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You can reach the person managing the list at [EMAIL PROTECTED] When replying, please edit your Subject line so it is more specific than "Re: Contents of Medianews digest..." Today's Topics: 1. Cell phones won't keep your secrets (Monty Solomon) 2. An Industry Based on a Simple Masquerad (George Antunes) 3. Bidding War Starts for Chip Maker Freescale Semi (George Antunes) 4. How Will Apple?s Marketing Maestro Marry the Computer and the Home TV? (George Antunes) 5. Revived 'Nightline' May Get Last Laugh (George Antunes) 6. Florida County to Vaporize Trash - Poof! (George Antunes) 7. Study: Promising future for power-line broadband (George Antunes) 8. AT&T Enters Muni Wi-Fi Game (George Antunes) 9. La. Utility Continues Broadband Fight (George Antunes) ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Message: 1 Date: Mon, 11 Sep 2006 02:36:44 -0400 From: Monty Solomon <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: [Medianews] Cell phones won't keep your secrets To: undisclosed-recipient:; Message-ID: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Cell phones won't keep your secrets WASHINGTON (AP) -- The married man's girlfriend sent a text message to his cell phone: His wife was getting suspicious. Perhaps they should cool it for a few days. "So," she wrote, "I'll talk to u next week." "You want a break from me? Then fine," he wrote back. Later, the married man bought a new phone. He sold his old one on eBay, at Internet auction, for $290. The guys who bought it now know his secret. The married man had followed the directions in his phone's manual to erase all his information, including lurid exchanges with his lover. But it wasn't enough. Selling your old phone once you upgrade to a fancier model can be like handing over your diaries. All sorts of sensitive information pile up inside our cell phones, and deleting it may be more difficult than you think. A popular practice among sellers, resetting the phone, often means sensitive information appears to have been erased. But it can be resurrected using specialized yet inexpensive software found on the Internet. A company, Trust Digital of McLean, Virginia, bought 10 different phones on eBay this summer to test phone-security tools it sells for businesses. The phones all were fairly sophisticated models capable of working with corporate e-mail systems. Curious software experts at Trust Digital resurrected information on nearly all the used phones, including the racy exchanges between guarded lovers. ... http://www.cnn.com/2006/TECH/ptech/08/30/betrayed.byacellphone.ap/ ------------------------------ Message: 2 Date: Mon, 11 Sep 2006 16:11:09 -0500 From: George Antunes <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: [Medianews] An Industry Based on a Simple Masquerad To: medianews@twiar.org Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED] Message-ID: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Content-Type: text/plain; format=flowed; charset=iso-8859-1 September 11, 2006 An Industry Is Based on a Simple Masquerade By MATT RICHTEL and MIGUEL HELFT NY Times http://www.nytimes.com/2006/09/11/technology/11hewlett.html?_r=1&oref=slogin&ref=business&pagewanted=print When Patrick Baird, a private detective in Granbury, Tex., was hunting a runaway or helping a husband find out if his wife was cheating, he would often look for clues in telephone records. He bought them from firms that specialized in obtaining them, and says he did not ask about their methods. But late last year, as scrutiny of such firms and their often deceptive practices heated up, Mr. Baird stopped giving them business. ?If my own mother came to me and said ?I need this done,? I couldn?t do it,? he said in an interview last week. ?We?re abiding by public opinion here.? People who obtain calling records often use a technique known as pretexting ? using a pretext, like masquerading as a customer, to get a company to disclose information. Their shady subculture has been getting renewed attention since the revelation last week that a subcontractor for an investigative firm working for Hewlett-Packard used pretexting to obtain the call records of company board members and reporters. It is hard to quantify the size of the telephone pretexting economy. But in recent years it has turned into a small industry, with dozens of Web sites offering calling records to anyone with a credit card, for a modest fee. Their main customers appear to be private investigators, although some in that field criticize the practice. ?Web sites came out of the woodwork like locusts in the last five to seven years,? said Eddy L. McClain, past president of the National Council of Investigation and Security Services, a trade group. ?It was too tempting for many investigators not to take that shortcut.? Pretexting ?is at a minimum unethical and at a maximum unlawful,? Mr. McClain said. ?It is a real smear on our profession.? Pretexters often use techniques similar to those employed by identity thieves to obtain not only telephone records but also other private data. Robert Douglas, an information security consultant and former private detective, said they often called telephone companies armed with some personal information, like a customer?s Social Security number, mailing address or date of birth. Then they charm and cajole the phone company employee into thinking they are the actual customer. ?They have the knack,? Mr. Douglas said. ?It?s more art than science.? Many professionals pretexters, including those who have used the practice to build lucrative data brokering businesses, are reluctant to discuss their methods. At a Congressional hearing in June, 11 of the witnesses who were called refused to answer questions, invoking their Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination. But two others agreed to speak. One of them was David Gandal of Loveland, Colo., whose business, Shpondow.com, helps repossession companies find cars whose owners have defaulted on their loans. Mr. Gandal said in an interview that he used pretexting to obtain cellphone records, when necessary, until last year. He stopped, in part, because carriers began suing some pretexters. But there was nothing difficult about getting cellphone records, Mr. Gandal said. ?All you need is the last four digits of a Social Security number and a correct ZIP code,? he said. ?You go to the wireless company?s Web site, you sign up like you are that person, you can view the bill.? In most cases, Mr. Gandal said, he already had the Social Security number from the lien holder. But if necessary, he could find it in commercial databases. To demonstrate, he asked a reporter his full name and state of residence and read him back his Social Security number within seconds. Another witness at the June hearing, James Rapp, a former data broker from Colorado with a long history of run-ins with law enforcement, described how he used pretexting to gather all sorts of information: addresses linked to a specific phone number from the telephone company, Social Security numbers from credit reporting agencies, and an address and phone number from a utility company. Mr. Rapp explained how he might call the utility company pretending to be a customer with a gas leak. He would then give the operator a false address for that customer, only to have the operator correct him. ?They?re going to say, ?Oh, well, we have you over here, 144 Northwest,? whatever,? Mr. Rapp told the committee, according to a transcript. With a bit more subterfuge he could easily get the customer?s phone number as well. At the hearing, Representative Edward Whitfield, a Kentucky Republican who is chairman of the Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, said that research had showed that in addition to private investigators, lawyers and tabloids, the customers of these data brokers included ?automobile finance companies and repossession companies and major banks and major corporations around America.? The Federal Trade Commission, some state legislatures and telephone companies have all tried to shut the industry down, with mixed success so far. Many Web sites that sold calling records have disappeared, but experts say many pretexters remain in business. ?Part of the problem is that there is still no law at the federal level making it clear that the activity is illegal,? said Marc Rotenberg, executive director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center. Using pretexting to obtain financial records was made illegal in 1999. Many legal experts say that pretexting to get phone records is already illegal under federal and state laws against fraud, but Congress is considering bills that would make this more explicit. The California Legislature has passed a bill that makes it unlawful to obtain phone records by fraud or deceit, and to buy or sell someone?s phone records without their consent. The bill has not yet been signed by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger. The F.T.C. has filed suits against several pretexters under laws barring unfair and deceptive practices. AT&T, Cingular, Verizon and other companies have also sued dozens of people whom they accuse of fraudulently obtaining phone records. And some carriers have changed the way they do business in an attempt to thwart pretexters. Last year Verizon stopped asking customers for their Social Security numbers as a chief way to establish their identity, said Eric Rabe, a Verizon spokesman. Instead, he said, the company is asking people to provide information that is on their phone bill, like an account number. Verizon is also teaching customer service representatives what they should look for to identify possible pretexters, Mr. Rabe said. The new vigilance comes at a price. Customers often want to get information quickly and are impatient when they have to put up with a series of questions to establish their identity. Mr. Rabe said. Walt Sharp, a spokesman for AT&T, said his company continued to accept Social Security numbers as a central means of identification. ?That?s generally something known only to customers, or it should be,? Mr. Sharp said. Mr. Douglas, the security consultant, agreed that the carriers faced a tough balancing act. ?We?re in the McDonald?s generation. Everybody wants information and they don?t want to wait for it,? he said. ?That?s why these guys win.? No system is foolproof if a wily pretexter knows how to convince a company representative that he is a customer who is desperate for account information, Mr. Douglas said. This person might say he is on a business trip, without access to account information, but needs to check his records quickly. ?You come up with a plausible scenario as to why you need the information now,? he said. Mr. Baird, who operates a detective agency with three employees, said he did not know if the people he paid for phone records used duplicitous means to get records, though he assumed that their approach may have involved pretexting. He said he once regularly contracted with various companies and people that charged $110 to $175 for sets of records. The records, he said, were of use in many instances, such as tracking runaways, helping insurance companies ferret out fraud or helping the police determine if a criminal suspect was having conversations with another bad actor. ?It?s an issue for law enforcement wanting to move on something early and we were able to give them a direction while they?re waiting for a subpoena,? Mr. Baird said. He said that he stopped trying to obtain phone records because of the negative attention it has received, and the uncertainty about whether obtaining them was legal. Mr. Baird said he felt that his and other detective agencies were using the phone records in beneficial and legitimate ways. The decision to stop using them has cost him in lost business, though he declined to say how much. ?We?ll leave it alone and let Congress figure it out,? he said. ================================================= George Antunes Voice (713) 743-3923 Associate Professor Fax (713) 743-3927 Political Science Internet: antunes at uh dot edu University of Houston Houston, TX 77204-3011 ------------------------------ Message: 3 Date: Mon, 11 Sep 2006 16:13:15 -0500 From: George Antunes <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: [Medianews] Bidding War Starts for Chip Maker Freescale Semi To: medianews@twiar.org Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED] Message-ID: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Content-Type: text/plain; format=flowed; charset=us-ascii September 11, 2006 Bidding War Starts for Chip Maker By ANDREW ROSS SORKIN and JOHN MARKOFF NY Times http://www.nytimes.com/2006/09/11/business/12dealcnd.html?ref=business&pagewanted=print Two groups of investment firms were vying to acquire Freescale Semiconductor for more than $16 billion late Sunday night, people involved in the negotiations said. Such a transaction, if completed, would be the largest leveraged buyout to date in the technology sector, surpassing the $11.3 billion sale of SunGard Data Systems last year. The bidding war illustrates the increased appetite of private equity firms for the technology industry, a sector shunned for years by many financiers because it was considered too volatile. But as technology companies have matured and private equity firms have begun to look for companies that are not simply stable, but also growing, more deals are taking place in the sector. The heart of Freescale's business is in making specialized, or "embedded," chips that provide intelligence for things as varied as automotive engines and cellphones. A consortium including the Texas Pacific Group, the Blackstone Group, Permira and the Carlyle Group was near a deal to acquire Freescale on Sunday. But a rival consortium including Kohlberg Kravis Roberts, Silver Lake Partners and Bain Capital swooped in with a last-minute offer that was higher, the people involved in the negotiations said. The K.K.R.-Silver Lake group is considering a plan to merge Freescale, a former unit of Motorola, with the semiconductor unit of Philips Electronics; they and another partner agreed to buy control of that unit last month, and and Bain has since joined the buyers in that deal. Exact details of the Freescale bids could not immediately be learned, and people involved in the discussions cautioned that the talks could still collapse. A spokeswoman for Freescale did not return a call seeking comment. Spokesmen for the consortium either declined to comment or could not be reached. The semiconductor industry appears to be in a deal frenzy. In the Philips deal, the Dutch electronics giant agreed to sell 80 percent of its semiconductor division to K.K.R., Silver Lake and AlpInvest Partners for 3.4 billion euros ($4.4 billion). Earlier in the summer, Advanced Micro Devices agreed to buy ATI Technologies for $5.4 billion in cash and stock. Joe Osha, an analyst at Merrill Lynch wrote a note to investors last month saying that semiconductor companies were ripe for more deals. "We think that managers in the semiconductor industry need to start thinking more seriously about capital structure or risk some unwanted but long overdue attention from activist investors and buyout firms." Freescale, which was spun out of Motorola in 2004, is now the worlds' 10th largest chip maker, with some $5.8 billion in revenues last year. The company plays a major role in the automotive and communications industries. Its customers include Motorola, with its extensive line of cellphones; Sony Electronics; Whirlpool appliances; Cisco routers; and automakers like Mercedes, BMW, Ford, Hyundai and General Motors. The chips used in these companies' products are similar to the microprocessors that control desktop and portable personal computers. However, the software that controls the chips is stored in special memory chips referred to as flash memory. Freescale's chief executive is Michel Mayer, who is a 19-year veteran of I.B.M.'s semiconductor business. On Friday, Freescale's shares closed at $30.75, up 43 cents. The company has a market value of $12.47 billion. ================================================= George Antunes Voice (713) 743-3923 Associate Professor Fax (713) 743-3927 Political Science Internet: antunes at uh dot edu University of Houston Houston, TX 77204-3011 ------------------------------ Message: 4 Date: Mon, 11 Sep 2006 16:14:40 -0500 From: George Antunes <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: [Medianews] How Will Apple?s Marketing Maestro Marry the Computer and the Home TV? To: medianews@twiar.org Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED] Message-ID: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Content-Type: text/plain; format=flowed; charset=iso-8859-1 September 11, 2006 How Will Apple?s Marketing Maestro Marry the Computer and the Home TV? By JOHN MARKOFF NY Times http://www.nytimes.com/2006/09/11/technology/11apple.html?ref=business&pagewanted=print SAN FRANCISCO, Sept. 10 ? Has Apple Computer?s chief executive, Steven P. Jobs, found a way to connect the PC to the TV? With an enticing invitation proclaiming ?It?s Showtime,? Mr. Jobs last week touched off speculation about how far Apple will go as it takes its next big step into digital video. On Tuesday, Apple will hold another of Mr. Jobs?s marketing events here to introduce what trade publications and analysts indicate will be his next campaign: an effort to transform the distribution of Hollywood movies as thoroughly as he has revolutionized the recording industry with the iTunes Music Store. A distribution deal with the Walt Disney Company and sleeker, higher-capacity video iPods are part of the consensus among those who handicap Apple product announcements. But company executives have hinted that Apple has at least one bigger idea on tap. Mr. Jobs needs one. In his quest to remake Hollywood distribution in the Internet era, his main challenge is one that has bedeviled the personal computer industry. Today, despite many efforts by Microsoft, Intel and a variety of start-up companies to insinuate the computer into home entertainment, almost all movies watched at home use cable, satellite or DVD players, making it possible for Hollywood to control both piracy and pricing. The computer industry, under the banner of ?digital convergence,? has been looking longingly at the American living room for several years. Beginning in 1993, Microsoft tried to rally the cable industry under the banner of Cablesoft, an abortive effort to turn the home cable box into a Microsoft-based PC. More recently, Microsoft and Intel have invested millions in a slow-growing effort to offer Media Center PC?s that promise a single home entertainment box. Separately, Microsoft has been trying to start a business in Internet-based television technology, intended to arm telephone companies to compete with cable operators. And in January, Intel introduced a microprocessor system called Viiv, designed for PC-based digital entertainment. So far, it has found few backers. Despite proclaiming that its Macintosh computer is the center of a digital home strategy, Apple has taken only baby steps into the video era, offering iPods that play television videos on tiny screens and a software program called Front Row, largely hidden within the Mac, for managing video collections, music playlists and slide shows. Those efforts may become more aggressive on Tuesday, but so far Mr. Jobs has kept his strategy well hidden. Much speculation has centered on a living-room-ready version of the company?s least expensive computer, the Mac Mini, a compact desktop model originally positioned as an inexpensive way for PC users to switch to the Macintosh market. A living-room Mini could play DVD?s, download Internet data like digital movies and include a TV tuner. The downside of such a strategy, of course, is that it would be compared, perhaps unfavorably, with the dozens of similar devices already introduced in attempts to bring the Internet closer to the home television set. That might amount to yet another box in the living room ? something Mr. Jobs and his designers choose to avoid. ?Apple is genetically incapable of doing anything that smacks of me-too,? said Mike McGuire, research vice president at the market research firm Gartner. A more intriguing possibility discussed by former Apple engineers and on rumor sites like AppleInsider.com is that Apple may use wireless technologies like Wi-Fi and ultra-wideband to stream digital content from a Macintosh to the TV. Such a system would allow the video to be played on television screens with the computer?s hand-held Apple remote control. Such an approach would almost certainly appeal to Mr. Jobs?s spartan aesthetic. And it tracks well with one of Apple?s peripheral products, AirPort Express, which makes it possible to stream digital audio wirelessly to speakers in different rooms of a home. Moreover, such an approach would keep Hollywood digital video content locked up on a Macintosh and stream it to the TV using a connector called HDMI (High-Definition Multimedia Interface), which is engineered to offer copy protection. The obstacle to such a wireless video service is that such projects often run afoul of real-world wireless environments in the home, which are replete with interference from devices like microwave ovens, wireless video cameras and wireless phones, and uncooperative neighbors. Yet Mr. Jobs and Apple were pioneers in using Wi-Fi in their computers, and it is likely that he is looking for a way to renew Apple?s technological leadership in video. That is almost certain to make Tuesday?s event, to be held at a theater across the street from the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, one of Apple?s most closely watched product introductions. Mr. Jobs has repeatedly found ways to position Apple in front of important technology changes, and the convergence of the broadband Internet and a new generation of high-definition television has presented an opportunity for the company to play an even larger role in consumer electronics. According to Steve Perlman, a former Apple engineer who founded Moxi Digital in 1999 in an effort to create an integrated set-top box for the living room: ?The ?last mile? problem of delivering broadband to the home has largely been solved. What remains is the ?last hundred feet? problem.? By that, he meant reliably delivering high-definition video to television sets using Internet-based technology. ?Once that has been solved,? he said, ?it will completely transform the entertainment landscape.? ================================================= George Antunes Voice (713) 743-3923 Associate Professor Fax (713) 743-3927 Political Science Internet: antunes at uh dot edu University of Houston Houston, TX 77204-3011 ------------------------------ Message: 5 Date: Mon, 11 Sep 2006 16:16:04 -0500 From: George Antunes <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: [Medianews] Revived 'Nightline' May Get Last Laugh To: medianews@twiar.org Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED] Message-ID: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Content-Type: text/plain; format=flowed; charset=us-ascii 'Letterman' in Sights, Revived 'Nightline' May Get Last Laugh By SARAH ELLISON Wall Street Journal September 11, 2006; Page B1 http://online.wsj.com/article/SB115793294451358967.html?mod=hps_us_at_glance_mm After Ted Koppel left "Nightline" in November, many of the show's staff members and fans thought the show was effectively dead, even though it was scheduled to plug along in a revamped format. Colleagues saw Mr. Koppel as one of the last in a generation of serious newsmen, and his departure was viewed as another chapter in the inevitable decline of network news in favor of lighter entertainment programming aimed at younger viewers. Signing off on in his final appearance, Mr. Koppel warned viewers that if they didn't give the new "Nightline" a chance, "I promise you, the network will just put another comedy show in this time slot. And then, you'll be sorry." But late-night news junkies aren't sorry now. Nine months after Mr. Koppel left, "Nightline's" audience is up 9% compared to a year ago, taking its ratings very close to, and sometimes higher than those of CBS's "Late Show With David Letterman" particularly in the younger demographics that ABC was eager to attract. The new team behind "Nightline" accomplished this by softening some of the show's programming, adding lighter features and more celebrity coverage, while still trying to maintain the show's news chops with frequent segments on political and social topics. The new show has featured singer Alicia Keys discussing AIDS, an examination of the IRS's efforts to tax gift bags to celebrities, and profiles of various comedians for a series called "Seriously Funny." Overseeing the turnaround is new Executive Producer James Goldston, who previously was best known for producing Martin Bashir's unsettling 2003 interview with Michael Jackson, in which the pop star admitted sharing his bedroom with children. Even if "Nightline" isn't always as high-minded as it was in the past, some argue that these changes were needed to rescue a dying franchise. "You can characterize the relative success of 'Nightline' today in this context: In the last years of Ted Koppel, the show had lost its way," says Andrew Tyndall, who monitors television news for his New York-based research and consulting firm, ADT Research. "This is more a rejuvenation than a reinvention." Toward the end of his tenure, Mr. Koppel was often unwilling to do live shows and reduced his number of appearances per week. Many of Mr. Goldston's new features added a touch of razzle-dazzle that would have been unheard of under Mr. Koppel, such as a "Sign of the Times," a 90-second segment at the end of the show. One recent spot featured Dick Cheney's list of demands when visiting a hotel (examples: turn the thermostat to 68 degrees and the TV to Fox News). An episode last month touted the "secret audiotapes of John Mark Karr -- alleged Jon-Benet Ramsey killer." Mr. Karr was later dropped as a suspect in Ms. Ramsey's death. One planned new feature, Mr. Goldston said in an interview, is dubbed "What keeps me up at night." It would focus on the kinds of things that thinkers and other notable people find themselves obsessing over. Mr. Goldston also brought Mr. Bashir in as one of the "Nightline" anchors, and ABC News also named two others -- Cynthia McFadden and Terry Moran -- as lead anchors for the show. To give the network more control, the show moved many of its staffers to New York, where ABC News is based, while maintaining a sizable presence in Washington, D.C., where "Nightline" was based under Mr. Koppel. The partial relocation to New York precipitated an exodus of staff, including numerous producers, worried about the direction of the show under its new management. Still, despite the overhaul, staffers who stayed with the show say they're happy with how it has turned out. "I was very, very concerned about the show changing," says John Donvan, a longtime "Nightline" correspondent. "The reputation of the show was based entirely on the example Ted set, and when he left, I just wasn't sure if that wasn't all going to go away." But Mr. Donvan, like several of his colleagues, stuck around. "I decided to stay...in November, and by the end of January I was pretty convinced that I had made the right move." He says the changes have tripled the number of topics the show can cover, leading to more story ideas and travel for him, which he relishes. Many former "Nightline" staffers are nostalgic for the old format under Mr. Koppel, but see the switch to the new format as inevitable. The former staffers say that they viewed "Nightline" under Mr. Koppel as the best place to work at ABC News, but they don't see it that way anymore. Mr. Koppel declined to comment on the new "Nightline." He is gearing up for his first show on Discovery Channel, a three-hour primetime special dubbed, "The Price of Security," which is set to air Sunday night, to coincide with the eve of Sept. 11. His longtime producer, Tom Bettag, who followed Mr. Koppel to Discovery said, "We don't want to cast a shadow on these people's worlds. I'm not going to tell people what I really think, other than I'm thrilled the broadcast has continued." Mr. Goldston defends the show's new direction, and says it still does plenty of hard news, something the multitopic format allows. For the Karr tapes, Mr. Goldston says, "would I have wanted to have made a whole show on that? No. But I think we followed it with a segment on AIDS denial in Africa." Last week, "Nightline" aired an interview with Hillary Clinton from the campaign trail. Mr. Donvan spent the better part of August in the Middle East covering the conflict between Hezbollah and Israel. ABC News management is happier with the new show. Four years ago, ABC unsuccessfully courted David Letterman to plug his comedy-talk show into its sagging late-night news slot, prompting many in the industry to conclude that Mr. Koppel didn't enjoy his bosses' support. Many assumed his departure would be used as an excuse to try to find a new Mr. Letterman, Jay Leno, or Jon Stewart. With "Nightline's" ratings rise, talk of scheduling a comedy program in its slot has faded and news is getting the last laugh. "All of us had questions about how 'Nightline' would fare once Ted Koppel left, and while there's no such thing as tenure in the TV business, we are very pleased with the program today," said David Westin, president of ABC News, in an interview. "We're not talking about whether it will survive; we're talking about how to make it stronger." Earlier in the summer, for the week ending June 25, "Nightline" tied new episodes of "Letterman" in ratings among both adults ages 25-54 and 18-49. "Nightline" also beat out "Letterman" in August in total viewers three weeks in a row. Two of those weeks featured "Letterman" reruns; the third had new shows. "Leno," as usual, finished first all three weeks. Now, the big question for "Nightline" is can the show turn a profit? ABC yanked the program from its initial expensive Times Square studio and now produces it in the same building as ABC News, but such cuts have yet to make it profitable, according to a person familiar with the show's finances. "My key message would be that this show remains a work in progress. We are pleased with the progress we've made but by no means are we finished," says Mr. Goldston. ================================================= George Antunes Voice (713) 743-3923 Associate Professor Fax (713) 743-3927 Political Science Internet: antunes at uh dot edu University of Houston Houston, TX 77204-3011 ------------------------------ Message: 6 Date: Mon, 11 Sep 2006 16:17:41 -0500 From: George Antunes <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: [Medianews] Florida County to Vaporize Trash - Poof! To: medianews@twiar.org Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED] Message-ID: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Content-Type: text/plain; format=flowed; charset=us-ascii County to Vaporize Trash - Poof! Associated Press 17:10 PM Sep, 09, 2006 http://www.wired.com/news/wireservice/1,71757-0.html FORT PIERCE, Florida -- A Florida county has grand plans to ditch its dump, generate electricity and help build roads -- all by vaporizing garbage at temperatures hotter than parts of the sun. The $425 million facility expected to be built in St. Lucie County will use lightning-like plasma arcs to turn trash into gas and rock-like material. It will be the first such plant in the nation operating on such a massive scale and the largest in the world. Supporters say the process is cleaner than traditional trash incineration, though skeptics question whether the technology can meet the lofty expectations. The 100,000-square-foot plant, slated to be operational in two years, is expected to vaporize 3,000 tons of garbage a day. County officials estimate their entire landfill -- 4.3 million tons of trash collected since 1978 -- will be gone in 18 years. No byproduct will go unused, according to Geoplasma, the Atlanta-based company building and paying for the plant. Synthetic, combustible gas produced in the process will be used to run turbines to create electricity -- about 120 megawatts a day -- that will be sold back to the grid. The facility will operate on about a third of the power it generates, free from outside electricity. About 80,000 pounds of steam per day will be sold to a neighboring Tropicana Products facility to power the juice plant's turbines. Sludge from the county's wastewater treatment plant will be vaporized, and a material created from melted organic matter -- up to 600 tons a day -- will be hardened into slag, and sold for use in road and construction projects. "This is sustainability in its truest and finest form," said Hilburn Hillestad, president of Geoplasma, a subsidiary of Jacoby Development. For years, some waste-management facilities have been converting methane -- created by rotting trash in landfills -- to power. Others also burn trash to produce electricity. But experts say population growth will limit space available for future landfills. "We've only got the size of the planet," said Richard Tedder, program administrator for the Florida Department of Environmental Protection's solid waste division. "Because of all of the pressures of development, people don't want landfills. It's going to be harder and harder to site new landfills, and it's going to be harder for existing landfills to continue to expand." The plasma-arc gasification facility in St. Lucie County, on central Florida's Atlantic Coast, aims to solve that problem by eliminating the need for a landfill. Only two similar facilities are operating in the world -- both in Japan -- but are gasifying garbage on a much smaller scale. Up to eight plasma arc-equipped cupolas will vaporize trash year-round, nonstop. Garbage will be brought in on conveyor belts and dumped into the cylindrical cupolas where it falls into a zone of heat more than 10,000 degrees Fahrenheit. "We didn't want to do it like everybody else," said Leo Cordeiro, the county's solid waste director. "We knew there were better ways." No emissions are released during the closed-loop gasification, Geoplasma says. The only emissions will come from the synthetic gas-powered turbines that create electricity. Even that will be cleaner than burning coal or natural gas, experts say. Few other toxins will be generated, if any at all, Geoplasma says. But critics disagree. "We've found projects similar to this being misrepresented all over the country," said Monica Wilson of the Global Alliance for Incinerator Alternatives. Wilson said there aren't enough studies yet to prove the company's claims that emissions will likely be less than from a standard natural-gas power plant. She also said other companies have tried to produce such results and failed. She cited two similar facilities run by different companies in Australia and Germany that closed after failing to meet emissions standards. "I think this is the time for the residents of this county to start asking some tough questions," Wilson said. Bruce Parker, president and CEO of the Washington, D.C.-based National Solid Wastes Management Association, scoffs at the notion that plasma technology will eliminate the need for landfills. "We do know that plasma arc is a legitimate technology, but let's see first how this thing works for St. Lucie County," Parker said. "It's too soon for people to make wild claims that we won't need landfills." Louis Circeo, director of Georgia Tech's plasma research division, said that as energy prices soar and landfill fees increase, plasma-arc technology will become more affordable. "Municipal solid waste is perhaps the largest renewable energy resource that is available to us," Circeo said, adding that the process "could not only solve the garbage and landfill problems in the United States and elsewhere, but it could significantly alleviate the current energy crisis." He said that if large plasma facilities were put to use nationwide to vaporize trash, they could theoretically generate electricity equivalent to about 25 nuclear power plants. Americans generated 236 million tons of garbage in 2003, about 4.5 pounds per person, per day, according to the latest figures from the Environmental Protection Agency. Roughly 130 million tons went to landfills -- enough to cover a football field 703 miles high with garbage. Circeo said criticism of the technology is based on a lack of understanding. "We are going to put emissions out, but the emissions are much lower than virtually any other process, especially a combustion process in an incinerator," he said. Circeo said that both plants operating in Japan, where emissions standards are more stringent than in the U.S., are producing far less pollution than regulations require. "For the amount of energy produced, you get significantly less of certain pollutants like sulfur dioxide and particulate matter," said Rick Brandes, chief of the Environmental Protection Agency's waste minimization division. Geoplasma expects to recoup its $425 million investment, funded by bonds, within 20 years through the sale of electricity and slag. "That's the silver lining," said Hillestad, adding that St. Lucie County won't pay a dime. The company has assumed full responsibility for interest on the bonds. County Commissioner Chris Craft said the plasma process "is bigger than just the disposal of waste for St. Lucie County." "It addresses two of the world's largest problems -- how to deal with solid waste and the energy needs of our communities," Craft said. "This is the end of the rainbow. It will change the world." ================================================= George Antunes Voice (713) 743-3923 Associate Professor Fax (713) 743-3927 Political Science Internet: antunes at uh dot edu University of Houston Houston, TX 77204-3011 ------------------------------ Message: 7 Date: Mon, 11 Sep 2006 16:41:30 -0500 From: George Antunes <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: [Medianews] Study: Promising future for power-line broadband To: medianews@twiar.org Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED] Message-ID: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Content-Type: text/plain; format=flowed; charset=us-ascii Study: Promising future for power-line broadband By Caroline McCarthy News.com http://news.com.com/Study+Promising+future+for+power-line+broadband/2100-1034_3-6114397.html Story last modified Mon Sep 11 14:05:38 PDT 2006 The demand for using traditional electrical lines as a medium for broadband technology in the residential sector is rising worldwide and will continue to grow, according to a study by market research firm In-Stat. Broadband service over power lines (BPL), which allows an Internet connection to be established through a standard electrical outlet, is seen as a potential rival to coaxial (coax) and twisted-pair wiring, the fixed-line technologies most commonly used for cable and telephone service, respectively. Incorporating BPL into a residence or business requires no additional wire installation. It may sound too good to be true, and indeed BPL has had a rocky history because of technical limitations, high development costs and its potential for interference with ham radio and emergency radio signals. But according to In-Stat's research, it's catching on. The number of broadband power-line equipment units sold passed the 2 million mark in 2005, and the research firm expects that the number will increase by 200 percent this year. The main advantage of BPL, according to In-Stat analyst Joyce Putscher, is the fact that the availability of coaxial or twisted-pair connections can be limited. In many countries, specifically those in Europe and Asia, cable television is far less common than it is in the United States, and households in those countries tend to have fewer telephone jacks. BPL could consequently facilitate more-widespread broadband Internet connectivity in those markets. Domestically, according to Putscher, choosing BPL can mean the customer will have more flexibility when accessing the service because connections can be set up at any power outlet. "Even in the U.S. there are still a lot of homes that, even with coax and phone jacks, may only have them running to one room," she said. "It's limited." Even in some markets where cable and telephone services seem to have a lock on broadband services, local leaders still explore the BPL option. And if In-Stat's research proves accurate, more markets may be picking it up soon. ================================================= George Antunes Voice (713) 743-3923 Associate Professor Fax (713) 743-3927 Political Science Internet: antunes at uh dot edu University of Houston Houston, TX 77204-3011 ------------------------------ Message: 8 Date: Mon, 11 Sep 2006 16:43:25 -0500 From: George Antunes <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: [Medianews] AT&T Enters Muni Wi-Fi Game To: medianews@twiar.org Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED] Message-ID: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Content-Type: text/plain; format=flowed; charset=iso-8859-1 AT&T Enters Muni Wi-Fi Game By Karen Brown MultiChannel News 9/11/2006 http://www.multichannel.com/article/CA6370090.html In this story: COMPANY FINANCED A MOBILITY PLAY OWNING NETWORK COUNTS SPRINT CONFLICT? AT&T Inc.?s plan to build a Wi-Fi network in Springfield, Ill., not only signals its entry into the municipal wireless market, but it also is part of a new strategy to extend its broadband services outside of the home and office. The Bell operator is now in negotiations with about a dozen cities to build and operate Wi-Fi mesh networks, which it plans to operate in parallel with its existing wired digital subscriber line and Project Lightspeed fiber-optic-fed broadband services. In doing so, the former SBC Communications Inc. can offer customers broadband Internet service that follows them outside the home ? something cable competitors as yet do not offer. COMPANY FINANCED The Springfield City Council has yet to sign off on the deal, but if approved the plan calls for AT&T to finance and build a 25-to-30-square-mile mesh Wi-Fi network covering nearly the entire city. It would then offer a range of broadband-access options, including free service as well as subscription residential and data services. The city also would have access to the network for its communications. AT&T won?t disclose how much the Springfield network would cost because the contract is still pending. But it is ?a substantial amount,? according to Ebrahim Keshavarz, AT&T?s managing director of new-services development. AT&T has been in the Wi-Fi service business for some time through AT&T Wi-Fi, a service that offers wireless service for business and consumers through 54,000 indoor ?hot spots? nationwide. Now the telco is moving outdoors and expanding that strategy to include municipal Wi-Fi mesh networks. While indoor Wi-Fi hot spots, cellular and wired digital-subscriber-line access might be the main connections for most customers, providing outdoor wireless through mesh Wi-Fi also play an important role in extending that access to broadband, Keshavarz said. It also helps that Wi-Fi radios have been incorporated in almost all new laptop computers, as well as a growing number of gaming devices and portable media players. A MOBILITY PLAY ?For the consumer side, we see it more as an extension of broadband in the home,? he said. While the more widely available digital subscriber line services will provide higher-speed and more reliable service, the added municipal Wi-Fi networks ?we see as a mobility play, really.? In addition, cities are looking to these networks to manage utilities and provide separate communications for public safety. Businesses also are looking for such systems to keep employees connected in and out of the office. ?We?ve seen the market evolve, where in the past cities had the right thought ? if you build a wireless network, there are lots of uses for it,? Keshavarz said. ?Where we?ve seen a change, though, is that municipalities now realize the scale of that. And doing it in a robust way, it makes sense to partner with someone like AT&T or other partners who do that for a living, essentially, and let them do that as an extension of their current infrastructure.? OWNING NETWORK COUNTS The move does put AT&T in competition with the likes of EarthLink Inc. and Google Inc., which have already pulled down Wi-Fi mesh network deals in San Francisco and Philadelphia, among others. But Keshavarz argues that AT&T has significant advantages because it owns the wired network that will be used to connect these networks to the larger Internet, and it can offer bundled services that allow DSL customers to take their connection outside the home. ?When cities look at us, they know that this is a company that knows how to do wireless, and there is a financial viability aspect, as well,? Keshavarz said. AT&T also has a lot of experience in the government and business sector, he added. By working with AT&T these cities have a chance to build a viable network that takes advantage of all the infrastructure in the ground, he said. It may well be that AT&T wants to gain a foothold in the municipal Wi-Fi market rather than cede it to potential broadband service competitors like EarthLink and Google, according to Tom Elliott, vice president of North American consulting for Strategy Analytics. It also could attract more valuable customers who will sign up for higher-tier offerings and generate more revenue. ?Some of those people will turn into interactive gamers or video-swappers ? they will be the high-bandwidth, high ARPU [average revenue per unit]-types. So if you are connected with offering them access, it is that much easier to convert that customer to whatever your premium offer is. In principal, it makes sense.? That also could provide another competitive plank for AT&T, especially since cable operators as yet have not entered the municipal Wi-Fi competition. Whether this will prompt cable operators to jump in, ?is a good question,? Elliott said. ?Historically, they?ve been focused on what they do best, which is getting a lot of stuff into your home,? he noted. ?Technically it?s a bit more of a stretch for them than an AT&T.? In addition, the joint venture with Sprint Nextel Corp. could be a barrier for partners Comcast Corp., Time Warner Cable, Bright House Networks and Cox Communications Inc., as any Wi-Fi service could compete against Sprint?s high-speed Evolution-Data Optimized cellular network service. SPRINT CONFLICT? ?If they got serious about being a mobile alternative, then you have questions about if they are doing a deal with Sprint, does it make sense for them to also be offering intra-urban mobility through Wi-Fi,? Elliott noted. ?If they felt compelled to offer their fixed customers a mobile alternative, they might be better off putting their energies behind supporting EV-DO.? Elliott also speculates that AT&T?s move into municipal Wi-Fi might have ramifications beyond simply offering a broadband connection alternative to its customers. ?It just seems to me that this potentially could be a chip played in games with a lot bigger stake than just cheap broadband access for the masses ? like in [video] franchising wars. It never hurts to have another friend in city hall.? ================================================= George Antunes Voice (713) 743-3923 Associate Professor Fax (713) 743-3927 Political Science Internet: antunes at uh dot edu University of Houston Houston, TX 77204-3011 ------------------------------ Message: 9 Date: Mon, 11 Sep 2006 16:45:02 -0500 From: George Antunes <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: [Medianews] La. Utility Continues Broadband Fight To: medianews@twiar.org Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED] Message-ID: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Content-Type: text/plain; format=flowed; charset=us-ascii La. Utility Continues Broadband Fight By Linda Haugsted MultiChannel News 9/11/2006 4:32:00 PM http://www.multichannel.com/article/CA6370673.html?display=Breaking+News Lafayette Utilities System of Louisiana went to that state's Supreme Court in an effort to overturn lower-court rulings that ban the utility from underwriting broadband-system-construction bonds with utility revenues. The municipal utility has been trying for more than two years to develop a broadband system in competition with Cox Communications and BellSouth. The latter two entities went to the state legislature in 2004, and lawmakers passed a bill that severely limits the ability of municipal entities to get into competitive broadband businesses. LUS went back to the drawing board on its process, holding a referendum on the project in order to comply with the new state law. In July 2005, that was approved overwhelmingly by voters. But this past May, a local resident, Elizabeth Naquin sued in district court to block the project. She alleged that the funding for the broadband system -- based on bonds guaranteed with revenue from utility customers -- violates the 2004 law. She lost in lower court, but the state's Third Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the utility's bond ordinance violates state policy. In the opinion of the appeals panel, a municipality may not use revenue from captive rate payers to support a broadband project, even if the broadband division pays back the utility division with interest. The appeal asserted that the bond program adheres to state law, and attorneys will argue that the lower court's interpretation of the state law is a barrier to community progress and to recovery from Hurricane Katrina. ================================================= George Antunes Voice (713) 743-3923 Associate Professor Fax (713) 743-3927 Political Science Internet: antunes at uh dot edu University of Houston Houston, TX 77204-3011 ------------------------------ _______________________________________________ Medianews mailing list Medianews@twiar.org http://twiar.org/mailman/listinfo/medianews_twiar.org End of Medianews Digest, Vol 28, Issue 1 ****************************************