Out With the New

teh
Ahhh! Richard Roeper identifies a pet peeve of mine:

…I popped a DVD of "Die Another Day" into the computer -- and then I had to weed through all kinds of previews and menus and commands and stuff, just to get to the damn movie.

This happens with just about every DVD. You can't just pop it in and play the film. You have to sit through the FBI Warning in English and in French, you have to wade through coming attractions, you have to wait while the menu loads -- and then you have to navigate around until you can find the "Play Movie" command. Sometimes you can fast forward or skip ahead, but more often than not, you get that little red slash sign and the "BONG" sound effect that tells you the "Operation is Prohibited" at that particular moment.

At least with the old-school VHS, you could just fast forward to the start of the movie.

No kidding! I think that same thing every time I start a DVD and have to sit through the FBI warning and more. “Bring back VHS”, say I. But once the show begins it’s all worth it in terms of quality and even quantity as most DVDs have lots of extras you never got on tapes. Besides, DVD will soon be obsolete (Bill Gates says so) and something better will come along to piss me off.