The Disney Vault is something I loathe and admire all at once. They release movies to DVD (or, in the old days, VHS) for only a limited window, and then put the title back into the “vault” for another 10 years. It creates a nice marketing buzz and cranks up the demand for their beloved films.

It’s a genius idea, from a business perspective–and not too many studios have the cache to pull it off.

But as a consumer, it’s mind-numbingly awful. You have to wait years for certain titles to become available. I honestly think it’s counter productive at this point. In today’s on-demand world, I think they’d make more money if I could buy Bambi whenever I darn well pleased.

(Don’t even get me started on this business about Disney DVD’s ALWAYS costing $20, no matter what… no matter where… no matter the title. That is about as annoying as anything.)

So the announcement today that Disney will start streaming their films online for free caused a bit of cautiousness in me (understandably so). Because I figure there would have to be some major catch to this deal.

And guess what… there is.

First, not all Disney movies will be streamed. Only the films they are showing each week this summer on ABC’s Wonderful World of Disney series will be streaming online for free–and only for the week following their airing on television.

So, it’s basically the streaming-online version of the Disney Vault.

That being said, if you have kids, and haven’t bought Finding Nemo for them yet (what are you waiting for?), you can watch it online with them for free through Friday.

While I can see some upside to this for the consumer, it’s very small. Fact is… if you’ve got high-speed internet and a hearty enough computer to handle quality video streaming, you can probably afford to own the Disney titles your kids love–and you probably already do.

Oh well. At least they’re trying something. Here’s a sampling of some of the other movies to come this summer, from the article:

“Monsters, Inc.,” “Haunted Mansion,” “Confessions of a Teenage Drama Queen,” “Princess Diaries 2,” “Freaky Friday” and “Peter Pan” also will be available on the site this summer.

So there you go. If you want to watch any of those movies online for free, with your family or something… check out the article. Or you can just borrow my Finding Nemo DVD.

PollDaddy is a create-your-own website poll service, and we thought we’d take it for a test drive for you.

The core service is free. You can create polls, publish them on your website, and have unlimited responses to them.

If you want to pay $20/month, you can upgrade to a premium package that allows for even more scalability and customization… as well as access to statistics about your poll and the people who took it. (We’re testing out the free version, because we’re cheap and we spent all our money on golf balls).

To give this thing a trial, we decided to ask our audience to help us name our robot.

We recently added a robot to our payroll. He takes care of a lot of the more mundane tasks such as taking out the garbage, cleaning the office, & fixing paper jams in the printer. Oh, he also answers tech questions from our readers in a new online Q&A column over at iSurfSumner.com (Dear Abby for Technology). Right now we’re calling him Arnie the AnswerBot, because we’re not very creative and didn’t want to waste precious time on the robot-naming task.

But we wonder if there isn’t a better name out there for him. Here… before you make up your mind… he looks like this:

Okay, so what does that guy look like to you? A Mike? A Simon? Maybe a Winchester?

Killing two birds with one stone, here is our PollDaddy poll where you can vote to help us name our new robot. Feel free to suggest a name yourself if you don’t like our choices, and vote as often as you like. Take the poll now:

As you can see, the poll is quite slick. It was easy to build and only took about 3 minutes. If you have anything worth letting your readers vote on… head on over to PollDaddy and sign up. Oh, and check back here on our blog to see what kind of name the little robot guy ends up with.

Photoshop has been the gold standard of professional photography software.  Several years back, they expanded their brand’s reach by releasing a scaled down version (for a much cheaper price tag) called Photoshop Elements. 

Now Adobe is gunning for even more by releasing Photoshop Express, a free online version of Photoshop. 

Aimed squarely at the core audience for already-established free photo-editing software like Google’s Picasa, Photoshop Express is a web-based application that uses Flash as a platform. 

You create an account and upload your photos.  From there, you have some basic editing tools at your fingertips such as cropping, color adjustment, red-eye reduction, and much more. 

You can also then create a gallery and export your edited pictures to that gallery for all the world to see.  In this way, Express is a lot like Flickr or PhotoBucket or any other photo-sharing website. 

It’s a crowded marketplace, so Adobe has their work cut out for them.  After all, any Windows user can already perform most of the same kinds of basic picture edits using Microsoft Office Picture Manager, which comes with the Microsoft Office suite of programs. 

But Adobe has their brand name going for them.  Everyone knows of Photoshop.  And now, what was once an expensive and complicated software for the elite has a new younger brother that is trim and simple and, best of all, free. 

So I tested it out for you.  I created my account, and uploaded a few photos.  The main photo on this post is one of the results of my edits.  I tried to use as many Photoshop Express features as I could on that picture, but if I’m honest… a lot of them weren’t terribly useful.  The main feature to rave about is the “color pop” control.  You can see that I’ve made everything in the photo black and white except for the jellyfish.  That’s a nice touch, I think, and not something I can do easily with some of the other basic photo-editing suites. 

I did feel like the Flash interface really slowed things down for me.  There’s a lot of wasted time spent waiting around for sections of the site to load, and that was aggravating.  Maybe I just have a slow connection today… but I doubt it.  Flash elements are notorious for slowing down a site’s performance. 

Overall, though… for something that’s free, you can’t beat it.  And since the project is still in beta (testing mode), you can be sure that customer feedback will help fine-tune things quite a bit.  So the end product will likely be even better. 

Check it out yourself here. 

Oh, and here’s the original photo for my example above… almost a shame I chose this picture, because the original is pretty darn good to begin with. 

The current iTunes business model is that you pay $0.99 per song.  It’s been that way for quite some time, in fact. 

But according to news reports, Apple is negotiating with record labels for a new model that would be music to the ears of iTunes fans:  free music access. 

That’s right.  Free.  Apple is trying to get the labels to consent to an iTunes where users gain access to any and all music they desire.  The catch–there’s always a catch, isn’t there?–is that Apple would then charge more for their digital music devices, and pass that extra revenue on to the record companies as payment. 

So your new iPod might cost $500 or $600, but then you’d have free music access to download all the free songs your device can hold.  Well, there’s also a rumor that Apple may include a sort of “membership” or “download subscription” fee–and I can’t tell if that’s in conjunction with the added cost to the mp3 player or as an alternative pricing model.  Either way… free music is probably on its way to iTunes soon. 

Pretty sweet, eh?  Just look at the guy in that picture; that dude is loving this news. 

Theoretically, you’d never have to pay for music again… only for mp3 players.  Granted, those mp3 players might end up costing as much as a gently used motorcycle, but hey… unlimited free music downloads, right? 

Unfortunately, if you own a Zune, you’re out of luck.  Sounds like the only folks who will be able to take advantage of this new model will be people who own or buy Apple products like the iPhone and the iPod.  Of course, if you own a Zune, you’re probably already used to being in the minority. 

The change in revenue model will be huge news if it goes through, and will further cement iTunes’ status as the top destination for digital music downloads.  Check back frequently for updates as news of this development becomes more readily available. 

The Doritos commercial during the second quarter of the Super Bowl last night, where the mouse is jumping through the wall, was the perfect metaphor for the game itself.  The guy with the Doritos, the one setting the mouse trap with a tiny corner of one chip, then sitting back and stuffing his face… that guy is the Patriots.  Confident, favored, the “clear winner” before the contest begins (and he knows it). He even sets up a chair so he can sit and watch and revel in his opponent’s defeat.  

But he didn’t count on his prey, the mouse, being tougher and more prepared for this challenge than could have been expected.  Here, take a look:

See, that’s what you get when you underestimate your opponent.  The NY Giants were the bullies last night, physically dominating the Super Bowl for pretty much the entire game.  Their defensive front pushed around the Patriots offensive line from the second quarter of the game on.  I will admit that I was rooting for the Giants, but calling them the winners of the physical battle in last night’s game is not a biased statement… it’s just a fact.  They were tougher.  That was one of the greatest upsets in NFL history.

But the real Super Bowl water cooler discussion this morning in most offices won’t have anything to do with the game itself.  Instead, office workers across the country are right now debating the greatest and the worst of the Super Bowl commercials.   What’s your favorite?  If you missed any, you can go here to check them all out. 

I clearly enjoyed the Doritos mouse jumping through the wall.  It was as funny as it was unexpected.  Many seem to think the Etrade baby spitting up was great–though a little gross. 

Or how about the trailer for Pixar’s summer 2008 movie, Wall-E?  That was pretty hilarious.  And the Macy’s parade balloons chasing after the coke bottle balloon was very clever as well.  And I was also a fan of the Pepsi/Justin Timberlake commercial. 

Seems like every year, though, the sum total of commercials is underwhelming.  Why does it always feel like previous years had a better crop? 

Hmmm, now my only challenge is to find a way to relate this post to technology, since this is a technology blog and all.  Hmmm.  Well, I did watch part of the game online.  And I watched the rest of it on a flat-panel HD TV.  That’s techy, right? 

I suppose we could talk about the tasteless GoDaddy/Danica Patrick commercial, since it relates to domain purchases.  But that’s just what GoDaddy wants us to do, now isn’t it?  Each year they get racier and racier, all for the sake of the free publicity that’s generated by having a super racy ad–and look at me, contributing to it.  Sorry. 

Well, how about the Etrade commercials?  They’re about a web-based business.  That’s techy. 

Oh, who am I kidding?  I just wanted to talk a little football and share my favorite commercials from the big game.  Time will tell which is the best, as everyone goes online over the next weeks to watch the ones they liked best over and over.  This year’s winner, for me, is the Doritos mouse jumping through the wall.  Great commercial, great analogy for the way little brother Eil and the Giants won the Super Bowl. 

Rupert Murdoch, the Chief Executive of NewsCorp (which recently purchased the Wall Street Journal) has announced that, contrary to industry trends, the newspaper will not offer all of its content online to people without a subscription. So if you’re hoping to read the Wall Street Journal online for free, you’re out of luck.

Which means that the headline of this post might as well be “I Will Continue to Get My News from Sources Other Than the Wall Street Journal.”

The web changed things, folks. Every newspaper groaned and whined as they slowly realized that there was enough free news online that people simply weren’t willing to pay a subscription fee to access a paper’s website. Heck, real-world subscriptions have continued to take a nosedive over the last few years as well. And why not? I know that I can go to Google and search the news section by topic and location and find just about anything I need to know in the world of news. Why would I pay for a paper or online newspaper subscription?

But Murdoch is betting that folks see some extra value in the Wall Street Journal name, so while he is going to offer more free content on the site, there will still be premium features and services that only come with a $99/year subscription. Here’s a quote:

“The really specialized (material) giving the greatest insights, that will still be a subscription service.”

I hear tell they have some finance insight that is apparently of great value. Great. Good for them. Know what? There are tons of free finance-advice sites that I can go to. I have a hard time believing that the Wall Street Journal has cornered the market on insights. I don’t read the Wall Street Journal…never have. But I know that some people who do read it are pretty devoted to it. Maybe their writers have some unique insight into the world’s news that other newspapers’ writers don’t have… but I’m struggling to see the value.

Instead, what I see is an old-world media magnate who wants to cling stubbornly to an archaic business model. In the world of the web, advertising dollars are everything. Advertising is the fuel of the web, and that’s why you see more and more free content online that you used to have to pay for in the real world. Like cable television shows that you can now stream for free on sites like Comcast’s Fancast or at Hulu.

As recently as a few years ago it was a big deal when shows like Lost started streaming episodes online for free the day after they aired. Networks realized that as long as their shows get viewers, it doesn’t matter if they come from TV or online. And viewers equal advertising dollars.

There is no better time of year to discuss this issue than now, with the Super Bowl coming up. It is the mother of all advertising-driven events. The Super Bowl is viewed by more than 100 million people, and yet you don’t have to pay a penny for it. It’s the biggest event of the year in terms of viewership and popularity and buzz….but it’s entirely free. Why do you think that is? It’s because the NFL is not stupid. And by making it free to everyone instead of a pay-per-view event like a boxing match, they get more viewers. And more viewers means they can charge even more for ad time ($2.6 million this year).

Look, there are thousands of new rich people who made their money by starting a website and getting enough traffic to it that they could sell advertising. There’s a 17-year-old gal who makes $70,000 a month from advertising by giving away free “skins” for MySpace profile pages. So the old-school business model would be to charge a few bucks a pop for each MySpace skin. But that wouldn’t be nearly as popular a site as one that touts “free MySpace skins.” The new business model is “give stuff away, and then sell ads.”

And you would think that Murdoch would get this, since his NewsCorp owns MySpace (and paid hundreds of millions of dollars for it). And MySpace is a site that’s free to use. Free to its over-180-Million users. So how are they monetizing it? Advertising.

Geez, I’m repeating myself so much that even I’m starting to think I’m a broken record.

So it just baffles the mind that you still cannot read the Wall Street Journal online for free, and won’t be able to do so anytime soon. And that this news comes on the heels of this article that talks about how newspaper websites are soaring in terms of readership. I’d be tempted to call it a shame, if I couldn’t just go find my news for free at… oh…. any other news site on the Internet! Don’t mistake my ranting for anger. I have no ill will toward Mr. Murdoch or his fancy newspaper. And if they can get people to pay $99/year to read the “special insights,” then more power to them. They are among the more popular subscription sites on the web.

But how many more people would bookmark the site and read the Wall Street Journal online if it were free?

UPDATE:  Here’s a new article detailing another way that the Wall Street Journal demonstrates their disdain for web users.  Apparently, they recently set up accounts so that you can’t have simultaneous logins on separate computers for one account.  So if you log in at home, and forget to manually log out (closing the browser doesn’t do it) and then try to log in on your work computer… you’re stuck.  The system locks your account and you have to call in on a telephone to get it reset.  Ugh.  What a mess.  I really don’t think the WSJ understands how to deal with the Internet or its users.