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

NewsScan Daily, 18 October 2004 ("Above The Fold")
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"ABOVE THE FOLD"
        Security Problems Prompt Strange Bedfellows
        New Solutions To Spyware Invasion
        Network Security Set For Quantum Leap
        Music Publishers Cut Web Radio Mega-Deal
        The Robots Are Coming! The Robots Are Coming!

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

SECURITY PROBLEMS PROMPT STRANGE BEDFELLOWS
      With security looming as major issue for users, top technology firms 
are coming to terms with the need to form alliances in order to combat the 
plague of viruses, computer worms and spyware programs that threatens 
computing productivity. One case in point is today's announcement that 
Microsoft and Cisco are teaming up to tackle the problem, in an 
acknowledgement that many corporate customers have made major investments 
in both companies' technology and do not want to be forced to choose 
between them when it comes to security solutions. Meanwhile, Dell is 
partnering with the nonprofit Internet Education Foundation -- a coalition 
that includes tech giants like AOL and Yahoo -- to educate consumers about 
the risks of spyware. Dell VP Mike George says his company normally does 
not become involved in software issues, but in recent months has stepped up 
efforts to help consumers rid their computers of spyware and other problems 
because they are turning off potential users. (Washington Post 18 Oct 2004)
<http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A41629-2004Oct18.html>

NEW SOLUTIONS TO SPYWARE INVASION
      Two companies have just released software programs aimed at 
eliminating the scourge of spyware. Blue Coat Systems, which specializes in 
proxy servers, is enhancing its security service with spyware- and 
adware-blocking software. It estimates that its product can prevent 98% of 
such unwanted programs from being installed. Webroot Software boasts a 
similar success rate with its anti-spyware software, which is installed 
directly on users' PCs. These two new products are notable because, while 
there are many products on the market that can remove spyware and adware 
from users' PCs, these two prevent their installation in the first place. 
Meta Group analyst Peter Firstbrook predicts that what ultimately will 
evolve is a "layered" defense system that combines centralized screening 
tools plus desktop software, similar to what's happened in the antivirus 
software market. (Wall Street Journal 18 Oct 2004)
<http://online.wsj.com/article/0,,SB109805050471847505,00.html> (sub req'd)

NETWORK SECURITY SET FOR QUANTUM LEAP
      It's a hacker's nightmare but a dream for bankers and spies: A 
computer network so secure that even the simplest attempts to eavesdrop 
will interrupt the flow of data and alert administrators to the snooping. 
The work by researchers at Harvard University, Boston University and BBN 
Technologies is the closest scientists have come to a real-world quantum 
encryption system that uses light particles called photons to lock and 
unlock information instead of random-number "keys." (The Age 15 Oct 2004) 
rec'd from John Lamp
<http://theage.com.au/articles/2004/10/14/1097607360143.html>

MUSIC PUBLISHERS CUT WEB RADIO MEGA-DEAL
      The American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP) and 
the Radio Music License Committee, which represents most of the nearly 
12,000 commercial radio stations in the U.S., have reached a $1.7-billion 
arrangement to cover licensing rights for music played over radio airwaves 
or streamed via Web radio. The deal has been hailed as the largest single 
licensing deal in the history of American radio and covers the entire ASCAP 
repertory of more than 7.5 million copyrighted musical works, as well as 
works owned by more than 60 affiliated foreign performing rights 
organizations. (Reuters/CNet News.com 18 Oct 2004)
<http://news.com.com/Music+publishers+sign+mega-deal+on+Web+radio/2100-1026_3-5414725.html>

THE ROBOTS ARE COMING! THE ROBOTS ARE COMING!
      This week the Santa Clara Convention Center will be overrun by a host 
of swiveling, beeping, rolling attendees at RoboNexus, the first exhibit of 
its kind in the U.S. According to Dan Kara, editorial director of Robotic 
Trends, which organized the conference, the robotics industry is poised to 
move out of academia and into the commercial mainstream. Heartened by the 
success of iRobot's Roomba vacuum cleaner, a number of startups are 
beginning to address the nascent market with a variety of components aimed 
at making robot-building easier. "A number of building blocks are already 
in place for this industry to take off," says Alec Hudnut, president of 
Evolution Robotics. "You have low-cost processing power, memory, low-cost 
assembly. You have some infrastructure in place." Hudnut says what the 
industry needs now are standard core components, or sub-assembly parts, so 
companies can stop reinventing the wheel. His company is helping out with a 
product that turns a digital camera into a smart camera, which could be 
used at a grocery store checkout counter to ensure the checker scans all 
the items in the shopper's cart. The same system is used by Sony for its 
Aibo robotic dog. Meanwhile, RoboDynamics has build a robotic platform 
called MILO that can be customized to create robots for home security or 
home health care monitoring and Box Robotics is introducing its 912 robot 
platform that would provide a basis for hobbyists to build their own 
robotic companions. But don't get your hopes up too soon -- "We are 
probably 50 years away from a Jetsons-like humanoid robot in your kitchen 
washing your dishes," says RoboDynamics CEO Fred Nikgohar. "It took the 
Japanese 35 years to create a robot that walks on two legs." (San Jose 
Mercury News 18 Oct 2004)
<http://www.siliconvalley.com/mld/siliconvalley/9948250.htm>

*****

FLASH CARD
      "What childishness is it that while there's breath of life in our 
bodies, we are determined to rush to see the sun the other way around?" 
(Elizabeth Bishop)

HONORARY SUBSCRIBER: ELIZABETH BISHOP
      Today's Honorary Subscriber is the American poet and writer Elizabeth 
Bishop (1911-1979), who was critically acclaimed for her polished, witty, 
descriptive verse and her stylistically distinctive short stories.
      Bishop is best known for her meditative and personal poetry, as seen 
in the collection, "North and South -- A Cold Spring," for which she won 
the 1956 Pulitzer Prize for poetry. Her other collected writings include 
"The Complete Poems: 1927-1979" published in 1983, and "The Collected 
Prose" published in 1984. Other awards included a 1969 National Book Award 
and a 1976 National Book Critics' Circle Award for poetry. In the opinion 
of critics, Bishop's poems generally "display a relaxed, conversational 
tone, though many are written in difficult verse forms." Bishop's work is 
often favorably compared to that of her friend and fellow poet, Marianne 
Moore, editor of the literary journal Dial.
      Bishop was born in Worcester, Massachusetts. She spent some of her 
childhood years with grandparents in Nova Scotia, made necessary the early 
death of her father from Bright's disease and the subsequent mental 
breakdown of her mother. Before enrolling in Vassar College, she attended 
Walnut Hill School in Natick, Massachusetts. She graduated from Vassar in 
1934, and then used her private income to spend time in travel, while 
perfecting her writing talents.
      She traveled widely in Europe and North Africa, after which from 1938 
to 1943 she made her home in Key West, Florida. Following a lengthy stay in 
Mexico, Bishop returned to live in the United States, where she served as a 
consultant in poetry at the Library of Congress for the two years 1949 and 
1950. Previously, in 1945 her poetry had earned her a Houghton Mifflin 
Poetry Fellowship and now in 1950 she was the recipient of the American 
Academy of Arts and Letters Award.
      For most of the 1950s and 1960s, she lived mainly in Petrópolis, near 
Rio de Janeiro, but also spent part of each year in San Francisco, 
California. After her Brazilian sojourn, she returned to the United States 
and in 1970 became a lecturer in English at Harvard University. In 1976 she 
was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Letters.
      Among the many fellow poets who admired Bishop's poetry was Robert 
Lowell who praised her "famous eye for meticulously observed descriptions," 
and "humorous commanding genius for picking up the unnoticed." Bishop's 
reputation has grown since her death. Insights into her life and poetry 
have been greatly helped by the collection of her letters, edited by the 
publisher Robert Giroux under the title "One Art."

[Visit RLG's RedLightGreen to find a library copy of Elizabeth Bishop's 
"Complete Poems 1927-1979 at 
<http://www.redlightgreen.com/ucwprod/servlet/ucw.servlets.UCWController?ACT 
ION=EDITION&WORKID=8666810&> -- or you might want to visit Amazon to find a 
copy to buy at 
<http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0374518173/newsscancom/ref=nosim> .
Note: We donate all revenue from our recommendations to adult literacy 
programs.]

MAILBAG: THE WORLD AS WE FIND IT

WHAT A WORLD WE LIVE IN, WOT?
Re: <http://www.newsscan.com/cgi-bin/findit_view?table=newsletter&id=11503>
      I once helped a friend with the prose of his patent request, which 
struck me at the time as a bit too process-general; this piece on the 
Sun/Kodak suit smelt of the same thing.  Are we really seeing corporate 
lawyers pushing patents beyond their original purpose and into the realm of 
impeding progress in the name of short-term gain?  More importantly:  Am I 
just a Pollyanna?  Probably.  Wow, what a world we live in, wot? (Ron A. 
Zajac, Dongshih, Taiwan)

ASSUREDLY WORTH CONSIDERING
Re: <http://www.newsscan.com/cgi-bin/findit_view?table=newsletter&id=11498>
      While I sympathize with the mailbag item warning against the dangers 
of using tinyurl [see tinyurl.com], I have clicked on them many times and 
never had a problem. However, in order for readers such as Amos Bannister 
to benefit from the convenience of tinyurl, would it be possible for our 
NewsScan editors to assure him that the link has been tested? Thanks for 
your great NewsScan service! (Keith Cowan) [Keith, we either create tinyurl 
links ourselves in certain special cases, or if we use someone else's 
tinyurl we certainly check it out. But we don't invite lawsuits of any 
kind, so "assure" may be too strong a word. -- J&S]

FRANCE'S JAMMING OF CELL PHONE CALLS IN THEATERS
Re: <http://www.newsscan.com/cgi-bin/findit_view?table=newsletter&id=11505>
      Honestly, and people have the nerve to derogate France? This is what 
I call a civilized response! (John Beck)

GOTCHA, PLANCK!
Re: 
<http://www.newsscan.com/cgi-bin/findit_view?table=honorary_subscriber&id=84 5>
      Here is the Laughlin Theorem: "Something is always made of something 
else." (It was probably first promulgated by someone else, but I don't know 
who that might be.) It leads from this that nothing is irreducible and 
therefore Professor Planck's claim for quanta is unsupportable. (Gene 
Laughlin)

NUS YOU CAN USE
Re: 
<http://www.newsscan.com/cgi-bin/findit_view?table=honorary_subscriber&id=84 5>
      Tiny nitpick... in your Planck bio you referred to "the frequency of 
the radiant energy (v)." In fact the symbol physicists use for frequency is 
not v but the lower-case Greek letter nu (µ) -- which looks like a lot like 
a "v", but often quite a cursive one. Not the sort of thing most easily 
conveyed in email! Now as for why physicists can't use "f" for frequency 
like engineers do... I guess some people just can't resist the lure of 
Greek! (Allan Todd, UK)

GUTHRIE HOT AND COLD
Re: 
<http://www.newsscan.com/cgi-bin/findit_view?table=honorary_subscriber&id=84 4>
      I forwarded your Book review/Flash card to a friend, Tom Sciance, 
that teaches at the U of Texas. He sent me these two emails:  "Where did 
they get those lyrics?  Woody Guthrie was singing about the dust bowl and 
economic depression when he wrote that song, and the actual words were 'So 
long, it's been good to know you, and I've got to be moving along,' or 
something like that.  The verse was talking about a preacher who '... 
closed up the book, took up the collection, and said ...' as I recall 
it.  It was about the Okies all moving to California because of the dust 
bowl." I then asked Tom to dig a bit deeper and send me what he found. I 
told him I'd forward the findings on to you. I just wanted you to know 
there's some sharp readers out there!  To continue quoting Tom: "Dave, this 
is the original song, recorded in 1935 under the title 'Dusty Old Dust.' I 
think that during WWII Guthrie probably re-issued it with other 
lyrics.  Anyway, I like this one. (I remembered it fairly well, considering 
when I last heard it.) ... Woody was 4 years older than my father, but my 
father didn't move to Oklahoma until he was 9, in 1925.  Woody returned to 
Okemah in 1926, briefly, but then took off when he was 16.  Okemah was and 
remains a small town, except during the oil boom days in the late '20s. It 
used to be (and maybe still is) distinguished by having two water towers 
you can see from the interstate, one much larger than the others. When I 
was little I thought the small one was for hot water. Apparently other 
people did, too, because about 10 years later somebody painted 'Hot' and 
'Cold' on the towers so it could be read from the highway." (Dave 
Caligaris) [We'll include the Sciance/Caligaris version of Guthrie's lyrics 
at the end of today's mailbag. -- J&S]

ALL THE CLASSY PEOPLE
Re: <http://www.newsscan.com/cgi-bin/findit_view?table=newsletter&id=11520>
      So all the classy people are hitting kids these days? Sheesh! We 
should be castigating this guy, not praising him. I want my daughter to 
know that it is NEVER ok for anyone to hit her. Show some respect for kids 
-- stop beating them! (Chris Shaffer)

THANKS TO NEWSSCAN AND RLG
      Thank you for the NewsScan archives. Recently I read a tidbit about 
RLG's "redlightgreen" site in one of your newsletters and tried to send the 
url to a friend. I discovered it did not arrive only after I had already 
eliminated the newsletter. I thought it worth a try to see if I could find 
the reference. On my first shot I discovered your homepage and the 
archives. I can now share this information with several friends. Thanks 
again for keeping me up to date. (Gwen Owens-Wilson) [A suggestion to 
NewsScan fans: go to <http://www.newsscan.com/newsscan/index.html> and 
bookmark the NewsScan archives for future reference and fun.]

IN PRAISE OF RLG AND CIRCULATING LIBRARIES
      What a wonderful thing you did when you introduced us to 
www.RedLightGreen.com <http://www.redlightgreen.com/> . Probably like many 
other of your readers, I had no idea such a site exists. How much better it 
is to borrow than to buy. We have so much STUFF in the world, and I 
certainly have too much of it in my life. Your offering of an alternative 
to consumerism is a welcome act. I love books, and I do still buy them, but 
I try to restrict my purchases to books of reference, which I know I will 
read multiple times. You are helping me stick to my resolve by reminding me 
with every NewsScan that books can be borrowed. (I'm probably one of the 
earliest subscribers to NewsScan, and I'm amazed at how it continues to be 
important in my life, even now in retirement.) (Linda Grashoff)

"DUSTY OLD DUST," WOODY GUTHRIE, 1935
I've sung this song, but I'll sing it again, Of the place that I lived on 
the wild windy plains, In the month called April, county called Gray, And 
here's what all of the people there say:
*
CHORUS:
"So long, it's been good to know yuh;
So long, it's been good to know yuh;
So long, it's been good to know yuh.
This dusty old dust is a-gettin' my home, And I got to be driftin' along."
*
A dust storm hit, an' it hit like thunder; It dusted us over, an' it 
covered us under; Blocked out the traffic an' blocked out the sun, Straight 
for home all the people did run, Singin':
[CHORUS]
*
We talked of the end of the world, and then We'd sing a song an' then sing 
it again.
We'd sit for an hour an' not say a word, And then these words would be heard:
[CHORUS]
*
Sweethearts sat in the dark and sparked, They hugged and kissed in that 
dusty old dark.
They sighed and cried, hugged and kissed, Instead of marriage, they talked 
like this: "Honey..."
[CHORUS]
*
Now, the telephone rang, an' it jumped off the wall, That was the preacher, 
a-makin' his call.
He said, "Kind friend, this may the end; An' you got your last chance of 
salvation of sin!" [CHORUS]
*
The churches was jammed, and the churches was packed, An' that dusty old 
dust storm blowed so black.
Preacher could not read a word of his text, An' he folded his specs, an' he 
took up collection, Said:
[CHORUS]

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