >>
> >>  So far, disc 1 plays back in a Coby and Toshiba DVD player and Plextor
> >> DVD
> >>  PC drive. Other PC DVD drives come up as not recognizing the region
> >> code.
> >>  I also have a Sony DVD recorder that will not load the discs.
> >>
> >>  Martin
> >>
> >>  ----- Original Message -----
> >>  From: "Michael Biel" <mbiel at mbiel.com>
> >>  To: "78-L Mail List" <78-l at klickitat.78online.com>
> >>  Sent: Friday, December 11, 2009 9:31 PM
> >>  Subject: Re: [78-L] They are practically Giving away the Vitaphone DVD
> >> set!
> >>
> >>
> >>  > From: "Steve Shapiro" <steveshapiro1 at juno.com>
> >>  >> When you order the 6 dvd set, a code comes up which says MOD.
> >>  >> The company says that MOD dvds are not mass-produced, but Made On
> >> Demand.
> >>  >> I presume this is each time someone orders such items.
> >>  >
> >>  > Yes, this was discussed when the Warner Archive series was first
> >>  > introduced back a year or two ago. I mentioned in my discussions here
> >>  > that these are DVD-Rs but are nicely printed so that you wouldn't
> >>  > notice. It is designed to allow for items of limited interest without
> >>  > having to warehouse quantities or distribute them to stores. This is
> >>  > similar to what Greenwood Press is doing for some of its
> >> discographies,
> >>  > and what the Smithsonian does with the Folkways and Cook recordings.
> >>  >
> >>  >> Perhaps our business is keeping someone in job./steve
> >>  >
> >>  > That is a nice thought in this economy, and I am happy to support
> >> this
> >>  > end of the commercial disc business because it is giving the company
> >> a
> >>  > clear denotation of what materials ARE of interest. Each sale here is
> >> a
> >>  > definite sale, while sending them to stores can often result in
> >> returns
> >>  > from the store. If films like these sell well enough to support their
> >>  > production, hopefully more will be released. I have a feeling that
> >> this
> >>  > set is partially a result of the interest in the Jazz Singer box,
> >> both
> >>  > in sales and in word of mouth/internet.
> >>  >
> >>  > Mike Biel mbiel at mbiel.com
> >>
>
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