NewsScan Daily, 22 December 2003 ("Above The Fold")

NewsScan Daily, 22 December 2003 ("Above The Fold")
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"ABOVE THE FOLD"
       Wal-Mart Enters Internet Music Business
       Online Shopping
       Murdoch Acquires DirecTV
       Wage Insurance for Displaced Workers?
       Dream On

FEATURES
       Flash Card
       Worth Thinking About: The Kuran
       "An Angel in Disguise" by Dr. Mike Litrel
       
WAL-MART ENTERS INTERNET MUSIC BUSINESS
Wal-Mart's new online store sells songs for 88 cents, more than ten cents
less than the cost of a song from Apple's iTunes (while other Internet music
services, such as RealNetwork's Rhapsody, sell songs for as little as 79
cents each). Apple vice president Rob Schoeben is unimpressed, and says:
"What we've learned is putting music first and making it about a music
experience is what real music consumers want. They want to discover music,
check out the video, buy it. We think knock-off portal site approaches are
not the answer." But industry analyst Dan Hess notes: "The purchasing power
of Wal-Mart is no small matter here. The fact is, the company is one of the
largest sellers and wholesale buyers of media products in the country. The
ability to offer products at a competitive price is a natural extension of
that." And digital media analyst Steven Vonder Haar makes the point that
Wal-Mart's move should be seen as part of a much bigger picture: "Offering
digital downloads is a piece of the puzzle required to sell a wide swath of
consumer electronics and entertainment products online. Today, you sell
online music downloads. Tomorrow, you sell online movies. It's the first
step in a natural digital progression." (San Jose Mercury News 19 Dec 2003)
http://www.siliconvalley.com/mld/siliconvalley/7531857.htm

ONLINE SHOPPING
Increasing numbers of shoppers are doing most of their buying online, and
online sales nationally have reached $12.2 billion -- 42% than last year,
according to Forrester Research. It's now been five years since online
shopping hit the mainstream, and retail analyst Graham Mudd thinks people
have gotten quite comfortable with the idea: "Once people have a good
experience buying that first book on the Web, they start thinking, 'What
else can I buy online?'" Still, there will always be a physical world (at
least we hope there will). One committed online shopper explains:
"Sometimes, no matter how hard you try, you can't get that warm, fuzzy
feeling from seeing things online." (USA Today 22 Dec 2003)
http://www.usatoday.com/tech/news/2003-12-22-shoppers_x.htm

MURDOCH ACQUIRES DIRECTV
Rupert Murdoch is a man who's never been intimidated by the status quo: he
successfully ignored Britain's state-owned BBC to launch that nation's first
pay-TV service, and in the U.S. established Fox as a lively competitor to
the three established TV networks. And now the 72-year-old Murdoch is hoping
to turn satellite television into a medium as common as cable, which is in
70% of homes. On Friday federal regulators approved Murdoch's News Corp.'s
$6.6-billion takeover of satellite television leader DirecTV from General
Motors Corp. Legg Mason industry analyst Blair Levin predicts: "He'll have
an army, an air force and a navy when everyone else has at best one or two
of those things. He could drive a bunch of consolidation in the industry."
And Jamie Kellner, a former Murdoch lieutenant who went on to found the WB
network, agrees: "With DirecTV, he'll be very aggressive in marketing. He'll
use all the tools he's used around the world to get a larger market share
here. Murdoch is willing to take risks that others wouldn't." (Los Angeles
Times 22 Dec 2003) 
http://www.latimes.com/technology/la-fi-murdoch22dec22,1,1775291.story?coll=
la-headlines-technology

WAGE INSURANCE FOR DISPLACED WORKERS?
What happens to employees whose work is outsourced to overseas contractors?
Probably much lower pay. Former labor secretary Robert B. Reich, now a
professor social and economic policy at Brandeis University, thinks that
maybe there should be wage insurance: "Wage insurance is worth considering
because technological change is so rapid. It would spread the costs of
economic change over a much larger pool." (New York Times 22 Dec 2003)
http://partners.nytimes.com/2003/12/22/technology/22neco.html

DREAM ON
Washington Post columnist Rob Pegoraro adds the following wish to his list
for Santa this year: "Every manufacturer and developer should provide free
tech support for life. Not because it's the right thing to do, but because
it's good for these companies in the first place. If companies had to pay an
immediate and direct penalty for shipping buggy or difficult hardware or
software, they'd soon learn to stop doing that -- and the resulting
improvements would, in turn, draw them new customers and their dollars. It
is crazy and foolish to wish for such a thing. But we can dream, can't we?"
(Washington Post 20 Dec 2003)
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A17047-2003Dec20.html

*****

FLASH CARD
     "If the human race wishes to have prolonged and indefinite period of
material prosperity, they have only got to behave in a peaceful and helpful
way toward one another." (Winston Churchill)

WORTH THINKING ABOUT: THE KURAN
     Very few in the West have ever read the Kuran, Islam's holy book. This
may be a good time to take a look at it. You'll find an English translation
at the site shown below, and here is a brief excerpt on Muhammed from that
version:
     In the name of Allah, the Beneficent, the Merciful.
[47.1] (As for) those who disbelieve and turn away from Allah's way, He
shall render their works ineffective.
[47.2] And (as for) those who believe and do good, and believe in what has
been revealed to Muhammad, and it is the very truth from their Lord, He will
remove their evil from them and improve their condition.
[47.3] That is because those who disbelieve follow falsehood, and have given
them their dowries, taking (them) in marriage, not fornicating nor taking
them for paramours in secret; and whoever denies faith, his work indeed is
of no account, and in the hereafter he shall be one of the losers.
[47.4] So when you meet in battle those who disbelieve, then smite the necks
until when you have overcome them, then make (them) prisoners, and
afterwards either set them free as a favor or let them ransom (themselves)
until the war terminates. That (shall be so); and if Allah had pleased He
would certainly have exacted what is due from them, but that He may try some
of you by means of others; and (as for) those who are slain in the way of
Allah, He will by no means allow their deeds to perish.
[47.5] He will guide them and improve their condition.
[47.6] And cause them to enter the garden which He has made known to them.
[47.7] O you who believe ! if you help (the cause of) Allah, He will help
you and make firm your feet.
[47.8] And (as for) those who disbelieve, for them is destruction and He has
made their deeds ineffective.
[47.9] That is because they hated what Allah revealed, so He rendered their
deeds null. 
[47.10] Have they not then journeyed in the land and seen how was the end of
those before them: Allah brought down destruction upon them, and the
unbelievers shall have the like of it.
[47.11] That is because Allah is the Protector of those who believe, and
because the unbelievers shall have no protector for them.
[47.12] Surely Allah will make those who believe and do good enter gardens
beneath which rivers flow; and those who disbelieve enjoy themselves and eat
as the beasts eat, and the fire is their abode.

See http://www.kuran.gen.tr/html/english1/  -- or look for the Kuran in your
favorite library. (We donate all revenue from our book recommendations to
adult literacy programs.)

"AN ANGEL IN DISGUISE" BY DR. MIKE LITREL
     [Dr. Litrel is in practice as an OB/GYN Georgia, where he is also
Clinical Assistant Professor at Emory University School of Medicine.]
                       ***
     It was Christmas Eve at Grady Hospital, and there were only three of us
residents left to work the service. I was in my first year of Obstetrics and
Gynecology training, working through my required three months on the Grady
Hospital General Medicine wards.
     We all wore Santa hats. The hats were an effort to boost morale as we
worked twenty-four hours straight at Grady Hospital. We had thirty patients,
sick for all kinds of reasons - cancer, strokes, heart attacks, pneumonia.
One of them, Mr. Teel, was a forty-ish mentally retarded white man. He had
been on our service for two weeks, hospitalized for extreme malnutrition.
The day he was admitted he weighed seventy pounds.
      "Please find out what is wrong with Ralph," his sister pleaded. "I
can't understand why he's lost all this weight." She was under
investigation, she told me indignantly, by the State Welfare Office, for
suspicion of neglect. "We give him wonderful care," she said. "How dare they
accuse us of this!"
     I reassured his sister we would find out what was going on. She
expressed her gratitude and made a point of checking on his progress every
day. Her concern was touching, and I enjoyed being in a position to help.
     When I checked on Mr. Teel that Christmas Eve, he was doing exactly
what he had been doing every day of his hospitalization. Pigging out. He was
on a high-calorie diet, with supplemental shakes. He drank so many of these
that we had to sneak some from the other floors. It was fun, watching him
eat all the time. He couldn't talk, or understand very much, and he had to
wear diapers. But he enjoyed his food. And he was getting better every day.
     Mr. Teel had an unpleasant roommate: a prisoner, shackled to his bed,
healing from a gunshot wound in the abdomen. This was not an uncommon sight
at Grady, but this guy was particularly rough-looking. He had bulging
muscles everywhere and his dark skin was plastered with tattoos. He glared
at us whenever we entered the room. I was grateful for the armed guard
stationed just outside.
     We hadn't been able to figure out what had caused Mr. Teel's
emaciation. Cancer was the number one suspect. But all our CAT scans and
MRI's had come up short. No tumor anywhere. Mr. Teel's sister arrived on the
morning of Christmas Eve, beautifully clothed and bedecked with jewelry. She
asked me if we had a diagnosis yet. I told her regretfully we were still
drawing a blank. She insisted on more tests. "I just don't understand it.
Why is he so thin? There has to be something wrong with him."
     There was something disingenuous in the tone of her voice. I became
suspicious. The diagnosis clicked. "We¹ve fed him for two weeks," I said,
looking straight into her eyes, "and he's gained back a lot of weight. After
all these negative tests, I think the problem is he just hasn't been fed
enough."
     Her face clouded over with guilt, and she looked away. She left the
ward without even denying it.
     It made for a sad Christmas Eve. No doubt Mr. Teal was difficult to
care for, especially at home. But he could have been placed in a nursing
facility. Everywhere you turn at Grady there is someone suffering. So much
of the suffering is unnecessary, and it makes it sadder still. Throughout
the long day, I kept thinking about Mr. Teel, the mentally retarded man who
almost died from hunger. My Santa hat stayed on my head, but it didn't feel
like Christmas. The hospital seemed barren of love.
     I stopped by Mr. Teel's room later that night. As I drew close, I heard
someone singing "Silent Night." I peeked around the curtain and was
astonished. There was the prisoner roommate, singing to Mr. Teel and helping
him with his dinner. "Hey Mr. Teel," I heard the prisoner say, "you lucked
out -- look at all the good things you get to eat." His smile lit up the
room. 
     But his smile vanished when he saw me. The familiar glare was back.
"I'm not doin' nothin'," he growled at me. "Ain't no nurse around and the
man's gotta eat."
     I groped for a response. "I appreciate you taking care of him," I heard
myself say. "We need all the help we can get around here." It felt like
Christmas again. I stuck out my hand to shake his. "Merry Christmas, Sir."
     He crushed my hand in a friendly way and smiled big. "Merry Christmas,
Doc! And I dig your Santa hat."
     I gave him the hat. He made a better Santa than I did, I told him.
     Of all my Christmas Eves, that one is my most memorable. I witnessed a
beautiful sight -- a prisoner in chains feeding a starving man deserted by
his own family. It was a fitting event to honor the birthday of Jesus, a man
who lived among the rejected, offered hope and healing to the poor, and
taught us not to judge each other, but to love.

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