Video: Earth Stations: Sky in the Pie

Big dishes bring satellite programming right into the backyard

No mistaking them. Some look like a cake mold capable of turning out angel food for 2,500. Others look like a louvered back door from a tract house in Brobdingnag, or a creature from a 1950s horror movieĀ—the wretched spawn of reckless radioactive experimentation, the amazing colossal sand dollar.

Don't be fooled. The scooped-out gimcrack is nothing more than a TV antenna. It is quite a bit more, however, than the rabbit-ears atop the family console.

While the rest of the neighborhood wonders when it will...

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