Home Alone, Classic Christmas Movie, Full Length

Cover of Home Alone

We have been seeing a number of issues while porting in videos onto this site and it has prevented us from being able to port a good number of videos onto here.  Turns out with all the issues surrounding DMCA and copyright laws, even if a video or film, shows up and is playable on You Tube, if you try to port it onto your website, the video will not play on your site.  That was the case with this video, Home Alone.  We found a work around that allows us to port the movie in despite these new restrictions now being put in place.

  We don't get it.  Play it on TV and you are free to record the movie onto a VHS tape, DVD or onto your Hard Drive and even TiVo.  You are free to make copies of that show any way you wish from that recording.  Yet, post it online and you violate copyright laws.  Download a copy and you violate copyright laws.  Anyone see any issues here?  We see VHS and DVD copies sold all the time through legal channels on the second hand market through thrift stores and more.  No one is thinking of copyright violations in those areas or markets.

  Used DVD or VHS tapes one would think should fall under copyright violations as the license should not transfer from the original purchaser.  Wait, that is a really bad idea and how many sales would the movie industry loose because of it?  DivX started out as a limited play and expired after so many days of first playing a video or after so many plays of the video.  What happened to that market?  The market crashed as no one wanted the highly overpriced crap and now DivX is free software.  Something eventually has to give over DMCA copyright laws as they are failing in so many areas and we just do not see them ever winning no matter what they do.

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Will Science Someday Rule Out the Possibility of God?

The Big Bang era of the universe, presented as a manifold in two dimensions (1-space and time); the shape is right (approximately), but it's not to scale. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Natalie Wolchover, Life's Little Mysteries Staff Writer

Date: 17 September 2012 Time: 02:11 PM E

Over the past few centuries, science can be said to have gradually chipped away at the traditional grounds for believing in God. Much of what once seemed mysterious — the existence of humanity, the life-bearing perfection of Earth, the workings of the universe — can now be explained by biology, astronomy, physics and other domains of science. 

Although cosmic mysteries remain, Sean Carroll, a theoretical cosmologist at the California Institute ofTechnology, says there's good reason to think science will ultimately arrive at a complete understanding of the universe that leaves no grounds for God whatsoever.

Carroll argues that God's sphere of influence has shrunk drastically in modern times, as physics and cosmology have expanded in their ability to explain the origin and evolution of the universe. "As we learn more about the universe, there's less and less need to look outside it for help," he told Life's Little Mysteries.

He thinks the sphere of supernatural influence will eventually shrink to nil. But could science really eventually explain everything?

Beginning of time

Gobs of evidence have been collected in favor of the Big Bang model of cosmology, or the notion that the universe expanded from a hot, infinitely dense state to its current cooler, more expansive state over the course of 13.7 billion years. Cosmologists can model what happened from 10^-43 seconds after the Big Bang until now, but the split-second before that remains murky. Some theologians have tried to equate the moment of the Big Bang with the description of the creation of the world found in the Bible and other religious texts; they argue that something — i.e., God — must have initiated the explosive 

event.




However, in Carroll's opinion, progress in cosmology will eventually eliminate any any perceived need for a Big Bang trigger-puller.
As he explained in a recent article in the "Blackwell Companion to Science and Christianity" (Wiley-Blackwell, 2012), a foremost goal of modern physics is to formulate a workingtheory that describes the entire universe, from subatomic to astronomical scales, within a single framework. Such a theory, called "quantum gravity," will necessarily account for what happened at the moment of the Big Bang. Some versions of quantum gravity theory that have been proposed by cosmologists predict that the Big Bang, rather than being the starting point of time, was just "a transitional stage in an eternal universe," in Carroll's words. For example, one model holds that the universe acts like a balloon that inflates and deflates over and over under its own steam. If, in fact, time had no beginning, this shuts the book on Genesis. [Big Bang Was Actually a Phase Change, New Theory Says]

CLICK HERE for more.

More unscientific science in the interest controlling your mind.  There are way to many areas of science and the arts that are not looked at here in this story that would invalidate the story.  But then again, it would ruin the story.



If you start to dig through Youtube videos, there is enough evidence there to support the Bible.  Giants often referred to as the Nephilim are mentioned in the book of Genesis.  The evidence of giant bones be uncovered is held out of the mass media.  Again, where does truth start and disinformation start?  

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GVLN - Are Torrents Destroying Hollywood? Part 5 and Final

English: improved version of http://commons.wikimedia.org/Sandy/Image:Bluray.png (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

This is the final part in our series of "Are Torrents Destroying Hollywood?".  This series has been very highly successful and so we are going to continue to explore various aspects of video downloads, burning, copyrights and so forth.  Each article in the future though will have it's own title and not be a part of an ongoing series.  In our final article here we have promised to discuss whether or not the disk is dead.  Arguments have been raging for several years now that the disk is dead.  That includes everything from music CD's, DVD movies, Blu Ray films, software and gaming disks.  The argument is that flash media, inexpensive mass storage hard drives, cloud storage, streaming media and instant downloads have changed the game.

  It has changed the game.  Sales on every type of media sold on disks is way down.  But does that mean that the disk is really dead?  We don't think so.  Here is why.  Let's look at the overall market force.  We are without question in some very tough financial times.  Sales on just about everything is down.  You can't site sales down in this area on a lack of interest.

  Another market pressure not usually considered in the sales numbers is the fact that the market is now flooded with all kinds of disks.  Retail marketing for disks of every sort is now available in more places and greater abundance.  Then there is the secondary market that is also very highly flooded.  Every thrift store, consignment shop, used or second hand store, pawn shop, flea market, yard sale and or garage sale has all kinds of disks for sale and now the prices are super cheap.  Local prices are between $2,00 to $4.00 per DVD title used.  CD's are now down to around $1.00 each.

  That's a lot of excess product out there.  There are a lot of people taking advantage of the lower prices on the secondary market that takes away from the primary retail market.  And the same with more retailers carrying more and more DVD titles.  Discounters have huge assortments to choose from these days and that includes movies, games, music and software.  Again, in the local market, if you don't want to pay the $10.00 price tag on a lower end jewel case game, wait until it is pulled off of Wal Mart's shelf and you can find it a week later at Ollie's Bargain store for only $3.99.

  Yet further considerations are the large amount of people without high speed Internet or even no Internet at all throughout rural and even suburban America.  All of these folks have no choice but to buy disks.

  Another area to consider is Blu Ray movies.  You do not want to play a hacked version of a Blu Ray movie on your Blu Ray player due to the fact that the next movie you buy may just shut the player down from playing that and all future Blu Ray movies again.  (Limited but becoming more common.  CLICK HERE for more information on this issue.

  We don't see the disk disappearing off the shelves for many years to come.  Also, compare the price of a 4 gig flash drive to a single layer DVD disk when transferring files and then giving the information to someone else.  A disk is still a much cheaper medium than a flash drive.

  One further issue.  When it comes to software, I would rather have the disk version than the download version any day of the week.  Re loading or setting up a new system and retiring an old system is much easier when you have the software disk.  Many downloaded software titles these days are not transferable to other computers even in the freeware arena.

  So no, the disk is not dead.  It's just fighting a highly saturated market force in a down economy.

We are ending this series with a nice freebie for everyone.  A Free downloadable video.  This is a legal video download and is in the MP4 format.  The title is Petticoat Junction - Herbie Get's Drafted.  This is an early 1960's sitcom.  It's in Black and White.  About 25 minutes in length and is around 111 mb's in size.
CLICK HERE for your free download.

  If you have problems with trying to figure out how to download the file. we have a link at the top of this site to one of our other sites that has full instructions there on how to get your copy.

Coming up next is a new series titled, "The Fight To Control Your Mind."

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GVLN - Are Torrents Destroying Hollywood? Part 4

Blu-ray disc front (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

In our last article we left off with the promise that we would explain what is legal and what is not legal in the way of films.  Here is what is legal.  It is legal to make one backup copy of any disk that you own.  Whether that disk is a video, music software or what have you.  Now here is the catch.  Even though you have the right to make one backup copy of any disk you own, you do NOT have the right to break any copyright protection on any disk here in the USA.  That means that when you buy a DVD or a Blu Ray movie, most all of them contain some form of copyright protection.  So you do not have the right to make a copy of those disks by breaking the copyrighted protection on those disks.

  Now, if you can make a copy of those disks while keeping the copyright protection on them, then you are fine.  However, most all of the software out there that allows you to make backup copies of movies or software work by stripping off the copyright encryption that blocks you from making a copy of those disks.  When you backup a copy of say a Hollywood film, you have removed the encryption therefore violating the software owners rights.

  To date we have yet to find one software program that allows you to copy a disk and still maintain the original copyright protection.  We have heard of one, but have not been able to locate it.  So what does one do?  We have recently learned that through Wal Mart and their on line business, VUDU, you can now take a copy of any DVD you own and for a fee, have a digital copy made and stored on line.  The digital copy is good on any device.

  The draw back?  Wal Mart has to have agreements with the studio for that particular DVD title.  If Wal Mart does not have an agreement with that movie studio or for that title?  No copy.  CLICK HERE to see more about the service.
On the bright side?  Wal Mart is the first company to be doing this and your purchase remains in the cloud for many years to come.  The fees are very low starting at $2.00 per copy.

The bottom line is this.  If you purchase a DVD or Blu Ray disk, software or music that contains copy protection and you also buy software to crack that protection to make copies just for your own use and do not distribute any of the copies in any way including lending them to friends, then you will be breaking the law, but no one is going to come after you for it.

Maintaining backup copies is a good idea.  A new Blu Ray title is not cheap.  If you want to take a few disks with you on vacation it is a lot cheaper to have copies stolen than to have your originals stolen.  There isn't much of a market for copies of films already released.  If you are just making a digital version for your PSP, it's up to you to decide which is the best way to go.  If it's in the cloud through VUDU, you still have it in the cloud and can have it on your PSP as well.

Our final article will be on whether or not the disk is dead.

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GVLN - Are Torrents Killing Hollywood? Part 3

Image via CrunchBase

Hollywood Sign (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

In our last article, we asked the question about how films are getting on the Internet before they are even out on the retail shelves?  Here we are going to partially answer that question.  From what we have learned there are legitimate reasons for sending files of any film over the Internet.  Hollywood film executives, producers, promoters and others share films before they are even released on the Silver Screen.  Sometimes it is to get professional comments, get extra financial backing, further promotions, planning cover or poster design art work and or graphics and many other reasons.  These folks will also send out copies of the films as part of a resume,  to raise financing for their next film, even thank you's to friends and plenty of other fair reasons.

  Now what happens all to often, is those who receive these copies also share them with their friends, family and others.  Eventually these earlier releases find their way to sites that are more than happy to share these films with the world.  What is interesting is that intellectual property rights is a western civilization concept.  It is not shared by a great majority of the world.  Even many in western civilization do not share or understand the concept.  Therefore there are many people who do not consider sharing a copyrighted film to be of any issue.

  A great case in point is the country of China.  The vast majority of China has no concept at all of intellectual property rights which is why copycat items flood so many markets that come out of China.  China is a mecca for forged items of every sort.  Even with over 20 years of western influence now having raged over China, this is still a major issue that all western companies face and will continue to face.

  Are torrents the only way that films are being violated?  Not at all.  There are now a host of new ways that films are being exploited for illegal downloads all over the Internet and the wave is growing.  We have recently learned of some new software that will download a copy of any streaming film.  Films are being hosted on more illegal sites everyday.  You Tube now hosts more TV shows and movies on the site.  Many of them are copyright violations.  The movies on the site are usually legal, the TV shows are not unless uploaded by the studios if they feel that the retail market is not longer there for DVD sales.

   On recent reviews throughout the You Tube site however, we found numerous TV shows that were all uploaded by independent individuals not authorized to upload these shows.  In You Tubes defense?  It is the job of the executives to police the site for violations and ask You Tube to block and prevent further uploads of the copyright owners works.  There are so many ways to download content from You Tube these days that it has become ridiculous.





  It is estimated that the number one way for getting video through 2015 is illegal downloads.  But there is a new battle now being waged that will catch a lot of people by surprise.  A new technology that is now about 2 years old developed by a one of our nations leading technology universities has developed a high frequency identification technologies that can not be stripped out by copying or transcoding videos.  The high frequency is not audible to the human ear, but is able to be tracked throughout the Internet.

  If a film has the technology loaded onto it and the film is put up for file sharing or playing on another site, the copyright owners can track exactly the originating source and all sources that have both downloaded and further uploaded that film. CLICK HERE for some general information on how this works.  The process described on the site is not the exact technology being used now in films and music, but is similar in it's nature and structure.  Each legal digital download can now have these signals built into them that identifies the purchaser, so if you upload the video onto another site or through a torrent, the copyright owners are able to track it instantaneously.

  For DVD and Blu Ray disks, a generic version is being implemented that identifies the title of the film as well as tracking technology.  So even when one breaks the encryption on these disks, the software used to break the encryption does not remove the high frequency tracking codes.  The new technology will end up short lived however as developers of software will eventually implement a two phase system of stripping out the frequency and then loading a scrambled frequency back onto the cracked encrypted files.

  So how does Hollywood fight these new threats?  This is exactly what destroyed the music industry and now it looks to destroy Hollywood films as well.

In part 4 of this series we will cover what is legal and what is not and we will end the series with answering the question, is the disk really dead?

  For all the latest news, please click on the Home button towards the top of this site.

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GVLN - Are Torrents Destroying Hollywood? Part 2

English: Underside of a DVD-R disc, modified to have transparent background. Français : Dessous d'un DVD (sur fond transparent) Frysk: DVD/dûbelskiif (Unterkant) (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Upload / Download (Photo credit: johntrainor)

In our last article we looked at torrents and a site where nearly 2,000 videos are hosted for free downloads.  We discussed the quality of the files and the file types.  In this section we are going to go further into the quality of the video files themselves and once again you will be shocked at what we have found.  On testing the videos, we found the quality of the films to be outstanding.  So we wondered if the quality could be maintained if these files were transferred into DVD format to play on any DVD player.  In many cases, you end up losing a good amount of quality when transferring up.

Our first test on one of the films we downloaded didn't work to well.  The quality of the picture was fine, however, the sound did not transfer to the DVD.  There were also compatibility issues with some of the DVD players we tested the video on.  We switched to a different program that took longer but gave us much more control over.  On that end we had a tremendous amount of success.  We were able to make a great DVD copy from the torrent video.  We were able to put a new menu and scene selection as well as a play button.  On test, the new DVD passed as being excellent.

  What that means.  In our last section we talked about the lead time on the video, The Avengers.  This video is released one month before it's retail scheduled release and while it is still playing in some movie theaters.  This means an average person can take one of these downloaded torrent files and turn it into a viable copy.  Once the copy is made, it's not hard to press about 20 copies per day on the average desktop home computer.  Give a person 5 days and one can press about 100 copies by the weekend.

  As Saturday hits, those 100 copies can easily make their way to any flea market for sale.  If it costs about $3.00 per copy to produce, one can sell copies for about $8.00 each making $5.00 profit per copy.  That $8.00 price tag is much lower than the $18.00 new release price that the stores will be asking so if the flea market is a good location, one could easily sell all 100 copies over the weekend.  Profit to the pirate?  About $500.00 minus expenses for the space at the flea market plus travel and food.  On Monday, the process starts all over again.  So within a 4 week lead time period, it's very possible for a pirate to pocket about $2,000.00 just on one video.

  Think $2,000.00 isn't a big deal?  Let's look at that from a real perspective.  Once again, all one has to do is look at how many people a day are already downloading a copy of this one video.  Thousands of people a day.  If 100 people decide the pirate the video for profit, $2,000.00 become $200,000.00.  100 people making 400 copies and selling them over a 4 week period means 40,000 lost retail sales or  at a price of $18.00 each, $729,000.00.  That's nearly three quarters of a million dollars in lost sales from pirating.


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  That still does not account for the lost sales from the people who illegally downloaded a free copy who now will not be buying or renting this film.  So it's fair to say that the net loss just from this one torrent site alone is in the millions of dollars.  This is only one torrent site.  There are hundreds of sites hosting torrents all over the world.  Once it's on one, it;s easy to put it on others.  Now let's once again go back to all the other videos on this one site alone and you see the pirates have an entire industry to plunder.

  This now leads to our next question.  How did the people hosting the torrents get a hold of a copy of the film before it's release date?  The copy we downloaded was not shot in a movie theater.  It's as clean as they come.  Others on the site one would say is obviously hacked from disk.  Not that hard to do.  But this being a film not yet out on disk and not being a film copied to a video camera from a movie theater, it's not hacked.  This is were we will begin our next section of this story.

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