Campaign Finance Reform
WSJ: Campaign Reform Is Returning to Center State, but Not for Long
Television
B&C: A new look for HDTV
B&C: Dollars, deals fly in CP gold rush
B&C: White House wants auction date lifted
Internet/Online Service
WSJ: Explosion of Internet Trading Accounts Makes Big Brokerage
Firms Go On-Line
NYT: Museum Takes on Science Project
NYT: Hollywood Pros Put Music Hits, Movies and More on PC
Encryption
NYT: Support for Encryption Is Less Than U.S. Claims, Study Says
Antitrust
NYT: Microsoft Case May Be Prelude to a Wider Antitrust Battle
InfoTech
NYT: Leap Day 2000 Might Pose Big Problems for Some Computers' Software
NYT: A Maverick Builds a New Supercomputer in a PC World
** Campaign Finance Reform **
Title: Campaign Reform Is Returning to Center State, but Not for Long
Source: Wall Street Journal
http://wsj.com/ (A20)
Author: David Rogers
Issue: Campaign Finance Reform
Description: The Senate will soon vote on sweeping campaign finance reform
-- a bipartisan bill backed by the White House. But the long-waited showdown
may not resolve the issue. CEOs and businessmen -- like famed billionaire
Warren Buffett -- are pushing for campaign finance reform because they feel
like prisoners of the big-money, political "arms race" that they often
dominate. Many believe that the 1998 election cycle will be even worse than
1996 -- "There's a great cancer that's just eating the guts out of our
democratic institutions," says Rep George Miller (D-CA). "If you give us
enough rope, we will hang ourselves. There is plenty of evidence of that."
** Television **
Title: A new look for HDTV
Source: Broadcasting&Cable (p.8)
http://www.broadcastingcable.com/
Author: Steve McClellan & Glen Dickson
Issue: Digital TV
Description: Two major television networks -- ABC & NBC -- are considering
using the 720 scanning lines progressive (720P) format for high definition
television (HDTV) programming. 1,080-line interlace format has been the
front-runner as the standard for HDTV and has been supported by CBS, but
720P will allow broadcasters to simulcast one HDTV and one standard
definition television (SDTV) channel (in 480P). [In a related story, Fox
officials say that 480P SDTV will meet the needs of viewers for years to
come. By using the SDTV format, Fox will be able to air several channels of
cable-like programming.] "Whatever you do, in order to optimize the use of
the channel, it must be progressive," an ABC official said. "It's
irresponsible not to do that. You have only 6 mhz, and you need to make the
best possible use of it." Rep Billy Tauzin (R-LA), the Chairman of the House
Telecom Subcommittee who blasted ABC in 1997 for suggesting that it might
not do HDTV, says that he anticipated use of 720P and "I simply want to make
sure that Americans have a chance to see HDTV. If [broadcasters] can do it
in a format that allows them to use the rest of their spectrum for other
things, that's fine." The question remains whether 720P equipment will be
available to broadcasters anytime soon.
Title: Dollars, deals fly in CP gold rush
Source: Broadcasting&Cable (p.10)
http://www.broadcastingcable.com/
Author: Chris McConnell
Issue: Television
Description: Taking advantage of a waiver of Federal Communications
Commission Rules, some 50 new TV stations may be coming on the airwaves as
competing bidders have settled on cash agreements. Millions of dollars --
none of which will be seen by the government -- exchanged hands as competing
applicants for TV licenses struck deals among themselves. "This is the
greatest era I've ever seen," said Paxson Communications chief Bud Paxson.
His company purchased six new stations -- the new Paxson network will reach
~70% of US households via 71 stations.
Title: White House wants auction date lifted
Source: Broadcasting&Cable (p.18)
http://www.broadcastingcable.com/
Author: Chris McConnell
Issue: Spectrum/Digital TV
Description: As part of the 1999 budget, the Administration has asked
Congress to repeal provisions in the 1997 Balanced Budget Agreement
requiring the Federal Communications Commission to conduct spectrum auctions
of former TV channels in 2002. The 1999 budget states that the expected
funds from auction of channels 60-69 will not be needed in 2002 and that the
FCC should be allowed to conduct the auction when market value will be
maximized.
** Internet/Online Service **
Title: Explosion of Internet Trading Accounts Makes Big Brokerage Firms Go
On-Line
Source: Wall Street Journal
http://wsj.com/ (B7G)
Author: Rebbecca Buckman
Issue: Electronic Commerce
Description: Even if only a "trickle" of customers is leaving the big firms
to trade at smaller, online companies, Wall street's biggest brokerage firms
-- including Merrill Lynch and Prudential -- "want to make sure it doesn't
turn into a flow." These firms are now entering the business they once
downplayed: online trading. Many of the bigger firms plan to be online
before the end of the year.
Title: Museum Takes on Science Project
Source: New York Times (CyberTimes)
http://www.nytimes.com/library/cyber/digimet/020998digimet.html
Author: Pamela Mendels
Issue: Arts/Education
Description: Museum officials at the American Museum of Natural History are
hoping to reach people who live more than a commuter ride away from the
complex of buildings located on Manhattan's Upper West Side, across from
Central Park. One of their main vehicles for doing that is the Internet. The
effort is coming from the museum's National Center for Science Literacy,
Education and Technology, launched two months ago with a $25 million budget
over the next three to five years. The mission of the project is to help
people overcome science illiteracy by using a combination of technology --
everything from CD-ROMS, to the radio and Web sites. "How can we extend the
relationship we've had beyond the metropolitan area?" Nancy Hechinger,
director of the center, said this past week. "That's were technology offers
some powerful opportunities". Andrew Blau, director of Communications Policy
and Practice at the Benton Foundation, says that museum Web site efforts are
helping to fill a huge void on the Internet. "One of our concerns when we
wrote the [Learning Connection] was where is the content going to come
from?" Blau said. "Museums have terrific content,
precisely the kind of things that could enrich education. A number of
museums are stepping up to the challenge." The Benton report can be accessed
at http://www.benton.org/Library/Schools/, the NCSLET's site at
http://www.amnhonline.org/NationalCenter/, and a similar site from the San
Francisco Museum of Art, called the Thinker, can be accessed at
http://www.thinker.org/index.shtml
Title: Hollywood Pros Put Music Hits, Movies and More on PC
Source: New York Times (D7)
http://www.nytimes.com/library/cyber/week/020998intertainment.html
Author: Andrew Pollack
Issue: Content
Description: Jonathan Taplin,along with two other Hollywood veterans, has
formed Intertainer Inc., a company which aims to deliver movies on demand,
music, electronic shopping and other services to personal computers through
"broadband" circuits, so called because of their large carrying capacity.
Intertainer's services will be demonstrated for the first time this week at
the Networked Entertainment World exposition in Beverly Hills, CA. "They are
the beginning of what I call the aggregators, that are aggregating content
and putting it out there," said Stephen McKenna, director of sales to
entertainment and media companies at Sun Microsystems Inc., whose equipment
and software is used by Intertainer. "There are other people who are trying
to do it, but they've done it in an elegant way."
** Encryption **
Title: Support for Encryption Is Less Than U.S. Claims, Study Says
Source: New York Times (CyberTimes)
http://www.nytimes.com/library/cyber/week/020998encryption.html
Author: Jeri Clausing
Issue: Encryption
Description: A report scheduled to be released today by the Electronic
Privacy Information Center http://www.epic.org, based in Washington DC ,
says that the Clinton Administration is losing its battle to increase
international controls over "how reliably computer data can be scrambled to
insure privacy." The report which surveyed 243 governments, says that "the
United States is virtually the only democratic, industrialized nation
seeking domestic regulation of strong encryption." David Sobel, who has
directed research for the Global Internet Liberty Campaign
http://gilc.org/, a civil-liberties advocacy group, said of the
administration: "They make the claim that other countries are accepting the
U.S. position on this, then in an attempt to make that a reality, our
government launched a worldwide lobbying campaign on encryption policy." The
report comes as Congress is preparing to renew its debate on encryption policy.
** Antitrust **
Title: Microsoft Case May Be Prelude to a Wider Antitrust Battle
Source: New York Times (D1,D8)
http://www.nytimes.com/library/cyber/week/020998antitrust.html
Author: Steve Lohr
Issue: Antitrust
Description: Discussion, debate and negotiations have begun regarding
whether the Justice Department should file a broader Sherman Act case
against Microsoft. If such a case is filed, it is sure to be a lengthy and
intensive courtroom battle. The issue at hand, according to policy makers
and economists, is to try to insure that the software giant's near-monopoly
of PC operating-system software is not used to exercise control over new
markets of the Internet commerce and software. The goal of the antitrust
policy is to make sure that the door is open in Internet markets for the
"next Microsoft" to enter the market and unseat the current industry leaders
by means of innovation, business skill and luck.
** Info Tech **
Title: Leap Day 2000 Might Pose Big Problems for Some Computers' Software
Source: New York Times (D5)
http://www.nytimes.com/library/cyber/week/020998year.html
Author: Matthew L. Wald
Issue: Technology
Description: There is a new twist of the so-called year 2000 problem.
Computers that survive New Year's Day 2000 by pretending its 1900 may
function fine, but only for 59 days as February 29 will offer new
opportunities for computers to fail. Why is this a problem? Because 2000 is
a leap year where 1900 was not. Any computer that believes it is 1900 will
not allow for Feb. 29 to exist.
Title: A Maverick Builds a New Supercomputer in a PC World
Source: New York Times (D1,D4)
http://www.nytimes.com/library/cyber/week/020998smith.html
Author: John Markoff
Issue: Technology
Description: Burton Smith, a supercomputer designer at the Tera Computer
Company, is on the verger of creating a new supercomputer company based on a
new approach to parallel processing. Although Tera's engineers are still
wresting with last-minute bugs, many believe that Smith's machine will shake
up the computer world once it is complete. Supercomputers are defined as
being the fastest computers available at any given time. In the past they
have been used for everything from designing nuclear weapons and predicting
weather, to simulating car crashes and designing drugs. However, with the
end of the cold war, a decline in government funding and an increase in
desktop computing, innovations have increasingly come first from the PC
industry. Now, Burton Smith believes he has found a way to overcome the
problem of memory latency, a measure of time wasted while microprocessors
wait for new data, found in is today's parallel supercomputers. If Tera's
new approach proves to be successful, it will affect the entire computer
field because all levels of computers suffer from some form of imbalance
between memory speed and processor speed.
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