Faces vs places

I find it really interesting that I have a very hard time remembering people's names /faces /usernames, but have no problem with places.

Sample one: driving along on a main road somewhere in Yorkshire, 'Ah ha, there's an ice cream parlour near here, we went six years ago!' Ten miles of country roads later, there it is, on the bend that I remember.

Sample two: visiting a foreign city for the first time in about fifteen years, I can recognise the remainder shop where I bought some CDs, DVDs and watches. Oh, and one of the local equivalent of TheWorks chain where I had bought a puzzle.

Music vs film

The other recent thought was when it comes to music, I look on in amazement at people buying new vinyl of old stuff. There were loads of reasons why CDs took off as a music format over vinyl, with about the only downside being that there wasn't so much room for the cover art. (Oh, and the cost, but that's now reversed, especially with second-hand where you can more or less guarantee that a CD that's not badly scratched will play perfectly.)

Somewhat cynically, I think the popularity of the 'includes link to MP3 download!!' stickers on such LPs shows how many of them are actually played rather than just used as ornaments.

But when it comes to film, I have spent a lot of time in cinemas, including many, many hours at the old National Film Theatre and the still much missed Scala in Kings Cross...

.. but now I have to be actively prodded to go. Live broadcasts, fine, but for 'film' it's a struggle and I really do not want to pay anything like the standard price.

I'm wondering how much the switch to digital projection has to do with this: do I miss the film noise of scratches and cuts but not the vinyl music noise of rumble and pops? Or is it that a £1 DVD played on a £30-something player with 5.1 sound plus a £199 TV is good enough?