The animated film "Ice Age 3, Dawn of the Dinosaurs" is the top-grossing Hollywood film in Latvia, reports news agency LETA. The film has grossed 380,000 lats (542,800 euros) so far. It is also the most-watched Hollywood film in Latvia, with 126,722 viewers having seen the flick as of Sept. 13. The film can also be viewed in 3D format. Coming in second place this year is "Angels and Demons," followed by "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince." In 2008, movie house operator Forum Cinemas earned a profit of 1,996,943 lats, 2.3 percent less than a year earlier. Revenue last year reached 8,994,564 lats, up 8.9 percent from 2007 numbers.
According to the government committee on transition to digital TV coverage, Estonia is largely ready for transferring to digital television, reports news agency LETA. The committee noted that digital television that can be viewed with regular antennae covers a much wider area than the old analogue television. "Today, the coverage of six Estonian digital channels is nearly 99 percent of Estonia's territory, which is already much better than the old analogue television coverage," said the head of the committee, Juri Pihel. The digital signal coverage needs to be guaranteed at the required quality, free of charge for the entire Estonian territory before July 1, 2010, when the analogue signal will be switched off, with Estonia fully transferred to digital signal coverage.
Latvian airline airBaltic continues to ignore requirements by European Union Consumer Protection Laws which stipulate that the consumer has the right to know the final price of a service, reports news agency LETA. The Estonian Consumer Protection Board said that consumers have to be able to compare prices of different airlines, that prices, including taxes, have to be visible at all times. The Board reviewed airBaltic's Web site and confirmed that consumers are not shown the final price of the service. Board director general Andres Sooniste said "not revealing the final price is using unfair trading practices, causing unfair competition and gives the consumer misleading information about the price of services."