By JESSICA GUYNN
San Francisco Chronicle
June 25, 2006
The 19th-century steel magnate Andrew Carnegie, who late in life reshaped his legacy from predatory businessman to renowned philanthropist, famously said: "He who dies rich dies thus disgraced."
Like Carnegie, Microsoft mogul Bill Gates wants to be remembered not just for how ruthlessly he made his fortune, but for how he gave it away.
The world's richest man recently announced that in 2008 he will step back from day-to-day oversight of the company he founded with Paul Allen to focus his attention on the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, which has pledged to spend billions of dollars on health, education and overcoming poverty.
Gates' decision has led to speculation that he could influence other self-made philanthropists to step up their efforts in Silicon Valley.
"He's setting the standard for what wealthy entrepreneurs in this generation ought to be doing," said Kathleen Gwynn, chief executive officer of the Steven and Michele Kirsch Foundation in San Jose, Calif. "He has the financial capacity, the intellect and the drive to make a real difference. He could be the Carnegie of our generation."
In Silicon Valley, David Packard and William Hewlett pioneered a philanthropic tradition emulated by everyone from Intel founder Gordon Moore to entrepreneur Steven Kirsch to Oracle CEO Larry Ellison. But the region was dubbed "Stingy Valley" after a 1998 study showed that a quarter of households with incomes in excess of $100,000 gave $500 or less a year to charity.
In recent years, tech-boom beneficiaries have become tech-boom benefactors in greater numbers, helping Silicon Valley shed its tightwad image.
"This is one of the areas where there are new ventures in philanthropy and new directions in philanthropy," said Paul Schervish, director of the Center for Wealth and Philanthropy at Boston College.
Schervish predicts Gates will become a prototype for the wealthy who, when faced with limitless quantity of choices, may begin to consider the quality of their choices.
"It's a fulfillment of a deeper purpose and something he will find bigger happiness in," Schervish said.
Monday, June 26, 2006
Buffett to give $54b to charity
June 26, 2006
Warren Buffett ... plans to become a trustee of the Gates Foundation.
Photo: Rocco Fazzari
Warren Buffett, the world's second richest man, plans to give away 85 per cent of his fortune to charities, including one run by Bill Gates, the wealthiest man on the planet, Fortune magazine reported today.
Buffett, 75, pledged in an interview with Fortune to give away 85 per cent of his stock - worth more than $54 billion - in his Berkshire Hathaway investment firm, starting in July.
"I know what I want to do," he was quoted as saying, "and it makes sense to get going."
The shares will go to five foundations. More than 80 per cent will go to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation which already has a kitty of nearly $41 billion used to pay for medical research and give educational grants.
Buffett and the Gates are close friends. According to Fortune, Buffett plans to eventually become a trustee of the Gates foundation.
Fortune magazine estimated earlier this year that Buffett has a fortune of about $60 billion. Gates has about $68 billion.
AFP
Friday, June 16, 2006
Art ?
Empty plinth sidelines sculpture
BBC
Photo: The original sculpture Above and the plinth (below) now on display.
An artist's sculpture has been rejected by the Royal Academy of Arts which has instead opted to display the wooden support it was put on.
David Hensel, 64, from East Grinstead, West Sussex, was told the laughing head would be part of the summer exhibition.
But at a preview he found that just a piece of wood intended to support the head was on display on the plinth.
The Academy said the judging panel assumed the two pieces were separate and decided the support was better.
Final decision
Mr Hensel assumed staff had accidentally left the sculpture in the basement where it was being stored.
In a statement, the Academy said Mr Hensel's work, One Day Closer To Paradise, was submitted as two separate pieces.
"Given their separate submission, the two parts were judged independently.
"It is accepted that works may not be displayed in the way that the artist might have intended."
It said the head had been safely stored ready to be collected by the artist.
The co-ordinators of the exhibition in Piccadilly, central London, have been called in to make a final decision over whether the head should be returned to its rightful place.
Monday, June 05, 2006
Drink-spike victims had one too many
Liz Porter
The Age
June 4, 2006
MANY young women who believed they were victims of drink spiking had instead drunk dangerously high levels of alcohol and had no date rape drugs in their system, ground-breaking research has shown.
Victims were more than five or six times over the .05 legal limit for driving in 37 per cent of cases. The alarming findings have prompted police and forensic doctors to call for campaigns to highlight the dangers of binge drinking to young women rather than the risks of drink-spiking.
The manager of Victoria Police's drug and alcohol strategy unit, Inspector Steve James, said the results confirmed his view that the incidence of drink-spiking had been exaggerated.
"Alcohol, in the majority of cases, is the problem. We have been saying this for years," he said.
Doctors at the Victorian Institute of Forensic Medicine carried out a study of alcohol and drink-spiking — the first of its kind in Australia. They discovered that even though the average delay between the assault and a blood test was 11 hours, the average blood alcohol concentration in 37 per cent of the victims was between .22 and .33 at the time of the assault.
The doctors examined the files of 434 adult victims of sexual assault reported to Victoria Police between April 2002 and April 2003, identifying 76 as cases of suspected drink-spiking or "drug-facilitated sexual assault". But researchers found "unexpected" drugs in only 15 victims or 20 per cent of cases.
Moreover 13 of the 15 had also knowingly taken a range of other "psychoactive" drugs, including antidepressants and party drugs. No evidence was found of GHB or Rohypnol, two well-known "date rape" drugs.
Ninety-five per cent of victims in the survey were female, and the average age was 25.
VIFM staff forensic physician Angela Williams said the study was an attempt to find the truth about the much-publicised connection between drink-spiking and sexual assault.
Dr Williams said alcohol was the main risk to personal safety and that previous high-profile campaigns warning about the dangers of drink-spiking were tackling only a tiny area of the dangers faced by young women.
"When you teach young girls to cover their drinks and buy pretty straws or credit card-sized drink testers over the internet, you give the wrong message. It is less likely that there is an evil drink spiker lurking around ready to pop pills in your drink.
"Somebody wishing to offend looks for someone in a vulnerable situation. Having a lot of drinks and drugs on board, recreational or prescription, means you are less able to resist."
Helen Makregiorgos, manager of Centres Against Sexual Assault House, said it was impossible to generalise from the survey results because it drew on only the small proportion of victims of sexual assault who reported to police.
The Age
June 4, 2006
MANY young women who believed they were victims of drink spiking had instead drunk dangerously high levels of alcohol and had no date rape drugs in their system, ground-breaking research has shown.
Victims were more than five or six times over the .05 legal limit for driving in 37 per cent of cases. The alarming findings have prompted police and forensic doctors to call for campaigns to highlight the dangers of binge drinking to young women rather than the risks of drink-spiking.
The manager of Victoria Police's drug and alcohol strategy unit, Inspector Steve James, said the results confirmed his view that the incidence of drink-spiking had been exaggerated.
"Alcohol, in the majority of cases, is the problem. We have been saying this for years," he said.
Doctors at the Victorian Institute of Forensic Medicine carried out a study of alcohol and drink-spiking — the first of its kind in Australia. They discovered that even though the average delay between the assault and a blood test was 11 hours, the average blood alcohol concentration in 37 per cent of the victims was between .22 and .33 at the time of the assault.
The doctors examined the files of 434 adult victims of sexual assault reported to Victoria Police between April 2002 and April 2003, identifying 76 as cases of suspected drink-spiking or "drug-facilitated sexual assault". But researchers found "unexpected" drugs in only 15 victims or 20 per cent of cases.
Moreover 13 of the 15 had also knowingly taken a range of other "psychoactive" drugs, including antidepressants and party drugs. No evidence was found of GHB or Rohypnol, two well-known "date rape" drugs.
Ninety-five per cent of victims in the survey were female, and the average age was 25.
VIFM staff forensic physician Angela Williams said the study was an attempt to find the truth about the much-publicised connection between drink-spiking and sexual assault.
Dr Williams said alcohol was the main risk to personal safety and that previous high-profile campaigns warning about the dangers of drink-spiking were tackling only a tiny area of the dangers faced by young women.
"When you teach young girls to cover their drinks and buy pretty straws or credit card-sized drink testers over the internet, you give the wrong message. It is less likely that there is an evil drink spiker lurking around ready to pop pills in your drink.
"Somebody wishing to offend looks for someone in a vulnerable situation. Having a lot of drinks and drugs on board, recreational or prescription, means you are less able to resist."
Helen Makregiorgos, manager of Centres Against Sexual Assault House, said it was impossible to generalise from the survey results because it drew on only the small proportion of victims of sexual assault who reported to police.
Helium balloon kills two uni students
Two students found dead inside balloon
SMH
June 5, 2006
Two university students were found dead inside a large, deflated helium balloon after apparently pulling it down and crawling inside it, officials said.
The deaths of Jason Ackerman and Sara Rydman, both 21, appear to be accidental, Hillsborough County Sheriff's Major Bob Schrader said.
Their bodies were found yesterday partially inside a deflated helium balloon at the entrance of a condominium complex a few kilometres north of Tampa. The 2.4-metre-diameter balloon was used to advertise the complex.
"It was more a fun thing they thought they were doing," said Linda Rydman, whose daughter was found dead. "You know how you blow up the balloon and suck the helium."
The county medical examiner said today the cause of death will not be released until toxicology tests are completed.
Inhaling helium can quickly lead to brain damage and death from lack of oxygen, according to the Compressed Gas Association, which develops safety standards in the gas industry.
AP
SMH
June 5, 2006
Two university students were found dead inside a large, deflated helium balloon after apparently pulling it down and crawling inside it, officials said.
The deaths of Jason Ackerman and Sara Rydman, both 21, appear to be accidental, Hillsborough County Sheriff's Major Bob Schrader said.
Their bodies were found yesterday partially inside a deflated helium balloon at the entrance of a condominium complex a few kilometres north of Tampa. The 2.4-metre-diameter balloon was used to advertise the complex.
"It was more a fun thing they thought they were doing," said Linda Rydman, whose daughter was found dead. "You know how you blow up the balloon and suck the helium."
The county medical examiner said today the cause of death will not be released until toxicology tests are completed.
Inhaling helium can quickly lead to brain damage and death from lack of oxygen, according to the Compressed Gas Association, which develops safety standards in the gas industry.
AP
Grateful Dead keyboardist dead
SMH
June 5, 2006
Vince Welnick, the Grateful Dead's last keyboard player.
Photo: Jon C. Hancock/Acoustic Images
Vince Welnick, who took over as the Grateful Dead's keyboard player in 1990 after a succession of predecessors met untimely deaths, has died at the age of 55, according to an announcement on his website.
"Vince passed from this earth on June 2, 2006 ... after a decade of battling tragedy while creating beauty and light around him," the announcement said. It did not give a cause of death.
The San Jose Mercury News said he died in a hospital yesterday after being taken from his home in Forestville, California, and it quoted a person at his home as saying: "It looks like he took his own life."
Welnick had previously spoken of a deep depression after Jerry Garcia, founding guitarist of the iconic psychedelic rock band, died in 1995 and the group disbanded.
Welnick is the fourth keyboard player for the band to have died, and his website referred to the position as a "particularly doomed spot."
He once told an interviewer, "A lot of people ask about that and my stock answer is that I am aware of the fact that you could die doing this job, but I was somewhat dying of boredom before the job came up so I thought I'd take my chances."
Originally a member of the 1970s rock band The Tubes, Welnick joined the Grateful Dead after longest-serving keyboard player Brent Mydland died in 1990 of a drug overdose.
Previously, pianist Keith Godchaux died in a car accident in 1980, a year after he left the band, and founding vocalist and keyboard player Ron "Pigpen" McKernan died in 1973 of a gastrointestinal hemorrhage.
After the Grateful Dead broke up and ended its 30-year run as one of America's biggest touring acts, Welnick formed his own group, Missing Man Formation. He also toured with other groups, including Grateful Dead drummer Mickey Hart's band.
He did not take part in various reunions of the Dead's other surviving members.
"His service to and love for the Grateful Dead were heartfelt and essential. He had a loving soul and a joy in music that we were lucky to share," the band said in a statement.
In an extension of the band's "curse of the keyboard player", Scott Larned, cofounder and keyboard player for the nationally-touring Grateful Dead tribute band Dark Star Orchestra, died last year of a heart attack.
- Reuters
June 5, 2006
Vince Welnick, the Grateful Dead's last keyboard player.
Photo: Jon C. Hancock/Acoustic Images
Vince Welnick, who took over as the Grateful Dead's keyboard player in 1990 after a succession of predecessors met untimely deaths, has died at the age of 55, according to an announcement on his website.
"Vince passed from this earth on June 2, 2006 ... after a decade of battling tragedy while creating beauty and light around him," the announcement said. It did not give a cause of death.
The San Jose Mercury News said he died in a hospital yesterday after being taken from his home in Forestville, California, and it quoted a person at his home as saying: "It looks like he took his own life."
Welnick had previously spoken of a deep depression after Jerry Garcia, founding guitarist of the iconic psychedelic rock band, died in 1995 and the group disbanded.
Welnick is the fourth keyboard player for the band to have died, and his website referred to the position as a "particularly doomed spot."
He once told an interviewer, "A lot of people ask about that and my stock answer is that I am aware of the fact that you could die doing this job, but I was somewhat dying of boredom before the job came up so I thought I'd take my chances."
Originally a member of the 1970s rock band The Tubes, Welnick joined the Grateful Dead after longest-serving keyboard player Brent Mydland died in 1990 of a drug overdose.
Previously, pianist Keith Godchaux died in a car accident in 1980, a year after he left the band, and founding vocalist and keyboard player Ron "Pigpen" McKernan died in 1973 of a gastrointestinal hemorrhage.
After the Grateful Dead broke up and ended its 30-year run as one of America's biggest touring acts, Welnick formed his own group, Missing Man Formation. He also toured with other groups, including Grateful Dead drummer Mickey Hart's band.
He did not take part in various reunions of the Dead's other surviving members.
"His service to and love for the Grateful Dead were heartfelt and essential. He had a loving soul and a joy in music that we were lucky to share," the band said in a statement.
In an extension of the band's "curse of the keyboard player", Scott Larned, cofounder and keyboard player for the nationally-touring Grateful Dead tribute band Dark Star Orchestra, died last year of a heart attack.
- Reuters
Sunday, June 04, 2006
Share a drink between friends
Inhabitants of the Kamchitka Peninsula, in Northeastern Siberia, traditionally drank the urine of individuals who had ingested the psychedelic mushroom amanita muscaria.
It is believed to be the only hallucinogenic substance that does not alter it's chemical structure upon being passed through the human body.
Only well-to-do individuals could afford to purchase and consume the potent fungus. But they generously shared the prized intoxicant with poorer friends and relations by letting them drink bowls of their drug-laced urine.
These individuals then shared their urine, and so on, and so on -- ensuring that everyone shared in the high.
The intoxicant would also drink his own urine, thus keeping his high going for a few days at a time, without any additional expense.
World's biggest meteor crater
How Australia was born
Frank Walker
June 4, 2006
SCIENTISTS believe they have finally solved one of Earth's greatest mysteries: what caused the great extinction of life hundreds of millions of years ago.
The answer was revealed yesterday when an American team announced it had discovered the world's biggest meteor crater almost two kilometres under the ice in Antarctica.
They say a meteor almost 50 kilometres wide caused a 500-kilometre-wide crater deep under the Wilkes Land region of Antarctica, directly south of Australia.
The massive explosion from the impact probably created the continent of Australia, forcing it to break away from the existing land mass.
The incredible discovery caused huge excitement among Australian scientists last night. It could be the missing link in the geological formation of the continents. It would also answer why life on Earth was almost completely wiped out hundreds of millions of years ago.
The meteor the size of Sydney struck 250 million years ago and must have been the biggest explosion ever seen on the planet, far bigger than the 10-kilometre-wide meteor which hit east of Mexico 65 million years ago, wiping out the dinosaurs.
Ohio State University scientists who found the crater said the massive Antarctic crater could explain the global extinction in the Permian-Triassic period when all animal life on Earth died out, clearing the way for the dinosaurs.
The massive impact probably broke up the ancient continent of Gondwanaland, pushing Australia out on its long drift north to its current position. The landmass that became India shot off first, while Africa and South America broke off later.
"This Wilkes Land impact is much bigger than the impact that killed the dinosaurs, and probably would have caused catastrophic damage at the time," said Ralph von Frese, professor of geological sciences at Ohio State University.
Professor von Frese and Laramie Potts, a postdoctoral researcher in geological sciences, led the team of Ohio University, NASA, Russian and Korean scientists that discovered the crater.
They reported their preliminary results yesterday to the American Geophysical Union joint assembly meeting at Baltimore.
The scientists used gravity fluctuations measured by satellites to peer beneath Antarctica's icy surface, and found a 321-kilometre-wide plug of mantle material - a "mascon" in geological parlance - that had risen up into the Earth's crust.
Mascons are the planetary equivalent of a bump on the head. They form where large objects slam into a planet's surface. When the scientists overlaid their gravity image with airborne radar images of the ground beneath the ice, they found the mascon perfectly centred inside a circular ridge 482 kilometres wide.
"Based on what we know about the geologic history of the region, this Wilkes Land mascon formed recently by geologic standards - probably about 250 million years ago," Professor von Frese said.
Professor Michael Archer, dean of the Faculty of Science at University of NSW, said the crater could prove to be the missing link science has been waiting for.
"A meteor that size would have punctured right through the crust of the Earth and caused enormous damage to the planet," he said.
In that period 95 per cent of life on Earth was destroyed, he said.
"It's possible this is the missing key to what caused it."
Frank Walker
June 4, 2006
SCIENTISTS believe they have finally solved one of Earth's greatest mysteries: what caused the great extinction of life hundreds of millions of years ago.
The answer was revealed yesterday when an American team announced it had discovered the world's biggest meteor crater almost two kilometres under the ice in Antarctica.
They say a meteor almost 50 kilometres wide caused a 500-kilometre-wide crater deep under the Wilkes Land region of Antarctica, directly south of Australia.
The massive explosion from the impact probably created the continent of Australia, forcing it to break away from the existing land mass.
The incredible discovery caused huge excitement among Australian scientists last night. It could be the missing link in the geological formation of the continents. It would also answer why life on Earth was almost completely wiped out hundreds of millions of years ago.
The meteor the size of Sydney struck 250 million years ago and must have been the biggest explosion ever seen on the planet, far bigger than the 10-kilometre-wide meteor which hit east of Mexico 65 million years ago, wiping out the dinosaurs.
Ohio State University scientists who found the crater said the massive Antarctic crater could explain the global extinction in the Permian-Triassic period when all animal life on Earth died out, clearing the way for the dinosaurs.
The massive impact probably broke up the ancient continent of Gondwanaland, pushing Australia out on its long drift north to its current position. The landmass that became India shot off first, while Africa and South America broke off later.
"This Wilkes Land impact is much bigger than the impact that killed the dinosaurs, and probably would have caused catastrophic damage at the time," said Ralph von Frese, professor of geological sciences at Ohio State University.
Professor von Frese and Laramie Potts, a postdoctoral researcher in geological sciences, led the team of Ohio University, NASA, Russian and Korean scientists that discovered the crater.
They reported their preliminary results yesterday to the American Geophysical Union joint assembly meeting at Baltimore.
The scientists used gravity fluctuations measured by satellites to peer beneath Antarctica's icy surface, and found a 321-kilometre-wide plug of mantle material - a "mascon" in geological parlance - that had risen up into the Earth's crust.
Mascons are the planetary equivalent of a bump on the head. They form where large objects slam into a planet's surface. When the scientists overlaid their gravity image with airborne radar images of the ground beneath the ice, they found the mascon perfectly centred inside a circular ridge 482 kilometres wide.
"Based on what we know about the geologic history of the region, this Wilkes Land mascon formed recently by geologic standards - probably about 250 million years ago," Professor von Frese said.
Professor Michael Archer, dean of the Faculty of Science at University of NSW, said the crater could prove to be the missing link science has been waiting for.
"A meteor that size would have punctured right through the crust of the Earth and caused enormous damage to the planet," he said.
In that period 95 per cent of life on Earth was destroyed, he said.
"It's possible this is the missing key to what caused it."
Thursday, June 01, 2006
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