Drive-by Downloads: Beware

Drive-by Downloads: Beware of Malware in Disguise

Did you know that your computer can download malicious software without you even knowing it? It’s called a “drive-by download,” and it can happen when you visit a perfectly legitimate website, sometimes without you even clicking on a link. Bad guys can hide viruses, spyware, or just unwanted adware on good websites, and the download is triggered when you, for example, click on a pop-up window thinking that you are acknowledging an error report from the operating system or dismissing an advertisement. The download happens in the background and—bam! —your computer or mobile device is infected.

How Can You Protect Yourself?

Drive-by downloads are intended to happen without your knowledge, so it’s hard to avoid them. But there are things you can do to protect yourself.

• Stick to safe websites. Real drive-by attacks don’t always happen just in the dangerous parts of town. So, be vigilant and practice safe browsing habits by avoiding questionable websites like ones that offer pirated music, movies or adult content.
• Keep your software current. Malware tends to exploit bugs and security holes in software, so install security updates on your PC and mobile devices as soon as they become available. You can configure your computer or mobile device to regularly check and notify you of updates.
• Invest in security software to give you additional protection. A good security program will warn you if you visit a site that is questionable, and it will warn you if a program tries to use services on your computer, change configuration settings or run an application. When you consider the damage that criminals could do by stealing your personal information or locking up and ransoming your computer files, a decent security application is worth the minimal investment.
• Be on the alert for unwanted downloads. Don’t click on any unexpected pop-up window that warns you of a system problem or advertises an unknown product. Configure your browser’s security and privacy settings to block ads and to restrict execution of ActiveX or Flash files.

Finally, watch for the spinning icons, progress bars, or browser messages that indicate a download is in process. If you notice a download happening that you didn’t expect, stop it. Close that window, shut down the browser, disconnect from the Internet, and shut down the computer. Having to restart might be inconvenient, but the alternative could be downright dangerous.

"Ghost in the Shell" is Good

"Ghost in the Shell" Is Actually Pretty Good

Scarlett Johansson powers a satisfying remake of the anime classic.

By Tim Grierson

It's been 22 years since Ghost in the Shell hit theaters, but in a sense, the film has never really gone away. Based on Masamune Shirow's 1989 manga, the Japanese anime has spawned sequels, video games, and television series. More crucially, the film's dystopian, future-shock tension has been felt in later movies such as The Matrix and Avatar.

Borrowing from Blade Runner and Robocop, Ghost in the Shell envisioned a society in which man and machine would become inseparable—and that reality itself would become almost impossible to gauge. As A.I. and virtual reality become commonplace in our daily lives, Ghost in the Shell's prophecy only seems more prescient.

The weight of that 1995 sci-fi classic helmed by Mamoru Oshii hangs heavy over director Rupert Sanders' big-budget Hollywood remake, but this live-action reimagining ends up being pretty superb in its own right. Scarlett Johansson's intense performance helps a lot, but this new version also wisely recognizes that it can't just mimic the original's themes. After all, by this point they're well-worn genre tropes. Instead, this Ghost in the Shell brings other flavors into the mix. The result is a visually stunning thriller that is surprisingly emotional and enthralling.

*Mild Spoilers Ahead*

The film stars Johansson as the Major, a cyborg with a synthetic body but the mind of a human being. Saved from a near-fatal accident, she is now an elite soldier who helps track down a large metropolis' most dangerous criminals. Adjusting to her new body and new life, the Major works alongside fellow soldiers like the hard-ass Batou (Pilou Asbæk) in their search for the mysterious Kuze (Michael Carmen Pitt), a terrorist who seems determined to kill all those around her—including Dr. Ouelet (Juliette Binoche), the kindly scientist who oversees the program that designed the Major.

Using the 1995 movie as its starting point, the new Ghost in the Shell copies specific scenes from the original. But Sanders (who previously made the dull Snow White and the Huntsman) amplifies the dark tone and dystopian worldview. The universe of this Ghost in the Shell, as dreamed up by production designer Jan Roelfs and cinematographer Jess Hall, takes the looming skyscrapers, ubiquitous advertising and gloomy skies of Blade Runner and Minority Report and makes them even more imposing and bleak and gorgeous. There's a hypnotic grandeur to this remake's dystopian nightmare—sleek, chilly, eerily beautiful—that's always enrapturing to the eye.

Along the way, Sanders offers surprises for those who know the original. It would be unfair to reveal any spoilers, but let's just say that this Ghost in the Shell is more invested in the Major learning how she became a lethal killing machine. The ethics of artificial intelligence—always central to this franchise—remain an integral element of this remake, but Sanders augments it with other concerns. As with the best science fiction, the new film uses the genre as a way to comment on modern times, and indeed everything from drone warfare to the horror of child abuse is woven into the movie's fabric, but never heavy-handedly and often with intelligence and sensitivity.

What sells this Ghost, though, is Johansson—even with the burning controversy over her place in the film. Ever since the Golden Globe-nominated actress was cast as the lead in such an iconic Asian franchise, the film has been dogged by myriad accusations of whitewashing (a charge that the movie ends up addressing in its own way, though it's best to leave just how as a surprise). Indeed, this remake again demonstrates that there are far too few high-profile Asian stars who would have been able to get the movie green-lit, and the pushback has clearly had its effect on the film. Buzz has been low, press screenings came late, and Johansson didn't even mention Ghost during this month's appearance on "Saturday Night Live," whose monologue is nakedly a platform for the host to plug a new movie. But one must give Johansson her due, as she proves to be a worthy Major.

The truth is, several recent roles have prepared her to play this deadly commando. Take her confident turn as the ass-kicking Black Widow, the serenely murderous heroine in Lucy, and the spooky, otherworldly alien from Under the Skin, and you'll get a sense of how she brings the Major to life. Initially impassive until she gradually connects with her humanity, the Major discovers that what she knows is a lie, and Johansson sells that transformation, turning the character into an avenging angel you want to root for.

Johansson isn't the only standout. Asbæk is an imposing, believable Batou, all the way down to the prosthetic eyes that have always been the character's trademark. As Kuze, Pitt is menacing but also deeply scarred by a dark secret, making him an uncommonly vulnerable bad guy. And "Beat" Takeshi Kitano gives off a regal glow as the Major's commanding officer: Watching the veteran actor-director of art-house hits like Fireworks once again wield a gun with that deadpan menace is particularly thrilling.

It's inevitable that this remake, like the Major herself, will be spooked by echoes of the past. But perhaps it's appropriate for a film about the fluidity of reality and identity to say that this Ghost in the Shell is a very satisfying simulation of the original.

Transforming a Stadium

Transforming a Football Stadium Into a Final Four Court

A new floor, new seats, and a 700-ton scoreboard named Colossus.

By Tim Newcomb

University of Phoenix Stadium is no freshman newbie when it comes to hosting a Big Game. It set the stage for the New York Giant's stunning victory against the New England Patriots in Super Bowl XLII and has hosted college football's national championship. Now this 63,000-seat stadium is getting ready for the NCAA Final Four, which requires a lot of creative engineering.

To get ready for the conclusion to March Madness, the University of Phoenix Stadium would need to transform, swapping in a basketball court, bringing in more seats right up to the action, and hoisting a giant video board onto a retractable stadium roof.



Getting a floor inside the stadium is a familiar dance practiced by multi-purpose stadiums around the world. The stadium's natural-grass turf (the home field of the NFL's Arizona Cardinals) rests on a retractable tray that slides out of the stadium completely to soak in the rays of the Arizona sun. Once removed, the team builds the court directly onto the concrete floor. Surface experts Connor Sports made this court special for the NCAA Final Four, harvesting wood in Michigan and milling it before having it stained, painted, and finished in Idaho.

But before crews could even put down the floor for the NCAA Final Four semifinals tip off, University of Phoenix Stadium needed to affix its crown jewel—a 700-ton board named Colossus.

This is the same scoreboard that adorned Bristol Motor Speedway in Tennessee for an NCAA football game in fall 2016 and has served two NHL outdoor games, too. Engineers had to figure out a way to safely hang the 700-ton scoreboard above the court. What would usually be a herculean task in any stadium was made even harder at the University of Phoenix.

"We had to engineer the method in which we were going to hang the board because our facility was not built with a center-hung scoreboard in mind," says Tom Sadler, president and CEO of the Arizona Sports and Tourism Authority, owners of the stadium.


The Colossus. Its four high-definition screens stretch 32 feet wide by 18 feet tall and its four more statistics screens are 24 feet by 18 feet.

The Colossus, featuring 764 LED screens in a ring, is only 14 feet shorter than the court below it. Along with video, it holds auxiliary lighting and sound needed to hover over the floor. Crews needed 100 tons of cables, tied into the stadium's scaffolding, to make sure Colossus would stay in place.

"It took about two years of designing and coordinating with our structural engineer," says Fred Corsi, executive director of operations at the stadium.

After taking five days to "pre-rig" Colossus in late February, crews spent another 10 days constructing and hanging the technological beast earlier this month.



Now with the video board in place, crews could install the custom-made floor—longer and wider than a traditional floor. At the same time, the stadium removed about 5,200 seats in the lower bowl to make way for a temporary riser system, constructed and cantilevered over the existing lower bowl seats and the sidelines. More than 16,000 temporary seats go on this riser system until it flows seamlessly into the permanent seating partway up the lower bowl, bringing the stadium's max occupancy to 75,000.

"Imagine all the sideline seats and start at the floor," Sadler says. "You can see row one and then how it gradually moves into permanent seating and blends in...It is a little bit of an art."

With the venue now wiped clean of its football persona, the thousands of fans descending on Glendale, Arizona, likely won't appreciate the amount of planning and sweat poured into the stadium's transformation, but they'll certainly enjoy the view.

Trivia

The Waters Of Which Of These Lengthy Rivers Rarely Reaches The Ocean Anymore?

The Colorado River	The Mississippi River
The Rio Grande	The Tigris River

Answer: The Colorado River

There’s little that can stop a mighty roaring river from eventually reaching the sea, little that is, except for the needs of humankind. Historically, the Colorado River moved a huge amount of water throughout the southwestern United States and northern Mexico, fed mainly by snowmelt water from the Rocky Mountains. In fact, huge might be an understatement. Before human development along the river, the average discharge from the Colorado River into the Gulf of California was around 20 million cubic kilometers of water per year with an average peak discharge of roughly 2,800 cubic meters per second during the summer.

Today, shockingly, the Colorado River runs dry. While there’s plenty of water to see closer to the mountains, if you follow the river’s winding path through five U.S. states and northern Mexico, by the time you get to the end, you won’t see a powerful river emptying into the ocean, just a dry river bed with the occasional slow trickle of water that is more reminiscent of a country stream than the powerful river that cut the Grand Canyon into the earth.

Where did all the water go? Starting in the late 1880s, a series of irrigation and damming projects—from the Grand Ditch (completed in 1890) to high profile projects like the Hoover Dam (completed in 1935)—began altering the flow of the river to capture the water for farmland irrigation, energy generation, and to supply water to numerous cities along the way. The river is the sole supply of water for Imperial Valley in Southern California, seen in the photo here, which is among the most productive agricultural land in the United States.

While that made the arid badlands of the Southwest livable for millions of people, it also permanently changed the river. Starting in the 1960s, the river began running dry before it reached its mouth and since then, save for a few exceptions and several consecutive years in the 1980s when record-breaking precipitation and snowmelt sent water surging down the Colorado River watershed, it has never approached its previous flow rate.

Did You Know/Todays Term

Did You Know?

Kinder Surprise Eggs, a hollow chocolate candy with a toy hidden inside, are banned from import into the United States because FDA regulations ban the inclusion of non-nutritive objects in confectionery products (unless the non-nutritive objects have functional value).

Today's Tech Term 

Netroots

Netroots (a combination of the terms Internet and grassroots) is a term used to describe a campaign, movement, or political activism that is sparked, promoted, and conducted solely via the Internet.

Popular online sources that are used include: social media websites, blogs, podcasts, newsletters, wikis, etc.

Todays HaHa

Solution Riddle of the Week

Solution to Riddle of the Week: Racing Camels

Difficulty level: Moderate

 
By Jay Bennett

Remember, the owner of the camel that arrives at the city last wins the fortune. You can check the original question here.

SOLUTION

The wise men told the two sons to switch camels.

Entertainment News

From 'Jane the Virgin' to 'Scandal,' TV series are taking a matter-of-fact approach to abortion storylines

Xiomara (Andrea Navedo) talks with her ex, Rogelio (Jaime Camil), in an episode of "Jane The Virgin" that addressed abortion.

By Meredith Blake
Contact Reporter

In an episode of “Crazy Ex-Girlfriend” that aired days after the election in November, Paula, a middle-aged mom played by Donna Lynne Champlin, is lying in bed looking slightly peaked, when the doorbell rings.

Her teenage son hollers from somewhere off-screen: “Mom, I’ll get it, since you just had an abortion.”

This is how viewers of the CW musical dramedy found out that Paula, whose unplanned pregnancy threatened her dream of enrolling in law school, had opted not to have another child — not with a tear-streaked confession or an anguished scene in a clinic waiting room.

It also happened to be the second show on the CW, whose audience skews young and female, to tackle the subject in matter-of-fact fashion, following a similar story line on the telenovela spoof “Jane the Virgin.”

Once prone to portrayals that were wishy-washy or moralizing, TV and its storytellers are increasingly treating abortion as a simple reality for many women. In the last two years alone, shows ranging from ABC's prime-time soap "Scandal" to the surreal Netflix animated comedy "BoJack Horseman" to the AMC computing drama “Halt and Catch Fire” have shown characters opting to terminate pregnancies with little guilt or equivocation. Perhaps not coincidentally, most of these episodes were written by women.


A still from "Abortion: Stories Women Tell." (HBO / HBO)

TV is also diversifying its portrayals. On Monday, “Abortion: Stories Women Tell,” a documentary that takes a sympathetic look at women affected by stringent abortion regulations in Missouri, will run on HBO. The women range in age, race, marital status and motivation, undermining the idea that abortion is something for carefree twentysomethings or, as Paula jokes on “Crazy Ex-Girlfriend,” “teenagers the month after winter formal.”

Nearly 45 years after Norman Lear’s controversial sitcom “Maude” first tackled the subject in prime time — sending sponsors and affiliates running for the hills — a creatively vibrant television industry has grown comfortable with the “A” word. If abortion is still not exactly commonplace on the small screen, particularly when compared to the statistics — there are roughly 1 million abortions performed a year in the United States — it is clearly no longer the taboo it once was.

For Aline Brosh McKenna, co-creator and executive producer of "Crazy Ex-Girlfriend," and her female-dominated writing staff, Paula’s decision grew organically out of conversations about character development.

Choosing to put her ambitions first, after subsuming much of her identity to her husband and children, represented a breakthrough for Paula.

"We didn't have any conversations about the politics of it," says McKenna, who sees these abortion story lines as a natural byproduct of more women like her running shows. "If you're writing about women's lives, it’s a pretty hard thing not to write about."

Unplanned pregnancies are nothing new to “Jane the Virgin,” an emotionally grounded, if implausible, tale about Jane (Gina Rodriguez) a chaste young Latina accidentally inseminated at her gynecologist’s office. Jane chose to continue with the pregnancy, delighting her devoutly Catholic grandmother, Alba (Ivonne Coll).

But Jane’s fortysomething mother, Xiomara (Andrea Navedo), made a different choice in a plot last fall, opting to terminate an accidental pregnancy conceived in a more traditional manner. “In the interest of balance, of exploring different women's relationship to their bodies and their reproductive rights,” says creator and show runner Jennie Snyder Urman, “we owed the other side.”


Kerry Bishe, left, and Mackenzie Davis on "Halt and Catch Fire." (Annette Brown / AMC)

As on “Crazy Ex-Girlfriend,” the abortion was casually revealed after the fact, as Xiomara struggled with whether to share her secret with Alba. The focus was not on the decision itself, which was relatively easy for Xiomara, but on how it affected her personal relationships, particularly with her religious mother.

Snyder Urman, who, like McKenna, received no resistance from the CW about the story line, says: "I wanted to tell a different kind of abortion story.”

To abortion rights advocates, these understated portrayals help destigmatize a misunderstood procedure; to opponents, they downplay the gravity of what should be a monumental decision.

“Even progressives must be willing to acknowledge that abortion is serious — not a momentary annoyance or trivial act,” writes Gracy Olmstead, a blogger at the conservative website the Federalist.

At least demographically, these portrayals are closer to reality, says Gretchen Sisson, a sociologist at Advancing New Standards in Reproductive Health at UC San Francisco. Paula and Xiomara are already mothers, like 59% of women who have abortions. Xiomara, like 25% of women who have abortions, is Latina.

Historically, Sisson has found that women of color, lower-income women and those who already have children — groups more likely to have abortions in real life — are underrepresented in small-screen depictions. While this has begun to change, television still has some catching up to do.

"There's so much misinformation and social myth about abortion," Sisson says. "People believe it's less common and riskier than it really is. They don't have a good sense of who's getting it, or for what reasons. A lot of what we see on TV reflects those social myths and perpetuates them, and that has political consequences."

There's so much misinformation about abortion. A lot of TV reflects those social myths and perpetuates them, and that has political consequences.

— Gretchen Sisson

Even through a modern lens, “Maude” stands out for the humor, sensitivity and empathy with which it handled the subject of abortion (and, lest we forget, also acknowledging a 47-year-old grandmother as a sexual being).

But the provocative two-episode arc represents something of an anomaly in the annals of pop culture. For many years, it was rare to see a main character on a television series follow through with an abortion. More typical were pregnancy scares that turned out to be false alarms or pregnancies that resulted in narratively convenient miscarriages.

Characters who did have abortions were often racked with guilt or driven to madness as a result. The daytime soap "Another World" introduced TV’s first abortion story line in 1964, as a young woman left infertile by an illegal procedure shot her boyfriend out of rage.

The industry's ambivalence was most vividly (and absurdly) embodied by Erica Kane, the legendary bad girl played by Susan Lucci for 41 years on the daytime soap "All My Children." In 1973, Erica became the first TV character to have an abortion on television post-Roe vs. Wade. But decades later, it was revealed that she hadn’t had an abortion at all. Instead, a doctor had actually removed the fetus and implanted it in another woman, and Erica now had a grown son. To some, the ludicrous plot twist also felt like backpedaling.

Networks had good reason to be skittish. In 1989, NBC lost a reported $1 million in ad revenue when sponsors declined to buy time on "Roe v. Wade," a made-for-TV movie about the landmark case starring Holly Hunter.

Sympathetic portrayals of abortion were a safer bet for networks not dependent on advertisers, like HBO. In 1992, the network aired "A Private Matter," a docudrama about Sherri Finkbine, who fought to obtain an abortion in the early 1960s after taking thalidomide while pregnant A 2001 episode of "Sex and the City" also revealed that protagonist Carrie Bradshaw had had an abortion after a one-night stand when she was 22. The second-ever episode of "Girls” in 2012 was set in the waiting room of an abortion clinic.

Like Carrie, Tara Rose, a stay-at-home mom and freelance writer, had an abortion as a young woman. While she never regretted the decision, it was something she couldn’t talk about openly for many years.

"I saw that parallel in television,” says Rose, who started the blog Remember the Abortion Episode?. She has also detected a change in cultural attitudes over time.

"In the past, if a character did go through with an abortion, she had to be really sad about it and really tortured. More recently, what we're seeing is that people are talking about it a lot more, characters are going through with it and are not beating themselves up about it."

Mega-producer Shonda Rhimes has arguably done more to destigmatize abortion than just about anyone in the modern network TV business, working it into at least three of her prime-time ABC dramas — "Grey's Anatomy," "Private Practice" and "Scandal."

In a groundbreaking 2015 episode of the latter series, protagonist Olivia Pope (Kerry Washington), D.C. fixer and girlfriend to the president, underwent an abortion that was depicted on-screen, rather than merely implied — a rarity for a broadcast network. Meanwhile, her longtime nemesis, Republican Sen. Mellie Grant (Bellamy Young), filibustered on behalf of Planned Parenthood.

What might have caused a boycott a decade or two earlier led to an angry tirade from Rush Limbaugh, but not much more in the way of backlash.

Another major tipping point was a Season 4 story arc on the NBC/DirecTV series "Friday Night Lights" involving a high school student whose abortion becomes a local controversy in her small West Texas town.

Once the domain of tawdry soaps or earnest made-for-TV movies, abortion now turns up in sitcoms — albeit nontraditional ones, like “You’re the Worst” on FXX. In a recent subplot of the irreverent rom-com, a character treated herself to a decadent meal before having an “a-bo-bo,” as she called it.

It’s even become a trope on period dramas, including "Mad Men," "Downton Abbey," “Mercy Street.” ”Good Girls Revolt” and "Call the Midwife,” which tend to highlight the danger and desperation faced by women in the era before Roe vs. Wade (or in Great Britain, the Abortion Act of 1967).

Whether television is simply catching up with the American public, 69% of whom oppose overturning Roe vs. Wade, or the rise of cable networks and streaming services being less dependent on advertisers has enabled riskier storytelling, is unclear.

It also seems possible that TV writers are responding to a growing activist movement to remove the shame of abortion — embodied by the Twitter hashtag #ShoutYourAbortion.

Whatever the reason, these narratives have become more commonplace over a period of renewed intensity in the battle over abortion and funding for Planned Parenthood. Between 2011 and 2015, states enacted some 288 restrictions on abortion, according to the Guttmacher Institute, a research organization that advocates for reproductive rights.

“You can’t discount how much the election and what was going on politically was infecting and scaring people in the writers room,” says Snyder Urman, who included a caption reading “#supportplannedparenthood” in a post-election episode of “Jane the Virgin.” “You want to react in whatever corner of the Earth you have some control over.”

Later this month, a heavily anticipated — and, to some, uncomfortably timely — series adaptation of “The Handmaid’s Tale” will premiere on Hulu. Recently, in Texas, opponents of a proposed abortion bill turned up at the state Senate in the red robes and white bonnets worn by the enslaved breeders in Margaret Atwood’s dystopian novel. (The protest also felt like guerilla marketing.)

But because so many shows have urban, blue-state settings, scripted TV doesn't necessarily do a great job of illustrating the restrictions faced by an increasing number of women across the country.

That’s where nonfiction storytelling comes in.

Launched last year, the topical comedy show "Full Frontal With Samantha Bee” has made access to reproductive health a focal point of its coverage. According to a report by Media Matters, a liberal media watchdog group, the TBS comedy series has devoted twice as much time to the subject as any of the network news broadcasts.

Directed by Tracy Droz Tragos, "Abortion: Stories Women Tell” chronicles the experiences of women at an abortion clinic in Illinois, just over the state line from Missouri, in wake of a new law mandating a 72-hour waiting period.

Tragos’ previous film, "Rich Hill," examined poverty in small-town America, and she says it made her more aware of "the cycle of poverty perpetuated by not having access to education, birth control and abortion."

In a bid to “bust the stereotype,” Tragos gathered as many abortion stories as she could. While many women were reluctant to appear on-camera, others were eager to recount their experiences — with poverty, with domestic abuse, with the discovery of a fetal abnormality.

“Many of them found some personal solace saying I’m not a bad person,” Tragos says. “It speaks to the power of storytelling.”

Fri Inspiration

Morning Inspiration with Pastor Merritt

Almost every time the word "church" is used in the Bible, it refers to a local, visible, single, congregation that meets in a certain location. The New Testament always assumes membership in a local church. The Christian who is not a member of a church is compared in the Bible to an organ without a body, a sheep without a flock and a child without a family. Ephesians 2:19 says,

"You belong in God's household with every other Christian." (Ephesians 2:19, LB)

In other words, every believer ought to be “all in” with every other believer and for every other believer. Why? Because not only does the church need us but we need the church as the author of Hebrews points out.

"And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another." (Hebrews 10:24-25)

There are some great benefits to being all in to a church. The author of Hebrews lists two: one we stimulate each other to loving others and doing for others and we encourage others just by showing up. I have found at least three more benefits.

First of all, there are physical benefits. According to a study from Indiana's Purdue University published in the Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, people who joined a church, attend regularly, and get involved in the church, get sick much less often than those who don't. In fact, it was found that non-church members who never attended church or participated in a church were more than twice as likely to report health problems as those who were members.

God knew what He was doing when He said, "Do not forsake the assembling of yourselves together." Not long ago, came across this article. I don’t know how scientific it is, but it makes sense to me.

· Do not ride in automobiles - they cause 20% of all fatal accidents.

· Do not stay home - 17% of all accidents occur in the home.

· Do not walk on the streets or on the sidewalks - 14% of all accidents occur to pedestrians.

· Do not travel by air, rail or water - 16% of all accidents happen only by these three types of transportation.

· Only .001% of all deaths reported occur in the worship services of a church and these are related to previous physical disorders.

· Therefore the safest place for you to be at any time is in church. Come to church. It could save your life!

There are also emotional benefits to joining a church and getting actively involved. You will not only be healthier. You will be happier. The Connecticut Mutual Life Insurance Company studied people who had joined a church, were actively involved, prayed, read their Bibles and had surrendered their lives to Christ. When they compared those people to the people in America who did not attend church or were not religious, they discovered:

1. Church attenders are twice as likely to say their home life is happy.

2. Church attendersare almost twice as likely to believe that their work contributes to society.

3. Church attenders are more than twice as likely to reconcile marital problems rather than divorce.

4. Church attenders are six times more likely to do community volunteer work.

No wonder we are told that being all in with your church is encouraging.

Most importantly there are the spiritual benefits that come from being a member of the church. Let me just give them to you quickly.

Identity. - Just as a uniform identifies you as a solider, and a badge identifies you as an officer, church membership identifies you as a believer.

Maturity. - We grow best as we grow together and the church provides you a place where you can mature your faith and grow it.

Ministry. - The church gives you a place to discover your spiritual gifts and an avenue to put them to work.

Authority. - Every church member needs to be under the spiritual authority of a church pastor.

Accountability. - The church, especially friends in the church and a small group you are a part of, can help you be accountable and help encourage you in your daily walk with God.

Make Disciples

Make Disciples

By Touching Lives

“Therefore go and make disciples of all nations…” Matthew 28:19

“All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to Me.” These were the words Jesus spoke before giving His final command to His followers. For 33 years He had willingly humbled Himself in order to make a way for sinners to be right with God. For 33 years He chose to look like us, live with us, and struggle among us…but most importantly, He chose to model for us the ministry that He would leave in our hands – the ministry of making disciples.

By His authority, Jesus issued His final command to the followers He dearly loved. Most Christians know it as, “The Great Commission.” The purpose of each and every Christian begins with one little word, “Go.” It must have been one of Jesus’ favorite words, especially after He rose from the grave. In five of His ten resurrection appearances, Jesus told His disciples to “go.” Christianity is a faith on the go.

Somehow along the way, Christians have gotten the idea that our primary responsibility as Christ-followers is to come instead of to go. Our primary responsibility is not to come to the church, but to go out from the church to the people who need Jesus. We come to the church so that we can grow and mature. This equips us to go out and make disciples in the name of Jesus.

The only way anyone becomes a disciple of Jesus is when someone who already knows Him shares the Gospel. This is what we call evangelism. Evangelism is not making Baptists or Methodists or Presbyterians. It is making disciples – fully devoted followers of Jesus Christ. If you are a follower of Jesus, your number one reason for being here is to make other followers of Jesus.

There is one of two things true about every person on the face of the earth. You either need to become a disciple because you are not a follower of Christ; or, you need to become a disciple maker, because you are a follower of Christ. Christianity is the most culturally diverse faith movement in history, and it should be, because we have been commanded to, “Go and make disciples of all nations…”

We Know God’s Truth

We Know God’s Truth through Creation

We Know God’s Truth Through Creation
By Rick Warren

“But the basic reality of God is plain enough. Open your eyes and there it is!” (Romans 1:19 MSG).

About 35 years ago, I was at a camp in the mountains. Alone in a room, I prayed, “God, if there is a God, I’m open. If you’re real, I want to know you’re real. And, Jesus Christ, if you can change my life, if there is a purpose for my life, I want to know it.”

You know what happened? I didn’t get goose bumps. I didn’t cry. No bright lights shone down — nothing like that.

Yet, still, it was the turning point in my life, because I was no longer biasing myself against God. I wanted to know the truth, even if it was inconvenient.

Truth can be discovered, but first we have to have an attitude of openness that says, “I want the truth more than anything else.” Once you choose that attitude, you can discover the truth. How?

First, through creation.

We learn a lot about God and a lot about truth just by looking at nature. This is why science is so important — it helps us understand God and his universe.

For instance, by knowing that there are 60,000 varieties of beetles, we learn God likes variety. By seeing a volcano, a tidal wave, or an earthquake, we learn God is powerful. From the delicately balanced ecosystem, we can observe God is incredibly organized.

The Bible says, “The basic reality of God is plain enough. Open your eyes and there it is! By taking a long and thoughtful look at what God has created, people have always been able to see what their eyes as such can’t see: eternal power, for instance, and the mystery of his divine being. So nobody has a good excuse” (Romans 1:19-20 MSG).

God will also lead us to the truth through conscience, through careful consideration, through God’s commandments, and through Jesus Christ. We’ll talk more about it in the next few days.

High Infidelity

High Infidelity
by Alex Crain, Crosswalk.com Contributor

"…you also were made to die to the Law through the body of Christ, so that you might be joined to another, to Him who was raised from the dead, in order that we might bear fruit for God."

Romans 7:4 NASB

Usually, we think of "having faith" as simply "trusting, believing." And while that is true, it can be incomplete if we forget that, as Christians, we are also joined to Christ as our Bridegroom. In other words, there is a real relationship with Him—the living Christ—that is at stake. It is not just a matter of possessing correct content of what we believe about the person and work of Christ. And although we never have a legitimate cause to do so, we often break faith with and betray our faithful Bridegroom.

Francis Schaeffer talks about this in chapter seven of True Spirituality where we continue our journey with him this week. Citing the passage above, he notes that since we have been rescued from the tyranny of the devil and placed safely in the arms of the Lord Jesus Christ—we are now positioned to bring forth His fruit.

Schaeffer expands upon the simple, yet remarkably powerful word picture inRomans 7:1-4 to make the point plain:

"Imagine a married couple both of the one color of skin. Suddenly the wife brings forth a child clearly of another race [sic]. All the world would know that she has been unfaithful to her proper mate. So it is with us."

When we do not bring forth His fruit—love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control (per Galatians 5:19)—but bring forth immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmities, strife, jealousy, outbursts of anger, disputes, dissensions, factions, envying, drunkenness, carousing, and things like these (Galatians 5:19), it is because we have broken faith with Him and are in the state of infidelity of the highest order.

What generally causes us to distrust Christ and leads us to break faith with Him and run to the arms of another is the fact that we often think that we have a better way. We think that, somehow, God really doesn't have our best interests at heart. I know for me, personally, this happens mostly when I am "Law-minded" in a way that discounts or obscures the gospel. One writer, Milton Vincent, in his a gospel primer for christians provides a helpful counter to this erroneous and sinful way of thinking (p. 18):

"…when I begin my train of thought with the gospel, I realize that if God loved me enough to sacrifice His Son's life for me, then He must be guided by that same love when He speaks His commandments to me. Viewing God's commands and prohibitions in this light, I can see them for what they really are: friendly signposts from a heavenly Father who is seeking to love me through each directive, so that I might experience His very fullness forever." (see Deut. 5:29)

Not only are they friendly signposts, they are friendly love letters from our faithful Bridegroom who has done nothing to warrant our distrust. By His life-giving Spirit, He is actively seeking to love us and bring forth His fruit in us today. What is the state of your union with Him? 

Intersecting Faith & Life: In light of today's devotional, contemplate afresh Schaeffer's summary of the life of faith: "The how of the Christian life is the power of the crucified and risen Lord, through the agency of the indwelling Holy Spirit, by faith moment by moment."

For Further Prayer & Study:
If repentance for spiritual infidelity is in order, reflect on Isaiah 30:15 "Thus the Lord GOD, the Holy One of Israel, has said, ‘In repentance and rest you will be saved, In quietness and trust is your strength.'" For further study, read Romans 6:1.

Auto Recall

Toyota Recalls 2.9 Million Cars Due To Exploding Airbags

by Brendan Kelly

Toyota has announced that it will be recalled about 2.9 million vehicles due to faulty airbag inflators.

According to Reuters, Toyota Motor Corp announced on March 30 that it will be recalling a total of about 2.9 million vehicles in Japan, China, and Oceania, among other regions. The vehicles being recalled include Toyota's Corolla Axio sedan and its RAV4 SUV crossover.

The vehicles are being recalled due to faulty airbag inflators.

Reuters reports that Fuji Heavy Industries, which makes Subaru cars, Mitsubishi Motors, and truck maker Hino have also recalled vehicles, a total of about 240,000, due to similar problems with airbag inflators made by Takata Corp. The inflators can explode if exposed to heat for prolonged periods of time.

At least 16 deaths have been linked to exploding Takata inflators, mainly in the United States, which has led to the biggest-ever global recall in the auto industry.

Global transport authorites consider Takata's airbag inflators containing the chemical compound ammonium nitrate to be unsafe if used without a drying agent. Roughly 100 million Takata inflators on the market must be  withdrawn.

Toyota says that the latest recall comes following a wider recall of the inflators ordered by global transport authorities in 2016.

Recalls were issued for about 1.16 million vehicles sold in Oceania, the Middle East, and smaller markets for the company, Toyota says. About 750,000 vehicles were recalled in Japan.

Vehicles sold in North America are exempt from the latest recall, the company says.

Consumer Reports detailed the issue with the Takata inflators. The site reported, "At the heart of the problem is the airbag’s inflator, a metal cartridge loaded with propellant wafers, which in some cases has ignited with explosive force. If the inflator housing ruptures in a crash, metal shards from the airbag can be sprayed throughout the passenger cabin—a potentially disastrous outcome from a supposedly life-saving device."

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration referred to the recall as the "largest and most complex safety recall in U.S. History."

The NHTSA has determined that the cause of the problem is that the airbags use awn ammonium nitrate-based propellent without a chemical drying agent.

"As postulated early on, environmental moisture, high temperatures, and age as associated with the defect that can improperly inflate the airbags and even send shrapnel into the occupant," Consumer Reports explains.

Sources: Reuters, Consumer Reports / Photo Credit: Reuters

Control Your Echo from Anywhere

How to Control Your Amazon Echo from Anywhere Using Your Phone

If your Amazon Echo can’t hear you from the other room, or if you just want to control it when you’re away from home altogether, you can do so with the Amazon app (on iOS) or a handy third-party app (on Android).

The Echo’s far-field voice recognition technology is one of the device’s most touted feature, and it allows it to hear your voice from well across the room, even when there’s music playing. However, its biggest hindrance is walls, and if you want to control the Echo from the next room over, it may not hear you. Furthermore, if you’re away from home and you want to give a voice command to the Echo, you obviously can’t.

However, Amazon’s own shopping app on iOS now allows you to give your Amazon Echo voice commands through your phone, effectively getting rid of the need for the $30 Voice Remote, too. It doesn’t directly control your physical Amazon Echo unit, per se, but it acts as a virtual Echo device, communicating with your Alexa account and letting you control your smarthome devices by voice using Alexa on your phone.

The feature uses the existing microphone button in the app that’s used for voice search. You can still use it for that, of course, but now Alexa is completely built in. Here’s how to quickly set it up and get going.

Unfortunately, this feature isn’t available on Android yet, but we have a third-party alternative you can use for the time being—just scroll down to the next section to see it.

How to Control Alexa From Your iPhone

Install the Amazon app for iOS, if you haven’t already. Then open it up and tap on the microphone button toward the top-right corner of the screen.



Tap on “Allow Microphone Access” at the bottom.



Hit “OK” to give the app permission to use your iPhone’s microphone.



After that, you can give Alexa commands by tapping on the microphone button first and then saying your command—no need to start with “Alexa”, either. She is listening whenever the blue bar at the bottom lights up.



How to Control Alexa From an Android Phone

Unfortunately, this feature is not yet available in the Android version of the Amazon app, but luckily there’s a third-party app (called Ubi) that gives you similar functionality.

After you download and install the app, open it up and tap “Login with Amazon” at the bottom.



You’ll be taken to the web browser where you’ll log in to your Amazon account.



On the next screen, tap on “I Agree” at the bottom.



You’ll be taken back to the Ubi app where you can immediately begin using Alexa from anywhere. Simply tap once on the big round button and say your command (no need to say “Alexa”). Alexa will respond through the phone’s speaker.



Of course, the only downside of these apps is that they aren’t quite as quick to use as the Voice Remote, where you can just pick it up and speak, and they don’t have the always-on listening of the Echo. But if you want a much cheaper alternative that you can also use while you’re away from home entirely, then the Amazon app and Ubi are the apps to get.

Best Picture Quality from HDTV

How to Get the Best Picture Quality from Your HDTV

Feel like you aren’t getting the best picture from your shiny new TV? Want to make sure you’re watching movies as they were intended to be seen? Here’s what you need to know about HDTV picture quality, and how to adjust your set for the best image.

Why TV’s Don’t Come with Optimal Picture Quality

Most TVs are not designed to have the best picture quality out-of-the-box. Instead, they’re designed to be eye-catching in the showroom, next to other TVs under fluorescent lights. That means their backlight is as bright as possible, contrast is set so the image “pops”, sharpness is turned up way too high, and motion is ultra smooth.

However, most of these features are not ideal for your living room. Colors that “pop” are usually ugly and un-lifelike, and can remove detail from the image. Those overly bright whites actually have a blue tint, which is inaccurate and can strain your eyes when you’re watching in the dark. Furthermore, extra sharpening and smoothing features are usually just marketing gimmicks, and actually add artifacts to your image, rather than making them look better.

For a long time, TVs used to come with these “vivid” settings out of the box, which is terrible for at-home viewing. If you have a TV that’s more than a couple years old, you may still be using those awful settings. These days, things are a little better, since most TVs will ask you to put them in “Home” or “Store Demo” mode when you set them up. But even the out-of-the-box “Home” settings are less than ideal, even if they’re not quite as bad as the old “vivid” settings were.

For the best possible picture quality, you’ll have a better viewing experience by turning most of these features off, and adjusting the brightness, contrast, and color to more lifelike settings. It may not “pop” like it did in the store, but you’ll actually see more detail in the picture, and more lifelike colors. Once you get used to it, you’ll never go back.

Step One: Change Your TV’s Image Preset

Most TVs come with different presets, like “Standard”, “Movie”, and “Vivid”, that use different combinations of settings. The first—and biggest—step to getting better picture quality is to choose the right preset.

Open your TV’s settings menu, usually by pressing the “Menu” button on your TV remote. Find the picture mode presets and enable the one labeled “Movie”. (On some TVs, this may be called “THX” or “Film”. If you don’t see an option like this, or aren’t sure, pick “Custom”.)

You should see the picture already looks quite different, depending on which mode your TV was in before (again, many modern TVs use a not-terrible-but-still-not-ideal “Standard” mode, but if your TV is older or secondhand, it may use the god-awful “Vivid” mode).

Note that if you’re used to the default settings, you might be underwhelmed at first. For example, Movie mode may look dark and “washed out” in comparison, but that’s only because other modes, particularly “Vivid” or “Dynamic” ones, are too bright, oversaturated, and (ironically) unnatural. (Remember, if things are actually too dark to see, you can always turn the backlight up a little higher later.)

This simulated comparison gives you an idea of the difference between the “Movie” and vivid modes you’ll find on many TVs. Notice how the skin tones look pink and unnatural in the more vivid modes.

After enabling Movie mode, you may also think that some white areas (like clouds or snow) appear to have a reddish tint, but that’s your eyes playing tricks again. In fact, that color is probably much closer to true white–the other modes actually have a blue tint that makes them look brighter, but it’s actually quite inaccurate. This movie mode is not only truer to life, but it’s much less harsh on your eyes—especially if you’re watching in the dark.

In addition, on some TVs, Movie mode is the only preset that gives you access to all the advanced settings. Other presets may have them blocked or greyed out. This is important, since we’ll tweak those advanced settings in step two and three.

Step Two: Turn Off the Unnecessary Features

Modern TVs come with a host of advanced settings that claim to make the picture look better. In reality, most of these are marketing gimmicks meant to one-up the competition, and you should turn them off. Head back to your TV’s menu and look at any “Picture Options” or “Advanced Settings” menus.

You should turn off most of these features, including:

• Dynamic Contrast, which attempts to make the picture “pop” by making the dark areas darker and the light areas lighter. Unfortunately, with this enabled, you lose some detail in the picture. In some situations, this can even introduce artifacts like color banding.
• Black Tone or Black Detail aims to make blacks darker, but like Dynamic Contrast, will reduce detail in the picture. These are different from Black Level, which you’ll want set to RGB Limited (or the equivalent) if your TV has the option.
• Color Temperature should already be handled by your preset, as described above—but in case it isn’t, you’ll want this set to the warmest option, since that’s most likely to set whites to “true white” instead of “blue white”.
• Flesh Tone lets you adjust skin colors, but on a properly calibrated TV, this shouldn’t be necessary. In fact, it can cause other quirks, like blond people having pink streaks in their hair. Leave this at 0.
• Noise Reduction or DNR sounds like a good thing, but for HD content like Blu-Ray discs, it’ll cause more problems than it solves. (It could be useful for some low-quality videos, though, like VHS tapes.)
• Game Mode reduces the lag between your video game console and the TV for super responsive video games. For movies and TV, it’s best to turn off, since it can lower picture quality.
• Motion Interpolation may be called something else on your TV—Samsung calls it Auto Motion Plus, Sony calls it MotionFlow, and so on. This creates new frames in between the ones in your video, smoothing out motion and causing what’s commonly known as the soap opera effect. This is mostly personal preference—a lot of people hate it, while others like it on (especially for sports).

Many of these settings reduce detail, especially in dark or light areas. This simulated image may “pop” more with dynamic contrast, but you lose a lot of depth and detail in the suit—notice how the wrinkles in the sleeves nearly disappear.

Some of these features may go by different names depending on your TV’s manufacturer. If you’re unsure what a setting does, google it and see if it matches any of the above descriptions.

There are a few exceptions to this rule, of course. Local LED Dimming, for example, can be a good feature if it’s implemented well (though sometimes it can cause flickering). Try it both on and off to see which you prefer.

When in doubt, though, if you aren’t sure what a feature does, you can’t go too wrong turning it off.

Step Three: Adjust Your Settings with a Calibration Disc

Steps one and two should take you most of the way. If you’re willing to do a tad more work, you can fine-tune some of your TV’s other settings to really dial in optimal picture quality.

You’ll need a calibration disc to perform this step. We’re going to be using the free AVS 709 patterns available here. You can either burn it to a Blu-ray disc, or copy the MP4 version to a flash drive and use your Blu-ray player, Xbox, PlayStation, or other USB-enabled device to play the test patterns on your TV.

There are a lot of other calibration discs out there you can buy, like Spears & Munsil HD Benchmark, Disney’s World of Wonder, or Digital Video Essentials, but for today’s purposes, the free AVS 709 disc will be more than enough.

Once you’ve got the patterns ready to play on your TV, read on—we’ll start with some basic adjustments and then move into slightly more advanced territory.

Adjust Brightness and Contrast for Deep Blacks and Maximum Detail

First, you’ll want to adjust your TV’s brightness, which affects how dark your blacks are (not to be confused with the backlight setting, which you can set to whatever is comfortable for your eyes).

On the AVS 709 disc, head to Basic Settings and play the first chapter, “Black Clipping”. You’ll see the following image on your screen.

Then, open your TV’s menu and head to the Brightness setting. Lower it until the black bars on the right start to disappear, then increase it one step at a time. You want the brightness set so that you just barely see the black bar at 17. If you set the brightness any lower than that, you’ll lose detail as your blacks get crushed.

Setting contrast is similar. Head to Chapter 3 in Basic Settings, called “White Clipping”. It’ll look like this:

Then, open your TV’s menu and head to the Contrast setting. Set it as high as you can while still being able to see the distinct grey bars from 230 to 234. If one of them turns as white as the background, lower the contrast a bit.

If that means setting your Contrast to the maximum value, that’s fine. Don’t worry if you see white values beyond 234, too—that’s normal on some TVs. You just don’t want the bars at 234 or lower to disappear.

After adjusting your contrast, go back and adjust the brightness again, and make sure you’re at the right level. Changing the contrast can affect the optimal brightness level, and vice versa. Once you go through both a second time, though, you should be able to find the ideal setting for each.

Tweak Overscan and Sharpness for a Pixel-Perfect Picture

Back in the days of big CRT televisions, content creators used something called overscan to ensure the picture filled the screen. It would cut off a small portion of the picture around the edges, usually by a couple percent. But on modern digital LCD TVs, this is a bad thing—if your screen has 1920×1080 pixels, and your Blu-ray has 1920×1080 pixels of information, you want each pixel to show up exactly where it’s supposed to—otherwise your TV is zooming in on the picture, things won’t be as sharp, and you won’t get that pixel-perfect image.

Alas, overscan still exists on modern TVs, so you’ll want to make sure it’s turned off. On the AVS 709 disc, go back to the Basic Patterns menu and head to chatper 5, “Sharpness & Overscan”. You’ll see something like this:

If you see the one-pixel white line around the outside of the image, you’re all set—overscan is turned off. Otherwise, you’ll have to jump into your TV’s menu and turn overscan off. If you can’t get it to fit perfectly, you may also need to disable overscan on your Blu-ray player or set-top box.

Once that’s done, you can move on to adjusting sharpness, which uses this same test pattern. Many TVs come out of the box with the sharpness dialed too high, and while it may look good at first glance, the edge enhancement algorithm can actually create lots of artifacts that make the picture worse.

In most cases, you can probably just turn Sharpness down to 0—that will show the movie, pixel for pixel, as it is on the disc. But if you want to add a little bit of sharpening, this test pattern will help you find the right level. Turn the sharpness up until you start to see a Moiré pattern around any of the black lines, particularly the really skinny ones. As soon as you see that, turn the Sharpness down until they disappear. That’s the highest sharpness can be without causing serious artifacting.

Fix Color Saturation and Tint for More Accurate Colors

Lastly, it’s time to adjust the actual colors on your screen. You can’t do serious color adjustment without a colorimeter, but you can perform a few basic adjustments that should get you close, provided you have a decent TV.

There are two ways to perform this adjustment. If your TV has a built in “RGB Mode” or “Blue Mode”, you’re golden—dig through the settings and see if you can find something by that name.

If it doesn’t, you’ll need a pair of blue filter glasses. They come with some of the aforementioned calibration discs, but if you’re using the free AVS 709 disc like we are, you’ll need to buy a pair—THX sells them for $5.

To adjust the color saturation and tint, head to chapter 4 of Basic Settings, “Flashing Color Bars”. It’ll look something like this:

Then, turn Blue mode on, or put your blue filter glasses on. Once you do, the screen should look a bit more like this:

Your goal is to get the blue inside the boxes to match the blue of its corresponding bar. Start by adjusting the “Color” setting on your TV—turn it up or down until the outside bars match their boxes as close as possible.

Then, move onto Tint, and do the same thing with the middle two bars. Note that as you adjust the Tint, the Color bars on the outside will get a little out of whack too, since both of these settings are a little dependent on one another. So keep flipping back and forth between the two, adjusting them until all four boxes match all four bars.

Check Your Colors and Fine-Tune If Necessary

At this point, you should be mostly done. You can go back and double-check all your settings now (in case any of them affected the others), and I like to go into the Misc Patterns > Additional section of the AVS 709 disc and check a few extra patterns. The Grayscale ramp is useful for seeing if you’re getting any color banding, and the Color Steps and Color Clipping ensure that colors aren’t bleeding together. If you see problems with these patterns, it’s likely you have some advanced setting turned on that you shouldn’t, so you should go back and experiment until the greyscale ramp looks as gradual as possible, the color steps look distinct from one another, and the color clipping is showing each distinct bar on the left side of the screen.

Once you’re happy with how everything is set up, pop in a movie and see how it all looks. It should be quite an improvement over that “vivid” setting.

A simulated comparison of vivid mode and a calibrated image. Isn’t that better? The vivid mode’s street is purple for crying out loud!

Remember, things may look a bit more muted compared to that vivid setting, but give your eyes a bit of time to get used to the change. At the end of the day, these adjustments will ensure you’re getting the maximum amount of detail out of your TV, and you’re seeing the movies pixel-for-pixel as they were intended—or at least as close as you can get without professional calibration.

Speaking of which…

The Easier Option: Is Professional Calibration Worth It?

If all that sounds like too much work for you—or if you want to get the absolute most out of your TV—a professional calibrator might be the answer.

The price of a professional calibrator can vary a lot, though on average they cost around $300 to $500 (though you can occasionally find some cheaper or more expensive). A professional calibrator will do all of the above adjustments, plus a few more that you can’t do by eye. By using special equipment, a calibrator can perfect your greyscale, map your color gamut, and adjust gamma to your preferences.

This part of the process is a bit more about adhering to a certain standard than getting perfect picture quality. It ensures that when you watch Avatar, the Na’vi will be the same shade of blue that James Cameron saw in the editing room. The white snow in Planet Earth will be a true white, not drifting toward other hues like blue or red.

Some panels will be pretty close to accurate after the basic adjustments we discussed in this article, while other TVs will need professional calibration to look anywhere close to accurate.

So how do you know whether it’s worth the money? It mostly comes down to how critical you are of your picture. If you’re one of those people that wants the most accurate possible picture, professional calibration may be worthwhile for you. But if you just watch the occasional comedy in a brightly-lit living room, and your TV looks fine to you after the above adjustments, you may not need to go any further.

The cost and complexity of your setup can make a big difference too. If you have a high-end video receiver that also has its own image adjustments, a professional calibrator can help you make sense of it all. If you have a TV that cost $2000, a $300 calibration may be a small price to pay for perfect picture—while it may seem overly expensive for a TV that itself was $300.

And, of course, the less of the above work you want to do yourself, the more a professional calibrator will be worth your money. $300 may be a lot of money if you’re going from “almost there” to “perfect”, but well worth it if you’re going from “bad vivid settings” to “perfect”. This is especially true if you aren’t super tech-savvy to begin with—a calibrator may find little things you missed that can make a big difference (like a cable box that got stuck outputting in standard definition instead of HD).

You can get a calibration from big-box stores like Best Buy, usually for pretty cheap—but it’s hard to know what you’re getting, because they employ so many calibrators. Some may be great, others may be terrible. If you really want to ensure you get your money’s worth, you’re best off searching for a list of ISF or THX certified calibrators in your area. You can find good lists on the ISF and THX websites, as well as sites like AVS Forum. Find a calibrator with a good reputation. Ask them about their services—what kind of equipment they use, how long they’ve been in the business, and whether they offer you a full report after calibrating your set. If you do a little due diligence, you can be much more confident that you’ve picked a good person for the job.

Remember: Your TV Is Only As Good As the Source Material

Lastly, we should remind you: your TV is only as good as the video you’re playing on it. You can calibrate your TV to perfectly fit any standard out there, but no amount of calibration will save you from a bad quality video. If you’re using DVD instead of Blu-Ray, you aren’t getting the best quality possible. Streaming video like Netflix will always be more compressed than its Blu-Ray counterparts. And if you’re illegally pirating low-quality episodes of Game of Thrones instead of watching the real thing, you’re going to have a bad time.

So as you go through the above process, make sure you’re getting your movies and shows in the best quality they’re available in. Blu-ray is the best quality most consumers can get. If you can’t do that, HD streaming or HD downloads (from stores like iTunes) will suffice, with DVDs being a last resort (if the movie or show isn’t available in HD anywhere). If you are forced to watch something on DVD, a better DVD player can make things look a little sharper on an HDTV.

In addition, not every movie is perfectly mastered. Some movies are just a little more washed out than others, or were over-sharpened when put on a Blu-ray disc, and there’s nothing you can do about that. These settings will match how most movies were mastered, but don’t expect every movie to look perfect—if the studio wasn’t doing its job well, that’ll come through on the TV, no matter what settings you use.

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TV quality is a surprisingly complex subject, but with a little research and tweaking, you’ll be surprised how much better you can make your picture look. Just remember: these tips may make your picture look dim or washed out at first glance, but that’s mostly your eyes playing tricks on you. This is how those movies and shows were edited and colored, and how they were intended to be seen in the theater at home. Give yourself some time to get used to it, and you’ll probably see how much better it really is.

Special thanks to calibrators David Abrams, Ray Coronado, and Bill Hergonson for offering their expertise as we wrote this article.