Imagine a dozen alley cats, who would normally claw at each other incessantly, purring happily together in a box. This gives you an idea of what's so remarkable about the 1394 Trade Association (TA) Theater Demo this week at Comdex in Las Vegas. Several consumer-electronics giants, such as Sony, Mitsubishi, Samsung, NEC, and Yamaha, as well as computer titans Intel, Compaq, and Microsoft, are pulling together to support the 1394 (FireWire) standard. It is hoped that FireWire will unite the consumer-electronics and computer worlds with a common digital interface. A recent agreement between the consumer-electronics and cable industries has established 1394 as the standard link between digital television sets and DTV set-top boxes.

If you don't have one of the pricey new digital TVs, but you're curious about those DTV broadcasts that started in your area last week (if you happen to live in one of the lucky cities), your PC might soon be able to provide some relief. With a graphics accelerator that can handle the various DTV formats and MPEG decoding and a low-cost DTV receiver card, viewing DTV on the PC is an affordable option. A graphics accelerator and receiver card with a combined cost under $500 can provide DTV at a fraction of the price for a new digital TV and tuner/decoder.

A new country has taken the lead position in the modern media world. Is it in Europe or Asia? Africa? Australia? Nope, the newest media moguls on the block reside on the small South Pacific group of atolls known as Tuvalu.

For decades, Disney has dominated the animated feature-film business. Recently, Dreamworks SKG, which scored a hit with this summer's Saving Private Ryan, jumped into the fray with the film Antz, about the life of an idealistic ant who feels trapped amoung his colony's soldiers and workers. Considered better than any other animated feature released so far this year, Antz needed an early start out of the gate, as Disney had planned a big splash for their own insect story.