A �media center� could be an integral part of every home by 2015. But movies on demand need a willing Hollywood and a super-PVR -- In a recent interview with Japanese web site TechOn, Star Wars director George Lucas discussed the impact of digital movie-making on cinema and touched on the rise of home entertainment servers in the digital home. Lucas is an unabashed devotee of digital film and digital projection � the second Star Wars prequel, Attack of the Clones, was the first movie to be shot entirely using a high-definition 24fps digital camera, Sony�s HDW-F900. The creator of that galaxy far, far away sees a digital future where more Hollywood movies will be shot in this way, more filmmakers will get their work shown and movies will be distributed over the Internet. �I'm not sure how it will actually play out,� Lucas is quoted as saying, �but it seems to be something like the same day and date of a movie being released in a movie theatre, you can also get it over the Internet.� �I think eventually [Internet distribution] will be the future of Hollywood,� Lucas said in another interview, this time with US news channel CNBC. But like many industry observers, he is also realistic about this future happening any time soon.
For decades, the story of digital commerce has been one of incremental improvement: better search, faster checkout, smarter recommendations. But something more fundamental is now underway. The emergence of agentic commerce, in which AI agents autonomously search, evaluate, and execute purchases on behalf of buyers, represents a genuine architectural shift in how commerce operates. Whether it becomes the revolution its proponents promise, or another technology that peaks at interesting pilot project, will depend on how effectively the AI industry addresses the structural challenges it faces. Agentic Commerce Market Development Agentic commerce involves deploying AI agents to handle the full purchasing cycle. Rather than browsing a website and entering card details yourself, you grant an AI agent the authority to act on your behalf, within defined parameters. The agent handles product discovery, comparison, negotiation, and payment execution. It draws on your procurement preferences, pur...