Don, I am taking the liberty to post your point of view of the OAR issue with VOOM. I hope you don't mind...
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The issue is all about your own world you live in when viewing these movies in the home. If you had a real home theater with big screen you would quickly change your position
For the most part TV set viewers using 4:3 and 16x9 TV sets will have a much higher degree of ignorance to the issue of OAR as compared to the Home theater enthusiasts who are more educated in the subject of movies and Home theater equipment. The typical mind set of the TV set viewer is like that of JimP who just posted: "Personally, I'd rather have a slightly cropped picture filling my 16:9 screen." Jim may or may not realize that he has that control himself. He didn't state except for his desire of what to watch.
I say you are not fully aware of your receiver's capability to do that for you leaving the movie uncensored for those who wish to see all of it. It is the price we have to pay for your ignorance that you believe that the provider has to censor the movie for you.
The vast majority of Home theater enthusiasts have voted in the past overwhelmingly for OAR format because these people have the appreciation for the whole movie and do understand that if they wish to fill their 16x8 screen they can do it easily themselves with their standard STB setups. Pan and scan it won't do, but 99.999% of everything you will see with your own STB setup for 16x9 fill screen mode will look fine to you TV Set mindsets because you really don't care about anything except NOT seeing the black areas of your screen. Let us movie buffs and true Home theater big screen enthusiasts see the movie without provider censorship!
Let the TV Set people censor it if they want. Sorry if you have to learn how to do that. A little education isn't all that painful.
In ref to the overscan issue, tis true but that, again, is for the TV SET systems. Front projection systems don't have to be calibrated that way and usually aren't. We see everything desirable on the screen.
Hearing this about VOOM kills it for me too.
edit- manfred- says not all so maybe there's hope yet. It could be that VOMM just purchased some available masters for air and really didn't spec it the way MC does at HDNet Movies. They probably just picked up what's off the shelf! Wait and see for final verdict. Maybe Matt or Alan can get to someone who understands the topic and can state the VOOM policy for us.
Did you know that a transfer of a movie with P&S HBO style costs 15-30 times in labor and suite time what a transfer with only minor CC added in OAR? Think of the programming that we could have if that budget could be applied to purchase of more movies rather than censoring a movie because the average TV set owner doesn't understand how to adjust his set for screen fill.
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Don Landis