In February, Warner Bros. Home Entertainment announced that Extended Edition Blu-rays of The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey would be sold closer to the 2013 holiday season. Now, the studio has revealed new details and an official release date for the sets.
The Extended Edition, which features a 13-minute longer cut, will arrive on Digital Download on October 22 and on Blu-ray 3D, Blu-ray and DVD on November 5. All disc versions of the release come with nearly nine hours of new bonus content, including an audio commentary with writer-director Peter Jackson and co-writer-producer Philippa Boyens, “New Zealand: Home of Middle-earth” featurette, and “The Appendices,” a multi-part documentary focusing on various aspects of the film and the Trilogy.
It’s been quite a year for Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson. The popular WWE wrestler-turned-Hollywood action hero has starred in no less than four films so far in 2013, including sequels in the Fast and Furious and G.I. Joe franchises. But Johnson has been a major player in Hollywood ever since making the jump from wrestling to acting with 2001’s The Mummy Returns. He quickly developed a knack for playing colorful action heroes with a healthy dose of humor and his trademark charisma.
That skill-set was on full display in G.I. Joe: Retaliation, which arrives on DVD this week. To celebrate, we’ve compiled a list of our ten favorite movies featuring The Rock. Whether straight-up action-adventure fare like The Scorpion King or more dramatic efforts like Gridiron Gang, these are the movies that made Johnson a household name, even for those who don’t enjoy a weekly dose of WWE.
Two of the leading names in DVD and Blu-ray technology announced a joint effort to develop a next-generation standard for optical discs. Sony and Panasonic will collaborate on a new standard, and plan to produce new super discs that can hold up to 300GB of data on a single disc by 2015.
The first question to ask is whether or not such technology will even be relevant in 2015. Is it even relevant today? Or, more importantly, what value or impact will it have for your business?
Archiving Data
Not too long ago, recordable optical discs were a primary means of storing and archiving data. Blank disc media is cheap, and burning data to disc is a relatively simple process that small and medium businesses can easily manage. Current Blu-ray discs can hold 25GB of data—or 50GB on a dual-layer disc. But, removable media often has trouble keeping up with the skyrocketing storage demands of newer technology.
There was 1.8 trillion gigabytes of data generated in 2011 alone. According to a study conducted by IDC, the explosion of mobile devices, embedded technologies, wearable computers, and sensors in clothing, medical devices, and building will result in the overall amount of data expanding by 50 times by 2020.
LOS ANGELES, July 29 (UPI) — “42,” the Jackie Robinson bio-picture starring Chadwick Boseman and Harrison Ford, is the top-selling DVD in the United States, Rentrak announced Monday. …read more
DVDs are so analog. Sure, they’re digitally encoded versions of your favorite movies and TV shows, but they’re trapped on physical platters. If you want to watch something, you have to find the disc, slide it into a DVD player—or a computer with a DVD drive—and flip your TV to the proper input.
As DVD players leave the market and DVD drives disappear from PCs, it’s time to free your films from their shiny silver prisons so they’ll still be watchable in the player-free future. As a bonus, ripping your movies off the disc extends your viewing options to your phone, tablet, Roku box, game console, and more.
Once you convert your movie library to digital files, you can store those files on a server and stream them anytime, from anywhere. Media companies are slowly waking up to how convenient this is and are building services like Flixster, Ultraviolet, and Vudu, which offer DVD-to-digital conversions: Pop a disc into your PC, and the service adds it to your online account—at which point you can stream it to an app or to a set-top box.
Each such conversion will cost you a few bucks, however, and you won’t be able to convert some movies (owing to studio-imposed restrictions). But you can take a more hands-on approach and accomplish the same thing yourself, spending little or no money in the process.
LOS ANGELES, July 22 (UPI) — The Melissa McCarthy-Jason Bateman comedy “Identity Thief” is the top-selling DVD and Blu-ray in the United States, Rentrak announced Monday. …read more
This has been a good week for the build. I’ve got the DVD drives wrapped, more paracord has arrived (enough to do the top), the side windows are ready to cut and I finally got sponsored, thanks to IceModz.com .
I’ve also got around to planning the mount and door for the ITX board and Mac Mini. They will be mounted sideways, possibly with a mount in the middle, possibly with just zip ties. This will be connected to the bottom 4 5.25″ drive mounts and a front USB panel. I’ll try to add a door too, but i might not be able to.
I apologise for the pics this week, it’s raining so i cannot get proper lighting.
The Stencil for the windows. The inside cutout will be used with purple mirror acrylic on one side, The whole size of the paper will be the UV orange window on the other side.
The paracord. It’s more violet and orange in real life.
The DVD drives, with lots of Carbon Fibre wrap
And now, some pics of the UV/Purple LEDs off IceModz.com Since mine haven’t arrived yet, as you can see, UV reactive things really glow.
We have a feeling Siskel and Ebert would have given these wedding invitations two thumbs up.
Southern California couple Joshua and Rachel Watson took inspiration from their favorite films and TV shows when they crafted the invitations for their June 1 wedding. With the help of photographer Jordan Nakamura, the Watsons inserted themselves into posters for films such as, “Casablanca,” “Inception” and “Mad Men,” then sent guests a DVD case with one of the posters as the cover and a CD of their favorite music inside.
Joshua, a photographer, told HuffPost Weddings in an email that he and Rachel, who works in film and television, felt “burnt out” with traditional wedding and engagement photography. “[Traditional photography] seems a little ‘cut-and-pasted’ to us,” he said. “We wanted our engagement and wedding to be the first time we actually collaborated and created something together, and decided to produce this.”
“Schindler’s List” is being auctioned off on eBay.
No, not a DVD of the Oscar-winning Steven Spielberg film, but one of the original Schindler’s lists — the only one ever to go on the open market — will be publicly auctioned tonight on the popular shopping Web site.
The reserve price is an eye-popping $3 million.
But its sellers, California collectors Gary Zimet and Eric Gazin, are hoping it will go for as high as $5 million.
“Enter US $3,000,000.00 or more” the listing will instruct bidders when it goes live at 9 p.m. EDT, according to an advance copy obtained by The Post.
“Free Local Pickup” the listing will advise. “Item location: Israel.”
“We decided to sell the list on eBay because it has over 100 million worldwide members, and this is a global story,” Gazin told The Post.
“There are billionaires using the site, wealthy celebrities,” said Gazin, who is the president of AuctionCause.com. “We like the platform.”
The “list” was named for Oskar Schindler, a businessman from Germany who is credited with saving more than 1,000 Jewish refugees from the Nazis by deeming them essential workers for his enamel-works factories.
Of the seven original versions of the list, only four are known to still exist — including two in Yad Vashem, the Israeli Holocaust Memorial Museum, and one in the US Holocaust Museum in Washington.
The one being offered for sale on eBay tonight is 14 onion-skin pages long.
The date April 18, 1945, is written in pencil on the first page. It lists 801 male names.
“It is extremely rare that a document of this historical significance is put on the market,” Zimet said.
“Many of the survivors on this list and their descendants moved to the United States, and there are names on this list which will sound very familiar to New Yorkers.”
BEVERLY HILLS, Calif., July 18 (UPI) — U.S. DVD rental and streaming service Netflix says it is “overwhelmed” three of its original series earned a total of 14 Primetime Emmy Award nominations. …read more
Microsoft caved to market pressure and sagging demand this week by slashing the price of the Surface RT tablet by 30 percent. The Surface RT is better-equipped for business than rival tablets, and at $350 ( $470 once you add a Touch or Type keyboard cover, which it requires to be truly functional) it straddles the line between tablet and PC, and could help business customers rein in IT costs.
The Surface RT isn’t for everyone. It can’t run traditional Windows software, so businesses or users that depend on specific applications or custom software can’t just toss out their PC and use a Surface RT. For a variety of use cases, however, a device with email, Web access, and Microsoft Office is sufficient.
The Surface RT can replace a Windows PC for many users.
The Surface RT includes Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and OneNote. With Windows 8.1, the Surface RT also gets Outlook, and Microsoft just updated the OneNote MX app to allow it to connect to Office 365 accounts. Microsoft has also made many of its tools available across iOS and Android, but the integration of the Surface RT with Microsoft software and services sets it apart from other mobile devices as a business tool.
It’s true a business can supply users with standard Windows laptops—with the full Windows operating system, more internal storage, a real keyboard, and possibly a DVD or Blu-Ray drive—for roughly the same money. But when it comes to weight and battery life, no $500 laptop can come close to what the Surface RT has to offer.
If you thought Power Rangers: From Mighty Morphin to Lost Galaxy DVD set was massive, then you haven’t seen anything yet! As Comic-Con begins, Shout! Factory have announced the upcoming Power Rangers Legacy: The First 20 Years collection.
In celebration of this multi-generational pop culture phenomenon, Shout! Factory and Saban Brands are releasing the first 20 (!!!) seasons of the Power Rangers TV series in one mega DVD set. This limited edition home entertainment collection comes packed with every Power Rangers episode, from Mighty Morphin Power Rangers to Power Rangers Megaforce, boasting over 270 hours of action-packed entertainment across 98 DVDs.
“Damages” has made its way online for free viewing.
The drama starring Glenn Close and Rose Byrne has landed on Crackle. Right now, just Seasons 1-4 are available. Season 5, the show’s last, came out on DVD on Tuesday, July 16.
“Damages” ended its run last summer after five seasons on the air. Originally an FX drama, “Damages” moved to DirecTV for Seasons 4 and 5. Close won two Emmys and a Golden Globe for her portrayal of the ruthless attorney Patty Hewes.
Amazon now has the Man of Steel Blu-ray and DVD cover art up, but it’s pretty much the same image that we’ve already seen on one of the film’s movie posters. Oh, well, at least we get a look at the action figures that come with one of the sets. Take a look:
The Best of Warner Bros. series of box sets released another DVD collection earlier this month with the fourth edition (after the studio’s Best Pictures, Musicals and Romance) of its 20 Film Collection series. (These are smaller releases derived from WB’s massive 100 Film Collection on DVD and 50 Film Collection on Blu-ray.) This particular set, however, focuses on Warner Bros.’ classic comedies spanning from 1935 (A Night at the Opera) to 2009 (The Hangover).
The Best of Warner Bros. series of box sets released another DVD collection earlier this month with the fourth edition (after the studio’s Best Pictures, Musicals and Romance) of its 20 Film Collection series. (These are smaller releases derived from WB’s massive 100 Film Collection on DVD and 50 Film Collection on Blu-ray.) This particular set, however, focuses on Warner Bros.’ classic comedies spanning from 1935 (A Night at the Opera) to 2009 (The Hangover).
LOS ANGELES, July 16 (UPI) — The family fantasy flick “Oz the Great and Powerful” is the top-selling DVD and Blu-ray in the United States, Rentrak announced. …read more
Jacqueline Corbelli, CEO and Founder of BrightLine, is one of the most prescient, engaging and inspirational women I’ve ever met. Consider this: a decade ago she saw that digital technology across multiple platforms (DVD, game consoles, TVs, smartphones, tablets, and soon, smart TVs) would become THE way we interact with content. What does that mean? It means that advertisers no longer have to entertain, cajole, shout at and/or beg you to pay attention to their 30-second spot that interrupts your favorite program. …read more
LOS ANGELES — It’s summertime and the stock market is sizzling. The market reached an all-time high last week, torching its previous record set just before Memorial Day.
Even so, a handful of companies stand out. Six stocks — Amazon, Starbucks, UnitedHealth, Visa, Mastercard, and Discover Financial — notched their own records last week, helped by the growing confidence of American consumers.
Would buying these stocks now be a hot-weather impulse or a coldly calculated move?
All six have improving earnings outlooks, analysts say. Credit-card companies and UnitedHealth appear to be the best bets.
The six companies share similar traits that make them attractive. They are consumer-focused, with dominant market positions and growing revenue streams, says Fred Dickson, chief investment strategist at D.A. Davidson & Co.
Their importance to shoppers is crucial to their growth prospects. Americans’ confidence in the economy has reached its highest point in 5½ years. The housing recovery is strengthening. Job growth continues at a steady pace.
When consumers feel better about the economy, they splurge on discretionary items like a Venti Caramel Macchiato from Starbucks or a new book or DVD from Amazon. And they pay for those items with credit cards.
Visa and UnitedHealth are the most attractive buys right now, says David Brown, chief market strategist at Sabrient Systems, an investment research firm.
The outlook for Discover and MasterCard is also good, particularly as consumer confidence improves. The companies’ biggest challenge remains staying competitive in a crowded field, he says.
While Brown expects Amazon to continue to dominate its market, he sees a big risk in buying the stock now.
“It’s a fine company, but I would want to enter it in a pullback — a big pullback,” Brown says. “It has, by far, the most downside.”
The stock of the nation’s largest health insurer has climbed more than 25 percent this year and hit an all-time high of $68.75 in trading Wednesday, according to FactSet.
Like other health insurers, UnitedHealth stands to benefit from the federal health care overhaul. The company will be able to participate in state-based health insurance exchanges designed to expand coverage to millions of uninsured Americans. The company is also the largest provider of Medicare Advantage plans, which are privately run versions of the government’s Medicare program for the elderly and disabled people.
Financial analysts, on average, expect the stock to move higher. Their consensus target price is $71.47, according to FactSet.
On average, the stock has a “Buy” rating from analysts polled by FactSet.
