Fred Manteghian Blog

Before the advent of Tivo and cable TV’s equivalent, video-on-demand, getting comfortable with a new television series in September was something of a crap shoot. If you missed the first couple of episodes of a new show before you heard good things about it from friends, you could either jump in late without the knowledge of the usually critical first few weeks, or you could wait until the summer rerun season and start afresh. I completely missed the boat on the first three seasons of “24,” forcing me to take a third, and costlier, path: TV on DVD. In the case of a highly addictive show like “24,” the ability to watch 2 or 4 episodes in one sitting more than compensated for the cost of the discs. This year, however, I planned well, and my Directv Tivo box made the new season easy to manage.

Google won't let me get to www.google.com. It forces me to www.google.co.jp when I use my Mozilla Firefox browser.

Because we're about to become a socialist-driven economy where the majority of the population pay no taxes themselves yet demand the minority do so in their stead, I thought it would be a good time for one last economics lesson about capitalism. In particular, the law of supply and demand and in super-particular, the case of the Pioneer Kuro plasma supply chain either drying up or giving the appearance of drying up which, as every good oil executive knows, is practically the same thing!

<span style="float:left;color:#D4D4C7;font-size:100px;line-height:70px;padding-top:2px;font-family: Times, serif, Georgia;">I</span> remember someone telling me years ago that, in order to prevent 'P's sounding like spit on the radio, D.J.'s were coached to say 'B' instead. I remember WBLR, I mean WPLR, in New Haven, Connecticut being one such station. Sometimes you'd catch them, clear as day, with a 'B' rolling off their tongues, but for the most part they got away with it, no one the wiser.

The black bezel gives the picture the appearance of more contrast. Not that it needs it. V-Inc claims 10,000:1. The picture on the <A HREF=" http://www.vinc.com/site/products/product_p50hdm.html" TARGET="NEW"> <b>50” VIZIO P50HDM Plasma Monitor </b></A> stood out in the chorus line of plasma and LCD sets on display at Costco.

We enjoyed the company of eight first year law students last night. Taking the shortest of breaks during the “reading week” which precedes final exams, they came for dinner and a few even stayed for a movie. Some of my daughter’s friends have become regulars of the blog, so they were expecting shock and awe. I don’t believe they left disappointed.

Pioneer blew everyone away with their new 60" plasma prototypes. They claim better than 20,000:1 contrast. They say they can't measure it any higher given todays test equipment. I wonder what Toshiba is using to measure the 50,000:1 contrast they claim they've achieved with SED?