1. Warner Bros. is starting up a potentially revolutionary program where, eventually, every program in their library will be available on a custom-burned DVD. Hitfix's Drew McWeeny exults. (h/t: Ryan Kelly)

["So how does Warner Bros. ever expect to get those other 5000 titles into the hands of collectors who would want them? The reason many of them aren't available is because the studio isn't sure there's enough demand to justify the expense of mastering and pressing and marketing each and every one of those movies. But what if they only had to make a DVD when someone ordered it? What if they could press a single copy of a film instead of having to press thousands and thousands? At that point, there seems to be no reason to hold any title back."]

2. Die, Newspaper, Die! Mark Morford of the San Francisco Chronicle takes on everyone predicting a soon-to-come death for the newspaper industry. (h/t: N.P. Thompson)

["Still, I like Shirky's ideas. I enjoy how he lays out a theory, lucid and unadorned. He gives good analysis. But I hotly disagree with his unchecked worship of social networking as the imminent platform for—and solution to—well, just about everything that's wrong with news media today, which carries with it the implied rule that if your given experiment doesn't worship at the same altar, it's doomed to fail. It's a bit like listening to a die-hard laissez faire economist tell you how there's nothing better than a "true" free market, unfettered by pesky government regulation. Pure capitalism! It's the only way! Hmm. OK."]

3. Television Shows Need Restoration Too. Jaime Weinman makes the argument for loving preservation of old TV after seeing just how crummy the new DVDs of Rhoda look.

["Up until the '90s, filmed shows were edited as well as shot on film, and most of them were on 35 mm film, just like features. If you take the original negatives of a filmed show and do proper restoration work on them, to get the original colours and look of the film, they can look absolutely beautiful. Paramount has done that with some of its filmed properties; it's why the early episodes of Cheers look better than the later ones, because the early ones were shot and cut on film, and they look pristine and vibrant. But it costs a lot of money to do that; restoring a full season of 25-minute episodes is the cost equivalent of restoring several feature films. And while some shows have been properly restored, or at least remastered from good prints, many more have not. Before its collapse, MTM probably paid to restore its most famous property, The Mary Tyler Moore Show; it almost certainly didn't do the same kind of work on its other properties, because while Mary Tyler Moore episodes mostly look great, Bob Newhart Show and St. Elsewhere episodes range from good to terrible, and Rhoda, we now know, is an absolute mess. "]

4. Culture Shock. The Washington Monthly takes a look at the short, strange life of conservative-centered pop culture site Culture 11, one of the best right-leaning sites out there for its short lifespan. (One of the site's writers, Peter Suderman, used to comment infrequently here at the House. Say hey if you're still around, Peter!)

["Friedersdorf had a different idea in mind. 'I'm not sure another Buckley's what we really need,' he wrote. 'Instead, I'd prefer another Tom Wolfe, or better yet a dozen. As his generation's conservative commentators railed against The Great Society, insisting its urban anti-poverty programs encouraged radicalism, bred dependence on the welfare state, and ignored the root causes of unemployment, Mr. Wolfe did something different: reporting.' Wolfe had gone to the conductor and composer Leonard Bernstein's cocktail party, watched Park Avenue's finest flatter themselves by sharing hors d'oeurves with Black Panthers, and wrote about it in scathing detail, first in New York magazine—the cover featured three white socialites in glittery cocktail dresses with raised fists—and later in Radical Chic & Mau-Mauing the Flak Catchers. In doing so, Friedersdorf believed, Wolfe had made a far stronger case for conservatism than the collected works of L. Brent Bozell. And Wolfe hadn't had any need to work within the confines of a conservative shadow institution; writing in New York and Esquire, he had reached and potentially persuaded an audience that didn't subscribe to Buckley's National Review. In sum, Friedersdorf wrote, 'the right must conclude that we're better off joining the journalistic project than trying to discredit it.'"]

5. Shamwow vs. Zorbeez: Which Works Better? Popular Mechanics takes on one of the great questions of our time.

["In a radio interview on Feb. 10, 2009, infomercial superstar Billy Mays claimed that the popular Shamwow has trod on the turf of Zorbeez, a super-absorbent towel he promoted in a separate infomercial about two years prior.

Zorbeez is the most absorbent towel in the world, Mays said in the interview. Vince, host of the Shamwow ad, has now 'unleashed and woken up the sleeping giant,' Mays said, suggesting the two settle the score via a 'pitch-off.' Mays predicted the outcome: "Shampow!" "]

Quote of the Day:

Image of the Day (click to enlarge): Man, I'm glad I never have to deal with one of these ...

Clip of the Day: "Enough with the music videos, VanDerWerff," I hear you saying. Well, how's about a movie trailer?

"Links for the Day": A selection of Links that will hopefully spark discussion. Comments encouraged. Suggestions for links are also welcome. Please send to todd@vanderwerff.us.