# The Change Mariner

Navigating Social, Technological, Political and Economic Change
A Tool for Forecasting Investment, Business, and Career Opportunities

## April 30, 2004

### Controversial Youth Ministry Spreading Like Wildfire

Contra Costa Times: It's Wednesday night, and the hottest teen hangout around is packed and throbbing with what seems an unholy beat.

A disc jockey spins dance tunes upstairs, sending boys in sagging pants into contortions. Downstairs, girls surf the Internet from rows of iMacs flanking a glassed-in basketball court. Hundreds of new arrivals flow under a neon sign reading, "Oneighty," slowed only by a weapons check at the door.

Church night Bible study, it's not. But the music is Christian, the surfing monitored and "the funnest part," a 12-year-old Oneighty regular attests over a video game, "is learning about God."

With a worship style that is both hugely popular and way over the top -- this night's service features live motocross stunts -- the youth ministry of Tulsa's Church on the Move has been copied nationwide.

More than 100 unrelated youth groups have franchised the concept and the trademarked Oneighty name, despite critics who find its approach big on show and short on spirituality.
It's Wednesday night, and the hottest teen hangout around is packed and throbbing with what seems an unholy beat.

Posted by Norm M. Wada at 10:50 PM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

### Asian Population Surging Across America

Yahoo! News:

> The scents of herbs and spices waft out of a Vietnamese medicine store, down a hall and past a restaurant where diners sip tea and eat bowls of pho. Pulsing Vietnamese music plays in the background.

> It's a scene out of Hanoi -- but it's really a suburban Washington strip mall that has become a hub for the burgeoning Vietnamese community and an example of what's happening elsewhere in the country.

> Asians are projected to be the fastest-growing major population category over the next half-century, outpacing blacks, whites and Hispanics. Recent Census Bureau projections show the Asian population could grow by a third, to 14 million, by 2010 and more than triple to 33 million in 2050.

Posted by Timothy Fredel at 07:31 PM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

### Internet E-Commerce Poised To Remake Six Major Industries: Jewelry, Bill Payments, Telecom, Hotels, Real Estate & Software

Business Week Online:

> The Web is threatening to force down the prices charged by traditional players, squeeze their margins, and even put some out of business. New technology, new ways of doing business, and new approaches to cutting out the middleman mean the old pricing power is collapsing in a series of industries -- and existing leaders will be forced to find new ways to make money. The pressing question is: How many more industries will be transformed by the Net? "How high is the sky?" answers Barry Diller, CEO of InterActiveCorp (IACI ) , which owns Expedia and other Net properties.

> In the first wave of disruption, Amazon, Expedia, and others rewrote the rules for books, music, and air travel. Now the Web is poised to remake at least six more major industries: jewelry, bill payments, telecom, hotels, real estate, and software. In the jewelry business, online players are set to wreak havoc on traditional players. Amazon CEO Jeffrey P. Bezos, who jumped into the business on Apr. 22, says he can buy a diamond wholesale for $500 and resell it for $575. Never mind that Tiffany (TIF ), Zale (ZLC ), and neighborhood stores are used to getting $1,000 for the same stone. Five-year-old Blue Nile Inc. has proved that this strategy can be very profitable.

Posted by Bob King at 02:05 AM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

## April 29, 2004

### Key Breakthrough In Obesity Research

ScienceDaily:

> Saint Louis University researchers believe they've won a major skirmish in the battle of the bulge, and their findings are published in the May issue of Diabetes.

> "We figured out how obesity occurs," says William A. Banks, M.D., professor of geriatrics in the department of internal medicine and professor of pharmacological and physiological science at Saint Louis University School of Medicine. "The next step is coming up with the solution."

> "High triglycerides are blocking the leptin from getting into the brain. If leptin can't get into the brain, it can't tell you to stop eating," says Banks, who is principal investigator and a staff physician at Veterans Affairs Medical Center in St. Louis.

> "This is a big deal. We now know what is keeping leptin from getting to where it needs to do its work."

Posted by Timothy Fredel at 10:22 PM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

### Google Files to Go Public Via Auction-Based IPO

The Rugged Elegance Inspiration Network:

Google has filed to go public via a $2.7 billion auction-based IPO. The company will go public in the late summer or early fall.

One of the most interesting aspects of Google's SEC filing is that it leads off with a letter from the founders, Larry Page and Sergey Brin.

The letter begins by saying, "Google is not a conventional company. We do not intend to become one."

Consistent with that philosophy, Google has chosen an unconventional means to go public: an auction-based IPO. Here's what Page and Brin had to say about the auction:

> Informed investors willing to pay the IPO price should be able to buy as many shares as they want, within reason, in the IPO, as on the stock market. It is important to us to have a fair process for our IPO that is inclusive of both small and large investors. It is also crucial that we achieve a good outcome for Google and its current shareholders. This has led us to pursue an auction-based IPO for our entire offering. Our goal is to have a share price that reflects a fair market valuation of Google and that moves rationally based on changes in our business and the stock market. (The auction process is discussed in more detail elsewhere in this prospectus.)

> ...

> An auction is an unusual process for an IPO in the United States. Our experience with auction-based advertising systems has been surprisingly helpful in the auction design process for the IPO. As in the stock market, if people try to buy more stock than is available, the price will go up. And of course, the price will go down if there aren't enough buyers. This is a simplification, but it captures the basic issues. Our goal is to have an efficient market price -- a rational price set by informed buyers and sellers -- for our shares at the IPO and afterward. Our goal is to achieve a relatively stable price in the days following the IPO and that buyers and sellers receive a fair price at the IPO.

> We are working to create a sufficient supply of shares to meet investor demand at IPO time and after. We are encouraging current shareholders to consider selling some of their shares as part of the offering. These shares will supplement the shares the company sells to provide more supply for investors and hopefully provide a more stable fair price. Sergey and I, among others, are currently planning to sell a fraction of our shares in the IPO. The more shares current shareholders sell, the more likely it is that they believe the price is not unfairly low. The supply of shares available will likely have an effect on the clearing price of the auction. Since the number of shares being sold is likely to be larger at a high price and smaller at a lower price, investors will likely want to consider the scope of current shareholder participation in the IPO. We may communicate from time to time that we would be sellers rather than buyers.

> We would like you to invest for the long term, and to do so only at or below what you determine to be a fair price. We encourage investors not to invest in Google at IPO or for some time after, if they believe the price is not sustainable over the long term.

> We intend to take steps to help ensure shareholders are well informed. We encourage you to read this prospectus. We think that short term speculation without paying attention to price is likely to lose you money, especially with our auction structure.

Posted by Timothy Fredel at 01:23 PM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

### Robotic Traffic Cones To Hit Our Highways

New Scientist:

> Herds of robotic traffic cones could soon be swarming onto a highway, closing down lanes and slowing the traffic.

> The new road markers have been developed by Shane Farritor, a roboticist at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, in a bid to help reduce the $100 billion per year that the Department of Transportation estimates is lost to the US economy through accidents and delays caused by highway lane closures.
> The self-propelled markers take the form of robotic three-wheeled bases for the brightly coloured barrels that are set out to demarcate road repair zones. Farritor says they can open and close traffic lanes faster and more safely than humans.

> The markers are delivered to the roadside by a specially equipped truck, from which an operator controls their deployment using a laptop computer. Each fleet of robots is made up of a lead robot or "shepherd", which is equipped with a Global Positioning System satellite navigation receiver, plus a number of less expensive "dumb" units.

> The laptop screen displays an image of the road, captured by a camera mounted on top of the truck. Using software developed by Farritor's team, the operator marks on the screen where the barrels should be placed.

Posted by Bob King at 10:46 AM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

## April 28, 2004

### DNA Computer Detects, Treats Disease in Test Tube

Yahoo! News:

> Scientists have come a step closer to creating a minuscule DNA computer that may one day be able to spot diseases like cancer from inside the body and release a drug to treat it.

> Professor Ehud Shapiro and researchers at Israel's Weizmann Institute constructed the world's smallest biomolecular computer a few years ago.

> Now they have programmed it to analyze biological information to detect and treat prostate cancer and a form of lung cancer in laboratory experiments.

> "We've taken our earlier molecular computer and augmented it with an input and output module. Together the computer can diagnose a disease and in response produce a drug for the disease in a test tube," Shapiro told Reuters.

> The microscopic computer is so minuscule a trillion could fit in a drop of water. Its input, output and software are made up of DNA molecules -- which store and process encoded information about living organisms.

> "Our work represents the first actual proof of concept and the first actual demonstration of a possible real-life application for this kind of computer," Shapiro added.

Posted by Timothy Fredel at 06:53 PM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

### Compstat Shakes Up Police Departments from NY to Baltimore to Boston to LA

The New York Times:

> In the mid-1990's, a new management program called Compstat shook up the New York Police Department. Detectives stopped working 9-to-5 and started working at the hours when most crimes occur. Crime statistics, once compiled every few months, were updated and mapped weekly. Commanders who displayed a feeble grasp of their precincts' problems were summarily replaced. Crime rates raced downward, outpacing a national decline. Since then, the gospel of New York-style policing specialized units, statistics-driven deployment, and a startling degree of hands-on leadership has been spreading throughout the country. So have the people who personify those tactics, a diaspora of zealous former New York Police Department officers who have gone on to lead other departments.

> Some of the dozen or more in this wave of New York exports are well known, like John F. Timoney in Miami and William J. Bratton in Los Angeles. But further from the public eye, New Yorkers have been remolding departments one by one, from crime-plagued midsize cities like Baltimore down to Newton, Mass., a bedroom community near Boston whose police force numbers about one-half of 1 percent of New York's 37,000 officers. "It's culture shock," said Capt. Jeff Fluck.

Posted by Bob King at 08:43 AM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

## April 27, 2004

### Blair Warns on Climate Change As Threat

Yahoo! News:

> Prime Minister Tony Blair said Tuesday that the threat of climate change was the most pressing long term issue facing the world and reaffirmed Britain's commitment to the Kyoto Protocol on global warming.

> "We have to act and we have to act now," said Blair, at the launch of a new organization that aims to speed up cuts in greenhouse gas emissions.

> The prime minister said it was important the issue of global warming was discussed at the forthcoming G8 summit in the United States.

> The 1997 Kyoto Protocol sets the target of bringing emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases worldwide eight percent below the 1990 level by 2010.

> Washington has drawn fire from other countries for rejecting the protocol as based on flimsy evidence and harmful to the economy.

> Blair was speaking at the launch of the Climate Change Group, which brings together leading corporations, financial institutions, civil organizations and state, city and national governments to accelerate greenhouse gas emission reductions.

> "I think that there is a fair recognition around the world that something is happening to our climate," he said.

Posted by Timothy Fredel at 10:03 PM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

### Harvard Urged to Expand the Reach of Its Undergraduate Curriculum

The New York Times:

> For the first time in 30 years, Harvard University has reviewed its undergraduate curriculum, concluding that students need more room for broad exploration, a greater familiarity with the world that can only be gained from study abroad, and a deeper, hands-on understanding of science.

> After 15 months of study, a committee of administrators, professors and students has recommended that the university give students more time to choose their majors and limit the requirements for those majors, encourage students to spend time abroad and increase the number of required science courses.

> The committee's underlying conclusion, that students in a fast-changing world need a wider range of knowledge, is likely to have an impact on universities across the nation, many of which are also trying to modernize their curriculums. In making its recommendations, the committee was asked to address what it would "mean to be an educated man or woman in the first quarter of the 21st century."

Posted by Bob King at 01:45 PM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

### Heightened Surveillance in Wealthy Florida Town

NewsObserver.com:

> Manalapan, Florida -- One of the nation's wealthiest towns will soon have cameras and computers running background checks on every car and driver that passes through.

> Police Chief Clay Walker said cameras will take infrared photos recording a car's tag number, then software will automatically run the numbers through law enforcement databases. A 911 dispatcher is alerted if the car is stolen or is the subject of a "be on the lookout" warning.

> Next to the tag number, police will have a picture of the driver, taken with another set of cameras upgraded versions of the standard surveillance cameras already in place.

> If there is a robbery, police will be able to comb records to determine who drove through town on a given afternoon or evening.

> "Courts have ruled that in a public area, you have no expectation of privacy," said Walker, one of 11 sworn officers who protects Manalapan's 321 residents. Still, Walker says Manalapan's data will be destroyed every three months.

> Manalapan's town council authorized $60,000 in security upgrades last week after three burglaries this winter robbed residents of $400,000 in jewelry. The town averages two or three burglaries per year and residents demanded swift response, Town Manager Gregory Dunham said.

Posted by Bob King at 01:11 PM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

## April 26, 2004

### Diabetes Reportedly to Double Worldwide by 2030

Yahoo! News:

> Diabetes rates will double worldwide by 2030, to 366 million people with the disease, even if the obesity rate remains stable, an international team of researchers reported on Monday.

> But the rate will go up even higher if, as expected, more and more people become overweight, eat a so-called Western diet and stop exercising, the researchers said.

> "The total number of people with diabetes is projected to rise from 171 million in 2000 to 366 million in 2030," the researchers wrote in the latest issue of Diabetes Care, published by the American Diabetes Association.

> ...

> Sarah Wild of the University of Edinburgh in Britain and colleagues in Australia, Denmark and Switzerland, looked at type-2 diabetes figures from around the world, using United Nations data to project future diabetes rates based on current trends.

> "Assuming that age-specific prevalence remains constant, the number of people with diabetes in the world is expected to approximately double between 2000 and 2030 based solely upon demographic changes," Wild and her colleagues said.

> "The greatest relative increases will occur in the Middle Eastern Crescent, sub-Saharan Africa, and India."

Posted by Timothy Fredel at 12:36 PM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

### New High-Performance, Low-Power Electronics Dubbed Spintronics

Reed-Electronics.com

> IBM has teamed with Stanford University for research and creation of new high-performance, low-power electronics dubbed "spintronics."

> To formalize the effort, scientists at IBM's Almaden Research Center and Stanford today announced the formation of the IBM-Stanford Spintronic Science and Applications Center, or SpinAps.

> "SpinAps researchers will work to create breakthroughs that could revolutionize the electronics industry, just as the transistor did 50 years ago," said Robert Morris, IBM VP and director of the Almaden Research Center, in a statement.

> As IBM explains it, electron spin is a quantum property that has two possible states, either "up" or "down." Aligning spins in a material creates magnetism, and magnetic fields affect the passage of "up" and "down" electrons differently, Big Blue said.

> IBM's Almaden lab came out with the first mass-produced spintronic device in 1997, the giant magnetoresistive head. Another multilayered spintronic structure is at the heart of the high-speed, nonvolatile magnetic random access memory (MRAM), currently being developed by a handful of companies, according to IBM.

Posted by Bob King at 09:45 AM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

## April 25, 2004

### Life Expectancy: Now Only Death Is Certain After 100

New York Times:

> For nearly 150 years, people who lived past 100 could claim this accomplishment: They had outlived the point at which the life insurance industry technically predicted they would die.

> Now the industry is raising the bar, and not just a little. New mortality actuarial tables are being adopted that top off at 120.

> The tables predict the likelihood people at different ages will die within a year. It is the first time the tables have been revised since 1980, and just the fourth time since 1858.

> This might seem like nothing more than a bookkeeping change, albeit a big one and probably long overdue, but it could lower premiums for people who buy life insurance and help those who live past 100 avoid that other virtual certainty in life...taxes. Life insurance beneficiaries do not owe taxes on the payouts if policyholders die.

> But policies that invest part of the premiums, such as "whole life" ones, also have a cash value and when policyholders live to the point where the mortality tables end, insurance companies are required to cash out the policies and return the investment proceeds. Under a 1983 federal law those payouts are taxed.

Posted by Bob King at 09:29 PM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

### Steve Jobs Turns Apple Towards iPod

The New York Times:

> Stroll the corridors and the atriums on Apple Computer's corporate campus these days and you will notice that something is missing. Gone are the posters and graphics accenting the company's sleek personal computers. In their place, in the main lobby, is a striking, three-story-high billboard celebrating Steven P. Jobs's brand-new billion-dollar consumer electronics business - the iPod digital MP3 music player.

> In just two and a half years, Mr. Jobs, Apple's chief executive, has managed to take a well-designed hand-held gadget, add software connecting it to Macintoshes and Windows-based personal computers and convince the recording industry that he has found an elegant solution for ending its nightmare of digital piracy. In doing so, he has shifted the emphasis of Apple from what made it famous - hip, even lovable computers - to what he hopes will keep it relevant and profitable in the future: products for a digital way of life.

Posted by Timothy Fredel at 05:34 PM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

## April 21, 2004

### Mice Created With 2 Genetic Moms, No Dad

Yahoo! News:

> Just ahead of Mother's Day, scientists have found a way to cut dads out of the picture, at least among rodents: They have produced mice with two genetic moms -- and no father. It is the first time the feat has been accomplished in mammals.

> Scientists said the technique cannot be used on people, for reasons both technical and ethical. In fact, one of the mouse mothers was a mutant newborn, whose DNA had been altered to make it act like a male's contribution to an embryo.

> But the new work sheds light on why people, mice and other mammals normally need a male's DNA for reproduction, and some experts say it also has implications for the idea of using stem cells to treat disease.

> The feat is reported in Thursday's issue of the journal Nature by Tomohiro Kono of the Tokyo University of Agriculture in Japan, with colleagues there and in Korea.

Posted by Timothy Fredel at 05:13 PM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

### Happy Mother's Day! Mice Created With 2 Genetic Moms, No Dad

Yahoo! News:

> Just ahead of Mother's Day, scientists have found a way to cut dads out of the picture, at least among rodents: They have produced mice with two genetic moms" and no father. It is the first time the feat has been accomplished in mammals.

> Scientists said the technique cannot be used on people, for reasons both technical and ethical. In fact, one of the mouse mothers was a mutant newborn, whose DNA had been altered to make it act like a male's contribution to an embryo.

> But the new work sheds light on why people, mice and other mammals normally need a male's DNA for reproduction, and some experts say it also has implications for the idea of using stem cells to treat disease.

> The feat is reported in Thursday's issue of the journal Nature by Tomohiro Kono of the Tokyo University of Agriculture in Japan, with colleagues there and in Korea.

> They say they produced two mice, one of which grew to maturity and gave birth. Kono said this mouse, named Kaguya after a Japanese fairy tale character, appears healthy.

Posted by Bob King at 01:45 PM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

### States' Interest in Stem Cell Research Up

KTOK-AM Oklahoma City:

> Growing U.S. interest in embryonic stem cell research has produced some 100 bills in 33 states, USA Today reported Wednesday.

> In California, for example, there is a voter initiative in November that could pump nearly $3 billion over 10 years into such research.

> There is a tremendous amount of legislation flying around on one area of medical research. It is remarkable and unprecedented, says Dan Perry of the Coalition for the Advancement of Medical Research, a collaboration of 83 patient groups, universities and medical organizations that support the research.

> The activity, which includes at least 100 bills in 33 states, comes despite President Bush's decision three years ago to limit federal spending on stem cell research.

Posted by Timothy Fredel at 09:53 AM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

## April 20, 2004

### Studios Rush to Cash In on DVD Boom

The New York Times:

> Not since the advent of the videocassette in the mid-1980's has the movie industry enjoyed such a windfall from a new product. And just as video caused a seismic shift two decades ago, the success of the DVD is altering priorities and the balance of power in the making of popular culture. And industry players, starting with the Writers Guild, are lining up to claim their share.

> There's good cause. Between January and mid-March this year, Americans spent $1.78 billion at the box office. But in the same period they spent $4.8 billion -- more than $3 billion more -- to buy and rent DVD's and videocassettes.

> Little wonder then that studio executives now calibrate the release dates of DVD's with the same care used for opening weekends, as seen by Miramax's strategic release of "Kill Bill: Vol. 1" a few days before the theatrical release of "Kill Bill: Vol. 2." (The DVD made $40 million its first day out.)

> Studios now spend comparable amounts of money on DVD and theatrical marketing campaigns. Disney spent an estimated $50 million marketing the "Finding Nemo" DVD last year, said officials at Pixar, which made the film. It was money well spent. The DVD took in $431 million domestically, about $100 million more than the domestic box office. DVD has resuscitated canceled or nearly canceled television series like "The Family Guy" and "24," and has helped small art movies like "Donnie Darko" win rerelease in theaters. It is also beginning to affect the kinds of movies being made, as DVD revenues figure heavily in green-light decisions and are used as a perk to woo craft-conscious movie directors.

> "There's not a sector of the entertainment industry to which DVD is not a significant, if not the dominant, contributor of revenue," said Scott Hettrick, editor in chief of DVD Exclusive, a trade paper, pointing to the movie and television libraries being released on DVD. Even in the ailing music industry, he noted, music DVD's are an area of growth.

Posted by Bob King at 11:29 AM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

## April 19, 2004

### DVD War Looms As Advancements Draw Near

Yahoo! News

> The DVD stands out as one of the most rapidly adopted consumer technologies ever, but in the electronics industry it's akin to an aging king in Shakespearean drama -- rivals are lurking, knives drawn.

> Just as consumers are beginning to get comfortable with their DVD players, electronics manufacturers are set to introduce next-generation discs that store more -- and would be harder to copy.

> A dozen companies, headed by Sony Corp, are pushing a disc called the Blu-ray.

> The other main contender, the High Definition DVD, is promoted only by Toshiba Corp. and NEC Corp. But it has an important endorsement from an industry group and is also expected to get Microsoft Corp.'s support as the software giant seeks a toehold for its multimedia format in the consumer electronics arena.

> Movie studios generally aren't commenting on the new formats. And the rival industry groups aren't saying exactly when they expect to have players on the market. Both, however, consider the DVD ripe for replacement next year.

> For consumers, the benefit of a new format would be better image quality. Sales of high-definition TV sets have finally started to take off, but current DVDs don't have the resolution to get the most out of HDTV sets.

Posted by Timothy Fredel at 05:33 PM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

### The Success of Open Source

San Francisco Chronicle:

> The growing popularity of the Linux operating system has drawn attention to a style of software development in which volunteers, collaborating over the Internet, can create programs that are cheaper, even arguably better, than those that emerge from paid staffers working at high-tech firms.

> Now a new book argues that the style of development dubbed open source -- so-called because the working innards, or source code, are published freely -- has the potential to revolutionize not just the software and high-tech industries, but biotechnology, publishing and other fields.

> "Open source is not just for hackers. It's a new way of organizing people to create complex products in a knowledge-based economy,'' said Steven Weber, author of "The Success of Open Source,'' from Harvard University Press.

Posted by Timothy Fredel at 05:21 PM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

### Southern Arizona: Epicenter of Obesity Epidemic

The Arizona Daily Star:

> Americans are in grave danger of undoing the greatest achievement of medical science - the doubling of the human life span from four decades just a century ago to nearly 80 years today.

> The culprits are the twin epidemics of obesity and diabetes, with some doctors predicting children could lose as much as 20 years off their lives.

> Nowhere is this more likely to happen than in Southern Arizona, where an evolutionary collision has left those native to this land overwhelmed by these twin epidemics, which are maiming and killing them at the highest rates in the world.

> Among Southern Arizona's largest Indian tribe, the Tohono O'odham, 50 percent of adults are battling diabetes, a figure that soars to 85 percent in older adults. They are facing a diabetes risk 10 times that of the rest of the country. Mexican-Americans in this region who share Indian blood suffer diabetes at twice the rate of the population as a whole.

> The blame lies squarely on a toxic modern diet and lifestyle - cheap, high-fat, sugar-packed, processed, supersized foods, requiring no more energy to get than extending a hand out the car window.

> Because this region sits at the center of the problem, experts here have developed new and aggressive ways to attack it, successfully bringing diabetes under control in those most severely sick - and even starting to prevent it in those most at risk.

> But poverty is a barrier, here and elsewhere, between many Americans and a healthy life.

> "Eating healthy costs a lot."

> Put a bag of carrots in one hand and a Happy Meal in the other, and the cost of each is pretty much the same. But in one hand you have a whole meal, and the other you have only the start of one.

Posted by Timothy Fredel at 10:47 AM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

## April 18, 2004

### Better Living Through Hacking

Boston.com:

> Today, a growing hacker culture is not only reclaiming the original meaning of the term but also applying its can-do ethic far beyond computer code to embrace everything from home electronics to home improvements.

> Just as the first hackers looked at behemothcomputers and rudimentary programs and insisted, ''We can make them better," so are modern-day hackers looking at a wide variety of products, services, and materials and saying, ''We can make these better, too."

> Take Tony Northrup of Woburn, for example. Dissatisfied with a pet sitter who showed up only sporadically to care for his cat, he didn't merely fire the sitter and find another one. Instead, at the cost of about $250, he built a system of wireless cameras, motion detectors, and an old personal computer to snap pictures of the cat at strategic places -- like the food bowl -- and load them on a website, allowing him and his wife, Erica Edson, to check on the cat from almost anywhere.

> This pet-sitting ''hack" -- a hack being the term of art for a ''creative solution to an interesting problem" -- is just one of more than a dozen similar home remedies to be included in the soon-to-be published book, ''Home Hacking Projects for Geeks," coauthored by Northrup and Eric Faulkner of Lowell.

Posted by Timothy Fredel at 11:59 PM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

### NASA to Probe Einstein's Relativity Theory

Yahoo! News:

> Almost a century after Albert Einstein began writing about relativity, NASA is poised to launch a mission 45 years in the making to put a little known tenet of his general relativity theory to its first test.

> The Gravity Probe B satellite is the bland name given to one of the most precise scientific instruments ever built. But the project's $700 million price-tag adds glamour, as does its long history, surviving the Congressional budget ax seven times.

> Lift-off of the Boeing Co. Delta 2 rocket carrying the probe is scheduled for Monday at 1:01 p.m. EDT from the rocket range at California's Vandenberg Air Force Base.

> With four near-perfect spheres -- the roundest objects ever made, according to NASA -- the probe will try to show whether the Earth, which is known to warp both time and space with its mass, also twists them like tornado winds as it rotates.

Posted by Timothy Fredel at 11:48 PM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

## April 17, 2004

### Now Can We Talk About Health Care?

The New York Times:

> Twenty-first-century problems, like genetic mapping, an aging population and globalization, are combining with old problems like skyrocketing costs and skyrocketing numbers of uninsured, to overwhelm the 20th-century system we have inherited.

> The way we finance care is so seriously flawed that if we fail to fix it, we face a fiscal disaster that will not only deny quality health care to the uninsured and underinsured but also undermine the capacity of the system to care for even the well insured. For example, if a hospital's trauma center is closed or so crowded that it cannot take any more patients, your insurance card won't help much if you're the one in the freeway accident.

> Let's face it -- if we were to start from scratch, none of us, from dyed-in-the-wool liberals to rock-solid conservatives, would fashion the kind of health care system America has inherited. So why should we carry the problems of this system into the future?

Posted by Timothy Fredel at 09:58 PM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

### Christian Music's New Wave

The New York Times:

> Sales of praise and worship albums have doubled since 2000, to about 12 million in 2003. While music sales over all slumped last year, including Christian music in general, worship music was up 5 percent. A series of CD's marketed on television by Time-Life, "Songs 4 Worship," has drawn a million subscribers and sold about 8 million CD's since 2000.

> Several Christian pop stars, including Michael W. Smith, Newsboys and Third Day, have recently recorded worship albums, often to the biggest successes of their careers.

> "What's selling now is compilations and praise and worship," said John W. Styll, president of the Gospel Music Association in Nashville. For this music, he added, "Church is the new radio. It's where people learn about songs, and how songwriters get compensated.

> ...

> Her enthusiasm mirrors national trends among college students, according to surveys by the Higher Education Research Institute at the University of California, Los Angeles. Last fall, 13.4 percent of freshmen identified themselves as evangelical Christians, up from 4.5 percent in 1990.

> ...

> "It was underground, but now it's just exploded," he said. "The Internet connects all these smaller subcultural units. For us, a small band in Waco, it disseminated our songs all over the world."

Posted by Jennifer King at 12:09 PM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

### Warming Climate Disrupts Life in Alaska

Yahoo! News:

> Anyone who doubts the gravity of global warming should ask Alaska's Eskimo, Indian and Aleut elders about the dramatic changes to their land and the animals on which they depend.

> Native leaders say that salmon are increasingly susceptible to warm-water parasites and suffer from lesions and strange behavior. Salmon and moose meat have developed odd tastes and the marrow in moose bones is weirdly runny, they say.

> Arctic pack ice is disappearing, making food scarce for sea animals and causing difficulties for the Natives who hunt them. It is feared that polar bears, to name one species, may disappear from the Northern hemisphere by mid-century.

Posted by Timothy Fredel at 12:37 AM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

## April 16, 2004

### Wireless Blooms Beyond Wi-Fi

BW Online:

> It's just one example of how the unlicensed portion of the radio spectrum is turning into a hothouse of technological innovation.

> For years, these radio frequencies were neglected, the lonely domain of cordless phones and microwave ovens. In the past few years, however, engineers at institutions from Massachusetts Institute of Technology to Dutch giant Royal Philips Electronics have been hard at work on a grander vision for the unlicensed radio frontier. That tinkering is what sparked the creation of Wi-Fi, the wildly popular wireless Net technology that took off last year with the support of chip giant Intel Corp.

> Wi-Fi is just the first step, though. Hard on its heels are four equally innovative technologies -- WiMax, Mobile-Fi, ZigBee, and Ultrawideband -- that will push wireless networking into every facet of life, from cars and homes to office buildings and factories.

> These technologies have attracted $4.5 billion in venture investments over the past five years, according to estimates from San Francisco-based investment bank Rutberg & Co. Products based on them will start hitting the market this year and become widely available in 2005. As they do, they will expand the reach of the Internet for miles and create a mesh of Web technologies that will provide connections anywhere ...

Posted by Bob King at 02:55 PM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

### FBI Buried by Security Demands

The Washington Times:

> The number of secret surveillance warrants sought by the FBI has increased 85 percent in the past three years, a pace that has outstripped the Justice Department's ability to process them quickly.

> Even after warrants are approved, the FBI often doesn't have enough agents or other personnel with the expertise to conduct the surveillance. And the agency still is trying to build a cadre of translators who can understand conversations intercepted in such languages as Arabic, Pashto and Farsi.

> These are among the findings of investigators for the commission probing the September 11 attacks, which has criticized the intelligence-gathering efforts of the CIA and FBI.

> FBI and Justice Department officials said yesterday that they are working to address all three issues, which limit the government's ability to gather the kind of intelligence needed to head off terrorist attacks.

Posted by Bob King at 12:20 PM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

## April 15, 2004

### Genetic Breakthrough in Leukemia Treatment

Mercury News:

> Looking deep inside the genes of malignant cells, two teams of leukemia researchers have uncovered new ways to help identify the severity of a patient's cancer, the best treatments and how long a patient might live.

> While this type of detailed gene analysis isn't being used on leukemia patients yet, doctors say it probably will play an important role in treating the most common form of adult leukemia.

> More broadly, the studies, carried out at Stanford University and in Europe, are the latest to shed light on the basic wiring of cancer, probing whether some cancer cells are more lethal from the start. The research was published in today's New England Journal of Medicine.

Posted by Bob King at 08:51 PM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

### Breakthrough in Earthquake Prediction Technology

Yahoo! News:

> A US geophysicist has set the scientific world ablaze by claiming to have cracked a holy grail: accurate earthquake prediction, and warning that a big one will soon hit southern California.

> Russian-born University of California at Los Angeles professor Vladimir Keilis-Borok says he can foresee major quakes by tracking minor temblors and historical patterns in seismic hotspots that could indicate more violent shaking is on the way.

> And he has made a chilling prediction that a quake measuring at least 6.4 magnitude on the Richter scale will hit a 31,200-square-kilometer (12,000-square-mile) area of southern California by September 5.

> The team at UCLA's Institute of Geophysics and Planetary Physics accurately predicted a 6.5-magnitude quake in central California last December as well as an 8.1-magnitude temblor that struck the Japanese island of Hokkaido in September.

> "Earthquake prediction is called the Holy Grail of earthquake science, and has been considered impossible by many scientists," said Keilis-Borok, 82. "It is not impossible.

> "We have made a major breakthrough, discovering the possibility of making predictions months ahead of time, instead of years, as in previously known methods."

Posted by Timothy Fredel at 03:57 PM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

### Project Avalanche: Corporate "Open Source"

WSJ.com - Portals:

> [Project] Avalanche is a legally constituted intellectual-property cooperative. Companies pay $30,000 a year to become members. They can then donate any in-house software they choose to the Avalanche library, with the project becoming the legal owner of the code. Project members get to use, free of charge, any of the other programs in the library.

> ...

> Because large corporations like those in Avalanche are the biggest customers of software companies, any shift like this would have enormous repercussions. The last thing any company wants is to have its customers banding together.

> As residents of Minnesota, Mr. Black and Mr. Lien know their snow, and they say the name of their project was carefully chosen. An avalanche isn't only unstoppable, it also either buries everything in its path or carries everything along. Software companies may soon be needing to choose their fate.

Posted by Timothy Fredel at 01:33 PM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

## April 14, 2004

### FTC Says Pornographic 'Spam' Must Be Labeled

Yahoo! News:

> Pornographic "spam" e-mail will have to contain a warning on the subject line so Internet users can easily filter it out, the U.S. Federal Trade Commission said on Tuesday.

> Starting May 19, sexually explicit e-mail will have to bear a label reading "SEXUALLY-EXPLICIT:" and the messages themselves will not be allowed to contain graphic material, the FTC said.

> Outrage over unsolicited pornography and other forms of junk e-mail spurred Congress to pass the first nationwide anti-spam law last year, which required the FTC to develop labels for smut.

> An FTC study released last spring found that 17 percent of pornographic offers contained images of nudity that appeared whether a recipient wanted to see them or not.

Posted by Timothy Fredel at 09:30 PM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

### A Change in China's Nuclear Policy

FT.com:

> China's application to join the 40-nation NSG and its discussion on entry into the MTCR reflect a sea change in thinking in Beijing about where its national interests lie with regards to proliferation, foreign policy experts said.

> For years, China saw the two groups as supplier cartels, dominated by the US, which were used to restrict technology to developing countries.

> Beijing has a long history of missile and missile-related sales overseas, and in the 1980s provided Pakistan with enriched uranium and a working bomb design, which was later sold to Libya and possibly North Korea and Iran.

> But China has changed its thinking because of its need to harness all potential sources of energy, including nuclear power, and its desire for good relations with the US, Japan and Europe to maintain economic growth.

> China's diplomatic co-operation with the US and Japan on the North Korean nuclear threat has been driven by similar concerns.

> "China recognises that its interests in non-proliferation are increasingly aligned with those of the major powers," says Evan Medeiros, of the Rand Corporation, a think-tank.

> China is unlikely to face any barriers to joining the NSG at its annual May meeting in Sweden but it might be more difficult to join the MTCR.

Posted by Bob King at 08:08 PM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

### Genetic Link Between Cancer Cells and Stem Cells

Medical News Today:

> Researchers from the Netherlands Cancer Institute in Amsterdam have discovered a common link between cancer cells and stem cells.

> Together with colleagues from the University of Zurich, Merel Lingbeek and NWO pioneer Prof. Maarten van Lohuizen published their findings on 18 March 2004 in Nature.

> Because cancer cells and stem cells can both reproduce themselves in unlimited numbers, it was suspected that they have something in common. That suspicion proved to be correct. Together with their Swiss colleagues, researchers from the Netherlands Cancer Institute discovered an important common link: the BMI1 gene.

> Stem cells, the 'original cells', develop into specialised body cells by first of all making many copies of themselves. Once this copying process has been completed, they stop dividing and start differentiating into specialised cells, for example, a brain cell. But sometimes this process goes wrong. Instead of differentiating, the stem cells retain the expression pattern of a stem cell and keep on copying themselves. This is how medulloblastomas, the most frequently occurring form of brain cancer in children, can develop.

Posted by Bob King at 07:59 PM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

### Linux Moves to The Desktop

Investor's Business Daily:

> A new operating system war is brewing on desktop PCs, and it's not Windows vs. Mac, or even Windows vs. Linux. This time, it's Linux vs. Linux.

> Red Hat and Novell - already foes in the market for Linux server software - are taking their fight to the personal computer. The Linux firms hope to sell businesses a single, companywide software platform for both servers and desktops.

> The stepped-up Linux rivalry is another sign that the once-renegade operating system is becoming a mainstream alternative to Microsoft Windows. It also marks a new battleground as Linux jumps from servers to PCs used by non-techies.

> Novell got big-name backing from longtime Red Hat partner Hewlett-Packard, which will sell and support SuSE-brand Linux on its business PCs in the second half of the year. HP already sells SuSE Linux for business servers, along with a similar Linux product from Red Hat.

Posted by Bob King at 07:53 PM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

### CIA, FBI Need 5 Years to Make Post 9/11 Changes

CBC (Canada):

> Enormous intelligence and law enforcement gaps that contributed to the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks are being filled, but it will take years more for America to build the needed systems to effectively combat terrorists, the heads of the FBI and CIA said Wednesday.

> CIA Director George Tenet and FBI Director Robert Mueller went before the commission investigating the 2001 hijackings after the panel's staff released statements harshly criticizing the CIA for failing to fully appreciate the threat posed by al-Qaida prior to Sept. 11 and questioning the FBI's reorganization efforts.

> "It was a damning report of a system that's broken, that doesn't function," said commission member John Lehman, a former navy secretary, referring to flaws found in the intelligence system.

> Tenet, making his second appearance before the commission in three weeks, said that in the 1990s the CIA lost 25 per cent of its personnel, was not hiring new analysts and faced disarray in its training of clandestine officers who work overseas to penetrate terror cells and recruit secret informants.

> Although strides have been made since the attacks, Tenet said it would take five more years to "have the kind of clandestine service our country needs." The National Security Agency, which handles electronic surveillance, and U.S. mapping and analytic intelligence agencies also need time and sustained funding to improve, he said.

Posted by Timothy Fredel at 05:06 PM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

### California Import-Export Trade Could Triple by 2020

RE: San Francisco:

> The Bay Area has an opportunity to shape California's physical and economic landscape for decades to come. A report published this month by Jon D. Haveman and David Hummels called "California's Global Gateways: Trends and Issues'' outlines this opportunity. Haveman and Hummels are with the nonprofit Public Policy Institute of California which was co-founded in 1994 by the late William Hewlett, co-founder of Hewlett-Packard Co. The Institute is dedicated to improving public policy in California through independent, objective, non-partisan research on major economic, social, and political issues.

> The Institute's study emphasizes California's need to leverage the current service we offer which subsidizes economic activity in other states. Haveman and Hummels clearly express our need to decrease the congestion on rail lines that link the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach with America's interior and jammed Bay Area highways which slow down truckers near the Port of Oakland. If we do, shippers will not have to look for other U.S. gateways.

> San Francisco Chronicle's, David Armstrong writes, "California's international trade could soar to three times its current level by 2020, but only if the state's congested seaports, airports, highways and railroad lines are significantly expanded and upgraded."

Posted by Jennifer King at 11:29 AM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

## April 13, 2004

### Vinod Khosla Leaves Juniper Board, Blames Sarbanes-Oxley

San Jose Mercury News:

> Vinod Khosla, one of the Bay Area's premier venture capitalists, said Monday that onerous securities regulations had pushed him to step down as a board member of Juniper Networks.

> He said a host of recent regulations -- introduced by the Securities and Exchange Commission, Nasdaq and the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 -- are important but have combined to create burdens on board members, with unintended consequences.

> Khosla's move raises the question of whether Silicon Valley will see a wave of other venture capitalists making similar moves.

> Reactions by other venture capitalists to increased regulations are mixed. Some, such as Promod Haque of Norwest Venture Partners, believe Khosla's move is being joined by others.

> "It's so damned time-consuming,'' Haque said of the new regulations. "All of us have been reducing our board positions in some form.''

Posted by Bob King at 05:01 PM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

### Google Challenges Microsoft Monopoly

TechWeb:

> While Linux advocates look to desktop software to challenge Microsoft's desktop championship, a new top-ranked contender is coming from a direction that's both unexpected and obvious: Google.

> But first, Google needs to overcome privacy concerns, as proposed terms of service for its upcoming Gmail service leave users with very little legal protections for the privacy and security of their e-mail.

> While the common wisdom is that Google's core business is search, in fact, even search is secondary for Google, argue several bloggers and journalists.

> ...

> [Jason] Kottke writes:

> > [Google has] this huge map of the Web and are aware of how people move around in the virtual space it represents. They have the perfect place to store this map (one of the world's largest computers that's all but incapable of crashing). And they are clever at reading this map. Google knows what people write about, what they search for, what they shop for, they know who wants to advertise and how effective those advertisements are, and they're about to know how we communicate with friends and loved ones. What can they do with all that? Just about anything that collection of Ph.Ds can dream up.

> Kottke envisions Google selling cheap PCs running Gnome and Linux, tailored to take advantage of the Google service, practically giving the PCs away at $10 each. The PCs would run their own office suite, with built-in Internet collaboration.

Related Posts:

Topix.net -- The Secret Source of Google's Power

Kottke.org -- GooOS, the Google Operating System

Posted by Timothy Fredel at 03:51 PM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

## April 12, 2004

### Gunshot Detection Technology in Chicago

Chicago Sun Times:

> Big Brother isn't just watching the bad guys in Chicago. By late summer, he'll be listening as well -- for the sound of gunshots.

> Gunshot detection technology -- capable of "triangulating within 20 feet" of the location of a shooting -- is being added to 30 surveillance cameras already in place on high-crime corners and to 50 new cameras expected to be installed by late summer at undisclosed locations.

> The gunshot detection devices to be installed in Chicago's crime-watching cameras employ a technology similar to a seismograph that measures earthquakes.

> Circuit boards installed in four corners of each camera identify gunshots by measuring the decibel level of the unique sound made by a bullet traveling through the air at high speed. The sensors are then able to "triangulate within 20 feet" the location of the shooting.

> Assistant Deputy Supt. Ron Huberman said the system has been tested with a variety of sounds -- ranging from giant firecrackers and dynamite sticks to breaking glass -- to make certain nothing but a gunshot will trigger the system.

Posted by Bob King at 08:20 PM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

### London Mansion Sells for $128 Million

Local6.com (London):

> An Indian steel tycoon paid $128 million for a mansion in the British capital, breaking the world record for the most expensive house purchase, according to a report.

> The Sunday Times said Lakshmi Mittal, named by Forbes magazine as one of the richest people in the world, bought the 12-bedroom house in London's Kensington district from Formula One car racing boss Bernie Ecclestone.

> Mittal's spokesperson was unavailable for comment Monday and a call to Ecclestone's Formula One Management company went unanswered.
> The Sunday Times reported that three real estate agencies were involved in the sale. The offices of all three companies were closed for Easter Monday.

> Guinness Publishing also could not be contacted for comment on the report. The Sunday Times said the sale of the property near Kensington Palace, the former home of Princess Diana, broke the record for the world's most expensive house sale. It said the previous record was set in Hong Kong in 1997 when a property sold for $101.6 million.

Posted by Bob King at 08:12 PM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

### Reject Terror's 'Logic of Death,' Pope Urges

New York Times:

> Under heightened security that included airport-style metal detectors at the gates of the Vatican, Pope John Paul II used his Easter message on Sunday to plead for the world to unite to overcome terrorism and "the logic of death."

> The pope, speaking to tens of thousands of pilgrims in St. Peter's Square, prayed for leaders who are trying to resolve conflicts in Africa and the Middle East, including the Iraq war and Israeli-Palestinian violence. He called for what he described as the children of Abraham -- Christians, Jews and Muslims -- to rediscover their shared bonds.

> The world, he said, needs to "find the strength to face the inhuman, and unfortunately growing, phenomenon of terrorism, which rejects life and brings anguish and uncertainty to the daily lives of so many hard-working and peaceful people."

> The pope, who is 83, visibly frail and suffering from Parkinson's disease, has traditionally offered a message at Easter Mass that reflects upon world affairs. But this year, his comments came as Italy and the rest of Europe have grown increasingly anxious about the prospect of another terrorist attack.

> On Sunday, hundreds of uniformed and plainclothes police officers patrolled St. Peter's Square, as well as nearby roofs.

Posted by Bob King at 09:40 AM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

## April 11, 2004

### Keratoplasty: Surgical Fix for Near-Sightedness

New York Times:

> "I'm a little vain," Mr. Miller conceded. Though the new procedure, which uses radio waves to correct near-vision problems, had not yet been approved by the Food and Drug Administration for his problem, he had it done last winter.

> "It was a no-brainer," said Mr. Miller, who no longer needs reading glasses. "I can't imagine why anyone who could afford it would not do it."

> Biology and vanity are collaborating to make vision correction techniques a boom market, as some 78 million aging Americans seem intent on seeing well but looking good. Granny glasses? Grandpa's bifocals? Not for them. Offer them the option of paying $1,500 for a three-minute remedy and the eyeglasses are gone.

> "The baby boomers are kind of a picky bunch," said David Harmon, president of MarketScope, an eye care market research company in Baldwin, Mo., near St. Louis. "They want to be fixed."

> Last month, the F.D.A. approved the latest surgical procedure, called conductive keratoplasty, to correct a common near-vision problem for people whose eyesight is otherwise excellent, in a minimally invasive way.

Posted by Bob King at 08:56 AM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

### Robots Seen As Companions for Elderly

Yahoo! News:

> To some scientists, robots are the answer to caring for aging societies in Japan and other nations where the young are destined to be overwhelmed by a surging elderly population.

> In one of a budding series of robot-therapy sessions at Japanese hospitals and senior citizens' homes, the elderly patients suffer from severe dementia, but their faces light up when they see the dog-shaped robot, swaddled in soft clothing, waddle around the hospital floor. Some clap; others break into feeble smiles. Urged by nurses, a few cautiously reach out and touch it.
> "It's cute," one female patient cries out.

> Advocates see robots serving not just as helpers -- carrying out simple chores and reminding patients to take their medication - but also as companions, even if the machines can carry on only a semblance of a real dialogue.

> The ideal results: huge savings in medical costs, reduced burdens on family and caretakers, and old and sick people kept in better health.

> "This technology is really needed for the global community," said Russell Bodoff, executive director at the Center for Aging Services Technologies in Washington, D.C. "If you look 30 years out, we have what I would call a global crisis in front of us: that we will have many more aging people than we could ever deal with."

Posted by Bob King at 08:45 AM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

## April 09, 2004

### Has Obesity Met Its Match In Rimonabant?

BW Online:

> The French pharma Sanofi is getting positive results so far with a drug that suppresses appetite. And it may have cardiac benefits, too

> At the American College of Cardiology annual meeting last month, Paris-based Sanofi-Synthelabo caused a stir when it unveiled data on a promising experimental drug for obesity. The drug, rimonabant, seems to stem cravings in humans, thus reducing obese patients' appetites. If it proves safe and effective, rimonabant could see peak annual sales of $3.6 billion, says Jean-Francois Dehecq, the pharmaceutical company's CEO.

> Few treatments for obesity have garnered as much excitement in recent years. The existing prescription drugs got attention when they were introduced several years ago, but that has faded amid some less than favorable publicity. The two approved for use in the U.S. -- Roche's Xenical and Abbott Labs' Meridia -- both offer modest weight loss and unpleasant side effects. A drug that produced significant weight loss, Wyeth's Redux, was removed from the U.S. market in 1997 after being linked to a deadly heart condition in some patients.

Posted by Bob King at 08:52 AM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

## April 08, 2004

### Oman's Oil Yield Long in Decline

The New York Times :

> The Royal Dutch/Shell Group's oil production in Oman has been declining for years, belying the company's optimistic reports and raising doubts about a vital question in the Middle East: whether new technology can extend the life of huge but mature oil fields.

> Internal company documents and technical papers show that the Yibal field, Oman's largest, began to decline rapidly in 1997. Yet Sir Philip Watts, Shell's former chairman, said in an upbeat public report in 2000 that "major advances in drilling" were enabling the company "to extract more from such mature fields." The internal Shell documents suggest that the figure for proven oil reserves in Oman was mistakenly increased in 2000, resulting in a 40 percent overstatement.

See related story: Saudi Arabia Struggling To Meet Oil Demand

Posted by Jennifer King at 03:05 PM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

### Religious Use of the Internet Climbs

San Jose Mercury News:

> Jimmy Chu sent a mass e-mail to his Bible study group asking for help setting up for Easter services. He posts the group's prayer requests on his Weblog, downloads hymns from his church's Web site and listens to Sunday sermons online.

> Chu, 23, who lives in Mountain View, is one of the almost 82 million Americans who use the Internet for religious or spiritual purposes.
> That's 64 percent of the 128 million Internet users in the United States, according to a survey released Wednesday by the Pew Internet & American Life Project, a Washington, D.C., think tank that studies the social impact of the Internet.

> "The Internet and religion are contradictory,'' said Stewart Hoover, a journalism professor at the University of Colorado and co-author of the survey. "The Internet is technical, commercial, rational, demands conscious attention and its entertainments are thought to be violent and materialistic. Religion is thought to be the opposite: emotional, spiritual, authentic, deeply meaningful, steeped in values.

> "Religious use of the Internet, such as we've seen here, crosses such boundaries.''

Posted by Bob King at 10:00 AM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

### Bay Area Cemeteries Bowing to Cultural Needs

San Jose Mercury News:

> In the Bay Area, where whites are no longer the majority, diversity is redefining communities for the dead as well as the living.

> From Richmond to Fremont to San Jose, funeral homes are building rooms where Indian families can wash their deceased with honey and yogurt before cremations, and supplying special pots so Vietnamese families can safely burn the paper money (artificial) their ancestors may need in the afterlife.
> Cypress Lawn Memorial Park, which opened Hillside Gardens last year, doesn't stop at providing facilities to meet different cultural needs. It also hosts elaborate ceremonies for Memorial Day and Dia de los Muertos and recently welcomed thousands of people for Ching Ming, the Chinese ancestor-worshiping day.

> Some cemeteries are also changing policies that once prized tidy -- and easily maintained -- lawns so visitors can leave stones on Jewish grave sites and tangerines on Chinese ones. Accommodating different cultures is a trend sprouting across America, said Bob Fells, external chief operating officer with the International Cemetery and Funeral Association.

> "The cemeteries have become more sensitive and say: These aren't just rocks; they have meaning,'' Fells said.

Posted by Bob King at 09:58 AM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

### China Braces for Power Shortages

New York Times:

> China's galloping economic growth will continue to be dogged by widespread electricity shortages this year, a Chinese energy official has said. The deputy chairman of the State Electricity Regulatory Commission, Song Mi, told a meeting of electricity industry officials that the country faced a shortfall of 20 million kilowatts this year - twice last year's shortfall, the official Xinhua News Agency reported late Tuesday.

> "This year the imbalance between demand and supply will remain sizable," Mr. Song said. He warned that electricity shortages would be most acute in eastern and southern China, where double-digit economic growth has pushed industrial and domestic demand to new heights.

> The projected shortfall is roughly equivalent to the low end of that experienced by California during its energy crisis in 2000.

> Businesses in the coastal provinces powering China's economic boom, especially Jiangsu and Zhejiang, are experiencing rotating electricity shutdowns, and are bracing for worse disruptions as summer nears, when a growing number of air-conditioners will put added strain on demand.

Posted by Bob King at 09:55 AM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

## April 07, 2004

### Global Music Sales Plummet

Wired News:

> Global music sales fell 7.6 percent in 2003 to $32 billion, the steepest decline since the advent of the compact disc, the trade body representing the world's largest music companies said on Wednesday.

> The International Federation of the Phonographic Industry blamed the slump in retail music sales -- now in its fourth consecutive year -- on rampant piracy, poor economic conditions and competition from video games and DVDs.

Posted by Timothy Fredel at 09:45 PM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

## April 06, 2004

### Privacy and Google's New E-Mail Service

Yahoo! News:

> Google Inc. hails its new e-mail service as a breakthrough in online communication, but consumer watchdogs are attacking it as a creepy invasion of privacy that threatens to set a troubling precedent.

> Although Google's free "Gmail" service isn't even available yet, critics already are pressuring the popular search engine maker to drop its plans to electronically scan e-mail content so it can distribute relevant ads alongside incoming messages.

> Privacy activists worry that Gmail will comb through e-mail more intensively than the filters widely used to weed out potential viruses and spam.

> Gmail opponents also want Google to revise a policy that entitles the company to retain copies of people's incoming and outgoing e-mail even after they close their accounts.

> The e-mail scanning, which Google says will be handled exclusively by computers, has raised the most alarms, partly because it seeks to capitalize on messages sent by people without Gmail accounts.

Posted by Timothy Fredel at 11:18 PM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

### Reaching Out With VoIP

San Jose Mercury News:

> When was the last time you ooohhed and aaahed at your telephone? Probably never, right? Because let's face it, the traditional home phone may be amazingly reliable, but its coolness factor is almost zero. This might be the year that changes.

> Internet phone service -- where you make calls through your broadband Internet connection using a regular telephone -- is picking up steam. And for the first time since mobile phones hit the market, the technology could make people seriously rethink Alexander Graham Bell's 127-year-old invention.

> Want calls to your home phone to find you wherever you are? Done.

> Want to automatically send all your calls straight to voice mail while you watch the Sopranos? Done.

> Want to take your home phone and number wherever you travel, or send a voice mail message to a friend via e-mail? How about programming your own hold music? Done, done and done.

> Internet phone service -- also known as VoIP for Voice over Internet Protocol (pronounced ``voyp'') -- has been widely available to consumers for more than a year through small companies such as VoicePulse, Vonage and Packet8. So far, Americans have been slow to sign on.

Posted by Bob King at 05:35 PM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

### Froogle Visitors Soar

Mercury News:

> Traffic to Froogle soared after Google added a link to the comparison-shopping site on its home page last week. A report by Hitwise.com said a 319 percent increase in visits to Froogle pushed it into the top 10 shopping sites. The move by Google followed Yahoo's recent purchase of Kelkoo, a comparison-shopping site in Europe.

> "Yahoo and Google's recent actions indicate that the next battlefront in the search engine war will be comparison-shopping,'' said Bill Tancer, Hitwise vice president of research, in a statement. "It's also interesting to note that competitive lines are blurring between these two major players,'' he added.

> "According to Hitwise clickstream data, the No. 1 domain visited after Froogle was Yahoo Small Business. This indicates that a good portion of the products featured on Froogle are being sold by small businesses on Yahoo's small business service.''

Posted by Bob King at 05:33 PM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

### The Altered Human Is Already Here

New York Times:

> Many people, however, have already made a different kind of leap into the posthuman future.

> Their jump is biochemical, mediated by proton-pump inhibitors, serotonin boosters and other drugs that have become permanent additives to many human bloodstreams.

> Over the past half century, health-conscious, well-insured, educated people in the United States and in other wealthy countries have come to take being medicated for granted.

> More people shift to the pill-taking life every year, to the delight of pharmaceutical manufacturers. Indeed, drug sales suggest how willing people are to pursue better living through chemistry.

> Last year retail drug sales worldwide were $317 billion. In the United States alone, consumers spent $163 billion on drugs. In North America, the use of drugs that affect the central nervous system, antidepressants and others, increased 17 percent. No group has escaped. Last week the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported that 10 million children took prescription medication for three months or longer in 2002, and preschoolers, another study found, are now the fastest growing group of children receiving antidepressants.

> This is a social change on the same order as the advent of computers, but one that is taking place inside the human body. Just 50 years ago, according to a report by IMS Health, a company that tracks the pharmaceutical industry, the two biggest-selling over-the-counter drugs were Bufferin and Geritol. The prescription drug business was tiny. In 1954, according to IMS, Johnson & Johnson had $204 million in revenue. Now it is about $36 billion. In 1954, Merck took in $1.5 million in drug sales; in 2002, that figure was $52 billion.

Editor's Note: Here's an interesting President's Council report which was mentioned in New York Times article: Beyond Therapy: Biotechnology and the Pursuit of Happiness

-Tim

Posted by Bob King at 05:30 PM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

## April 05, 2004

### First Soap Opera for Mobile Phone

Yahoo! News:

> The launch of TV's first-ever soap for the tiny mobile phone screen might not suit everyone's taste, but it is living proof that the TV and digital worlds are merging.

> With this convergence due to transform the average consumer's entertainment fix, a record number of mobile-phone operators -- including heavy-hitters such as Vodafone, Nokia and Telefonica -- turned up in large numbers at this week's international MiPTV and MILIA trade shows.

> Aside from ring tones and music, games, news and sports results are the current favourites of cell phone users, many of them children and younger adults. And now the race is on to attract new audiences, with the big strides achieved in video streaming to phones throwing up new opportunities.

> "The quality of content, like video, is improving as are the handsets. It's a step change in the level of service," Vodafone's Graham Ferguson told a forum in this Riviera town.

> The first soap-drama specifically made for mobile phones, called "Hotel Franklin," has just been launched by media giant News Corporation. The episodes last just one-minute because, said News Corp.'s Lucy Hood, this "seems to us to be the natural length" for phone viewers.

> That time frame allows for enough character development and plot before leaving a hook at the end to get viewers to look at the next episode.

Posted by Timothy Fredel at 09:40 PM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

## April 04, 2004

### Indonesia's Elections

CNN.com:

> Voters will elect members for a range of government bodies, including a new 550-member national parliament, setting the stage for the country's first direct presidential elections in July.

> Polling booths in the sprawling archipelago's eastern-most regions opened first in the second general election since the 1998 demise of Suharto, Indonesia's long-serving autocratic president.

> In a complex and daunting logistical exercise, about 90 percent of Indonesia's 147 million eligible voters are expected to choose candidates for the nation's senate and the national and provincial legislatures as well as a new body called the regional representatives council.

> It is a major change for Indonesians, who in the past have only been required to cast a vote for a single party, not individual candidates.With 24 parties contesting the polls, the ballot papers are huge and the process unwieldy.

> Already logistical problems involving the distribution of around 660 million ballot papers to more than 595,000 polling stations has forced the government to allow voting to be delayed in some districts.

> To add to the complexity for voters, only the parties winning at least 3 percent of the seats can field candidates in the presidential elections on July 5.
> Run-off elections are scheduled for September, if there is no simple majority winner.

> Posted by Bob King at 08:31 PM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

### Fukuyama: Our Posthuman Future

Maybe we have a future after all: Our Posthuman Future is political historian Francis Fukuyama's reconsideration of his 1989 announcement that history had reached an end. He claims that science, particularly genome studies, offers radical changes, possibly more profound than anything since the development of language, in the way we think about human nature. He makes his case thoroughly and eloquently, rarely dipping into philosophical or critical jargon and consistently maintaining an informal tone.

Fukuyama is deeply concerned about the erosion of the foundations of liberal democracy under pressure from new concepts of humans and human rights, and most readers will find some room for agreement. Ultimately, he argues for strong international regulation of human biotechnology and thoughtfully disposes of the most compelling counterarguments. While readers might not agree that we're at risk of creating Huxley's Brave New World, it's hard to deny that things are changing quickly and that perhaps we ought to consider the changes before they're irrevocable.

Posted by Bob King at 08:24 PM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

### The Cure for Child Abuse is Prevention

Mercury News:

> Julie Serrano is on the front lines in the war against child abuse in San Jose, but she's lost her most potent weapon because the nation's outdated child welfare system won't pay for it.

> Study after study shows that the only cure for child abuse is prevention -- stopping the cycle in which abused children grow up to become abusive adults. When Serrano began teaching parenting classes for new immigrants in East San Jose, child abuse reports in the area dropped in half.

> "They didn't understand that in this country, it's against the law to hit a child," Serrano said. "We'd show them the difference between abuse and correction."

> When the county places fewer children in foster care, it saves taxpayers money. So one would think the federal government, which spends $5 billion a year to keep kids in foster care, would gladly foot the bill for parenting classes and other money-saving preventive programs. Wrong. Under the current law, federal entitlement money doesn't kick in until the kids are in the system. So Santa Clara County had to pay for the parenting classes, and when the statewide budget crunch hit, it canceled them.

> The Bush administration is trying to reform the foster care system. It has been pressuring states to shift the focus away from removing kids from their homes and toward strengthening families so they can stay together.

Posted by Jennifer King at 05:47 PM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

### Finding Happiness by Trading Up

Boston.com:

> Consumers get emotional payoff from splurging Public-relations executive Kristin Dormeyer works hard for her extra cash, but some people might say she doesn't spend it wisely. She buys face cream that costs $50 for two ounces and splurges on all-inclusive vacation packages in the Caribbean.

> During a recent visit to Three Dog Bakery in Ladue, Mo., she bought $40 worth of gourmet dog treats for her Italian greyhound.

> ''I know people might think it's a little strange," said Dormeyer, 34. ''[But] it makes all the hard work feel like it's worth something on a personal level."

> Experts on consumer behavior say Dormeyer's spending isn't strange at all. She's part of a growing group of middle-market consumers who trade up, spending more in certain product categories in return for an emotional payoff: comfort, a boost in self-image, or a feeling of closeness with a loved one.

> ''One way to look at this is, consumers are idiots," said James Twitchell, author of ''Living it Up: America's Love Affair with Luxury."

> ''Another way to look at it is that we're quite rational. . . . The reason these seemingly ridiculous products from seemingly ridiculous places command the prices they do is that when we get near them, we feel powerful feelings."

Posted by Jennifer King at 05:34 PM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

## April 03, 2004

### The Rise of Eurabia

New York Times:

> To begin with, consider the extraordinary prospect of European demographic decline. A hundred years ago -- when Europe's surplus population was still crossing the oceans to populate America and Australasia -- the countries that make up today's European Union accounted for around 14 percent of the world's population. Today that figure is down to around 6 percent, and by 2050, according to a United Nations forecast, it will be just over 4 percent. The decline is absolute as well as relative. Even allowing for immigration, the United Nations projects that the population of the current European Union members will fall by around 7.5million over the next 45 years. There has not been such a sustained reduction in the European population since the Black Death of the 14th century. (By contrast, the United States population is projected to grow by 44 percent between 2000 and 2050.)

> With the median age of Greeks, Italians and Spaniards projected to exceed 50 by 2050 -- roughly 1 in 3 people will be 65 or over -- the welfare states created in the wake of World War II plainly require drastic reform. Either today's newborn Europeans will spend their working lives paying 75 percent tax rates or retirement and ''free'' health care will simply have to be abolished. Alternatively (or additionally), Europeans will have to tolerate more legal immigration.

> But where will the new immigrants come from? It seems very likely that a high proportion will come from neighboring countries, and Europe's fastest-growing neighbors today are predominantly if not wholly Muslim. A youthful Muslim society to the south and east of the Mediterranean is poised to colonize -- the term is not too strong -- a senescent Europe.

Posted by Timothy Fredel at 10:39 PM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

### Ireland's Smoking Ban

Sunday Herald

> You might once have met them at close of day, heading with florid faces to bar or restaurant with grey, smoke-filled interiors, but no more. As Alan Taylor discovers, the world's first national ban on smoking seems to have had a terrible effect on Dubliners

> In the Dublin suburb of Rathfarnham, where tourists rarely venture, is a pub called Taylors Three Rock And Farmhouse Bar. On the day that Ireland became the first country in the world to ban smoking in all public places, the bar's eponymous owners have removed one of the windows and replaced it with a contraption that looks like medieval stocks. For the price of a pint, Haro Mulligan from Kellystown, with a face like a battered boxing glove, demonstrates how it works, putting his head through the big hole while holding his Guinness in his right hand and a fag in his left. Thus his body remains inside the pub while he smokes and drinks outside it, in compliance with the new edict. Everyone is happy, though how long Mulligan will be able to keep up his pose is uncertain.

Posted by Bob King at 08:34 AM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

### Linux Brings Peace to Sun and Microsoft

San Jose Mercury:

> So what prompted the peace?

> Both firms are now under the threat from the spread of cheap, ``open source'' software, such as the Linux operating system.

> Dan Kusnetzky, an analyst with IDC, said customers are tired of the complexity in trying to make their various Sun-based systems talk to Microsoft systems and vice versa.

> "They said, `Folks, we don't want to be in the middle of your squabble. We are busy writing our future now. If you want to get written out of it, continue your squabbling,' '' he said.

> McNealy said that he extended the first olive branch -- or rather, golf club -- a year ago, when he asked Ballmer to join him for golf in Pebble Beach. They ended up being partners. McNealy said he was prodded to begin discussions by customers, which had been urging him to "stop the noise and start the collaboration.''

Posted by Bob King at 08:26 AM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

### Google E-Mail Causes Privacy Concerns

San Jose Marcury News:

> Internet giant Google caught some flak this week for its new e-mail service, Gmail, which will serve up text ads based on the content of a user's e-mail messages. The concern is that Google will somehow snoop on people's personal e-mail.

> But lost in the hand-wringing is another, less-obvious concern, some privacy experts say.

> The problem is with Google's promise to give users a whopping 1 gigabyte of free e-mail storage space. According to privacy advocates, this is a case of getting too much of good thing.

> Google says the jumbo inboxes will keep people from having to delete e-mail messages, welcome relief for those of us who feel constrained by the puny 2 or 4 megabyte mailbox limits at other companies.

> But Chris Hoofnagle, associate director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center in Washington, D.C., points out that messages stored on computers longer than 180 days have less privacy protection under federal law.

> Federal privacy laws were designed to keep people from snooping on real-time electronic communications and conversations. But after six months, the law assumes people have stopped communicating, and e-mails are considered stored.

> "All they need is a subpoena. The government doesn't even need to show cause'' if it wants to look at your stored e-mails, Hoofnagle says.

Posted by Bob King at 08:17 AM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

### Stricter Rules on Foreign Visitors

San Jose Mercury News:

> The Department of Homeland Security announced Friday that it planned to require travelers from 27 industrialized nations -- including longtime allies like Britain, France, Germany, Spain, Japan and Australia -- to be photographed and electronically fingerprinted when they arrive in the United States.

> Officials described the move as a critical security measure intended to protect the country from future terrorist attacks. Once the program goes into effect by Sept. 30 at 115 airports around the nation, only diplomats, Canadians and Mexicans carrying border cards -- which are typically used for 72-hour visits to the United States -- will be exempt from the new rules.

> Under an existing program, airport inspectors have already been photographing and fingerprinting travelers who need visas to visit the United States.

> The new decision would extend that requirement to tourists from 22 European countries who can currently travel to the United States for up to 90 days without a visa. Because they are required to carry visas, students and other visitors from those nations who stay for more than three months have already been subjected to the new security measures since January.

Posted by Bob King at 07:58 AM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

### Sony's Chief's View of Change: Broadband as the Big Meteorite

UK Times Online

Inteview with Nobuyuki Idei, Sony CEO.

> ... In an environment changing as quickly as this you have no time to create a business model. People used to talk about "game plans" but you can't even do that today’.

> "Tokyo has created a society that is completely different from other regions of Asia. Its economy is bigger than England's. The greater Tokyo area represents a quarter of Japan's GDP. It has created a totally different lifestyle. Other companies around the world see that, and Tokyo has become the place for product planning. Devices that work here are forerunners for the rest of the world."

> "Now, I suppose, you own a mobile phone and many other devices; in the future there will be no distinction between data and voice and it will all be integrated into one"

> "It only took a small meteorite to hit the world and the dinosaurs all died. The internet and MP3 are just a small meteorite. Broadband is a big meteorite. Unless the content industry changes, it will become extinct."

> "I think that the combination of broadband internet, wireless, games and mobile phones will shape the future of content. Whether it is a two-hour movie, a 30-minute show for TV, or short content for a handset, I think that the length of content will always be related to the size of the screen you watch it on."

> "How many people really watch NBC in Hokkaido? There is a huge gap of cultural convergence versus technological convergence. It will take a long time to close. Technology is much easier to advance. It’s just mathematics."

Posted by Norm M. Wada at 01:06 AM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack

## April 01, 2004

### Astronomy: Milky Way's "Fog" Lifted

U.C. Berkeley Press Release:

> Thirty years after astronomers discovered the mysterious object at the exact center of our Milky Way Galaxy, an international team of scientists has finally succeeded in directly measuring the size of that object, which surrounds a black hole nearly four million times more massive than the Sun.

> This is the closest telescopic approach to a black hole so far and puts a major frontier of astrophysics within reach of future observations. The scientists used the National Science Foundation's Very Long Baseline Array (VLBA) radio telescope to make the breakthrough.

> "This is a big step forward," said Geoffrey Bower, of the University of California-Berkeley. "This is something that people have wanted to do for 30 years," since the Galactic center object, called Sagittarius A* (pronounced "A-star"), was discovered in 1974. The astronomers reported their research in the April 1 edition of Science Express.

> "Now we have a size for the object, but the mystery about its exact nature still remains," Bower added. The next step, he explained, is to learn its shape, "so we can tell if it is jets, a thin disk, or a spherical cloud."

Posted by Bob King at 03:06 PM | E-mail to a Friend | TrackBack
©Copyright 2003-4 Rugged Elegance LLC
All rights reserved.