I was involved in a 4-car accident. I drove car number 2. Nobody got hurt, but my car was the only one not able to drive out of this. I am thankful for a) that it’s not my fault and b) that insurances are covering all of the cost of about $5000. Let’s see the positive side: my garage will clean the car as well, it was time for that.
Maria Chose to Walk Her Own Away
Unfortunately Maria chose to walk her own way, seperate from mine. I am making this entry Sept 5th because it took me until today to come to terms with the pain this means for me. Imagine this: You meet a girl, you just *know* she is the one, but because she is focussing on herself, she could not care less. I feel like I am screaming through thick security glass but cannot be heard.
I am pondering thoughts like “what fun is life if you cannot say that you are loved?”. What a mess. My shrink will have her hands full repairing it. The only reconciliation I have is that I can still hope: seven years from now, if we are both unbound, I’ll ask her to marry me.
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One For the Road
One for the road! The damage on my VW Polo was more extensive then the remaining value of the car itself. So was was quasi-forced to get a new car. I got a new VW Golf 4, 100 horsepower, 5 gear tiptronic automatic, storm-beige metallic with aluminium tires. Because it was a presentation car I got it for a substantial discount. It is a wonderful car, I am in love with it. The only thing that it is missing (for now) is GPS.
Oh, and this car is vegetarian just like me! It feeds on Bio-Diesel brewed from Austrian plants!
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Changed my Picture
I changed my picture on the right side to reflect a more serious image. (Yeah, right) Got a call from pioneer repair department informing me that the repair of my DVD player would cost almost as much as a new one. Hm, maybe I should NOT have tried to oil it when it started squeaking…. *g* Now I am shopping for a new DVD player.
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The Star Trek: On Demand Petition
Update Oct 2nd 2007: We surpassed 500 signatures but never got Paramount to respond. 7 years after my open letter to them there is still no legal way to watch full episodes online.
Loyal trekkers all around the globe are uniting to move for persuading Paramount Pictures to make all past, present and future episodes of the Star Trek series available on the internet. The underground already transfers new episodes to the Internet and digitizes old ones. Using modern codecs like MPEG4 DivX 😉 can reduce shows to a size that lends itself for distribution while retaining acceptable quality. What’s not acceptable to us honest fans is the legal aspect: it is not legal.
This underground interest and some polling of my own has shown that a large amount of people would be willing to pay a justifiable price to be able to legally obtain digital copies of Star Trek episodes or to watch streamed episodes. Having to wait for the video cassette to be released is not compatible with the attitude and lifestyle of generation @.
We believe that all technical difficulties which have made such an endeavor impossible in the past have been washed away by the tides of time. Paramount should be presented with the idea and nudged to execute on it.
The Petition
- We believe that it is technically possible to deliver the Star Trek experience over the Internet by means of streaming digital media and/or downloadable files.
- We believe that there is enough demand worldwide to justify an effort by Paramount to fulfill it.
- We believe that the existing strong underground demand for current episodes must prompt Paramount to offer a legal alternative. It has to be made just as easy to obtain legal copies of episodes from Paramount as it is to get illegal ones.
- We believe that Paramount needs to earn money for on-demand episodes because this money is what finances new additions (episodes, movies etc.) to the Star Trek universe.
- We believe that Paramount needs to protect their copyrighted material by the state-of-the-art technologies available and it needs to employ licensing to validate the pay-per-view endeavor.
- We would be willing to pay a realistic price for viewing.
Please join our cause by signing the petition. Your e-mail will be saved and once critical mass is reached the bulk will be presented to the responsible people at Paramount Pictures and the media. Comments are appreciated.
The first open letter to Paramount can be read here.
Don’t forget to spread the word.
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