"just order it online"

[KellyHabersham]

Last night, my sister's family came over to go swimming, and as everyone was talking, we got on the subject of how most of the bookstores in this city have closed, and the few which remain aren't as convenient to get to unless you can drive. My brother-in-law's comments were along the lines of "just order stuff online", and "Amazon is better/cheaper....blah blah blah."

What kind of annoyed me is that Amazon is NOT necessarily cheaper - they're not required to charge sales tax in my state, but shipping charges jack the price up more than the tax would. (And I don't always want to spend X amount of dollars just to get free shipping) Not to mention that sometimes their prices on books are no different than what other stores are charging.

[HYHYBT]

Amazon is great if you know what you want, at least to the point of subject matter. But for browsing and picking something that catches your interest, nothing can replace a physical book store... even if every last one of them goes out of business.

[jackfaire]

nothing can replace a physical book store... even if every last one of them goes out of business.

For me it can. The physical book stores never seemed to have decent selection. At least in my area Sci Fi and Fantasy seem like they are always considered fringe genres they dedicate one maybe two rows to it and then the rest of the genres get over filled. Like 5 aisles of cooking books, and books by political pundits.

[Bloodsoul]

I can definitely see going online if you're looking for something that's rare, out-of-print, or otherwise hard to obtain locally (such as the first issue of the comic book series written by former WWF wrestler, the Ultimate Warrior; came to me in much better condition than I had expected and for cover price, too!).

[Gravekeeper]

(such as the first issue of the comic book series written by former WWF wrestler, the Ultimate Warrior; came to me in much better condition than I had expected and for cover price, too!).

DESTRUCITY~

( That man is insane ).

For me ordering online is the last resort. I would much rather physically purchase something so that I can actually see it and assess it to make sure its what I'm actually looking for. I'll only order it online if I can't find it anywhere, or if its something too heavy to for me to get back to my house. -.-

[Ginger Tea]

Browsing shops (book/video/music) always brings up stuff you were not looking for, see a new album not too sure what it sounds like, write the name down and check out their website for tracks to stream, would not find these at the store websites, they will lilst them, but it wouldn't pop out at you.

Really hating not being able to find 80's movies on DVD in the UK, not even via HMV.com the only real physical shop for DVD's now that Virgin (aka zavvi) have gone to the wall.
website says nada so no point asking in store to order it.
I'm resorting to yeolde torrents for films I CANNOT buy even though I WANT to.

[Andara Bledin]

I'm really irritated that there are companies with movies that are out of production that they refuse to digitize and add back into circulation. A digital model would be ideal for all of those, but content providers are still being drug kicking and screaming into the 21st century.

^-.-^

[Ginger Tea]

most of my Manga entertainment (UK) VHS are not available on DVD, yet I'm sure they still own the rights.
Granted at the time they just shoveled out whatever was on the market along with some really good films and OAV's, so maybe I don't mind missing the crap, but maybe my idea of great and want to see it again or never got the VHS due to lack of funds* is their idea of crap do not re release.

I recently got Guyver, but it's not the same version I had, I got their one episode per VHS 12 parter and although it seems the same re episode one (sans being widescreen) I don't know if it IS the same 12 episodes with more "missing" episodes or a whole new remake with identicle art style.
Hell for all I know they just cropped the 4:3 pilot story to 16:9 (iir the PAL release was fullscreen, but hey that could have been pan and scan) and then drew like that for the rest of the season's remake.

*At the time of the first wave of Manga video's (lable name not mixing up medium names) I was working for YTS wages, which was basically Giro money + with city & guilds training scheeme, so I didn't have much money to get video's with, I got Akira, Project A-KO, Urotsimicallit with the tentacle rape 1 &2 3x3 eyes and a few others I can not recall at the moment, but guyver being almost full price for a half hour episode kinda limited me on what I could buy each month, so I missed out on alot of potentially good films due to their pricing of Guyver or not making it 3 episodes per tape.
Now I have the money, the films I wan't are no longer listed via the UK website or HMV, perhaps Manga US stocks them and I could region free my pc DVD player, but they shouldn't region lock anything if they are the only source of English Dub's.

Mind you Manga UK might have the rights here but ADV had the rights elsewhere and although I had not really heard much about them at the time, I found out alot when they went to the wall, leaving the licences in limbo, so even if Manga UK sold it, Manga USA never did as it was ADV/another with the Stateside rights.

[Jack T. Chance]

most of my Manga entertainment (UK) VHS are not available on DVD, yet I'm sure they still own the rights.
Granted at the time they just shoveled out whatever was on the market along with some really good films and OAV's, so maybe I don't mind missing the crap, but maybe my idea of great and want to see it again or never got the VHS due to lack of funds* is their idea of crap do not re release.

I recently got Guyver, but it's not the same version I had, I got their one episode per VHS 12 parter and although it seems the same re episode one (sans being widescreen) I don't know if it IS the same 12 episodes with more "missing" episodes or a whole new remake with identicle art style.
Hell for all I know they just cropped the 4:3 pilot story to 16:9 (iir the PAL release was fullscreen, but hey that could have been pan and scan) and then drew like that for the rest of the season's remake.

*At the time of the first wave of Manga video's (lable name not mixing up medium names) I was working for YTS wages, which was basically Giro money + with city & guilds training scheeme, so I didn't have much money to get video's with, I got Akira, Project A-KO, Urotsimicallit with the tentacle rape 1 &2 3x3 eyes and a few others I can not recall at the moment, but guyver being almost full price for a half hour episode kinda limited me on what I could buy each month, so I missed out on alot of potentially good films due to their pricing of Guyver or not making it 3 episodes per tape.
Now I have the money, the films I wan't are no longer listed via the UK website or HMV, perhaps Manga US stocks them and I could region free my pc DVD player, but they shouldn't region lock anything if they are the only source of English Dub's.

Mind you Manga UK might have the rights here but ADV had the rights elsewhere and although I had not really heard much about them at the time, I found out alot when they went to the wall, leaving the licences in limbo, so even if Manga UK sold it, Manga USA never did as it was ADV/another with the Stateside rights.

Speaking about Guyver, there ARE 2 versions... the original anime adaptation, produced in Japan in the 1980s, and then the updated, more extensive adaptation (which follows the story up through the beginning of Volume 10 of the manga) which was produced in Japan in 2005 or so as a TV series. It ran for about 26 episodes in a single season. It came to the US on DVD and cable TV in '06 or '07 and it's what made me a Guyver fan!

At least here in the US, it's easy to tell the difference. The original '80s version is titled The Guyver: Bio-Booster Armor here, while the new, more extensive adaptation is titled Guyver: The Bioboosted Armor. I'm just mad at the Japanese studio for NOT keeping it going past its one and only season. The manga is now up to something like Volume 30 in Japan, so there's AT LEAST enough story left for 2 more seasons. But despite the show's immense popularity and high sales volume on DVD, the studio has unwisely chosen not to produce more episodes.

As for finding the DVDs you want when you live in the UK and they aren't available there, it's really very simple. You need to do what I did when I wanted DVDs that were ONLY available in Region 2, such as the classic BBC SF series Blake's 7...

1. Find a model of DVD player that supports playback of BOTH NTSC and PAL formatted video and can convert the signal it outputs from one to the other, so the discs can always be played back on your TV. For those that don't already know, PAL is the TV standard in Region 2 (UK and Europe) while NTSC is the standard in Region 1 (North America). To find out if the player you own does this, you need to find a site that has the complete specs for that player. Amazon is usually a good site to check for that info. While there, you can check the ratings to make sure it's a GOOD player that's worth purchasing.
2. If the player you choose to buy is Region-Coded to the Region you live in, as most are, do a google search on "(Manufacturer's Name) (Model # of the player) region free code" to find the code to UNLOCK your DVD player so that it can play DVDs from ALL regions.
3. Use Amazon's international sites from outside your region (if you're in the UK, that would mean going to Amazon.COM or Amazon.CA instead of Amazon.co.UK) to find the DVD you want in another Region, then ORDER IT and have it shipped to you!
4. Put it in your Region-Free player and enjoy!

I've done this myself, to get titles that are considered by the studio/rights holder to not be worth the cost to release them in the US, and it works perfectly! I have had the entire series of Blake's 7 on DVD for several years, and I had the 1996 Doctor Who TV movie years before it was finally released Stateside!

[jackfaire]

I'm really irritated that there are companies with movies that are out of production that they refuse to digitize and add back into circulation.

*nods* Disney decided that the sales of the DVDs for seasons 1-3 of Boy Meets World were lackluster and so they weren't going to release seasons 4-7, even though those were the seasons that most fans wanted and why they didn't want the first three, we finally got the last of them released this year though because Disney sold the rights to BMW as part of a lot of properties they were getting rid of.

We hounded the purchasing company until they announced the release of the last seasons.

[Ginger Tea]

As I predominantly search HMV over amazon UK* let alone amazon US/international, I only see what I cannot get normally.
Granted I could import (assuming what I'm looking for is onsale across the globe) and not using a TV but a PC totally negates the worry about PAL/NTSC.
If swapping between regions bricks my DVD drive to one set up only, I have a spare from my dead pc that I could use instead.

*My second port of call is the lables website, if they don't list it, maybe it never even was.

[Jack T. Chance]

As I predominantly search HMV over amazon UK* let alone amazon US/international, I only see what I cannot get normally.
Granted I could import (assuming what I'm looking for is onsale across the globe) and not using a TV but a PC totally negates the worry about PAL/NTSC.
If swapping between regions bricks my DVD drive to one set up only, I have a spare from my dead pc that I could use instead.

*My second port of call is the lables website, if they don't list it, maybe it never even was.

In that case, just reset the Region one time, to Region 0. That's what you do when you make your DVD player Region-Free, you set it to Region 0, which means it will play DVDs from ANY Region! Do that once and you're set, unless you find out that you have one of those rare DVDs that enforces the Region-Coding and will ONLY play on a player set to its specific region. But I own TONS of DVDs, and have rented or borrowed many others, and I have yet to find one that won't play on my Region 0-encoded player!

[Ginger Tea]

I'm hoping the watermargine (which is available ) is one of those rare beasts that I can dump donw to HDD and watch from there (not ripped just copied to another folder)
I keep most of my DVD's in storage as I live in a room not a house/flat but might not get round to watching them so early, having them temporarily on a hard drive gives me the option to watch whenever.

Although I had to do that with the UK release of Robotech, half the disc's were vibrating like mad and it was safer to have it do that for the 5 or so minutes it took to copy than the hours the disc ran for.

[jackfaire]

Although I had to do that with the UK release of Robotech, half the disc's were vibrating like mad and it was safer to have it do that for the 5 or so minutes it took to copy than the hours the disc ran for.

In the states the Supreme Court determined it was perfectly legal to create backups of movies you own.

[Jack T. Chance]

In the states the Supreme Court determined it was perfectly legal to create backups of movies you own.

Yes, but they ALSO ruled, under the infernal Digital Millennium Copyright Act of 1998 that it is ILLEGAL to circumvent/hack/crack/whatever any form of digital copy protection scheme in order to do so.

So, after years of lengthy research and development, a company FINALLY developed and was set to release DVD copying software that was in full compliance with BOTH laws, allowing you to LEGALLY copy your movies and TV shows WITHOUT circumventing or cracking through the digital copy protection schemes!

So, OF COURSE RIAA and the movie studios promptly went before a sympathetic judge (who was most likely already in cahoots with them) and got an injunction issued, preventing that COMPLETELY LEGAL software from being sold!

But that's a rant for another day...