You may have never heard of CEDIA (Custom Electronic Design and Installation Association) but its annual tradeshow is a hotbed of hot and upcoming technologies that will affect anyone interested in consumer electronics and the "digital lifestyle". The show offers everything from televisions, stereo components, and the latest PC/consumer electronics crossover products to the wiring technologies and home automation products that installers and integrators use to supply the rich and famous with the latest in home theater. I attended this year's show in bland Indianapolis, Indiana with Keith Furman. We noted back in our CES 2001 review how out of the loop we felt, after years of attending computer-oriented shows. Now, almost three years later, CES feels like a homecoming. But CEDIA was nothing of the sort: It's a different audience, a different class of showgoer, and a different set of press. In some ways it was exciting, but in others it was scary.
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