NewsScan Daily, 18 June 2004 ("Above The Fold")

NewsScan Daily, 18 June 2004 ("Above The Fold")
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"ABOVE THE FOLD"  
       IBM Lobbyists Accused Of Altering Document
       Silicon Valley Recovery
       'World's First' Free Zone for Outsourcing
       Games Ad Execs Play
       Intel Inside Your Living Room

FEATURES        
       Flash Card
       Honorary Subscriber: Alfred Stieglitz
       Mailbag: The World As We Find It

IBM LOBBYISTS ACCUSED OF ALTERING OF DOCUMENT
     The Treasury Department's acting inspector general has concluded that
IBM lobbyists, perhaps with the aid of Treasury Department officials,
illegally altered an internal Treasury document during a debate on pension
policy last fall. The document was a list of "Talking Points" in opposition
to an amendment to bar the Treasury from working on any regulations contrary
to an Illinois judge's finding on cash balance plans. An IBM executive says
the company thought it was distributing a public document that it thought
was widely distributed by Treasury. (Washington Post 17 Jun 2004)
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A50604-2004Jun17.html

SILICON VALLEY RECOVERY
     U.S. Treasury Secretary John Snow says that the economic recovery has
spread to California's Silicon Valley -- and that the feedback he's received
on his trip there "confirms the good news we're seeing on the American
economy, which is beginning to hit on all cylinders. And we've still got a
lot of headroom for growth in this economy." (San Jose Mercury News 18 Jun
2004) http://www.siliconvalley.com/mld/siliconvalley/8953619.htm

'WORLD'S FIRST' FREE ZONE FOR OUTSOURCING
     Dubai Internet City has announced the opening of the world's first free
zone dedicated to the outsourcing industry: "Dubai Outsource Zone (DOZ) will
provide a comprehensive infrastructure and environment for outsourcing
companies to set up global or regional hubs servicing the worldwide market.
DOZ's offering includes 100-percent exemption from taxes, arguably the
world's most reliable technology and communications infrastructure, a
one-stop shop of support services and the best possible working
environment." (The Age 16 Jun 2004) Rec'd from John Lamp, Deakin U.
http://theage.com.au/articles/2004/06/16/1087244950985.html

GAMES AD EXECS PLAY
     Viacom CFO Richard Bressler says that the company's looking for ways to
make money off the $10 billion U.S. video game industry: "I think the jury
is in, people are spending a lot of time in interactive. The interesting
thing for us is to figure out if there's a market for advertising in video
games." Last summer's drop in young male viewers of prime time television,
which has been attributed in part to video games, has prompted advertisers
to try new ways to reach that demographic. (Reuters/USA Today 18 Jun 2004)
http://www.usatoday.com/tech/news/2004-06-18-viacom-game-ads_x.htm

INTEL INSIDE YOUR LIVING ROOM
     Intel is introducing chips and circuitry for a new generation of PCs
that help people manage their growing libraries of digital photos, music,
games and videos. Intel executive Bill Siu calls the move "the most
ambitious and significant makeover of the PC platform in more than a
decade." Intel's two chipsets, code-named Grantsdale and Alderwood,  deliver
better high-definition video and audio playback, offer more lifelike
animation, and  make it easier to share music, photos and video over
wireless networks. Jeff Lowe, of Intel competitor Advance Micro Devices
(AMD), muses: "It's an odd way for a microprocessor company -- to lead with
a chipset rather than a processor." He says AMD will continue to focus on
computer logic and memory chips and let others focus on audio and video
cards. (Los Angeles Times 18 Jun 2004)
http://www.latimes.com/technology/la-fi-intel18jun18,1,5416521.story?coll=la
-headlines-technology

*****  

FLASH CARD
     "Nobody sees a flower --really -- it is so small it takes time  -- we
haven't time  --  and to see takes time, like to have a friend takes time."
(Georgia O'Keeffe)

HONORARY SUBSCRIBER: ALFRED STIEGLITZ
     Today's Honorary Subscriber is the famous American photographer Alfred
Stieglitz (1864-1946), who was a pioneer in transforming photography into an
art form. He also helped introduce and promote modern art in the United
States. 
     The first indication of Stieglitz's photographic originality came in
1897 when he won first prize at a London amateur photography exhibition. In
1890 he began to experiment with three-color pictures, making color
photographs in the rain and snow and at night before the invention of fast
lenses and plates. Stieglitz's fame rests not only on his own work, but on
his organizational leadership in promoting the work of other modern
photographers and painters. In 1902 he formed the Photo-Secession, an
organization for avant-garde photographers who practiced photography as an
expressive art. At the same time he began publishing Camera Work, a magazine
forum for the work of leading photographers, artists, and critics. Also
important was the gallery he opened, to be named "291," after its location
at 291 Fifth Avenue. Here he would exhibit paintings, sculpture, and other
works by modern painters, including such luminaries as Rodin, Matisse,
Cézanne, Toulouse-Lautrec and Picasso.
     Stieglitz was the oldest son of a retired New York woolen merchant. He
received his early schooling in New York, but completed his education in
Europe, where the family moved to in 1881. Stieglitz became a mechanical
engineering student at the Berlin Polytechnic in 1883, and while still a
student he decided to abandon engineering and make a career in photography.
He had many friends who were artists, and he decided to elevate photography
to a level equivalent to painting as a creative art medium. The path he
chose was to set high standards for his prints and to win as many prizes and
medals as possible. He also became an indefatigable advocate for his
artistic convictions.
     Stieglitz returned to United States in 1890, and by 1910 he had
produced a body of work that earned him considerable recognition as a gifted
photographic artist. During that same time period he edited and published
magazines and other literature promoting photography as art, as well as
founding his Photo-Secession group of similar minded photographers.
     As the editor of American Amateur Photographer (1893-96) and of Camera
Notes (1897-1902) he helped make other upcoming American photographers known
internationally, including Gertrude Kasebier, Edward Steichen, and Clarence
H. White. Later he opened two other galleries, first The Intimate Gallery,
then An American Place, where he exhibited the photography of Ansel Adams,
Eliot Porter, and Paul Strand and paintings by leading American artists.
     Also exhibited was his own extensive work, including his series of
portraits the famous painter Georgia O'Keeffe, whom he married in 1924.
Today, the National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C. holds the most complete
set of Stieglitz photographs.

See 
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0893817457/newsscancom/ref=nos
im for Dorothy Norman's book, "Alfred Stieglitz: an American Seer" -- or
look for it in your favorite library. We donate all revenue from our book
recommendations to adult literacy programs.]

MAILBAG: THE WORLD AS WE FIND IT

MATSUSHITA GOES TO THE MOVIES
Re: http://www.newsscan.com/cgi-bin/findit_view?table=newsletter&id=10775
     Matsushita's "Vitality Diagnostic Corner," sounds suspiciously like the
ending to "Soylent Green" (Pete Drum)

SEE-THROUGH PUBLICITY STUNTS
Re: http://www.newsscan.com/cgi-bin/findit_view?table=newsletter&id=10776
     Regarding "See-Through Walls Create Room With a View," we've all seen
the pictures of the "invisibility" cloak and I don't get it. Tachi's
prototype was interesting but hardly impressive -- move your viewpoint a
little off the centerline and the illusion (which is poor to begin with)
vanishes completely. And it would appear that we'll have a long wait for a
product that convincingly does what Tachi's prototype does poorly.
     So, my question is why has he got so much press for so little delivery?
Are we that desperate to be impressed? Are we such boosters of technology
that we'll glom onto the weakest proof of concept without asking whether it
has value, practicality, or profundity? And then he flies another kite:
"See-through walls." I can only hope that it is due to a slow news season
that he is getting publicity from the likes of the NewsScan (a normally
smart publication) and the BBC (who frequently aren't at all smart). Yours
with my usual crankiness -- (Mark Gibbs)
     PS. Check out:
http://www.nwfusion.com/columnists/2004/0614gearhead.html for my in-depth
discussion of how DidTheyReadIt does it. It will be completed in next week's
Gearhead column. 

JAMES BUCHANAN EADS
In reading this sentence in your item on Sir Henry Bessemer, "Patented in
1855, it made steel inexpensive to produce and was rapidly adopted by the
iron industry, first in Britain and later worldwide," I was reminded of the
1867 Eads Bridge across the Mississippi at St. Louis. It was supposed to be
the first steel bridge in the world because the use of steel for bridges was
not approved in Great Britain. Perhaps this was due to the phosphorus
problem. An article about the bridge can be found at
http://www.eslarp.uiuc.edu/ibex/archive/guidebook/EadsBridge.htm. The
builder, James Buchanan Eads, is certainly deserving of an Honorary
Subscription. There was a PBS "American Experience" film about Eads,
entitled "Secrets of a Master Builder" <http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/eads/>
(Bob Schuchman)

FREE SPEECH
Re: http://www.newsscan.com/cgi-bin/findit_view?table=newsletter&id=10794
     Interesting. A U.S. Deputy Attorney General chides France about
protecting free speech while in this country protesters are not allowed
within sight or earshot of Administration officials, and law enforcement
agencies record license plate numbers and make photographs of those involved
in dissent.  Then he says the French should focus on criminal activity.
Meanwhile the President reassures us that everything our agencies are doing
complies with the law, notwithstanding the fact that living up to that claim
requires the Patriot Act allowing warrantless searches, memos saying that
laws do not limit the President's power in time of hostility, and a
customized definition of torture to avoid the Geneva Convention. Hypocrisy
taken to seven dimensions! (Joe Callahan)

HAPPIER WITH ELECTRONS
Re: http://www.newsscan.com/cgi-bin/findit_view?table=newsletter&id=10799
     Maybe some people feel godlike online, but when you live up in the
mountains where DSL is a faraway myth and the storm du jour knocks out your
power for half an hour, you maintain a nice sense of physical reality. I
think a spiritual slant to the world is a personal predisposition that
doesn't have much to do what's "out there." One person's religion is the
next guy's head scratching: I feel happier with electrons than with
churches, but either way physics today suggests that "nothing" is constantly
manifesting as "something"--and vice versa. (Derek Davis, hills of
Pennsylvania)

DON'T CALL US, WE'LL CALL YOU
Re: http://www.newsscan.com/cgi-bin/findit_view?table=newsletter&id=10788
     At the present time the "Do-not-call' registry as operated by the
Federal government is not well-run. Before the time when NYS handled their
own DNC list, I received only one or two calls and ZERO faxes per year. Now
I receive junk faxes at my home every week and there is no reason to believe
that I have a fax machine on my residential line. If I am enrolled in the
Federal DNC list, why doesn't that protect me from these faxing jerks who
wish to sell me cruises, condos, etc? In my definition a junk fax over a
telephone line by a telemarketer is telemarketing just as much as someone
who calls to talk to me about the vacations, etc.
     But the FCC wimps out and says they do "not adjudicate individual
complaints of this type." Why should they put themselves out when I am only
one taxpayer and not a large corporation? If they don't want to deal with
it, give it back to the states. If Eliot Spitzer were to take the list back,
I would be delighted because I know it went to 'hell in a hand basket' in
Federal bureaucratic hands. I hope both Rep. Fred Upton & John Dingell get
buried in nasty beeping telephone calls from idiots selling vacations in
Disney's neighborhood.
     And I am sorry, Charlie (Schumer), but the Feds just can't do the small
stuff well at all! There is no reason given their track record on the DNC
list that DNEmail would work any better. Nor that the FTC could or would do
a better job of protecting people like me from spam than their colleagues
across the street do in protecting me from fax-telemarketing. (Gloria
Bryant)

FAX STACKS ON CORPORATE DESKS
Re: http://www.newsscan.com/cgi-bin/findit_view?table=newsletter&id=10788
     This is great! Exactly what we need! Let's legalize fax spamming!
Except that fax spam is even worse than e-mail spam because the recipient
has to pay for the paper and ink. I wonder how many companies would continue
to accept faxes if they received even a fourth as much junk by fax as they
do via e-mail. Thanks for the great publication. (Aaron Cannon)

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