LATEST ADDITIONS

According to figures just released by the <A HREF="http://www.ce.org">Consumer Electronics Association</A> (CEA), revenues from manufacturer-to-dealer sales of audio products in December 1999 totaled nearly $568 million, a 6.3% increase over the previous December. CEA reports that the strong month's sales pushed year-end revenue totals to their highest mark in four years: total audio shipment revenues in 1999 surpassed the $8 billion mark for the first time since 1995, growing by 2% over 1998.

Markus Sauer is in a ponderous audio mood: "When several listeners each play music they like on the system, their reaction should be more uniform. But it isn't. What irks me is that, while we seem to be able to agree pretty well on how a system sounds, there seems to be no consistency of emotional reaction to this sound . . . " Sauer works through this troubling aspect of being an audiophile in "<A HREF="http://www.stereophile.com//features/203/">God is in the Nuances</A>." "This journal has seen a number of thoughtful ruminations on what it is that attracts us to music or to a given audio component, and how we should describe that attraction." Now it's Sauer's turn.

Satellite radio got a boost toward wider market acceptance on February 16, when <A HREF="http://www.siriusradio.com/">Sirius Satellite Radio</A> and <A HREF="http://www.xmradio.com/">XM Satellite Radio</A> announced an agreement to develop a unified standard for satellite radios. The current batch of satellite receivers can pick up transmissions from one of the providers, but not both. The next generation of receivers will expand the technology's reach by enabling reception of both companies' broadcasts.

DVD-Audio has kept a low profile since its misfired "launch" late last year (see <A HREF="http://www.stereophile.com/news/10620/">previous story</A>), but has popped up again at this week's Audio Engineering Society Convention (<A HREF="http://www.aes.org">AES</A&gt;) in Paris. <A HREF="http://www.pioneerelectronics.com/">Pioneer</A&gt; is demonstrating its latest generation of universal DVD players, <A HREF="http://www.stereophile.com/news/10633/">recently released in Japan</A>, using a new DVD-Audio disc, some of the contents of which were encoded using Meridian Lossless Packing (MLP) technology to enable high-resolution surround sound.

Where would you like to see the next <I>Stereophile</I> HI-FI Show?

High-definition audio is on its way to a DVD player near you. <A HREF="http://www.hdcd.com/">Pacific Microsonics</A> has introduced a new High Definition Compatible Disc chip, the PMD-200, for the next generation of CD and DVD players. The device is a "feature-rich audio IC that provides HDCD processing for both the CD and DVD formats," according to a February 11 company press release.

It's been a rough season for some in the e-commerce crowd, as several consumer-electronics Internet startups find themselves amid changes. Last week, <A HREF="http://www.CyberShop.com">CyberShop.com</A&gt; announced that it will close the e-tailing sites CyberShop.com and electronics.net (created as a joint venture with Tops Appliance City, which is now under Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection) and sell these operations' remaining retail assets. At the same time, the company says it will launch an "Internet incubator" through the establishment of <A HREF="http://www.grovestreetventures.com">Grove Street Ventures</A> to attract and develop startup Internet companies.