Dish Network recently announced a very cool new DVR called The Hopper.  Your DVR may have the ability to jump ahead 30 seconds and allow you to skip through commercials fairly quickly, but the Hopper can do away with them completely.  Its functionality is a bit limited at the moment – it only works for the major networks and it doesn't work until 24 hours after the program airs.  Once it does though, you simply have to make sure the commercial skipping feature is enabled, then sit back and enjoy.

It's that time of year again. 2012 has begun and it's time for everyone in the electronics business to show off everything they're bringing to market.  First up from the Consumer Electronics Show is Samsung, who unveiled, among other things, a 55" OLED TV. Samsung is the second company to announce a 55" OLED this year with LG being the first.  Like LG's set it's incredibly thin and boasts crystal clear images, a response time that's too small for even the most observant of people to notice and a ludicrous contrast.  Sadly, also like LG's set, Samsung's new 55" OLED doesn't have a price attached.  All we know right now is that it's coming sometime this year.

Though Google TV had a rocky start it's showing some signs of improvement.  It's also becoming more widely adopted which is a good thing for a platform that's trying to woo more customers and developers.  LG is the latest to announce a Google TV infused television - one that they'll be showing at CES next week.

Sony is a company that's really trying to turn things around, and at the head of that movement is CEO Phil Molyneux.  He's been in position for 14 months and he's already starting to see things improve.  Black Friday sales were particularly strong. Numbers aren't in for every store yet, but Sony Store sales were up a significant 20 percent.  Calls to their online service also increased significantly, which is a good sign.  Molyneux gives a lot of credit for the sales increase to Blu-ray players which he calls "a phenomenal success."

Sony and Harris Interactive conducted a poll earlier this month to find out just how attached people are to their TVs.  The results are a bit surprising as it turns out over half of TV owners are unhappy with their current sets. Of those dissatisfied owners, 32% say that the size of their TV is the biggest problem.  We'll just go ahead and assume that means that those folks would like bigger TVs - it's hard to imagine many complaints the other way around.