CED VideoDisc and Player Discussion

[Beetlescott]

I research many movie titles through Wikipedia, it is a great place to find information on movies. At the bottom of each description, there is a paragraph on "Home Video Release" They always mention VHS, sometimes Beta, and Some times Laser Disc, but NEVER CED! Is it because CED is considered a "failed format?" I mean, if CED format was a failure, wouldn't that mean that 8 Tracks, and Beta were failed formats? I consider Beta & HD DVD failed formats, because they were replaced by something of the same type. Maybe i'm wrong, but Since we have 1700 titles, and since the titles were released for 6 years, we even have at least one title that was never released on CED.
_________________
1000 titles
SGT-250
SJT-400
Montgomery Ward
SGT-100

[Beetlescott]

Anyone????????????
_________________
1000 titles
SGT-250
SJT-400
Montgomery Ward
SGT-100

[7jlong]

I don't much understand the nuances of what is considered appropriate for Wikipedia, though I do like the site very much. However, since it is all user-contributed, it might simply be a case of lack of knowledge on the part of the main contributors for the movie in question.

The other problem might be that it opens a can of worms - when does Wikipedia stop becoming an encyclopedia and start becoming discogs.com or lddb.com?

Take the example of Close Encounters of the Third Kind. The 'Reissue and home video section' alludes to tape (via the irritating and vague "home video") and LaserDisc. Beta doesn't come up - though it was definitely released on that format - nor does CED or prerecorded 8mm video.

I didn't dig through the Wikipedia history page for Close Encounters, but I'm willing to bet that if you do you'll find that this kind of data had been added at one time and then removed citing some guideline or discussion.

Not to mention, where does it end? Should DIVX-DVD (may it rot in hell) be included? What about Cartrivision? How about VHD? If they made a 16mm rental copy of movies (very common back in the day), should those be listed? How about the abridged 16mm reels that were made of many films? Does the general public care anymore if a movie once came out on VHS?

Is Wikipedia the right place to catalog all this information? As fascinating as I find the fallout of various format wars and failures - and I know a lot of other people on this board do too - well... there's a reason we found each other here. I enjoy the topic, though many of my friends, uh, don't (trust me - ha!). I suspect the same is true for the bulk of the planet.

That said, you're an LDDB user, so you have a good repository of this kind of information available to you. I realize that's not the point, but I think if you were to start adding it in to Wikipedia posts you might be met with some argument about the usefulness of the information.

Additionally, some of my favorite sites (the aforementioned lddb.com and discogs.com, cedmagic, Wikipedia itself) started as pet projects and grew. IMDB is very non-committal on this kind of information, so I think a new database will surface eventually that rolls all the home video data across ALL the formats into one. I could be wrong, but taking the example of lddb: they already has five formats under their belt due to user requests and contributions...

[Rixrex]

ALl very good points made. I recall using LDDB when it was Julien Wilke's educational project, and watched it grow from there. The addition of other formats initially came from a member of the CEDmagic community, owenatverrs, as I recall and you, meaning 7jlong, were also instrumantal in that project. Initially I wondered about the need for that, since CEDmagic existed, but now I see that it was wise to do, and it has helped in cross referencing.

For example, the LDDB admin made a list of PAL LDs that were never released on NTSC, and I was able to collect about 30 of those that I did not already have. Anyway, all the other format additions there were member requested, but basically they are obsolete formats that have a fairly limited and defined database.

Putting something like Beta or VHS on the LDDB would probably be overwhelming, and not desired by the members, as most of us who collect these formats are not too interested in such. Kind of the reverse of Wikipedia in a way.

[7jlong]

Oh, I don't know, I love the fact that on discogs you can look up, say, a Beatles album and inspect dozens of releases all over the world in all kinds of formats (and, just playing devil's advocate here, I would have no use for a list of PAL LDs, but I love that the info is simply available for the world to see if they want it).

Beta still has a surprising following, and though I can't possibly imagine any desire to collect VHS, there must be a band of adherents out there somewhere.

Perhaps a videogs.com? Start maybe with lddb.com and add more fields for other formats. As unlisted or new movie titles come up, users add them. As format/country variations surface for existing titles, they get added. Someone actually has a Cartrivision of Bridge on the River Kwai? They add all the appropriate info and package scans. There would be some chaos and decisions to be made, sure, but can you imagine the data?

It would be wonderful.

[Beetlescott]

I suppose you are right. I guess CED is just a tiny blip on the monitor in the scheme of things. I guess it stirs up my rightesous indignation, as I love this format so much. It is amazing to me the number of people who has never heard of the CED format.
_________________
1000 titles
SGT-250
SJT-400
Montgomery Ward
SGT-100

[Rixrex]

Yeah, I think that a database for VHS and Beta is fine. Don't know that it's an LDDB perview, and maybe better handled as a separate site by one who relaly has the time and interest in doing that.

I still have both Beta and VHS. There are still some items on tape that are not on another format, except for bootlegs. And then the bootleg is from a tape, so I prefer to have the original tape then anyway.

[Beetlescott]

[Rixrex]

Yeah, send an email to Julien Wilk, the LDDB admin at

lddb.admin@gmail.com

Ask him to help you get your account unfrozen or reset password. Hope you know your user ID still.

[7jlong]

I think my main reason for suggesting that other formats be merged with lddb would be to save the effort of starting from scratch and re-entering all the movies that lddb already catalogs. Between adding a few more fields to a database or typing in all the movies again? I know which path I'd want to take!

Also, there's the redundancy problem - when looking for a good site to catalog my music collection I spent a lot of time poking around both rateyourmusic and discogs to see which I wanted to invest time in. discogs won out because I like their interface a lot better, but it is a shame that so much time is spent on both when they are effectively after the same goal - the sites probably individually have unique information that could be successfully merged to make one much, much stronger database.

That said, indeed, I'm not sure how Julien would feel about expanding lddb or if it is in his grand scheme of things. On the other hand, some of the formats (not sure why I keep going back to Cartrivision, but there you have it) had so few releases in the catalog that it would hardly be a taxing addition. I suspect that was why it wasn't such a burden to add the other formats he took on - there just weren't that many of them to catalog.

VHS and/or Beta would be an enormous undertaking, true. But they definitely both now fall under the Dead Format category.

Scott: definitely make your way back to lddb! It is a very handy way to catalog your collection, and the shops can also yield some good deals without all the hoop-jumping of eBay. The other thing I like is that Julien placed dynamic links for each film to go back to all kinds of sites for further research - he really does a terrific job of it.

(one other thing: I just took a spin through IMDB. I don't go there much anymore because I can't stand what they did to the interface, but did they also drop all video/LD release info? or can I just not find it in their stupid layout?)

[Beetlescott]

I used to love to go in there and and read the mini bios and things. I have only been back there since they messed it up. But I wasn't back into CEDs when I was in there. I didn't realize there was a list of the formats.
_________________
1000 titles
SGT-250
SJT-400
Montgomery Ward
SGT-100

[Rixrex]

IMDB new formating stinks. The search functions are lousy, especially the advanced search. The fanboys skew every title's rating, and throw a negative on you if your reviews don't fit their ideas. You can't say anything on the boards without getting vulgar retributions, no matter how innocuous, somebody's always offended and they use toilet bowl language to tell you so.

The old saying "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" doesn't apply to websites apparently. Every time a new chief of web design takes over, they think they need to show how lousy the old way was with their even lousier new methods. Just like gov't bureaucracy, gotta create a reason to keep the job.

[7jlong]

Ugh... IMDB is a total waste these days. The Top 250 list is beyond aggravating, though the bottom 100 is good for a few laughs.

I submitted a critical review of The Wall once. I thought it might be good to add balance to the "wow this film is so trippy awesome coolest movie ever yay". It was appropriately analytic, not "this movie is stooopid" etc. Needless to say it was never even published, because how dare I be critical of such a 'masterpiece'. I gave up on contributing after that.

[Rixrex]

Right, imagine commentary about The Godfather complaining that it was too long and boring, without enough action.

IMDB relates well to those who have arrested their intellectual development at junior high school levels.

[krbsforty]

CED is referenced on the Wikipedia article for the movie "Race For Your Life, Charlie Brown." I have not seen it mentioned on any other movies.



When mentioning all of the other home video formats, I have seen some 1980s movies for sale on Ebay released on Sony's 8 millimeter video format, which was used for home movies shot on camcorders. There is not any mention of this format anywhere either. Apparently, it was never popular for Hollywood movies.

[Jesse Skeen]

There were a fair number of movies released on 8mm tape, but they didn't sell very well. Around 1988 Sony put out a "Video Walkman" that had a small screen and battery-powered 8mm player, but somehow nobody cared about portable movies. I have a few pre-recorded 8mm tapes, the main problem with them is that they will only play in stereo if you have one of the few machines that can play their PCM digital sound tracks. I have a small portable deck and a camcorder which only play the analog audio track which is quite good (the camcorders had stereo mics on them) but the analog tracks on these tapes are in mono.

A more recent failure (besides the UMD movies for the PSP game system) is Mini DVD- 3-inch DVDs that play on any player but were designed for a series of portable players that would only play 3-inch discs. There was one from Cyberhome and one other brand I forget. Warner put out a number of titles mostly for kids- I have a Scooby-Doo episode and a few sports highlights ones. There were a few full-length movies put out as 2-disc sets (they should have made the discs 2-sided instead.) Other studios including Universal were slated to put out their own titles, but never did since sales of the Warner titles weren't spectacular. There was also a less-sophisticated portable disc player for kids called VideoNow, I have a player and a few discs but it didn't interest me enough to keep collecting them. The discs are an odd size (more than 3 inches but less than 5) and hold about 20 minutes. The first generation of these was black and white only, but they added color later. (And speaking of black-and-white, does anyone else have a Fisher-Price PXL-2000 camcorder, which recorded lo-res black and white video on AUDIO cassette tapes?)
_________________
Videodisc and stereo sound- there's no better value around!

[dumbchemist]

Today, the 3 inch CD is used for software distribution when you buy hardware. I have seen many a 3 inch disc included with PC hardware (i.e. USB addon cards, firewire and network cards).

I have only one 3 inch music CD. It is labeled Delos Pocket Classics, 2001: A Sonic Odyssey. It has 7 classic music pieces on it and has a total running time of 17 minutes. I got the disc in 1987 when I worked in New Jersey. It comes with a 3 inch to 4.75 inch adapter so you can play the CD in a normal CD player if your player does not have the 3 inch well.

I haven't seen any other ones with music. Are they still available today?
_________________
Sears 934-54780150 & 934.54810350,
Realistic CED-1
1-SJT-400. 2-SJT-200 & 1-SJT-090.
CLD-D406, CLD-980.
MDP-600, MDP-MR1.

[Jesse Skeen]

I've only seen a few recent 3-inch audio CDs. You can get blank ones though, I got a few and recorded some of my 12-inch singles onto them.

You can also get blank 3-inch DVDs, but the idea of having a portable player that only plays those has died. I once saw a portable laserdisc player at a flea market that only played 8-inch discs, wish I had picked it up.
_________________
Videodisc and stereo sound- there's no better value around!

[Midwinter]

Did the portable laserdisc player also play the 5 inch discs or was it only designed to handle the 8 inch discs? I need to find one of these - because I didn't even know a portable unit existed!
_________________
My SJT400 keeps me warm MIDWINTER when the OSD board overheats!

Trying my wife's patience one purchase at a time.

[Jesse Skeen]

I think it was top-loading. Most likely it did not play 5-inch CDs (or CDVs) and probably had just analog sound.
_________________
Videodisc and stereo sound- there's no better value around!

[7jlong]

I was amused to find via Pawn Stars that Sammy Davis Jr. had a considerable collection of prerecorded movies on 8mm tapes.

I though about picking up a PXL-2000 for a while, but after reading up on their failure rate it sounded like more trouble than it was worth.

Japan had a strong affection for 3" CDs that I believe still lasts to today. There is an interesting though not particularly comprehensive site somewhere that catalogs them. In the format's "heyday" some cool and unique stuff was released on them (b-sides, remixes, etc). A few of them fetch quite good money at this point - reissues of Beatles singles in particular.

If you haven't seen the Sony D88 portable 3" player, look it up - it's pretty cool.

Teac had a portable 3" player that would theoretically play a disc full of MP3 files. I picked one of these up new - big mistake. Lemon right out of the package.

It was a neat idea for a format though...