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RCA has been making commercial televisions longer than anyone, and they can take some credit for having invented the technology. Vladimir Zworykin, the chief engineer on the company's TV project during the 1930s and '40s, created the first workable picture tube, while his competitor, Philo Farnsworth, developed the first workable receiver and other elements. A federal court ruled that Farnsworth was the true inventor of modern-day electronic television, but RCA played a critical role—and was entirely responsible for its successful commercial introduction.

Maybe This Christmas, Various Artists Here's one of the best various-artist collections in years, focusing on new names like Coldplay, Phantom Planet, and Bright Eyes.

Within seconds of firing up Miramax's DVD release of the classic Beatles movie A Hard Day's Night, I knew that the Fab Four had been deep-sixed by the new set's producers. The image quality is excellent-the movie appears for the first time in a widescreen (1.66:1) video transfer-but the music is another story.

A red laser–based Advanced Optical Disc (AOD) format system developed by Toshiba and NEC has been chosen by the DVD Forum as the standard for next-generation high-definition DVD players. The DVD Forum will develop AOD specs and publish them in the spring, according to the Nikkei news service. NEC said it would release AOD drives for PCs next year. Toshiba plans to market AOD home recorders in 2004.