I think one of the best unintended consequences was that it imposed a national common experience.

Yes.
I remember reading that in NYC, there was a noticeable increase in water consumption during commercial time when the I Love Lucy show was on.

 

Yes.
I remember reading that in NYC, there was a noticeable increase in water consumption during commercial time when the I Love Lucy show was on.

One thing I forgot about, because I never did it myself, was that it fostered neighborhood interaction as people, mostly kids, would go to a friend's house to watch a TV show because they couldn't watch it at their own house. The flip side, of course, was that this took away from what otherwise might have been family time. But I think, on balance, this was a good thing because it made people more connected with their neighbors. For a variety of reasons, we did not socialize with others very much (my mother had a severe and crippling stroke when I was eight and the need to care for her and the difficulty of taking her places, not to mention that she couldn't speak or communicate except by using her thumb to answer yes/no questions). But I know that other families (again, mostly because of the kids) had a lot of interaction with other families in the neighborhood. Today that has largely evaporated. We've been in this neighborhood for more than five years. My faughter was 13 when we moved here and it turned out that the family next door and the one directly behind us each had a daughter that same age, yet they've never done anything together. No even sure that my daughter has even met the girl behind us or spoken more than once with the girl next door. Their lives are almost entirely on-line. I think that that is an overall significant negative, although it's not without its upsides. She has remained extremely close to the friends she had before, including one she met before kindergarten, and I fully expect many of them will remain firmly in touch for the rest of their lives, something that was very difficult a few decades ago.

 

I really get annoyed by people glorifying the past. No, everything was not better in the past. I would bet that a week of living in, (choose your date in the past,) would leave nearly everyone alive today begging to be sent back to the future.

 

I really get annoyed by people glorifying the past. No, everything was not better in the past. I would bet that a week of living in, (choose your date in the past,) would leave nearly everyone alive today begging to be sent back to the future.

OK, BOB, you can be annoyed, so far that is still legal in the US. Certaainly there are parts of the past thatwere very bad, BUT ALSO there were some very good portions! Consider communications, as one area. Instant communications has allowed rumors to spread at the speed of light, instead of allowing time to actually think about responses. And the whole internet, in addition to providing instant communications, has also provided a sewer line for the proliferation of garbage and hate. That proves that there is not much that can't be abused and mis-used. But we knew that already.

 

Yes, everything new and powerful has some negative consequences as well as positive ones. And the reverse is sometimes true as well. As much as I wish nuclear weapons did not exist, I think it is likely that they have saved us from global wars involving superpowers (so far.)

 

One thing that was far worse in the past, was the air pollution caused by vehicles without catalytic converters.
If one was caught in a traffic jam on a freeway, one would literally choke from the fumes.

 

Everything is better in the present then the past...until that first cataclysm.

 

But back to the original question; how did one transmit two simultaneous images side by side?
Since most likely the images were not genlocked, they had to be digitized first, placed in a fast RAM array, manipulated and then the composite image converted back to the analog domain.
A similar scenario would occur for transcoding from different systems, for instance a PAL source into NTSC retransmission.
Nowadays we don’t think much about digital video. But back in the late 80s, the machine that did this was a large and VERY expensive unit.

 

The US base at Yokohama (in the 50Hz zone) has its own 60Hz generation station just for the base.

When I served in the UK forces and would visit various US bases abroad, I noticed that they were generally fully contained with all the conveniences and luxeries of home,
I also noticed that US personel would very rarely leave the base during thier off-duty time.

 

I really get annoyed by people glorifying the past. No, everything was not better in the past. I would bet that a week of living in, (choose your date in the past,) would leave nearly everyone alive today begging to be sent back to the future.

Where did I say that everything was better in the past. Even in this one very narrow missive, I pointed out things that were not better then than now. Sorry that acknowledging that there WERE advantages, many of them subtle, that have been lost due to technological progress annoys you so much.

As for going back and living in the past, that's something that I've given thought to from time to time, and have had interesting discussions with others about. How far in time would you be willing/eager to go? A big complicating factor to that question is whether you got to keep all of your personal knowledge from the present and, as another complicating factor, got to actually use it? Another consideration is what condition you are sent back in and what preparation you get to make for the journey? I think the most interesting option is what I think of as The Terminator Criterion -- you can prepare as much as you want ahead of time, but you come back naked with your knowledge and memories intact and no constraints one how you use them (i.e., no fear of changing the future, since either your mere presence has already done that, or nothing you do can do that, at least in your original timeline). I generally relax the 'naked' part so that you can come back in basic period clothing suitable for the climate you arrive in. Another condition that I generally impose is that you can't expect to benefit from knowledge of specific future events, as your arrival will have made that knowledge unreliable, and possibly pretty quickly. So you can't just invest in the right companies or befriend a future wealthy or influential person. But you can benefit from knowing about and introducing technologies -- for instance, you could become the inventor of radio or the laser or the repeating firearm, provided that you actually have sufficient knowledge to make those things happen in the era you arrive at. Thus, it's a fair bet that, provided you manage to survive your initial time there starting with just the clothes on your back, you would stand a very good chance of becoming one of the most wealthy and influential people in relatively short order. On that case, the question is whether you would rather be as you are today, or be a very wealthy person back then? To what degree could that wealth, combined with the advances your knowledge could reasonably result in, offset the disadvantages of that time? You also have to keep in mind that you will be stuck living in the culture of that time -- while you might be able to have significant influence that impacts that culture, those changes take a long time (likely longer than your remaining years) and your ability to introduce new concepts and ideas, technological, social, or otherwise, are going to meet resistance.

There are some interesting flips on that question, too. Would you prefer going into the future, where your knowledge would be of little value to anyone except historians and you would be unlikely to be able to use it to really benefit your situation. It's easy for us to say that we'd rather be poor today than rich two hundred years ago. It's an attractive notion because we can point to lots of specific things that even the very poor have available today, like indoor plumbing and refrigeration and all the electronic do-dads (though, certainly, there are places today where people still don't always have that), Well, if that's the case, then shouldn't we be even more willing to be poor two hundred years in the future than at whatever modest level of wealth we are at today? That doesn't sound nearly as enticing, at least not to me. Perhaps it's simply because I have no conception of what new and wonderful things that will be available even to the very poor by that time. Perhaps everyone will be able to live in near-perfect health well into their early 100s. It is likely that I would at least be in a position to appreciate whatever new things I would be benefiting from, but would that be sufficient to keep me from being envious and every angry about all of the things that I see others having that would be beyond my means?

A similar twist would be to ask someone that is uber-wealthy today whether they would be willing to trade all of that to become, at best, middle class at some point in the future. My guess is that there would be very few takers, but it would be interesting to have that discussion with some of them.

 

My experience with most of the very wealthy is THAT THEY ARE DIFFERENT!
Never needing to ask the price, and never having to know that "I CAN'T AFFORD THAT" is certainly a different world.
( I AM NOT saying better or worse, just DIFFERENT)
I do not judge, that is not my job!! I lack both the autority and the wisom to get it right every time.)

 

Where did I say that everything was better in the past.

And I didn't say you did. Your post triggered a pet peeve of mine, not related to you. I can see how it might easily be taken to refer directly to your post, and I am sorry about that.

 

Consider that there is definitely constant change occurring in much of the world, and that, at best, only half of all changes are "for the better", that tends to point towards the past as having fewer changes for the worse.
I do not intend to mention names, as none on these pages seem to be involved.

 

and that, at best, only half of all changes are "for the better",

Why would you assume that? I would assume the opposite. Harmful changes are likely to be backed out and beneficial ones kept. But then, I do consider myself an optimist, though not at the Pangloss level.

 

Why would you assume that? I would assume the opposite. Harmful changes are likely to be backed out and beneficial ones kept. But then, I do consider myself an optimist, though not at the Pangloss level.

My opinion is based on my personal experiences and observations over the years. Your results may differ! Good for You!!

 

This was the original topic:

European HD TV standard compatible with US HD tv?

So how did we get to the good old days? Were the good old days really that good? Apparently for some yes and for others no. Now can we resume the thread title?

Ron

 

I attempted that on post #28.
But the TS may have already left this thread.

 

Hi guys,
Please stay on the TS's TOPIC.

Moderation.