Think there's a huge market for personal video recorders, or PVRs? So does Wall Street. On September 30, <A HREF="http://www.tivo.com/">TiVo Inc.</A>, the Sunnyvale, California-based maker of hard-disk time-shifters, earned more than $88 million with an initial public stock offering. TiVo shares rose from an opening price of $13.94 to $29.94 each in the first day of trading, a gain of 87%. A total of 5.5 million shares were sold at $16 each.

Last week, <A HREF="http://www.warner.com/">Warner Home Video</A> announced North American shipments to dealers of 1.5 million DVDs of <I>The Matrix</I>, generating $23.4 million in revenues and establishing yet another benchmark in DVD's market acceptance. Setting another industry record, <I>The Matrix</I>, released on DVD September 21, generated sales to consumers of approximately 780,000, or 52% of the shipment totals mentioned above, making it the most successful DVD in first-week sales. According to VideoScan, first-week consumer sales of <I>The Matrix</I> on DVD were three times greater than the next-highest-selling title to date.

Digital television (DTV) sales to dealers exceeded 50,000 units at the end of August, according to figures released last week by the <A HREF="http://www.cemacity.org/">Consumer Electronics Manufacturers Association</A> (CEMA). At CEMA's recent DTV Summit, the organization's fifth, CEMA president Gary Shapiro stated that "DTV is moving forward at a promising pace, and we expect continued success in the third and fourth quarters."

L.A.'s Beverly Hilton Hotel will be swarming with television executives and technical gurus this week as the <A HREF="http://www.cemacity.org/">Consumer Electronics Manufacturers Association</A> (CEMA) hosts its fifth Digital Television Summit conference. The conference officially begins Tuesday, September 28, preceeded by a reception Monday evening featuring a high-definition broadcast of <I>Monday Night Football</I>.