Welcoming Utz
By Jeremy Glowacki
So what do I think of CEDIA’s pick for its first-ever CEO? Easy. I think Utz Baldwin is a great guy and will be an excellent “face” of the organization.I’ve known all of the past CEDIA presidents (now called “chairmen”) pretty well since Mitchell Klein’s two-year term in the late 90s. During this “modern era” of CEDIA leadership, all of these men had unique leadership styles and all had affable personalities. Over the years, the role of the top board of directors member seemed to be reduced in significance by the growing strength of the association’s full-time staff and the development of ...
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Optoma Shows Another Use for a Napkin
By Llanor Alleyne
Digital projection and display manufacturer Optoma is making the rounds this week in New York to get the word out about a few new products coming down the pipe line. This morning, I met with Jon Grodem, the company’s director of product and marketing, who came armed with two Picos, and a lot of insight into where the projection market is heading in these heady times.Over coffee and after a near disastrous water spill, Grodem unveiled the Pico PK-101, touted as “the world’s smallest and lightest micro-portable DLP projector.” Shipping now, (can you say, Christmas present?), the Pico has been ...
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Control4, Panasonic Tap into Phones
By Llanor Alleyne
Panasonic, which most of us find notable for its consumer electronics, took this rainy and windy Thursday in New York City to highlight its communication-branded products -- delivered and appropriately packaged as "enhanced communications solutions." While many of the unveiled products were targeted at the small business market (fun fact: there are 25 million small businesses in the U.S. that, according to Panasonic, represent the world's third-largest economy), custom installation integrators might find one the company's latest offerings of interest.Back in September Panasonic entered into ...
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Retail AV Hit Hard by U.S. Economic Woes
By Jeremy Glowacki
There’s always been a Catch 22 for the custom installation channel when
it comes to mass-market retail competition. On one hand, most retail
outlets -- particularly the big-box stores like Best Buy and Circuit
City -- often under-serve customers looking to make big purchases like
flat-panel TVs, computers, and digital cameras, because of their lack
of product training or simple apathy. Even the “installation
departments” of these retailers typically provide nothing more than a
hang-and-bang attitude with no customer service to speak of. On
the other hand, retail does provide the ...
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Netflix Finally Recognizes Mac Users
By Llanor Alleyne
As an advocate of the mail order DVD rental site, Netflix, i was thrilled to learn last week that the company had finally opened up its "Watch Instantly" functionality -- which streams some movies directly to a PC's screen for no additional cost (with a subscription to Netflix, of course) -- to the Mac platform. I was immediately zinged, however, when I signed into my account and got the "Our apologies, but..." this feature is not available for Macs; the beta-version of the platform was only open to certain Mac customers that Netflix had apparently already chosen. The comments section of one ...
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Green is Good with New Control Product
By Jeremy Glowacki
To adapt and improve upon an annoying catch phrase from the eighties, I’d like to state that "Green is Good." And although business is rough for many of us, I think a new product that launches next week from Agilewaves can give you a Green story and a positive pitch to tell your clients who may be reluctant to buy more toys from you as their stock portfolios continue to tumble.A couple months ago, Residential Systems columnist Gordon van Zuiden wrote about growing "Green" opportunities in the custom integration channel. In that story, van Zuiden cited Agilewaves, a designer of a "Resource ...
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Call Me Mr. RG6
By Jeremy Glowacki
After my first two days of CEDIA Boot Camp course in Indianapolis this week, I’ve become so knowledgeable about the ins and outs of terminating “coax cable” that you can now officially refer to me as “Mr. RG6.” Just think, only two days ago I couldn’t have told you what RG6 was… or RJ45, 16/4, or 16/2 for that matter. Coax? Sure! Cat-6 cable? No problem! But that other wire and cable lingo used to sail right over my head. Now, with two-thirds of CEDIA’s version of installer basic training under my belt, I can confidently identify, pre-wire, label, and terminate cable of all kinds, with the ...
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Polk Audio Fans Show Love and Affection
By Llanor Alleyne
In these finicky consumer times, for a manufacturer to have diehard loyalists is a wondrous thing in and of itself, but Polk Audio's fans are something special. Last week, starting on Thursday night, Polkfest got underway at the Baltimore, Maryland, home of Matthew Polk, chairman of the speaker company. Invited were approximately 20 Polkfest members, all enthusiastic audiophiles mostly from the north and southeast, who helped to organized the event. Perhaps the right word to describe Polkfest is "reverential." Started in 2001 by the shy and very modest Russ Gates, the gathering is an ...
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Bush Enacts Pro-IP Anti-Piracy Law
By Jeremy Glowacki
In what could be another blow for companies like RealNetworks and even consumers and integrators involved with digital media, President George W. Bush this past Monday signed into law a bill designed to increase protection of intellectual property (IP) such as software, films, and music by raising penalties for infringement and creating a national "IP czar." The Business Software Alliance, Motion Picture Association of America, and the Recording Industry Association of America all supported the bill.The Prioritizing Resources and Organization for Intellectual Property Act of 2007, or PRO-IP ...
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CBS Affiliate Leaves Me in the Dark
By Jeremy Glowacki
Given all that’s happening with the U.S. economy, it seems petty to complain about missing a couple of football games in high-definition over the weekend. However, an on-going dispute between my cable provider and the owner of the Indianapolis CBS affiliate has reduced me to doing just that.The Indianapolis-area cable provider, Bright House, cannot carry the station WISH-TV or CBS programming without retransmission consent from corporate owner, LIN TV Corp. That consent expired at 11:59 p.m., October 2, leaving about 125,000 customers, like me, without the station or its other stations in ...
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CEDIA’s Remedy for the Financial Freefall: Invest in Education, Share Best Practices, Explore Retrofits
By Margot Douaihy
The Bureau of Economic Analysis stated this week that consumer spending, which was anemic for the past two quarters, sharply declined in the third quarter. The catalog of woes include plummeting car sales, lines of credits are being cut, airline traffic is dropping, restaurant chains are struggling to fill tables, and there sparse shoppers in stores. What’s more, some economists now believe the cutbacks are so severe that the overall economy did not expand either, and they warn that a consumer-led recession could be severe. The specifics of the current crisis could have a nasty fall out for ...
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RealNetworks Cites Kaleidescape in Hollywood Lawsuit
By Llanor Alleyne
RealNetworks,
most popularly known for digital music service Rhapsody and digital
media player software, RealPlayer, didn't get much of a chance to
celebrate the launch of its latest digi-coup, RealDVD.
That is because the company was promptly sued by Walt Disney Co.,
Warner Brothers, Columbia Pictures, Paramount Pictures, Sony, Twentieth
Century Fox, and Universal Studios -- basically all of Hollywood.
Sounds familiar?High-end media server manufacturer Kaleidescape
is probably in Silicon Valley feeling RealNetworks' pain. Last year,
after a long battle with the DVD Copy Control ...
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My Disneyland Dream Home Experience
By Jeremy Glowacki
The Innoventions Dream Home is located in the heart of Disneyland's Tomorrowland section.As I sat there, my flight delayed at Chicagos OHare Airport I
pondered the carbon footprint required to get me from Carmel, Indiana,
to Anaheim, California. I was on my way to attend the grand-opening
festivities for Disneys Innoventions Dream Home, and the only reason I
was going was because of my respect for the folks at Exceptional
Innovation whose Life-ware brand was one of the core technologies in
the home and one that is increasingly more important to the custom
installation channel. ...
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Fesco Rewards Dealers at Queens NY Event
By Margot Douaihy
Queens, NY--Brooklyn-based Fesco Distributors' second-annual Expo
welcomed more than 1,000 dealers to do business, demo new products, and
network. Held September 16 and 17, at the scenic Terrace on the Park in
Queens, the dealer event showcased products from 35 of Fesco's valued
vendors.
At the event dealers were invited to partake in 300 "show
specials"--significant discounts on premium lines and new brands. David
Goldstein, Fescos director of sales and marketing, is proud of the
ever-growing Fesco portfolio and this unique forum for dealers to meet
manufacturers. "The vendor feedback is ...
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CEDIA Opens Up
By Margot Douaihy
As I searched for a song on iTunes I thought of the exciting
developments that made this year's CEDIA EXPO (my eighth) the most
Apple-friendly and "open source" of its kind.
Numerous new residential products with iPhone/iPod Touch modules and
open source control interfaces proved that manufacturers in the CEDIA
channel really get it. The virtual desktop has replaced the literal
desktop, making 3G phone and PC peripheral controls a must. Music and
video applications are richer and heavier to load, therefore a smart
controller must be strong enough to give full access to ...
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