NewsScan Daily, 8 June 2004 ("Above The Fold")

NewsScan Daily, 8 June 2004 ("Above The Fold")
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"ABOVE THE FOLD"  
       Microsoft Weighed Merger With SAP
       Oracle: 'PeopleSoft Takeover Would Increase Competition'
       Demand for Internet Names a Sign of General Recovery
       Microsoft to Appeal EU Antitrust Decision
       Every Fourth Chinese to Have Cell Phone by Year-End
       BT System for Blocking Child Porn Sites

FEATURES        
       Flash Card
       Worth Thinking About: The 'Neocortical' You and the 'Limbic' You

MICROSOFT WEIGHED MERGER WITH SAP
     Microsoft explored the idea of merging with SAP, the German software
company, but ended negotiations with that company after weighing the
"complexity of the potential transaction." SAP, which makes business
software for large companies, is about one-fifth the size of Microsoft.
Industry analysts say that Microsoft's interest in SAP suggests that
Microsoft is restless with the slowing pace of the PC business, which it has
long dominated. Gartner technology analyst David M. Smith says: "It's no
surprise that Microsoft is looking for other acquisitions in the business
software applications industry. But the fact that Microsoft was talking to
SAP means they were going after the big kahuna." (New York Times 8 Jun 2004)
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/06/08/technology/08soft.html

ORACLE: 'PEOPLESOFT TAKEOVER WOULD INCREASE COMPETITION'
     When companies merge, federal regulators always worry that the merger
will reduce competition -- and yet Oracle is claiming, paradoxically, that
its acquisition of PeopleSoft would actually do just the opposite: increase
competition. In an antitrust case against the company, the government is
taking the position that just three companies -- Oracle, PeopleSoft and SAP
-- have cornered the market for the complex software systems used on large
corporate computers, whereas Oracle is claiming that Microsoft's interest in
SAP (see above) shows that Microsoft wants a bigger piece of the $20-25
billion business applications software market, and that the competitive move
by Microsoft was actually prompted by Oracle's plan to acquire PeopleSoft.
(AP/San Jose Mercury News 7 Jun 2004)
http://www.siliconvalley.com/mld/siliconvalley/8863589.htm

DEMAND FOR INTERNET NAMES A SIGN OF GENERAL RECOVERY
     VeriSign says that a record 4.7 million Internet addresses were sold in
the first three months of 2004, bringing the total number of registered
addresses to a new high of 62.9 million for all domains. (That number
includes all domains -- not only .com and .net but also ones such as .edu,
gov, .mil, .org, .biz, as well as domains signifying particular countries.)
The growing demand for domain names came partially from the new availability
of Internet addresses that use Arabic, Chinese and Russian characters.
Investment banker Steve Ashley comments: "VeriSign is a good barometer of
general economic activity and it's very reasonable that their business is
getting better as the economy is recovering. Every time a movie comes out,
every time a new product is issued, you'll likely have a new domain name
with it. Economic activity spurs domain name sales." (Washington Post 8 Jun
2004)
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A23803-2004Jun8.html

MICROSOFT TO APPEAL EU ANTITRUST DECISION
     Microsoft has filed an appeal of the European Union's antitrust
decision requiring the company to change business practices deemed
detrimental to competition. Microsoft says that to follow the EU's ruling
would undermine global innovation: "We believe that the interest of
consumers and other European companies should be at the heart of this case.
The Commission's decision undermines the innovative efforts of successful
companies" -- and would "significantly alter incentives for research and
development that are important to global economic growth." EU Competition
Commissioner Mario Monti says he's confident that the Microsoft appeal will
fail. (AP/USA Today 8 Jun 2004)
http://www.usatoday.com/tech/techinvestor/techcorporatenews/2004-06-08-ms-ap
peals-eu_x.htm

EVERY FOURTH CHINESE TO HAVE CELL PHONE BY YEAR-END
     One in four Chinese persons will have a mobile phone by the end of the
year. The Ministry of Information Industry predicts that by late 2004 24.5%
of the people, or about 320 million, will own a cellular phone. Cell phones
already account for about half of all operating revenue in China's telecom
industry, with short message and wireless Internet services seen as
important growth sectors. (The Age 7 Jun 2004) Rec'd from John Lamp, Deakin
U.
http://theage.com.au/articles/2004/06/07/1086460208600.html

BT SYSTEM FOR BLOCKING CHILD PORN SITES
     Using a system called Cleanfeed, British Telecom intends to block its
2.7 million Internet subscribers from reaching child pornography Web sites
banned under British law. Attempts to reach the sites will result in a "Page
Not Found" error message. Cleanfeed will block sites by filtering out either
specific domain names or the unique numeric addresses associated with the
Web server hosting the site; it can also block individual pictures on sites.
In the U.S., civil liberties groups have fought attempts to force service
providers to block access to child porn sites, taking the position that such
efforts have the unintended consequence of also blocking thousands of
legitimate sites. (AP/Los Angeles Times 7 Jun 2004) http://tinyurl.com/2qcr8

*****  

FLASH CARD
     "Men give me credit for some genius. All the genius I have lies in
this; when I have a subject in hand, I study it profoundly. Day and night it
is before me. My mind becomes pervaded with it. Then the effort that I have
made is what people are pleased to call the fruit of genius. It is the fruit
of labor and thought." (Alexander Hamilton)

WORTH THINKING ABOUT: THE 'NEOCORTICAL' YOU AND THE 'LIMBIC' YOU
     Technology writer Steven Johnson writes about how MRIs, PET scans, and
other high-tech mirrors may be putting "mind reading" on a scientific
footing:
     "Brain-imaging tools are miracles of modern science, but they are not
the only channels to your mind's inner life. Simply possessing a more
informed understanding of your brain's internal architecture can change the
way you think about yourself. Part of such a process involves separating out
mental routines that you typically experience in unison.
     "If you know nothing about what's actually happening in your head, the
neurological activity you experience is invisible: it's just you being
yourself. But the more you learn about the brain's architecture, the more
you recognize that what happens in your head is more like an orchestra than
a soloist, with dozens of players contributing to the overall mix. You can
hear the symphony as a unified wash of sound, but you can also distinguish
the trombones from the timpani, the violins from the cellos. To come to a
comparable understanding of your own head, you don't need a million-dollar
imaging machine. You just need to learn something about the brain's
components and their typical patterns of activation.
     "Sometimes those components come in the form of specialized brain
regions; sometimes they come in the form of chemicals, like serotonin.
Invariably, a certain mood that strikes you will contain a mix of both, the
result of both neurochemical release and predictable activity in specific
regions of your brain.
     "As you learn to detect these brain components, you start to recognize
how much multitasking is really going on in your own head. You realize that
the emotion you feel isn't simply a reaction to the world at that moment,
but rather something closer to a drug, with a strange life of its own.
There's what we used to call a 'rational' you and an 'emotional' you, and
the two aren't always in sync.
     "Brain science has now given us more accurate descriptions of these two
sides of a personality, mapped onto specific regions of the brain. Instead
of 'rational' and 'emotional,' today we have the 'neocortical' you and the
'limbic' you." 
     [See 
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0743241657/newsscancom/ref=nosim for
Steven Johnson's "Mind Wide Open: Your Brain and the Neuroscience of
Everyday Life" -- or look for it in your favorite library. We donate all
revenue from our book recommendations to adult literacy programs.]

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