JOBS
Fear of Unions Has Companies Keeping Quiet (NYT)
SECURITY
Netscape Web-Browser Software Has Possible Opening for Hackers (WSJ)
ADVERTISING
Advertising: Spending, Led By Internet, Forecast to Reach
$249 Billion in 2004 (NYT)
CULTURE
How Culture Molds Habits Of Thought (NYT)
INTERNATIONAL
Vetoing Press Freedom in Iran (NYT)
A Look Just Over the Horizon (CyberTimes)
JOBS
FEAR OF UNIONS HAS COMPANIES KEEPING QUIET
Issue: Jobs
What do the largest communications companies think about unions? "No
comment," is the reply Schiesel received when he asked AT&T, Sprint, Bell
South and WorldCom about the Verizon strike. The unspoken secret in the
industry is that the carriers that still have union employees basically wish
they did not. And newer companies that don't have unionized employees will
do anything to keep them away. "All else being equal, would it make our life
easier if there were no union? Of course," said an executive at a large
communications carrier, on condition of anonymity. "But we do, so we just
have to deal with it, and it's very delicate." Companies fear the
Communications Workers of America, but Verizon is willing to put up with a
strike to try to keep its wireless and Internet operations union free. On
condition of anonymity, one Wall Street analyst said yesterday that if
Verizon's wireless operation were completely unionized, it could cost the
unit $300 million in additional annual expense. That money probably means a
lot more to Verizon's workers than it does to the company; some analysts are
expecting that same wireless unit to generate $5.5 billion or more of cash
flow this year. So in the overall financial scheme, unionization may not be
that big a deal. But there are other factors that matter. "If you're
unionized," said John M. Bensche, a wireless communications analyst for
Lehman Brothers, "you have less flexibility in terms of hiring and firing
people. And when you're growing this fast and want to shift resources around
in a company, that can matter. For example, you might see a company move an
entire collections department over to customer activation at Christmas time
because it's really busy. And you might have to ask whether they could do
that if they were unionized."
[SOURCE: New York Times (C1), AUTHOR: Seth Schiesel]
(http://www.nytimes.com/library/financial/080800verizon-impact.html)
See Also:
PICKET LINES SWELL AND TELEPHONE DISRUPTIONS SPREAD IN STRIKE
[SOURCE: New York Times (C1), AUTHOR: Simon Romero]
(http://www.nytimes.com/library/financial/080800verizon-strike.html)
TELEPHONE CABLES ARE TARGETS OF VANDALS
[SOURCE: New York Times (C9), AUTHOR: Elissa Gootman]
(http://www.nytimes.com/library/financial/080800verizon-vandals.html)
SECURITY
NETSCAPE WEB-BROWSER SOFTWARE HAS POSSIBLE OPENING FOR HACKERS
Issue: Security
A flaw in Netscape Internet browser software could let hackers view and
retrieve files on a computer or office network after someone merely opens
an e-mail or visits a Web site. A
22-year-old programmer who published details over the weekend on his Web
site discovered the vulnerability. The vulnerability, according to computer
experts, could be quite severe as it affects the millions of consumers using
Netscape's browser. A spokesman for AOL, which owns Netscape, said engineers
were evaluating the perceived problem and will fix it once they can
reproduce it. Customers can protect themselves for now by turning off
Netscape's ability to run Java programs, AOL spokesman Andrew Weinstein said.
[SOURCE: Wall Street Journal (A24), AUTHOR: Ted Bridis]
(http://interactive.wsj.com/articles/SB965685374996521765.htm)
ADVERTISING
ADVERTISING: SPENDING, LED BY INTERNET, FORECAST TO REACH $249 BILLION IN 2004
Issue: Advertising
Veronis Suhler, a investment banking firm, predicts in its annual forecast
that total advertising spending will continue to rise to $249.1 billion in
2004. Ad spending rose 9.1% last year to $165 billion. According to the
report, this growth "will be driven largely by Internet advertising, which
exploded 140.6 percent, to $4.6 billion in 1999 and is forecast to increase
at a 39.5 percent compound annual growth rate, more than quadrupling to
$24.4 billion by 2004." Should Veronis Suhler's predictions pan out, by
2004, Internet advertising will exceed consumer magazine advertising, which
is projected to reach $16.4 billion; network television advertising,
estimated at $19.4 billion; and cable television advertising, a projected
$21 billion. It should then be close to radio advertising, projected to
climb to $26.6 billion. Daily newspapers are still expected to generate the
highest advertising income, an estimated $63.2 billion in 2004.
[SOURCE: New York Times (C8), AUTHOR: Jane Levere]
(http://www.nytimes.com/library/financial/columns/080800internet-adcol.html)
CULTURE
HOW CULTURE MOLDS HABITS OF THOUGHT
Issue: Culture
Scholars who have long studied cultural differences between the East and
West generally accepted that the same basic processes underlie human
thought, even if different cultures tend to think about different things.
Recent research at University of Michigan, however, has cast this view into
doubt. In studies comparing European Americans to East Asians, Dr. Richard
Nisbett and his colleagues have found that people from these different
cultural background may actually process information differently. "We used
to think that everybody uses categories in the same way, that logic plays
the same kind of role for everyone in the understanding of everyday life,
that memory, perception, rule application and so on are the same," Dr.
Nisbett said. "But we're now arguing that cognitive processes themselves are
just far more malleable than mainstream psychology assumed." The researchers
found that Easterners appear to think more "holistically," paying greater
attention to context and relationship, while Westerners are more "analytic"
in their thinking, tending to rely more heavily on formal logic.
[SOURCE: New York Times (D1), AUTHOR: Erica Goode]
(http://www.nytimes.com/library/national/science/health/080800hth-behavior-c
ulture.html)
INTERNATIONAL
VETOING PRESS FREEDOM IN IRAN
Issue: International/Journalism
[Editorial] Hopes for reform of the theocratic controls of the Iranian
government were once again dashed on Sunday when Iran's supreme religious
leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei forbade Parliament to revise a restrictive
press law. By thwarting the elected parliament on such a fundamental
democratic ideal, the Ayatollah invites more radical challenges to clerical
rule in the future. Riding a high from election victories in February,
Iranian reformers deliberately chose press freedom as an issue to test their
strength within Iran's political system. The reformers wanted to amend a law
to restrict the power of judges to close newspapers while making it easier
for journalists to move from already closed newspapers. Newspapers are more
than a little symbolic in this effort: historically, Iranian newspapers have
exposed official links to violence and corruption and embarrassed prominent
conservatives. One story revealed the role of the intelligence
ministry in a string of murders of dissenting intellectuals two years ago.
The author, Akbar Ganji, and other journalists have been jailed for their
work and the government has closed more than 20 reform newspapers. With the
large majority of Iranians voting for reform, the populace can only be upset
and angry at a government that refuses to respect its will.
[SOURCE: New York Times (A28), AUTHOR: NYT Editorial Staff]
(http://www.nytimes.com/yr/mo/day/editorial/08tue3.html)
A LOOK JUST OVER THE HORIZON
Issue: International
After more than 100 articles, the New York Times on the Web has decided to
discontinue Giussani's EuroBytes column. Writing about technology, Giussani
says, is really writing about people and companies, about their social
roles, the networks they're part of, the culture they inherit and how they
change it, their ideas and experiences, and the difference they try to make.
Giussani reveals a not-very-secret journalistic secret: every reporter or
columnist has, in the back of his mind, a list of companies, people, issues,
in short "subjects" that he (or she) would like to write about. He lists the
ten European Internet companies he'd like to cover if he was still writing
this column.
[SOURCE: CyberTimes, AUTHOR: Bruno Giussani (giussani( at )nytimes.com)]
(http://www.nytimes.com/library/tech/00/08/cyber/eurobytes/08eurobytes.html)
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