BVDH The Blog

Why Blockbuster will die

The other night for the first time in years, I rented a DVD from Blockbuster.  It cost $4.79.  That's absurd.  And it's the reason that Blockbuster will die.  The company is doing poorly and they are closing stores.  Their costs are high (staff, DVDs, store rent, electricity, etc), so they have to charge a lot per movie.  Unfortunately for them, we now have other options.

It's called Netflix.  For $4.99 you can get up to 2 DVDs (1 at a time) from them.  For $8.99 you can get an unlimited number of DVDs (1 at a time).  I'm not a Netflix member.  I don't have time to watch movies.  But I just can't see how Blockbuster, even though they have launched an online service similar to Netflix, can survive. Enough people will start using online services that cost less or download movies online that not enough people will go to Blockbuster to allow it to survive.  Especially at $4.79 for a movie.

Independent Kosovo: The way it should be

Kosovo has been independent for just about a month now and things have seemed to calm down a bit.   Once independence was declared on Feb. 17, the was an immediate fission in the international community in terms of recognizing Kosovo's independence.   The United States, Britain, and France were the first countries to recognize Kosovo.  Not surprisingly, Russia opposed Kosovo's independence because they are afraid of parts of Russia (re: Chechnya) could breakaway like Kosovo did from Serbia.   It was not only rouge countries like Russia (yea, Russia under Putin is a rouge country) not recognizing Kosovo.   Many first-world nations like Spain, Israel, and Canada have not recognized Kosovo because they are afraid that it would stir separatist movements in their own countries.   

Only 28 countries have recognized Kosovo and made the right decision.

Endangered World Leaders: Castro and Musharraf

Last weekend Fidel Castro announced to Cuba and the world that he was stepping down as President of Cuba, ending 50 years in power.  This marks an end of an era, even though he hadn't been running day-to-day affairs of Cuba since he fell ill in 2006.  Will anything in Cuba change?  Probably not in the immediate future, but his brother Raul, who now runs the country is generally seen as more pragmatic.  I think in the next few years, relations between the United States and Cuba will improve because Cuba needs better relations with the U.S. to improve its economy and the U.S. embargo on Cuba is silly.   Why did Castro step down now?  I'm guessing because he is about to die (he's been very sick) and the party realized that having him die in office would be more destabilizing than turning over power when alive.

Well Castro has stepped down, and I'm guessing Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf won't be too far behind him.  As many of you know, I've always been a supporter of Musharraf.  But his party got slaughtered in the parliamentary elections and the new ruling coalition could actually remove him from office.  Since he is no longer in charge of the army, his power base is fading quickly.  I think he will leave office voluntarily before he is forced out.  He definitely tried to improve Pakistan, but in the end he made poor decisions in the name of personal power that are leading to his downfall.