Archive for the 'Americas' Category
Thursday, March 27th, 2008
| The Olympic torch is coming to San Francisco. Exactly where is another question.
Two weeks before the torch arrives here for its only stop in North America, San Francisco officials say they still have no final plans on its route through the city. And the delay has upset some groups — including members of the always-vocal San Francisco Board of Supervisors — that want to use the torch’s procession to protest China’s human rights record and its crackdown in Tibet.
Michael Risher, a lawyer with the American Civil Liberties Union , which has asked the city to hurry up and publicize its plans for the April 9 event, said his concern was that fans of the Games, due to begin in Beijing on Aug. 8, would be tipped off while protesters would be left wondering.
“We’re concerned that the people who are going to come to the ceremony and cheer will be given information,” Mr. Risher said, “and those that want to come and jeer will not.”
The jeering section includes some supervisors who are expected to introduce a nonbinding resolution on Thursday calling on the city to receive the torch with “alarm and protest at the failure of China” on human rights. A similar measure has already been voted down this month.
Mayor, who has met with the event organizers and police and transit officials several times this week, and shortened a planned eight-mile procession in response to various concerns, including security.
“As soon as we have some concrete expectations that the route won’t change materially, we’ll put it out.”
The mayor did disclose some details. He said the flame would begin and end its visit at AT&T Park, where baseball’s Giants play, and would travel the city’s waterfront. Protesters will be allowed at various points along the route, he said, and some areas will be set aside for larger demonstrations.
San Francisco was chosen as the sole North American host of the torch in part because of its large Chinese-American population. But among early plans for the flame that have been dropped was a trip through Chinatown, where organizers feared that the small streets would be overwhelmed by crowds. A planned ride on a cable car and a trip to Alcatraz were also shelved.
The torch had a bumpy international debut on Monday, when protesters tried to disrupt the lighting ceremony in Greece. Given that, Mr. Newsom said, whatever final plans the city makes could themselves be changed right up until the flame’s arrival from Paris.
source: newyork times
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Tuesday, March 18th, 2008
| A Japanese university plans to return about 250 pieces of original animation art to the Walt Disney Company that were mislaid in storage after traveling to Japan nearly five decades ago.
Disney said that the art — cels, backgrounds, preliminary paintings and storyboard sketches — was part of a collection that was handpicked by Walt Disney himself. It was sent to Japan in 1960 for a touring exhibition timed to the opening of the film “Sleeping Beauty.” The exhibition opened at Mitsukoshi Department Store in Tokyo in May of that year and traveled to 16 other stores throughout Japan.
“Walt wanted to explain every element of the animation process, so he chose artwork from all phases of production and a number of films,” said Lella Smith, creative director of the Disney Animation Research Library in Burbank, Calif., which preserves the studio’s artwork. “But the primary focus was ‘Sleeping Beauty.’ ”
Although most of the art is from that film, the collection also includes rare set-ups (cel and background combinations) from two Oscar-winning Silly Symphony cartoons: “Flowers and Trees” (1932), the first Technicolor cartoon and the first film to win the Academy Award for animated short film, and the landmark short “Three Little Pigs” (1933).
“The ‘Flowers and Trees’ set-up is an extremely important piece,” Ms. Smith said in an interview at her office in the library. She said other highlights included two backgrounds from the “Nutcracker Suite” and “Rite of Spring” sequences in the 1940 film “Fantasia.”
Among other striking works is a sequence of images by the designer Eyvind Earle that show how he created the stylized forest backgrounds for “Sleeping Beauty.” The delicate clusters of leaves and intricately textured bark on the trees reflect Mr. Earle’s interest in 15th-century French manuscripts and the painting of Van Eyck, and foreshadow his later serigraphs.
After the department store tour, Disney donated the artwork to the National Museum of Modern Art in Tokyo. But the material was not considered a good fit for its permanent collection, so the museum gave the pieces to Chiba University to enhance the study of the visual arts.
Chiba’s academic focus was on science, engineering and medicine, however, and the Disney art was consigned to a janitor’s closet and forgotten until it was found by chance four years ago. Although the artwork suffered some damage because of dampness, the rarest pieces were sealed in frames, which protected them somewhat.
After a year of restoration work by technicians at Disney’s Animation Research Library, some 200 works went on tour in Japan, along with 350 additional pieces lent by the studio in an exhibition titled “The Art of Disney.” The show toured seven museums around the country in 2006 and 2007, including the Tokyo Museum of Contemporary Art . At the end of its run, Chiba University offered to return the artwork to Disney.
In a statement Chiba University’s president, Toyoki Kozai, said, “The response to the exhibit gave us a new appreciation for the historical and artistic value of these works.”
Because the university was concerned about keeping them in good condition for the next generation, he said, it “concluded that entrusting them to Disney would be the best route to take.”
In return, Disney is giving Chiba University high-resolution digital copies of the artworks and $1 million for scholarships. But both sides said the deal should not be viewed as a sale.
In 1960 little value was placed on artwork from animated films, and cels were sold at Disneyland for a few dollars apiece. Today animation art is prized by collectors, and a top-quality Earle background from “Sleeping Beauty” might sell for $20,000 to $30,000. Given the rarity of some of the pieces, it is hard to assign a dollar value to the collection over all, because nothing comparable has been offered for sale.
“There is no way to put a price on these works — they represent our artistic heritage,” Ms. Smith, of Disney, said. “That said, their value as archival materials for study and research is very high.” She added that when the works were discovered, they did not have much commercial value because of years of accumulated damage from mold.
Mr. Kozai said that Chiba University would channel the donated money into its overall educational programs and into research on art and animation and what he called “the sound growth of children.”
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source: nytimes
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Monday, March 17th, 2008
| Taber Spani, one of the best high school girls basketball players in the nation, holds hands with two opponents as a coach reads a Bible verse. It is the way each game in the National Christian Homeschool Basketball Championships begins.
This is more than a postseason tournament for the 300 boys and girls teams from 19 states that have competed here over the past six days. As the stands packed with parents and the baselines overrun by small children attest, this is also a jamboree to celebrate faith and family.
“You build friendships here with other girls who know what it’s like to be self-motivated and disciplined and share your values,” said Spani, a junior who plays for the Metro Academy of Olathe, Kan. “I wouldn’t trade this tournament for anything.”
Only a decade ago, home-school athletics was considered little more than organized recess for children without traditional classrooms. Now, home-school players are tracked by scouts, and dozens of them have accepted scholarships to colleges as small as Blue Mountain in Mississippi and as well known as Iowa State
When the field for the women’s basketball tournament is selected Monday, there will be plenty more evidence that standout players can be plucked from a prayer circle as well as from a playground. Rachel McLeod of Liberty University, Corrie Hester of Oral Roberts and Shalin Spani of Kansas State, Taber’s older sister, all played in the national home-school tournament.
Taber Spani, however, is the movement’s most celebrated player. Two coaching giants in women’s college basketball, Connecticut’s Geno Auriemma and Tennessee’s Pat Summitt, who between them have won 12 national titles, are pursuing her.
An estimated two million children are schooled at home, and only 18 states have laws that grant them access to athletic teams at public schools. So it was perhaps inevitable that home-school programs and tournaments developed.
“As the home-school movement has gotten older, there has been much more demand for extracurricular activities,” said Ian M. Slatter, a spokesman for the Home School Legal Defense Association. “Parents had already crossed the hurdle of educating children at home, so now they have turned their energy and resources to athletics.”
Many of the best teams here were founded by some of the home-school athletic movement’s pioneers. In 1992, Tom Sanders bought some reversible jerseys and founded the Homeschool Christian Youth Association Warriors in Houston so his 14-year-old son could play organized basketball with his friends. He had to plead with small Christian schools, even reform schools, to schedule 14 games that season.
By 1998, Sanders’s program had sent Kevin Johnson, a 6-foot-8 center, to the University of Tulsa on a scholarship. Before this tournament, the Warriors had a 33-3 record against some of the best high school teams in Texas. Sanders’s son Jesse will play for Rice next season. The Warriors were represented by 12 teams and more than 100 players last week.
Likewise, Tim Flatt has built the Oklahoma City Storm into a feared opponent among the state’s high schools the past 10 years. His program has 125 boys and girls, ages 8 to 18, on 11 teams. As with most home-school groups, it was built on word of mouth and financed out of parents’ pockets and the occasional bake sale.
“We went from not being very good to not being scheduled again after we beat some big schools,” said Flatt, whose varsity boys team was 20-6 this season. “The culture has changed, and there is less of a stigma if you lose to a home-school team. It’s not a slap in the face now when we beat a high school team. They know we make them better for their state playoffs.”
In 2001, Flatt, a retired sports memorabilia dealer, took the National Christian Homeschool Basketball Championships here. He wanted to create not only a basketball showcase, but also a destination for families. He understood that fielding a home-school team remained an independent and often taxing endeavor. Rounding up opponents is a grind, as is raising as much as $20,000 annually for uniforms, renting gyms and traveling to tournaments.
“A lot of home-school teams play in small gyms, church gyms, and they play against weaker competition,” Flatt said. “They don’t get to experience something at a national scale. I wanted to make the kids feel like they were getting big-time treatment, and their parents want to take a week of vacation to come here.”
Flatt’s vision was on full display Wednesday at the 5,000-seat Sawyer Center at Southern Nazarene University. It was standing room only as parents and children shared pizza and watched the National Christian Homeschool all-American boys and girls teams compete in all-star games, as well as 3-point and dunk contests.
source: newyork times
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Tuesday, March 4th, 2008
| Sales of cars and trucks in the United States fell 10 percent in February as oil prices climbed past $100 a barrel and worries about a recession rattled consumer confidence.
only major automaker that sold more vehicles last month than in February 2007, though the increase was just 0.7 percent. The Detroit Three, whose lineups are still heavy in sport utility vehicles and pickup trucks despite their introduction of new passenger cars and crossovers, each reported double-digit percentage declines when adjusted for one additional selling day this year.
The carmakers largely blame the housing slump for the lackluster demand, particularly for the pickups used by building contractors, but steadily rising gas prices are yet another concern.
“I think $3 seems to be the invisible barrier that makes a difference,” said Steven J. Landry, Chrysler’s executive vice president for North American sales. Chrysler is owned by Cerberus Capital Management.
Americans were paying an average of $3.165 for a gallon of regular gas Monday, 69.8 cents more than a year ago, according to the AAA motor club. That increase adds more than $18 to the cost of a full tank for a Ford
Gas prices typically rise in the spring, and analysts say that $4 a gallon is possible within months.
The Ford Motor Company said it was cutting second-quarter production by 10 percent from the period in 2007, and G.M. reduced its second-quarter production forecast by 5 percent.
“We’re in the midst of consumers rethinking what kind of vehicle they truly need,” said Jesse Toprak, director of industry analysis at Edmunds.com, a Web site that gives car-buying advice to consumers.
For many people, that means driving a smaller car off the dealership lot than they have in the past. And for automakers, that means considerably less income, because small cars have much smaller price tags. In contrast, a big truck could generate as much as $10,000 in profits.
“Small cars are hot, but the profits are very thin,” said Ron Pinelli, the president of Autodata. “The pickup trucks and the large utes, this was the bread and butter for Detroit. That was a money pump for them.”
The Detroit automakers have introduced several small cars recently that are proving popular. Last month, Ford dealerships sold 36 percent more of the Focus, a compact sedan that was redesigned for 2008, though much of that increase was offset by an intentional reduction in deliveries to rental car companies. Sales of the compact Chevrolet Cobalt rose 50 percent.
But selling thousands more of those cars brings in only as much money as a few hundred more pickups could.
Over all, Ford was the only Detroit company that did not lose market share in February, staying flat at 15.7 percent. G.M.’s share fell to 22.7 percent, from 24.4 percent, and Chrysler’s fell to 12.8 percent, from 13.9 percent.
“When there’s a downturn in the economy and people are nervous about their jobs, the last thing they want to do is make a big purchase,” Mr. Pinelli said.
“The discussion of, ‘We’re in a recession,’ ‘We might be in a recession,’ ‘When are we going in a recession?’ — I think that that hurts consumer confidence,” Mr. LaNeve said. “I’d almost like to say, ‘Hey, we were in one in the fourth quarter, and when are we going to get out of it?’ I think it’s better in terms of consumer mind-set in buying new vehicles.”
Mr. LaNeve said sales had not been affected by a weeklong strike at one of its biggest parts suppliers, which has forced G.M. to halt production at six factories. G.M. idled another plant, in Moraine, Ohio, on Monday after running out of parts for three sport utility vehicles built there. A Hummer plant in Mishawaka, Ind., operated by AM General is scheduled to shut down Tuesday.
No talks have occurred since the strike began Feb. 26. G.M. has about five months’ worth of its pickup trucks in inventory.
“It’ll be a long time before we run out of pickups to sell,” Mr. LaNeve said. “We are in great shape for 60 to 90 days easy on our full-size pickups.”
Chrysler said it had enough minivans for the time being, even though the plant in Windsor, Ontario, that builds them had to close last week because of another supplier strike.
Operating Officer for G.M.
The General Motors Corporation said Monday that its board had elected its vice chairman and chief financial officer, Frederick A. Henderson, to the post of president and chief operating officer.
Mr. Henderson’s financial duties will be taken over by Ray Young, who will become executive vice president and chief financial officer.
G.M. said it previously had a chief operating officer position, and it was now time to re-establish the post.
source: newyorknews
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Monday, February 11th, 2008
| Nearly six million people with digital receivers may still lose TV signals when digital-only broadcasts begin next February, a new study says.
The study by Centris, a market research firm in Los Angeles, found gaps in broadcast signals that may leave an estimated 5.9 million TV sets unable to receive as many channels as they did before the changeover. It may affect even those who bought the government-approved converter boxes or a new digital TV. To keep broadcast reception, many viewers may have to buy new outdoor antennas, the study found.
The federal government estimates that 21 million American households have primary TV sets that receive only over-the-air signals. But it says most will continue to get a digital signal by means of a digital-to-analog converter box, which costs about $50 to $70. It is helping to underwrite the cost of a converter box by issuing $40 coupons.
Centris said it looked at a more detailed method for predicting the coverage pattern of TV signals than the government had used.
However, the problems with reception could be far worse, according to engineers who have taken signal measurements. One study of the first HDTV station by
“For the people with rabbit-ear antennas, I would say at least 50 percent won’t get the channels they were getting,” Dr. Bendov said. “I would say a lot of people are going to be very unhappy.”
Digital reception is more affected by hills, trees, buildings and other interference than analog has been. An analog TV picture degrades gradually, getting more snow or ghosting as a signal becomes weaker.
But digital TV is subject to the “cliff effect” — the picture is excellent until the signal gets weak and the picture suddenly drops out.
The number of sets that the Centris study projects will fail varies from city to city, based largely on the landscape. In Las Vegas, which lies in a flat basin, the study estimates that 2.5 percent of over-the-air TVs would lose at lease one of five major networks. In Philadelphia, which has more hills, 5 percent of over-the-air TVs would lose reception, while in St. Louis, 10 percent would lose reception.
Centris says, based on the F.C.C.’s data, a digital signal would travel 60 to 75 miles in those three cities. However, Centris says its own model showed that the signals would degrade at 35 miles.
Whether a TV gets a strong digital signal may depend on seemingly minor impediments, said David Klein, executive vice president of Centris. “Are there big trees in your area? Is there a big retaining wall next your house?” he said. “It’s not a matter of, ‘is reception good in your neighborhood’; it’s a matter of, ‘can I get the signal in the bedroom?’ ”
Centris also estimated that of the 117 million TVs not connected to cable or satellite, up to 80 percent have set-top rabbit-ear antennas that may not be able to pull in an adequate digital signal. Many of those sets will require a better antenna or a cable or satellite connection to do so.
Electronics manufacturers say the quality of the TV’s receiver and converter will play a role.
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Wednesday, January 2nd, 2008
| WASHINGTON — United States intelligence analysts are not convinced by the evidence offered so far by Pakistani authorities that a militant linked to Al Qaeda was responsible for Benazir Bhutto’s assassination, American officials said Tuesday.
Pakistani authorities, working from a single intelligence intercept collected the day after Ms. Bhutto’s death, have identified a militant leader, Baitullah Mehsud, as the chief suspect behind the attack.
“As far as I know, the Pakistanis are saying this is it, this is the proof,” said a senior State Department official, who, like other officials contacted for this article, spoke on condition of anonymity because of the continuing investigation. “Before our guys say yes or no, they need a hell of a lot more than one thing, even if it is a substantial piece of evidence.”
As American officials disclosed Tuesday that the Bush administration had differed with Ms. Bhutto’s representatives over how best to improve security for her, questions surrounding her assassination mounted, adding to the pressure for outside involvement in the inquiry.
A Pentagon official said that American analysts were examining several other potential enemies of Ms. Bhutto, including elements of Pakistani Taliban groups and other Islamic extremists. “There are so many people who’d want to kill her, it’s difficult to ascribe any one agency,” the official said.
American officials said that the United States did not have access to all the information available to Pakistani authorities, and that in the end, Mr. Mehsud might well be held responsible for the attack on Ms. Bhutto. Based in the South Waziristan tribal areas near the Afghan border, Mr. Mehsud has been accused by Pakistani officials of being behind most of the suicide attacks on government, military and intelligence targets in recent months.
With skepticism growing inside and outside Pakistan about the competence and objectivity of the investigation into Ms. Bhutto’s assassination, President Pervez Musharraf is expected as early as Wednesday to ask Scotland Yard to send technicians to help with the inquiry, an American official said.
Senior Bush administration officials and American lawmakers from both parties have privately been urging Mr. Musharraf to allow international involvement in the inquiry to give it credibility with Ms. Bhutto’s family and supporters, and to help tamp down civil unrest.
While a team of forensic experts from the Federal Bureau of Investigation has been standing by to fly to Pakistan, an American official said Tuesday that sending British specialists from Scotland Yard would be less likely to inflame tensions in Pakistan.
Outside experts joining the inquiry are unlikely to assuage Ms. Bhutto’s most fervent supporters, including her widower, Asif Ali Zardari, and her 19-year-old son, Bilawal Bhutto Zardari, who has been chosen as chairman of the Pakistan Peoples Party.
The elder Mr. Zardari has called for an inquiry modeled on one by the United Nations after the 2005 assassination of Rafik Hariri, a former Lebanese premier. Pakistan’s ambassador to the United States, Mahmud Ali Durrani, seemed to rule out that possibility, saying in a telephone interview on Monday that such an international investigation posed “a lot of complications.”
The elder Mr. Zardari has also complained that the Bush administration failed to press Mr. Musharraf’s government hard enough to provide adequate security for his wife during her campaign.
On Tuesday, however, American officials fired back, saying they had provided a constant flow of threat reports to Ms. Bhutto and her political advisers, even before she returned to Pakistan on Oct. 18 after a self-imposed exile.
American intelligence officials said they never received a credible threat of an attack with a specific date, time or place. Short of that, they said, Ms. Bhutto, a strongly opinionated, two-time prime minister, decided she would mount an aggressive political campaign.
“U.S. officials repeatedly met with and spoke with former Prime Minister Bhutto and members of her party — including Zardari — to discuss her security concerns,” the State Department official said. “It was general advice, not what route to take or which rally to attend.”
The official said that each time Ms. Bhutto or her advisers requested the administration’s help in getting increased security for her from the Musharraf government, administration or embassy officials pressed her case with Pakistani authorities. On the day she was killed, Ms. Bhutto was riding in an armored car after a political rally in Rawalpindi.
The State Department official said diplomats at the United States Embassy in Islamabad, including Ambassador Anne W. Patterson, were in daily contact with officials from Ms. Bhutto’s party. The Americans passed along information and specific advice on private security contractors to hire, counsel that Ms. Bhutto and her aides apparently spurned, the official said.
Diplomats and security experts at the American Embassy, for example, discouraged Ms. Bhutto from hiring American or British private security firms, fearing that a Western guard detail would draw too much attention to her and become a target.
Security officers at the embassy instead recommended the names of half a dozen Pakistani security companies that the United States and other Western countries had used to protect their personnel, the State Department official said. “The local companies employed guards who spoke the language and knew the landscape,” the official said.
But Ms. Bhutto and her husband rejected that suggestion, the official said, apparently fearing that even the reputable Pakistani firms might be infiltrated by extremists.
“Was she aware of the threat? Of course, she was aware,” said the Pentagon official. “But I don’t know how foolproof you can make any security when people are willing to kill themselves.”
source: newyorktimes
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Friday, December 14th, 2007
| Seats in the FCX Clarity include fans to heat and warm occupants, reducing the energy drain of the climate-control system. Concave interior surfaces add to a sense of spaciousness.
OFTEN, it is the smallest of gestures that deliver the most powerful messages. I was reminded of this last month when I settled into the driver’s seat of the FCX Clarity, a sedan powered by fuel cells that Honda will begin leasing to a handful of private customers next summer. Fresh from a briefing that detailed the car’s NASA-grade complexity, I wondered what procedures might be required to start the reaction of hydrogen and oxygen and bring the power supply to life.
In fact, it took nothing more than inserting an entirely conventional metal key into a normal-looking switch and pushing a power button much like the one that starts the Honda S2000 sports car. The familiarity of the steps — deliberate gestures, I think, to convince drivers that the cars of our future aren’t so frightening after all — reinforced the message of the meeting I had just left: the FCX Clarity is ready now.
Scanning the dashboard for unmarked switches, mysterious buttons and puzzling controls, I looked for the inevitable loose ends of an engineering prototype being hustled toward production. Seeing nothing unfamiliar beyond a dazzling 3D dashboard display — a large power meter where my eye expected a tachometer, with a glowing ball in its center to track hydrogen consumption — I noted essentials like the parking brake and seat adjustment, all familiar operations. There really wasn’t going to be much out of the ordinary about the way this car drove, at least.
That theme was repeated by another, less apparent gesture: no engineer or technician from Honda came along on my test drive, both a sign of confidence in the car’s road-readiness and an indication of how normal it is.
Normalcy is a recurring, and intentional, theme of the FCX Clarity. It is refueled using a high-pressure connector tucked behind a typical gas-cap door on the rear fender. It has a handsome exterior, a nice audio system and plenty of knee room in the back. (A design analysis is at nytimes.com/autos) Anyone who has driven a Toyota Prius will feel at home with the dash-mounted gear selector and the park button.
Honda has not announced who will get the FCX Claritys or how many will be available in Southern California, where the program begins. Households will be selected, in part, for their ready access to hydrogen stations. Honda is realistic about the slow growth of a hydrogen infrastructure as well as the viewpoint that fuel cells may not seem to make much sense using current methods of hydrogen production.
But there are practical matters to consider as well: compared with alternatives like plug-in hybrids, the onboard energy supply is quicker to replenish and has a better travel range, 270 miles. Moreover, in Honda’s full-cycle calculation, a fuel-cell vehicle can reduce carbon dioxide output by half compared with a gasoline vehicle. In the United States, where much electricity is produced from coal, it is even better than a battery-electric car, Honda says.
It will be a while before drivers selected for the three-year, $600-a-month Clarity lease program (it includes insurance and maintenance) will think about such topics. Instead, they will revel in its extraordinary silence. It drives away from a stop so quietly that it seems to be holding its breath, much as a hybrid does before the gas engine starts. Accelerating onto Interstate 10, though, incites a turbinelike zing — quite pleasant, really, if not as satisfying as the guttural bark of a V-8 — and the Clarity blends effortlessly into traffic. The sound of a pump at work breaks the silence occasionally, but it has none of the clicking and whirring evident in the previous-generation FCX.
Honda says the performance is on par with a similar-size car powered by a 2.4-liter engine, and it should know, as the 2008 Accord LX has just such an engine. The comparison is apt. The FCX motor produces 134 horsepower and 189 pound-feet of torque; the Accord’s in-line four makes 177 horsepower and 161 pound-feet. The Clarity weighs nearly 3,600 pounds, and while that is 400 pounds lighter than its predecessor, the Accord is some 300 pounds lighter yet. The wheelbases of the Clarity and Accord are identical at 110.2 inches.
On a drive up the Pacific Coast Highway to Malibu, the Clarity lacked nothing except engine noise, and it easily kept pace with traffic when I turned off and headed up into the canyons. It wouldn’t be smart (or useful) to look for the edge when driving what is probably a million-dollar handbuilt car, but the FCX handled curves admirably and effortlessly. The electric power steering was a bit quick for my taste, but more than making up for that were the marvelous brakes showing none of the coarseness of the Prius’s regenerative braking.In fact, the degree of refinement was impressive throughout, from the polished look under the hood to the absence of rattles and squeaks one might excuse in a car that is still far from an assembly-line product. The FCX is no lab rat.
While the FCX seems fully qualified for local duties, its practicality for longer trips will have to wait on the availability of hydrogen. In this latest version, the range is a reasonable 270 miles on a single refill of the 5,000 p.s.i. tank behind the rear seat. Most fuel-cell vehicles using compressed hydrogen are now built around 10,000 p.s.i. tanks for greater range.
Honda chose to take a different route, emphasizing efficiency over capacity.
For instance, the 100-kilowatt fuel-cell stack is a Honda-built vertical-flow design, more powerful than the previous design, yet smaller — about the size of a carry-on suitcase — and lighter. The engineers reduced the load on the air-conditioning system by bringing climate control directly to the occupants, using fans in the seats to blow air cooled or warmed by thermoelectric elements.
Honda calculates its hydrogen consumption as the equivalent of 68 miles a gallon, all the more impressive considering the car’s excellent performance and accommodations for four — and the fact that it is fitted with the same tires as an Accord V-6, rather than special high-mileage rubber.
Until now, writing about fuel cells has been a no-risk proposition, with no reality check looming, no looking back when the cars arrived in showrooms to see whether one had been embarrassingly optimistic. Way back in the 1990s, a physicist assured me that fuel-cell cars were 20 years away — and always would be.
Honda has a different timeline; it considers this version of the FCX a production car, ready to roll into showrooms from a manufacturing and operational standpoint. Issues like fuel supply — potentially addressed by a grow-your-own solution called the Home Energy Station — remain unsolved, as does the matter of cost. The FCX Clarity still costs several orders of magnitude more than it will have to when true retail sales, without a Honda-subsidized lease, begin.
Maybe it’s not yet time to call back the pessimistic physicist — it’s my cousin Howard, actually — but the day is drawing closer.
source: newyork times
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Saturday, April 21st, 2007
FORBES VALUE YANKEES AT US$1.2 BILLION
April 21 , 2007
There’s money in those pinstripes.
The value increased by 17 percent for New York Yankees in the past year to $1.2 billion,
Forbes magazine said Thursday in its annual estimates of Franchise worth.
The Florida Marlins given the lowest value at $244 million, had the highest operating
income at $43.3 million, according to the magazine.
“As usual, the Franchise Valuations and operating income numbers are pure Fantasy and
based on no correct information,” Marlins president David Samson said. “To comment on
such irresponsible journalism would only give it more credit than it deserves.”
The magazine defended its article.
“Forbes compiles its annual valuations of Major League Baseball franchises based on
information obtained from team executives, sports bankers, public documents, and other
sources believed to be reliable,” spokeswoman Elizabeth Wasden said. “We stand by our
figures, and the content published.”
Despite the record evaluation for the Yankees, Forbes said they were the only ones to
post an operating loss after revenue sharing last year. The magazine estimated the
Yankees were $25.2 million in the red on operating revenue of $302 million, after
revenue-sharing payments to the commissioner’s office. The Yankees estimate their
revenue-sharing bill for 2006 will be about $70 million.
“I am gratified at the Forbes valuation of the Yankees,” New York owner George
Steinbrenner said in a statement. “We are continuing to build a worldwide brand for the
people of New York and Yankee fans everywhere.”
The New York Mets were given the second-highest value ($736 million), followed by
the Boston Red Sox ($724 million), the Los Angeles Dodgers ($632 million),
the Chicago Cubs ($592 million), World Series champion St. Louis ($460 million),
San Francisco ($459 million), Atlanta ($458 million) and Philadelphia ($457 million).
At the other end were Florida ($244 million), Tampa Bay ($267 million),
Pittsburgh ($274 million), Kansas City ($282 million), Milwaukee ($287 million),
Minnesota ($288 million) and Oakland ($292 million).
Franchise values did not include provisions for television networks owned in whole
or part by teams, such as the YES Network (Yankees), NESN (Red Sox) and Comcast
SportsNetChicago (Cubs), Forbes associate editor Kurt Badenhausen said.
The Dodgers had the second-highest operating income at $27.5 million, followed by
Pittsburgh ($25.3 million), Cleveland ($24.9 million), the Mets ($24.4 million),
Colorado ($23.9 million), Cincinnati ($22.4 million), the Cubs ($22.2 million),
Seattle ($21.5 million), Milwaukee ($20.8 million) and Tampa ($20.2 million).
Rob Manfred, baseball’s executive vice president of labor relations, criticized Forbes’
figures last year but declined comment Thursday.
Source New York AP
http://wwwUniversalNews.blogspot.com
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Sunday, March 18th, 2007
| Silicon Valley, March 18. (PTI):
While Google\’s phenomenal growth may by the envy of many, Microsoft Corp CEO Steve Ballmer criticised the internet company for trying to grow too fast. In a presentation at Stanford University\’s Graduate School of Business, Ballmer said Microsoft went from 24 to 75,000 people in nearly three decades, while Google had become a very large company in a fraction of that time.
“They\’re trying to double in a year. I think that\’s insane, in my opinion,” Ballmer said. Microsoft, with a more managed growth, had been digesting a certain percentage of growth over many years.” “What that has allowed us to do is build up a base of capable people who can take on more capable people.”
Ballmer also questioned Google\’s corporate culture of encouraging individual projects by employees. Google is known to allow its engineers devote 20 per cent of their work time to pet projects. “I don\’t really know if any one has proven that a random collection of people doing their own thing actually creates value. That doesn\’t create value, in my opinion,” he said. Playing down the efforts of Microsoft\’s fiercest rival, Ballmer described Google as a one-trick pony. “Google built one very good business. They only have one thing they do. Everything else is sort of cute,” Ballmer said.
“We do a lot of things that are cute, too. I\’ll tell you about our robotics effort, for example, but that\’s not paying for me to come down to Stanford,” Ballmer said amidst huge laughs from the business students. “I like to refer to us as a two-trick pony, and that\’s rare in the history of business. Desktop software was a trick. Server was a trick. Our third trick is trying to do online, and our fourth trick is trying to do consumer electronics,” he said. Ballmer, who left the Stanford Graduate School of Business in 1980 after a year to take up a job at Microsoft, said there are basically four stages in business: coming up with an idea, getting it to critical mass, milking it financially and then finding a new idea.
He said, “Google is in the part of the cycle where they are milking,” acknowledging that\’s a fun stage. “That was the \’90s for us… or I would say the \’80s and \’90s.” Ballmer also noted that currently 60 per cent of the industry\’s computer engineering and programming graduates are coming from China and India. Recruiting them is getting harder because of immigration restrictions in the US. “With the current issues that there are with H-1B visas there\’s even more pressure,” Ballmer said. The H-1B visa gives its holder permission to work on a temporary basis in the US in a specialty occupation.
Universal News
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GOOGLE growing insanely BALLMER
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Saturday, March 10th, 2007
| US President George Bush meets the Uruguayan president as part of his five-nation Latin American tour.
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