nitpick: discrete vs. digital

[Jeffrey Reid]

On Thu, 11 Jul 1996, David L. Pelovitz wrote:
> I can't help but think that the television/film division is reinforcing
> a larger analog/digital division in Pynchon's work.  After all, film is
> digital, operating at 24 fps with absolute demarcations.
Don't be confused about the difference between digital and discrete.
a digital recording is (straight from the OED)
  "a Designating (a) recording in which the original waveform is
digitally coded and the information in it represented by the presence or
absence of pulses of equal strength, making it less subject to degradation
than a conventional analogue signal; of or pertaining to such recording."

Film may be recorded in discrete images but it is in no way digital.  No
ones and zeros.

I think your point may hold water from the point of view of a discrete
media (even film series exist in well separated quanta [except maybe the
old serials?]) whereas TV with its reruns and different airing dates in
different cities, sometimes even airing episodes in a different order
approximates a continuum much better (but to be a stickler TV series are
discrete in the sense that they are episodic and each episode can be
viewed on its own)...

Maybe TRP just didn't have a handy classic TV reference guide?

Jeff

---------------------------------------------------------------
Jeffrey G Reid       			jgreid at u.washington.edu
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"O holy mathematics, may I for the rest of my days be consoled
 by perpetual intercourse with you, consoled for the wickedness
 of man and the injustice of the Almighty!"  -- Isidore Ducasse