Our reviews concentrate more on the technical aspects of a given DVD, rather than the particular merits of its programming content, although when we are pleasantly surprised by a given DVD's content (a "hidden gem"), we'll make a particular point of highlighting this.
We aim, wherever possible, to allocate review DVDs to reviewers who actually like (or think they will like) the content, or have other versions of the DVD to compare with. We feel that the majority of readers who are reading one of our DVD reviews do in fact themselves like the DVD's content, and so are more interested in reading about the technical aspects of the DVD rather than reading about the merits of the content itself.
We are always on the look-out for new reviewers. If you meet our technical requirements, we'd love to hear from you.
News items range in scope from upcoming release announcements to rumours to glitch reports to general news of specific interest to Region 4 DVD enthusiasts.
That's My Say is a site feature which is designed to allow site staff to have their personal say about matters relevant to Region 4 DVD. It can be controversial at times, but it has been very popular since its introduction.
Site users are able to comment on our Reviews and on our Editorials, making for some spirited discussion at times.
As a service to our readers, who may wish to read more than one opinion of a given DVD, we maintain a database of links to other Region 4 reviews elsewhere on the Internet. We visit most other sites on a near-daily basis to keep these links up-to-date, but reviewers from these sites are also able to submit their review links directly if they wish for a more timely service - more documentation can be found here.
We review DVD players and associated DVD hardware, a consistently popular section of the site.
We have many articles covering the technical aspects of DVD which are always popular with our readers.
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| July - Sep 2001 | Oct - Dec 2001 | Jan - Mar 2002 | Apr - Jun 2002 | July - Sep 2002 | Oct - Dec 2002 |
| #7 Entertainment-Movies | #6 Entertainment-Movies | #5 Entertainment-Movies | #6 Entertainment-Movies | #7 Entertainment-Movies | #7 Entertainment-Movies |
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| Jan - Mar 2003 | Apr - Jun 2003 | Jul - Sep 2003 | Oct - Dec 2003 | Jan - Mar 2004 | Apr - Jun 2004 |
| #7 Entertainment-Movies | #6 Entertainment-Movies | #6 Entertainment-Movies | #5 Entertainment-Movies | #5 Entertainment-Movies | #6 Entertainment-Movies |
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| Jul - Sep 2004 | Oct - Dec 2004 | Jan - Mar 2005 | Apr - Jun 2005 | Jul - Sep 2005 | |
| #7 Entertainment-Movies | #9 Entertainment-Movies | #7 Entertainment-Movies | #10 Entertainment-Movies | #10 Entertainment-Movies |
Advertising is available at very reasonable rates. Please email Michael D for further details. Note that we do not accept commission or affiliate-style advertising as we feel that accepting such advertising could lead us to being accused of bias in our reviews and editorial content. We also do not accept adult advertising.
1. How do you choose who gets to review a disc? Reviewer X reviewed my favourite movie and they didn't like it. Surely you should have given this disc to another reviewer who actually liked it?
If a reviewer has another region's version of a DVD, they are given priority when allocating DVDs for review. There is also a system of lesser priorities in place which attempts to allocate a DVD to the reviewer who most wants to review the DVD. The aim is to allocate a review DVD to the reviewer who is the most enthusiastic about it. Sometimes a reviewer unexpectedly dislikes a DVD they have been allocated.
2. How do you carry out your Region 4 versus Region 1 comparisons?
Where possible, the comparisons are carried out directly between the Region 1 (or other region) DVDs and the Region 4 DVD. Where this is not possible, we rely on various online reviews of other versions of the DVDs or, as a last resort, information on other region's e-tailer's sites.
3. You're biased for/against Region 4.
We tend to favour Region 4 releases over releases in other regions, all else being equal. We like to support the local DVD industry whenever we can unless another region's DVD is clearly superior.
4. Where do you get your review DVDs from?
Generally, they come from the local DVD distributors. Most of our review DVDs are supplied by the local distributors at no charge to us and with no strings attached. Some local distributors do not supply us with review DVDs, some because of apathy towards the Internet as a medium and some because they release sub-par product (and we've said as much in the past). Some will only offer the first disc or two of a series for review. In these cases, we have to purchase the DVDs ourselves for review after release date.
5. So you get DVDs for free? What an excellent gig/scam/perk.
Not really. Firstly, if we had to purchase all our DVDs for review, we simply couldn't afford to bring you the in-depth coverage that we do, at least not without charging for it. Secondly, our reviews go into a lot of detail. A typical review of an extras-free DVD takes over 4 hours to produce, much more if there are copious extras to wade through. There's a staggering amount of work involved. A big features-laden 2 disc release can often take up to 24 hours to review. Complete series box sets take even longer than that to cover. Thirdly, whilst we try to allocate review discs to those that like the content, there are many less-than-stellar DVDs out there which can be a real chore to wade through.
6. How much do you pay your reviewers?
Nothing. Most of the time we get to keep the review DVDs, but we're doing this because we love DVD. If we paid our reviewers, we couldn't run the site as a free service.
7. But surely the website must be hugely profitable since it is so popular?
We pay for our bandwidth costs. We have a small amount left over to purchase a few key DVDs for review. That's about it, really. None of us gets paid or makes any money out of this. Maybe we will one day. Maybe.
8. Where is your review of X?
We don't get all DVDs released for review, so sometimes that is an issue, and we only have limited funds with which to purchase review DVDs. Sometimes a reviewer takes a while to produce a review or they go on holidays for a while. We try to get all reviews done in as timely a fashion as possible.
9. How do you get your reviews done before the DVD's release date? Do you review the Region 1 DVD and pretend it is the Region 4 disc?
We are often supplied with preview DVDs which are identical technically to the finally released product. We have never reviewed a Region 1 release and pretended that it is a Region 4 disc (although more than one Region 4 DVD print publication has been caught out this way, and so has the occasional Region 4 web site).
10. I run Website X and want to exchange links with you. What should I do?
If you run a website that is relevant to Region 4 DVD then we will link to it, regardless of whether you choose to link to us or not. If the website bears no relevance to Region 4 DVD then we won't link to it, even if you link to us. If you wish to link to us, feel free to do so in any way you wish, except by using frames (you don't need explicit permission to simply link to something on the 'net). We don't believe in "link exchange", which would merely dilute the relevance of our links page.
We use the current version of PowerDVD, which reports a given DVD's region coding and reports the audio bitrates of the included audio tracks.
To legally run competitions Australia-wide, we'd need to apply for a series of permits for each one - each state and territory in Australia has different rules as to what is required. These permits would cost over $200 per competition, something which we simply don't have the budget to support.
| MichaelD@michaeldvd.com.au | |
| Mailing Address | Michael D's Region 4 DVD Info Page
PO Box 447 Doncaster VIC 3108 |
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