by Scott Tilley

Consumer electronics is big business, and one of the driving forces behind many innovations in pervasive computing. New gaming consoles, home appliances, and PC-oriented audio-video equipment all continue to sell well, even in the current economy. However, there is more to consumer electronics than games. At the 2002 Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas last month, the most popular item was a new wrinkle on an old format: satellite radio.

In the last issue of SIGPC about the Los Angeles Auto Show I said that it was very tiring trying to cover all of the LA Convention Center in one day. That's true, it was tiring; but it was just a short stroll compared to trying to cover all of the Las Vegas Convention Center  for the 2002 Consumer Electronics Show (CES 2002) last month -- especially with the new 1.2 million square feet of exhibit space. It was huge!

Consumer electronics is big business, worth more than $90 billion in the U.S. alone last year. CES 2002 attracted more than 100,000 people and 1,900 exhibitors from 110 countries. There were live demonstrations, broadcasts, even geeky fashion shows! Keynote speakers included Bill Gates from Microsoft, Carly Fiorina from Hewlett-Packard, and Bill Esrey from Sprint.

There were several interesting products demonstrated at the show that were completely new to me. Probably the most interesting was an ad-hoc peer-to-peer application targeted to teenagers called Cybiko. The device looks a little bit like a cross between a Palm Pilot and a cellular phone, but with a small keyboard and a few more buttons. The Cybiko uses a wireless network to lets its users communicate with one another, to play multi-user games, and to control other devices. It also plays MP3 music files. It was quite novel, and I think may prove to be very popular if it gets enough marketing momentum behind it. 

[back to the top]

Satellite Radio

There were two satellite radio companies at CES 2002: XM Satellite Radio and Sirius. However, since XM had the largest presence at the show, I'll focus on them. The service provided by XM costs $9.99 a month. For this, consumers receive 100 channels of commercial-free (or limited commercial) digital radio programs. There are currently about 70 music channels, which include niche market channels such as "Progressive County" and "Christian Rock". The remaining channels are news, sports, comedy, and variety.

To receive the signal, you must purchase and install a new satellite radio for your car. There are only a few brands currently available, costing about $300. The coverage is coast-to-coast, so you can be driving through the Arizona desert and listen to the same station that you heard when you left Los Angeles.

Personally, I'm not sure the technology is quite ready, but the idea is intriguing. If and when most radios are satellite-ready from the dealer, I think this new flavor of radio will become very popular. I don't know why XM doesn't allow people to pay for their service over the Internet, so that I could listen to it from my computer; I think their missing a potentially big market.

Satellite radio was in fact just one facet of a theme at CES 2002: consumer automobile electronics. Many manufacturers seem to view the automobile as a gold mine for gadgets like seat-mounted DVD players, GPS navigation system add-ons, and of course high-end audio systems. I sometimes think cars are already getting too complicated; service costs are going to make a significant jump upwards once all these electronic devices make their way into the nation's SUVs.

[back to the top]

Recordable DVD

The second highlight was recordable DVD, a topic I mentioned as one of the likely hot technologies for 2002 in the first issue of SIGPC this year. There is still much confusion over which of several formats will gain the most market share for rewriteable DVD: DVD-RAM, DVD-RW, and DVD+RW; it seems the latter two are in the lead for now. But for the more mundane writeable DVD, DVD-R, there is just one format and many hardware/software products are now available.

I listened to an interesting presentation by RWPPI (Read-Write Products Promotion Initiative), which focuses solely on interoperability issues and formatting requirements for rewritable media. It appears this organization is primarily for VARs and resellers, but it may have an indirect impact on consumers by guiding the market. Time will tell which of the rewritable DVD formats will win.

There is also a lot of third-party software coming out related to DVD-R creation for home video. Several companies at CES 2002 had software on display to let consumers take their old VHS tapes (or direct connection from a video camera) and burn a DVD (or a VCD in some cases) with the content. With mainstream applications like Apple's iMovie becoming more powerful and easier to use, this will likely become a commonplace activity for most computer users.

[back to the top]

Photos and Comments

CES 2002 was a very enjoyable event. If you can, I suggest you head to the Nevada desert in 2003 for a show that I'm sure will be even larger than 2002. Below are some of the many photos I took during the day. Click on the thumbnail image to see the full-size version.

	The main entrance to the North Hall of the Las Vegas Convention Center. Just out of the picture on the left was the fashion show. It was rather amusing to watch actually: "fashion" usually meant how many geeky devices a model could be seen wearing on the runway. (99KB)
	This was the exhibit from Cybiko, which I found to be one of the most interesting of the show. I have to admit that I'd never heard of the company before, but the gadget sure was cool! An excellent example of the rapid consumerization of very advanced networking technology. (127KB)
	One of several special sessions that were part of CES 2002 was related to information technology for the automobile. This is one of my research areas. The discussion was very interesting, full of new ideas such as optical networks for the car running on inexpensive plastic fiber cables. (79KB)
	C|NET was broadcasting live from CES 2002. I happened to come by when they were interviewing someone from the Boston area about a new digital camera. It was very cool, literally the size of a credit card! (142KB)
	This was the booth that XM Satellite Radio used to broadcast their show live from CES 2002. XM was the hit of the show. In the picture are XM DJs interviewing Gabe Kaplan ("Welcome Back Kotter"). XM had several celebrities at CES to attract attendee attention -- and it worked. (127KB)
	TechTV was broadcasting live coverage of the show. If you were staying in the Hilton Hotel, you could watch them on a special closed-circuit channel. There was enough Sumi Das for the rest of us on the regular TechTV cable channel. (115KB)
	OK, so this one has nothing to do with CES 2002 -- I just was happy to see one of my favorite bands from my high school days: "Cheap Trick". They were being interviewed by a DJ from Sirius, the other major satellite radio provider at the show. (119KB)