Its FINALLY official

In case you have been visiting another planet lately, you should know that the HD-DVD format is dead. Today, Toshiba, who developed and was the primary backer, announced they will no longer manufacture HD-DVD players. If you haven't already, its ok to go buy your PS3 with its built-in Blu-Ray player.


Top 10 Things to do with you HD-DVD player:

1. Mail it to the office of Howard Stringer in protest of Blu-ray's victory.
2. Plug it into your clothes dryer's 240-volt outlet. Woops, honey! My bad, guess we have to buy a Blu-ray player now.
3. Finally, replace your Betamax player.
4. Buy the Blu-ray player of your choice, put it in the box, attempt to return it as "defective."
5. Channel it through Whoopi Goldberg and make some pottery with it.
6. Put a Blu-ray disc in the tray and then call up Toshiba when it doesn't work. Repeatedly.
7. Put it in a time capsule, just to confuse future generations.
8. Buy a few dozen of 'em and build a little hut for your Blu-ray player.
9. Lock it alone in a room with a few lethal weapons... let it die honorably.
10. Use it to upscale DVDs, which is all you ever used it for anyways.

On the software side, Universal's president Craig Kornblau had this to say: "While Universal values the close partnership we have shared with Toshiba, it is time to turn our focus to releasing new and catalog titles on Blu-ray."

Are you ready for Feb. '09?

I have been on a crusade about wireless for several years. Warning churches about the up coming FCC sell off. The bidding has started and most of the blocks have meet the minimum bid price. You have until Feb. 2009 to get things OUT of the 700Mhz range. I have yet to understand why some people thought they could get the FCC to change its mind as they are set to get about 15 billion dollars from this sale. Yes, money talks.

Here is why churches need to pay attention, any current devices in that range will be illegal to use after Feb. ‘09. It will be like having an unlicensed radio station. While you may not, at first, have interference issues, you should stop using them simply because its the law. I suspect that it will take very little time in the large metro areas for these frequencies to get used up. If nothing else it will force churches to get out.

My suggestion at this point is that you go TODAY and tell those in your leadership that all your current wireless systems that are in the 700Mhz range must be replaced before Feb. ‘09. Make a plan, tell them how much it will cost and start setting aside money. I am a recent hire at my church so we are behind. I am currently working on a plan for our church and we have so many wireless systems its going to cost a fortune.

I would love to hear about your plans.

Uganda or bust

My friend Anne, along with several other bloggers, is heading to Uganda and will be blogging live from there as they minister to people there. Please be in prayer for them and spread the word.

Rockin the students

This weekend our high school students are having some intensive dicipleship training. The wonderful worship leader Steve Fee from North Point church in Atlanta came to lead worship with them. My buddy Dave gets to mix for Steve on a regular basis and I know he loves working with him. Steve is just amazing. I thought I would share just a little bit of what happened tonight. Most of the production is being handled by volunteers and they are just knocking out of the park. This is great stuff from our student ministry team and I was totally loving it. Great job team.