Blog articles from 01/2013

By Kurt Scherf, Contributor Although a great deal of web and apps capabilities are being directly embedded into televisions and other consumer electronics, there were several companies that demonstrated stand-alone set-top boxes with the ability to not only connect to well-known online content sources such as Netflix or Hulu Plus, but also over-the-air (OTA) and even cable television programming. Among the companies showing such trends were Boxee , NETGEAR , and Roku . Each...

By Kurt Scherf, Contributor TVs make for good eye-candy, and there were plenty of huge displays to be seen from all of the major manufacturers. This year’s hot topic was “Ultra High-Definition” televisions (also known as “Ultra HD” or “4K” sets. In layman’s terms, these are televisions that vastly increase the number of pixels, and therefore the resolution, on TVs. Having seen them up close at the 2012 CES, I can verify that the picture image is stupendous, and...

Think tanks have always seemed a curious concept to me, throwing up images of deeply serious people sitting in dark moodily lit rooms, looking wise and meditative, stroking their beards, and smoking pipes. A disturbing image I’m sure you’ll agree, especially as some of them are no doubt women. (And is this thinking full-time, or just a part-time thing? Do they have other jobs? Who is paying them to be a full time think tanker?) These bizarre ponderings aside, some good things...