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Earlier this month executives from CBS, NBC, ABC, Fox, UPN and WB announced jointly that their research efforts have indicated that people who use TiVos and other DVRs not only watch more television, but that some even watch the commercials rather than blasting right past them with the fast-forward button.

What's the most annoying flaw in digital programming from DVDs or HDTV? Video artifacts? Macroblocking? Freeze-ups? Standard definition commercials? David Letterman?

I dropped in to my local Costco today after lunch to pick up a couple of new DVDs. (No, Virginia, we don't get free review samples for <I>all</I> the titles that come out.) The aisles were crowded with cartons containing new televisions, all of them plasmas, LCDs, and DLPs. I saw the same thing last week when I was in Fry's&mdash;a California chain well known for just about everything electronic and a few things that are not. The branch in my area gives the same amount of space to a giant, 10-foot ant suspended from the ceiling (not a real one&mdash;just in case you were wondering if I've been watching too much science fiction lately) as it does to the latest in big-screen TVs. With the boxes piled high and deep at retailers everywhere, it's obvious they're all humming <I>'Tis the Season to be TV Buying</I> and <I>Jingle Bills</I> (but no interest until 2007).

When you live with something or somebody long enough (no matter how good the body—or how great the personality), it's all too easy to become complacent about how well off you are. That thought came to mind the other night when I was watching, of all things, The Blues Brothers. I had forgotten how great the music is in that movie. But then I noticed that part of what had made me rediscover my appreciation for the movie was the truly nice Triad Silver speaker system I had been living with for a little while but had stopped noticing.