One reason many individuals like having a hand in designing their own home theatre system is that you can basically mix and match to make it into whatever you want. You are not restrained by package deals. It is possible to put together a full-scale, state of the art system with projector, receiver and the works, or if that seems a little over the top, you can buy a quality TV (some almost to projection screen sizes nowadays) and accessorize it with DVD player and surround sound speakers.

The variance can go from a couple thousand, to $100,000 for the ludicrously rich and extravagant. This illustrates the importance of choosing a system that suits your needs and doesn’t break the bank.

In the end, it’s all about getting the best possible home theater system for the money you have available. Don’t be afraid if it’s not state of the art-your neighbor will still be paying that off six years down the road when you’ve already upgraded for cheaper. Because of the rapid move of technology, prices bottom out pretty quickly as companies rush at sometimes break neck speeds to try and out do each other.

Think about your own watching and listening needs. Based on what you prefer, a little research should reveal to you the best brands, the best speakers, the best options for what you want to enjoy.

Building your home theater can be a great experience. If you are a family man, you can enjoy movies with the family without having to go out to the hassles of a theatre. If you’re a bachelor, invite the guys over for the game. If you’re a college student, you are probably incredibly popular (just don’t put it on the credit cards). There are several different factors to consider when picking out the various parts that will go into your own personal home theatre system. Here is a check list of a few things to consider:

* Projector or TV? Are you in a semi-permanent residence, or moving soon? That may make a huge difference in how much you want to sink in.

* If you’re shooting for the projector, then what type suits your needs?
* Small room or larger one.
* What is the focus? Movies? Music? Football games? All of the above?
* Location, location, location!
* Can I do it myself, or should I get help?

Keep this checklist in mind and do your research, and you’ll be sure to find the home theatre system that matches your needs.

All electronics, from computers to alarm clocks, are prohibitively expensive when the first come on the market, but they become more affordable as time goes on. Home theatre audio systems have been no different. What was once a luxury item that only people like Donald Trump could afford is now something that tens of thousands of Americans have in their homes. The market has been, and continues to be, flooded with new and cheaper audio systems, especially those of the HTiB, or Home Theatre in a Box, variety. But again, as with all electronics, you get what you pay for, and not all of these systems are created equal. When selecting a home theatre audio system, there are several factors that need to be balanced, including quality, price, and size.

If you’re in college, don’t have a lot of disposable income, but simply must have a home theatre audio system, chances are you’re going to end up with a budget-priced HTiB. These systems, which usually feature small satellite speakers and subwoofers, have an inclination toward spotty sound quality and lack sheer oomph. To quote Napster in The Italian Job, a budget-priced HTiB will never be “loud enough to blow women’s clothes off.” But while Napster might disapprove, such systems have their upsides. They are, as mentioned, affordable for the average individual, and they also tend to have the advantages of being compact and comparatively easy to assemble.

Or perhaps you own a downtown loft in a high rise somewhere and you want a theatre audio system that coordinates with such an ambiance. Some HTiB manufactures offer systems that feature style and are overtly sleek in appearance. A home theatre audio system that goes this route will often have very petite satellite speakers, or perhaps “tallboys,” which are very slender but as much as sixty inches tall. The advantage of a style-centric HTiB, in addition to its elegant appearance, will probably include lots of features and simplicity of set up. The disadvantages? Such a system will probably have limited bass output and limited connectivity options.

Some manufactures are now offering component packages, which are built around separate components. These systems, while forfeiting the traditional HTiB advantage of compactness, usually have the benefits of solid build quality and variety of features. However, as mentioned, such a home theatre audio system will probably be fairly large and clunky, which won’t work if you need to fit it into your studio apartment.

Finally, if you want to go cutting-edge, there are wireless HTiB systems that utilize the very latest in audio technology. These are great if you can afford them, since they save space while maintaining high quality. But as mentioned, they can be extremely expensive and in some cases, you’re better off buying separate components.

London Theatre Tickets are one of the most resilient of animals having overcome a multitude of challenges to still reign supreme in the world of entertainment. All we had was theatre tickets for years and years then suddenly there are hundreds and thousands of new kids on the block. Movies, TV, the Internet and computer games all vying for the attention of a public who is being pulled this way and that. But still top shows sell out night after night, and this can really be put down to some great writing and amazing new shows that constantly hit the stage each month and year.

London Theatre – Not All Shows Created Equal…

Some of these shows are really special like Wicked and The Lion King which seem to transcend theatre and plant you in a world of magic and wonder! Other shows don’t hit the public imagination at all and are gone with the wind before they even get started.

The best shows for me start off with a small production touring the county and then get bigger and bigger as word of mouth spreads and causes more and more demand. Most of the time a successful show will run for maybe three years then clever producers will end the run when they see that sales are waning a little. Only to reopen a couple of years later when the public have forgotten they were ever getting jaded. OLIVER! is a great example of that.

You sometimes get really a monster hit like ‘Phantom of the Opera’ that runs for many years and show no sign of loosing pace. AND Mousetrap has now been on for a whopping 50 years!

Your first night in the West End will be a shining life long memory if you’re anything like me, probably you will have a pre-theatre meal at one of the many delicious restaurants spotted around Theatreland. Then make your way with butterflies in your stomach to the theatre and take you seat to the sound of the band tuning up. The first show I ever saw was Oliver at the Palladium and it was marvelous. My sister loved it so much in fact that she made me take her again the very next week. Even though we are all grown up now she still wants to see every show I get tickets for

Take the Kids!

Theatre Tickets can be a very rewarding gift for your children, you just have to look at the excitement in their eyes and see the sheer joy that young people get from good old showbiz. So much of what children consume these days is hurtful and violent, but theater is an altogether more wholesome experience showing the value of hard work, talent and confidence.

With that being said we’ve been going out more and more recently seeing all kinds of shows from all over the world, some great and some not so great but there have of course been our favorites: Sound of music, We will rock you and Billy Elliot all stood out as being far ahead of the competition. My next trip will defiantly be Zorro, what could be better than a mixture of swashbuckling action and gypsy kings music!

In my darker moments I really want to take my wife to Avenue Q as we were both big fans of the Muppets and I’ve herd it absolutely superb, like a total laugh-a-minute wet your pants kind of show. (If a little blue.)

I know that not everyone is going to like every show but I think the key thing is to get out there to keep trying things on for size. If we all stay at home and watch Eastenders every night we’re going to shrivel up and die. (Whoa I’m getting a little spiritual there!)

Theatre is most resilient of animals and none shall overcome…

The ETC offers a fantastic view from every seat (about 200 or so by my guestimations), and also has surprisingly good acoustics for that space. What makes the venue even better is the building itself…it is a gem and has all sorts of architectural details for you to enjoy (if you’re in to that sort of thing).

As for the show we saw ‘Rabbit Hole’ which is the winner of the 2007 Pulitzer Prize for Best New Play and a Tony Award-winning drama. The show was great and the seats were full…at the end the audience gave a standing ovation for the great performance. The ETC is a great theatre that has a strong history and is nationally known.

I highly recommend a visit to the ETC. It is a good alternative to the movies and the show lets out with plenty of time to go out drinking afterwards. The ETC offers student discounts, as well as, senior discounts. You can now also buy tickets online…and if you want to see ‘Rabbit Hole’ then you better hurry because its time runs up this Sunday.

Why did you decide to start using social media?
We started for a couple of reasons. We knew we needed to start trying new ways of reaching audiences. Print advertising has been losing its effectiveness for years. And it seemed like everyone was getting MySpace pages and blogging. It just seemed like to band wagon to jump on. We started using social media at the same time we really stepped up our grassroots marketing efforts. We’re really focused on creating good word of mouth buzz, and social media is a great way to do that.
Anthology of Instrumental Music from the End of the Sixteenth to the End of the Seventeenth Century (Da Capo Press Music Reprint Series)
How did you start?
We started about 3 years ago with a MySpace page, followed by a Facebook page and Youtube a few months later. We started blogging about 2 years ago and have been on Twitter since February 2009. We just jumped in. Not much of a plan at all! Three years ago when we started, there wasn’t as much buzz about social media as there is now. There weren’t conferences and webinars and people telling you how to integrate you social media plan with the rest of your marketing or how to calculate ROI. Or maybe there were, but I didn’t see them! For us, it was a way to reach younger audiences (although that really hasn’t been the case. The majority of our Facebook users are in the 35-55 age group!) and to expand marketing efforts as print advertising becomes less effective and print editorial space declines. So we jumped in, figured out how all the different outlets worked, and then went back and thought about planning. Which worked for us, I think if you wait until you have the perfect plan, you’ll never dive in and figure out how to tweet or upload a video or whatever.

What tools/sites are your currently using?
Facebook, Twitter, Youtube and a blog. We also have a Myspace, but just keep it updated with show dates, not much interaction there anymore for us.

What results have you seen?
I think Twitter has been amazing at raising our visibility among local people and businesses. MET has definitely been given opportunities though the twitter community- partnerships and whatnot, that we would not even know about otherwise. It’s really hard to judge the impact on ticket sales, but I look at our social media efforts as public relations, not advertising. Our blog posts, videos and Facebook posts have really started to generate conversations about our work, which is super exciting. Just this week we got ‘like’s and comments on facebook from people I don’t even know! So I see our online community starting to grow beyond the inner circle of employees, board members, volunteers, season ticket holders, etc. I think that’s the most exciting part – to put up a video of a rehearsal, or interview with a director and a week later over 100 people have watched it, and some have posted comments and we get to have a conversation. A conversation that we would never have without social media. People would just come to see a show, sit in the seat and maybe read the director’s notes in the playbill, then go home. But with our social media efforts, the experience begins even before they get here – with the reading of a blog post, or commenting about rehearsal photos on Facebook, or watching a video. And then after they see the show, there’s a place for them to talk about what they thought, it’s a whole different way to connect with patrons.

What has been your biggest challenge in using social media tools?
Time! Social media is time consuming. Maintaining a consistent presence on Facebook and Twitter, shooting, editing and uploading video to YouTube and trying to blog at least 3 times a week takes a lot of time. So juggling that with all the other things on my plate is hard, especially since social media is so much more fun than the other things on my plate! I’d say a second big challenge is measuring results in a way that I can present to my boss and to our board of directors. I know MET’s visibility has been raised through our social media efforts, but I don’t have any numbers or charts to back that up. And it’s almost impossible to track how social media affects our ticket sales. But in the end, our social media strategy is to engage our audience members and our community and I think we’re doing that.