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Amplifier of the year? We'll have to wait until the votes are tallied in the December issue, but Paul Bolin reviews the Halcro">http://www.stereophile.com//amplificationreviews/683/">Halcro dm58 monoblock power amplifier and reveals what the fuss is all about. As Bolin notes, "the sheer audacity of Halcro's claims generated much curiosity and interest."

For years, we've seen attempts to disguise loudspeakers">http://www.audiocircuit.com/9041-esl-circuit/Commercial/Audio4-AU4/9041… as paintings. A pair of announcements last week highlights the ongoing drive within the consumer electronics industry to find new ways to hide speakers within other objects.

Media critics may be right: If record companies had spent as much effort building a digital distribution network as they have fighting digital piracy, they might actually be making money online instead of complaining about it. This is the conclusion of a new report from KPMG and the Economist Intelligence Unit.

Sales of recorded music declined by 9.2% on a monetary basis and 11% on a unit basis worldwide during the first half of 2002, according to recently released figures from the International">http://www.ifpi.org">International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI). The drop is a continuation of a long slump that began in the mid-1990s, blamed by many music industry executives on the widespread use of CD burners and the popularity of downloading tunes on the Internet. Others acknowledge that increasing competition for consumers' time and money—especially films on DVD—is eating into music industry profits.

We've heard the sad tales from the record labels and distributors about their ever-weakening music sales, but there are other players in the market who are also feeling the pinch: retailers.

Not all Washington lawmakers are on the Hollywood payroll. Some even risk offending Big Entertainment by upholding their sworn duty to protect their constituents' interests. Representative Zoe Lofgren (D-CA) is such a legislator.

If you peer back into audio history, you'll discover that long-term formats are generally established at the mass-market level and then perfected or re-invented by those with audiophile inclinations. One could argue that SACD and DVD-A are attempts at turning that rule on its head. But the slow start exhibited by both formats (with the copy-restriction issue a new and rather large stumbling block) indicates that, once again, the mass market needs to get involved before we can really move forward.