Decline of reading?

On November 19th 2007 the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) announced the release of To Read or Not To Read: A Question of National Consequence, (PDF format 3.32 MB; 98 pages) a new and comprehensive analysis of reading patterns in the United States. To Read or Not To Read gathers statistics from more than 40 studies on the reading habits and skills of children, teenagers, and adults. The compendium reveals recent declines in voluntary reading and test scores alike, exposing trends that have severe consequences for American society.

Among the key findings:

- Americans are reading less

- Americans are reading less well

- The declines in reading have civic, social, and economic implications

On January 16th 2008, a new study (in the UK) overturns the common assumption that the "Google Generation" - youngsters born or brought up in the Internet age - is the most web-literate. The first ever virtual longitudinal study carried out by the CIBER research team at University College London claims that, although young people demonstrate an apparent ease and familiarity with computers, they rely heavily on search engines, view rather than read and do not possess the critical and analytical skills to assess the information that they find on the web. The report Information Behaviour of the Researcher of the Future (PDF format; 1.67MB; 35 pages) also shows that research-behaviour traits that are commonly associated with younger users – impatience in search and navigation, and zero tolerance for any delay in satisfying their information needs – are now becoming the norm for all age-groups, from younger pupils and undergraduates through to professors.

Steven Berlin Johnson (1968) is an american popular science author and he's widely known for his book "Everything bad is good for you: How today's popular culture is actually making us smarter"; Johnson is very sceptical about about the decline of reading described in the 2 studies and he wrote it in The Guardian:

"We've been hearing about the decline of reading for so long now that it's amazing a contemporary teenager can even recognise a book, much less read one. The US (where I am) seems to be cycling through yet another "Johnny can't read" mini-panic, sparked by the release of a National Endowment for the Arts study, called To Read Or Not To Read, which chronicles in exhaustive statistical detail the waning of literary culture and its dire consequences for society. Newspapers dutifully editorialised about America's literacy crisis.

It's the sort of "our kids in peril" story - right up there with threats of MySpace predators - that plays well as a three-minute television newsbite or a three-paragraph op-ed piece. But if you actually read the report, what you find are some startling omissions - omissions that ultimately lead to a heavily distorted view of the Google generation and its prospects." full article

Director (Sunil Iyengar) of the Office of Research & Analysis at the United States' National Endowment for the Arts and former director (Mark Bauerlein) replied to Steven Johnson:

"Steven Johnson diminished the significance of reading problems in the Britain and the United States, and misrepresented our research into the issue (Dawn of the digital natives, February 7). His biggest error was to assert that "in almost every study [the US National Endowment for the Arts] city, screen-based reading is excluded from the data." full article

Mobile tv in Europe: another step for DVB-H

Good news for DVB-H (and bad news for T-DMB ?)

July 2007
Commission proposed a strategy for promoting Mobile TV across Europe.
It included the use of the open standard DVB-H as the common standard for
terrestrial Mobile TV across Europe

November 2007
The Council of Telecoms Ministers endorsed the European Commission's
strategy on Mobile TV

Today, 17/03/2008
Commission endorses addition of DVB-H to EU List of Official standards

"For Mobile TV to take off in Europe, there must first be certainty about the technology. This is why I am glad that with today's decision, taken by the Commission in close coordination with the Member States and the European Parliament, the EU endorse DVB-H as the preferred technology for terrestrial mobile broadcasting," said Viviane Reding, EU Commissioner for the Information Society and Media. The next steps for implementing the EU strategy on mobile broadcasting will include guidance on the authorisation regimes as well as the promotion of rights management systems based, as is DVB-H, on open standards"

Shall I ever read Viviane Reding saying "For digital radio to take off in Europe, there must first be certainty about the technology"??

DVB-H is an open standard developed by the open Digital Video Broadcasting (DVB) Consortium. It is part of a family of interoperable standards that dominate digital broadcasting around the world, together with DVB-S for digital satellite TV, DVB-C for digital cable TV and DVB-T for digital terrestrial TV

Observer: most powerful blogs

Nine journalists of Observer wrote a list of the world's 50 most powerful
blogs (from Observer, March 9 2008)

1 The Huffington Post
Huffington Post is a liberal online news site and aggregated blog founded (in 2005) by millionaire Arianna Stassinopoulos Huffington (1950) and Kenneth Lerer
2 Boing Boing
Boing Boing was launched in January 2000 and has had an immeasurable influence on the style and idiom of blogging. But hidden among the pictures of steam-powered CD players and Darth Vader tea towels there is a steely, ultra-liberal political agenda: championing the web as a global medium free of state and corporate control
3 Techcrunch
Techcrunch began in 2005 as a blog about dotcom start-ups in Silicon Valley, but has quickly become one of the most influential news websites across the entire technology industry. Founder Michael Arrington had lived through the internet goldrush as a lawyer and entrepreneur before deciding that writing about new companies was more of an opportunity than starting them himself. His site is now ranked the third-most popular blog in the world by search engine Technorati, spawning a mini-empire of websites and conferences as a result. Business Week named Arrington one of the 25 most influential people on the web, and Techcrunch has even scored interviews with Barack Obama and John McCain
4 Kottke
one of the early wave of blogging pioneers, web designer Jason Kottke started keeping track of interesting things on the internet as far back as 1998. The site took off, boosted partly through close links to popular blog-building website Blogger
5 Dooce
Heather B. Armstrong (1975) is an american blogger who writes her personal blog under the pseudonym of Dooce
6 Perezhilton
Mario Armando Lavandeira Jr (1978) blogs at Perez Hilton about gossip items about musicians, actors and celebrities
7 Talking Points Memo
TPM is a centre-left political blog created (in November 2000) and run by Josh Marshall
8 Icanhascheezburger
ICHC (I Can Has Cheezburger?) was created in January 2007 and it shows lolcats (images combining a photograph of an animal with a funny caption in broken english)
9 Beppe Grillo
probably the most famous blog in Italy
10 Gawker
a New York blog of 'snarky' gossip and commentary about the media industry, Gawker was founded in 2002 by journalist Nick Denton
11 The Drudge Report
it's a US-based news aggregation site (blog?) run by Matt Drudge; it became famous worldwide when it was the first to talk about Monica Lewinksy
12 Xu Jinglei
Jinglei is a popular actress in China, who in 2005 began a blog ('I got the joy of expressing myself') which within a few months had garnered 11.5m visits and spurred thousands of other Chinese to blog. In 2006 statisticians at Technorati, having previously not factored China into their calculations, realised Jinglei's blog was the most popular in the world; the blog is in chinese language
13 Treehugger
green consumer blog with a mission to bring a sustainable lifestyle to the masses
14 Microsiervos
founded in 2001, it's a spanish-language blog run by 3 guys in Madrid
15 TMZ
entertainment news, celebrity gossip and Hollywood rumours
16 Engadget
popular blog on gadgets and consumer electronics
17 Marbury
a british commentary on the 2008 US presidential race
18 Chez Pim
Pim grew up in Bangkok and she moved to San Francisco; she travels a lot and she blogs about restaurants, recipes and anything about food
19 Basic Thinking
german-language blog, recently rated the 18th most influential blog in the world by Wikio, Basic Thinking, which has the tag line 'Mein Haus, Mein Himmel, Mein Blog', is run by Robert Basic of Usingen, Germany, who aims 'to boldly blog what no one has blogged before', and recently posted his 10,000th entry
20 The Sartorialist
fashion blog run by Scott Schuman, the blog attracts more than 70,000 readers a day and has been named one of Time's Top 100 Design Influences
21 Students for a Free Tibet
global, grassroots network of students campaigning to free Tibet
22 Jezebel
celebrity, sex and fashion: a blog like a women's magazine
23 Gigazine
japanese-language blog, it's the most popular blog in Japan
24 Girl with a one-track mind
following in the footsteps of Belle de Jour – the anonymous blogger claiming to be a sex worker – the girl with a one track mind started writing in open, explicit terms about her lively sex life in 2004
25 Mashable
created by Peter Cashmore in 2005, it's a is a social-networking news blog, reporting on and reviewing the latest developments, applications and features available in or for MySpace, Facebook, Bebo and other social-networking sites and services
26 Greek tragedy
Stephanie Tara Klein's blog allows her to 'create an online scrapbook of my life, complete with drawings, photos and my daily musings' or, rather, tell tawdry tales of dating nightmares, sexual encounters and bodily dysfunctions
27 Holy Moly
latest celebrity gossip & entertainment news for UK, Hollywood & more
28 Michelle Malkin
Michelle Malkin, a conservative newspaper columnist and author with one of the most widely read conservative blogs in the US
29 Cranky flier
Brett Snyder is obsessed with airports and airplanes and he gives us all the information we may ever need about planes
30 Go fug yourself
comedy blog about fashion gossip run by Jessica Morgan and Heather Cocks
31 Gaping void
Hugh MacLeod is a cartoonist and professional blogger, known for his ideas about how "Web 2.0" affects advertising and marketing
32 DirtyDirtyDancing
pictures from parties in London (is it a blog?)
33 Crooked timber
formed as an internet supergroup, pulling several popular intellectual blogs together, Crooked Timber now has 16 members – largely academics – across the US, Europe, Australia and Asia. The site has built itself a reputation as something of an intellectual powerhouse; a sort of global philosophical thinktank conducted via blog
34 Bean sprouts
combining diary, opinion and green lifestyle tips, Beansprouts is a blog that covers one family's 'search for the good life'. Melanie Rimmer and her family of five live in a 'small ex-council house' with a garden on the edge of farmland in Poynton, Cheshire (UK)
35 The offside
UK-based blog covering football leagues globally
36 Peteite Anglaise
bored at work one day in 2004, expat secretary Catherine Sanderson happened upon the concept of blogging. With a few clicks and an impulse she created her own blog, and quickly gathered fans who followed her life in Paris, the strained relationship with her partner and adventures with her toddler
37 Crooks and liars
founded in 2004 by John Amato, it's a progressive/liberal-leaning political blog
38 Chocolate and zucchini
it's a blog written by Clotilde Dusoulier, a 28-year-old Parisian woman who lives in Montmartre and shares her passion for all things food-related -- thoughts, recipes, musings, cookbook acquisitions, quirky products, nifty tools, restaurant experiences, ideas, and inspirations
39 Samizdata
written by a bunch of anarcho-libertarians, tax rebels, Eurosceptics and Wildean individualists, it has a special niche in the political blogosphere: like a dive bar, on the rational side of the border between fringe opinion and foam-flecked paranoid ranting
40 Andrew Sullivan - The daily dish
Andrew Sullivan (1963) is an english man living in US and he's been blogging since 2000; he supported Bush in 2000, Kerry in 2004 and he's supporting Barack Obama now
41 The f word
contemporary UK feminism
42 Jonny B's private secret diary
growing in popularity since its debut in 2003, Jonny B's diary catalogues the rock and bowls lifestyle of one man in the depths of rural Norfolk
43 Popjustice
founded in May 2000, the most famous blog about pop music
44 Waiter rant
rant isn't quite the right word for this collection of carefully crafted stories from the sharp end of the service industry in a busy New York restaurant. 'The Waiter', as the author is known, has been blogging his experiences with fussy customers and bad tippers since 2004, winning a gong at blogging's biggest awards, the Bloggies, in 2007
45 Hecklerspray
sharply written and often laugh-out-loud funny, Hecklerspray has been called the British alternative to Perez Hilton, but it's different in important ways: the emphasis here is on style and wit, with a stated aim to 'chronicle the ups and downs of all that is populist and niche within the murky world of entertainment'
46 WOW Insider
blog about the World of Warcraft, the role-playing game
47 AngryBlackBitch
Angry Black Bitch, which has the tagline, 'Practising the Fine Art of Bitchitude', is the four-year-old blog of Shark Fu of St Louis, Missouri
48 Style bubble
Susie Bubble lives in London and she blogs about fashion
49 After Ellen
news, reviews & commentary on lesbian and bisexual women in entertainment and the media
50 Copyblogger
Copyblogger was founded in 2006 by Brian Clark, who blogs about copywriting skills

London is not calling anymore (on shortwave)

The BBC decided to stop broadcasting BBC World Service to Europe on shortwave (with amplitude modulation) on 18th February 2008: after decades it's an end of an era.

This is the statement from BBC official site:

"Shortwave changes for Europe February 2008

The remaining BBC World Service shortwave transmissions* to Europe closed on 18th February 2008.

This change was made in line with listener trends in radio. Increasing numbers of people around the world are choosing to listen to radio on a range of other platforms including FM, satellite and online, with fewer listening on shortwave.

This is particularly the case in Europe, where the majority of shortwave transmissions ceased in March 2007. The current closures affect the remaining transmissions heard in southern Europe.

Please note these changes also affect English short wave transmissions to North Africa.

* Digital shortwave radio (DRM - Digital Radio Mondiale) for north-east continental Europe will not be affected "

BBC World Service (called BBC Empire Service) started on December 1932 and it gained a lot of credibility through years, becoming a real legend. In a time of dictators ruling several countries in Europe, BBC offered news in many languages (" by the time war ended in 1945, the BBC was offering programmes in 45 languages worldwide"); and the purpose of BBC was not propaganda: "unlike the american stations, for instance, the BBC did not encourage the Hungarians' failed uprising against the Soviet Union in 1956".

The Guardian wrote about the shutdown and we can read:

"There comes a point where the shortwave audience in a given region becomes so small that spending money on it can no longer be justified," the World Service said.

and

"It is a landmark in as much that the BBC and other international broadcasters have been using shortwave for the last three-quarters of a century and it is now coming to an end," said Simon Spanswick, the chief executive of the Association for International Broadcasting, the industry association for the international broadcast community.

"Everybody now has to use different ways to engage listeners. Nobody in the developed world listens on noisy, crackly shortwave anymore," Spanswick added.

New York Times didn't miss the news and added:

“Europe is very developed and so is America,” said Michael Gardner, a spokesman for BBC World Service. “Shortwave is not the best way of reaching those audiences there. They all have FM, AM stations close by. Some of them have satellites, or they can pull it down on their TV screens and there are alternatives online. There are lots of ways of interacting with the BBC.”

and

Andy Sennitt, a media specialist with the Dutch public broadcaster, Radio Netherlands Worldwide, said that he got his start 30 years ago working on BBC shortwave broadcasts and had mixed feelings about the end of the transmissions.

“For die-hard shortwave listeners, this is negative,” he said. “What they don’t understand is the huge cost of powering transmitters. The cost of diesel fuel has doubled.”

Don't miss this post of a blog where there are more than 30 interesting comments.

In 1932 Christmas Message (the message was written by Rudyard Kipling) King George V used BBC saying:

"I speak now from my home and my heart to you all; to men and women so cut off by the snows, the desert or the sea that only voices out of the air can reach them".

Today people cut off by the snows, the desert or the sea do need a satellite dish or an Internet connection

European Union on the air

In April 2008 European Union will have its own network of radio stations working in a consortium. Good, but who is missing?
So far Austria, Cyprus, Denmark, Estonia, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Slovakia and Sweden are out of the project. Finland and the UK don't seem very interested: their radio stations aren't proper members but only associate radio stations.
It would be interesting asking BBC and (italian) Rai why they didn't join the project.

The press release is available from the official site of Ms Margot WALLSTRÖM, Vice-President of the European Commission responsible for institutional relations and communication strategy, you can see her blog here

Brussels, 26 February 2008

Europe on the air: a network of European radio stations is launched

From April 2008 on, day in and day out, 16 radio stations from 13 countries working in a consortium and 7 associate radio stations will co-produce and simultaneously broadcast programmes devoted to current affairs and society in the Europe of 27

Broadcast daily, the programmes of this EUROPEAN network will include daily news reports, interviews, debates, magazines looking at subjects in greater depth and coverage of live events. The first broadcasts will go out in April 2008.

Initially, broadcasts will be in 10 languages (Bulgarian, English, French, German, Greek, Hungarian, Polish, Portuguese, Romanian and Spanish), but they will gradually expand to the 23 languages of the EU.

This network is open to all kinds of national, regional, local, public or private radio stations, and already ranges from "Radio Polskie" to "Punto Radio" (Spain), via "Deutsche Welle", "Radio Netherlands", "Radio France Internationale" and "Radio Slovenia International".

Other radio stations can join the network if they meet the rules laid down by the consortium.

The interactive nature of this daily programme lasting between 30 and 60 minutes will also be enhanced by the launch of a common internet portal in July 2008.

On 28 February 2008, Ms Margot WALLSTRÖM, Vice-President of the European Commission responsible for institutional relations and communication strategy, welcomed the support which the European Commission intends to give to the European consortium of radio stations for five years from its launch.

On 14 December last the Commission signed a service contract for € 5.8 million per annum with the consortium coordinated by "Deutsche Welle" and RFI following the Invitation to Tender of 14/07/2007. The strictest respect for the consortium's editorial freedom is guaranteed by an editorial charter.

Messrs. Erik BETTERMANN, Antoine SCHWARZ and Jan HOOK, respectively Presidents of Deutsche Welle, RFI and Radio Netherlands International, stressed to the press in Brussels the unique, enriching experience which the contributions and broader perspective of the consortium partners will bring to the citizens of the 27 countries of the EU in lively, well documented programmes on questions relating to Europe.

Members of the consortium on 26 February 2008

Germany Deutsche Welle
France RFI
Netherlands Radio Netherlands Worldwide
Spain Punto Radio
Poland Polskie Radio Warsaw
Poland Polskie Radio Szczecin
Belgium RTBF
Bulgaria Bulgarian National Radio
Czech Republic Czech Radio
Greece Skai Radio
Hungary Hungarian Radio
Romania Radio Romania International
Slovenia Radio Slovenia International
Portugal Europa Lisboa

Associate radio stations (not members of the consortium who can relay whatever subject they wish)

UK CUR 1350 Cambridge University
Germany Hochschulradio Aachen
Germany TIDE Radio Hamburg Media School
Germany CampusRadioBonn - Bonn University
France Radio Campus Paris
France Eur@dionantes
Finland Radio Moreeni - Tampere University

Girl generated content

If you think that majority of teen geeks are guys, you're wrong.
Read what NYT says, click here for the full article:

Geek Chic: Not Just For Guys

Sorry, Boys, This is our domain

By STEPHANIE ROSENBLOOM
Published: February 21, 2008

The prototypical computer whiz of popular imagination - pasty, geeky, male -
has failed to live up to his reputation.

Research shows that among the youngest Internet users, the primary creators
of Web content (blogs, graphics, photographs, Web sites) are not misfits
resembling the Lone Gunmen of "The X Files." On the contrary, the
cyberpioneers of the moment are digitally effusive teenage girls.

"Most guys don't have patience for this kind of thing," said Nicole
Dominguez, 13, of Miramar, Fla., whose hobbies include designing free icons,
layouts and "glitters" (shimmering animations) for the Web and MySpace pages
of other teenagers. "It's really hard."

Nicole posts her graphics, as well as her own HTML and CSS computer coding
pointers (she is self-taught), on the pink and violet Sodevious.net, a
domain her mother bought for her in October.

"If you did a poll I think you'd find that boys rarely have sites," she
said. "It's mostly girls."

Indeed, a study published in December by the Pew Internet & American Life
Project found that among Web users ages 12 to 17, significantly more girls
than boys blog (35 percent of girls compared with 20 percent of boys) and
create or work on their own Web pages (32 percent of girls compared with 22
percent of boys).

Girls also eclipse boys when it comes to building or working on Web sites
for other people and creating profiles on social networking sites (70
percent of girls 15 to 17 have one, versus 57 percent of boys 15 to 17).
Video posting was the sole area in which boys outdid girls: boys are almost
twice as likely as girls to post video files.
[...]

DAB in UK: economically or not economically viable?

GCap Media is a British commercial radio company formed from the merger of the Capital Radio Group and GWR Group. The merger was completed in May 2005. It is listed on the London Stock Exchange.

On December 20th 2007 Fru Hazlitt started working as CEO of the group.

After 53 days she presented her plans for the company's future; in the meanwhile:

- 6 January 2008: Global radio confirms interest in buying GCap

- 7 January 2008: GCap rejects the-313 million-pound bid offer from Global

- 12 February 2008: Global reserves right to raise GCap offer

The big issue is Fru Hazlitt saying "reflecting our view that DAB is not an economically viable platform for the Company"

A lot of newspapers wrote about this:

FT
8 February 2008 Ben Fenton Digital radio at critical stage
10 February 2008 Ben Fenton Global radio questions GCap plans
11 February 2008 Ben Fenton Hazlitt turns the dial from DAB radio
11 February 2008 Ben Fenton Radio waves hit remaining supporters
Guardian

11 February 2008 John Plunkett Hazlitt : DAB "not economically viable"

12 February 2008 Owen Gibson and Katie Allen
The end for digital radio - or the start of a listening revolution?
Telegraph
12 February 2008 Juliette Garside Doubt over digital as GCap pulls the plug
14 February 2008 Juliette Garside Radio bosses seek new digital map
Times
10 February 2008 James Ashton GCAP's Fru Hazlitt switches off digital radio
12 February 2008 Amanda Andrews Blow for digital radio as GCap drops stations
Independent
12 February 2008 Ciar Byrne GCap retreats from digital radio to focus on FM and broadband

Globalization of films' content

Interesting article from New York Times: screen writers work for US audience and, specially, for foreign audiences.

Moviegoers in Seoul will love this film

by Brooks Barnes
Published: January 27, 2008

LOS ANGELES — An avid moviegoer, Lindsay Bern takes in a flick at her local multiplex about twice a week. But Ms. Bern, the co-owner of a Los Angeles recording studio, has recently become irritated by what she sees as a disturbing trend on the big screen: the obliteration of New York City.

In particular, she has been annoyed by “I Am Legend”, the Warner Brothers hit that stars Will Smith in a post-apocalyptic Manhattan, and “Cloverfield”, the Paramount film about a monster that implodes the Empire State Building, tears down the Brooklyn Bridge and generally reduces the city to a smoking pile of rubble and despair.

“Can’t they destroy another city for once?” Ms. Bern said in an interview at a local movie theater. “It’s despicable that the studios are using the destruction of New York to sell movies to me.”

Hollywood uses the stunt to sell movies all right — but not primarily to Ms. Bern or anyone else in the United States, for that matter. If Americans go to see the Statue of Liberty’s head ripped off, as they have in droves for “Cloverfield,” all the better. But the fans the studios are really trying to attract with such imagery are in Eastern Europe, South Korea and Latin America.

New York City, studio executives say, is the only United States metropolis with a skyline that is instantly recognizable the world over. (San Francisco is a possible exception, but razing a city that is already teetering on the seismic brink is not as much fun.) Aren’t Americans growing a little tired of seeing the Big Apple being splattered? “Maybe,” a senior Paramount executive said, “but that is what will sell it overseas.”

To gain control over runaway costs, the movie industry is increasingly striving for a one-size-fits-all strategy when it comes to the types of films it churns out and the megawatt marketing campaigns that accompany them. But while the studios once tailored their product to the tastes of American audiences and tweaked it for the international crowd, the reverse is becoming the norm.

Indeed, the international movie business — of strategic importance to studios for two decades — has become so lucrative that many movies are now built primarily to appeal to people outside the United States. Given the broad range of cultures to which movies must play, their content will become only simpler as the trend grows. It surely isn’t lost on entertainment companies that complex, politically themed pictures like “In the Valley of Elah”, a tough sell at home, were also disastrous abroad.

“Clearly, international is playing a bigger role than ever in the green-light process for pictures,” said Jeff Blake, chairman for worldwide marketing and distribution at the Columbia TriStar Motion Picture Group. “You’re having big conversations about what you can do to increase your chances overseas.”

What sells best overseas is a simple message, preferably one that is nonverbal and can be communicated with a single dominant image. “The Day After Tomorrow” was an easy global sell for 20th Century Fox. (Manhattan freezes over.) But “Spanglish,” with its complicated story about an Anglo chef falling for a Hispanic household helper, and with a tough title to translate, was a nightmare for Sony international marketers.

Ticket sales at theaters in the United States have declined over the last decade despite the efforts of studios and theater owners. In 2007, sales totaled $9.7 billion, up 4 percent from the previous year, according to Media by Numbers, a box-office tracking company. But the attendance figures puncture that happy story: the number of people going to the movies was flat, after a narrow increase in 2006 and three previous years of sharp declines.

The international market, meanwhile, is sizzling. Foreign receipts for the six biggest studios rose 9 percent in 2007 from a year earlier, to $9.4 billion. While there are no reliable independent data for attendance, the number of people outside the United States going to the movies is soaring, too, partly because more modern theaters are popping up, according to Patrick Wachsberger, the co-chairman of Summit Entertainment, a boutique studio with a large foreign film sales business.

“Spider-Man 3” illustrates the shift. Released last May, the movie was a low point for the series at the domestic box office when ticket sales are adjusted for inflation, according to Box Office Mojo, another tracking service. But foreign sales for the picture were the best ever for the series, totaling $554 million.

Spider-Man has a lot of company. Most studio movies now gross substantially more abroad than they do at home.

The growth overseas — American movies made $158 million in China last year, for example, up 38 percent from 2006 — helps explain what kinds of films show up on marquees in St. Louis and Seattle.

Multicultural organizations routinely criticize Hollywood, saying it fails to cast many minorities in leading roles. They point to movies like “Madea’s Family Reunion”, which featured a mainly African-American cast, that have performed well at the box office. That picture, which cost about $6 million to make, sold $63.3 million in tickets at North American theaters.

The big studios know that these films make money, but they shy away from them in large part because multicultural casts are a hard sell overseas. “Madea's Family Reunion” sold only $50,939 in tickets abroad. “Urban movies just don’t travel,” Mr. Wachsberger said.

International movie ticket sales, in broad terms, used to be one of two things: gravy or insurance. If a film looked as if it would be a hit, studios would take a chance on how it would perform overseas, knowing that the receipts would only make them richer. If a picture was deemed a difficult sell, studios would sell off parts of the overseas distribution rights to local companies in advance, cutting the risk.

The situation started to change in the 1990s, as companies became more global and foreign investors developed more of an appetite for the movie business. As Hollywood started relying more heavily on action extravaganzas, and as movie attendance in the United States started to drop, the business had to court a wider audience.

WITH many markets still growing, the practice of tailoring scripts for a global audience is only going to increase, said David Maisel, the chairman of Marvel Studios.

He should know. “The Incredible Hulk” from Marvel (set for a June 13 premiere) has been meticulously constructed to appeal to moviegoers across the planet. In one sequence, Dr. Bruce Banner, the scientist who transforms into a green monster when his emotions run high, travels to Brazil to search for a cure. Instead of building Brazil on a back lot, Mr. Maisel sent the production to Rio de Janeiro — a move that could help sell the movie in South America.

If that doesn’t work, he always has a backup: The script also calls for a fight of comic book proportions in which the Hulk must call upon the hero within to save a city from “total destruction.”

Care to guess which city?

New guidelines for UK radio stations

Ofcom today published their view about two areas: 1) localness guidance for analogue (FM and AM) commercial radio and 2) stereo and mono broadcasting on DAB

Here you can read the 44 pages of the pdf file

Here you can read John Plunkett's view about this statement

Plunkett wrote about the quality of DAB:
"The commercial radio trade body, the Radio Centre, said "perceived audio quality" should not be "micro-managed" by Ofcom, adding that it was best left to individual radio operators and digital multiplex owners."

Localness guidelines

Ofcom has concluded that it is right to maintain a minimum amount of obligations for local content on radio, shown by research to be important to listeners. Today’s statement revises guidance on the local content obligations for commercial analogue radio licensees, in line with the proposals set out in Ofcom’s Consultation document published in November 2007.

The new guidance states that:

-FM local radio stations should broadcast at least ten hours of locally-made programmes each weekday during daytime (including breakfast) and at least four hours at weekends; and

-AM stations should provide at least four hours of locally-made programming every day of the week. Stations based in the nations (Scotland , Wales and Northern Ireland) will be required to provide a further six weekday hours of programming from their home nation.

No station will be required to produce more locally-made programming than at present and, for many licensees, the new guidelines represent substantial deregulation.

Given the challenging economic climate facing the radio industry currently, Ofcom recognises the need for flexibility and the case for reducing overheads. So Ofcom will now consider requests from stations with a population coverage under 250,000 adults for co-location and/or programme sharing with a neighbouring station. Where stations are allowed to share programming they will still be required to provide at least four hours of bespoke local programming per day.

Stereo and mono broadcasting on DAB

Ofcom has concluded stereo and mono broadcasting on DAB should be regulated to preserve sound quality for listeners. Licensees wishing to switch from stereo to mono must now request approval from Ofcom. This policy will be reviewed after 12 months

Miscommunication between US and Iran

The year 2008 started in a very nice way, with a naval dispute between US
and Iran.

If you click here, you can download a video realeased from Pentagon, it's a
28.6 MB wmv file and you can see a 4:20 minutes file of the american
version.

One crew member of the US warship says:
"This is coalition warship. I am engaged in transit passage in accordance
with international law."
he doesn't get an understable answer and he says again:
"This is coalition warship. I am engaged in transit passage in accordance
with international law. I maintain no harm. Over!"

The most interesting part is the last 36 seconds when you can hear (the
video is just a black screen) a weird voice (it's like a voice from an horror film)
saying: "I am coming to you" and after the US crew member says"You're
approaching a coalition warship operating in international waters, your
identity is not known, your intentionts are unclear [...]" the unidentified
voice says "You will explode after a few minutes."

If you click here, you can see a Pentagon page with 2 versions of the naval dispute, the short version (i already talked about it) and the long version (45 minutes! but there's not sign of any creepy voice)

If you click here, you can see a short video (in Reuters site) that shows the iranian version.

The video showed an Iranian naval officer in a small speedboat speaking via
radio to a ship which could not be clearly identified (we know that there's
high probability it was the american warship).

Iranian officer: "Coalition warship 73 this (is an) Iranian navy patrol
boat"

"This is coalition warship 73. I read you loud and clear," the person
replied with an American accent.

The Iranian officer then appeared to ask for the ships to identify
themselves, though his words at times were indistinguishable:

"Coalition warship 73 this (is) Iranian navy patrol boat, request side
number ... operating in the area (at) this time."

In this video, there's no trace of the creepy voice threating to explod the
americans. Who said that? The iranian say: the audio of the voice was fabricated. Was it? Who can tell?

There are rumours, the Guardian (but it's not the only one) wrote about it,
that the threatening voice heard on the US clip may, in fact, be that of a
prankster given the nickname "Filipino Monkey".
According to wikipedia, "Filipino Monkey" is just a pseudonym used by radio
pranksters in maritime radio transmissions since at least the 1980s,
especially in the Persian Gulf.

If a radio prankster might cause an american warship almost firing against an
iranian boat, i would say that the naval system of communication is not
working properly, is it?

Ratzinger blames mass media

Joseph Ratzinger (1927), alias head of the Catholic Church, alias Pope Benedict XVI, blames the mass media.

Warning: if you want to do propaganda pro-Pope or against the Pope, this is NOT the right place to comment. Here i'm only interested about his view of media.

MESSAGE OF THE HOLY FATHER
BENEDICT XVI
42nd WORLD COMMUNICATIONS DAY

Sunday, 4 May 2008

The Media: At the Crossroads between Self-Promotion and Service.
Searching for the Truth in order to Share it with Others.

Dear Brothers and Sisters!

1. The theme of this year’s World Communications Day – “The Media: At the Crossroads between Self-Promotion and Service. Searching for the Truth in order to Share it with Others” – sheds light on the important role of the media in the life of individuals and society. Truly, there is no area of human experience, especially given the vast phenomenon of globalization, in which the media have not become an integral part of interpersonal relations and of social, economic, political and religious development. As I said in my Message for this year’s World Day of Peace (1 January 2008): “The social communications media, in particular, because of their educational potential, have a special responsibility for promoting respect for the family, making clear its expectations and rights, and presenting all its beauty” (No. 5).

2. In view of their meteoric technological evolution, the media have acquired extraordinary potential, while raising new and hitherto unimaginable questions and problems. There is no denying the contribution they can make to the diffusion of news, to knowledge of facts and to the dissemination of information: they have played a decisive part, for example, in the spread of literacy and in socialization, as well as the development of democracy and dialogue among peoples. Without their contribution it would truly be difficult to foster and strengthen understanding between nations, to breathe life into peace dialogues around the globe, to guarantee the primary good of access to information, while at the same time ensuring the free circulation of ideas, especially those promoting the ideals of solidarity and social justice. Indeed, the media, taken overall, are not only vehicles for spreading ideas: they can and should also be instruments at the service of a world of greater justice and solidarity. Unfortunately, though, they risk being transformed into systems aimed at subjecting humanity to agendas dictated by the dominant interests of the day. This is what happens when communication is used for ideological purposes or for the aggressive advertising of consumer products. While claiming to represent reality, it can tend to legitimize or impose distorted models of personal, family or social life. Moreover, in order to attract listeners and increase the size of audiences, it does not hesitate at times to have recourse to vulgarity and violence, and to overstep the mark. The media can also present and support models of development which serve to increase rather than reduce the technological divide between rich and poor countries.

3. Humanity today is at a crossroads. One could properly apply to the media what I wrote in the Encyclical Spe Salvi concerning the ambiguity of progress, which offers new possibilities for good, but at the same time opens up appalling possibilities for evil that formerly did not exist (cf. No. 22). We must ask, therefore, whether it is wise to allow the instruments of social communication to be exploited for indiscriminate “self-promotion” or to end up in the hands of those who use them to manipulate consciences. Should it not be a priority to ensure that they remain at the service of the person and of the common good, and that they foster “man’s ethical formation … man’s inner growth” (ibid.)? Their extraordinary impact on the lives of individuals and on society is widely acknowledged, yet today it is necessary to stress the radical shift, one might even say the complete change of role, that they are currently undergoing. Today, communication seems increasingly to claim not simply to represent reality, but to determine it, owing to the power and the force of suggestion that it possesses. It is clear, for example, that in certain situations the media are used not for the proper purpose of disseminating information, but to “create” events. This dangerous change in function has been noted with concern by many Church leaders. Precisely because we are dealing with realities that have a profound effect on all those dimensions of human life (moral, intellectual, religious, relational, affective, cultural) in which the good of the person is at stake, we must stress that not everything that is technically possible is also ethically permissible. Hence, the impact of the communications media on modern life raises unavoidable questions, which require choices and solutions that can no longer be deferred.

4. The role that the means of social communication have acquired in society must now be considered an integral part of the “anthropological” question that is emerging as the key challenge of the third millennium. Just as we see happening in areas such as human life, marriage and the family, and in the great contemporary issues of peace, justice and protection of creation, so too in the sector of social communications there are essential dimensions of the human person and the truth concerning the human person coming into play. When communication loses its ethical underpinning and eludes society’s control, it ends up no longer taking into account the centrality and inviolable dignity of the human person. As a result it risks exercising a negative influence on people’s consciences and choices and definitively conditioning their freedom and their very lives. For this reason it is essential that social communications should assiduously defend the person and fully respect human dignity. Many people now think there is a need, in this sphere, for “info-ethics”, just as we have bioethics in the field of medicine and in scientific research linked to life.

5. The media must avoid becoming spokesmen for economic materialism and ethical relativism, true scourges of our time. Instead, they can and must contribute to making known the truth about humanity, and defending it against those who tend to deny or destroy it. One might even say that seeking and presenting the truth about humanity constitutes the highest vocation of social communication. Utilizing for this purpose the many refined and engaging techniques that the media have at their disposal is an exciting task, entrusted in the first place to managers and operators in the sector. Yet it is a task which to some degree concerns us all, because we are all consumers and operators of social communications in this era of globalization. The new media – telecommunications and internet in particular – are changing the very face of communication; perhaps this is a valuable opportunity to reshape it, to make more visible, as my venerable predecessor Pope John Paul II said, the essential and indispensable elements of the truth about the human person (cf. Apostolic Letter The Rapid Development, 10).

6. Man thirsts for truth, he seeks truth; this fact is illustrated by the attention and the success achieved by so many publications, programmes or quality fiction in which the truth, beauty and greatness of the person, including the religious dimension of the person, are acknowledged and favourably presented. Jesus said: “You will know the truth and the truth will make you free” (Jn 8:32). The truth which makes us free is Christ, because only he can respond fully to the thirst for life and love that is present in the human heart. Those who have encountered him and have enthusiastically welcomed his message experience the irrepressible desire to share and communicate this truth. As Saint John writes, “That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon and touched with our hands, concerning the word of life … we proclaim also to you, so that you may have fellowship with us. And our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ. And we are writing this that our joy may be complete” (1 Jn 1:1-3).

Let us ask the Holy Spirit to raise up courageous communicators and authentic witnesses to the truth, faithful to Christ’s mandate and enthusiastic for the message of the faith, communicators who will “interpret modern cultural needs, committing themselves to approaching the communications age not as a time of alienation and confusion, but as a valuable time for the quest for the truth and for developing communion between persons and peoples” (John Paul II, Address to the Conference for those working in Communications and Culture, 9 November 2002).

With these wishes, I cordially impart my Blessing to all.

From the Vatican, 24 January 2008, Feast of Saint Francis de Sales.

BENEDICTUS XVI

Do mass media help terrorists?

Raphael Cohen-Almagor is an israeli professor (he's the founder and director of the Center for Democratic Studies at the University of Haifa) and he wrote a paper called "Media Coverage of Acts of Terrorism: Troubling Episodes and Suggested Guidelines"; the paper was published in vol 30-3 (2005) of Canadian Journal of Communication.

In the paper you can read a long list of unprofessional and unethical mistakes made by journalists during coverage of acts of terrorism.

Journalists should never forget that when they report some news, they do not give information only to the public, they do give information to the public and to the terrorists.

Sometimes it seems that the rule of the scoop is more important than the rule of saving human lives. And the consequence can be a matter of life or death.

At the end of the paper, the author wrote some guidelines for journalists:

- The media need to be accountable for the consequences of their coverage

- The media should not jeopardize human life

- The media are advised to co-operate with the government when human lives are at stake in order to bring a peaceful end to the terrorist episode. This is not to suggest that the police or other security organizations should have a veto power over reporting. What is suggested is co-operation and mutual respect and understanding between the government agencies and the media

- The media should not glorify acts of terror as they glorified the SLA during the Hearst kidnapping

- The media should refrain from sensational and panicky headlines, from inflammatory catchwords, and from needless repletion of photos from bloody scenes

- Terrorism should be explicitly condemned for its brutality and violent, indiscriminate nature, as the Israeli media on the whole condemn terror

- The media must not pay or be paid for covering terrorist incidents

- The media are advised not to take upon themselves to mediate between the terrorists and the government. Special qualifications are required before one assumes such a responsibility upon oneself. Journalists are there to cover the event, not to become part of it

- The media are expected to refrain from making dangerous speculations about the terrorists' plans, government response, hostages' messages, and other matters. Speculations might hinder crisis management

- Media professionals should have background information about the terrorists they are required to cover. They should do research prior to their coverage. We should learn from the Hanafi incident, which luckily did not end with the murder of a hostage just because one reporter was ill-informed and did not do his homework as he should have

- The media should not broadcast live terrorist incidents that include hostage taking. This is in order not to jeopardize human life and not to impede a government's attempts to rescue the hijacked. This is not to say that the media should not cover such incidents. Rather, there should be a delay of a few minutes during which an experienced editor inspects the coverage and authorizes what should be on air and what should not, as was the case when hostages were released from the Iranian embassy in London in 1980

- The media are advised not to interview terrorists while the terrorist incident is still in motion. Lines of communications between the authorities and the terrorists should be left open. The media should not impede the negotiations process, as they did in the Hanafi takeover in Washington

- The media should not co-operate with terrorists who stage events. The BBC's decision not to broadcast the spectacle in Carrickmore was right

- The media are required to show sensitivity to the victims and to their loved ones. This critical guideline should be observed during terrorist incidents and, no less importantly, also after their conclusion

- The media are expected not to report details that might harm victims' families

- The area in which the terrorist incident takes place should not be open for anybody who testifies that he or she is a journalist. Only senior and experienced reporters should be allowed in. Junior and inexperienced reporters should undergo a learning process during which they fathom the complexities involved. Adequate training is a necessary precondition

Media Coverage of Acts of Terrorism: Troubling Episodes and Suggested Guidelines 2005

(20 pages + 8 pages of notes and references)

Preliminaries

Troubling episodes

Endangering life

Hindering governmenti activities

Glorifying terrorists

Sensational coverage

Irresponsible terminology

Co-operation with terrorists and payment for interviews

Irresponsible mediation

Dangerous speculations

Lack of homework and live interviews during crisis

Live coverage

Staging events

Conclusion

English language in South Asia

Radha Chakravarty is an indian writer and is currently Reader, Department of English, Gargi College, University of Delhi.
Her latest book is Feminism and contemporary women writers - Rethinking subjectivity, published by Routledge India on 31 December 2007. The book attempts to deal with the problem of literary subjectivity in theory and practice. The works of six contemporary women writers — Doris Lessing, Anita Desai, Mahasweta Devi, Buchi Emecheta, Margaret Atwood and Toni Morrison — are discussed as potential ways of testing and expanding the theoretical debate.

On 4th January 2008, the weekend magazine of Daily Star (english newspaper in Bangladesh) printed an interview with her.
This is a short excerpt, here you can read the full interview

How do you see English in South Asia, a place where the language has once been forced upon its people?

English may today be counted as one of the South Asian languages. It was indeed extraneous to our culture once, and introduced for political reasons, but today it has been appropriated and adapted to our contemporary needs in ways that have given it a new character and I think a new lease of life.

The relationship between English and other South Asian languages was not a one-way street. It was transactional, and remains so to this date. The influence of English language and literature challenged but also gave a great impetus to the modernization of our indigenous languages. In turn, these languages also enriched English with a vocabulary and range of expression that continues to grow, as recent versions of the OED acknowledge. Today the best writing in English comes from regions where English is not the people's mothertongue. And we have reshaped the language in creative ways. To borrow the title of a well-known book, “The Empire Writes back,” as it were!

So English has now acquired these extraordinary regional flavours, but it also remains an international language, and in some important ways, our link with the non-South Asian world. In a multilingual society such as India where I belong, English, and translation into English, also provides an important common platform for people of diverse languages to know and understand each other better.

The politics of language are of course linked to larger issues and it may be argued that the privileging of English perpetuates the colonial mindset. The solution I believe is not to do away with English, but to treat it on par with other languages in our region, as one more facet of our multilingualism. That calls for a change of attitude for which many South Asians don't seem ready yet.

Whether English is perceived as an asset or a stumbling block depends on how we make it instrumental to our specific regional needs. If it is merely a matter of aping “the West” and losing our cultural independence, which is what upholders of “pure” identity seem to fear, the language and the culture it is taken to purvey may indeed continue to enslave us. But if it empowers us to be effective citizens of the world without surrendering our distinctiveness as South Asians, English is a language to be embraced without embarrassment.

How many inventors for radio?

When i was a child, i was sure about a couple of things: i was italian and another italian (Guglielmo Marconi) invented the radio. It was cool to know that i was born in the same nation of the inventor of a magical instrument like the radio. Now i'm not a child anymore and things seem a bit more complicated than they used to be.

I was reading an italian blog of a friend, Radiopassioni, and i found out that in Spain they released a book called "Radio in Spain 1896-1977". The author of the book is the professor Angel Faus Belau (professor of "Cultura y Comunicación Audiovisual" at University of Navarra) and his point of view is that the inventor of radio was the spanish (spanish professor and spanish inventor: what a coincidence!) Julio Cervera Baviera (1854-1929).

In a bit of confusion, i'm trying to fix few things:

1) Gugliemo Marconi (1874-1937) wasn't entirely italian: he was born in Bologna (Italy) and his parents were Giuseppe Marconi (italian) and Annie Jameson (scottish-irish).

2) We still don't know who invented radio, we know that several people were doing experiments of radio signals during 1890-1910 but we can't say who made the most important achievement.

According to history of radio of wikipedia, "several people are claimed to have "invented the radio". The most commonly accepted claims are:

- Jagadish Chandra Bose (1858-1937)

- Alexander Stepanovich Popov (1859-1906)

- Nikola Tesla (1856-1943)

- Guglielmo Marconi (1874-1937)

Should we add Julio Cervera Baviera ? And what about Oliver Lodge (1851-1940) ? And Reginald Fessenden (1866-1932) ? Anybody else??

If somebody has time, it would be interesting to see how the same invention was (and still is) credited to different people in different countries. Same invention, but different inventors and different celebrations.

Marconi's prediction about tv

In the magazine printed by CRIT (research and innovation of technology of Rai; Rai is italian state-owned tv and radio) of April 2001 you can see an excerpt from the italian magazine Radiorario of 1926.

"Gugliemo Marconi told the Vossische Zeitung [a german newspaper] that the problem of television will be fixed by two years and then any war will be impossible. An invisible enemy won't exist anylonger: the enemy, with the help of television, wil be seen at any long distance. Therefore it won't be difficult anymore to predict and to defend any enemy's strike. It will be the end of submarines, the end of wars."

As far as we know today, Marconi (assuming it's true that he said that) was right: since the invention of television, we haven't had any war in the world.

Fox News and 2000 US election

The day after the 2000 US presidential election nobody knew who would become the next president of the United States. The world had to wait until 12th December, when the Supreme Court (9 persons NOT elected by the people) decided about Florida's 25 electoral votes.

Stefano Della Vigna (assistant professor of economics at Berkeley) and Ethan Kaplan (Stockholm University) wrote a paper called "The Fox News Effect: Media Bias and Voting" that talks about the impact of Fox News on the 2000 election.

Probably George Walker Bush should have thanked the Supreme Court and Rupert Murdoch's Fox News.

Abstract

Does media bias affect voting? We address this question by looking at the entry of Fox News in cable markets and its impact on voting. Between October 1996 and November 2000, the conservative Fox News Channel was introduced in the cable programming of 20 percent of US towns. Fox News availability in 2000 appears to be largely idiosyncratic. Using a data set of voting data for 9,256 towns, we investigate if Republicans gained vote share in towns where Fox News entered the cable market by the year 2000. We find a significant effect of the introduction of Fox News on the vote share in Presidential elections between 1996 and 2000. Republicans gain 0.4 to 0.7 percentage points in the towns which broadcast Fox News. The results are robust to town-level controls, district and county fixed effects, and alternative specifications. We also find a significant effect of Fox News on Senate vote share and on voter turnout. Our estimates imply that Fox News convinced 3 to 8 percent of its viewers to vote Republican. We interpret the results in light of a simple model of voter learning about media bias and about politician quality. The Fox News effect could be a temporary learning effect for rational voters, or a permanent effect for voters subject to non-rational persuasion.

The Fox News Effect: Media Bias and Voting (37 page pdf file)

1 Introduction page 1
2 Fox News History and Data page 3
3 Empirical results page 7
4 Interpretations page 15
5 Conclusion page 20
References and tables

The only flaw of Nicole Kidman

Please, Nicole Kidman, i know you've got contract from Nintendo for Brain Training, but check things before you say: "I've quickly found that training my brain is a great way to keep my mind feeling young"

Sense About Science is an independent charitable trust. They respond to the misrepresentation of science and scientific evidence on issues that matter to society, from scares about plastic bottles, fluoride and the MMR vaccine to controversies about genetic modification, stem cell research and radiation.

In January 2007 in a special leaflet called Sense About… Science for Celebrities, (get it here, it's a 2 page leaflet; they realeased a 2 page leaflet and they got national and international coverage! If you criticize celebrities, you get good coverage, don't you?) scientists told celebrities: “Before making scientific claims check your facts - all it takes is a phone call”. It showed how easily some mistakes could have been avoided and gave a phone number for celebrities to call so that Sense About Science could connect them with scientists, scientific societies and charities.

After one year the same organization has just realeased a new report about celebrities and science during 2007, here you can download the 7 page file.

Professor Peter McNaughton (pharmacologist, Cambridge University) gives a perfect statement: "Celebrities occupy a powerful position - they have access to the media in a way that scientific experts generally do not. I am delighted that they appear to have been getting their facts straighter over the last year. Long may it continue"

The file is interesting but there is a disappointing part. In the section "Earth science" they repeated one sentence of Matt Helders (drummer for the Arctic Monkeys; is he a celebrity??) and one sentence of Heather Mills; after that the reader expects a perfect answer from scientists but i only got "scientists couldn't respond in fewer than three sentences, so we have been unable to address this one." Excuse me?

Using (and changing, obviously) the words of Professor McNaughton: "Scientists occupy a powerful position - they have access to the laboratories, to the public and private funds and to all kind of studies in a way that common people generally do not. [i'm adding] Therefore, if you don't have space to criticize some sentences, why repeat them? Let's assume those sentences are untrue: why repeat untrue sentences without any criticism?"

Surveillance societies in 2007

Ten days ago the organization Privacy International released a very interesting report called "Leading surveillance societies in the EU and the World 2007", they said "the World" but actually the new 2007 global rankings cover only 47 countries.

Privacy International (PI) is a human rights group formed in 1990 as a watchdog on surveillance and privacy invasions by governments and corporations. PI is based in London, England, and has an office in Washington, D.C. We have campaigned across the world to protect people against intrusion by governments and corporations that seek to erode this fragile right.

Summary of key findings

- The 2007 rankings indicate an overall worsening of privacy protection across the world, reflecting an increase in surveillance and a declining performance o privacy safeguards.

- Concern over immigration and border control dominated the world agenda in 2007. Countries have moved swiftly to implement database, identity and fingerprinting systems, often without regard to the privacy implications for their own citizens

- The 2007 rankings show an increasing trend amongst governments to archive data on the geographic, communications and financial records of all their citizens and residents. This trend leads to the conclusion that all citizens, regardless of legal status, are under suspicion.

- The privacy trends have been fueled by the emergence of a profitable surveillance industry dominated by global IT companies and the creation of numerous international treaties that frequently operate outside judicial or democratic processes.

- Despite political shifts in the US Congress, surveillance initiatives in the US continue to expand, affecting visitors and citizens alike.

- Surveillance initiatives initiated by Brussels have caused a substantial decline in privacy across Europe, eroding protections even in those countries that have shown a traditionally high regard for privacy.

- The privacy performance of older democracies in Europe is generally failing, while the performance of newer democracies is becoming generally stronger.

- The lowest ranking countries in the survey continue to be Malaysia, Russia and China. The highest-ranking countries in 2007 are Greece, Romania and Canada.

- The 2006 leader, Germany, slipped significantly in the 2007 rankings, dropping from 1st to 7th place behind Portugal and Slovenia.

- In terms of statutory protections and privacy enforcement, the US is the worst ranking country in the democratic world. In terms of overall privacy protection the United States has performed very poorly, being out-ranked by both India and the Philippines and falling into the "black" category, denoting endemic surveillance.

- The worst ranking EU country is the United Kingdom, which again fell into the "black" category along with Russia and Singapore. However for the first time Scotland has been given its own ranking score and performed significantly better than England & Wales.

- Argentina scored higher than 18 of the 27 EU countries.

- Australia ranks higher than Slovakia but lower than South Africa and New Zealand.

At the end of the article they tell us key aspects for every single country, for instance we have:

United Kingdom

- World leading surveillance schemes

- Lack of accountability and data breach disclosure law

- Commissioner has few powers

- Interception of communications is authorised by politician, evidence not used in court, and oversight is by commissioner who reports only once a year upon reviewing a subset of applications

- Hundreds of thousands of requests from government agencies to telecommunications providers for traffic data

- Data retention scheme took a significant step forward with the quiet changes based on EU law

- Plans are emerging regarding surveillance of communications networks for the protection of copyrighted content

- Despite data breaches, 'joined-up government' initiatives continue

- Identity scheme still planned to be the most invasive in the world, highly centralised and biometrics-driven; plan to issue all foreigners with cards in 2008 are continuing

- E-borders plans include increased data collection on travellers

United States of America

- No right to privacy in constitution, though search and seizure protections exist in 4th Amendment; case law on government searches has considered new technology

- No comprehensive privacy law, many sectoral laws; though tort of privacy

- FTC continues to give inadequate attention to privacy issues, though issued self-regulating privacy guidelines on advertising in 2007

- State-level data breach legislation has proven to be useful in identifying faults in security

- REAL-ID and biometric identification programs continue to spread without adequate oversight, research, and funding structures

- Extensive data-sharing programs across federal government and with private sector

- Spreading use of CCTV

- Congress approved presidential program of spying on foreign communications over U.S. networks, e.g. Gmail, Hotmail, etc.; and now considering immunity for telephone companies, while government claims secrecy, thus barring any legal action

- No data retention law as yet, but equally no data protection law

- World leading in border surveillance, mandating trans-border data flows

- Weak protections of financial and medical privacy; plans spread for 'rings of steel' around cities to monitor movements of individuals

- Democratic safeguards tend to be strong but new Congress and political dynamics show that immigration and terrorism continue to leave politicians scared and without principle

- Lack of action on data breach legislation on the federal level while REAL-ID is still compelled upon states has shown that states can make informed decisions

- Recent news regarding FBI biometric database raises particular concerns as this could lead to the largest database of biometrics around the world that is not protected by strong privacy law

Italy

- Constitution protects right to privacy in the home (article 14) and communications (article 15)

- Comprehensive privacy law

- Data privacy authority has extensive powers, including auditing databanks of intelligence activities

- Data privacy authority has stopped two initiatives for expanding use of fingerprinting; and has regulated use of CCTV; and has run public education campaigns on television

- Judicial authorisation for interception, and granted for 15 days at a time; if transcripts are not used they must be destroyed; and exceptions apply for religious ministers, lawyers, and doctors, though there are more lenient procedures for anti-mafia cases

- 2007 a judge ruled that planting bugging devices in a car was not an offence because the law only applies to the home

- A number of abuses in communications surveillance: in 2005 Italian police placed a backdoor into an ISP's server, and monitored all transactions of 30,000 subscribers; telecom italy collected thousands of file on stars and influential people

- Data retention period were for four years, though internet traffic data is now set for 12 months, through a graduated scheme where investigations involve serious crimes are allowed to get telephone data after 2 years, or internet data after 6 months

- Biometric plans for travel authorisation have been reviewed and changed by authority

- Council of ministers approve law requiring every blogger to register with the state; though law is in early stages

---
The bill requiring bloggers to register was kind of stopped, it'll never be law that way.
Yes, Constitution protects privacy but as i wrote 2 weeks ago, in the reality there's no protection, newspapers and tv news can even realease private phone calls!