NewsScan Daily, 27 June 2003 ("Above The Fold")

NewsScan Daily, 27 June 2003 ("Above The Fold")
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"ABOVE THE FOLD"
       Google Toolbar Extends Features
       Dell Criticized, HP Praised, for Recycling Efforts
       Court Overturns Order That Windows Include Java
       PDAs in the Corporate Scheme of Things
       Wireless Gives Poorer Nations Chance To Catch Up...
       ... But Needs to be Watched for Security Breaches

FEATURES
       Flash Card
       Honorary Subscriber: Theobald Smith
       The Riaa and MP3 Music File Sharing: A Guest Column

GOOGLE TOOLBAR EXTENDS FEATURES
Search engine Google is extending the features of its tool bar to include
automatic blocking of pop-up ads, automatic filling out of Internet forms,
and help for users wanting to maintain personal diaries or "blogs" (Web
logs). The toolbars may be used for online searching without requiring the
user to go to the Google Web site. (AP/San Jose Mercury News 27 Jun 2003)
http://www.siliconvalley.com/mld/siliconvalley/6184497.htm

DELL CRITICIZED, HP PRAISED, FOR RECYCLING PROGRAMS
While praising Hewlett-Packard for its computer products recycling program,
two environmental organizations give low marks to similar efforts by Dell
because of Dell's use of a Justice Department effort (called Unicor) that
makes use of labor provided by federal prisoners. The groups say that use of
low-cost prison labor is an obstacle to the creation of a profitable
recycling industry in the United States. But a Bureau of Prisons official
disputes the charges, and notes that "there are over 500 recyclers in the
United States, and we're not a major player by any means." The report can be
found at www.svtc.org. (New York Times 27 Jun 2003)
http://partners.nytimes.com/2003/06/27/technology/27RECY.html

COURT OVERTURNS ORDER THAT WINDOWS INCLUDE JAVA
A federal appeals court has overturned a lower-court injunction that would
have required Microsoft to incorporate Sun's Java programming language in
Microsoft's Windows operating system. On the other hand,, the court also
upheld the lower court's ruling that Microsoft had broken a 2001 legal
settlement between the two companies and had infringed on Sun's copyrights.
The case has been sent back to the district court for further proceedings.
(Reuters/USA Today 27 Jun 2003)
http://www.usatoday.com/money/industries/technology/2003-06-26-ms-java-appea
l_x.htm

PDAs IN THE CORPORATE SCHEME OF THINGS
Handheld computers are in evidence everywhere in corporate America -- yet
they typically belong to individual employees rather than to the
corporations that employ them. (Gartner Research analyst Todd Kort says that
only 28% of all PDA's worldwide were purchased by businesses.) Microsoft is
hoping that its new Windows Mobile software for the Pocket PC handheld
operating system will bring that percentage up to a much higher level.
Gartner's Kort says, "Most of the cool stuff is under the hood. The average
end user isn't going to be immediately aware that any kind of major changes
have taken place. What they're doing is a lot of things to satisfy IT
managers." IT departments "don't want those support calls," so Microsoft has
created a new configuration manager for automatically detecting and
connecting to Wi-Fi and Bluetooth networks and allowing users to connect
wirelessly without having to deal with any complicated configurations or
setups -- and without having to ask for help. (Information Week 26 Jun 2003)
http://www.informationweek.com/story/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=10802320

WIRELESS GIVES POORER NATIONS CHANCE TO CATCH UP...
In a speech prepared for a UN conference on the social implications of
wireless communications technologies, UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan
declared that wireless Internet access has "a key role to play everywhere,
but especially in developing countries and countries with economies in
transition... It is precisely in places where no infrastructure exists that
Wi-Fi can be particularly effective, helping countries to leapfrog
generations of telecommunications technology and infrastructure and empower
their people." (Reuters 26 Jun 2003)
http://asia.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=internetNews&storyID=2998152

..BUT NEEDS TO BE WATCHED FOR SECURITY BREACHES
Using a laptop with a wireless card outside the main office of a Palo Alto,
California school district, a reporter was able to gain access to such data
as grades, home phone numbers and addresses, emergency medical information,
student photos  , and psychological evaluations.
Unlike the majority of the district's information, the documents available
on this wireless network were not password-protected.  Superindent Mary
Frances Callan says: "I don't see this as such a huge news story." The real
story, says Callan, is  the great progress  represented by  the network
itself, which was made possible by new software purchases, employee training
sessions, and technology-use policies. (Palo Alto Weekly 25 Jun  2003)
http://www.paloaltoonline.com/paw/paonline/weekly/morgue/2003/2003_06_25.wir
e25.html

*****

FLASH CARD
     "When a man mistakes his thoughts for persons and things, he is mad."
(Samuel Taylor Coleridge)

HONORARY SUBSCRIBER: THEOBALD SMITH
     Today's Honorary Subscriber is the early American microbiologist and
comparative pathologist Theobald Smith (1859-1934), who first gained fame in
1892 when he demonstrated that Texas cattle fever was caused by a protozoan
parasite that was spread by blood-sucking ticks. This was the first definite
indication of the spread of disease by blood-sucking anthropods (ticks and
certain insects). 
     Although Smith's discovery was met at first with considerable
skepticism, it ultimately became the groundwork for identifying the causes
of several other animal diseases and for raising important public health
issues, most notably the contamination of the Hudson River by fecal
bacteria. Smith's work also paved the way for control of malaria, yellow
fever, and other insect-borne diseases.
     Smith was the first American to identify Salmonella as a separate
bacterial strain or genus -- which was named not for Smith but for Dr.
Daniel Salmon who was the USDA administrator under whose supervision Smith
was working at the time. Smith did receive an honor in his own name when the
famous German bacteriologist Paul Ehrlich coined the term "Theobald Smith's
phenomenon" to describe his identification of anaphylaxis, the body's
allergic hypersensitivity reaction to a foreign protein or drug.
     The son of German immigrants, Smith was born in Albany, New York and
was graduated from Cornell University in 1881 with a Bachelor of Philosophy
degree. He received his M.D. at Albany Medical College in 1883, and from
1884 to 1895 was director of the pathology laboratory of the Bureau of
Animal Industry in the United States Department of Agriculture, Washington,
D.C., where he investigated infectious disease of animals. During this
period he also established a Department of Bacteriology at Columbia (now
George Washington University).
     In 1915 he went to New Jersey to become director of the Department of
Animal Pathology at the Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research in
Princeton, where he remained until 1929, when he became emeritus director.
He received twelve honorary degrees from leading universities and eleven
medals, among which was the Copley Gold Medal of the Royal Society, regarded
as one of the highest scientific awards in the world.

See http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0674012208/ for Theobald Smith's
"Suppressing the Diseases of Animals and Man" -- or look for it in your
favorite library. (We donate all revenue from our book recommendations to
adult literacy programs.)]

THE RIAA AND MP3 MUSIC FILE SHARING: A GUEST COLUMN
     [This is a guest column by NewsScan subscriber Bob Weiss of
wyzguys.com.]
     The first point to be made is that the music industry leaders are
failing to adjust to major fundamental changes in the music distribution
model.  Years ago, Wal-Mart, Target, Office Max, Home Depot and the like
changed the retail distribution model forever by providing more variety and
convenience at lower prices.  This drove countless small retailers out of
business.  File sharing has also provided more variety and choice at lower
(albeit free) prices. But it doesn't have to be free, and Apple Computer and
the supporting record companies "get it" with iMusic.  I predict this
service will achieve remarkable successes, if they don't screw it up by
trying to improve it.  If only it was available to Wintel owners. (sigh)
     The second point is that what the music consumer is telling the record
companies is basically a big GET REAL!  Music fans are tired of paying $20
for the 2 songs they want on a 12 song disc, average price $10 each. Again,
iMusic, with their $1 per song pricing is getting closer to what the
marketplace wants. I think this model will eventually support prices in the
twenty five to fifty cent range.  The major record labels are used to
soaking the public with high priced CDs from derivative bands loaded with
songs of no consequence, and the consumer is refusing to continue with this
business model now that something better is available.
     The third issue is that the people they are pursuing for file sharing
for the most part are the biggest purchasers of legal music CDs.  It is
always bad policy to punish your best customers with law suits.
     The fourth issue is getting short shrift in all this, and that is the
precedent of Fair Use. If I buy the CD, I should be able to burn a copy to
save as a back up, and rip it to MP3 so I can play it on my portable player,
computer, cell phone or PDA.  The music industry appears to be trying to
abolish this principle as well.
     But I believe what really is keeping these music-industry guys awake at
night is this:  the consumer of their product has already abandoned their
traditional business model in favor of something less expensive and more
convenient.  What happens to the record labels if the CREATORS of their
product abandon them as well. It is a small thing to set up an e-commerce
web site and sell your product directly, and thousands of small computer
software producers are doing this already, and evidently with some
reasonable success. The bands are beginning to get into direct distribution
already on their own web sites, and it is only a matter of time before this
will be the way of things.  Then the record labels will really be in
trouble, much more so than today.  Basically they are the "middleman" of
this industry, and we have all seen what happens to middleman businesses who
stop adding value to BOTH the producers and the consumers they serve.
     If I were in a major band, I would be asking my business manager
exactly how much I am getting per song for every song sold through the major
label. I bet it is way under a buck, in fact I bet it is under a quarter. If
you consider that my album had only two songs anyone really wanted on it,
and you adjust your calculations, maybe it gets close to a buck for the good
songs, and the other songs were "free."  These guys are smart enough to
figure out that they can make more money selling their songs directly to
fans for a dollar or less. What the music industry needs to become, if it
wants to survive, is the hosting platform and marketing arm for this type of
distribution.  The attempts of music-industry leaders to force people back
to the old model will fail, even with the vast sums of cash they have to
throw at it.  it failed 30 years ago when people started making cassette
tapes from the vinyl albums they already owned. (Does anyone remember?) They
can no more stop the changing marketplace by force, fear, intimidation, and
the courts anymore than the small retailers could stand against Wal-Mart and
Target. 
     They need to quit wasting their time and resources on lawyers, and
start developing a vision of their business that can still include them.  If
they don't, others will, and they will be gone.

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