NewsScan Daily, 4 August 2004 ("Above The Fold")

NewsScan Daily, 4 August 2004 ("Above The Fold")
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"ABOVE THE FOLD"
        HP to Ship Pre-Loaded Linux Laptops
        Cable Giants Seek to Dominate VoIP
        DVD-Copying Company Signs Off
        Singapore Airlines Introduces SMS Check-In
        Googling Oneself Is a Popular Pastime

FEATURES
        Flash Card
        Honorary Subscriber: Knut Hamsun

HP TO SHIP PRE-LOADED LINUX LAPTOPS
      In a sign that Linux is rapidly gaining traction in the 
desktop/laptop world, Hewlett-Packard announced plans to ship a business 
notebook computer with the Linux operating system pre-installed. The HP 
Compaq nx5000 will come loaded with Novell's SUSE Linux OS and prices will 
start at about $1,140 -- about $60 less than the basic model running 
Microsoft Windows XP. HP is touting its move as the first major PC maker to 
ship a Linux laptop, but California-based Tadpole Computer Inc. also 
markets a line of Linux notebooks. HP VP for Linux Martin Fink says the 
company's foray into Linux laptops will test whether "we can see the take 
up we get for this particular product." (AP 3 Aug 2004)
http://apnews.excite.com/article/20040803/D847VOV81.html

CABLE GIANTS SEEK TO DOMINATE VOIP
      Time Warner Cable, Cablevision and other cable giants have begun 
setting up their own Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) services for 
American consumers, says a new Yankee Group report, aimed at quickly 
gaining the lead over alternative Internet telephony providers in 2004. 
"After many years of testing, the VoIP technology is finally available and 
ready for prime time. The U.S. market, which represents almost all the 
cable VoIP market today, also will drive the global MSOs (multiservice 
operators) to move forward," says a Yankee Group analyst. Already, some 
alternative providers such as Vonage and Net2Phone are collaborating with 
cable and other broadband partners to offer their services, but in the long 
run, consumers likely will opt for VoIP service straight from their local 
cable or phone company. In a separate report on the U.S. broadband market, 
Yankee predicts that subscriptions to high-speed services will overtake 
narrowband signups by 2006. That study listed Comcast as the leader in 
cable modem subscribers and SBC as the dominant DSL provider. (CNet 3 Aug 2004)
http://news.com.com/2100-7352-5295023.html

DVD-COPYING COMPANY SIGNS OFF
      321 Studios, which has been embroiled in lawsuits brought by 
deep-pocketed movie studios and video game producers, has quietly given up 
the ghost. In a posting on the 321 Web site it announced "it has ceased 
business operations including, but not limited to, the sale, support and 
promotion of our products." Tuesday's announcement came on the heels of 
another legal setback when a New York federal judge imposed a worldwide ban 
on the production and distribution of 321's Games X Copy software in 
response to a lawsuit by three leading makers of video games. 321 has 
steadfastly maintained that its copy software was merely intended for 
consumers who prefer to make backups of expensive DVDs and video games in 
case of damage to the originals. (AP/Washington Post 4 Aug 2004)
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A38303-2004Aug4.html

SINGAPORE AIRLINES INTRODUCES SMS CHECK-IN
      Passengers on Singapore Airlines will now be able to check in for 
flights by sending a text message on their mobile phones. The short message 
service (SMS) function is the latest use of technology that Singapore 
Airlines has introduced to make checking in easier and quicker, adding to 
Internet, mobile phone and fax facilities. After checking in remotely, 
passengers need to pick up their boarding passes and check in their luggage 
on the day of departure from a dedicated counter, rather than wait in 
regular queues. (The Age 3 Aug 2004) rec'd from John Lamp, Deakin U.
http://theage.com.au/articles/2004/08/03/1091476476848.html

GOOGLING ONESELF IS A POPULAR PASTIME
      Thirty-nine percent of respondents in an MSN survey have looked 
themselves up online, compared with only 29% who'd looked up family 
members. Thirty-six percent reported using search engines to track down 
long-lost friends and 17% looked for ex-lovers. The survey results indicate 
that many people are curious about how well-known they are on the Web, 
based on their personal Web sites, postings to newsgroups or other 
Web-based activity. The poll, conducted by Harris Interactive, found that 
people aged 59 and older are most likely to use the Web to research their 
family history and ancestors, while Gen Xers are more likely to look for 
new flames on the Web. On average, people spend 11 minutes combing through 
the results of a search, and 29% abandon their search without getting any 
useful information at all. (BBC News 4 Aug 2004)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/3534794.stm

*****

FLASH CARD
      "The subjects that were dearest to the examiners were almost 
invariably those I fancied least... I should have liked to be asked to say 
what I knew. They always tried to ask what I did not know. When I would 
have willingly displayed my knowledge, they sought to expose my ignorance. 
This sort of treatment had only one result: I did not to well in 
examinations." (Winston Churchill)

HONORARY SUBSCRIBER: KNUT HAMSUN
      Today's Honorary Subscriber is the Norwegian novelist, dramatist, and 
poet Knut Hamsun, whose novels earned him the 1920 Nobel Prize for 
literature. His best-known novel, "The Growth of the Soil," realistically 
describes the hard life of peasants in rural Norway. He has been compared 
to Fyodor Dostoyevsky for the intensity and poetic force with which he 
explored "the mysterious forces at work in the human psyche."
      Hamsun was the pen name of Knut Pedersen, who was born of peasant 
origins in Lom, Norway. He spent most of his childhood in the Lofoten 
Islands and had almost no formal schooling. He started writing at age 19 
while working as a shoemaker's apprentice in Bodo. For the next ten years 
he worked at various jobs, and during this period he twice visited the 
United States. For a time he was a streetcar conductor in Chicago and a 
farmhand in North Dakota. Following the success of his first novel, 
"Hunger," Hamsun spread his literary wings with a series of lectures 
attacking such idols as Ibsen and Tolstoy. Influenced by Nietzsche and 
Strindberg, he was committed to a fierce individualism and was antipathetic 
to modern Western culture and supported the Germans during their occupation 
of Norway in World War II. After the war he was imprisoned as a traitor, 
but later charges against him were dropped in view of his age.
      Hamsun's collaboration with the Nazis seriously damaged his 
reputation, but interest in his works re-emerged after his death. His 
powerful novels transcended the limitations of his political views, and new 
translations made his works accessible to an international readership that 
welcomed the deliberate irrationalism and impressionism of his writings. 
Influential authors such as Maxim Gorky, Thomas Mann, and Isaac Bashevis 
Singer enthusiastically acknowledged his genius. Hamsun died near Grimstad 
in 1952.

See http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0394717813/newsscancom/ref=nosim 
for Hamsun's "Growth of the Soil" -- or look for it in your favorite 
library. Note: We donate all revenue from our book recommendations to adult 
literacy programs.]

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