Sony is announcing six new 3D ready TVs this year. Some come with the glasses and others require a separate purchase of glasses and infrared transmitters. It is planning for 3D to be ten percent of its TV sales. Panasonic and Samsung already have 3D sets available at Best Buy. Vizio, the number one largest LCD TV seller, is following with a 72inch, 480Hz LED 3D HDTV screaming stunner in August, with smaller 3D sets to follow. The 72inch is slated to cost a comparatively measly $3,500.
At least a dozen 3D movies are coming out this year and a large number of theaters are upgrading to 3D capable screens.
ESPN has been testing it for two years and recently announced it is coming out with an all 3D network June 11, and plans to have at least eighty-five 3D events ready this year. One caveat, the new network will go dark when no 3D is available. Discovery announced plans for its 3D network to begin broadcasting in 2011.
Gamers are also in on the 3D craze and Microsoft and others announced some of their new games in all 3D.
Just when we all have slipped into the HDTV age, another new technology makes it obsolete. Still, I don't see full scale adoption for another 4 - 5 years, but I do smell upcharges coming sooner to a cable network near you.
Mar 15, 2010
Mar 12, 2010
Birthday Wishes
Tomorrow is Donald Duck's Birthday. He was likely born Friday, March 13, 1914. The number of his car license is always 313 and it really does reflect his birthday.
A Hundred Years Ago
Here are a few things from a century ago. -
1910 - First photo of Halley's Comet 1910
1910 Boy Scouts of America is founded
1911 First air conditioner invented
1912 Sinking of the Titanic
1912 First use of zippers in clothing
1913 Panama Canal completed
1914 Outbreak of World War I
1915 Fist use of poison gas in warfare
1916 Albert Einstein - General Theory of Relativity
1917 USA enters World War I
1918 Lawrence leads Arabs into Damascus
1919 First airline between London and Paris
1910 - First photo of Halley's Comet 1910
1910 Boy Scouts of America is founded
1911 First air conditioner invented
1912 Sinking of the Titanic
1912 First use of zippers in clothing
1913 Panama Canal completed
1914 Outbreak of World War I
1915 Fist use of poison gas in warfare
1916 Albert Einstein - General Theory of Relativity
1917 USA enters World War I
1918 Lawrence leads Arabs into Damascus
1919 First airline between London and Paris
Cucumber Reduces Eye Puffiness Myth
The cucumber itself does not reduce puffiness. Cucumbers are able to stay cold for long periods of time outside of a refrigerator. That cold is what actually reduces puffiness (it causes blood vessels around our eyes to constrict, thereby reducing swelling). Of course, you could also lay a cold dirty sock over your eyes and it would help as much.
Manly Cupcakes
Looks like someone has kicked it up a notch. One shop has come up with some new manly cupcakes and they are selling like, um, hotcakes. For the Love of Cake's 'mancakes' feature such ingredients as beer and bacon, with no pink sprinkles. The macho cupcakes are part of a new trend that's seeing the once dainty desserts reinvented for an audience that drinks milk straight from the carton.
These new style cupcakes have everything from bacon to beer. They are a tongue-in-cheek response to the apparently too-prissy offerings that dominate display cases. At Butch Bakery in New York, the 12 available flavors include Rum & Coke (rum-soaked Madagascar vanilla cake with cola Bavarian cream filling), Beer Run (chocolate beer cake with beer-infused buttercream, topped with crushed pretzels) and The Old-Fashioned (orange-soaked whiskey cake with lemon curd filling).
These new style cupcakes have everything from bacon to beer. They are a tongue-in-cheek response to the apparently too-prissy offerings that dominate display cases. At Butch Bakery in New York, the 12 available flavors include Rum & Coke (rum-soaked Madagascar vanilla cake with cola Bavarian cream filling), Beer Run (chocolate beer cake with beer-infused buttercream, topped with crushed pretzels) and The Old-Fashioned (orange-soaked whiskey cake with lemon curd filling).
LifeLock and Identity Theft
The Federal Trade Commission and a consortium of state attorneys general have reached a $12 million agreement with an identity theft protection service provider to settle charges that the company used false claims in its advertising. The FTC also charged that its service provided no protection against certain forms of identity theft, including medical identity theft.
LifeLock made promotional claims such as the following: “By now you've heard about individuals whose identities have been stolen by identity thieves … LifeLock protects against this ever happening to you. Guaranteed.”
The forms of protection LifeLock employed as part of its service, placing fraud alerts on customers' credit files “protected only against certain forms of identity theft and gave them no protection against the misuse of existing accounts, the most common type of identity theft,” the FTC release said, adding, “It also allegedly provided no protection against medical identity theft or employment identity theft, in which thieves use personal information to get medical care or apply for jobs. You can place your own fraud alerts on your credit files, but it is a pain to get credit, etc.
LifeLock made promotional claims such as the following: “By now you've heard about individuals whose identities have been stolen by identity thieves … LifeLock protects against this ever happening to you. Guaranteed.”
The forms of protection LifeLock employed as part of its service, placing fraud alerts on customers' credit files “protected only against certain forms of identity theft and gave them no protection against the misuse of existing accounts, the most common type of identity theft,” the FTC release said, adding, “It also allegedly provided no protection against medical identity theft or employment identity theft, in which thieves use personal information to get medical care or apply for jobs. You can place your own fraud alerts on your credit files, but it is a pain to get credit, etc.
Restaurant Healthcare Charge
The next time you eat in a restaurant in San Francisco, take a closer look at the bill. You may see a new line item there, a "health" fee to cover employees’ healthcare.
The idea is to cover the employers’ mandatory contribution to the City’s "Healthy San Francisco" health-coverage system. The charge is levied on employers, but some crafty restaurants are adding a few dollars or percentage points to each customer’s bill to cover this charge.
Their excuse for assessing this charge separately is to let customers know how much they’re paying for employees’ health coverage. That’s the same excuse hotels use when they add "resort" or "housekeeping" fees to unsuspecting guests’ room bills. Caveat Emptor!
The idea is to cover the employers’ mandatory contribution to the City’s "Healthy San Francisco" health-coverage system. The charge is levied on employers, but some crafty restaurants are adding a few dollars or percentage points to each customer’s bill to cover this charge.
Their excuse for assessing this charge separately is to let customers know how much they’re paying for employees’ health coverage. That’s the same excuse hotels use when they add "resort" or "housekeeping" fees to unsuspecting guests’ room bills. Caveat Emptor!
Mar 11, 2010
Booty Call
To prevent the wrong moment, there is an iPhone application that sends ovulation alerts sent to your phone. It sends a series of 18 text messages (3 per menstrual cycle) that let you know when you are most likely to be fertile and provide helpful fertility advice. The name is 'booty caller'.
School Days
Mark Ashby was allowed to get a blue Mohican hairstyle by his parents as a reward for hard work at school in Omaha, Nebraska. The school then suspended him for breaking the dress code.
Mar 9, 2010
What's in a Name
Here are a few you might remember and a few you probably never knew.
| Birth Name | Stage Name |
| Harry Lillis Crosby | Bing Crosby |
| Mendel Berlinger | Milton Berle |
| Joseph Gottlieb | Joey Bishop |
| Emanuel Goldenberg | Edward G Robinson |
| Laszlo Loewenstein | Peter Lorre |
| Camille Javal | Brigitte Bardot |
| Carlos Irwin Estevez | Charlie Sheen |
| John Charles Carter | Charlton Heston |
| Demetria Gene Guynes | Demi Moore |
| Erich Weiss | Harry Houdini |
| Jerome Silberman | Gene Wilder |
| Marion Morrison | John Wayne |
| Norma Baker | Marilyn Monroe |
| Margaret Hyra | Meg Ryan |
| Columcille Gibson | Mel Gibson |
| Maurice Micklewhite | Michael Caine |
| Nicolas Coppola | Nicolas Cage |
| Thomas Cruise Mapother IV | Tom Cruise |
| Allen Konigsberg | Woody Allen |
National Potato Chip Day
Yep, March 14 every year marks the day we celebrate the thin and crispy snack, the potato chip.
Potatoes were originally cultivated in South America, probably in Bolivia, Chile, and Peru. More than 400 years ago, the Inca Indians in those countries grew potatoes in their mountain valleys.
During the Alaskan Klondike gold rush, (1897-1898) potatoes were so valued for their vitamin C content that miners traded gold for potatoes.
Potato Chips were first made in 1853 while Commodore Cornelius Vanderbilt was on vacation in Saratoga Springs, New York. At one restaurant, he kept sending his fried potatoes back to the kitchen because he said they were "too thick". The chef, George Crum, decided that he would cut them into paper-thin slices, boil them in oil, fry them, and salt them as a joke to the Commodore. It backfired. They became an instant success and the restaurant was well known for them.
It was the invention of the mechanical potato peeler in the 1920s that paved the way for potato chips to soar from a small specialty item to a top-selling snack food. For several decades after their creation, potato chips were largely a Northern dinner dish. I can still make a dinner of nothing but chips.
Of course, I am partial to Detroit's Better Made Potato Chips. Detroiters eat an average of 7 pounds of chips per year, vs. 4 pounds in the rest of the country Better Made has even been sending chips to our troops in Iraq.
Chip facts - Chips are available in other countries, and are also called crisps and Saratoga chips. Potato chips have become America's favorite snack, and US retail sales of potato chip are over $6 billion and 1.2 billion pounds a year. The thickness of an ordinary potato chip is 55/1000 of an inch. Ridged chips are 4 times thicker, 210/1000 of an inch. 50.4% of US potatoes come from Idaho. The potato was the first vegetable to be grown in space.
For those who have been wondering, yes, there are bacon potato chips. Who's Your Daddy makes handmade bacon potato chips. They are available on the web and in selected stores around San Francisco.
Potatoes were originally cultivated in South America, probably in Bolivia, Chile, and Peru. More than 400 years ago, the Inca Indians in those countries grew potatoes in their mountain valleys.
During the Alaskan Klondike gold rush, (1897-1898) potatoes were so valued for their vitamin C content that miners traded gold for potatoes.
Potato Chips were first made in 1853 while Commodore Cornelius Vanderbilt was on vacation in Saratoga Springs, New York. At one restaurant, he kept sending his fried potatoes back to the kitchen because he said they were "too thick". The chef, George Crum, decided that he would cut them into paper-thin slices, boil them in oil, fry them, and salt them as a joke to the Commodore. It backfired. They became an instant success and the restaurant was well known for them.
It was the invention of the mechanical potato peeler in the 1920s that paved the way for potato chips to soar from a small specialty item to a top-selling snack food. For several decades after their creation, potato chips were largely a Northern dinner dish. I can still make a dinner of nothing but chips.
Of course, I am partial to Detroit's Better Made Potato Chips. Detroiters eat an average of 7 pounds of chips per year, vs. 4 pounds in the rest of the country Better Made has even been sending chips to our troops in Iraq.
Chip facts - Chips are available in other countries, and are also called crisps and Saratoga chips. Potato chips have become America's favorite snack, and US retail sales of potato chip are over $6 billion and 1.2 billion pounds a year. The thickness of an ordinary potato chip is 55/1000 of an inch. Ridged chips are 4 times thicker, 210/1000 of an inch. 50.4% of US potatoes come from Idaho. The potato was the first vegetable to be grown in space.
For those who have been wondering, yes, there are bacon potato chips. Who's Your Daddy makes handmade bacon potato chips. They are available on the web and in selected stores around San Francisco.
Quotable
Your best years are when the kids are old enough to help shovel snow, but too young to drive the car.
Hair Color Facts
Hair color helps determine how dense the hair on your head is, and natural blondes, top the list. The average human head has 100,000 hair follicles, each of which is capable of producing 20 individual hairs during a person's lifetime. Blondes average 146,000 follicles. People with black hair tend to have about 110,000 follicles, while those with brown hair are right on target with 100,000 follicles. Redheads have the least dense hair, averaging about 86,000 follicles.
Lincoln Logs
Frank Lloyd Wright was born Frank Lincoln Wright, but he legally changed his name when his parents were divorced. Lloyd Jones was his Welsh mother’s maiden name and Frank changed his name to honor her.
Lincoln logs were invented by his son and named after his father's real middle name.
One of my favorite quotes of his, "Give me the luxuries of life and I will willingly do without the necessities."
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