If data integrity is assured, and thus there is no change in the data to store/transfer, then that's the opposite of computationally transforming the data?
How do we see robot and AI and helping interactions in film and tv and games?
A curated list of films for consideration:
Mary Shelley's "Frankenstein" or "The Modern Prometheus" (1818), Metropolis (1927), I\, Robot (1940-1950; Three Laws of Robotics, robopsychology), Macy Conferences (1941-1960; Cybernetics), Tobor the Great (1954), Here Comes Tobor (1956), Jetsons' maid's name: Rosie (1962), Lost in Space (1965), 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968), THX 1138 (1971), Star Wars (1977), Terminator (1984), Driving Miss Daisy (1989), Edward Scissorhands (1990), Flubber (1997, 1961), Futurama (TV, 1999-), Star Wars: Phantom Menace (1999), The Iron Giant (1999), Bicentennial Man (1999), A.I. Artificial Intelligence (2001), Minority Report (2003), I\, Robot (2004), Team America: World Police (2004), Wall-E (2008), Iron Man (2008), Eagle Eye (2008), Moon (2009), Surrogates (2009), Tron: Legacy (2010), Hugo (2011), Django Unchained (2012), Her (2013), Transcendence (2014), Chappie (2015), Tomorrowland (2015), The Wild Robot (2016, 2024), Ghost in the Shell (2017),
~AI vehicle: Herbie, The Love Bug (1968-), Knight Rider (TV, 1982-1986), Thunder in Paradise (TV, 1993-95), Heat Vision and Jack (1999), Transformers (2007), Bumblebee (2018)
Games: Portal (2007), LEGO Bricktales (2022), While True: learn() (2018), "NPC" Non-Player Character
I’m not necessarily disagreeing with your list, even though some of those are mediocre at best, but yeah I did mean per year, and limited to Hollywood (Parasite for instance not counting). And no, ok, I will also straight up disagree with the second Knives out Movie which I thought was absolute trash. A perfect example of poor storytelling and the form over substance of modern cinema.
But just taking say 1992 you have Last of the Mohicans, The Unforgiven, My Cousin Vinny, Malcolm X, Bad Lieutenant, Scent of a Woman, Reservoir Dogs, Dracula, Chaplin.
And then a bunch of fun schlomp like Arizona Dream, Basic Instinct, Sister Act, Army of Darkness, Home Alone 2, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, The Mighty Ducks, Wayne’s World.
These are all undoubtedly great movies.
And then another huge bunch of watchable stuff easily comparable to some of your mentions like Watcher or High Life.
And 1992 is not an outlier.
In 1993 you have Jurrasic Park, Groundhog Day, Whats Eating Gilbert Grape, Scindlers List, Meanace 2 Society, Alive, Dazed and Confused, Falling Down, In The Name of The Father, True Romance, Demolition Man, Carlitos Way, The Secret Garden, Philadelphia, A Perfect Workd, Cool Runnings, Short Cuts.
In 1991 Silence of The Lambs, Ternimator 2, JFK, Point Break, Thelma and Louise, Boyz in the Hood, The Doors, My Own Private Idaho, Barton Fink, The Fisher King, Naked Lunch.
In 1990 Goodfellas, Hunt for Red October, Total Recall, Edward Scissorhands, Home Alone, Godfather 3, Dances with Wolves, Tremors, Back to the Future 3, Awakenings, The Witches, Wild at Heart, Jacobs Ladder, Nikita, Slacker, Millers Crossing.
And the quality difference is massive too, not just somewhat better. Like just Millers Crossing is miles better than anything that has been made in the last 5 years, and I’m picking at random.
In 1994 Shawshank Redemption, Pulp Fiction, Forrest Gump, The Lion King, Speed, Ace Ventura, Dumb and Dumber, Stargate, Natural Born Killers, The Crow, Clercs, Maverick, Ed Wood, In the Mouth of Madness, Interview With The Vampire.
I could go on.
And this is not even talking about how the 80s is a better decade for cinema, or how the 70s is the peak of the power of the author with far more experimental, artistic, and substantial productions.
Has quality declined? Yes. Massively. Humongously. Stupendously.
It's almost completely gone in the US on Netflix also. I've had better luck watching older movies on Youtube 'Free with Ads' service, especially 80s and 90s movies, than I've had on Netflix. And there's no ads if you get Youtube's premium service (I currently don't, but don't mind the ads).
Currently on there is Wrongfully Accused (funny Leslie Nielsen movie), Glengarry Glen Ross, Robocop (1987), Ghost in the Shell, The Mask, License to Drive, The Neverending Story, Tombstone, Leon The Professonal, The Amityville Horror, Over the Top (some Stallone movie), Miracle on 34th Street, Con Air, Edward Scissorhands, Gone Fishin', Look Who's Talking, While You Were Sleeping, The Craft, Red Dawn, So I Married an Axe Murderer, Secret of Nimh, Killer Klowns from Outer Space, Revenge of the Pink Panther, Mad Max, Das Boot, Little Shop of Horrors, Hackers, .... okay, I'm just going to stop now, but t keeps going, I'm only a third of the way though the list.
I have seen maybe half of these films. I was able to correctly name some of them immediately upon looking at them: Wizard of Oz, The Matrix, The Big Lebowski.
Some were obvious after reading the title: Star Wars, Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle (never saw it), Being John Malkovich, Space Jam (never saw it), Miami Vice (never saw it), Office Space.
Some that I half guessed or felt like I knew the name of the film but could not immediately recall the name: Castaway, Mad Max: Fury Road, Edward Scissorhands (Thought it was The Nightmare Before Christmas but Tim Burton so close enough)
I used to live pretty close to the AFI in Silver Spring and while I thought their selection of older movies was pretty great, I didn't end up going terribly often. I think it's linked to the fact that for most people (certainly me), going to the movies is a social occasion (I don't think I've ever gone to a movie theater by myself - I know people do, but I suspect that's a fairly small minority).
Anyhow, marketing does it's job - lots of people have some awareness of new movies coming out, and they're curious about that thing that they've heard about but haven't seen. It just seems tougher to drum up interest to go see Officespace or Edward Scissorhands or Seven Samurai or whatever - "I just saw that on TV", "Seen it a million times", "Never heard of it", etc.
The number of CEOs who think printing money is a good idea might make you wonder if they even know anything about money. Polluting air costs less money why not do it ?
80% movies don't need the 100 million dollar budget and I'm pretty sure Johnny Deepp would be happy to release Edward Scissorhands to the public domain.
Most big movies make their money by single day screenings and releasing movies at different dates in different regions with market buzz.
> If we take away the option of artificial scarcity then an entire highly trained professional class will be out of work.
Interestingly your argument fails for porn. Its about 1/4th the size of hollywood.
How about publishers own the copyright and creators own the copyright instead of commoditising a copyright artefact ?
I assure you musicians can survive and Depp can do some theatre. Most EDM is essentially copyright free, especially techno. 1 year of exclusivity is fine. Fuck NDAs.
These days the cost of production has gone down so I think you will see more indie media taking advantage of that. The average budget for a reasonable movie is less than 5 million, heck even 500k dollars going by kickstarter funded movies.
I don't see the public interest angle here. This is merely entertainment. If even entertainment is something the government should be butting into because of unspecified "public interest" considerations, then what is outside the government's role?
Goodfellas, Dances with Wolves, Edward Scissorhands, Total Recall, Ghost, the Hunt for Red October, Back to the Future III, Pretty Woman, and the Godfather Part III were all released in 1990, 29 years ago. These were all created by a group of individuals, and studios spent millions of dollars paying those people to make those movies. The government had nothing to do with creating any of those movies. Why should the government be able to take those movies and release them for free?
Laying sod, grading and seeding only became cheap due to volume demand and peer pressure; it could swing the other way, once momentum was gained. Lawn care could become more fulfilling in taking care of different plants. One man's weed is another man's salad. It's all in what you have become accustomed to in your life.
Personally, I have never maintained a lawn. Unlike my neighbors, I didn't cut down almost all of the native trees, so I have native landscaping, and it looks 100X better than flat, mowed lawn. It has wildflowers, and 'weeds' that flower and add to the beauty. I simply rake leaves in the fall, and keep my walkway clear to the house with stone from my property.
The way manicured lawns and homogeneous homes depicted in Tim Burton's 'Edward Scissorhands' film was spot on to me except in real life most condo communities would not allow the differently colored houses, or at least limit the palette. I grew up in Brooklyn, but found this out when I tried to change my carburetor in my mother-in-laws driveway, and I was told you cannot work on your car in your own driveway. No thanks to that life!
10 comments on Hacker News
If data integrity is assured, and thus there is no change in the data to store/transfer, then that's the opposite of computationally transforming the data?
How do we see robot and AI and helping interactions in film and tv and games?
A curated list of films for consideration:
Mary Shelley's "Frankenstein" or "The Modern Prometheus" (1818), Metropolis (1927), I\, Robot (1940-1950; Three Laws of Robotics, robopsychology), Macy Conferences (1941-1960; Cybernetics), Tobor the Great (1954), Here Comes Tobor (1956), Jetsons' maid's name: Rosie (1962), Lost in Space (1965), 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968), THX 1138 (1971), Star Wars (1977), Terminator (1984), Driving Miss Daisy (1989), Edward Scissorhands (1990), Flubber (1997, 1961), Futurama (TV, 1999-), Star Wars: Phantom Menace (1999), The Iron Giant (1999), Bicentennial Man (1999), A.I. Artificial Intelligence (2001), Minority Report (2003), I\, Robot (2004), Team America: World Police (2004), Wall-E (2008), Iron Man (2008), Eagle Eye (2008), Moon (2009), Surrogates (2009), Tron: Legacy (2010), Hugo (2011), Django Unchained (2012), Her (2013), Transcendence (2014), Chappie (2015), Tomorrowland (2015), The Wild Robot (2016, 2024), Ghost in the Shell (2017),
Giant f robots: Gundam (1979), Transformers (TV: 1984-1987, 2007-), Voltron (1984-1985), MechWarrior (1989), Matrix II: Revolutions (2003), Avatar (2009, 2022, 2025), Pacific Rim (2013-), RoboCop (1987, 2014), Edge of Tomorrow (2014),
~AI vehicle: Herbie, The Love Bug (1968-), Knight Rider (TV, 1982-1986), Thunder in Paradise (TV, 1993-95), Heat Vision and Jack (1999), Transformers (2007), Bumblebee (2018)
Games: Portal (2007), LEGO Bricktales (2022), While True: learn() (2018), "NPC" Non-Player Character
Category:Films_about_artificial_intelligence : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Films_about_artificial_intelligence
List of artificial intelligence films: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_artificial_intelligence_films
Category:Films_about_robots: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Films_about_robots
Category:American_robot_films: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:American_robot_films
I’m not necessarily disagreeing with your list, even though some of those are mediocre at best, but yeah I did mean per year, and limited to Hollywood (Parasite for instance not counting). And no, ok, I will also straight up disagree with the second Knives out Movie which I thought was absolute trash. A perfect example of poor storytelling and the form over substance of modern cinema.
But just taking say 1992 you have Last of the Mohicans, The Unforgiven, My Cousin Vinny, Malcolm X, Bad Lieutenant, Scent of a Woman, Reservoir Dogs, Dracula, Chaplin.
And then a bunch of fun schlomp like Arizona Dream, Basic Instinct, Sister Act, Army of Darkness, Home Alone 2, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, The Mighty Ducks, Wayne’s World.
These are all undoubtedly great movies.
And then another huge bunch of watchable stuff easily comparable to some of your mentions like Watcher or High Life.
And 1992 is not an outlier.
In 1993 you have Jurrasic Park, Groundhog Day, Whats Eating Gilbert Grape, Scindlers List, Meanace 2 Society, Alive, Dazed and Confused, Falling Down, In The Name of The Father, True Romance, Demolition Man, Carlitos Way, The Secret Garden, Philadelphia, A Perfect Workd, Cool Runnings, Short Cuts.
In 1991 Silence of The Lambs, Ternimator 2, JFK, Point Break, Thelma and Louise, Boyz in the Hood, The Doors, My Own Private Idaho, Barton Fink, The Fisher King, Naked Lunch.
In 1990 Goodfellas, Hunt for Red October, Total Recall, Edward Scissorhands, Home Alone, Godfather 3, Dances with Wolves, Tremors, Back to the Future 3, Awakenings, The Witches, Wild at Heart, Jacobs Ladder, Nikita, Slacker, Millers Crossing.
And the quality difference is massive too, not just somewhat better. Like just Millers Crossing is miles better than anything that has been made in the last 5 years, and I’m picking at random.
In 1994 Shawshank Redemption, Pulp Fiction, Forrest Gump, The Lion King, Speed, Ace Ventura, Dumb and Dumber, Stargate, Natural Born Killers, The Crow, Clercs, Maverick, Ed Wood, In the Mouth of Madness, Interview With The Vampire.
I could go on.
And this is not even talking about how the 80s is a better decade for cinema, or how the 70s is the peak of the power of the author with far more experimental, artistic, and substantial productions.
Has quality declined? Yes. Massively. Humongously. Stupendously.
It's almost completely gone in the US on Netflix also. I've had better luck watching older movies on Youtube 'Free with Ads' service, especially 80s and 90s movies, than I've had on Netflix. And there's no ads if you get Youtube's premium service (I currently don't, but don't mind the ads).
Currently on there is Wrongfully Accused (funny Leslie Nielsen movie), Glengarry Glen Ross, Robocop (1987), Ghost in the Shell, The Mask, License to Drive, The Neverending Story, Tombstone, Leon The Professonal, The Amityville Horror, Over the Top (some Stallone movie), Miracle on 34th Street, Con Air, Edward Scissorhands, Gone Fishin', Look Who's Talking, While You Were Sleeping, The Craft, Red Dawn, So I Married an Axe Murderer, Secret of Nimh, Killer Klowns from Outer Space, Revenge of the Pink Panther, Mad Max, Das Boot, Little Shop of Horrors, Hackers, .... okay, I'm just going to stop now, but t keeps going, I'm only a third of the way though the list.
1988 Die Hard http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0095016
1988 Red Heat https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0095963/
1988 My Stepmother Is an Alien https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0095687/
1988 Twins https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0096320/
1989 Honey, I Shrunk the kids https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0097523/
1989 Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0097576/
1989 Tango & Cash https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0098439/
1990 Edward Scissorhands https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0099487/
1990 Home Alone https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0099785/
1990 Pretty Woman https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0100405/
1991 Terminator 2 https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0103064/
1991 Silence of the Lambs https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0102926/
1991 The Last Boy Scout https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0102266/
Yeah, looking at the Edward Scissorhands one, it was obvious that it was a Tim Burton movie, but not which one. I had guessed Corpse Bride.
I have seen maybe half of these films. I was able to correctly name some of them immediately upon looking at them: Wizard of Oz, The Matrix, The Big Lebowski.
Some were obvious after reading the title: Star Wars, Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle (never saw it), Being John Malkovich, Space Jam (never saw it), Miami Vice (never saw it), Office Space.
Some that I half guessed or felt like I knew the name of the film but could not immediately recall the name: Castaway, Mad Max: Fury Road, Edward Scissorhands (Thought it was The Nightmare Before Christmas but Tim Burton so close enough)
Obvious ones: Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory
I used to live pretty close to the AFI in Silver Spring and while I thought their selection of older movies was pretty great, I didn't end up going terribly often. I think it's linked to the fact that for most people (certainly me), going to the movies is a social occasion (I don't think I've ever gone to a movie theater by myself - I know people do, but I suspect that's a fairly small minority).
Anyhow, marketing does it's job - lots of people have some awareness of new movies coming out, and they're curious about that thing that they've heard about but haven't seen. It just seems tougher to drum up interest to go see Officespace or Edward Scissorhands or Seven Samurai or whatever - "I just saw that on TV", "Seen it a million times", "Never heard of it", etc.
The number of CEOs who think printing money is a good idea might make you wonder if they even know anything about money. Polluting air costs less money why not do it ?
80% movies don't need the 100 million dollar budget and I'm pretty sure Johnny Deepp would be happy to release Edward Scissorhands to the public domain.
Most big movies make their money by single day screenings and releasing movies at different dates in different regions with market buzz.
> If we take away the option of artificial scarcity then an entire highly trained professional class will be out of work.
Interestingly your argument fails for porn. Its about 1/4th the size of hollywood.
How about publishers own the copyright and creators own the copyright instead of commoditising a copyright artefact ?
I assure you musicians can survive and Depp can do some theatre. Most EDM is essentially copyright free, especially techno. 1 year of exclusivity is fine. Fuck NDAs.
These days the cost of production has gone down so I think you will see more indie media taking advantage of that. The average budget for a reasonable movie is less than 5 million, heck even 500k dollars going by kickstarter funded movies.
I don't see the public interest angle here. This is merely entertainment. If even entertainment is something the government should be butting into because of unspecified "public interest" considerations, then what is outside the government's role?
Goodfellas, Dances with Wolves, Edward Scissorhands, Total Recall, Ghost, the Hunt for Red October, Back to the Future III, Pretty Woman, and the Godfather Part III were all released in 1990, 29 years ago. These were all created by a group of individuals, and studios spent millions of dollars paying those people to make those movies. The government had nothing to do with creating any of those movies. Why should the government be able to take those movies and release them for free?
Laying sod, grading and seeding only became cheap due to volume demand and peer pressure; it could swing the other way, once momentum was gained. Lawn care could become more fulfilling in taking care of different plants. One man's weed is another man's salad. It's all in what you have become accustomed to in your life.
Personally, I have never maintained a lawn. Unlike my neighbors, I didn't cut down almost all of the native trees, so I have native landscaping, and it looks 100X better than flat, mowed lawn. It has wildflowers, and 'weeds' that flower and add to the beauty. I simply rake leaves in the fall, and keep my walkway clear to the house with stone from my property.
The way manicured lawns and homogeneous homes depicted in Tim Burton's 'Edward Scissorhands' film was spot on to me except in real life most condo communities would not allow the differently colored houses, or at least limit the palette. I grew up in Brooklyn, but found this out when I tried to change my carburetor in my mother-in-laws driveway, and I was told you cannot work on your car in your own driveway. No thanks to that life!