Samsung's Digital Camera PR Raises Serious Questions COMMENT: Samsung Electronics may be #1 in the flat panel TV market but in the digital camera market they are getting their backside kicked because of poor digital camera marketing and even sloppier PR.

Should the NBN Co Cut A Deal With Google & Forget About Telstra? COMMENT: Telstra and the NBN Co could become another horror story for the Rudd Government running into the next Federal Election, with the Federal Opposition set to start focusing on the billion-dollar expenditure that Communications Minister Stephen Conroy is looking to extract from government coffers to fund his broadband pipe dream.

How Sony Screwed Up 3D COMMENT: 3D TV was set to be a turning point for Sony, a new technology that was set to catapult the company back into the dizzy world of old, when millions of consumers purchased Sony Trinitron TVs and the difference between Sony and its competitors was measured in the hundreds of thousands of units.

Politicians Are Scarier Than Gamers COMMENT: Claims by a South Australian politician that gamers are scarier than bike gangs, is a cheap publicity stunt by a politician who is so out of touch with reality that it is frightening.

Why Samsung's Bada Is Set To Be A Fizzer COMMENT: Do we really need another mobile operating system? According to Samsung we do, which is why it is attempting to launch its new Bada OS.

Struggling Sony Banking On 3D TV Make-believe company Sony Australia is set to kick start a bitter 3D TV war later this month, with the company already claiming that it has the best 3D TV offering, spanning TV, content and cameras. The experts disagree.

JB Hi Fi Data Loss Set To Hurt GFK COMMENT: The decision by leading consumer electronics retailer JB Hi Fi to stop supplying data to research company GFK is set to have a ripple effect across the entire consumer electronics industry. It is also set to impact the credibility of GFK data from the retail technology industry going forward.

Google, Sony & Microsoft Give OZ Two Finger Content Salute COMMENT: Australia is fast becoming a content backwater, with vendors like Sony, Samsung Microsoft and Google with their new YouTube TV service choosing not to deliver online content in Australia.

LG 40inch HD OLED TV Coming 15inch OLED By Xmas LG has confirmed that its 15-inch OLED HDTV will ship before Xmas and that they will launch a 30" OLED TV in 2010 and a 40" model in 2012 that will be cheaper than current model LED TV's by 2016.

Sony A Broken Brand With Little Upside COMMENT: As we predicted, Sony has made yet another billion dollar loss, with the Company struggling to not only make a profit but find direction in a brutal consumer electronics market, which is now dominated, by the likes of Apple and Samsung and new kids on the block like Google and Vizio who are now licensing their LED TV technology to Sony.

Who's Screwing Who As Price Gouging Becomes Rampant COMMENT: A major row has broken out over who is ripping off who in the consumer electronics industry following yesterday?s launch of the new Windows 7 operating system which is up to $200 more than the same product in the USA.

Why the Harvey Norman Franchise Operation Is Flawed COMMENT: Harvey Norman Electrical boss David Ackery who earlier this month pocketed $1.5 million when he sold shares in the Company, is adamant that the Harvey Norman Franchise model is the best model for growth up against the store owned model used by JB Hi Fi.

Why Intel Wants To Get Into Your TV Comment: Intel who in partnership with Microsoft have been accused of crashing PCs and servers for years are now trying to muscle in on the TV, Blu ray and PVR market as demand for consumer electronics outstrips PCS.

Consumers Turn Off Sony Despite New Products COMMENT: Tomorrow Sony will launch a new product line-up in an effort to recapture lost sales in Australia they are also tipped to slash the price of several products in an effort to remain competitive. The price cuts come as Sony moves to Chinese manufacturers to make their products.

Has Clive Peeters Compromised A Major Fraud Investigation? COMMENT: The Victorian Police have confirmed that within the past 36 hours a matter relating to the alleged theft of millions of dollars from retailer Clive Peeters, has been referred to them for investigation. But is this too late?

Bugger The Crime, We Got Our Money Say Clive Peeters COMMENT: Sonya Causer, the woman who stole millions from retailer Clive Peeters, is tonight a free woman after a deal was cut between Causer, the one time payroll master at the Melbourne based retailer and Clive Peeters boss Greg Smith.

Has Apple Screwed Themselves Into Cheap Components? Is Apple cutting costs a tad too far in an effort to make even bigger profits than the billions they currently make?

Content Copying War Decision Looming COMMENT: Two court cases in the USA could decide the fate of whether Australian's will be allowed to copy and store content much to the angst of movie and music companies.

Why Truscott's Really Failed COMMENT: A lot has been written of late about the failure of Truscotts, the South Australian consumer electronics and appliance retailer, and most of what has been said is sheer garbage.

Google To Microsoft Its 1983 All Over Again COMMENT: It?s been coming for some time, an almighty battle between Microsoft and Google, for the operating system market. Now the battle is on with the announcement by Google of a new Google Chrome OS for netbooks with notebooks and PC?s to follow shortly.

Foxtel Telstra Content Monopoly Now In The Making COMMENT: When Foxtel wanted to announce their recent Olympics package they deliberately chose media partners like News Ltd and NineMSN along with key marketing media as opposed to technology and lifestyle media.

Revealed Sonys Spin Doctor Extraordinaire COMMENT: Sony Australia?s chief spin doctor Jenny Geddes, who is desperately trying to smother the outpouring of bad news about Sony has taken to promoting her own image in local consumer electronic trade sites while taking yet another stab at myself and ChannelNews.

Warner & Commercial Radio Slammed Earlier today, trade website Current tried to discredit 4Square Media and websites ChannelNews and SmartHouse by claiming that we had engaged in an alarmist reporting over Digital Radio in Australia.

NBN: Why Optus Is Wrong And Telstra Will Cut A Deal COMMENT: The recent comments by Optus CEO, Paul O'Sullivan raises serious questions about the intent of Optus and, more importantly, their understanding of basic telecommunication costs relating to the roll out of the proposed National Broadband Network.

Sony Tries To Rationalise Price Gouging COMMENT: In a move to try and rationalise why they are price gouging, Sony Australia today pumped out a press statement in an effort to justify why they are charging Australians consumers up to 125% more for the same products than what a US consumer pays.

Vindictive & Unfair Attacks Really Sony COMMENT: Yesterday Sony PR attempted to intimidate 4Square Media by deliberately issuing a statement to the Australian technology media that was false and misleading. It was pure bullying tactics by a large Corporation who accused 4Square Media of vindictive and unfair attacks on their credibility.

Why Cisco Is A Logical Choice To Buy Sony During the past five years, Cisco has invested significantly in consumer electronics technology. They are building out massive content engines that will allow Hollywood content providers to deliver vast amounts of movie and music content to global audiences.

Sony Is So Stupid Say Consumers During the past month as we have exposed Sony price gouging of TV?s and Playstation consoles, along with their seriously overpriced notebooks, readers have responded with hundreds of emails. Very few are complementary of the Japanese company, who later this month is set to announce billions in losses.

Tech PR Spin Doctors Itself Into A Hole COMMENT: Financial Review marketing writer Neil Shoebridge has today launched into a scathing attack on public relations executives describing the PR industry as awash with incompetent people.

Broadband White Elephant In The Making COMMENT: The Labour Federal Government?s idea of a $43 Billion dollar fibre optic broadband network is already running into problems with one Internet Service Provider AAPT claiming that it could cost householders who use it up to $200 a month.

Whinging AV Dealer Sends The Wrong Message COMMENT: There is nothing worse than a whinging specialist AV dealer and when Frank Di Bartolo from Pacific Hi-Fi recently let loose against the likes of Harvey Norman and the mass retailers recently he really opened up a can of worms.

Self Inflicted Wounds Hurting Sony COMMENT: For more than 20 years I have been writing about Sony and during that period I?ve developed a huge respect for this Japanese brand because one could always rely on the quality of the Sony product and the fact that by majority it was a made in Japan brand, which in the past really meant something.

Intel CE Boss Talks Up TV Strategy COMMENT: I cannot recall a more exciting time to be involved in the consumer electronics industry. We are entering an inflection point that will transform the way all of us experience the world?s most popular and pervasive medium ? television.

Sony Sack Staff To Protect Competitive Position COMMENT: Sony Australia whose parent Company is wallowing under a mountain of losses and product failures has now resorted to the mass sacking of staff in Australia in an effort to cut costs while also admitting that they are trying to protect their competitive position.

Telstra Set To Hurt Federal Government COMMENT: Telstra has created a giant headache for Prime Minister Kevin Rudd and Senator Stephen Conroy the Minister for Broadband and the Digital Economy by announcing that they will start delivering 100Mbs broadband to capital Cities by Xmas.

What Good Customer Service Really Is Finding new customers is much more expensive than retaining existing ones. Customer service is more than just keeping customers happy. It's about revenue, because a lost customer means lost revenue and an unhappy customer can damage your reputation.

Feds Do Nothing As Banks Hurt Small Business COMMENT: One has to seriously question whether the current Federal Government actually understands small medium business and that right now thousands of SMB organisations are starved of cash because of high interest rates and a refusal by banks to loan money to SMB organisations.

Who The Hell Wants Freeview? COMMENT: In October 2006 the Australian Federal Government gave the green light to the free to air TV broadcasters to launch several new high definition digital TV channels in Australia. 2 and half years later the networks have still not rolled out their full offering.

How Lousy Japanese Management Killed Pioneer Plasma COMMENT: The exit of Pioneer from the flat panel TV market is a massive loss for the entire flat panel TV industry as well as consumers. Their Kuro plasma TV offering has been praised worldwide by both the media and analysts as being simply the best flat panel TV in the world.

Lifestyle A Flop For Bose Management COMMENT: Bose is an incredible arrogant Company who will sue at the drop of a hat. In the past they threatened to sue SmartHouse for daring to use the word ?lifestyle? in a story. Now the lifestyle choice of Bose management is in question.

Why the Vodafone Deal Will Hurt Optus Comment: Only weeks out from Vodafone rolling out a new 3G network, the Company has cut a deal to form a 50/50 joint venture with the struggling 3 Network owned by Hutchison Telecommunication. The new network will now take on Optus who last week rolled out the new Google Android HTC phone in an effort to grow their 3G traffic.

Windows 7 Eliminates Vista Packaging Issues COMMENT: One of the annoyances that got Vista off to a rough start was Microsoft's decision to package the operating system in six different versions with assorted feature sets that ended up contributing to customer confusion.

Will Sony Be Acquired And Is Stringer The Right Leader? COMMENT: Serious questions are today being asked about the performance of Sir Howard Stringer the Welsh-born former TV journalist who as the CEO and Chairman of Sony has just announced that the Japanese consumer electronics Company will make losses this year of over A$3.8 Billion dollars.

Apple Slammed Credibility On The Line Technology media writers in the USA have raised serious questions about the credibility of Apple and their lack of disclosure over the current state of Steve Jobs health who last week stepped down from his job as CEO of the Company.

COMMENT: Will Jobs Ever Come Back To Apple? As the world speculates on the future of Apple and Steve Jobs health some analysts are asking: "Do we really know the state of Job's health and has Apple lost a lot of credibility in the way that this issue was handled."

Seduction Is The Key to 2009 2009 has been a big year for SmartHouse and ChannelNews. SmartHouse grew traffic online by 35% and at December the 8th we were the #1 technology and home lifestyle web site tracked by Nielsen Online.

TV Retailers Killing The Goose That Lays The Golden Eggs A leading consumer electronics industry researcher has said that mass market retailers run the risk of killing the goose that lays golden eggs by constantly driving down the price of flat panel TVs. He also says that in current market conditions "something has to give" for vendors and retailers to survive.

Logitech And That Damn Bloody Mouse COMMENT: Computer peripheral powerhouse Logitech is working to get some PR mileage out of a milestone event -- since letting the first one scamper into the retail market in 1985, the company has now shipped 1 billion computer mice.

COMMENT: Perth Retravision Dealer A Right Prat Recently, a Perth-based Retravision dealer spat the dummy over the marketing of his competitors and the attitude of the media who are educating consumers on how to shop for a good deal.

CEDIA Gets Its Wake Up Call With New Board The CEDIA board in Australia has been restructured with the custom install organisation admitting that they are set to target new markets in an effort to expand the organisation in Australia.