challenges as a nation. >> you can watch this and other programs online at booktv.org. >> you've been watching booktv, 48 hours of book programming beginning saturday morning at 8 eastern through monday morning at 8 eastern. nonfiction books all weekend every weekend right here on c-span2. >> coming up next, that that its continues its series from the consumer electronics show in las vegas with a look at the latest developments in consumer technology. then two former solicitors general give an overview soft -- of some of the major cases this term. after that, we're live with the aipac with remarks by vice president biden and others. and after the conference we'll join the discussion on the european union's political and economic outlook. >> host: well, this is "the

communicators" on c-span, and we are in las vegas for the annual consumer electronics show international, now known as ces international. and this is one of the exhibits here at samsung, it's next to kobe. there are literally thousands of exhibitors and thousands of people here at the convention center here in las vegas. one of the things we decided to do this year in our coverage is talk with a reporter, actually follow a reporter around as he toured and see the ces through his eyes. troy wolverton is with the "san jose mercury news". mr. wolverton, how often have you been coming to ces, and what's its importance? >> guest: i've probably been coming for seven of the last eight years, something like that. and its importance is that it is, basically, kind of the showcase for, or the centerpiece for the technology industry.

it's where many of the major companies come to show a off their latest and greatest products, and you get a sense of what's going to be on store shelves later in the year. you know, it's a place where, um, consumers can kind of get a glimpse of where things are going, but the real import is that this is where the manufacturers try to sell to the retailers what they should have on their store shelves later. >> host: and what's the importance of the "san jose mercury news" to the technology industry? what's the connection? >> guest: well, the mercury news is in the heart of silicon valley, and our focus and our business section has long been on technology, in fact, it's basically what we cover, is technology. so i'm the personal technology columnist for the merc, and that's my bent. i try to keep an eye on all things consumer technology. >> host: do can you find that washington -- do you find that washington and silicon valley are on two different planets? [laughter] >> guest: i think that's probably fair to say. you know, i think that the ties

are probably getting closer. there's a lot more interaction these days than there was before, but, you know, i think in many ways and for a long time folks in silicon valley didn't really care or want to know what was going on in washington, and, you know, likewise, i think the folks in washington have sometimes been tone deaf to what's going on with the technology industry. >> host: when you talk to tech companies in silicon valley, what do they say about washington? >> guest: oh, gosh. i -- >> host: that you can report. [laughter] >> guest: i think it kind of depends on which companies you're talking about. you know, i think in some cases technology executives want washington to stay the hell out, to keep it hands off. in some cases technology companies want certain steps from government, so, you know, they'd like to have more spectrum available for the mobile phone industry. in some cases they want, you know, again, for washington to

not regulate. so, you know, there was a big uproar over the sopa legislation. there's been uproar over, you know, various kind of things regarding whatever privacy or whatever. i mean, it's kind of a divided message coming out of silicon valley, because the company depends on the issue. in some cases they want government to do more action, and in some cases they want government to do less. >> host: well, troy wolverton, give us a preview of the tour you're taking us on today. >> guest: so i was hoping to go to a number of the big electronics companies. we're going to stop by sony, lg, panasonic, maybe intel as well and get a flavor of some of these things the companies are showing off here at the show. >> host: well, let's go. >> guest: so e yeah. it's very striking to see how these companies -- and it's not just sony. lg, samsung, everybody else has

really been flogging 3-d for the few years, and basically nobody's mentioning it year. first, what we have here is we have design display camera and connectivity. so we can definitely start -- [inaudible] it has an omni balance, so it's perfect no matter how you turn the device, it just feels comfortable in your hands. and you can view the content no matter how the device is tilted. it has a -- [inaudible] and that displays what we call engine 2, and that technology we acquired from sony. the technology that powers our televisions is the same technology that's implemented in our mobile devices now. phenomenal. it has two gigs of ram, so it's definitely a powerful device. >> guest: lt? >> of course. >> guest: is it available in the market yet? >> it's not yet, availability will be announced in the time to

come. >> guest: are there other highlights to the phone? >> absolutely. one which is probably my favorite is one sort of technology, we're able to transfer content to another enabled device. and that technology -- [inaudible] for example, let's say i go to open, i hit play, and i want to get that music now on my headset, so instead of connecting it to the wire table, i tap here. it's automatically tiered, so i never have to go to the blue tooth setting, find it and pair it. >> guest: any nsc-enabled device or just sony products? >> just sony products. [inaudible] stream over. >> guest: right. >> tap it again, they'll disconnect, and it'll come back to my phone. >> guest: right. similar technology to past technology, but it sounds like it's not going to work with the

samsung technology. >> no, it wouldn't work with the samsung. with one-touch technology, we actually took it a step further. for example, you're at home with a family, you have content that you would like to display on your big screen tv, is so you pick up your enabled tv remote, take your device, tap the remote, and it automatically transfers that content to your tv. >> what we have here is one of two new sites we've introduced for 2013. last year we launched the 84-inch over there, and this year we're introducing smaller sizes to make it more sort of accessible and also make it easy for folks to put them in different rooms for different applications and things like that. >> guest: right. >> we have been involved in 4k for quite a while. we have a saying called from the lens to the living room. and that's because a majority of the cameras are, in fact, sony

cameras. as a matter of fact, three out of four movie theaters currently use 4k projectors from sony. >> guest: right. >> so, essentially, people have been paying $15 to watch content on 4k at their local movie theater. >> guest: right. >> so we're uniquely positioned to offer the technology to the end user at home, and what we've shown over here is an example of content that's captured. and this could, essentially, being you using your own 4k camera capturing this stuff. >> guest: and what size is the screen here? >> this is 43 inches. >> -- 64 inches. >> guest: and when are those available? >> we are shooting for mid to late spring. >> guest: med to calculate spring. and -- [inaudible] >> hasn't been announced yet. >> guest: any range? >> they will be competitive, but no price has been announced yet. >> guest: okay. so the idea is you're going to get these down, started off at,

what, $25,000? >> $25,000, yes. the benefit of a 4k television is everything looks great. that said, because we own a movie studio as well, we are leveraging that relationship, we're leveraging the content that we have access to to deliver 4k content. min who gets the 84-inch television gets a video player. it comes preloaded with ten full-4k movies, including the amazing spider-man, as well as independent movies and shorts, what we call eye candy, like stuff like in this. >> guest: right. >> the it's available to to the users at no charge to them. at some point during the second half of the year we will officially unveil a content delivery system that willen able folks to have access to 4k content. >> guest: and is that going to be delivered direct to the tv

like netflix or something? or is it a download service? >> so currently folks who get the 84 inch get the player. as for when 4k becomes available, sony sends them a blu-ray data disc. as to the mode of transport or the mode of distribution, nothing has been announced just yet. um, you know, it is possible that it could be streaming, or it could still be physical media, but nothing's been announced yet. >> guest: blu-ray dvds as well? >> what we have are blu-ray discs that were mastered in 4k. they're still -- >> guest: oh, okay. >> they're shot and mastered in 4k. >> guest: downgraded. >> okay. >> guest: i guess i must have misunderstood. >> in the summer we will offer a 4k distribution service. >> guest: okay. >> what you can get today in a retail story store is,

essentially, a 2k blu-ray movie that may have been shot and/or mastered in 4k. >> host: so in this tour of sony, what have you learned? >> guest: well, they're obviously pushing 4k. >> host: what is 4k? >> guest: that's a high resolution television. >> host: is that 4 thousands pixels? >> guest: right now it's twieped as 1080p. that means you've got about 1,080 lines of resolution by about 2,000 what we call columns of resolution. on a 4k tv you you have double . so you have double the lines of resolution and double the columns of resolution, so you get about 4,000 columns of resolution on a 4k tv. it's, actually, the resolution -- because both sides are doubled, so the length and the columns, you actually have four times the resolution of a regular television. so it's useful on a big screen

tv. most experts would they it's useful on, like, a 60-inch and above tv, that below 60 inches you can't tell the difference. but on a large screen tv and particularly if you're sitting up close, you can definitely tell a difference. i don't know if you saw, but there was a display on the other side of this wall here where they were demonstrating newspaper text on a screen, and they were showing what it looks like on a 4k and a 1080 tv, and you could definitely tell the difference. it's much sharper and clearer on a 4k tv than it is on a 1080p tv. the problem right now is the 4k tvs are extraordinarily expensive. sony came out with its first 4k tv this past year, and like daryl was saying, they started off at, like, $25,000. so they're hoping to get those prices down, and they probably will come down, but you're still probably talking about several times the cost of a regular

1080p television at the same size for a 4k v.. the other problem is as we were talking about in our conversation, there's just no content out there. so sony is distributing with its 4k tvs a hard drive that has ten movies on it. well, i don't know about you, but i watch a lot more than ten movies in my regular viewing habits, so you're not going to get any of your latest television shows in 4k, the vast majority of the latest movies in 4k, you know, your streaming video services aren't coming in in 4k, there's just nothing out there in 4k right now. so sony's trying to help spur that along, and as terrell talked about, you know, sony has a lot of the movies that are shot these days are actually shot in 4k, they're just distributed to consumers in 2k and 1080p resolution. so they're hoping to start moving the ball so you get more of those out in 4k, but it's going to be a big process. and, you know, frankly, i have my doubts that they're going to

put much out in 4k unless there's a sizable market of consumers that are going to watch the content. i mean, why would they take those through the process? there is going to be a considerable, pence if nobody's -- expense if nobody's out there to buy it. that's kind of what they learned with 3-d. it turned out that consumers weren't terribly interested in 3-d, and so it's kind of this chicken and egg thing. consumers aren't interested, they're not putting out more 3-d content, and 4k's going to be even worse because it's in the sense that it's only applicable to big-sized televisions, and the market while growing and significant, it's like 20% now, it's still a fraction of the total market. >> host: troy wolverton, how do you view sony in the tech stratosphere? >> guest: you know, sony, i think, for a long time was considered to be the pinnacle of technology. i mean, they were the die monday company -- diamond company. but they've really been knocked

off in recent years. you know, sony was the dominant game company five years ago. today they're in third place. if you look at music players, sony was the testimony plant player with their -- dominant player with their walkman, and then they got knocked off by the ipod. they're not a huge player in smartphones. they -- and, you know, it's funny, i was at the samsung conference yesterday, and really in many ways samsung has become the sony of today. samsung dominates a lot of the markets that it's in, including smartphones. and that's something that you might have been able to say about sony 5, 10, 15 years ago. that's not something you can say about sony today. >> host: this is "the communicators" on c-span, and we are following troy wolverton of the "san jose mercury news" on his tour at ces international in las vegas. >> this is a brand new system from he novo, available out in

the spring. it's called yoga. one of the interesting things about it is not only does it look like a full pc, but it's an ultra book, so it's super thin and light. i can use it like a tablet, and then if i really want to use it like a tablet, i can take and convert it into a full tablet mood. >> guest: when you do that, the keyboard turns off, right? >> it does, so i can rest it on my lap, and i don't have to worry about input happening, and i've got full access to my applications. >> guest: so it's a full pc. >> when i want to bring it back, i convert it back up, my keyboard will turn back on -- >> guest: the keyboard turns on whenever it's more than -- narrower than 180 degrees, correct? >> correct. what's great, too, is you can put it in tent mode where i can have it like this, and you can see the screen automatically reconfigures. so if i'm watching a movie, you put them on your lap, and you on the constantly have to be

looking down. this you can just pop up. even be you want to show off photos, you have a full tablet interface just propped up for you. >> guest: right. >> so that is calls the lenovo yoga. it'll be available in the springtime. >> guest: right. that's going to be sort of like an $800, $700 -- >> it's going to start at $799. a different one, if i want more of a tablet usage, this one is actually designed for business, but it'll be available for all. i can have it as a full pc so it has a full key poard, intel processer, but then if i want to take it as a tablet, i can remove the tablet part, and it's extremely light, thin. full pc performance. everything's built right into this part of it, so i have all the great benefits. windows 8, full desktop mode, etc., but also as a tablet. and then if i want to, i can just put it back together. one of the also interesting things is i can put it in the

opposite way so i can have it as a tablet facing out. >> is. >> guest: and when you do that, you also get the -- [inaudible] into the base. >> exactly. exactly. so then i can just carry it around like this, plus my keyboard is protected. >> guest: splits the battery usage between the screen and the bay so you're going, what, six hours at the top but together it gets ten. >> you're exactly right. so i get the battery life built in for both of those. i get that extra battery built into the base as well as the tablet as well. >> guest: right. okay. and this one, though, is going to be 1299 or 1199? >> the pricing i don't think has been officially set, but probably will be in that range. >> guest: available first quarter? first half? >> this should be available at the end of next month. >> caller: okay. >> so very soon. >> guest: so here in the booth, how many convertible designs are

you guys showing off? >> we have about 40. there is over 140 different ultra books available on the market today. >> guest: right. but not all those are convertible. >> correct. >> guest: right. >> but 140 of them, 40 of them will have touch capabilities, and then the convertible part of them we're showing at least, i think, about a dozen of those. so whether or not it's a dispatchable design, some that twist and flip or some that fold over, so many, many different types. >> guest: right. about 40 that have touch capabilities, only about a dozen that are actual convertible? used on dispray? >> correct. what i think is very interesting happening in the marketplace today which is very different than previous times is you really have to take a look at these and decide which is the best for your lifestyle. you really have a lot of choice now. you may think only caseally would i be typing things, well, for that this is probably a really great type of model for you. the other ones that we showed you where, hey, maybe i do want

a regular pc and only in sometimes do i want to take it into a tablet type mode, this may be the right type of design. or you have this betweener so i can take it as a tablet but also have it set up as a full pc. so lots of choices. you really just have to take a look at what is the right one for your lifestyle. what actually works pest for you? >> guest: some of the things we're seeing on the notebook side we're also seeing on the desktop side too. >> exactly. interesting things on the desktop side. they're making desktop all in one systems which you may have been familiar with. these are full pc capabilities built into a really giant type of screen so all you see is the screen and the keyboard and mouse. not only do they have touch capabilities, but they also have capability to be used without being tethered no to an electrical outlet. they have a built-in battery.

it only lasts a couple of hours, but it's designed where you can take it down and use it as a typical all in one pc for productivity, but then when i want to have fun with it, i can take it around the house. so if i want to watch a movie and et it up in a different room or a i new take on family game night. they have games like monopoly, air hockey, etc. that i can then play with my whole family. put it on my kitchen table, don't have to worry about losing the dice or losing all the different things. everything's built right into the pc. >> guest: so this is a monopoly by -- [inaudible] >> for hasbro, correct. and what we're looking at here is a system called lenovo horizon. it's a 27-inch display, and it is a full windows 8pc. you can use it with a keyboard and mouse or with a touch interface. so, again, your standard windows 8 interface that you can use.

now, it also has a built-in battery, so i can take it around my house. i can take it over to my kitchen table, and i just fold it down. >> guest: how heavy is that thing? >> it's less than 20 pounds. it's portable. it's not something you would take on vacation -- >> guest: not in your backpack. >> it's designed for your house. i have access to photos and video, i have access to games, and one of them is monopoly. so, again, if i wanted to play monopoly with the family, i could have them put away their screen, and we all gather around the table and look at this screen, and it's really the exact same monopoly game that you know and love but done electronically, so a little bit more fun. so here we have the game, and we're going to play. >> guest: and how long will the battery last on this thing? >> about a couple of hours. so, again, really designed for

that portability aspect of it. okay. now we're ready to roll. so interesting thing here. so here's my dice, but because it's touch -- >> oh, you can shake the dice up. >> i can shake the dice up, and then it rolls, and it'll automatically move. and then ask me do i want to buy, right is? because i landed on it. i say, yes, i'd like to buy. so it's really, it's the monopoly game you know and love. >> guest: okay. but so can i put $500 in the free parking spot? [laughter] >> it's the standard monopoly rules. >> guest: oh, come on. i've always played it that way. >> so now it's your turn. >> guest: oh, shoot, i forgot to shake up the dice. i get to be the iron. thank god, i'm just visiting. >> you're going to end your turn. >> guest: i want to try shaking the dice instead.

>> oh, electric company. i like the utilities, i think they're a good buy. now -- >> guest: okay, it's my turn. >> there you go. >> guest: the nice thing is it doesn't go off the board. >> that's right. and you know what? i don't have to worry about the money floating around everywhere, i don't have to worry about the cards. >> guest: i will buy virginia. >> oh, you're going to buy virginia. that's usually a good buy too. >> guest: now, can you mortgage all your properties? >> you can do everything you can do with the normal monopoly game, so, yes. correct. >> guest: okay. this is almost like what microsoft's vision of surface was, the original several years ago, tabletop computing. >> correct. that was done more for commercial, this is really like an all in one pc. this is not designed to play games, that's one of benefits of it. you put this in your kitchen, your family room, it has lots of storage pace -- space in it

because you've got the 27-inch touch pad. and then you get the added benefit of portability and being able to play games with your family. >> guest: so this is already out on the market? >> be available shortly. >> guest: and what's the price point going to be? >> details are still to be seen. they haven't announced yet. >> guest: okay. and this is running, obviously, on intel's chip. what chip is this running? >> this is an intel core processer, so our state of the art performance will go into the system, so, again, you get full pc, full performance, state of the art from intel all built in. and then i exit the game, and it'll take me back to this screen, and then i can go right back into my -- >> guest: windows -- >> windows display. >> guest: now, you were talking like perceptual -- [inaudible] is that right? >> yeah.

so one of the things you're seeing for consumers is really changing the pc is using the touch interface. what if we take that a step further, right? what if your pc, you interface, you interact with it more like we interact, right? we use hand gestures, we use our face, so we've got some interesting things happening with facial recognition and gesture recognition part of our work under conceptual computing which is just a name we -- >> guest: the idea of natural interface. >> exactly. this is our new technology. this shows how you interact more naturally with your system, and this is an interesting demo. >> guest: it's got a dual camera, a 3-d camera that's on it. >> a dual camera. pretend we're doing a video conference with a skype application, so we're in this crowded, crazy environment, it can taken us and filter out automatically, puts in a virtual green screen behind us and fills in the back. say you're in a coffee shop and you want to do a video

conference but you don't want everybody to distract them, they will -- >> guest: battery. >> it's been running for a while. but it filters out that background so we don't have to worry about background distraction. this one where, again, it puts in that virtual kind of reality world, and it takes you out of what you're in and puts you in a different space, and, obviously, you can configure those to be as much as you want -- >> guest: this capability is built into the chips, something that's added on to the camera? is it something that's -- >> right now it requires an add-on camera. this is from creative. not available yet, will be available shortly. so you'll have a whole suite of applications you'll be able to do, in fact, we'll show you another. in just a second. this is just one application you can run with this. in the future, this camera technology will be built right into the pc itself. >> guest: right. this is basically like a connected camera for the pc?

>> actually it's interesting that you say that. it's similar to that technology, and i'll show you in a second why it's different as we look at this demo right here. your hand was great there. so what this is showing is i can then take my hand and make it part of the action. so just using regular gestures, i can interact with what i have on film. you brought up kinect as an example. how this is different is this is designed for that 6 inch to about a foot-and-a-half difference. >> guest: right. >> so when i'm really right in front of it. plus it can do the preciseness of my actual fingers, it can actually show you my fingers and i can show things down to the fingertip level as to as opposed to the other game consoles where you don't have the accuracy down to a fingertip perspective, this will do that. >> guest: right. >> you can collect the coins, you can throw them, you can do a bunch of different things with them. but other applications like 3-d modeling, so we'll be able to take a 3-d model and turn it

with just my hand gestures. so instead of having to use some kind of system like a keyboard and mouse or something like that, this makes it much more natural for you to interact with your p crushes. >> guest: but is this something that like ultra book, you have to have an ultra book to run this? >> it does require a lot of processing, so we do recommend you have an ultra book or an intel processer because what's going on behind there is a lot of technology to make this happen in realtime. so, yes, you do need a lot of processing power which is great because it's really what intel is known for, but intel also works with other companies to make sure these technologies will get built into systems eventually and also the technology to make this happen. we showed you here, too, which gives you kind of a touch interface or a hand gesture and then more of a facial recognition -- >> guest: right. >> guest: we're also working on voice technology as well to be able to talk to your pc. as you do like today