November 8, 2007 – World Usability Day

World Usability Day 2007 will take place on November 8th with this year’s focus on healthcare. Started in 2005, the event is aimed at making “the services and products important to human life easier to access and simpler to use.”

The goals for 2007 include growing the number, size and types of the events worldwide. This includes: adding more events that not only provide education about usability, but work to effect change by taking the message to the average citizen, offering additional webcasting features that enable World Usability Day to be even more accessible and increasing the volunteers, supporters and sponsors for the event. In order to accomplish this, we need more event leaders and volunteers as part of the World Usability Day team.

Some issues that will be addressed are: new technologies, drug research, emergency disaster planning, functionality of hospitals, and much more.

To learn more and find information on how you can become involved, visit the World Usability Day website at http://www.worldusabilityday.org/.

HighBeam Research to launch new website, Newser.com

UPDATE October 30, 2007: Newser — an Online News Service from HighBeam Research and Michael Wolff — Debuts Today

This Tuesday, October 30, HighBeam Reseach will release Newser.com, a news website that creators Patrick Spain and Michael Wolff hope will change the current trend of content aggregation.

Newser stories run approximately 120 words in length, and feature photos licensed from the Associated Press as well as links to the original story source. Readers can also determine their mix of hard and soft stories through a “slider box,” which Spain hopes will introduce “different ways of how to perceive news.” The site, which was designed by Chicago-based Duo Consulting, also features the top stories of the day and categorizes news by topic and publication date.

So what makes Newser different from others like Google or Yahoo? The answer: Humans. Instead of using “spiders” or “crawlers” built off of algorithms to gather information from the web, an entire staff has been hired to contribute to content found on Newser.com.

“Nobody is really aggregating news in a meaningful way,” said Spain, 55, who ran and sold business-information service Hoovers.com. “Google in a robotic way [aggregates stories] from hundreds of brands and sources. But it doesn’t have any editorial zest.”

NewspaperARCHIVE.com provides free global warming research tool

The topic of global warming has infiltrated the media, industry and politics in the U.S. and throughout the world. NewspaperARCHIVE.com, the largest online historic newspaper database, has created a special collection dedicated to global warming. The Global Warming Newspaper Archive, found at http://www.globalwarmingarchive.com/Home.aspx, allows users to search through 50,000 archived newspaper pages to find articles about global warming. The archive also includes a timeline of events relating to the Earth’s climate and a historical overview of the topic.

With the 2008 U.S. Presidential Election right around the corner, the topic of global warming is on the list of candidates’ issues to address. Regardless of the current fundamental argument – are humans causing the earth to warm? – the earth is changing and education, including the history of the planet’s climate, is important.

By searching the Global Warming Newspaper Archive, you can explore past perspectives on the “greenhouse effect” and also research what many scientists, politicians and those in the media had to say about the concept. Newspapers are a great source of information and NewspaperARCHIVE.com has released this socially relevant archive so that we can all benefit from information it contains.

Genealogical Society of Utah, National Archives and Footnote.com work to digitize Civil War Era pension files

The Genealogical Society of Utah (GSU) and the National Archives have announced a partnership to “digitize approved pension applications of widows of Civil War Union soldiers…” Operating as FamilySearch.org, the GSU, in conjunction with Footnote.com, intents to work with the National Archives to release more than 1.2 million files.

These records, of great interest to genealogists and others, are currently available only at the National Archives Building in Washington, DC. The widows’ pension application files, a rich source of information about ordinary American citizens of the time, include supporting documents such as affidavits, depositions of witnesses, marriage certificates, birth records, death certificates, and pages from family bibles.

Free Speech, Chicago, Laws and Litter

Last weekend, Warner Todd Huston of the Canada Free Press reported that Chicago passed a law that includes the prohibition of free newspaper distribution. The law, which was intended to aid in the control of ‘litter’ in the Windy City, was passed by a group of 50 individuals who are now coming under fire for the repression of the First Amendment – Freedom of Speech.

Warner Todd Huston writes:

Of course, the Aldermen who voted 50 to nothing for this law are scrambling to answer critics of the ordinance. It seems fairly certain that not a one of them even read the thing before they voted, something that isn’t unusual in this city. They all claim, of course, that this ordinance would never be used to stop a community newspaper from being distributed.

But just wait for the first incumbent Alderman who decides he doesn’t like what a paper has to say about him during an election campaign! Just wait for the first time King Daley doesn’t like what some small paper has to say about his trucking schemes or other alleged criminal enterprises. Watch how quickly a newspaper becomes “litter” then.

Rare palm-leaf collections microfilmed and digitized

With help from the U.S. Consulate-General, rare palm-leaf collections residing at the United Theological College in Bangalore have been digitized and microfilmed. The project, launched in October 2006, started with a $35,000 grant from the U.S. Department of State, under the Ambassador’s Fund for Cultural Presentation.

“Some of the original material available in the library archive was getting old and had become brittle. Theological and secular scholars involved in research in sociology, ethnography and history have been using the library facilities, and digitising will help in providing better access to the materials.”

The collection includes manuscripts that are more than 200 years old, written in several Indian languages. The “first printed Bible in India that dates back to the 18th century” is also included in the collection.

Spokane Spokesman-Review & Houston Chronicle announce layoffs

The Spokane Spokesman-Review announced it will lay off 30 employees, and offer up early retirement incentives to those that hold 10 other positions. The paper’s editorial department is expected to lose about 15 employees.

Editor Steven Smith said he’s been asked to trim more than $1 million from his annual $9 million budget. The newspaper employs 550 people and about 137 of them work in the editorial department.

Tuesday, only hours after the announcement made by the Spokesman-Review, the Houston Chronicle said it expects to lay off nearly 5 percent of its current employees.

The Chronicle will lose about 70 of its 1,400 positions, Publisher Jack Sweeney said, confirming an article on the paper’s Web site and a memo he wrote to employees that was posted on the Romenesko journalism blog.

Falling advertising revenue and subscription rates have been contributing to the mass-layoffs seen in previous months within the newspaper industry. In addition, many publications are working toward online solutions for revenue, however, in past months advertising on the web has declined as well.

Billionaire investor Sam Zell compares newspaper industry to Rome

Sam Zell, well-known billionaire investor, recently spoke to a group of newspaper executives and compared the industry to the fall of Rome.

“I think the newspaper industry has stood there and watched while other media enterprises have taken our bacon and run with it,” he told the annual meeting of the Inland Press Association, a newspaper trade group representing about 1,200 papers in all 50 states. “It’s too much complacency.”

[…] The industry as a whole, Zell said, has been “standing there and letting this happen while Rome is burning.”

Zell also spoke about the rise of the internet and the lack of attention the industry has given the medium, blaming the lack of cross-media utilization as the catalyst for the current state of the industry.

Six million military personnel files to be released

Official Military Personnel Files (OMPFs) will be made available by the National Personnel Records Center (NPRC) for the first time. The initial release will include more than 6 million records, however more than 57 million total files are expected to be released through the year 2067.

These archived files are treasured by family members, historians, researchers, and genealogists. Contained in a typical OMPF are documents outlining all elements of military service, including assignments, evaluations, awards and decorations, education and training, demographic information, some medical information and documented disciplinary actions. Some records also contain photographs of the individual and official correspondence concerning military service.

For more information, please refer to the original press release, “National Personnel Records Center Opens more than Six Million New Military Personnel Files”

MediaNews predicts 20 percent internet revenue gain by 2012

MediaNews Group, Inc., owner and publisher of the Oakland Tribune, the Denver Post and more than 50 daily and 35 non-daily newspapers plans to grow its web revenue by 20 percent over the next 5 years. The company has already began to consolidate and localize staff by cutting editorial jobs and combining printer and newsgathering efforts within specific locals.

”We have to find ways to grow revenue or become more efficient by eliminating fixed costs,” Lodovic said. “Why does every newspaper need copy editors? In this day and age, I think copy-editing can be done centrally for several newspapers.”

MediaNews plans to “attract young readers” through web sites that cater to them while relying on services, such as those provided by Yahoo! to streamline advertising initiatives for both print and web markets.

”The Internet is a small piece now, but obviously it’s growing at a faster rate than the print side,” Lodovic said. “The print side is struggling right now. Some of that is cyclical and some of that is not, but in the next five years we don’t see print growing.”

Read the full article, “Singleton’s MediaNews Plans to Triple Web Revenue (Update1).”