I looked in vain for a place on a wall that could hold a 55-inch flat screen
I don't think this has gotten better. I toured some homes last year, and the flat screen TVs were placed above the fireplace. Two problems: 1) you wind up constantly craning your neck to watch TV, and 2) if you actually use the fireplace the TV probably gets much warmer than it should.
And yet these houses all sell for $500,000 or more. Or even a few million dollars in expensive places like the Bay Area.
I agree that the TV-above-the-fireplace thing is insane for exactly the reasons you mentioned, but I fear that the real problem there is that too many homeowners haven't really thought it through and want to do exactly that. :( I can almost guarantee that there will be angry replies in this thread from people who have done this and will defend it to the death in large part because they committed to it years ago and don't want to believe that they made a terrible mistake, especially now that they're used to it.
As someone who thinks about this stuff way too much, TVs above fireplaces are up there with leaving high frame rate supersampling (i.e., the "soap opera effect") turned on, and people who leave horizontal stretching enabled because that distortion is somehow less visually disturbing to them than pillarboxing when viewing SD content on an HD display. Needless to say, I'm really fun at parties. :)
I have my TV above the fireplace. I was concerned about overheating but in practice it's not a problem. Modern gas fireplaces don't actually give off much heat. They're designed to look nice and burn minimal fuel.
I don't think this has gotten better. I toured some homes last year, and the flat screen TVs were placed above the fireplace. Two problems: 1) you wind up constantly craning your neck to watch TV, and 2) if you actually use the fireplace the TV probably gets much warmer than it should.
And yet these houses all sell for $500,000 or more. Or even a few million dollars in expensive places like the Bay Area.