So the crack I was responding to wasn't rather cheap and nasty? I certainly make no claim of being sober and dignified, in any case.

Anyhow, the fact that you seem to perceive a variable effect on things is telling. The speedup itself isn't variable, see? In fact that is something digital media has over analogue: it can't play at the wrong speed. It can play defectively -- stutter, skip, break up, whatever -- but the data is read off the disc and interpreted at a fixed rate rather than physically played in real time (OTOH, every kind of analogue media can and often does play at varying speeds). It doesn't matter what speed Coburn said that line at. If he blurted it in a split second or drawled it out in slow-motion, the speedup would still be 4% of whatever it was -- and if it was three seconds, just as an example, that means the PAL version would one tenth of a second faster. Always and in every instance, irrespective of your mood or psychological reactions or perceptions at any given time.

Reasonable? Well, you stand by the helium comment! No, that's not reasonable at all. It's okay for a cheap crack but it's worthless as a serious contribution to discussing this kind of issue. I think you are responding to the knowledge of there being a speedup per se (and I think this applies to a LOT of people -- and I even experienced it myself before I made a very careful comparison as noted) without caring to appreciate what that really means, and the human mind being so suggestible and perception itself being basically illusory (even our vision, on a scientific level, can be said to be an illusion, an approximation, of what's in front of us), all kinds of random or apparently nonsensical impressions can result.

I'm not angry. A little bemused, yes. What I am really saying is, these comments on PAL almost always seem to come from NTSC natives and it almost smacks of a kind of partisanship. Well, smell the coffee. NTSC is a sh***y format as well, subject to problems at least as notable. I can pick that up much more readily if I'm sitting there looking for it. I'd rather not. Life's too short and a tenth of a second means nothing to no one in the real world. And these chipmunks you're hearing -- your mind's playing tricks on you. Trust me!!

Go on, have the last word. I'm really quitting this time!