CES 2009 “It’s All About the Green”
It’s Thursday at the Consumer Electronics Show and being green is the catch phrase of the day. The crowds are running about 10% less than last year, but it's still the largest tech show in the world and the largest show in Vegas for all of 2009.
We are sharing the show with the Adult Video convention, and I’m hearing more than one person has strayed into the wrong camp. One lady I spoke with complained when she was asking for directions that the hotel staff sent her to the adult convention by accident. I told her that might have been because she was wearing a leopard print dress. She was not amused.
We did a lot of interviews today and got some great free stuff. There was a manufacturer of a keychain remote control that can learn and change the TV channel at any bar, restaurant or fitness center. Its so small you can even do it discreetly. I can just picture everyone in the health club having treadmill channel wars while they exercise. I went ahead and changed the channel at the sports bar from a basketball game to a soap opera. Hilarity ensued.
But the big news here is Green Technology. OLED (Organic LED) TVs were out in higher numbers this year. They use almost no electricity and have the richest picture I have ever seen. Does it bother anyone that the picture is brought to us by bacteria being irritated into different colors hundreds of times a second?
One really big thing for TV’s besides the OLED news is that they are all going to have internet capabilities. We announced on our radio show last week about a single TV that could do this, but now a slew of them are expected to be released by Christmas 2009 or even sooner! Yahoo has even announced a widget for internet TVs that allows you to jump around the web on the left side of the screen while you’re watching TV on the right. Now you know why they were practically giving away the plasma TVs over Christmas. The new features in the next six months are going to make your TV look dumb. These new ones will have internet, a built in digital tuner (so you won’t need a set top box), and HDMI ports for watching HD from multiple devices like PS3 and Blue ray. They use a lot less electricity, thus making them green friendly.
This is the same thing that happened to cell phones. If your cell phone only makes phone calls, then you are not “with it” according to anyone under 25. But then again, when do we ever pay attention to those whipper snappers anyway?
Check back tomorrow for the latest news from CES, and watch for our video wrap up on Monday.
For more great tips, check back here and listen to me on the All Tech Radio show at 9:00 Sunday mornings on AM 1360 KUIK, or listen online at http://alltechradio.com.
If you would like your technical question answered here, just email rmcmillen@koin.com. Even if it doesn’t get answered in the column I will always answer by email.
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