Looks like RIAA is going after personal use:

[link]

Now, in an unusual case in which an Arizona recipient of an RIAA letter has fought back in court rather than write a check to avoid hefty legal fees, the industry is taking its argument against music sharing one step further: In legal documents in its federal case against Jeffrey Howell, a Scottsdale, Ariz., man who kept a collection of about 2,000 music recordings on his personal computer, the industry maintains that it is illegal for someone who has legally purchased a CD to transfer that music into his computer.

I don't understand this at all. What are they going to do? Go after everyone who owns an ipod?

Unfortunately almost nobody releasing movies on HD-DVD is taking advantage of them.

Yeah. I'm afraid this will be like the multi-angle option on DVDs. I understand that porn uses it pretty often, but the only other time I've seen this used EVER is on the Moulin Rouge special features (the dance numbers).

I've seen a couple of Special Edition DVDs that had alternate viewable angles for certain scenes, but I believe they were all "behind the scenes" angles of the scene in question, and only available for certain parts.

The best HD-DVD is, believe it or not, Two Fast Two Furious (or The Fast And The Furious: Tokyo Drift, I've forgotten which one). It uses a wide variety of the HD-DVD special features, so it's a good technology demonstration - unfortunately, it's The Fast and The Furious.

The Serenity HD-DVD uses interactive menus (meaning the menus overlay the film), but that's it.

There's a few cute ones - an aquarium HD-DVD, which is full of fish tanks which look very pretty, and a fireplace one, which does exactly what it says on the tin.

So my new laptop can't see my home wireless network. It's not just that we can't log it on -- it literally does not detect the home network, though it finds several other (secured) networks in the area.

Any ideas on where to start? Is this a security setting or some kind of configuration thing? Useful troubleshooting websites?

You can try calling the tech support line for your wifi router. I know it's a bit of a cheat, but if there's one thing those guys know (and that's often literally true) it's how to hook a computer up to a wifi router.

Dana,

is your network broadcasting? are there any restrictions on who can connect to it (restrictions by computer)?

try restarting the computer if you already haven't. That's what I have to do when my laptop doesn't see a network.

You can also try turning off the wifi and then turning it back on to see if that resets it.

is your network broadcasting? are there any restrictions on who can connect to it (restrictions by computer)?

Yeah, the two desktops connect to the network just fine. And yeah, the network is fairly restricted, though I don't remember exactly what we did. I don't think the router management software allows us to specify what computers can connect, but I could be wrong.

You can also try turning off the wifi and then turning it back on to see if that resets it.

Yeah, I don't know if we've tried that yet.

You may have turned off the SSID as a security measure. If you know the name of your network you should be able to manually tell your computer to connect.

You may have turned off the SSID as a security measure. If you know the name of your network you should be able to manually tell your computer to connect.

I tried that, though it's entirely possible I got the name of the network wrong. I'll definitely check the SSID in the router configuration.

It's also very amusing to see what other people name their networks. One of the ones around me is called "peanut." I'm also kind of impressed that none of them are unsecured.