I read with interest your post on computers in teaching cinema. I think there are many useful ways it could help. But one aspect disturbs me and that is the seeming reliance on the computer to expose students to films. It seems to me that the increasing use of low-quality video to show films is a disaster. One of the most interesting and significant things about film is its resolution. By downgrading films to video reproduction, students are deprived of understanding how powerful and effective these images can be in an atmosphere in which they are not under the control of the viewer. The size and quality of the image in a theater is an essential element in understanding the medium. The psychological value of being in an audience and not being able to manipulate the experience is totally lost with electronic methods. Projecting images electronically, at least at the present state of the art, reduces the great works of cinema to the level of just another music video or commercial -- a disposable part of the information slag which represents the current situation. It would be like teaching art history with xeroxes of the great paintings or learning about music with a kazoo. Gene Stavis, School of Visual Arts - NYC