Get ready for the next TV wars.  Like most wars, they're going to cost a lot.

Samsung announced today that it will sell its first big-screen OLED TVs in the US starting in the second half of this year.  The ES9500 is a 55" model based on the next generation OLED display technology that's thinner, lighter, more energy efficient and performs better than today's LED, LCD or plasma sets.

There's a lot to like in OLED, which will very likely become the dominant TV display technology (easily) within the next decade.  One of the things to like best is that when they eventually get into economies of scale on the manufacturing side, OLED should actually be pretty cheap to produce.  Meaning one day soon, a big screen cheap TV is going to be astonishing to own. Maybe even something you can roll up in your pocket.

Of course the word cheap as a prefix to the letters TV is one of the things driving the announcement.  The estimated US price for this bleeding tech is going to run around $9,500 by the time this thing hits the market.  For that money, you could buy 10 of Samsung's current most popular 51" TVs on Amazon.

Cheap TVs are now the bane of the TV industry, and Samsung, as the #1 maker, has challenges to meet if it wants to differentiate itself from the dozens of me-too brands that it finds itself competing with -- not to mention its serious competitors like LG, Sharp, Panasonic and Sony.

Further, the long term transition of turning today's glutted and soon to be outmoded LED-LCD manufacturing plants throughout the world over to OLED is going to cost a lot of won (and yen).  Someone's got to pay for it -- well heeled videophiles will likely do their part.

Samsung obviously understands that this is first-mover stuff and openly states that OLED "may take at least two to three years before becoming mainstream" TV technology. "May take" -- heh, good one, guys.

It won't take that long for everyone to want a set like this.  But how long will it take before the barbarians crash the gate again with cheaply sourced competition? Or even American companies trying to get back in the electronics game?

Should be an interesting Christmas season, and some people's 2013 Super Bowls are going to look awfully good.

In an announcement that surprised nobody except by its timing, LG Electronics will be selling TVs equipped with Google's platform starting as early as this month.

In a press briefing yesterday, the world's #2 TV maker promised production of "Google TVs" will start on May 17 and consumers will be able to buy the product from the week of May 21.

That's mighty fast work fellas, what's the hurry? Oh right, Apple's got a TV coming out this year.  Or next.  And who knows what will be different about it?  Whatever it is, it's always better to get there firstest with the mostest, no?  Even if the last battle was a near-epic fail.

LG and Google can be a formidable team.  Both companies are flush, aggressive and want desperately to be your best TV friends.  But LG is taking a chance here, because Google TV's last appearance was a debacle for everyone -- for user, for the manufacturers, even the retailers.

If you were uncharitable, you could  blame that on Logitech, which actually manufactured the boxes and did a lovely job of industrial design, but tried to sell Google TV boxes for $249, when competing boxes from Roku et al were selling for less than a third of that.

You could also blame it on the braniacs that decided to introduce such a complex product straight to the masses through Best Buy, relying on sales forces not trained on the product and who could barely explain what it actually did. Going through specialty and custom retailers first would have been a shrewder strategy, but that's a longer play and would have required patience, which is in a bear market.

Or...you could just blame it on Google, which has never been shy to keep software in perpetual beta, expecting that everything just naturally gets upgraded over time. Google TV 1.0 was a surprisingly flawed beta that reviewers and consumers rejected in droves.  Has anyone else noticed that outside of their superb search and ad sales, this company hasn't exactly been no-miss?

LG is hoping they didn't miss this time.  We'll find out soon.

They say everything in electronics gets better, faster and cheaper.  They also used to say that two out of three ain't bad.  What if it's just one out of three?

The digitization of all things media is causing fallout effects throughout the various media industries.  That's hardly news, of course.  What we didn't see coming was that the blowback might seriously change the actual user experience for all that media -- to its detriment.

In an age of HDTV and beyond, video quality often gets worse.  In an age of SACD and high res music files, music often sounds worse than ever.  In an age where every device is a camera, image purity is out, image vandalism is in.

It's a provocative topic that inspires passion.  Check out the feature story...what's your take?

It's hard to muster much sympathy for a big electronics maker that's notorious for bare-knuckled business practices, deliberate incompatibilities, and a corporate culture that makes parochial school look like Haight Ashbury.

But these days, you have to feel a little sorry for Sony.  They used to rule the roost as one of the world's most admired brands.  Now the company stands dazed and confused in a marketplace it used to dominate, battered by bigger, smarter and more nimble competitors.

For the moment, let's look past the company's financial troubles; these days they're not alone.  Instead let's look at a recent announcement of a flagship Sony product -- a new piece of gear meant to introduce  the next big thing in video according to Sony.

Sony's BDP-S790 is 4K Blu-ray player.  That means it's compatible with the coming "Quad HD" format, and will upscale your high-def Blu-ray discs to that resolution once you get a display that can actually play it back, assuming you ever do.

The announcement itself was not unusual -- Sony is often first out of the gate or close on innovations for A/V.  What was unusual was the price.  Sony's next-big-thing statement piece -- as good as it gets (and will get for the foreseeable future) for movie playback at home lists for $250.

To put this announcement in perspective, Sony's first DVD player, the DVP-7000, came out in 1997 for a list price of $1000.  That would be $1,429 in today's dollars.  Sony's first HDTV for the US market, the KW-34HD1, debuted in 2001 for a suggested selling price of (gasp) $8,999.  That would cost $11,656 if you bought it today.

In 2012, Sony's flagship new media "statement" product costs the same as a couple of dozen pizzas. If you're Sony, that can't be good.

Of course in a commoditized market where you can get a new Blu-ray player for the cost of a Blu-ray disc, even an asking price of $250 will seem ludicrous to the average, non-videophile movie fan.

No wonder Sony is desperately trying to reorganize, cut its losses in the money pit that the TV business has become, and move into arenas that have nothing to do with consumer electronics.

Will Sony ultimately become nothing more than a logo on your home entertainment gear -- made by someone else, from someone else's designs, components and technologies?

Might be worth asking Philips or RCA. Or Apple.