This is another sad day in journalism. One of the best newspapers in the West in closing its doors and publishing its last issue on Friday. The RMN was about to celebrate 150 years in print.
Rich Boehne, chief executive officer of Scripps, broke the news to the Rocky staff at noon today, ending nearly three months of speculation over the paper’s future. He called the paper a victim of a terrible economy and an upheaval in the newspaper industry.
The Rocky was founded in 1859 by William Byers, one of the most influential figures in Colorado history. Scripps bought the paper in 1926 and right away entered into a newspaper war with The Post. That fight ebbed and flowed over the course of the rest of the 20th century, culminating in penny-a-day subscriptions in the late ’90s.
In the past decade, the Rocky has won four Pulitzer Prizes, more than all but a handful of American papers. Its sports section was named one of the 10 best in the nation this week. Its business section was cited by the Society of American Business Editors and Writers as one of the best in the country last year. And its photo staff is regularly listed among the best in the nation when the top 10 photo newspapers are judged.
What can I say. I like cheesy horror flicks. The cheesier it is the more I like them. Prom Night easily falls into the cheesy popcorn flick. The plot is laughable, the characters are as shallow as a kiddie pool, and the bad guy is as scary as a bad cold. In other words, I love it.
Do I have to even say that this movie occurs during prom night? Do I have to even say that stupid teenagers will die in senseless, silly, and completely avoidable situations?
Believe it or not, gore and sex is almost none-existent. Even the UNRATED designation barely raises this movie beyond a PG-13 rating.
The PQ for the 2.40:1 aspect ratio is actually pretty good considering that most of it happens in dark settings. The colors are deep and contrast is quite good. Don’t expect reference quality but it is good enough for a good popcorn flick.
The audio is a mixed bag. You get a real nice True-HD 5.1 but I can tell you that is its barely used to its full potential. Even though this is a horror/slasher flick the majority of the movie is dialogue driven so you will not fully enjoy the full audio.
There are some features that just scream out “Why didn’t they add this!!!”
This is definitely one of them. One of the things I truly hate about rearanging icons on the iPhone is the fact that when you move one over more than one screen it messes up the rest and leaves blank spaces all over the place.
If this concept was possible then it would solve all those problems.
From Russia with Love is Sean Connery second go at being the best Bond ever. This time you can easily see that he is far more comfortable with the character (as opposed to the somewhat stiff Dr. No). Since the Cold War was in full force in 1963 it would be silly to have an enemy other than the Russians.
For a 1963 film the picture quality is very good. The restoration and remaster of the original print was well done. They kept the original aspect ratio of 1.66:1 so those black bars on each side (instead of top and bottom) are normal. Do not try to adjust your set.
The DTS-MA audio track is probably very faithful to the original track but don’t expect the bone jarring surround audio that you get in other action flicks. You will hear some rear audio work but in reality the film is very front heavy.
Pierce Brosnan may not have been the best Bond but he sure was the most stylish. This time Bond goes after Korean terrorists, a Diamond baron, and a killer silly space weapon. All of this with the help of the full-blow eye candy Halle Berry.
The picture quality of this, and all of the Bond series, is quite good. Since this is a 2002 film I did not expect that it would look any different (improved quality) than the theater version. There’s ton of detail and some that I did not remember in the theater release (i.e., Berry is wearing pasties in the love scene).
Audio quality is just exceptional. Explosions, gun-shots, car chases, and punches all sound perfect in the disks DTS-MA audio track.
Even the LA Times had an article about how LA based businesses were getting shaken down by Yelp sales reps that by paying for Yelp advertising they could move or remove bad reviews. And if the business did not have any bad reviews already and they refused to pay the bad reviews would all of the sudden show up.
But Yelp-savvy customers also mean Yelp-savvy competitors. Inzunza at Mamma’s Brick Oven Pizza said she noticed last year that every time a nasty review appeared on the site about her restaurant, a glowing review popped up for a pizza place down the street.
“We decided we had to advertise on Yelp because we wanted to make sure we could play up the good reviews,” she said.
and
On the other hand, Joompong Kongchareon, owner of Joom Bangkok Cafe in Los Angeles, is taking no chances. He said he decided to pay $300 a month for Yelp sponsorship after a salesperson from the website called “over and over” shortly after his restaurant opened about a year ago.
“If you don’t give them money, maybe they will put a bad review up high,” he said. “That would hurt my business. People come to us from Yelp.
“This is insurance that I won’t get real bad reviews at the top.”
This article (from the East Bay Express) is shocking!!! If only a few of the accusations are even true then Yelp will lose all credibility and it will mean that Yelp cannot be trusted for any reviews.
Here are some of the shocking excerpts:
“Hi, this is Mike from Yelp,” the voice would say. “You’ve had three hundred visitors to your site this month. You’ve had a really good response. But you have a few bad ones at the top. I could do something about those.”
and
But when John asked Mike what he could do about his bad reviews, he recalls the sales rep responding: “We can move them. Well, for $299 a month.” John couldn’t believe what the guy was offering. It seemed wrong.
and
Indeed, Yelp does pay some employees to write reviews of businesses that are solicited for advertising. And in at least one documented instance, a business owner who refused to advertise subsequently received a negative review from a Yelp employee.
and
Several business owners likened Yelp to the Mafia, and one said she feared its retaliation. “Every time I had a sales person call me and I said, ‘Sorry, it doesn’t make sense for me to do this,’ … then all of a sudden reviews start disappearing.” To these mom-and-pop business owners, Yelp’s sales tactics are coercive, unethical, and, possibly, illegal.
and
Negative reviews are not the only bait that Yelp employees apparently use to attract advertisers. Some business owners believe Yelp sales reps remove positive reviews when they refuse to buy an ad.
and
Robert Gaustad, co-owner of Bobby G’s Pizzeria in Berkeley, said that about a year ago a Yelp sales rep offered to “move good reviews to the top to make us look better.” Since declining to advertise, approximately fifteen to twenty of his restaurant’s reviews — mostly positive — have been removed for reasons he can’t figure out.
Gaustad said his complaints have gone unheard but that a Yelp sales rep told him his complaints would be heard if he advertised.
and
But if the accusations are true, Yelp is compromising the integrity of its reviews to make a buck, which contradicts its identity as a user-generated, consumer-first web site.
