Features

WASHINGTON — People are changing Earth so much, warming and polluting it, that many scientists are turning to a new way to describe the time we live in. They’re calling it the Anthropocene — the age of humans.

Though most non-experts don’t realise it, science calls the past 12,000 years the Holocene, Greek for “entirely recent”. But the way humans and their industries are altering the planet, especially its climate, has caused an increasing number of scientists to use the word “Anthropocene” to better describe when and where we are.

“We’re changing the Earth. There is no question about that, I’ve seen it from space,” said eight-time spacewalking astronaut John Grunsfeld, now associate administrator for science at NASA. He said looking down from orbit, there was no place he could see on the planet that didn’t have the mark of man. So he uses the term Anthropocene, he said, “because we’re intelligent enough to recognise it”.

Grunsfeld was in the audience of a “Living in the Anthropocene” symposium put on last week by the Smithsonian. At the same time, the American Association for the Advancement of Science is displaying an art exhibit, “Fossils of the Anthropocene”. More than 500 scientific studies have been published this year referring to the current time period as the Anthropocene.

And on Friday the Anthropocene Working Group ramps up its efforts to change the era’s name with a meeting at a Berlin museum. The movement was jump started and the name coined by Nobel laureate Paul Crutzen in 2000, according to Australian National University scientist Will Steffen.

Geologists often mark new scientific time periods with what they call a golden spike — really more of a bronze disk in the rock layer somewhere that physically points out where one scientific time period ends and another begins, said Harvard University’s Andrew Knoll, who supports the idea because “humans have become a geologic force on the planet. The age we are living now in is really distinct”.

But instead of a golden spike in rock, “it’s going to be a layer of plastic that covers the planet, if not a layer of [heat-trapping] carbon”, said W. John Kress, acting undersecretary of science for the Smithsonian. Kress said the Smithsonian is embracing the term because “for us it kind of combines the scientific and the cultural in one word”.

It’s an ugly word, one that many people don’t understand, and it’s even hard to pronounce, Kress admitted. That’s why when he opened the Smithsonian’s symposium, he said, “we are living in the Anthropocene”, then quickly added: “the age of humans.”

“Never in its 4.6-billion-year old history has the Earth been so affected by one species as it is being affected now by humans,” Kress said.

Steffen, one of the main leaders of the Anthropocene movement, said in an e-mail that the age of humans is more than just climate change. It includes ozone loss, disruption of nitrogen and phosphorous cycles that are causing dead zones, changes in water, acidification of the ocean, endocrine disruptors and deforestation.

Steffen said there’s no scientific consensus for the term Anthropocene yet, but he sees support growing. To become official it has to be approved by the International Union of Geological Sciences’ Commission on Stratigraphy.

That process is detailed and slow, said Harvard’s Kroll, who spearheaded the last successful effort to add a new time period, the little known Ediacaran period, about 600 million years ago. It took him 15 years.

The head of that deciding committee, Stan Finney at California State University at Long Beach, said in an interview that he is often called “the biggest critic” of the Anthropocene term. He said while there’s no doubt humans are dramatically changing the planet, creating a new geologic time period requires detailed scientific records, mostly based on what is in rocks.

Supporters also don’t agree on when the Anthropocene starts. Suggestions include the start of farming, industrialisation and the use of the atomic bomb.

The Geological Society of America hasn’t taken up the term yet, but may soon start paying attention to the concept, said society president Hap McSween of the University of Tennessee.

“I actually think it’s a great idea,” McSween said. “Humans are profoundly affecting the environment, probably as much as natural events have in the past. And when effects become profound enough, we draw a new boundary and make it a period. ... It’s a good way to point out the environmental havoc that humans are causing.”

LONDON — Businesses and governments around the world are increasingly turning to voice biometrics, which sometimes are described as voiceprints, to replace passwords and fight fraud. A look at this fast-growing technology:

Talk your way past security

Canada’s TD Bank Group, the National Australia Bank Ltd. and the Bank of New Zealand are among the businesses allowing customers to sign into their accounts or skip call centre security questions by supplying a voiceprint.

“There’s no need for a call centre agent to know your name, your mother’s maiden name, your inside leg measurement or whatever,” said Clive Summerfield, whose Sydney-based Auraya Systems is supplying the technology to the Bank of New Zealand. “The machine can verify that this voice belongs to this account and that’s all you need to know.”

Sign contracts with your voice

California-based VoiceVault gives consumers and businesses the option of attaching “vocal signatures” to documents by speaking into the receiver following a telephone prompt. Nik Stanbridge, who spoke to The Associated Press this year when he was still with VoiceVault, said the technology helped cut down on paperwork and increased closure rates for health insurance contracts. Executives can use the technology to close big deals, too.

“The countersigning can be done by somebody on a golf course,” Stanbridge said.

Turn your speech into a spare key

FST Biometrics is using voice biometrics to secure everything from apartment complexes to airports. Voice recognition in conjunction with other biometric techniques now screens those who show up at the door of New York City’s Knickerbocker Village. 

 “The voice biometric replaces what we used to use for a PIN code or a RFID [swipe] card,” FST Biometrics executive Shahar Belkin said. “We found it to be much more user-friendly and at the same time much more secure.”

Help authority keep an ear on you

Georgia-based AnyTrax uses the technology to monitor low-risk offenders on parole. The company’s Louie Hunter said the automated calls to an offender’s home landline telephone prompts the person being monitored to repeat a random set of numbers into the phone.

It can spare people convicted of petty crimes from routine visits to their parole officers.

“It’s better than missing work, explaining to your boss why you have to take half a day, get money for a bus or get a friend to take you,” Hunter said. With voice authentication, “they can step out at a break or lunch and make a phone call and get right on back to their life”.

Quietly being harvested

Over the telephone, in jail and online, a new digital bounty is being harvested: the human voice.

Businesses and governments around the world increasingly are turning to voice biometrics, or voiceprints, to pay pensions, collect taxes, track criminals and replace passwords.

“We sometimes call it the invisible biometric,” said Mike Goldgof, an executive at Madrid-based AGNITiO, one of about 10 leading companies in the field.

Those companies have helped enter more than 65 million voiceprints into corporate and government databases, according to the Associated Press interviews with dozens of industry representatives and records requests in the United States, Europe and elsewhere.

“There’s a misconception that the technology we have today is only in the domain of the intelligence services, or the domain of ‘Star Trek’,” said Paul Burmester, of London-based ValidSoft, a voice biometric vendor. “The technology is here today, well-proven and commonly available.”

And in high demand.

Dan Miller, an analyst with Opus Research in San Francisco, estimates that the industry’s revenue will roughly double from just under $400 million last year to between $730 million and $900 million next year.

Barclays Plc. recently experimented with voiceprinting as an identification for its wealthiest clients. It was so successful that Barclays is rolling it out to the rest of its 12 million retail banking customers.

“The general feeling is that voice biometrics will be the de facto standard in the next two or three years,” said Iain Hanlon, a Barclays executive.

Vendors say the timbre of a person’s voice is unique in a way similar to the loops and whorls at the tips of someone’s fingers.

Their technology measures the characteristics of a person’s speech as air is expelled from the lungs, across the vocal folds of the larynx, up the pharynx, over the tongue, and out through the lips, nose, and teeth. Typical speaker recognition software compares those characteristics with data held on a server. If two voiceprints are similar enough, the system declares them a match.

The Vanguard Group Inc., a Pennsylvania-based mutual fund manager, is among the technology’s many financial users. Tens of thousands of customers log in to their accounts by speaking the phrase: “At Vanguard, my voice is my password” into the phone.

“We’ve done a lot of testing, and looked at siblings, even twins,” said executive John Buhl, whose voice was a bit hoarse during a telephone interview. “Even people with colds, like I have today, we looked at that.”

The single largest implementation identified by the AP is in Turkey, where mobile phone company Turkcell has taken the voice biometric data of some 10 million customers using technology provided by market leader Nuance Communications Inc. But government agencies are catching up.

In the US, law enforcement officials use the technology to monitor inmates and track offenders who have been paroled.

In New Zealand, the Internal Revenue Department celebrated its 1 millionth voiceprint, leading the revenue minister to boast that his country had “the highest level of voice biometric enrolments per capita in the world”.

In South Africa, roughly 7 million voiceprints have been collected by the country’s Social Security Agency, in part to verify that those claiming pensions are still alive.

Activists worry that the popularity of voiceprinting has a downside.

“It’s more mass surveillance,” said Sadhbh McCarthy, an Irish privacy researcher. “The next thing you know, that will be given to border guards, and you’ll need to speak into a microphone when you get back from vacation.”

By Melissa Healy

Los Angeles Times (MCT)

We all know that lacing up and breaking a sweat is good for our mood, and that exercise can feel like a lifeline when the stresses of life threaten to engulf us. But how a pounding workout helps lift us from the encroaching gloom was a mystery — until now.

Using mice that were stressed to the point where depression would be a predictable response, researchers at Sweden’s Karolinska Institute in Stockholm uncovered a cascade of biochemical events that begins with exercise and ends with mice that are unusually resilient in the face of stress.

Their findings, published recetly in the journal Cell, not only illuminate the link between chronic stress and depression; they help explain how a known anti-depressive agent — in this case exercise — works to prevent or mitigate the debilitating mental condition. That’s more than can be said for many antidepressant medications, which clearly help many with depression, but whose mechanism of action is not all that well understood.

The findings also point the way to a novel way to ward off depression in those under stress. Antidepressant medications seem to rely largely on changing brain chemistry, and they require the use of molecules that cross the barrier that protects the brain against most blood-borne toxins. But the Swedish researchers found that exercise’s therapeutic effects begin in the muscles, and alter brain chemistry only indirectly.

Engaging in exercise is great. But finding a way to mimic exercise’s antidepressant effect could also be of “great therapeutic value” to patients who are not helped by antidepressants or who find hard exercise difficult, the authors suggested.

“It will be interesting to expand this study design to a larger cohort of human volunteers, to include also patients with depression,” the authors wrote.

Explaining the exact cascade of events that begins with endurance exercise won’t be easy. Here’s what new research, gleaned both from wheel-running mice and from muscle biopsies of exercising humans, has uncovered about the mechanism by which exercise can prevent and even chase away the blues in people under stress:

Within the muscles, endurance-type exercise prompts the activation of a protein called PGC-1a1. This protein does a lot already: It promotes the growth of blood vessels, increases the efficiency with which the cells use energy, ensures that fatty acids are broken down for the body’s use and guards against muscle atrophy.

But the authors of the latest study show that activating PGC-1a1 in the muscles also increases the production of kynurenine aminotransferases inside of muscle. And the presence of these enzymes catalyses a chemical change in kynurenine, converting it into kynurenic acid.

In mice, and very likely in humans too, chronic stress increases levels of kynurenine in the brain — and high levels of kynurenine appear to induce depression. But kynurenic acid can’t get into the brain, because it can’t get across the blood-brain barrier. So, when PGC-1a1 levels in muscle are high, and kynurenine gets converted into kynurenic acid, levels of kynurenine in the brain naturally drop.

The result: mental wellness in the face of disadvantage, social setbacks and general adversity.

Illuminating this process may also help explain why depression is more common among diabetics, and why there appears to be a direct link between obesity and depression. Mice who are diabetic or obese, or both, have lower levels of PGC-1a1 in their muscles. Perhaps, the authors suggested, an imbalance of PGC-1a1 and kynurenine could be the common link in many related ills.

Human trials of exercise will likely refine researchers’ understanding of this process, and help discern what kind of exercise — say, strength-training versus endurance — most effectively activates PGC-1a1 levels in the muscles. Such research may also make clear whether this approach is better at preventing depression or at treating it once it’s set in, and to clarify the link between PGC-1a1, stress and depression.

The go-to company for fast estate cars, Audi’s RS cars have included the now classic 1994-95 RS2 and several RS4 and RS6 models. Termed an “Avant” in Audi-speak, the innovative Ingolstadt car maker’s first ever wagon was offered in a performance version.

Built on the then-advanced C3 platform, the 1983-91 Audi 200 Quattro Avant transplanted the legendary rally-proven Quattro sports coupe’s turbocharged five-cylinder engine and four-wheel-drive onto a premium executive-class estate, and as such was ground zero for the explosively powerful RS6 Avant.

A car for practically any occasion, the RS6 Avant combines executive car refinement, estate car versatility, devastating performance, tenacious road-holding and a slew of high tech safety, infotainment and efficiency features. 

Sharper, edgier and more nuanced than its predecessor, the current RS6 Avant’s tight chiselled lines and well-integrated design lend it a thoroughly robust and sculpted “hewn-from-granite” sense of power and presence. With inward-squinting and heavily browed headlights, huge inward-angled lower air intakes and upright gills, vast trapezoidal grille and new tarmac-scraping air-splitter, the RS6 Avant has a hungry and predatory feel to it.

A consistently level waistline is a refreshing change from competitors’ fashionably rising waistlines, which with wide haunches and enormous 285/30R21 tyres on split five-spoke black alloy wheels, lend a reassuringly road-hugging aesthetic quality. A gently arcing roofline ends with an abrupt tailgate spoiler, while the rear end features sporty dual exhausts and air diffuser.

Thoroughly engineered

Built on an aluminium-intensive platform with aluminium bonnet, boot, doors and front wings, the current RS6 is 90kg lighter than its predecessor. Underneath, the RS6 uses a traditional Audi Quattro four-wheel-drive layout with an in-line engine positioned low and closely ahead of the front axle, for a low centre of gravity and superb front wheel traction and resilience to torque-steer.

Incorporated in the gearbox, Audi’s traditional and innovative hollow shaft Quattro four-wheel drive is a light, compact, efficient and tension-free system. With a 60 per cent rear-bias for a more sporting feel, the RS6 Avant’s Quattro system can variably reapportion up to 85 per cent power rearwards or 70 per cent to the front, while an electronically controlled rear differential allocates power right and left as required. 

With a smaller and lighter four-litre twin-turbo V8 engine slung in-front, the current RS6 may lose 20BHP to its 572BHP five-litre twin-turbo Lamborghini-derived V10 predecessor, but the lower front weight pays off in terms of handling, while the new engine is also more efficient and develops 37lb/ft more torque. Combined with a lighter weight, the current RS6 in fact delivers improved performance, including 0.7-second quicker 0-100km/h acceleration.

A direct fuel injection design with stop/start system and subtle four-cylinder deactivation when cruising on motorways or driving in traffic also translates into 9.8L/100km combined cycle fuel efficiency and 229g/km carbon dioxide emissions, which for a two tonne four-wheel drive estate with supercar performance are nothing short of frugal.

Supercar swift

With its two twin-scroll turbochargers mounted between its V8 cylinder banks, the RS6 short induction pipes greatly reduce turbo spool-up time and translate to excellent low end responsiveness and an almost total absence of turbo lag. Developing a mighty 552BHP throughout 5,700-6,700rpm and a gut-wrenching 516lb/ft torque over a rich 1,750-5,500rpm band, the RS6 Avant’s four-wheel drive ensures that none of this is wasted on wheel spin, and with vice-like traction ferociously bolts off the line.

Devastatingly swift, the RS6’s completes the 0-100km/h dash in supercar-like 3.9-seconds. The RS6 tops 305km/h when de-restricted as part of a dynamic package plus, which also features powerful fade-resistant ceramic brakes and hydraulically linked front damper dynamic ride control suspension providing firmer body control.

Responsive low-down, abundant in mid-range and explosively powerful at its top end, the RS6 Avant’s mighty twin turbo V8 delivers effortlessly swift and muscular acceleration and flexibility as it surges through a broad sweet spot of escalating power underpinned generous torque, and is mated to a smooth but quick-shifting eight-speed automatic gearbox with manual paddle actuated sequential shifts.

Through the RS6’s drive select menu, one chooses from pre-set vehicle mode combinations, or tailors such settings to one’s preference. These include throttle and gearbox responsiveness, a more vocal exhaust note, firmer steering feel, stiffer adaptive air suspension setting and more aggressively sporty differential setting. With the hard-edged “dynamic” modes selected across the board, the RS6 becomes a more ferociously focused beast.

Tenacious traction and road holding

Renowned for its high-speed stability, the RS6 Avant’s highway refinement, reassuring confidence is matched by little else on the road. While a planted high speed experience absent of fidgeting or dynamic awkwardness was expected, the RS6 Avant’s alert and responsive handling wasn’t. Given its legendary Quattro driveline, the RS6 was expected to deliver the sort of tenacious traction and heroically high levels of grip that it does.

However, the surprise was that despite a hefty 2,010kg kerb weight and nose-heavy layout with engine lying outside of the wheelbase, the RS6 Avant felt agile and light on its feet, with sudden direction changes executed in a crisp and tidy manner without the distinctly nose-heavy feel of the early Quattro and in-line front-drive Audis.

Eager into corners, the RS6 Avant’s front end digs in faithfully and ensures a tidy cornering line, while its taut air suspension works hard to effectively control weight transfers through both fast sweepers and through sudden switchbacks.

Through a corner, the Quattro system and centre and rear differentials ensure power is distributed between front and rear, and right and left to be best utilised, which translates to class-leading road-holding for both safety in low traction conditions and phenomenally quick and confident handling as it goes through corners like it was riding on rails. With cabin refinement high, and levels and grip from its low profile tyres, the RS6 does however ride on the firm side, especially in its dynamic suspension mode.

Classy and cavernous

Tightly planted at speed, taut through corners and buttoned down on vertical rebound, the RS6 is firm, smooth and sophisticated, while its level riding air suspension’s comfort mode takes the edge off the large alloy wheels and stiff ride, and delivers decent comfort. A plush and ergonomic cabin with high quality fit, finish and design, the RS6 has a serious ambiance to it.

Comfortable, well adjustable and supportive, the RS6’s sports seats are superb and feature lumbar support and an optional massaging function. With clear instrumentation, classy minimalist layouts and materials, adjustable thick flat-bottom steering wheel, user-friendly controls and infotainment screen, the RS6 offers a terrific driving position and good road visibility owing to a big glasshouse.

Well-spaced in the rear, the RS6 Avant also features a cavernous load capacity of between a minimum 565- to a maximum 1,680 litres. Well-kitted, the RS6 features innumerable mod cons and safety features from Isofix child seat latches, automatic tailgate, Bluetooth music streaming and many others, but unfortunately only an iPhone jack and no USB connectivity.

Optional packages are similarly extensive and include things like four-zone climate control, heated seats, HUD display, 360° camera and several semi-autonomous driving aids including active lane assistance, adaptive cruise control with “Stop & Go”, and parking and night vision assists. Materials include standard carbon inlays and Alcantara and leather upholstery, and include optional brushed aluminium and more luxurious leather among other trim options.

TECHNICAL SPECIFICATIONS

Engine: 4 litre, twin turbo, in line V8 cylinders

Bore x stroke: 84.5 x 89mm

Compression ratio: 10.1:1

Valve train: 32 valve, DOHC, direct injection

Gearbox: 8-speed automatic, four-wheel drive, limited-slip rear differential

Power distribution, F/R: 40 per cent/60 per cent

Power, BHP (PS) [kW]: 552 (560) [412] @ 5,700-6,700 rpm

Specific power: 138.2BHP/litre

Power-to-weight: 274.6BHP/tonne

Torque, lb/ft (Nm): 516 (700) @ 1,750-5,500 rpm

Specific torque: 175.3Nm/litre

Torque-to-weight: 348.2Nm/tonne

0-100km/h: 3.9-seconds

Top speed, restricted/de-restricted: 250/305km/h

Fuel consumption, urban/extra-urban/combined: 13.9/7.5/9.8 litres/100km 

CO2 emissions, combined: 229g/km

Fuel capacity: 75 litres

Length: 4,979mm

Width: 1,936mm

Height: 1,461mm

Wheelbase: 2915mm

Track, F/R: 1,662/1663mm

Overhangs, F/R: 939/1125mm

Headroom, F/R: 1,046/985mm

Luggage volume, min/max: 565/1,680 litres

Kerb weight: 2,010kg

Steering: Electric-assisted rack & pinion

Turning Circle: 11.9 metres

Suspension: Multi-link, adaptive air dampers

Brakes: Ventilated & perforated discs

Tyres: 285/30R21 (optional)

Other Lives

Iman Humaydan

Translated by Michelle Hartman

US: Interlink Books, 2014

Pp. 153

Returning to her native country, Lebanon, after fifteen years spent in Australia and Kenya, gives Mariam final proof of her state of displacement and transience — always being on the verge of leaving (symbolised by thirteen suitcases kept on the ready in her Mombasa home). She’s coming to reclaim the family house, to see her grandmother and old friends, and to trace her old love who disappeared when her family emigrated at the height of the civil war. “Or,” she asks herself, “did I come to settle old scores with a war that broke up my family, destroyed our dreams and every kind of permanence?” (p. 9) Just as unclear as her motives is whether she will leave again or stay. 

“Other Lives” is a novel built on an inner voice, that of Mariam, the narrator and protagonist, and her dialogue with those she encounters. Not too much happens in now-time (1995), but one is immediately drawn into the novel’s rich prose as Mariam records her observations of post-war Beirut, family memories, snatches of Lebanon’s history, the war and exile experience. It is noteworthy that the author chose Australia as an exile site since so many Lebanese (and other Arabs) have immigrated there, but to date, there is less literature about their experience than about immigrants to the United States. According to Mariam, in Adelaide, “These Lebanese families cared for their gardens and grew trees that reminded them of their villages and perhaps even their homes in the Lebanese mountains.” (p. 8) 

Fear is what triggered Mariam’s state of impermanence — a fear born of war’s random and devastating violence, specifically the rocket explosion that killed her brother and left her father deranged and her mother locked in silence. How Mariam responded to this tragedy is less tangible. She developed techniques for interacting with people, married and did various kinds of work, but an undercurrent of panic, pain and loss remained inside her, causing recurrent migraines and ennui. Early on in Australia, she learned, “To kill fear, it isn’t enough to move to another country… It’s already taken root inside of us and so in order to kill it we first have to kill something inside ourselves… But what remains after that?... Does memory remain, for example? Or does it become like a blank page? And what should we fill it with?” (p. 10)

Actually Mariam has plenty of memories, and recalling them overwhelms her return to Beirut and the mountains, giving the novel a non-linear structure which parallels her thought processes rather than the order in which events occur. Surprisingly, this spiralling plot is not difficult to follow, because of Humaydan’s skillful writing. It is something like an oil painting where each memory adds a new layer and luminosity to the one before. What holds one’s attention is the intimate tone and emotional honesty with which Mariam tells her story. One follows breathlessly, hoping she will find closure, but knowing deep inside that she probably won’t. Hers is a “suspended life”, lived in a “state of being in-between” different places and times. (p. 13) She tries to find her country in relations with others but this is never easy.

The book title recurs in the story, assuming many nuances. Mariam’s family is Druze, and occasionally “other lives” refers to the Druze belief in reincarnation. Mariam often feels she is living another life; every place is another life, but it is more than that; it’s related to disconnectedness: “My life feels like interrupted sequences of time, like scenes in a film that begin just as another scene ends. My memory… is not continuous, but circular. I always come back to where I began.” (pp. 12-13) She is dissatisfied with the explanation of her psychiatrist in Mombasa, who says that is just how women remember things, but finds solace in the words of her Kenyan gardener, in whom she confides more than her British husband. He says he can “live multiple lives while in the very same place”. (p. 35)

In evocative prose, Humaydan has written a deeply personal story that is also a public outcry against war, showing that the damage does not end when the guns fall silent, but lives on in the hearts and minds of all those concerned. Her story is convincing because she is passionate about the subject as evidenced by her having done extensive research on the disappeared and other post-war topics. Like in her other novels, “Wild Mulberries” and “B is for Beirut,” she conveys particularly Lebanese scenes in universally understood terms, and trauma in an understated, yet incisive manner. For a short novel, “Other Lives” is quite complex, which one only fully appreciates after reading Michelle Hartman’s note on the challenges of translating it. The result of her efforts is fluid and poignant.

FRANKFURT — US online retail giant Amazon may be absent from the stands at the world’s biggest book fair but it has still been at the heart of a heated debate.

Amazon threw a shadow over Germany’s book industry on the inaugural day of the Frankfurt Book Fair Tuesday by announcing the launch of a monthly flat-rate offer for unlimited access to e-book titles.

“We fear unfair competition on prices as well as authors’ fees through this service,” Austrian author Gerhard Ruiss told a discussion by a panel of authors at the book fair this week.

“Amazon doesn’t have the market it would like to have in Europe. That’s the reason for this new step,” he complained.

Ruiss is one of about 2,000 German-language writers to have signed a petition protesting against the methods used by Amazon in its e-book price battle with Scandinavian publishing house Bonnier, a major player in German publishing.

The authors have accused Amazon of delaying the release of books and boycotting authors signed to publishing houses in dispute with the US company.

They had taken their cue from US writers involved in a similar protest over Amazon’s e-book dispute with Hachette which represents “Harry Potter” author JK Rowling among others.

Germany is Amazon’s biggest market outside the United States but the company has been hit by repeated strikes in a long-running wage dispute and a scathing TV documentary broadcast last year.

EU probes tax dealings

Despite it not having a stand among the thousands of exhibitors filling the sprawling halls of the book fair in the western German city, which opens to the public Saturday, the Seattle-based company is at the heart of many of the discussions.

A conference during the five-day book fair brought in to sharp focus the depth of feeling on both sides of the argument.

While one audience member stated they had “boycotted” Amazon for 20 years, another argued that the US company enabled new authors “to be published and find their readers” and pointed the finger at big publishing houses.

Online business is estimated to account for about 16 per cent of the German book market, of which 50 to 70 per cent are Amazon sales, according to figures by the German Publishers and Booksellers Association.

“In the last years we have invested a lot and we have learnt, even from Amazon... It’s a competitor, of whom we are not scared,” the association’s chief executive Alexander Skipis said.

But he accused Amazon of using “its dominant position to blackmail” publishers.

The European Union said this week that anti-trust regulators would examine whether Amazon’s tax arrangements with Luxembourg amount to illegal state aid, giving the company an unfair advantage.

Amazon has said it “received no special tax treatment from Luxembourg — we are subject to the same tax laws as other companies” operating there.

Cultural diversity

“I don’t rule out Amazon ending up boosting cultural diversity,” journalist Dieter Schnaas, from Germany’s economic Wirtschaftswoche magazine, said.

“It doesn’t penalise consumers, quite the contrary,” he said, adding that he believed in the need to be cautious over calls for action against Amazon.

Martin Shepard, co-publisher at US publishers The Permanent Press, which puts out about 12 titles every year, said he strongly supported Amazon.

“It is very easy when you are a famous author backed by a big publisher to attack Amazon,” he said.

“I always have a lingering suspicion that when one of the large publishing cartels complains they are being treated unfairly by Amazon, it’s probably good for most all of the smaller, independent presses.”

SAN FRANCISCO — Google is being swamped with demands from Europeans trying to erase humiliating links to their past from the world’s dominant Internet search engine.

Nearly 145,000 requests have been made in the European Union and four other countries by people looking to polish their online reputations, according to numbers the company released Friday. That’s an average of more than 1,000 requests a day since late May, when Google began accepting submissions in order to comply with a European court that ruled some embarrassing information about people’s lives can be scrubbed from search results.

Europe’s insistence that its citizens have the “right to be forgotten” in certain instances has thrust Google into an uncomfortable position that it sought to avoid. The company has been trying to define what kind of material merits deletion while also striving to stand by its belief that all of the world’s information should be universally accessible.

Requests can be made by more than 500 million people living in the European Union’s 28 countries, as well as Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway and Switzerland.

The removal requests covered more than 497,000 Web links. Google says it has jettisoned 42 per cent, or more than 200,000, of the troublesome links. Among all websites, Facebook’s social network has had the most links erased from Google’s European search results so far at 3,332. Google’s own YouTube video site has had nearly 2,400 links removed.

The content blocked from Google’s search results in Europe could still appear in listings posted in other parts of the world, including the US Even in Europe, links to certain results only be excluded in response to a specific person’s name. That means a search about “Imogene White” might not produce a result tied to an embarrassing episode at a London hotel, but the link could appear if a different request, such as “London hotels” were entered.

Google relied on a panel of experts to craft its “right to be forgotten” standards. The criteria lean toward expunging “outdated or inaccurate information” while seeking to preserve information in the public interest, including material detailing crimes or other kinds of malfeasance, according to Google.

Any request rejected by Google can still be appealed to privacy regulators in Europe.

The Mountain View, California, company provided a glimpse into its decision-making process with a sampling of requests that have been made so far. The 15 examples posted Friday suggest Google is more likely to remove links to a victim or bystander in an incident than to a person who had a direct involvement.

For instance, Google says it removed a link to an old article about the murder of a woman’s husband in Italy because the story mentioned the wife. Another woman in Germany who was raped asked Google to remove a newspaper article about the crime, and the company discarded links mentioning her name.

Google, though, says it has rejected requests from financial professionals seeking to remove links to material describing arrests or convictions for past misconduct. The company also rebuffed a demand from a “media professional” in the United Kingdom who wanted to erase four links to embarrassing content that had been previously posted. It also turned down a request from a former clergyman in the United Kingdom who wanted to cover up links to articles reporting an investigation into his alleged sexual abuses.

The whitewashing of search results could extend beyond the countries covered in the May ruling. A Japanese judge ruled Thursday that Google should remove search results that hinted a man had been previously tied to a criminal organisation.

ROUEN, France — The perfect baguette has long been the ultimate test for aspiring bakers the world over.

And now the ability to produce this long, thin loaf is in global demand because the appetite for baked delights from France is surging in regions with burgeoning middle classes — notably Asia and the Middle East.

“The growth is linked to lifestyle changes, and more broadly to the emergence of middle classes,” says Christophe Monnier, an expert at the Ubifrance agency which helps French companies set up overseas.

Forget the timeworn caricature of the Frenchman in black beret and blue overalls with a baguette tucked under his arm: French baked goods are in, and they are taking the world by storm.

The numbers speak for themselves. From 2003 to 2013, French exports of dough and mixes for baked goods more than doubled, from 197 million euros to 480 million euros ($600 million).

Finished baked goods, which end up being sold in French restaurant chains or hotels abroad, have leapt from 850 million euros’ worth to 1.5 billion euros during the same period.

The growth has been spectacular in some markets, with exports to China soaring 7,800 per cent over the past decade.

The bakery sector “is undeniably the spearhead for the [French] food sector” abroad, Monnier said. 

Chains have opened locations across the globe to cultivate the craving for French baked goods.

Brioche Doree, which calls itself the world’s leading French-style fast-food chain, now boasts more than 500 restaurants worldwide.

Another, Delifrance, has several hundred locations abroad, including more than 200 across Asia.

But France’s small-scale bakery tradition, which is still vibrant at home, has also ventured abroad.

Take for example baker and food writer Eric Kayser, whose mix of tradition and innovation led him to success in Paris, and who has since opened up in 100 cities abroad as far flung as Taipei and Tangiers.

‘Infatuation’ for French pastries

“The entire world is an exciting market as everyone wants to eat well and the croissant or the baguette are an affordable luxury,” Kayser told AFP.

Upscale pastry shop Pierre Herme has also ventured far from its Paris roots to open boutiques in Japan, Hong Kong, South Korea, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates as well as in neighbouring Britain.

But baguettes cannot conquer the world without trained bakers, and the National Bakery and Pastry Institute (INPB) in Rouen is trying to meet that need.

While a group of students from a number of countries tries to assemble a Saint-Honore — an elaborate concoction involving cream puffs and caramel glaze — the Institute’s director Jean-Francois Astier said there is ample foreign interest in their training programme.

And in addition to the foreign students who make up 15 per cent of the INBP’s professional trainees, “a small majority of the French students... want to go overseas.”

Alexandre Matcheret, 47, is one Frenchman who left to try his luck abroad.

He has just opened two Kayser boutiques in Cambodia, and is excited about the potential.

“Bread is already in their culture, but it is not the same process, it is very industrial,” Matcheret said.

“I sense there will be a strong demand with the development of the middle class,” he said, adding that 95 per cent of his customers are Cambodian.

While the market is promising, setting up shop is not cheap if genuine equipment is imported from France.

Many bakeries also import flour, butter and yeast from France to ensure an authentic taste, although they often still have to adapt the baking process to local conditions.

The secret of perfection 

In emerging markets, that can pose difficulties.

Patrick Moreau, 48, moved to Cape Town in 2008 and now has three bakeries and a tea room under his own Cassis Paris brand.

“There is a real infatuation in South Africa for French pastries and rising demand for hand-made bread,” Moreau said.

But “with the slide in the value of the rand it is too expensive to import French flour,” he added.

They have been forced to experiment, and found that by mixing four local flours and adjusting the kneading process, they can produce the same texture.

“You have to adapt to local ingredients to reach the same quality as in Paris,” Moreau said.

And what is the secret of the perfect baguette?

Denis Fatet, who coordinates training at the INBP, defined the ultimate test of the baker’s skills, this way: “The baguette is made with no additives, and it must not be frozen.

“Its crust must be crisp, with a beautiful golden colour. The doughy part, cream-coloured, has irregular holes, and melts in the mouth.”

There’s a flagrant contradiction between the popularity and the wide spread usage of small computers of all kinds on one hand, and on the other hand the need that users have for professional technical support for these products that are anything but simple. This is especially true for those who want to make the best out the devices and put to good use their countless functions.

Unfortunately today more than ever, small computers are falling into the consumer market segment, or “supermarket” segment should I say. And it’s not necessarily a good thing, apart from the fact that the supermarket connotation implies popular, easily accessible and inexpensive. The part that is not seen as being a good thing has to do, precisely, with quality technical support.

Back in 2005 IBM forsook its small computer business to concentrate on corporate server machines and expensive IT products intended for the lucrative enterprise segment. Obviously the small computer business had stopped being feasible or at least interesting enough for Big Blue. We know what happened; IBM laptops and desktop computers became Lenovo’s.

There were hints on the web this week that Hewlett-Packard was about to do more or less the same. Apparently the company would like to focus on big, enterprise machines and leave its “small business” to someone else, most likely under another brand name, just like IBM switched to Lenovo about ten years ago. There isn’t yet any confirmation or expected date for the move. Moreover, because HP is particularly renowned and appreciated for its wide range of printers and scanners for home and office, consumers are wondering if the change would include these peripherals or if it will only apply to laptops and desktop computers.

When two major players like IBM and HP decide to give up the small computer part of their business, one has the right to ask a few questions, and to have a few worries too.

Admitted, a laptop computer, for example, isn’t as complicated or difficult to operate and to maintain as a server computer. However, the complexity of networking and connectivity and the less-than-perfect operating system are a constant source of headache for users of personal devices. Not forgetting the constant updates that they hardly understand and anti-virus software that sometimes creates more issues than it actually addresses.

This leaves the vast majority of users, the non-technical population, either seeking technical help wherever they can find it, randomly, or desperately looking for solutions to their problems by searching the web and trying to understand and to apply the fix they sometime find, often in the form of cryptic YouTube video tutorials.

By giving up the small computer business they had run for years, manufacturers at the same time are also walking out on their users in a certain way, if only by denying them the kind of professional technical support they expect and are entitled to. Supermarkets just don’t provide pro tech support.

Shifting business sales to supermarket shelves comes at a price and with collateral damage. Reduced price means reduced technical support. Moving personal computing to supermarket shelves is not a new phenomenon per se. It has been going on for years now. It is, however, when big manufacturers stop using their original name that consumers feel they have been betrayed.

Again, the core issue here is that a small personal computer, a laptop, a smartphone, is not as simple as it may seem. How many smartphone owners can honestly say that they know, understand and use more than, say, one-third of the device possibilities and functions? How many are frustrated when they have a technical issue and have no one to turn to?

Whether it’s a big server computer or a humble smartphone, professional technical support is a must and a real need, albeit at different levels. Not all manufacturers will admit that.

WASHINGTON — Drivers using hands-free virtual assistants like Apple’s Siri can be distracted by the technology, creating safety hazards, according to a study released Tuesday.

The study produced for the AAA Foundation for Traffic Safety found that some systems offering hands-free communications for tasks such as navigation or changing radio stations can create “cognitive distractions” which compromise safety.

The research comes amid growing use of hands-free technology which aims to get drivers to avoid the dangerous use of hand-held phones behind the wheel.

But with the technology offering more complex functions — such as making dinner reservations or updating social media profiles — these virtual assistants have their own perils.

“Technologies used in the car that rely on voice communications may have unintended consequences that adversely affect road safety,” said Peter Kissinger, president and chief executive of the foundation.

“The level of distraction and the impact on safety can vary tremendously based on the task or the system the driver is using.”

The study by researchers at the University of Utah found that Siri was particularly distracting when it was used for certain tasks such as updating Facebook or Twitter feeds.

The study found that when performing commonly used tasks, Siri generated a “category 4” level of distraction on a five-point scale, which was the highest in the research.

By contrast, some automakers’ virtual assistants performed better. Measuring the most common voice-based interactions — changing radio stations and voice dialling — the researcher gave Toyota’s Entune system a low distraction rating of 1.7.

Other systems tested included the Hyundai Blue Link (rating 2.2), the Chrysler Uconnect (rating 2.7), Ford Sync (rating 3.0), the Mercedes Ccommand (rating 3.1) and Chevrolet MyLink (rating 3.7).

One factor affecting the rate of distraction was the accuracy of voice detection. Systems with low accuracy and reliability generated a high level of distraction.

“It is clear that not all voice systems are created equal, and today’s imperfect systems can lead to the perfect storm for driver distraction,” said Beth Mosher of AAA, which is also known as the American Automobile Association.

AAA said it urges vehicle and device manufacturers to use the study to improve their voice systems to promote road safety.