FAQ I can't find what I'm looking for on the list. What can I do? Many things have either never been released for public consumption (ie: the contraption was never released on video) or have been out of print for a long, long, time. Your best bet in that situation is to contact someone who collects Rocky Horror/O'Brien stuff, or check an auction site like EBay. I found the video I want, but it's in the wrong format. Few things you can do. You can buy the video imported and have it converted, or get a machine to do it for you. The first is a little pricy, second is even more pricy. Can I play the video even if it's not in the right format? No, sorry. How do I get it converted? There are many companies that will convert videos from one format to another. At least in America. I am unsure about the UK and Europe as I don't live there. Anyway, they will convert the video for you, but there are restrictions to this. The video CANNOT be in production or copyright in the country you are in. For instance, if I have a copy of Rocky Horror from the UK I want transfered . . . no LEGAL operation will do it, because there is an existing copyright on the film in the United States. This also applies for films like the Odd Job, which are currently out of print in the US, but available in the UK. It once was made here, so it is still copyrighted. The Crystal Maze, on the other hand, is only under copyright in Europe, and therefore able to be transfered. What's the difference between UK and US CDs? Not much, really. Usually the only difference lies in the cover art- and price. Import CDs, on average, will always cost more than domestic releases. In some instances, countries like Japan will have more tracks and such on the CDs, and in the sixties Capitol Records (among others) was notorious for doing the same in America. For every two Beatle albums in Europe, there were three in America. But this practice has pretty much stopped. Are there formats to CDs? No. All musical formats (LP, Cassette, CD) are format free and can be played on any stereo. The DVD I want is in the wrong region. What can I do? Not a whole heck of a lot. Restrictions on DVDs are currently far more difficult to bypass than VHS standards. If it's out of print, is that forever? Of course not. It just means that the video or DVD is currently not being made. Studios re-release titles all the time. What is Widescreen/Letterbox? It's the format where the little black bars are up top and bottom of the screen. Films are made this way because movie screens are rectangular. Your tv is square, so the bars appear to make up the difference in the picture size. The advantage of letterbox is that you see everything in the film that you would have had you seen it in a theater. Pan and Scan? "This film has been formatted to fit your screen". As previously explained, theater screen and tv screen shapes are different. Pan and scan is edited and cropped to follow the main action of the film, but often cuts out things that the letterboxed editions would show. Oh my God!! Almost 100 bucks for a video? What the *^*&*^??? Very few VHS videos are released for public sale. The general guidelines for videos going straight to sale are: a) if the film made over 100 million gross at the box office. (ie: Forrest Gump) b) If it is a family film. Moms buy movies and studios know this. (ie: Anything by a studio with the initials "WD") Generally, VHS movies are released for sale 3-6 months after being available for rental. Why? Money, why else? Work this out (use a calculator if you have to) Video stores- especially these days- like to boast that they always have the movie in stock. They do this by buying a TON of them- an average buy on a movie that did fairly well is about 50 or so. More in higher volume stores. They pay approximately 101.99 per tape. Most people will watch the movie once and never see it again. But the video store makes it's money by more than one customer renting it. Now figure the number of video stores in the country. Quite a few of them out there. The number of people who actually want to OWN the movie is a much smaller margin. So compare thousands of video stores buying 50 copies of 100 dollar movies to thousands of people buying ONE at 19.99.