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Al's Morning Meeting reader Orpheus Allison sends me lots of great tips. This is one of them. The Los Angeles Times explores why electronic components such as games, computers, DVRs and cable boxes are getting so darn hot these days. You may even notice that your air conditioner works harder as you stuff more electronics in your home.

The paper says:

The coolest electronic gear is often scorching.

Game consoles, digital video recorders, cable boxes and other gadgets in the living room are throwing off tremendous amounts of heat as manufacturers seeking more power cram them with circuitry, experts say.

As a result, home entertainment enthusiasts are reporting a variety of symptoms — rising room temperatures, malfunctioning gadgets, even warped wood and peeling paint in stereo cabinets.

The heat intensifies when consumers stack the devices in enclosed racks, choking off air circulation.

It's a growing problem for manufacturers, too. Some experts believe that overheating is a contributor to the wave of Xbox 360 malfunctions that last month prompted Microsoft Corp. to set aside more than $1 billion for repairs and extended warranties. Analysts estimate that as many as 25% of the consoles are faulty.

Microsoft won't say how many are failing or what causes the "red rings of death" that signify a system crash. But design consultants and electronics repairmen say the powerful console's wide temperature swings — from the supercharged heat of game play to overnight cool — is causing the solder to crack, fracturing the tiny electrical connections that allow energy to flow between the circuits. Eventually, one or more of the 1,700 components or 500 million transistors overheat and fail.

The desire for more powerful home electronics gear is fueling the rise of heat-spewing gadgets.

The Xbox 360 consumes three times the power that its predecessor does, while Sony Corp.'s PlayStation 3 console guzzles eight times as much energy as the PS2, according to the Natural Resources Defense Council, an environmental advocacy group.

A top-of-the-line cable television box that displays and records high-definition video can consume more energy in a year than a microwave oven or standard 32-inch TV.

The gadgets need that power to perform advanced functions, but it translates into heat. It's a problem that is exacerbated by the desire to cram ever more muscular components into thinner, more elegant packages. There's simply not enough room inside for the heat to dissipate.

"It's serious enough that consumers need to be aware of the issue," said Roger Kay, a technology consultant and president of Endpoint Technologies Associates.

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Can You Trust Your Waiter With Your Credit Card?

Al's Morning Meeting reader Kara Kenney at NBC2-TV in Fort Myers, Fla., addresses the problem of waiters who continue to take people's credit cards even though they have already been arrested and are awaiting trial for the crime. When gathering job application forms at local restaurants, Kenney found that while the restaurants ask if a person has been convicted of a crime, they rarely ask if the person has been arrested.

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Join Al for Live Webinar Thursday

You must sign up by noon Wednesday. On Thursday, August 16, from 2 to 3 p.m. Eastern Daylight Time, I will show you 25 places to find story ideas. We even have financial assistance available if the $24.95 is a problem for you.

You have said you want low-cost and practical journalism training. Here it is. See you LIVE online Thursday. 

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Educators Backing Politicians
On Friday, I told you about OpenSecrets.org's new data showing how people working in higher education are spending big bucks in the 2008 presidential race. The data makes it appear as though individual schools are helping to finance candidates, but Massie Ritsch, communications director of the Center for Responsive Politics helped me clarify this point:

Thanks for alerting your readers to our report on the political donations of the education industry. You ask a common question: "[W]hy the heck schools/nonprofit institutions, some of which get state tax dollars, are donating to any political candidate?" The answer is: They're not.

These are contributions from individuals who work for these institutions. (In our methodology, we also lump in immediate family members who don't appear to have jobs of their own — homemakers, children who are students, et al.) The schools themselves are forbidden from forming political action committees to make campaign donations, because they're 501c3 nonprofits (unless they are for-profit, like Apollo Group, in which case they can form PACs.) So, when our report says the University of California is responsible for $248,488 to federal candidates, parties and committees, that's shorthand for "employees of UC and their families."

We use the same shorthand throughout our Web site, OpenSecrets.org, though in the case of for-profit corporations, labor unions and trade associations that have PACs, any PAC contributions are included along with the individual contributions. We occasionally hear from administrators or attorneys for colleges, who say our reporting of the information in this way threatens their nonprofit status. We assure them it does not and explain our methodology. Sensing there might be similar confusion among readers of yesterday's report, I have expanded the footnote on the chart of university contributions and added some language in the story.

So, your question was a helpful one. Thank you.

Best,

Massie Ritsch

I still urge you to look at the lobbying money that schools themselves (not individuals) spend. Where is that money going and for what?

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Where Do Missing Adults Go?

The Detroit Free Press ran a fascinating series on missing adults and their kids who are searching for them. The paper points out:

At any given time, there are about 50,000 missing adults in the country, leaving behind families and neighbors and coworkers who continue to search. Some of the missing were victims of foul play. Some lost their lives to drug use or Alzheimer's or mental illness. Others disappear by choice and start a new life.

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Credit Crunch Crunches First-Time Homebuyers

Here is a story that helps explain a foundational issue behind the sub-prime mortgage meltdown that haunts Wall Street. Nearly 40 percent of first-time homebuyers put no money down when they bought their homes in 2005 and 2006. Those days are over. More and more homebuyers now have to come to the closing with cash because of the credit crunch that is moving through banking circles.

The Washington Post reports:

"No-down-payment loans are just about near impossible to get right now," said Jennifer Bridges, a real estate agent in Woodbridge at ERA Blue Diamond Realty. "We'll have someone all lined up and then without warning, the lender will say: 'It's gone.' It's terribly depressing."

National City Home Equity, a division of National City Bank, one of the nation's big home lenders, stopped funding some types of zero-down loans this month, said Ken Carter, the division's executive vice president.

"When home prices were appreciating and interest rates were declining, that product made sense," Carter said. "Today, we're on the opposite side of that coin, and it's not prudent to be stretching."

Washington Mutual, another big lender, in March stopped offering such loans to subprime borrowers, typically people with poor credit. It also reduced the size of loans to other borrowers.

"It used to be that we would finance a loan up to $1 million with no down payment for a first-time home buyer," said Daniel H. Aminoff, a senior loan consultant at Washington Mutual Home Loans in Alexandria. "But as of March, we will only finance a loan of $417,000 with no down payment."

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Editor's Note: Al's Morning Meeting is a compendium of ideas, edited story excerpts and other materials from a variety of Web sites, as well as original concepts and analysis. When the information comes directly from another source, it will be attributed and a link will be provided whenever possible. The column is fact-checked, but depends on the accuracy and integrity of the original sources cited. Errors and inaccuracies found will be corrected.

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