Well, I created another money sink. James Tilton (or was it Alan Matzka?) sent me a pointer to a product called DVD Region X, which converts your Playstation 2 into an all-region DVD player. My initial research led me to believe that it only worked with British PS2's, but I did some more digging, and only one site made that claim. So I decided to take the chance (cheap at $40), and ordered one.
I own a lot of Hong Kong DVDs, but they are Region 0, i.e., they play on any DVD deck. I only own one DVD from any other region besides the US. That DVD is Wild Zero, which I bought for it's gonzo indie bizarreness. I had a friend with a multi-region player dub a tape from it so I could watch it. But I used it to test DVD Region X and it works! Wahoo!
The big media conglomerates invented region coding to control distribution of their movies, preventing folks in Europe from buying a movie on DVD from America, before it made it's European theatrical release, for instance. But come on, they're never going to release Wild Zero in the US, so I have no qualms overriding their stupid control schemes. I buy what I want, and if they don't release what I want in the US, I buy it from overseas. Now I can do it with DVD's as well.
So now I'm rubbing my hands together thinking about all those Japanese and Korean films I've been wanting to see, like Attack the Gas Station and Shiri. This isn't going to cost as much as a PS2 or a new hard disk, but it will be a constant trickle 
.
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