TV

This past Sunday was a great day for watching football.  The New England Patriots played the Baltimore Ravens, while the New York Giants faced off against the San Francisco 49ers.  Both games were incredibly close but in the end the Patriots and Giants were the victors.  Now Patriots and Giants will play for the Super Bowl Championship on Sunday, February 5^th.  Are you ready for your Super Bowl party?

It is time to impress your friends this year with your TV Lift Cabinet.  Yes, that’s right. You have the large flat screen TV and the wow factor of the lift machine.  Of course, your house is the ultimate place to throw a Super Bowl party!  Now make sure to sport your team’s jersey, get the snacks and beverages ready and have that remote in hand. And just remember even if your team doesn’t win, you will still have bragging rights with your friends because you have a TV lift cabinet and they don’t.

Hulu, the popular video streaming service, has stepped into the forefront of streaming TV shows and movies to TV lift cabinets, PCs and smartphones. It seems only natural that the next step would be its own original series. The idea has long been discussed among executives and Hulu fans alike. Today, Hulu has officially announced the confirmed debut date of February 14^th for the Hulu original series, “Battleground”

“Battleground” is a political comedy that is centered on a primary campaign for a Wisconsin senate seat. Hulu will air 13 episodes of the new series beginning in February. It is the first of three original shows that Hulu plans to air over the coming months. In addition to “Battleground”, Hulu will introduce “A Day in the Life” (a documentary about fame) as well as a travelogue from the director of “Dazed and Confused”, Richard Linklater.

Original programming seems to be the latest venture for online streaming services like Hulu. Demand for inexpensive options to watch TV shows and movies continues to rise as consumers become more discouraged with increasing cable costs.  Hulu is not the only streaming service to jump on the original programming train. Their main competitor, Netflix, recently announced its own plans for an original series entitled “Lilyhammer”. With a 60% increase in revenue last year for Hulu, there is plenty of opportunity to expand original programming if the initial offering is a success with viewers.

This year at the Annual CES show in Las Vegas, there was definitely buzz generated around Smart TVs.  Television makers were aiming to impress and bring forth cutting edge technology.  Here are some snippets of what TV lift cabinet owners can expect to see come to market within the next year.

• Samsung and LG are increasing their sets’ processing power and memory to give television watchers the ability to streamline content and videoconference via Skype with friends.
• Samsung, Sony, and LG are using organic light-emitting diode (OLED) technology.  OLED can glow without separate light source.  In laymen terms, enabling them to produce wafer thin TVs.
• LG will sell these OLED televisions with a motion sensing Magic Remote.  Their new Magic Remote has voice recognition capabilities.

According to Technology News website CNET, Toshiba has confirmed that they will begin shipping a Glasses-Free 3D TV to the U.S. in early 2012. No indication was given to CNET on possible sizes for the TV. Toshiba currently has glasses-free 55” 3D TVs for sale overseas in Germany and Japan where they sell for over $10,000 apiece in each country.

The glasses-free model will be a welcome development for a large percentage of 3D TV fans and TV lift cabinet owners. Common complaints from 3D TV viewers, as well as those who have tried but shunned the devices: A) Glasses are inconvenient and can interfere with performing multiple tasks while watching 3D entertainment and B) The 3D glasses and resulting images can cause headaches.

So, how does it work? We frequently touch on the topic of 3D TVs on our blog and the topic of Toshiba’s glasses-free 3D TV has been discussed previously when it was more in its infancy. 3D TV works by presenting each eye with a slightly different image, giving the viewer perceived three dimensional pictures. Typically, the glasses would combine the two images to result in the 3D picture. In the glasses-free model, many tiny lenses project two different pictures from the screen, one to each of the viewer’s eyes. This effect is easier to achieve with only one viewer. With multiple viewers, the TV must ‘learn’ where the faces are located and project images accordingly. This is one major difference between Toshiba’s 3D TV and watching a standard HD TV. With Toshiba’s 3D model, the viewer(s) will need to press a button on the remote to launch facial recognition software. This allows the TV to present the best possible image for all viewers – pretty incredible stuff. We can’t wait to read more about it when the newest prototype is unveiled at CES on Sunday.

While Apple is busy keeping their planning under wraps, the rest of us are busy trying to discover what they are up to, especially when it comes to their iTV.

What has been leaked through the grapevine is that Samsung Electronics in Korea has started producing chips for the iTVs since November 2011.  Sharp also is rumored to be producing the displays for the new TVs.  The screens will be relatively small for the initial introductory phase at between 32 and 37 inches and will be better suited for the small foot of the bed TV lift cabinets.

Sterne Agee Analyst Shaw Wu wrote, ““We continue to hear what AAPL would love to do is offer users the ability to choose their own customized programming, i.e., whichever channels/shows they want for a monthly subscription fee. This is obviously much more complicated from a licensing standpoint. And in our view, would change the game for television and give AAPL a big leg-up against the competition.”

Wu goes on to write about how the biggest obstacle right now for Apple to iron out its content partnerships and licensing terms.  Apple has content and licensing agreements in place for iTunes but only for movie rentals, not TV shows or live broadcast television.  Apple would like live television offered via the internet or IPTV instead of through cable providers.  That is the direction Apple would like to go in and is currently in discussions to make this happen.

Film Director Peter Jackson is bringing us back to the Shire yet again, with his latest movie, The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey.  This movie tells the story (with a few twists) of J.R.R. Tolkien’s novel, The Hobbit which is the prequel to the Lord of Rings film trilogy.

For those Lord of the Ring enthusiasts, this is another chance to escape into the realm of Middle Earth. Jackson has brought back some of the original cast from Lord of the Rings, with Elijah Wood playing Frodo, Cate Blanchett the White Witch, Orlando Bloom as Legolas and Ian Holm as Bilbo.

The novel is being broken down into two parts.  The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey is the first part of the story.  The second movie is called The Hobbit: There and Back Again.  The first movie is scheduled to be released on December 14, 2012 with part 2 coming out a year later on December 13^, 2013.  It may be awhile for these movies to make it to your TV lift cabinets, but great films are always worth the wait.  I expect nothing less from Peter Jackson’s films. The trailer clip can be viewed here.

Apple has made it no secret that they plan to enter into the television market.  In Steve Jobs’ biography titled “Steve Jobs”, Jobs mentions how he felt he had finally come up with the solution to enhance the standard HDTV.  It makes sense for Apple to use their existing technology for ipads and iphones and apply it towards the television.

The ultimate Smart TV would have features such as wireless streaming capabilities, voice and motion controls and the ability to share content across multiple devices.  Consumers would be able to stream content from their ipads directly onto their Smart TV inside their TV lift cabinet.  According to The Wall Street Journal, Apple is currently in discussions with media executives to discuss their progress on developing a Smart TV.  It will be interesting to see what features Apple creates for their new Smart TV and when this TV will be released to general public.

Are you one of the millions of Americans who find themselves startled by excessively loud commercials while watching their TV lift cabinet? Well, good news! The FCC is finally cracking down on commercials that are much louder than TV programming. FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski made the announcement on Tuesday. The new act, titled The Commercial Advertisement Loudness Mitigation Act, means that loud commercials will no longer interrupt programming. Commercials will be required to be the same volume as programming and news.

After years of complaints, Congress finally got the ball rolling a year ago when it passed legislation regarding intrusively loud commercials. It was then up to the FCC to create and implement rules to keep commercial volume in check. FCC Commissioner Michael J. Copps elaborated: “I cannot tell you how many hundreds of citizens have told me — personally, through emails and letters, at public hearings, even across the family dinner table — how obnoxiously intrusive they find loud commercials.” Now it is in the hands of cable, satellite and local broadcasters to ensure volume remains consistent.  The new rules go into effect in December 2012.

Over the next week, sports fans will officially make the transition from summer sports to winter sports with the start of the MLB World Series. This year’s championship has the American League’s Texas Rangers facing off against the National League Wildcard, St. Louis Cardinals. You can catch the action on your TV lift cabinet starting Wednesday, October 19 at 8:05PM ET on FOX. The Series kicks off in St. Louis where the Cardinals are considered underdogs to the Rangers’ domination.  However, the momentum that the Cardinals have gained through the playoffs so far could work in their favor. The Cardinals have two games at home before heading back to Texas for Games 3 and 4.

Texas, on the other hand, have been considered favorites by many throughout the entire season. The two main obstacles that could have thwarted the Rangers’ play-off run were the Red Sox and the Yankees. With the Red Sox (shockingly) not making the play offs and the Yankees being eliminated at the hands of the Detroit Tigers, the Rangers have another chance to take home top prize.

Be sure to tune into the World Series on your TV lift cabinet to make sure you do not miss any of the action!

Okay TV Lift Owners, the numbers are in following last week’s onslaught of season premieres. Variety reports that CBS and Fox are on top, thanks to new shows like ‘The X Factor’ and perennial favorites such as ‘The Big Bang Theory’. For the first time, Fox won out with the adult 18-49 demographic.  The network received big gains with comedy “The New Girl” while “Glee” countered with a disappointing showing, dropping out of the top ten.

The bottom two networks were ABC and NBC, third and fourth place respectively. “Modern Family” on ABC dominated mid-week. NBC faltered with its best results coming in during “The Office” on Thursday night.

Of note is the success of comedies so far this season. Variety’s article showed that 9 of the top 10 shows last week were comedies. This result does not include sports. For the record, Sunday Night Football was the number two most watched program last week.

All in all, this season of network TV is shaping up to be better and watched by more people than ever before. New shows are making a big splash. Even new stars are shaking things up (“Two and a Half Men” with Ashton Kutcher in the lead was the week’s number one show). Did any particular new show catch your attention? Leave your reviews in the comments!