Kids today. Let me tell YOU.

[thebitterguy]

You know what's aggravating me? Annoying me? Causing me distress? How EASY people have it today. No, I'm not talking in terms of anything IMPORTANT, I'm talking about getting to see Genre shows that aren't showing in your country yet.

Every Tom, Dick & Harriet down in the Holy Republic who's got half a care to has been able to see the new Dr. Who show, even though it isn't being shown anywhere in that country. Which, really, is great. But in my day, if you wanted to watch a show that wasn't on in your country, we didn't have Torrents, we didn't have P2P systems. If you wanted to see a show, you had to have a friend! In that country! And they would send you, for example, the last four episodes of B5 for season 3. And you'd sprint down to your local video entrepreneur and get a PAL-NTSC conversion done, and you'd devour them like a happy monkey.

And that was work, man! Building contacts, getting things shipped, getting conversions done? That was HARD! You had to work for it. And when you were done, you took it to a friend's place, and you watched Za'Ha'Dum, and you turned to each other and said "What?!? We have to wait six months to find out how that turns out?!?"

And you LIKED it. Because you EARNED it.

Comments

[muskrat-john.livejournal.com]

Wow.

Mind if I use this as a basis of a cartoon?

[thebitterguy]

I'd be honoured.

[pyat.livejournal.com]

Yay, thebitterguy!

[anidada.livejournal.com]

You're totally going to hold this over our heads next time we play a Certain Card Game, aren't you. ;D

[madmanofprague.livejournal.com]

He should get a cameo, though.

[uncut-diamond.livejournal.com]

"No one comes back from Za'Ha'Dum"
"coughbullshit"
"What?"
"We're two for two in named characters, you whiney wannabe French Aristocrat."

[thebitterguy]

Lorien? Who else?

And is Londo the Whiney WFA?

[uncut-diamond.livejournal.com]

Sheridan came back. As did his first wife (sorta).

Who else fits the WFA description? G'kar? Even other Centari - like Vir - didn't seem as . . . arisocratic as Londo.

[thebitterguy]

Morden, too. So that's at least three named characters.

Reefa even was more Machiavelli than Sun King.

[uncut-diamond.livejournal.com]

Morden. Dang, good point.

Reefa was the type of guy Machiavelli wrote about in the Prince, sure, but there's an argument to be made that Mac was trying to set someone up with that book and doom them to failure.

[kaijugal.livejournal.com]

Meh, I still dont' know how to use that Torrent thing... :P

[thebitterguy]

Amusingly enough, I think I may hve used it to download a Dr. Who ep, but don't know where it is.

[kaijugal.livejournal.com]

Ah. Hehe. Great minds think (ignore learning how to use the evil new technology of the young punks) alike.

[anidada.livejournal.com]

Dude, I remember audiotaping TV shows in the days before we had VCRs (I did this with an episode of Joanie Loves Chachi -- quiet, you!).

Heck, I remember audiotaping frickin' everything -- import records, 8-tracks, the sounds on my Odyssey game, my friends and I chatting about all kinds of silly stuff -- because y'know, cassettes were The Media of Choice at the time. And it was FUN.

G-d, I'm old.

[pyat.livejournal.com]

Time was, you could pick up Global Television on your radio by setting it to the lowest frequency. I'd listen to cartoons at six in the morning on summer mornings, so I didn't have to get out of bed or wake people up by going downstairs to turn on the television.

[anidada.livejournal.com]

*sound of rocking chair creaking* Ah, radio. Now THERE was a medium you could set your watch to!

...clearly I need more coffee.

[umario.livejournal.com]

I still can pick up CTV on the radio. Yay, Capital City!

thebitterguy, remember when me and Uday used to do our taped radio shows? Man, I wish I could find some of those tapes. Such childishness would be fun to listen to again.

Remember when... (picturing thebitterguy beating me to a pulp for revealing something far too secretive on livejournal...) Oh, never mind.

[thebitterguy]

What, somethign with the Sailor Chick, or Quatre Saison?

[umario.livejournal.com]

I can't remember now. I probably said it just to get a rise out of you. Brothers are good for stuff like that.

I like Ottawa - lots of Quatre Saison softcore. Even on weeknights (at midnight - dammit! I usually miss it, if I'm still awake because I'm watching Futurama - and the sad thing is that this is the truth.)

[doc-mystery.livejournal.com]

Hey, I used to audiotape TV shows, too. I still have that tape of 'Arena' kicking about (with half the audio from this episode being the Gorn captain sounding like a pervert on a telephone).

Then we got a Betamax!

::B::

[thothmeister.livejournal.com]

Heck, torrents are how I got to see Dr. Who (we had it here on CBC, but the schedule conflicted with another show for me).

I'm paying for the privilege though. Videotron has a download cap, and I've had to pay for every byte I went above it.

[creativedv8tion.livejournal.com]

*tears up*

Ah, the good ol' days of pirating via videotape.

*wistful sigh*

Oh, wait, nevermind, the new way is so much better.

Screw that earning it; been there, did that, I'm much happier with having downloaded the new Doctor Who hours after it was aired in Britain.

[tfbretz.livejournal.com]

Great rant. Takes me back to my days in the early dawn of US anime fandom. One of our guys had a pen pal in Tokyo who he would trade US country music albums and stuff in exchange for VHS copies of "Fist of the North Star".

Back when fan subs were the only subs.

Gods, I'm old.

[kaijugal.livejournal.com]

Woot! ZOD! XD

I had a beta machine and I have the macross series on it. Heh. Also now useless taped episodes of Land Of the Lost. Heh.