[JackSpratts]

Back to School

Duke Student Sues After Finding Her Term Paper For Sale Online
Natalie Gott

Blue Macellari wrote the term paper back in 1999 while studying abroad, so the Duke University graduate student didn't understand why it was on the Internet - or why it was for sale.

Now, she's suing the operator of Web sites selling her paper and seeking more than $100,000 for copyright infringement, invasion of privacy and damage to her reputation.

"They were pushing it, using it, making copies of it without authorization," Macellari's attorney, Evan Andrew Parke, said Thursday.

Macellari filed a lawsuit Wednesday in federal court in East St. Louis, Ill., against Rusty Carroll, his Carbondale, Ill.-based company R2C2 Inc. and South Carolina-based Digitalsmiths Corp. No one answered the telephone at a number listed for Carroll and Digitalsmiths did not immediately return a call Thursday from The Associated Press.

Macellari alleges in her lawsuit that she wrote a term paper about South Africa as one of her requirements for a class she took at the University of Cape Town, where she studied during her junior year in college. She returned to Mount Holyoke College in South Hadley, Mass., where she earned her undergraduate degree, and, for another class during her senior year, created a Web site and posted her term paper to highlight her past work.

Last January, Macellari learned from a friend that her paper was posted on Web sites registered to Carroll's company and contained notices that the sites own the copyright to the papers. Furthermore, her name was listed. Macellari never gave the papers to the Web sites or gave them permission to post her papers, Parke said.

"They didn't just post it. They are making an explicit claim that they own this paper," said Parke, who is representing Macellari free of charge.

Among the Web sites cited in the lawsuit are http://www.doingmyhomework.com, which says it provides the public with examples of papers and essays to help people find ideas to complete their homework.

"Feel free to cite our Web site if you decide to use any of our text in your papers. We do not support plagiarism, and will work to help fight it," the Web site reads.

Readers can find previews of essays but on a linked site, customers are prompted to sign up for memberships that cost as much as $104.95 for 180 days.

Macellari, a graduate student in a joint program through Johns Hopkins University and Duke, declined to comment about the case and referred calls to Parke, who said Macellari's paper has now been removed from the Web sites.

Faculty are already concerned about students who turn in papers downloaded from the Internet but this case raises another issue about protecting your work, said David DeCosse, director of Campus Ethics Programs at the Markkula Center for Applied Ethics at Santa Clara University.

Students and university professors want to post student work on the Web, he said. "But perhaps we should all be aware of ... requiring passwords or things of that nature a little bit more so we don't contribute to that traffic, sort of illicit student paper traffic," DeCosse said.

Donald McCabe, the founding president of the Duke-based Center for Academic Integrity, said he is not aware of a similar lawsuit and he believes that universities will applaud Macellari.

"This has been an issue at a large number of schools," McCabe said. "I think it's encouraging to see someone willing to take a stand on it from an integrity point of view."
http://www.myrtlebeachonline.com/mld...l/12551726.htm





IN RETROSPECT: Access To Digital Information Withering
Justin William

With every new peer-to-peer sharing program that makes its debut in college dorm rooms, a little bit of digital freedom is chipped away. It is an ever-growing trend for major recording labels — along with big-name bands riding wingman — to pursue startup companies like Grokster, StreamCast, Napster or Kazaa and pursue them right into the digital graveyard. But with each new strike against peer sharing programs, the level of lunacy is raised tenfold — most recently against Grokster and StreamCast.

Now, some might believe that it’s purely heresy to claim the rights of the individual come before the will of the “rightly appointed” Supreme Court justices, whose only fear for losing their positions is the grim reaper himself. But from time to time, I find myself thinking these crazy “individualistic,” “non-contemporary,” “wacky” thoughts — some of which include the belief that individuals should have the right to distribute and freely share digital media.

The problem, then, lies with the aims of the recording labels and the artists who intend to make a living producing these products. It doesn’t just stop with them, however, it also encompasses everyone associated with the production process that brought the band together in the recording studio and everyone who produced and fine tuned the sound. Then you have to consider the middle men, the people who are really turning the prices up: the distributors, wholesalers and retailers.

So, taking all of these people into consideration, it’s easy to understand why there’s all this commotion over the growing problem of copyright infringement that the Supreme Court is so fervently cracking down on.

Honestly, the problem isn’t really with the fact that the Supreme Court is upholding laws that make sense. In fact, that’s probably a good idea, and maybe we should do some more of that. The real problem lies with the persecution of file sharers that is becoming a growing trend in the decisions of the Supreme Court — digital media sharing is becoming a real-world “thought crime,” the crimes you read about in science fiction novels set in post-apocalyptic utopias.

According to the Supreme Court, copyright law goes as far as this: “One who distributes a device with the object of promoting its use to infringe copyright, as shown by clear expression or other affirmative steps taken to foster infringement, is liable for the resulting acts of infringement by third parties.” This is entirely too vague of a description. This type of open-ended ruling leaves a lot of room for loopholes and manipulation.

So you are probably wondering, what’s the big deal? It seems relatively simple to avoid infringing upon copyrights — or court rulings — doesn’t it? However, there are rolling complications with such vague rulings that favor the rights of large interest groups. Decisions like that require American companies to spend needless amounts of resources and time to re-engineer software, as well as ensure that every single aspect of their software doesn’t, in the slightest way, hint at “promoting” the possibility of infringing upon copyrights — because otherwise they are inviting investigators to inspect every server, every e-mail, every line of code and every developer meeting, searching for more clues that “thought-crimes” are being committed. And that’s not to mention the severe detriment to the freedom of innovation such a ruling causes.

The fact remains, years after the release of the first file-sharing program, people love to share the latest information, whether that information is ripped CDs, pirated software, audio books, movies or whatever else there is out there that hasn’t been outlawed yet. Because of this, companies should look for a better solution to obvious problems, before involving the Supreme Court. For years, hardware manufacturers and security software companies have been shouting for security integrated into the hardware — software is just too easy to get around.
http://www.bsudailynews.com/vnews/di.../431fddb54c004





Download Habits Change With File Sharing Software
Rebecca Shoval

Last year marked the beginning of a new type of file sharing at Cornell — one that allows students to legally download vast quantities of music without using up their two gigabyte limit. Napster, completely revamped from its original infamous form, allows users to download as much music as they want from a library of over 750,000 songs and stream advertisement-free Internet radio.

Soon after the service started, students complained that Napster did not work with Macs, that the service occasionally only downloaded 30 seconds of a song and that, in order to burn a track to a CD or MP3 player or retain the music after leaving Cornell, there was a 99 cent charge per song.

Nevertheless, by the end of last school year, approximately 9,000 Cornellians had subscribed to the service. About 14,000 people were eligible for the Napster program.

Cornell’s agreement with Napster was part of an effort to curb illegal file sharing by students. Beginning with five notices of copyright infringement at Cornell in Fall 2001, Tracy Mitrano J.D. '95, director of University Computer Policy and Law, has processed several hundred notices of copyright infringement.

“Upon receipt of notice from the copyright holder” the University blocks the IP address, Mitrano said. Once the IP address is blocked, the individual can delete their files, be unblocked and face the Judicial Administration or file a legal counter notice claiming ownership of the file or proper permission to share the file. Some of the notices that Cornell receives are the result of non-Cornellians hacking into the system.

In a February 2004 article entitled “Campaign Against Illegal Filesharing Continues,” Judicial Administrator Mary Beth Grant said that in the 2002-2003 school year “we had approximately 200 referrals for digital copyright violations.”

Grant also told The Sun that first-time violators usually receive community service or a fine as punishment.

Compared to the large number of notices some colleges and universities must handle, Cornell has relatively few problems and has never received a subpoena for the identity of an IP address user, according to Mitrano.

Mitrano also told The Sun that Cornell “does not monitor the network for content” in order to protect free speech and academic integrity throughout the school.

Last year, a major Cornell direct-connect hub was shut down after a bootleg video of Jon Stewart's performance at Cornell appear on the server. In an April 5 article in The Sun entitled “Studios, Universities Fight Battles Against Illegal File Sharing,” Jae Kwon ’05 spoke of the renewed file exchange room — which operates under a different name — as “fostering a sense of community among Cornell Resnet users.”

Kwon maintained that a “hub owner doesn’t know what files are traded between users” but said he disconnected users he found sharing copyrighted material.

This article appeared amid MGM v. Grokster, a Supreme Court case over whether file-sharing program makers are liable for secondary copyright infringement since their users trade copyrighted material.

The Supreme Court decided in June that file-sharing program makers could be held liable for illegal usage, based on whether or not they encouraged infringement.

“We adopt it here, holding that one who distributes a device with the object of promoting its use to infringe copyright, as shown by clear expression or other affirmative steps taken to foster infringement, is liable for the resulting acts of infringement by third parties," the Supreme Court decision stated.

The Digital Millennium Copyright Act of 1998 outlaws exchanging or obtaining copyrighted music, games or videos over the internet.

Yet some feel this 18-page addendum to copyright law may not be enough. Prof. Tarleton Gillespie, communications, gave a speech in April about copyright law. Gillespie feels the legal regulations that once protected copyrights are not sufficient.

"Copyright was principled on a moment when they were talking about print," Gillespie said in an April article in The Sun entitled Prof Speaks About Copyright Law. “Technology [has] stirred old copyright questions."

In 1999, the Recording Industry Association of America filed a lawsuit against Napster, the first wide-spread file-sharing program that allowed users to download music, both copyrighted and public domain, from strangers. According to Prof. Lawrence Lessig, law, Stanford University, when the RIAA filed the lawsuit, Napster had around 200,000 users; after the lawsuit drew public attention to file sharing and Napster, the number of users grew to 57 million.

Napster, in its original form, worked as a matchmaking service that linked users through a centralized system, allowing Napster to control what content could be found. Thus, Napster was forced to disable access to copyrighted material if the copyright holder told the company about the infringement.

In light of the Napster lawsuit, new peer-to-peer software, often written P2P in Internet slang, was developed; this software has no centralized server but has users search others directly for files.

These newer file-sharing programs, such as KaZaA, cannot be shut down by their creator; once the software exists, users need no parent body to continue.

Nationwide, people trade an estimated 2.6 billion copyrighted files each month through programs such as KaZaA and Grokster.
http://www.cornellsun.com/vnews/disp.../431e7c57baf05





The Media

An Excruciating Excess of Reality
Kate Aurthur

BREAKING BONADUCE
VH1
Premiere at 10:30 p.m. on Sunday, Sept. 11.

DURING a scene in the fifth episode of VH1's new reality series "Breaking Bonaduce," Danny Bonaduce, the former child star from "The Partridge Family," is playing with his 10-year-old daughter, Isabella. "Daddy, what happened to your wrists?" she asks, looking at bandages he is wearing. As she swings in and out of the frame, Mr. Bonaduce lies to her. "Oh, it's nothing," he says with a slight grimace. "Daddy's just not a very handy guy when it comes to installing windows."

What actually happened to Mr. Bonaduce's wrists is that he slashed them after his wife, Gretchen, asked him for a divorce. It was the last desperate act in a long, crazy night that started with hours of drinking and taking pills, and it caused him to land in the psychiatric ward.

Before she raised the subject of divorce, Mrs. Bonaduce had asked the cameras to leave, so her husband's suicidal gesture and subsequent hospitalization were not filmed. But the events that led up to them were: when as he drank himself into a rage, when he yelled at the television production crew ("I will cripple him for the rest of his life!" he says about a producer) and when he made threats toward his wife ("If she doesn't get on the phone right now," he says at one point, "there will be no stopping me."). These are just a few of the excruciating moments from his life as it fell to pieces. And they will soon be broadcast for all the world to see beginning Sept. 11.

That wasn't the plan when VH1 conceived of the show. "No normal person expects someone to slit their wrists on your reality show," Michael Hirschorn, the channel's executive vice president of programming and production, said in a recent interview. "If you're taking your sailboat out, you'd like a strong wind, you just don't expect a hurricane."

The rough weather, however, was not completely without warning. Over the years, Mr. Bonaduce has attracted a good deal of negative publicity because of multiple arrests and his struggles with addiction - though he was also able to achieve success in radio and as an occasional talking head (on shows like VH1's "In Search of the Partridge Family"). But his marriage of 15 years suffered a blow recently when he had an affair. His dodgy kind of fame well suited the Bonaduces for VH1's brand of "celebreality" programming, and the Bonaduces agreed to allow the network to chronicle their marital counseling.

Soon after the show began filming, however Mr. Bonaduce fell off the wagon. Not only did he binge drink - viewers will see him downing an entire bottle of vodka in a single guzzle at one point - but he also started taking Vicodin and, as part of an obsessive exercise regimen, injecting steroids. During the show, he becomes increasingly muscular and tightly wound. He also becomes verbally abusive toward his wife and their therapist, Dr. Garry Corgiat. After the suicide attempt, Dr. Corgiat refused to work with Mr. Bonaduce until he got in-patient treatment for his substance abuse. VH1 executives found a clinic near Los Angeles, and Mr. Bonaduce checked into rehab.

Over breakfast at the Argyle Hotel in Los Angeles last month, the Bonaduces, who are still together, recounted their experiences of the past few months. "My behavior is humiliating," Mr. Bonaduce said about what the audience will see on the show, which neither of them has watched. "Right now, I'm embarrassed in front of a crew of 20, 1 doctor and 1 wife. Sept. 12, I will be embarrassed in front of millions."

AS the life of the Bonaduces, including Isabella and Dante (age 4), shaped up to be less like the endearing dysfunction of "The Osbournes" and more like the viciousness of "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?" VH1 considered abandoning the project. Jeff Olde, the channel's senior vice president of series production, said that even the earliest sessions the Bonaduces had with Dr. Corgiat gave him and the channel's other executives pause.

"Therapy was a very revealing process for them," Mr. Olde said. VH1 had shot the pilot, along with the couple's first sessions with the psychologist, during the fall. In those early sessions, Mrs. Bonaduce expressed uncertainty about her commitment to her husband. Then months passed before therapy and filming began again. "I think they were ready to explode, really," Mr. Olde said. "That gate had been opened up. Some really, really intense stuff was coming up in their therapy sessions, and at the end of the day, we didn't want to get in the way of these people's marriage."

The Bonaduces wed on their first date, which was in 1990. Faced with the news that there would be no sex without marriage, Mr. Bonaduce - drunk at the time - called a minister. Despite this harebrained beginning, they say they have been devoted to each other ever since, even through some very rough patches. And that, he says, is why the recent fissures between them were so unsettling, and why he returned to substance abuse and other irrational behavior.

"This is where I get all psycho - everybody was out to facilitate my demise," Mr. Bonaduce said, trying to explain his delusional thinking during the filming of the show before he entered rehab. "Dr. Garry thinks I'm no good for her, that I'm a big mistake for Gretchen. 'You're trying to kill me,' is the way I saw it. So it became very adversarial."

The twice-a-week sessions with Dr. Corgiat - a psychologist whom everyone calls Dr. Garry, following the standard set by teletherapists like Dr. Phil (McGraw) - were filmed at the Sunset-Gower Studios in Hollywood, in a replica of his office. On the show, he asks Mr. Bonaduce directly whether he's using steroids, he grills Mrs. Bonaduce about whether her husband has ever hit her or their children (she adamantly says he has not) and as weeks go by, he grows visibly and outspokenly alarmed at what he sees.

In a restaurant in Venice Beach, Dr. Corgiat - tanned, fit and inquisitive - recently recalled what those counseling sessions were like. "Oh, man," he said, rolling his eyes. "I thought it was going to be celebrity shrinkdom. And I was going to tell them some very clever, insightful things, and they would integrate them. And they were going to get better! It's a lot more real than that. Everybody really has their pants down on that show." If "Breaking Bonaduce" rewrites the rules about how far televised therapy can go, it also does something even more daring - practically unheard of - for an unscripted program: it acknowledges that these events are being filmed for broadcast. Dr. Corgiat and the Bonaduces, for example, regularly refer to the show and the cameras during sessions. Most poignantly, in the fourth episode, Mr. Bonaduce says to Dr. Corgiat: "I never expected any of this. I thought this would be the best thing that ever happened, because I'd have another TV show and it makes me happy and it's what I'm good at. But now I see my marriage is dissolving." He starts sobbing.

The day after his suicide attempt - the "deal breaker," in Mr. Olde's words - executives met to discuss canceling the plans for the show. "We've all worked on a lot of reality shows where a lot of people get really, really drunk and do some crazy things, but Danny's behavior was on the edge," he said. "We would not have continued shooting that show, there was no way."

They consulted with Dr. Corgiat, who recalled saying: "He's in a drug-induced psychosis. This is not O.K. I'm not doing this - this is unethical, immoral. We need to take care of this guy."

But Mr. Olde said that when he and Claire McCabe, an executive producer for VH1, talked to Mrs. Bonaduce, "she really begged us to keep filming."

Mrs. Bonaduce explained: "I wanted to use every leverage that I could to get him to get help. Because Danny loves to be on TV. I expected them to say, 'You know what, you guys are just too crazy and we don't want any part of this.' And when they didn't, I literally started to cry because I couldn't believe they didn't cut us loose. They stuck around. It was amazing to me."

Mr. Bonaduce insists he would not have agreed to go into rehab had VH1 abandoned the project. "I pushed them to film," he said. "VH1 said: 'You've gone too far. We can't film you - you're dying.' I thought, What are you talking about? You'll have a great show if I die. What's wrong with you, not rolling on my death? So that surprised me."

Was sticking with their troubled star - and finding him a rehab facility that would allow cameras - a true act of beneficence on VH1's part? "I think the psychotherapeutic term is 'codependency,' " Mr. Hirschorn said, "where the network becomes codependent to the subject." If filming had stopped, of course, there would not have been a series. But Mr. Hirschorn insisted that wasn't the network's motivation. "Even the most cynical, self-serving interpretation would suggest that if somebody really did themselves harm, that would be really terrible for a television network," he said. "That would be something both personally I could not have on my conscience, and corporately would be horrible for VH1."

Mr. Bonaduce completed the drug-and-alcohol program at the beginning of June, and since then, he said, he has been sober. He was fired from his radio job, which he said paid $1 million a year. (The radio station, Star 98.7, did not return calls asking for comment.) Today he attends Alcoholics Anonymous meetings daily, and hangs out at home.

At the Argyle Hotel, the Bonaduces said they were nervous, about both the show's looming premiere date and about their being interviewed. Mr. Bonaduce's hands shook, and he had to be talked into ordering food. "I didn't sleep last night," Mrs. Bonaduce said. About her desire for divorce only a few months earlier, she said, "I was just trying to shake his reality - he just had lost control completely, and everything he was doing and saying was really freaking me out."

Mr. Bonaduce said he felt nearly worshipful of his wife, but added, "It makes me nervous to give her too many compliments, because when do I become obsessive again?" Since rehab, he said, "the old me is kind of dissipating, and that's a good thing." He added: "But there's no new me. It's a bizarre, precarious place to be. I'm really going to miss me."

Mr. Olde said he hoped that critics and viewers were able to see past the sensationalism of "Breaking Bonaduce." "It's such an easy shot to say, 'Oh, this is reality TV going to the next level,' " he said. "This is not in the same bucket as reality shows. It's more in line with a very intense documentary series that is relevant to our audience because of who Danny is."

And that is - still - in Mr. Bonaduce's words, "a B-lister who might die." If therapy is about changing the narrative of your life, having a television show expose it, then preserve it in reruns, might seem to endanger all that therapy accomplishes. In any case, it's scary. "Telling people to watch this show in some ways seems dishonest to me," he said. " 'Watch this show: I disintegrate.' Why would I want to do that?"
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/09/04/ar...on/04aurt.html





So Long, AT&T? Not So Fast

Once SBC completes its acquisition, Ma Bell's familiar moniker will replace its new parent's. And a renewed consumer push will commence

As telecom giant SBC prepares to close its acquisition of AT&T, it might seem that the 120- year-old telecom brand is about to fade into history.

Don't bet on it. SBC, which was spun off from AT&T amid the breakup of the Bell telephone system in 1984, will assume its former parent's name, BusinessWeek Online has learned. The plan, which is consistent with speculation that followed SBC's bid for AT&T earlier this year, reflects SBC's new national identity and its desire to market AT&T's Internet phone service to consumers around the country. And it gives SBC a marketing weapon to use against its rivals.

GLORY DAYS PAST. The initials S-B-C trace back to the company's roots as regional Southwestern Bell Telephone Co. A spokesman says SBC has made no decision on the fate of the AT&T brand. But one industry executive familiar with the matter says SBC's rebirth as AT&T is a done deal.

The AT&T brand still ranks among the most recognizable corporate monikers in the world. Of course, it has diminished since the height of AT&T's power, when it spent as much as $1 billion a year on marketing and advertising. But the name, which goes back to the incorporation of AT&T in 1885, has hardly passed from the national consciousness.

SBC's acquisition of AT&T is expected to close any time after mid-November because it requires approval at both the federal and state government level. First, the Federal Communications Commission and Justice Dept. are expected to sign off in mid-September. And then the long process of winning state approvals for the $16 billion cash-and-stock transaction is expected to take another two months, concluding with a vote by California regulators.

WHO STAYS, WHO GOES? The company that emerges from the acquisition will look far different from the current SBC or AT&T. Ed Whitacre, SBC's longtime CEO, will likely step aside after a long and dramatic reign filled with big deals.

Whitacre built SBC into a national player with the purchase of Ameritech, its counterpart in the Midwest. He also pushed wireless giant Cingular, a joint venture of SBC and BellSouth, to acquire AT&T Wireless. The top job at the combined SBC-AT&T is expected to go to SBC's current chief operating officer, Randall Stephenson. It isn't clear whether or not AT&T CEO David Dorman, who will earn about $20 million from the sale of AT&T, will stick around.

AT&T still serves millions of consumers, but it has stopped marketing and advertising in traditional consumer media such as print and TV. SBC has different ideas, though. It wants to sell AT&T's Internet-based phone service to consumers around the country. As SBC pushes beyond its local phone markets in the West and Midwest, it will compete head-to-head with rivals such as Verizon and BellSouth and cable-TV operators such as Time Warner and upstarts Vonage and Skype.

"NEED TO BUNDLE." SBC is readying for a nationwide push in the consumer market by getting its infrastructure in place. It has networks covering the West and Midwest, and it serves about one-third of the nation's phone lines. SBC has widened coverage outside of its region by striking deals with Covad. And SBC and AT&T extended an agreement with Time Warner Telecom in June. Time Warner Telecom will help connect the merged companies to customers outside of the SBC region, where SBC doesn't have its own wires running into homes and businesses.

AT&T hasn't enjoyed much success in the consumer market on its own during the last few years. It spent $25 million promoting its Internet phone service during the 2004 summer Olympics. Reviewers gave the service high marks, but AT&T couldn't gain enough traction and shifted its focus to serving businesses.

The approach to business will change after the SBC-AT&T deal closes, though. The new company will find it easier to sell consumers on broadband and Internet phone service, known as voice over Internet protocol (VOIP). "It's clear you need to bundle voice over IP with broadband and video," says AT&T spokesman Gary Morgenstern. "We weren't able to do that as a stand-alone company, but SBC can. So it will have a different value proposition." SBC, like Verizon, is beginning to roll out TV service.

VoIP'S BLOSSOMING. Internet phone technology continues to advance, which will help SBC-AT&T compete with traditional phone services in territories served by Verizon, BellSouth, and others. For example, Covad is deploying a new kind of "line-powered" VOIP, according to CEO Charles Hoffman. Customers will have full 911 service, just the way regular phone customers do. And they won't have to worry if their electrical power is knocked out, because the phone will be powered by a common source at the company's local phone office, just the way regular phones are. In fact, they won't even need to plug their VoIP phone into a cable modem or DSL router, he says.

AT&T's return to the consumer market shows that VoIP is coming of age. Smaller rivals such as Vonage will face a challenge, because they won't be able to match the breadth of offering from the likes of SBC and Verizon, which is buying MCI. Vonage lost its lead in the Internet phone market to Time Warner and is looking for a buyer, according to a report in trade journal LightReading. And Skype is looking for a buyer, too (see BW Online, 8/10/05, "Skype: On the Block").

The technology has changed immeasurably over the last 120 years, but one thing is as true about the communications business today as it was in the days of Alexander Graham Bell: The advantage goes to the company with the greatest scale and scope.
http://businessweek.com/technology/c...0330_tc119.htm





How Sound Feels to Musician Who Lost Her Hearing
Stephen Holden

"Hearing is a form of touch," the Scottish percussionist Evelyn Glennie declares. "You feel it through your body, and sometimes it almost hits your face."

Those words echo through "Touch the Sound," an impressionistic documentary directed, edited and photographed by Thomas Riedelsheimer. Subtitled "a sound journey with Evelyn Glennie," it is a mystical exploration of the sensory world as experienced by a renowned musician who lost most of her hearing by the time she was a teenager. Expanding on Ms. Glennie's passionate assertion that hearing is only the most obvious component of deeper physical relationship between sound and the human body, the film is crammed with striking visual correlations to the percussive vibrations she conjures.

Every location visited by the film - from a Manhattan rooftop swarming with pigeons, to a construction site, to the rocky Pacific Coast, to the Scottish farm where Ms. Glennie grew up - reveals its own percussive signature. In one of the film's most striking fusions of sound and image, the camera looks up from below to study the shadowy pitter-patter of pedestrians and their pets on a semitranslucent walkway.

"Touch the Sound" follows the same rambling format as "Rivers and Tides," Mr. Riedelsheimer's profile of the Scottish earthworks artist Andy Goldsworthy, whose mutable sculptures in nature embrace the concept of evanescence. Like Mr. Goldsworthy and like the great San Francisco experimental filmmaker Nathaniel Dorsky, Mr. Riedelsheimer is fascinated with the beauty of the fleeting moment and with what Ms. Glennie calls "the sixth sense."

That sense, in her definition, is not an occult connection to the spirit world, but her firsthand knowledge of how the loss of one of the five senses is compensated by the heightened attunement of the other four; that awareness used to be called synergy before the word was hijacked by jargon-spouting corporate bloviators. Ms. Glennie, an articulate, charismatic redhead, becomes vague only when trying to philosophize about the opposite of sound.

Structurally the film might be described as a duet within a duet. As the movie rambles here and there around the world, it periodically returns to a loft in an abandoned German sugar factory where Ms. Glennie and the British multi-instrumentalist Fred Frith are preparing to record an album of improvisations. If their project gives the film a center, it is only one aspect of a larger collaboration between the filmmaker and the percussionist.

The film follows her from Germany to New York, where she delights a small crowd in the middle of Grand Central Terminal by playing the snare drums, barefoot, to a Japanese restaurant where she arranges chopsticks, dishes, a glass and a metal lid into a makeshift drum kit and gives an impromptu demonstration.

Visiting the family homestead tended by a brother, she recalls being "Daddy's girl" and says she still harbors a special kinship with her father, an accordionist who is no longer alive. At 8, she says, she became aware of her progressive hearing loss. She had intended to be a pianist but switched to percussion upon entering high school. A gifted teacher advised her to remove her hearing aids and learn to distinguish musical intervals by pressing her head to a wall and feeling the percussive vibrations in her hands and arms. Out of these experiences developed her sense of sound as a tactile as well as an auditory phenomenon.

If Ms. Glennie declares her favorite instrument to be the snare drum, it is the marimba on which she creates the film's most haunting music. "Touch the Sound" concludes with a sustained meditation for percussion and guitar, in which Mr. Frith, stationed on an elevated platform on the other side of the room, elicits plaintive, shivery cries from an electric guitar while Ms. Glennie taps out a deep, quiet, musical prayer on the marimba. This is synergy of a high order.

Touch the Sound

Opens today in Manhattan.

Directed and edited by Thomas Riedelsheimer; director of photography, Mr. Riedelsheimer; music by Evelyn Glennie and Fred Frith, Roxanne Butterfly, Horazio Hernandez, Za Ondekoza, This Mika, and Saikou and Jason; produced by Stefan Tolz, Leslie Hills and Trevor Davies; released by Shadow Distribution. At the IFC Center, 323 Avenue of the Americas, at Third Street, Greenwich Village. Running time: 99 minutes. This film is not rated.
http://movies2.nytimes.com/2005/09/0...es/07touc.html





Upbeat Music Industry Hits Hill
Roy Mark

Neither an official state funeral nor the devastating aftermath of a cataclysmic storm will stop the music this morning in Washington. There's always time for showbiz on Capitol Hill.

While Washington buries Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist in a solemn ceremony stretching from the Supreme Court to Arlington National Cemetery, Desmond Child will be laying on a little Livin' La Vida Loca in a House office building.

As congressional committees scramble to focus on a federal response to the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, Gloria Estefan, Jimmy Jam and Dave Koz will be headlining a Power of Music show promoted by the folks who bring you the Grammys.

Last week, China President Hu Jintao postponed his trip to Washington to give the White House and Congress more time for disaster-recovery efforts. Not Hollywood.

For the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences, it's the first-ever Recording Arts Day on Capitol Hill and, of course, the show must go on, good timing or not. Besides, there'll be an awards event packed with stars and lawmakers alike jostling for photo ops.

According to the academy, the point of the event is to not only stress the power of music but to also "raise the profile of recording arts during meetings with legislators."

Desmond, Gloria, Jimmy and Dave have issues, although no one on Tuesday afternoon could recall quite what they might be.

"The entire music industry is coming together on common issues," said Daryl Friedman, vice president of advocacy and government relations for the academy, after a long day of dealing with star- struck media inquiries on the nature of Estefan's dress. "We want to build a top-line relationship [with Congress]."

The coalition put together by the Grammy Awards producers includes performing artists, songwriters, music labels, distributors and retailers, groups whose best interests often conflict with each other.

"They don't always agree," Friedman said. "But they do agree on the big issues."

Friedman admitted Hollywood has little to be unhappy about these days. Just two days ago, an Australian federal court gave the industry thumbs up to sue the peer-to-peer (P2P) network Kazaa for aiding and abetting massive copyright theft. Damages are expected to run into the billions.

That verdict follows a June ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court clearing the way for Hollywood to pursue similar litigation and jumbo damages against U.S.-based Grokster and other P2P networks.

As Kazaa and Grokster take their place to be the next P2P network sued out of business, the Department of Justice is stepping up its anti-piracy enforcement with a number of high-profile busts. The industry itself continues to successfully sue thousands of individuals for copyright infringement.

"The illegal services are becoming less attractive," said Friedman. "In the first six months of this year, the number of legal downloads are up three times from where it was a year ago."

All in all, the music industry thinks Washington is doing a bang-up job delivering the goods. "It's been a good year, no doubt about that," Friedman confessed.

So today Hollywood salutes the solons, even as they scuttle from funeral appearances to Katrina finger-pointing press conferences. Estefan will headline an all-star, hour-long show in the Gold Room of the House Rayburn Office Building.

In the media-only, RSVP-required event, Estefan will "mentor young musicians, culminating in a unique jam session with members of Congress." Dozens of other performers from Randy Jackson to Earl Klugh will join the mentored children and jamming lawmakers.

For the public, the academy is hosting a $200-per-ticket evening downtown at the Willard called Grammys on the Hill. Estefan, Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) and Rep. Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) will be honored for improving the "environment for music makers."

Hey, a Grammy's a Grammy, good day or not.
http://www.internetnews.com/bus-news...le.php/3538336





Navy Bans Access To P2P, Personal e-Mail On NMCI
Michael Wiss

No Hotmail, no Yahoo, no Napster, or any other Web-based e-mail services or peer-to- peer file sharing services for personnel using the Navy Marine Corps Intranet. Violators could lose computer privileges.

The use of e-mail is vital part of business and a great help with personal matters. But if you use a Navy computer workstation, mixing the two e-mail worlds can lead to a breach of security and a heap of trouble.

A new directive from the Navy Chief Information Officer prohibits military personnel from assessing their personal e-mail accounts from the NMCI military computer system. In addition, the directive says people cannot auto-forward official e-mail to a commercial account or use a commercial account for official government business. According to Kings Bay Information Access Mana-ger Bonnie Guinn, the policy will help stem the abuse of government computer systems.

''Commercial e-mail service is vulnerable to information being intercepted easier than government systems,'' she said. ''The policy is a way to protect you from computer hackers and people sending out Spam messages. The overall goal is to protect the security of the government computer system.''

Another procedure prohibited by the directive is peer-to-peer sharing applications, also called P2P. P2P file sharing provides Internet users the ability to share files on their computers with millions of other people. Common P2P swaps include MP3 and movie file sharing, gaming and instant messaging. This software also makes it possible for people to accidentally share personal files or sensitive data.

According to a bulletin from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, P2P programs have been found to allow easier access to government computer systems for theft of sensitive documents and use of government resources, due to unauthorized installation and use of this software on government systems. Recent news media reports stated P2P allowed sensitive government documents to get into the public domain. There are also documented incidents where DoD sensitive messages have been found on non-US computers with no protection against hostile intelligence services. The use of this software creates vulnerabilities, which can be exploited by providing a means of introducing malicious code and other illegal material.

According to Guinn, any small amount of data released can allow unauthorized personnel access to your government computer account.

''People need to know how serious a problem this could be. The consequences could be severe if the rules are not followed,'' she said. ''It would be foolish to lose your computer access because of breaking this policy. You will just have to wait until you get home to check your commercial account. The rule has been set - it must be adhered to, plain and simple.''
http://www.kingsbayperiscope.com/sto...email001.shtml





Hey iTunes, don't make it bad...
Just take a sad song and let us download it. The Beatles still aren't available (legally) online.
Paul R. La Monica

The Rolling Stones have fully embraced the digital music bandwagon. Is it time for the Beatles to do the same?

iTunes announced in early August that it had struck a deal with Abkco, the label that owned the rights to most of the Rolling Stones' older material, to provide the entire selection of Rolling Stones' songs online for downloading. The deal includes "A Bigger Bang," the latest Rolling Stones album, which was released on Tuesday.

The Rolling Stones had a prior online music deal with Rhapsody, owned by RealNetworks (Research). But it was not for the group's complete music catalog -- older music (pre-1971) was available only for streaming on Rhapsody, and couldn't be loaded onto a portable music player.

Now hopes are increasing that the Beatles may finally let their songs be downloaded as well.

A deal for the Beatles' library of music would be, by far, the most significant in the nascent world of online music.

According to the Recording Industry Association of America, the Beatles are, by far, the best selling artists in history, with 168.5 million albums sold. Elvis Presley is No. 2, with 116.5 million albums sold.

"If the Beatles did come on board, I'd imagine you'd see a lot of publicity," said Phil Leigh, an analyst with Inside Digital Media, an independent research firm. "It would have the effect of pressing down the accelerator a bit in the online music business."

Michael Goodman, senior digital entertainment analyst with Yankee Group, a Boston-based tech research firm, agreed.

He noted that the Beatles appeal to an older demographic, who have tended to buy songs and albums from legal online music sites like iTunes, Napster (Research), Rhapsody and the new Yahoo! (Research) Music Unlimited as opposed to illegally downloading songs from so- called peer-to-peer file sharing sites like Kazaa and Grokster.

"There is a clear bifurcation between older listeners who buy music online versus younger listeners who get it free," said Goodman. "The Beatles won't bring in a new generation of users but it will boost revenue because it will appeal to the segment of older listeners who are already buying music online."

Money can't buy me love...or Beatles downloads

But Leigh said that fans of the Fab Four may have to wait a bit longer before they can legally download hits like "Yellow Submarine," "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds" and "Yesterday." He said that the Beatles were one of the last groups to make their albums available as compact discs in the 1980s.

"They've already established a precedent of being the last to change to a new format," Leigh said.

Then there's the somewhat confusing ownership arrangement for the Beatles' songs.

Record label EMI Music owns the actual master recordings but a spokeswoman for EMI Music said that the company cannot make any decisions regarding online music distribution without the agreement of the Beatles' management company, Apple Corps.

Apple Corps. is controlled by surviving Beatles members Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr and the widows of John Lennon and George Harrison. (A partnership between Michael Jackson and Sony owns the publishing rights to the Beatles' music, which gives them free reign over the use of songs in movies and endorsements, but not any say in online distribution.)

What's more, Apple Corps. has been involved in a legal feud with Apple Computer (Research), which owns iTunes, regarding trademark issues.

This fight is widely believed to be one of the main reasons that Beatles songs are not yet available on iTunes. Representatives from Apple Computer and Apple Corps. did not return calls seeking comment about the lawsuits and speculation regarding an online music deal.

But if the Beatles don't come to an agreement with Apple, which is the clear market leader in digital music since it also makes the wildly popular iPod music player, then what company could they partner with?

Other players such as Napster and Rhapsody are possibilities. And there was even speculation last year that the Beatles were nearing an agreement with Microsoft, which launched its MSN Music online store in 2004, but it appears that nothing has come out of it.

"I am not hearing anything that says the Beatles are any closer to signing an online deal today than they were a year ago," said Goodman.

The EMI spokeswoman said that the company would not comment on speculation about an online distribution deal.

Still, she added that "EMI has made it a big priority and have been in ongoing discussions with Apple Corps. to get the Beatles to make their music available in a digital music format."

So while computer-savvy Stones fans are finally able to get some satisfaction, it looks like Beatlemaniacs that want to buy songs online are going to have take solace in some lyrics from a more obscure song on "Rubber Soul."

"I'll trust in you and know that you will wait for me."
http://money.cnn.com/2005/09/07/tech...ltech/beatles/





Is The Time Right For Phone-Music Player Hybrids?
Michael Singer

As Apple Computer and Motorola unveiled an iTunes phone Wednesday, analysts were debating whether the time was right for more mobile phone-digital music player hybrids.

Mobile-phone customers are already consuming music on their handsets. Nokia's N91, Samsung's SGH i300 and Sony's Walkman W800 are examples of handsets that play digital music files.

A phone may be limited to storing about 1,000 songs now--as much as 4 gigabytes of music storage is available in the N91 handset--but that's expected to grow dramatically as larger flash memory becomes available and as phones begin incorporating high-capacity micro-hard drives, which currently support 6GB of storage.

Current habits regarding the storage of digital music suggest that the marriage of mobile phones and digital music players makes sense, according to a study by Solutions Research Group.

Even though some standalone players can hold as many as 15,000 songs, the average user of a high-capacity digital music device stores only 375 songs, the study found. One out of every four players holds between 100 and 499 songs, while 25 percent have 500 songs stored on them. Half of those surveyed said their digital music player holds fewer than 100 songs. That's a good sign for the phone unveiled by Motorola and Apple, which should store about 100 songs.

Owners of Apple's iPods have significantly larger libraries--504 songs on average--compared with owners of other digital music players, with 246 songs, the study said.

The Solutions Research Group study was based on 1,062 random interviews the group conducted in the United States via telephone in May and June.

In a recent Forrester survey, 78 percent of online consumers age 18 and older said they had no interest in using their cell phone to play back audio tracks. Only 13 percent of online consumers ages 12 to 17 said they were interested in such a feature.

Despite the popularity of the iPod, the public still may need some coaxing in downloading songs. Only 22 percent of those who own digital music players bought a song online at some point in the past, suggesting that a majority of the music on the devices comes from owners' CDs and from peer-to-peer, file-sharing sources, Solutions Research Group found.

But that may change if Apple and Motorola launch a media blitz to convince the public that there is an advantage to owning a phone that merges iPod technology.

"Apple could offer a special on downloading songs from iTunes with the purchase of a cell phone and the plan," said Tim Deal, an analyst at Technology Business Research. "Clearly, we are talking about a computer-based solution using iTunes and not a download service via the carrier. Apple wants to make sure that the business model works first, before it develops its wireless world."

And teaming with Cingular may provide the market sweet spot Apple and Motorola are looking for. According to Solutions Research Group, 14 percent of Cingular's customers have a digital music player. A larger proportion, 17 percent of those surveyed, report that they want to buy one within 12 months, the report said.
http://news.com.com/Is+the+time+righ...3-5852845.html





The Baltics: More Famous Than You Might Think

Take a trip to any part of the world and the phrase “I come from the Baltics” is likely to be met with confused looks of wonder and confusion. “The Balkans?” people reply. But more and more, this part of the world finds itself in the news. As the Baltics emerge as independent countries after years of occupation, the world is getting a better sense of their unique identity. A common question might follow: “What are the people like?” To assist in answering this question, TBT staff has put together a list of some of the most famous and maybe not so famous people with connections to the Baltics.

Mikhail Baryshnikov – Latvia - Mikhail Nikolaevitch Baryshnikov was born in Riga in 1948. He started dancing in 1960. He studied in Leningrad under the famous Aleksander Pushkin and began to make a name for himself early on in his career. In 1974, Baryshnikov defected from the Soviet Union and started dancing with the American Ballet Theatre. He has become the face of ballet not only in cultural circles but among common people and has been described by dance critics as “the most perfect dancer of all time.”

Zydrunas Ilgauskas – Lithuania - This 30-year- old Kaunas native joined the Cleveland Cavaliers of the National Basketball League for the 1997 season. The 7’3’’, 230 pound center has remained with Cleveland since being drafted. He was named to the Eastern Conference All-Star Team in 2002-2003.

Ahti Heinla, Priit Kasesalu and Jaan Tallinn - Estonia – These three Estonian born computer geniuses were only in their twenties when they invented Kazaa in collaboration with a Swedish programming company. Kazaa, a peer to peer file sharing program, allows people to find virtually any song or movie on the internet—sometimes even before it is officially released—and download it for free. But the trio insists they never thought of creating it to bypass buying licensed music, movies and software. Says their official spokesman, “Consumers decide what to do with the tool. You can’t blame the tool maker.” The three have also had a hand in creating two other famous programs – Skype and Hotmail.

Auric Goldfinger – Latvia – Goldfinger is a millionaire industrialist, the founder of Goldfinger Industries and one of the richest men in England. He defected from Soviet occupied Latvia and opened a small jewelry store in London like his father and grandfather had done before him in Riga. His empire includes factories, biological institutes, horse breeding farms and research facilities. He has the largest private gold reserve in the world. So what if he’s a product of Ian Fleming’s imagination and a James Bond character? We can still credit him to Latvia, can’t we?

Mart Poom - Estonia - The Estonian Giant, as he is affectionately called, was born in Tallinn in 1972. Mart Poom started playing football in 1979, and has played at home in Estonia, as well as in Finland, Switzerland and England. The Estonian goalkeeper made his English Premier League debut at the end of the 1996/97 season in front of a nail-biting crowd of 55,000, against Manchester United. He currently plays for Arsenal.

Uljana Semjonova – Latvia – Semjonova was born in 1952 in Daugavpils, Latvia. At seven feet tall, she is the tallest female basketball player ever to play in the Olympic Games. Semjonova’s team won the Soviet Union women’s basketball championship 15 times and the European Champion’s Cup 15 times. It is an anstonishing fact that her team never lost a game in international competition in 18 years of play. This basketball superstar won an amazing 45 medals and was the first non-U.S. woman to be admitted into the Basketball Hall of Fame.

Charles Bronson – Lithuania – This rough and tumble Hollywood star of “The Magnificent Seven,” “The Great Escape” and “Death Wish” fame was originally born as Charles Buchinski to Lithuanian parents in Pennsylvania. But wait, is he really Lithuanian? The Latvians claim him as theirs …

Mark Rothko – Latvia - Born Marcus Rothkovich in Daugavpils, Rothko is one of the world’s best-known 20th century abstract painters. In 1913, his family emigrated from Latvia to the U.S.A. Rothko’s work is regarded to have made major contributions to the world of abstract art and his works are some of the most recognized 20th century paintings. He has been exhibited at some of the most prestigious galleries in the world including the Metropolitan Museum, the Tate Gallery and the Guggenheim.

Carmen Kass – Estonia – The whole world loves Estonian born Carmen Kass- the model for Christian Dior’s perfume “J’adore.” Not just another pretty face, she is president of the Estonian National Chess League and, while she didn’t win, received almost 2,000 votes when she ran for election to the European Parliament in 2004.

Monica Lewinsky – Lithuania

It may not be something that Lithuanians want to advertise, but America’s favorite presidential home wrecker is of Lithuanian heritage.

Mena Suvari - Estonia - The object of Kevin Spacey’s fantasies in the film ’’American Beauty ‘‘ (1999) has Estonian heritage – Mena Suvari’s father is Estonian. She has been acting since she was 12 and has appeared extensively in both television and films perhaps most notably as Heather in the first two American Pie films.
http://www.baltictimes.com/art.php?art_id=13535





Lotta swag

$1bn Pirates

THE music industry will push for more than $1 billion in damages after its landmark court victory over internet music pirates Kazaa.

The Sydney-based internet file-sharing company has had $30 million of its assets frozen as record companies try to recoup some of the estimated $3 billion lost in pirated music.

"Given the value of the music ripped off was several billion dollars, the damages claim will be substantial," Music Industry Piracy Investigations spokesman Michael Speck said yesterday.

"It's about sending a message to illegal operators that they cannot get away with taking other people's work."

The Federal Court ruled on Monday that Kazaa software, which allows users to swap music files for free over the web, had illegally infringed artists' copyright on an unprecedented scale.

The court did not order Kazaa to be shut down, but to instead install filters on future versions of its software to prevent trading of copyrighted music.

Kazaa owner Sharman Networks, which was sued by 30 record companies including Sony BMG, Universal and EMI, was given two months to comply.

More than 317 million people worldwide have downloaded the Kazaa software, developed by Sharman Networks, owned by Nikki Hemming, and Altnet, owned by Kevin Bermeister.

The pair met a decade ago while running the ill-fated Segaworld theme park at Darling Harbour.

Kazaa, which admits its customers download more than three billion files a year, is believed to have had more than 50 lawyers fighting its case.

The court also ordered Kazaa to pay 90 per cent of the music industry's legal costs of more than $9 million.

Justice Murray Wilcox found the majority of Kazaa's music files were "shared without the approval of the relevant copyright owner".

EMI Australia managing director John O'Donnell said Kazaa had profited from its theft "in a big way".

"I've been overwhelmed by the positive reaction from our artists and our full global company to this judgment – it's vitally important to all of us and sends a very clear message all around the world that copyright theft will not be tolerated," Mr O'Donnell said.

Kazaa, which intends to appeal, refused to comment yesterday.
http://dailytelegraph.news.com.au/st...001022,00.html





Sharman To Appeal While Record Labels Celebrate
Steven Deare

Sharman Networks has announced it will appeal a Federal Court ruling that several respondents associated with the company had authorised infringement of music industry copyright and that it must introduce filters to the Kazaa file-sharing software.

Justice Murray Wilcox delivered the landmark judgement in the Federal Court in Sydney today.

Outside the court, a spokesperson for Sharman Networks said the company would appeal the decision.

She stressed the record label's victory had not been comprehensive, citing the judge's dismissal of the labels' Trade Practices Act and conspiracy claims.

"Both parties have had a win, although neither side has had a complete victory.

"Sharman Networks is obviously disappointed that we have not been completely successful. But, we will appeal those parts of the decision where we were not successful and are confident of a win on appeal," the company said in a statement.

Spokesperson for the record labels, Michael Speck, said his side was disappointed in Sharman's decision.

"We're disappointed they won't accept the umpire's decision.

"It can't be fair to build a business on somebody else's work," he said.

However, the applicants were "absolutely delighted" with the judgement, according to Speck.

"It's a great day for artists, and music," he said.

"The consequence of this [judgement] will have global impact."

Importantly, Justice Wilcox had ruled that Sharman would have to make considerable change to Kazaa if it wished to continue its business, according to Speck.

"The court has made orders in that [Kazaa] has to be legitimate or disappear," he said.

"It is up to these people to honestly and decently stop ripping off music.

"If you're out there and you're ripping off music...sit up and take notice."

Asked how many millions of dollars the record labels might apply for in damages, Speck avoided giving a figure, but said: "These people have crowed for years about [the number of] their downloads."

The labels would ask the court that the damages awarded reflect those claims, he said.

The labels had already frozen AU$30 million worth of the respondents' assets, according to Speck, and so were confident they would receive full payment.

He described the cost of the long-running court action to the record labels as "a small investment".

"We made a small investment in protecting the future of the music industry.

"It's very small compared to what was ripped off from the industry."

Asked whether the record labels would pursue similar operators, he said: "It's not our preferred option".

The international record industry organisation, International Federation of Phonogram and Videogram Producers (IFPI), said the court's decision would lay down the law for future generations.

The Australian decision comes just ten weeks after the US Supreme Court ruled against file-sharing operator Grokster.

"Within the space of 10 weeks, two courts in different continents and hemispheres have given a huge boost to the efforts by music and technology companies to forge a legal online music business," said IFPI chairman and CEO John Kennedy.

"Today’s judgement shows that Kazaa -- one of the biggest engines of copyright theft and the biggest brand in music piracy worldwide -- is illegal," he said.

"This is a milestone in the fight against Internet piracy worldwide. Today there is a resounding signal to other unauthorised file-swapping networks: they should adapt their systems and go legitimate now".
http://www.zdnet.com.au/news/softwar...els_celebrate/ 0,2000061733,39210052,00.htm





This Is SKY & TELESCOPE's AstroAlert for Sun-Earth Interactions
============================================================ =====

A s t r o A l e r t

09 September 2005

Solar Terrestrial Dispatch
www.spacew.com


Intense Solar Flaring Continues

Active sunspot complex 10808 (also known as Region 808) continues to impress. It is now more fully in-view and is presenting itself as a very large sunspot complex that will (if its present size persists) be visible to the unaided (protected) eye over the next week to 10 days. Aside from the very large class X17 flare reported in the last Astroalert, it has managed to produce two additional major flares: a class X5 and a smaller class X1 within six hours of each other (the X5 occurred at 21:06 UTC [5:06 pm EDT] on 8 September, and the X1 occurred at 03:00 UTC on 9 September [11 pm EDT on 8 September]).

Region 10808 appears to be a magnetically complex monster, with at least one very probable strong delta magnetic configuration visible (opposite polarity umbrae located within a single penumbra). Such configurations are inherently less stable and are often associated with energetic solar flares. There is obvious strong magnetic shear visible in solar images of this region at various wavelengths that are undoubtably contributing to the energetic events. No significant change has been observed in the sunspot complex during the last 24 hours. Granted, it would be difficult to discern significant changes given its close proximity to the solar limb, but there is sufficient data available now to suggest that additional very strong solar flare activity will likely persist in the form of moderate to strong X-class events.

These recent events (the three X-class flares observed thus far) have elevated the population of energetic protons in the near-Earth space environment to levels that are now roughly 100 times more dense than normal background levels. Energetic protons are being redirected by the Earth's magnetic field toward the polar ionospheres, where they are bombarding and ionizing the polar ionosphere to levels sufficient to produce a phenomenon known as Polar Cap Absorption (or PCA). PCA is not harmful to human health, but can be dissasterous to high-frequency radio communications through the polar regions. Such radio signals are normally bounced off the lower side of the ionosphere and are returned back to the Earth, permitting long-distance radio communications to take place. But the energetic protons have ionized the lower ionospheric layers to levels capable of absorbing most radio signals that attempt to pass through that region. As a result, for large regions of the Earth where radio paths traverse the high and polar latitudes, a radio blackout is currently in effect.

Additional strong solar flare activity could significantly elevate proton populations over and above what is currently being observed, during the next two weeks. This could prove to be hazardous to the health of spacecraft in orbit around the Earth. Indeed, it is possible for vulnerable spacecraft to become crippled or even irrevocably lost. It is also possible that spacecraft reliant upon solar arrays for power may observe permanent degradations in performance. In other words, another effect of strong space radiation is to permanently reduce the efficiency of solar panels, causing a reduction in electrical output and therefore reduced lifetimes.

Space weather storms caused by the high velocity mass that is often ejected from such powerful solar events can also significantly reduce the lifetime of spacecraft through another method as well. During strong storms, the outer reaches of the Earth's atmosphere heats up and bloats outward into space. This bloating effect increases the atmospheric drag on spacecraft in near-Earth orbits and can cause their orbital parameters to change rapidly. Their lifetimes can therefore be reduced simply because the drag reduces their altitude, which can result in early re-entry of the spacecraft back to the Earth.

The intense radio bursts associated with these solar flares can produce interference with antennas that happen to be directed toward the Sun during the bursts. For example, if a strong solar flare occurs when the Sun is just rising and a cellular phone or other radio communications network (wireless internet, etc.) happens to be aligned in the direction of the rising Sun, the intense radio emissions from the Sun may interfere with the communications occurring in the network. This can result in poorer communications performance.

Thus, there are many ways in which Region 10808 may influence our activities here on the Earth during the next two weeks. Of course, this is all dependent upon whether it is capable of retaining its volatile nature. At the present time, this appears to be likely in the short-term. But such strong activity also often results in some stabilization in the sunspot complex, which could help curb future energetic activity.


** End of AstroAlert **


























If it keeps on rainin’, levee’s goin’ to break,
If it keeps on rainin’, levee’s goin’ to break,
When the levee breaks I’ll have no place to stay.
Mean old levee taught me to weep and moan,
Lord, mean old levee taught me to weep and moan,
Got what it takes to make a mountain man leave his home,
Oh, well, oh, well, oh, well.
Don’t it make you feel bad
When you’re tryin’ to find your way home,
You don’t know which way to go?
If you’re goin’ down south
They got no work to do,
If you don’t know about chicago.
Cryin’ won’t help you, prayin’ won’t do you no good,
Now, cryin’ won’t help you, prayin’ won’t do you no good,
When the levee breaks, mama, you got to move.
All last night sat on the levee and moaned,
All last night sat on the levee and moaned,
Thinkin’ ’bout me baby and my happy home.
Going, go’n’ to chicago,
Go’n’ to chicago,
Sorry but I can’t take you.
Going down, going down now, going down.

Led Zeppellin, 1971



























Until next week,

- js.










































Current Week In Review



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Jack Spratt's Week In Review is published every Friday. Please submit letters, articles, and press releases in plain text English to jackspratts (at) lycos (dot) com. Include contact info. Submission deadlines are Wednesdays @ 1700 UTC.


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