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Is it the low exhibitor rates? The excuse to visit Montreal, perhaps North America's most cosmopolitan city? The efficiency and charm of organizer Marie-Christine Prin and her assistants? Whatever the reason(s), Montreal's Festival Son & Image has become a real success story, attracting an ever-increasing array of exhibitors and audiophiles from far and wide. Last year, the Festival spilled over from the downtown Delta Hotel to the Four Points Sheraton across the street; this year, there were exhibits in the Holiday Inn next door as well.

If Senator "Fritz" Hollings has his way, coming generations of electronic products will monitor their users' behavior and report possible copyright violations to some governmental regulatory agency. That's one of the more ominous provisions in Hollings' Consumer Broadband and Digital Television Promotion Act (CBDTPA), introduced for consideration by the US Senate the third week of March. The bill goes far beyond the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, passed in 1998.

The affordable universal disc player may yet become a reality—if Royal">http://www.philips.com">Royal Philips Electronics has anything to do with it.

Chad Kassem is a true audio renaissance man. For years he has headed Acoustic">http://www.acousticsounds.com/">Acoustic Sounds, supplier of select recorded musical treasures from a variety of audiophile and specialty labels. Kassem also has his own label, Analogue Productions, which produces reissues, revivals, and a series of original recordings under the label APO Records.

As I explain in the current issue's "As We See It" column, I decide on the ratings of the equipment featured in Stereophile's "Recommended Components" listing after consultation with the reviewers, taking into account the original review comments and, sometimes, my own experience.

The record companies have declared war on their customers when it comes to the fair use rights of purchased music, and it would appear that they want the government to enlist in their crusade. Previous weeks have seen South Carolina senator Ernest Hollings propose draconian copyright">http://www.stereophile.com/news/11287/">copyright legislation as well as recent pro-Hollywood remarks from California's senator Diane Feinstein.

During copyright protection hearings in Washington the last week of February, South Carolina Senator Ernest "Fritz" Hollings labored mightily to please patrons Michael Eisner, CEO of Walt Disney Company, and Jack Valenti, president of the Motion Pictures Association of America (MPAA). Hollings' questioning of panelists from concerned industries was generally even-handed, according to several reports, except for his treatment of Intel executive vice president Leslie Vadasz, whose opposition to government-mandated copy control provoked an especially vindictive outpouring of vitriol from the 80-year-old Senator.