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Week 40, 2005
THE BEST SELLERS (recent popular articles):
1) CNN/Global Office: Early life crisis hits male workers [Les hommes britanniques connaissent la crise de la quarantaine de plus en plus tôt...]
2) Various sources: March of the Penguins supporting intelligent design theory [Les réacs chrétiens US font feu de tout bois en exploitant le film 'La Marche de l'Empereur' pour soutenir leurs théories créationistes.]
3) The New York Times/Paul Krugman: French family values [Un commentateur économiste des plus lus aux E-U prend la défense du savoir-vivre français.]

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THE REGULARS: Summary
4) Le texte plus abordable de la semaine/Scholastic: Rising gas prices [Les Américains sont mécontents du prix de l'essence.
5) A puzzle: The portrait [Un casse-tête.]
6) CNN/Global Office Management Masterclass: Strategy development [Conseils sur le développement de nouvelles stratégies.]
7) AUDIO SPECIAL/This American Life: Katrina [Un document assez exceptionnel : une émission de radio américaine qui donne la parole aux survivants de Katrina, avec une transcription au format PDF.]

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1) CNN/Global Office: Early life crisis hits male workers [Les hommes britanniques connaissent la crise de la quarantaine de plus en plus tôt...]
http://edition.cnn.com/2005/BUSINESS/08/03/early.life.crisis/index.html

Early life crisis hits male workers

By Nick Easen for CNN
Wednesday, August 3, 2005 Posted: 1319 GMT (2119 HKT)

LONDON, England (CNN) -- Most men want a better job, a bigger house, more holidays and a lot more besides. But the pursuit of a better work-life balance is proving a little too stressful for the younger modern male.

A new report says that many men in Britain are finding office and home life too much to handle. But it is not men facing a mid-life crisis that are going through this phase -- it is the younger generation that are now suffering from early-life crises.

The research group Mintel found that 23 percent of 25- to 44-year-old British men felt stressed in the office, compared with an average of 19 percent. This group is also concerned about a lack of personal time and earning enough money for the kind of lifestyle they want to live.

The survey of 1,883 men earlier this year found that nearly one in ten men between the ages of 25 and 44 are anxiety-ridden, worrying about employment issues and time pressures. Problems are made worse if they have children and especially if they are divorced. "British men are finding the work-life balance very difficult," Amanda Lintott, a consumer analyst at Mintel told CNN. "Only 25 percent do not worry about anything at all, and our research shows that women are handling things better." A further 16 percent of men worry about having enough money put aside for retirement and being able to pay for their children's education.

Many men in this early-life crisis phase hope to earn more money and work less, while still reducing their debt. Mintel suggests that these people need to dampen down their over-ambitious plans and be more realistic, if they want to lead happier and less stressed lives.

The change of men's role in society was also highlighted as one of the elements contributing to high levels of stress and anxiety. "There is a lack of direction due to their changing roles, men do not know where their roles are -- and whether they should stay at home, especially if their partner has a better job," says Lintott. One of the biggest changes in British society has been the increase in the number of women going to work, now only eight percent of men agree that a woman's place is in the home.

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The film, narrated by Morgan Freeman, distributed by Warner Independent Pictures, is a real-life documentary which follows a flock of emperor penguins in the Antarctic for a year as they journey 70 miles in harsh winds and freezing cold temperatures by foot, going through the harshest conditions in the struggle to survive - all to find true "love" and to find a mate and reproduce. This new French documentary follows them throughout the entire 9-month mating period.

The film beings with penguins jumping out of the water and starting their journey. The penguins journey to the breeding ground and travel in a single file line, walking nearly the entire way, to a distance seventy miles from their starting point.

Once all of the penguins finally reach the destination, they begin to pair off. Some fights occur as there are less males than females, but eventually they are paired off as best as possible.

After the female lays the egg, the egg is passed from female to male. The male protects the egg while the mother makes the 70 mile journey back to the water to eat. While the mother is away, the father shields the egg from the freezing weather conditions.

When the mother returns, the father makes the journey to find feed for itself as well. The chick hatches while the mother is away, so she sees her chick for the first time upon her return. They continue to go back and forth over the entire summer to provide food for themselves and their offspring. Due to harsh conditions, most of the young chicks do not survive.

The film takes viewers in a breathtaking entertaining educational experience. "The complexity of the penguins' lifestyle testifies to a Divine Creator," said one commentator.

"To think that natural selection or even the penguins themselves could come up with the idea to migrate miles and miles multiple times each year without their partner or their offspring is a bit insulting to my intellect. How great is our God!"

The successful film which was released in US in June, is set to hit the screens in the UK in December.

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http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/huffpost/20050915/cm_huffpost/007356_200509150105
Gene Stone: The Passion of the Penguin

Gene Stone Thu Sep 15, 2:05 AM ET

The Christian far-right has discovered the joy of penguins.

As recently noted on the Huffington Post, Christians all over the country are rejoicing at the success of the documentary The March of the Penguins, which documents the long journey Emperor penguins must take to reproduce and thrive.

On the right-wing Web site WorldNetDaily.com, an opponent of abortion wrote that the movie “verified the beauty of life and the rightness of protecting it.” And at a conference for young Republicans, the editor of National Review urged participants to see the movie because it promoted monogamy.

In another Christian magazine, writer Andrew Coffin says, "That any one of these eggs survives is a remarkable feat - and, some might suppose, a strong case for intelligent design.”

And still other Christian commentators have dubbed the movie The Passion of the Penguin, in reference to The Passion of the Christ, another successful movie that found enormous support in the far-right Christian community.

Do you ever wonder what these ultra far-right people are thinking? Everyone else in the world, or at least, everyone else in the world that pertains to science and reality, has been reading all the new documentation about homosexuality and nature.

For instance, researchers at Oregon State University recently discovered that about eight percent of rams are gay. The scientists, at the university along with those at the Oregon Health & Science University and the U.S.
Department of Agriculture's Sheep Experiment Station, say that the finding may prove sexuality in general, and homosexuality in particular, may be biologically driven.

Meanwhile, Boston Parks officials disclosed that Romeo and Juliet, the famous pair of white swans in the city’s Pubic Garden, are really two females. Gay lovers, these swans: Juliet and Juliet.

Actually, the book Biological Exuberance revealed that homosexual behavior had been documented in some 450 species; the book was cited by the American Psychiatric Association in a amicus curiae brief concerning the case in which the Supreme court overturned sodomy laws (for humans. Luckily for the swans and the rams, the Christians have yet to pass laws prohibiting them from falling in love).

But most relevant to the March of the Penguins is that there are more documented cases of gay penguins than perhaps any other species. Think about Roy and Silo, the gay penguins at Manhattan’s Central Park Zoo. This male homosexual couple fell in love and were so eager to have a baby together that they once placed a rock in their nest and sat on it to keep it warm.

Their keeper eventually gave them a fertile egg, which they hatched.

The real world is filled with incidents of gay penguins. Wendell and Cass, a happy pair of male African penguins, live at the New York Aquarium. There are twenty such pairs in Japanese zoos, as well as many throughout Europe.

No animal in recent history except, perhaps, man, has been so celebrated for its homosexuality. Penguins are coming out all over. Including the South Pole.

Funny that the far-right Christians don’t want to deal with that.

A recently published, in-depth article by writer Neil Swidey in the Boston Globe contains this paragraph: “While post-birth development may well play a supporting role, the roots of homosexuality, at least in men, appear to be in place by the time a child is born.”

Swidey goes on to say, “After spending years sifting through all the available data, British researchers Glenn Wilson and Qazi Rahman come to an even bolder conclusion in their forthcoming book Born Gay: The Psychobiology of Sex Orientation, in which they write: ‘Sexual orientation is something we are born with and not `acquired' from our social environment.’”

What do you want to bet that the far-right doesn’t want to deal with this, too?

But it’s something the penguins already know.

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http://www.iht.com/protected/articles/2005/07/29/opinion/edkrug.php

Paul Krugman: French family values
Paul Krugman The New York Times
SATURDAY, JULY 30, 2005

PRINCETON, New Jersey Americans tend to believe that we do everything better than anyone else. That belief makes it hard for us to learn from others. For example, I've found that many people refuse to believe that Europe has anything to teach us about health care policy. After all, they say, how can Europeans be good at health care, when their economies are such failures?

Now, there's no reason a country can't have both an excellent health care system and a troubled economy (or vice versa). But are European economies really doing that badly?

The answer is no. Americans are doing a lot of strutting these days, but a head-to-head comparison between the economies of the United States and Europe - France, in particular - shows that the big difference is in priorities, not performance. We're talking about two highly productive societies that have made a different tradeoff between work and family time. And there's a lot to be said for the French choice.

First things first: Given all the bad-mouthing the French receive, you may be surprised that I describe their society as "productive." Yet according to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, productivity in France - gross domestic product per hour worked - is actually a bit higher than in the United States. True, France's GDP per person is well below U.S. levels. But that's because French workers spend more time with their families.

OK, I'm oversimplifying a bit. There are several reasons why the French put in fewer hours of work per capita than we do. One is that some of the French would like to work, but can't: France's unemployment rate, which tends to run about 4 percentage points higher than the U.S. rate, is a real problem. Another is that many French citizens retire early. But the main story is that full-time French workers work shorter weeks and take more vacations than full-time American workers.

The point is that to the extent the French have less income than we do, it's mainly a matter of choice. And to see the consequences of that choice, let's ask how the situation of a typical middle-class family in France compares with that of its American counterpart.

The French family, without question, has lower disposable income. This translates into lower personal consumption: a smaller car, a smaller house, less eating out.

But there are compensations for this lower level of consumption. Because French schools are good across the country, the French family doesn't have to worry as much about getting its children into a good school district. Nor does the French family, with guaranteed access to excellent health care, have to worry about losing health insurance or being driven into bankruptcy by medical bills.

Perhaps even more important, however, the members of that French family are compensated for their lower income with much more time together. Fully employed French workers average about seven weeks of paid vacation a year. In America, that figure is less than four.

So which society has made the better choice? I've been looking at a new study of international differences in working hours by Alberto Alesina and Edward Glaeser of Harvard University and Bruce Sacerdote of Dartmouth College. The study's main point is that differences in government regulations, rather than culture (or taxes), explain why Europeans work less than Americans.

But the study also suggests that in this case, government regulations actually allow people to make a desirable tradeoff - modestly lower income in return for more time with friends and family - the kind of deal an individual would find hard to negotiate. The authors write: "It is hard to obtain more vacation for yourself from your employer and even harder, if you do, to coordinate with all your friends to get the same deal and go on vacation together."

And they even offer some statistical evidence that working fewer hours makes Europeans happier, despite the loss of potential income. It's not a definitive result, and as they note, the whole subject is "politically charged." But let me make an observation: Some of that political charge seems to have the wrong sign.

American conservatives despise European welfare states like France. Yet many of them stress the importance of "family values." And whatever else you may say about French economic policies, they seem extremely supportive of the family as an institution. Senator Rick Santorum, are you reading this?

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4) Le texte plus abordable de la semaine/Scholastic: Rising gas prices [Les Américains sont mécontents du prix de l'essence.]
http://teacher.scholastic.com/

Rising Gas Prices
By Ezra Billinkoff

In response to rising gas prices and concerns about the economy, President Bush asked Americans to use less energy. After Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, gasoline production in the Gulf of Mexico came to a stop. Oil equipment in the gulf was damaged, so it will be some time before supplies will return to normal. Americans depend on gas to power their cars, their homes, and their businesses.

"People just need to recognize that these storms have caused disruption and that if they're able to not drive on a trip that's not essential, that would be helpful," Bush told reporters this week.

Supply and Demand

Since the hurricanes, gas prices have climbed past $3 a gallon—the highest ever. Higher gas prices can be explained by an economic rule known as supply and demand. The rule says that the less there is of a product that a lot of people want or demand, the more expensive that product will be. Gold, for example, is rare and so jewelry made with gold is expensive. Bronze is more abundant, so jewelry made with bronze is cheaper than jewelry made with gold.

Americans need gas. To increase the amount of gas available, President Bush said he will release some of the nation's stored oil and gas. The U.S. government keeps a Strategic Petroleum Reserve in case of emergencies. If more gas is available, the price will go down. Along with increasing the supply of gas, President Bush urged Americans to use less of it. With smaller usage or demand for gas, prices can also begin to drop. Supply and demand says that when fewer people want something, the price drops. To use less gas, President Bush encouraged Americans to drive a little less. He also told government agencies to use less energy. He asked government workers to take public transportation to work rather than drive their own cars.

Increasing the Supply of Gas

Leaders in Congress have already begun to figure out ways to increase the supply of gas in the U.S. so that gas prices can return to normal. Some of their proposals include building more oil refineries (where oil is treated), allowing states to increase oil drilling on their coasts, and allowing for drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. All of these proposals are controversial because of the impact that oil production and drilling has on the environment. Environmentalists say that none of these proposals will help the gas price crisis. "It is kind of sad," said Kevin Curtis, of the National Environmental Trust. "There is nothing here that helps the consumer at the gas pump in the short term."

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6) CNN/Global Office Management Masterclass: Strategy development [Conseils sur le développement de nouvelles stratégies.]
http://edition.cnn.com/2005/BUSINESS/08/10/masterclass.strategy/

Management Masterclass

By Mike Petrook, Chartered Management Instituteexternal link
Wednesday, August 10, 2005 Posted: 0934 GMT (1734 HKT)

LONDON, England (CNN) -- Q: "I have been given the task of developing a new strategy for my organization as we have recently expanded and developed a new arm of the business. Although I have been involved in strategic planning in the past, I would like some advice about organizing a strategy development team and working with them on this project."

A: The new business area you refer to suggests a fresh challenge is on the horizon and thinking strategically is imperative for all businesses, whether growing or established.

According to research, titled "The Role and Importance of Strategy Workshops," published last month by the Chartered Management Institute and the Advanced Institute of Management Research, strategic planning processes are rarely inclusive and all too often ideas are not sought from across all levels of an organization. Problems arise if planning is confined to people at the top because when those individuals leave, gaps might appear due to an over-reliance on the views and experience of one person. And beyond that, it means that organizations are failing to take into account the knowledge and expertise of managers who may be responsible for the day-to-day running of the business.

One thing is clear. Organizations recognize the importance of strategic development and as this research shows, strategy workshops or corporate away days have become increasingly commonplace over the past 20 years.

But the question that needs to be addressed is how can they be used to your advantage? As a leader you need to ask yourself how strategy workshops can further your organization's aims and, at the same time, improve career prospects and personal development for you and your team. In short, if they are managed well and organized properly, they undoubtedly can do this. But the problem remains that many people believe away days fall short of expectations (10 per cent of research respondents said the workshop they last attended failed to meet its objectives and over 40 percent reported either no or a negative impact on a range of measurable outcomes). So what can you do to change these perceptions?

To get the best out of your team and the process of strategic planning you need to consider three things: purpose, preparation and participation.

Is the main goal to generate new ideas and solutions to attract customers? Perhaps you need to formulate a new strategy or achieve buy-in to some existing ideas. Whatever the reason, a day away from the workplace is only worthwhile if people know what is expected of them. So it is up to you to provide a clear purpose and direction. After all, how can you or your team move forward unless they are aware of your expectations? And how can you progress unless you deal with issues in a planned and concerted manner?

One of the best ways to develop your own capability as a leader and the skills of your team is by encouraging others to be creative and innovative. Doing so will give you the chance to guide people towards a common goal, allowing you to communicate a vision that team members can follow. It is also a way to generate trust and respect because, by ensuring colleagues express their opinion in a workshop environment, they will feel their views are valued, giving them a sense of purpose in the work they do.

Bear in mind that the Institute's research shows that only one-fifth of workshops are attended by junior managers, despite evidence suggesting that participation can improve relationships and boost morale -- something you would, naturally, want to achieve. But you also need to make sure that you and your colleagues prepare for workshops. Worryingly, the amount of time spent in preparation is limited, suggesting that participants rely too much on experience.

To be successful you need to make use of the information and resources available so that strategic discussions are informed and based on fact. How else can you create improvements that are customer-driven and focused? And of course, after the event, you must communicate and seek feedback. It is vital that you ensure others in the organization are aware of the outcomes so that you can achieve buy-in to the ideas. Without that your chances of developing ideas or being recognized for them are considerably reduced.

With that in mind, the end-point is the need to measure results. If you implement changes, you must test how well they have worked so that you can manage change and adapt as necessary. Ultimately, one way to ensure your career progresses is to demonstrate an ability to lead others and manage change. The key is to show that you have the ability to focus on the business and build on what you have achieved already to help you, your team and the company go forward.

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7) AUDIO SPECIAL/This American Life: Katrina [Un document assez exceptionnel : une émission de radio américaine qui donne la parole aux survivants de Katrina, avec une transcription au format PDF.]

L'audio: http://www.thislife.org/ra/296.ram

Le texte: http://www.thislife.org/pdf/296.pdf

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8) Big Picture: New office slang [Glossaire pour être dans le coup.]
http://bigpicture.typepad.com/writing/2005/03/new_office_slan.html
New Office Slang

404 - Someone who is clueless. From the Web error message, “404 Not Found,” which means the document requested couldn’t be located. “Don’t bother asking John. He’s 404.”

Adminisphere - The rarified organizational layers above the rank and file that makes decisions that are often profoundly inappropriate or irrelevant. (cf atmosphere)

Alpha Geek - The most knowledgeable, technically proficient person in an office or work group. “I dunno, ask Rick. He’s our alpha geek.” (alpha male = le mâme dominant ; geek = un jeune homme qui manque de savoir faire social mais qui est très calé en tecnique, surtout en informatique)

Assmosis - The process by which some people seem to absorb success and advancement by kissing up to the boss rather than working hard. (ass + osmosis)

Batmobiling - putting up emotional shields. Refers to the retracting armor that covers the Batmobile as in “she started talking marriage and he started batmobiling”

Beepilepsy - The brief siezure people sometimes suffer when their beepers go off, especially in vibrator mode. Characterized by physical spasms, goofy facial expressions, and stopping speech in mid-sentence.

Betamaxed - When a technology is overtaken in the market by inferior but better marketed competition as in “Microsoft betamaxed Apple right out of the market”

Blamestorming - A group discussion of why a deadline was missed or a project failed and who was responsible.(cf brainstorming)

Blowing Your Buffer - Losing one’s train of thought. Occurs when the person you are speaking with won’t let you get a word in edgewise or has just said something so astonishing that your train gets derailed. “Damn, I just blew my buffer!” (Synonym: “Head Crash”)

Body Nazis - Hard-core exercise and weight-lifting fanatics who look down on anyone who doesn’t work out obsessively.

Bookmark - To take note of a person for future reference. “After seeing his cool demo at Siggraph, I bookmarked him.” (bookmark = marque page, ou signet ou favori dans un navigateur web)

Brain Fart - A byproduct of a bloated mind producing information effortlessly; a burst of useful information. “I know you’re busy on the Microsoft story, but can you give us a brain fart on the Mitnik bust?” Variation of old hacker slang that had more negative connotations.

CGI Joe - A hard-core CGI script programmer with all the social skills and charisma of a plastic action figure. (GI Joe est le nom générique d'un soldat américain, et le nom d'une poupée genre Action Man)

Chainsaw Consultant - An outside expert brought in to reduce the employee head count, leaving the top brass with clean hands. (chainsaw = tronçonneuse)

Chip Jewelry - Old computers destined to be scrapped or turned into decoration. “I paid three grand for that Mac and now it’s nothing but chip jewelry.”

Chips and Salsa - Chips = hardware, salsa = software. “First we gotta figure out if the problem’s in your chips or your salsa.”

CLM (Career Limiting Move)- Used by microserfs to describe an ill-advised activity. “Trashing your boss while he or she is within earshot is a serious CLM.”

Cobweb - A WWW site that never changes. (cob = araignée [vieillot] cobweb=toile d'araignée poussiereuse)

Crapplet - A badly written or profoundly useless Java applet. “I just wasted 30 minutes downloading that crapplet!”

CROP DUSTING - Surreptitiously farting while passing thru a cube farm, then enjoying the sounds of dismay and disgust; leads to PRAIRIE DOGGING.....

Cube Farm - An office filled with cubicles.

Dead Tree Edition - The paper version of a publication available in both paper and electronic forms.

Dilberted - To be exploited and oppressed by your boss, as is Dilbert, the comic strip character. “Damn, I’ve been dilberted again! The old man revised the specs for the fourth time this week.”

Dorito Syndrome - The feeling of emptiness and dissatisfaction triggered by addictive substances that lack nutritional content. “I just spent six hours surfing the Web, and now I’ve got a bad case of Dorito Syndrome.”

Egosurfing - Scanning the Net, databases, etc., for one’s own name.

Elvis Year - The peak year of popularity as in “1993 was Barney the dinosaur’s Elvis year”

Flight Risk - Used to describe employees who are suspected of planning to leave a company or department soon. (flight risk s'utilise normalement dans le contexte juridique pour parler d'un prévenu qui doit rester en détention préventive pour prévenir une fuite)

Generica - Fast food joints, strip malls, sub-divisions as in “we were so lost in generica that I couldn’t remember what city it was” (generic + America)

Glazing - Corporate-speak for sleeping with your eyes open; a popular pastime at conferences and early-morning meetings. “Didn’t he notice that by the second session half the room was glazing?” (when your eyes glaze over, it means you are bored or tired ; glaze = glaçage)

Going Postal - Totally stressed out and losing it like postal employees who went on shooting rampages

GOOD job - A "Get-Out-Of-Debt" job. A well-paying job people take in order to pay off their debts, one that they will quit as soon as they are solvent again.

Gray Matter - Older, experienced business people hired by young entrepreneurial firms trying to appear more professional and established.

Graybar Land - The place you go while you’re staring at a computer that’s processing something very slowly (while you watch the gray bar creep across the screen). “That CAD rendering put me in graybar land for like an hour.”

High Dome - Egghead, scientist, PhD

Idea Hamsters - People whose idea generators are always running.

Irritainment - Entertainment and media spectacles that are annoying, but you find yourself unable to stop watching them. The O.J. trials were a prime example.

It’s a Feature - From the old adage, “It’s not a bug, it’s a feature.” Used sarcastically to describe an unpleasant problem you wish to gloss over.

Keyboard Plaque - The disgusting buildup of dirt and crud found on some people’s computer keyboards.

Link Rot - The process by which web page’s links become obsolete as the sites they’re connected to change or die.

Meatspace - The physical world (as opposed to the virtual) also “carbon community” “facetime” “F2F” “RL”

Mouse Potato - The online generation’s answer to the couch potato.

Ohnosecond - That minuscule fraction of time during which you realize you’ve just made a terrible error.

Open-Collar Workers - People who work at home or telecommute.

Percussive Maintenance - The fine art of whacking the crap out of an electronic device to get it to work again.

Perot - To quit unexpectedly. “My cellular phone just perot’ed.”

Plug-and-Play - A new hire who doesn’t require training. “That new guy is totally plug-and-play.”

Prairie Dogging - When something loud happens in a cube farm, causing heads to pop up over the walls trying to see what’s going on.

Ribs ‘N’ Dick - A budget with no fat as in “we’ve got ribs ‘n’ dick and we’re supposed to find 20K for memory upgrades”

Salmon Day - The experience of spending an entire day swimming upstream only to get screwed in the end. “God, today was a total salmon day!”

Seagull Manager - A manager who flies in, makes a lot of noise, shits over everything and then leaves. (seagull= mouette)

Siliwood - The coming convergence of movies, interactive TV and computers; also “Hollywired”

SITCOMs - What yuppies turn into when they have children and one of them stops working to stay home with the kids. “Single Income, Two Children, Oppressive Mortgage”

Square-Headed Spouse - Computer (conjoint carré = son PC)

Squirt the Bird - To transmit a signal up to a satellite. “Crew and talent are ready...what time do we squirt the bird?”

Starter Marriage - A short-lived first marriage that ends in divorce with no kids, no property and no regrets.

Stress Puppy - A person who thrives on being stressed-out and whiny.

Swiped Out - An ATM or credit card that has been used so much its magnetic strip is worn away.

Tourists - Those who take training classes just to take a vacation from their jobs. “There were only three serious students in the class; the rest were just tourists.”

Treeware - Hacker slang for documentation or other printed material.

Umfriend - One with whom one has a sexual relationship; as in, “this is Dale, my...um...friend.”

Under Mouse Arrest - Getting busted for violating an online service’s rule of conduct. “Sorry I couldn’t get back to you. AOL put me under mouse arrest.” (house arrest=

Uninstalled - Euphemism for being fired. Also: decruitment.

Vulcan Nerve Pinch - The taxing hand position required to reach all the appropriate keys for certain commands. For instance, the warm re-boot for a Mac II computer involves simultaneously pressing the Control key, the Command key, the Return key and the Power On key. (du célèbre geste de Monsieur Spock dans Star Trek)

WOOFYS - Well Off Older Folks.

World Wide Wait - The real meaning of WWW.

Xerox Subsidy - Euphemism for swiping free photocopies from one’s workplace.

Yuppie Food Coupons - Twenty dollar bills from an ATM. (ATM = DAB)

http://slate.msn.com/id/2126685/
moneybox
Attack of the Tentacle Lady!
At last, a business the Chinese can't dominate.
By Daniel Gross
Posted Wednesday, Sept. 21, 2005, at 12:50 PM PT

DÜSSELDORF, Germany—You don't have to go to China to see how much of the U.S. manufacturing base has relocated to the Middle Kingdom. On a trip to Germany with a group of journalists, I spent a few hours at the Messe Düsseldorf, a massive trade and convention center on the banks of the Rhine. (Trade fairs in European river cities have been essential to East-West commerce since the Middle Ages.)

To see just how far things have come—and how far they have yet to go—I visited Hall 16. The massive space was entirely filled with row upon row of booths manned by Chinese sales reps. They were hawking Chinese-made vacuum cleaners and power tools, fans and air conditioners, masking tape and panini presses, drill bits and tape measures, shovels and irons, clocks and coffee makers, juicers, and blow-dryers.

What was just as remarkable as the goods on display was the incompetent salesmanship that accompanied them. Here is a piece of good news for America: The Chinese can make anything, but they still need us to teach them how to sell it.

American trade shows are universally glitzy affairs, even (and especially) at the shows where the products are the most boring and pedestrian. High-end trade shows like the Consumer Electronics Show or the Detroit Auto Show feature hot spokesmodels waxing rhapsodic about products and rent-a-celebrities. The manufacturers' sales reps are always pros—smooth-talking, impeccably dressed, generally good-looking men and women whose patter is polished to the same sheen as their loafers and heels. Anyone who expresses the slightest interest in the product is met with a sincere, firm handshake, a demand for a business card, and contact information. And they won't let you move on without a heap of sales literature.

But my experience in Hall 16 of the Messe Düsseldorf was quite different than anything I've experienced at a U.S. trade show. I stopped at the booth of the Ningbo Herine Electric Appliance Co. Ltd., a 10-year-old company based in coastal Zhejian province, whose blender, equipped with an American-style plug, caught my eye.

The two men staffing the booth greeted me with all the enthusiasm of Dick Cheney at a MoveOn.org rally. They didn't rise to greet me. No inquiry was made as to my name and business. I helped myself to the brochure and asked how much it would cost for 1,000 blenders.

Their English was only marginally better than my nonexistent Chinese. (Bad on me, yes. But then again, I'm not in the business of selling goods for the U.S. market.) The younger man remained rooted to his seat, focused intently on his cup of coffee. The older man took his cigarette out from between his teeth, which were the color of a nice dark flan, and blew smoke in my general direction. I couldn't understand whether he was saying eight, 18, or 80, and so finally we reverted to what the Phoenicians must have done millennia ago when they plied the Mediterranean. I scribbled down numbers on a tablet and asked him to circle the right answer. It was $8 apiece.

The man and woman at a booth selling novelty products were somewhat more solicitous—perhaps too much so. Their main product was a ball with a bunch of tentacles springing from it, a battery-powered head-scratcher/massager. We sat down and took turns getting our heads rubbed. Between the whirring, I could hear the woman speak of how the product "is reaching your acupuncture pressure points and increasing blood flow." It was tingling and oddly pleasant for a bit. But after a while, I got a head rush and began to feel slightly dizzy, like when I drank Slurpees too fast as a kid. I looked up to see the lady grabbing the belt of one of my traveling companions and attempting to jam a vibrating back-massager into the small of his back.

Now, one shouldn't expect that Chinese sales and marketing practices would be as advanced as their manufacturing techniques. Manufacturing is a matter of applying labor and processes to raw materials, over and over again. A culture of successful manufacturing can be engineered from the top down. That's one reason many countries without a tradition of market economics, like China, have been able to master manufacturing relatively quickly.

But marketing and sales are different disciplines. They involve persuasion and suggestion rather than command. It's not always enough simply to have a product of adequate quality available at a low price. Salespeople have to offer potential customers a reason to choose their product over the rival products available in the marketplace. China has an ancient merchant culture, but communism seems to have damaged its service economy. The blender salesmen behaved like indifferent bureaucrats. The tentacle team misread its customers in another way. Slipping a cold piece of metal into somebody's pants is generally not a winning sales tactic.

The United States has lost its manufacturing edge to China. But we still have a massive competitive advantage in sales and marketing, no matter what the cost differential between the two countries. The United States, after all, is where modern advertising, marketing, and brands were invented. And that is precisely why smart Chinese companies are interested in buying U.S. companies. Lenovo didn't want IBM's personal-computer business for its manufacturing processes. The Chinese computer market wanted the unit for its American management, its strength in finance, marketing, and sales.

Today, companies from wealthier countries outsource production to China to compete effectively in a global market. But we may increasingly find that Chinese companies have to outsource sales, public relations, and advertising back to us.
Daniel Gross (www.danielgross.net), who writes Slate's Moneybox column, just returned from a trip to Germany sponsored by the Atlantik-Brucke Foundation. You can e-mail him at moneybox@slate.com.

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10) AFP: French films hot at US box office this year [Les films français font un tabac aux States.]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20050917/wl_canada_afp/afpentertainmentcanada_050917220718
French films hot at US box office this year

Sat Sep 17, 6:08 PM ET

TORONTO (AFP) - US audiences cannot get enough French films this year, industry watchers told AFP at the Toronto International Film Festival, where a handful of US distribution deals were signed. "This year is one of the best on record for French films in the US," said Katherine Verret-Vimont, executive director of Unifrance USA, which promotes French films in the United States.

In 2004, only 57 French films and co-productions were released in the United States. By the end of 2005, a record number will have opened on US screens, Verret-Vimont said, the exact number still undetermined. "It's cheaper than a ticket to France," said Sony Pictures Classics vice president Michael Barker.

Charlotte Mickie, head of acquisitions for Celluloid Dreams, said she was lured by "French actresses (who) are beautiful, and not in a cookie cutter way" as well as the way the films deal with "relationships in a mature way." What is more, "The French are not afraid of mature women," she said. Veteran director Patrice Chereau, whose film "Gabrielle" starring Isabelle Huppert was shown in Toronto and will be screened at the upcoming New York film festival, said French films deal with love and sex "a little more easily than in American films."

French films grossed 111 million US dollars (or over 150 million US dollars including co-productions) in North American at the box office so far this year, including the second most popular documentary ever "March of the Penguins," which grossed 67 million US dollars in America, more than double revenues generated by the hugely successful "Amelie" two years ago.

"Diva" premiered in Toronto in 1981 and went on to make 7.4 million US dollars. "Amelie" won the People's Choice Award in Toronto in 2001.

This year, the Toronto festival will have shown 25 French films and l6 co-productions in 10 days by the time it winds down Saturday. Six of them found distributors, including British co-production "Oliver Twist" by exiled US filmmaker Roman Polanski and Francois Ozon's "Time to Leave" starring actor Jeanne Moreau, which was picked up on the first day of the festival by Strand Releasing. Several others are in negotiations.

"French films are increasingly taking pride of place," said festival chief executive officer Piers Handling. "The number of French films at the Festival is second only to the US and Canada." Their US audience remains baby boomers whose first foreign film experience was likely the work of famed French directors Louis Malle and Francois Truffaut, said Wellspring Films' Marie-Therese Guirguis. Younger people, she noted, are beginning to respond to visually stylish films like "Amelie" and edgy films such as Catherine Breillat's "Fat Girl."

Even subtitles, once a major barrier for non-English films are no longer as big an issue, according to Michael Barker of Sony, which will release Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne's "L'Enfant," which won the Palme d'Or and "Cache" which won Best Director at Cannes for Michael Haneke. "The revelation of the past few years is that young people send text messages, read text on computers. There's even rolling 'subtitles' on the bottom of CNN. They're used to seeing print on screen," he said.

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11) BBC: Cooing at new-born babies banned [Afin de défendre les droits de l'homme même tout petit, une maternité britannique interdit aux tiers de parler de et aux bébés.]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/1/hi/england/west_yorkshire/4284522.stm
Cooing at new-born babies banned
A West Yorkshire hospital has banned visitors from cooing at new-born babies over fears their human rights are being breached and to reduce infection.

A statement from Calderdale Royal Hospital in Halifax said staff had held an advice session to highlight the need for respect and dignity for patients. On one ward there is a doll featuring the message: "What makes you think I want to be looked at?"

But Labour MP Linda Riordan said the measures were "bureaucracy gone mad".

She told the Halifax Courier: "All mothers want people to admire their babies because all babies are beautiful. "But in a case where a mother did not want to answer questions it should be up to that individual to say so."

Some new mothers have already said they are astonished by the rules which stop people asking questions about their babies or looking at them in maternity wards. Debbie Lawson, neo-natal manager at the hospital's special care baby unit, said: "Cooing should be a thing of the past because these are little people with the same rights as you or me. We often get visitors wandering over to peer into cots but people sometimes touch or talk about the baby like they would if they were examining tins in a supermarket and that should not happen."

A spokeswoman for Calderdale and Huddersfield NHS Trust said the advice was as much to do with reducing infection as it was upholding "rights". In a statement she said: "Staff were wishing to highlight issues of potential confidentiality, especially for young babies and their parents in what can be emotional times. "Infection control was also a key part of the message as the unit deals with very small babies with very vulnerable immune systems."

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Manners maketh the man
Sep 22nd 2005
From The Economist print edition

The new interest in etiquette crosses gender boundaries

ACCORDING to Simone de Beauvoir, a woman is not born, but made. For many well-off British girls, a big part of this manufacturing process used to take place at finishing school, with classes in such womanly essentials as deportment, etiquette and flower-arranging.

It is still possible to gain a Diploma in Finishing in Switzerland, where Surval Mont-Fleuri and the Institut Villa Pierrefeu offer a residential course “suitable to the professional aspirations of a modern young lady”. But British finishing schools have closed or turned into business and secretarial colleges.

It seems, however, that mothers still want their daughters to stand up straight and make polite conversation. So Diana Mather and Penny Edge, specialists in corporate recruitment and training, have created The Finishing Academy, offering short courses teaching women and girls to “make the most of themselves”. The talk is about winning business contracts, not husbands, and the cookery is tailored to university life, not gala dinners.

Alongside etiquette and deportment, the courses impart a smattering of self-esteem (public speaking, how to network) and common sense (first-aid, healthy eating), with one-hour sessions on chess, interior design and massage thrown in. The truly vital topics—walking with a book on your head and getting out of a car with your knees together—are covered too. (In case you're wondering, swing your legs out with your knees together, put both feet flat on the ground and push up from the seat.)

Etiquette is even making it onto prime-time TV. “Ladette to Lady”, which aired this summer, showed ten belching, hard-drinking, swearing young women learning to mind their language, walk in heels and host dinner-parties.

And the new interest in etiquette isn't just for women. Some years ago, Sean Davoren, head butler at The Lanesborough, a London hotel, was called on to help to pacify an obnoxious child. He explained the basics of behaving nicely in public, the child was enthralled, the parents told their friends and he found himself holding etiquette classes for children once a month. Demand, even at £45 ($80) a head for two hours, was so high that the waiting list reached 12 months. This year he took a break from teaching to write “Manners from Heaven”, a children's book on etiquette.

Ms Mather and Ms Edge are now planning courses for men. The core subjects of standing, walking and eating are the same as for women, but the add-ons are a little different: map-reading, car-maintenance, fishing, golf, clay pigeon shooting and how to sew on a button. Getting out of a car with your knees together is still for the ladies only, though.

http://www.news.com.au/story/0,10117,16554284-13762,00.html
Soup kitchens cater to well-heeled
From: Agence France-Presse
From correspondents in London

September 10, 2005

For decades they have been an invaluable source of nutrition for London's homeless. But now, mobile soup kitchens are attracting new customers, those who are not poor and needy but just too lazy to cook.
More than 80 per cent of the people using the British capital's soup kitchens, which also hand out food such as sandwiches, are in fact not homeless, The Times newspaper has reported.

Research by Westminster Council, whose remit covers much of the city centre, said that the 65 mobile soup kitchens were increasingly being seen as a free, convenient catering service. On a recent survey of outlets, council researchers heard of one man who was saving money to buy a football season ticket and regularly took sandwiches home to his apartment to eat in front of the television. "People come out of hostels and flats because it's free and it saves cooking," one user of a soup kitchen on The Strand, a central London street, told the survey.

Westminster Council is to discuss the findings next week, the report said. According to the paper, the council views the number of free food services, run by a variety of charities, many of them religious, as excessive, meaning homeless people are discouraged from leaving the streets.

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