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'Roll Your Own News' DVDs Now Shipping 90

Posted by Zonk from the more-from-mickey-roony dept.
theodp writes "Amazon.com and CBS have partnered to offer a la carte news clips on custom-made DVDs. Pay $24.95 and you'll get 10 clips or 90 minutes, whichever comes first. Not too surprisingly, CBS News seems to have the best coverage on the new service."
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'Roll Your Own News' DVDs Now Shipping More

'Roll Your Own News' DVDs Now Shipping

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  • huh? (Score:2, Informative)

    by svunt ( 916464 )
    I'm confused. Is this supposed to be "news for nerds" or "stuff that matters"? Doesn't really seem to fit into either.

    • Re:huh? (Score:3, Funny)

      by Frankie70 ( 803801 )

      I'm confused. Is this supposed to be "news for nerds" or "stuff that matters"? Doesn't really seem to fit into either.


      It's "news about stuff", 2 outta 4 ain't bad.

    • The news is... (Score:3, Insightful)

      by tepples ( 727027 )

      The news here is that an "old media" company and former MPAA member (CBS) is offering to allow the general public to select multiple short copyrighted works, write them to a recordable medium, and ship the disc to the customer's home.

  • Bah. CBS. (Score:5, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 15, 2006 @01:54AM (#15723665)
    I'd rather read news from bloggers, the real heroes, who sit on their asses reading news reports and giving me the real story. Fuck all that "traveling to other countries" and "gathering original reporting" shit.

    • Re:Bah. Bloggers. (Score:5, Funny)

      by Zaphod2016 ( 971897 ) on Saturday July 15, 2006 @07:52AM (#15724215) Homepage
      Not me. I'd rather watch my news on the major media cable channels. I trust Bill O'Reilly and Lou Dobbs to give me the facts, clear of any bias or corporate agendas.
    • Yes. Goodness knows we can trust the folks who were so blinded by their biases and what they thought was the chance to create a scandal just before an election that they believe that in 1973, a military officer wanting to create "CYA" documents would go to the trouble of typesetting them on a clunky, hard-to-use high-end IBM machine, and who still believe a photocopy that matches the output of Microsoft Word with the same input text is a copy of such a document.

      Others have already pointed out bloggers who a

  • $30 for something you can tape (Score:5, Interesting)

    by davecarlotub ( 835831 ) * on Saturday July 15, 2006 @01:54AM (#15723666) Journal
    This is like those advertisements at the end of PBS shows that charge $24.99 for a VHS tape of the show you have just seen. I always wondered who the hell bought that crap.

  • Licensing (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Umbral Blot ( 737704 )
    The usefulness of this service really depends on the licensing. If you can do whatever you want with them then I could see some cool 60 minute techno remixes (OK, they wouldn't really be cool, but at least someone might find the clips useful). However if they are licensed anally (as I suspect they will be) then this service is useless. Not surprisingly the article doesn't say.

    • Re:Licensing (Score:5, Funny)

      by TrappedByMyself ( 861094 ) on Saturday July 15, 2006 @02:12AM (#15723711)
      However if they are licensed anally (as I suspect they will be) then this service is useless.

      Wow, I guess RIAA/MPAA & friends really are out to screw us over.

    • Re:Licensing (Score:3, Informative)

      by evilviper ( 135110 )
      You either have no idea what this service is, or you're one of the few that does not care at all about the world around you.

      The price for the DVDs is a bit high, but I fully expect man people will start ordering sets of DVDs with full coverage of every major historical event in recent memory.

      How much money are they going to make just printing DVDs of the coverage of the 9/11 attacks? How about the fall of the Berlin wall, and end of the cold war? Perhaps even videos about the START of the cold war for tha
      • In fact I was just on cbsnews.com a few minutes ago, watching videos on the current Israel/Palestine/Lebanon conflict.
        Ah... so it was you.

        CBSNEWS.
      • Not too many. More likely they will be ordered, ripped, and put up on fileshare networks.

        Also, you might consider the search terms "60 minutes torrent".

        • More likely they will be ordered, ripped, and put up on fileshare networks.

          Still numerous sales for content they would make NO money on otherwise.

          Also, you might consider the search terms "60 minutes torrent".

          60 minutes is only the first thing mentioned because it's the most recognized CBS News show. However, they're offering ALL their CBS News content, not just clips of 60 Minutes.
    • However if they are licensed anally (as I suspect they will be) then this service is useless.

      Well then, good news! It's a suppository.

  • Limited Use (Score:2, Insightful)

    by mrpaco18 ( 958815 )
    I could see this as being useful in an educational setting, as a good way to show recent events to middle/high school kids who otherwise could care less and are probably more concerned about who just sent them a friend invite on MySpace. After all, who do you think spends $24.95 to buy the same program you just saw on the History Channel? Outside of this though, I have no idea who could possibly have any use for this, even after reading TFA.
    • Gah, couldn't care less, how has this expression managed to mutate in the wilds of the internet?
    • I've been quiet about this for too long, you people. The phrase is "I couldn't care less". Meaning you care so little that you could not possibly care any less.

      Saying you could care less is saying you actually care.

      Sorry for the rant.
    • Yes. Researchers are just about the only segment I can think who'd use this service. Also, the "did you see me on TV?" crowd too.

  • Old news (Score:3, Funny)

    by bunhed ( 208100 ) on Saturday July 15, 2006 @02:01AM (#15723684)
    Doesn't news become old news in about the same amount of time it takes to cook a DVD?

  • I remember a time... (Score:5, Informative)

    by Aeron65432 ( 805385 ) <agiambaNO@SPAMgmail.com> on Saturday July 15, 2006 @02:04AM (#15723692) Homepage
    when CNN attempted to make their content pay-to-view (made far worse by partnering it with RealPlayer). Even if it is an exclusive CBS story, there is no way that people are going to pay money to watch it when they can read about it from other sources or find out about it the next day.

    Not only did they drop it, but CNN/FOX/MSNBC offer premium content on their webpage for free.
    • Not only did they drop it, but CNN/FOX/MSNBC offer premium content on their webpage for free.

      What makes it "premium?" Since it is free, you aren't paying extra for it. Since it is free, it is not above the normal offerings. Have you been drinking the marketing kool-aid again?

  • I'm dubious about the potential market for customized DVDs of old news clips. I just can't recall any instances where I've felt like sitting down to an evening of watching old 60 Minutes segments from way back when. News is attractive because it's happening 'right now', or because it tells an interesting story that we didn't know before. Old news clips have none of this immediacy or novelty, and without those critical interest factors, what's left for us to enjoy? Watching old news clips seems as exciti

  • Now I can finally get yesterday's news next week. Or can I one-click my way to overnight shipping so I'm only 3 days out? If I have the computer to order the dvd of the news, why can't I use the computer to read the news in the first place? I must be missing a key point here.

  • purpose (Score:5, Informative)

    by poppen_fresh ( 65995 ) on Saturday July 15, 2006 @02:37AM (#15723760)

    To everyone who seems to think this is useless, I think you've missed the point. The summary and headline are perhaps misleading. This seems to be more geared toward owning a copy of the clip or news segment, not a way to get the current news. THe usa today article says

    CustomFlix, an Amazon division, allows customers to select from "thousands" of clips dating as far back as 1990
    .

  • New Anti-Piracy Measure Found! (Score:3, Funny)

    by rolfwind ( 528248 ) on Saturday July 15, 2006 @02:51AM (#15723792)
    Well, it seem that CBS has stumbled on a new anti-piracy measure! I, for one, predict that these old clips of old news will not be found on any bittorrent sites in the future. Truly ingenious and no DRM needed to boot.

    My hat is off to you, CBS.

    In other news, the RIAA has been experiment with zero value content for years now....

  • Ship me a dvd! (Score:3, Funny)

    by pontifier ( 601767 ) on Saturday July 15, 2006 @03:48AM (#15723890) Homepage
    If I go for standard shipping does that mean it's a slow news day?

  • Cool!! (Score:5, Interesting)

    by mattmacf ( 901678 ) <mattmacf@[ ]online.net ['opt' in gap]> on Saturday July 15, 2006 @04:19AM (#15723938) Homepage
    For all those doubters out there, take a minute to actually look [customflix.com] at the service CBS and Amazon.com are offering. This isn't about getting a DVD of yesterday's 60 Minutes broadcast (we all have MythTV for that, right?), but rather for finding copies of older news stories that certainly aren't going to be broadcast again. Personally, I think the move is genius for CBS. Rather than collect dust, they're offering up these old clips for a very reasonable fee. It's a perfect example of a mega-corp actually adjusting to technological advances and embracing them. If you think about it for 30 seconds, it's really a perfect medium for the syndication of millions of archived newsreels.

    Browsing through some of the clips, there's actually some really neat stuff available that would otherwise have been lost to the general public and appears to be a worthwhile trip down nostalgia lane. For example, their political [customflix.com] section has a vast array of news clips from the 2000 Presidential election. There are a couple of pre-9/11 snippets on gas [customflix.com] prices [customflix.com], and even what appears to be a segment on the Segway [customflix.com]. Plus there's a wide variety of interviews with people like Neil Armstrong [customflix.com], Jonathon "Fatal1ty" Wendel [customflix.com], Jon Stewart [customflix.com], and J. K. Rowling [customflix.com] dating back to 1999.

    There's probably a rather large potential market for this kind of stuff too. It's certainly not the kind of thing you'll find a torrent for or dig up on YouTube. I know there are some interesting documentaries on there that I would certainly be inclined to purchase. And aside from the academic environment, I could imagine buying one just to get a look at how stuff used to be (and to give to your grandparents years later). As of now, there isn't much older footage (I think late 1999 is as far as it goes back), but hopefully this is just the tip of the iceberg. If they offer much older stuff I'd definitely invest in a compilation of those big historical landmark broadcasts (e.g. Pearl Harbor, Cuban Missle Crisis, etc.).

    On a side note, it'd be even cooler if someone like ESPN got into the action with this. I'd die for the ability to buy old baseball and football highlights and such. Just my $.02

    • Re:Cool!! (Score:3, Informative)

      by rolfwind ( 528248 )
      I would agree with you on your point except the price. It's too steep. I could see $9.99 downloaded or say $11.99 burned and shipped. But $24.99? That more than most movies.

      Plus I find that clips are filled with more fluff than a nice written summary. My father recently got my uncle one of those year year DVDs (something like this [edirectory.co.uk]) and when we watched it, we went almost went to sleep with the amount of moralizing/fluff that was in it (plus the super narrow focus on one story of that year and not a well
      • except the price. It's too steep. I could see $9.99 downloaded or say $11.99 burned and shipped.

        You are right. All they have to do is let their marketing see your numbers:
        "$9.99 online or just $0.99 on CD or 8-track tape, plus $11.00 S&H"

        (and lose the part about waiting 4-6 weeks for them to process your order)

    • .... If you think about it for 30 seconds ....

      Actually, its 60 Seconds [wikipedia.org], not 30.

    • Great !

      <tinfoil hat>

      Let's just hope they don't edit the "news" to fit the current administrations definition of history.
      Ministry of Truth anyone ?
      All it would take is new voice overs to old video footage.
      </tinfoil hat>

    • Wish I had this service back in High School... forget magazine and newspaper clippings for my Political Science reports.. here comes full on Video presentations via iMovie/iDVD damn that would have been fun/impressive.
  • Really! [thatvideosite.com]
  • How could they DO this? HOW COULD THEY DO THIS? I can't beleive it. I just found out! Commodore is no longer making the 64!!!!!!!! No it's true, I just saw it on the news.....
  • On one hand, as someone who does research on media and is really interested in media coverage of certain events, this is really a nice service. On the other hand, up until now, if I can't find something online, I've had good luck just contacting the networks with my university email and telling them I want a copy of a program for research. They usually fax me a form to sign saying I won't air it and they fedex it to me for free. I wonder if they would begin to be less willing to do that from now on...
  • If Congress hadn't turned copyright into never-ending ownership, if we instead had a sensible expiration date, say 10 years, then all this content would become public domain in a reasonable time and there wouldn't be a market for most of these old clips. Yeah, the media producers paid to produce the material and they deserve to make money off it. But during the copyright period the public also makes an investment in the form of paying taxes to enforce the copyright laws. The end of the copyright period used
  • Why would I want a DVD of old news when I can download new news for much less money?

    Maybe if I banded together with 359 other people to archive all of our 15 minutes each of fame, it would be worth seven cents apiece for the official disc. Which we would then copy across the Net and burn for ourselves.

  • Stock cue VISUAL: cliptage, splitscreen, cut in bridge-melder, Mr. & Mrs. Everywhere depthunder (today MAMP, Mid-Atlantic Mining Project), spaceover (today freefly-suiting), transiting (today Simpson Acceleratube), digging (today as everyday homimage with autoshout).

    Like in Stand On Zanzibar [streettech.com] by John Brunner (1968)? Hmm, nope, not yet. Wake me up when it's news.

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