Fujitsu was able to cut its sticker price in half, he said, partly because of a lower failure rate and weaker yen against the dollar. Liquid crystal display flat screens the same technology used in some computer screens are marginally more affordable. About 65 percent of flat-screen sales are to businesses. It has proved an eye-catching marketing device. With plasma, the message is secondary.
People stop just to look at the monitor.
The Apartment, a mod home furnishings store on Crosby Street, has one suspended from the ceiling the first thing you notice when you walk in the door. The James Dean Lounge in the Iroquois Hotel on West 44th Street has one over the fireplace. He said he recently sold one to Julianne Moore. Jeffrey Sachs, an investment banker, said he got his 50-inch Pioneer plasma screen for a media room he just built in his apartment in United Nations Plaza. One criticism of the plasma screens is that they don't render black tones.