Monday, April 4, 2005

Rescuers were today sending a pod of 13 pilot whales back into the ocean at Geographe Bay, near to Busselton, south of Perth, in Western Australia. Six additional members of the pod had died during the stranding, including at least one calf. More than 300 people were watching as the whales set out to sea following a 30 hour rescue effort.

The whales had become stranded early yesterday. Several power boats and a spotter plane were escorting the surviving whales towards Cape Naturalist, in an operation expected to take several hours.

Western Australian State Government Department of Conservation and Land Management (CALM) officers feared that the whales could become stranded again.

One CALM officer, Neil Taylor, told ABC News dozens of his colleagues and community volunteers had helped the whales survive throughout the night.

“The vet has checked them all and given them some antibiotics yesterday, last thing before dark,” he had told the Australian national broadcaster.

“I think the plan is that the vet will be there again [today] and will give them some vitamins to kick them along before they actually take their swim out to sea.”

Saturday, October 27, 2007

Gay Talese wants to go to Iraq. “It so happens there is someone that’s working on such a thing right now for me,” the 75-year-old legendary journalist and author told David Shankbone. “Even if I was on Al-Jazeera with a gun to my head, I wouldn’t be pleading with those bastards! I’d say, ‘Go ahead. Make my day.'”

Few reporters will ever reach the stature of Talese. His 1966 profile of Frank Sinatra, Frank Sinatra Has a Cold, was not only cited by The Economist as the greatest profile of Sinatra ever written, but is considered the greatest of any celebrity profile ever written. In the 70th anniversary issue of Esquire in October 2003, the editors declared the piece the “Best Story Esquire Ever Published.”

Talese helped create and define a new style of literary reporting called New Journalism. Talese himself told National Public Radio he rejects this label (“The term new journalism became very fashionable on college campuses in the 1970s and some of its practitioners tended to be a little loose with the facts. And that’s where I wanted to part company.”)

He is not bothered by the Bancrofts selling The Wall Street Journal—”It’s not like we should lament the passing of some noble dynasty!”—to Rupert Murdoch, but he is bothered by how the press supported and sold the Iraq War to the American people. “The press in Washington got us into this war as much as the people that are controlling it,” said Talese. “They took information that was second-hand information, and they went along with it.” He wants to see the Washington press corp disbanded and sent around the country to get back in touch with the people it covers; that the press should not be so focused on–and in bed with–the federal government.

Augusten Burroughs once said that writers are experience junkies, and Talese fits the bill. Talese–who has been married to Nan Talese (she edited James Frey‘s Million Little Piece) for fifty years–can be found at baseball games in Cuba or the gay bars of Beijing, wanting to see humanity in all its experience.

Below is Wikinews reporter David Shankbone’s interview with Gay Talese.

Friday, May 20, 2005

The U.S. Federal Communications Commission (FCC) said May 19 that it will require VoIP providers to route 911 calls to the appropriate local dispatch center. Under this new regulation the dispatch center is also required to be provided with the caller’s callback number and location.

With the exception of Rhode Island, most VoIP’s 911 callers are delivered to the administrative offices of a public-safety answering point, instead of connecting directly to a standard 911 dispatcher. The resulting time delay was a consequence of the phone provider’s refusal to give VoIP providers access to the 911 infrastructure. To comply with this new regulation the VoIP providers need the cooperation of the traditional phone providers. The FCC has not required the traditional phone providers to assist the VoIP providers with this, but a bill introduced in the House and Senate Wednesday would require them to provide the connection.

“The road to full compliance will not be easy, and the commission will almost certainly be called on to take further steps to bring it about, but we have begun the process,” Commissioner Kathleen Q. Abernathy said.

This new regulation comes after the death of a 3-month-old in Florida, partially due to delays in routing the call that was placed over a VoIP service.

“While they seem functionally the same, many [VoIP] callers find that they can’t reach local emergency operators,” said FCC Chairman Kevin Martin. “This situation is unacceptable. People have a reasonable expectation that when they dial 911, they are connected to the emergency operator.”

This new regulation is expected to become final in 30 to 45 days. When it does, the companies will have 120 days to comply.

Cell phone makers have been required to install GPS chips in all phones. The chip is used the share the position of the phone to the nearest transmission tower in the event of an emergency. Newer cell phone models no longer have the option of turning off the location information sharing feature for emergencies. Location sharing for other services, such as a service that might report the nearest restaurant serving corned beef sandwiches when queried could be disabled, if that were the user’s preference.

The effects of 911 location sharing on law enforcement remains to be seen. Fugitives might leave their cell phones turned on. An arrest on I-95 occurred earlier this year near Richmond, VA, when a Florida fugitive was captured by accessing the cell phone location.

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