If the city of Ocala decides to help the Yankees move their Class A-Advanced minor league team here from Tampa, the decision will likely hinge on whether it is a good deal for the community.
But researchers say Ocala will have to look beyond the team's direct economic impact to make that decision because Minor League Baseball, in itself, does not generate a lot of jobs and doesn't attract millions of fans like a Major League team.
That doesn't mean Minor League Baseball can't be an economic driver, however.
A minor league stadium erected in the right location could revitalize an area or open up undeveloped land, both of which could be catalysts for new homes, businesses and jobs, researchers say.
And having a stadium and a baseball team like the Tampa Yankees could bring some cache to a town and engender civic pride that could be attractive to companies looking to relocate. At the very least, it could provide the community with new, affordable family entertainment and a venue for other events.
It is those ancillary benefits, researchers say, that may make a community's investment in Minor League Baseball worthwhile, even if it is not a big job creator or money-maker.
“You're never going to notice it's there economically,” said Roger Knoll, professor emeritus at Stanford University's Department of Economics. “It's too small and too unimportant. A Single A team is lucky if it draws 1,000 (fans) a game. It's not even as big as high school football.”
The Yankees and the city have been tight-lipped about their discussions to bring a farm team here. Ocala officials have said only that the talks are in the early stages. It is not known where a stadium would be built, who would pay for it or what other commitments of public dollars the Yankees would be asking for.
But Steve Densa, Minor League Baseball's executive director of communications, said when all the costs and benefits are calculated, minor league teams have a positive impact on communities.
“A MiLB (Minor League Baseball) club brings money to the area in the form of housing and/or hotel nights for the home club and the visiting one, coaches, scouts, umpires and various Major League personnel who visit each one of their affiliates during the season,” Densa wrote in an email. “There's also business generated for restaurants for these people as well. Other businesses may pop up around the ballpark, which may have not done so if there isn't a stadium. The ballpark is a community asset and can be used to attract other events throughout the year, such as concerts, fairs, holiday events, etc., that add to the quality of life of the community.”
The Tampa Yankees, like other Class-A minor league teams such as the Lakeland Flying Tigers and the Daytona Cubs, belong to the Florida State League. The Flying Tigers won the Florida State League's championship this year. Attendance at the final championship game at Lakeland's Joker Merchant Stadium, which holds 8,500 spectators, was 400 people.
“There were 398 and my wife and I,” said Bill Tinsley, the city of Lakeland's liaison to the Tigers and manager of financial resources. “The intent of minor league operations, typically, is that you don't lose money, that you break even and you provide some additional quality of life for your city.”
Breaking even, he admits, is no guarantee. There are considerable costs to a community, like the $35 million to $40 million price tag to build a minor league stadium.
“We're so different because we have spring training, which kind of covers the bills,” Tinsley said. “Spring training is huge.”
The Yankees are not considering moving their Major League New York Yankees' spring training to Ocala.
Tinsley said Lakeland “pretty much” breaks even on Minor League Baseball. He said the team and the city share expenses. Lakeland estimates that each Flying Tigers game costs the city $145 for utilities and field maintenance.
The city receives 15 percent of ticket sales and 15 percent of concessions, or a minimum of $125 a game from the team.
A minor league ticket costs between $5 and $7, although on nights when a business sponsors a game, a ticket could cost as little as $2. And if Tinsley can rent the stadium when there are no games, he receives $150 or more a night. The Flying Tigers' total 2012 attendance was 59,589. It averaged 1,027 fans a game for the 58 games it played.
The Flying Tigers do not pay to use the stadium, but the big league team pays Lakeland $325,000 a year to use the stadium for spring training, which helps offset the costs of the minor league team.
Knoll, of Stanford, said the Lakeland model works because the city uses the stadium for events beyond baseball.
“There's no real return on that investment to the city itself unless it's going to use that facility for lots of other things,” Knoll said.
Knoll said that in Stockton, Calif., the stadium is used by the local high schools.
Sunday, December 9, 2012
Wednesday, December 5, 2012
The attribution pit
In today’s antique world there is a great deal of talk, concern and hand-wringing over the number of fake and reproduction items being offered for sale. The Professional Show Managers Association is trying to get the Federal Trade Commission to include an “Antiques and Collectibles” category to the Consumer Protection website to provide an avenue of relief for buyers who fall prey to unscrupulous dealers and fraudulent transactions.
In many categories of the antiques and collectibles trade these concerns are justified based on the level of expertise used by potential crooks in producing fake objects and reproductions. To the uninitiated in the nuances of say American art pottery or folk art one object looks pretty much like another and one piece of modern art can be as undecipherable as the next. The use of molds to produce certain kinds of works of art makes reliable individual checks on authenticity difficult if not impossible. Of course with almost any category a professional or vigorous amateur who has dedicated his or her life to the pursuit of knowledge on the subject can easily detect a fake Roseville Futura vase or a bogus Buddy L tanker truck reproduction. It’s all the other folks in the beginning and middle phases of collecting and dealing who have a problem in this area.
But the area of antique furniture does not have quite so difficult a problem. It is significantly harder and much more expensive to duplicate an early 18th century Queen Anne chair than a 1920s toy truck and the duplication of a Federal sideboard clearly is a work of major proportion. And the return in most cases would result in a net loss for the faker. It’s just too hard to do a good fake of antique furniture. There have been some notable exceptions like the “17th century” turned chair made in the 1970s by Armand LeMontagne with the express purpose of embarrassing some museum officials as detailed by Myrna Kaye in her memorable book Fake, Fraud or Genuine? LeMontagne was so successful in his attempt that the museum officials did not believe him even after he confessed to the counterfeit.
For the most part, however, outright fake antique furniture is easily detectable by even the occasional collector who has a bit of interest in the subject and it generally is not worth the effort for the crook.
But there are other areas in the furniture category that do have room for some confusion and a bit wishful thinking or artful redirection. True American antique furniture pieces in good condition with a reliable provenance and some verifiable traces of the maker normally sell for higher prices than do “anonymous” similar pieces. While it is true that occasionally the impressive workmanship and style found on a genuine anonymous treasure will lead to a bidding battle at auction that recognizes the quality of the piece, it more often falls to the better-known name with a wider recognition.
That leads to two areas of potential concern, labeling and attribution. One of the best works on the subject of labeling is William C. Ketchum’s book American Cabinetmakers - Marked American Furniture 1640 – 1940 published by Crown in 1995. It is by far the most comprehensive work on an elusive subject that still leaves lots of room for more investigation. Ketchum illustrates such seldom seen marks as Duncan Phyfe’s paper label used between 1811 and 1815 when his shop was on Partition Street or the engraved label of Anthony Quervelle when he was on Second Street in Philadelphia. But Ketchum also shows the hand-signed marks of people like John Chipman, the Salem, Mass., cabinetmaker who signed a Chippendale blockfront secretary made between 1770 and 1790 and the brand of William Fiske on a Hepplewhite mahogany chair while working in Salem 1788-1793.
Brands and chalk signatures are hard to duplicate accurately, but paper labels and metal tags leave lots of room for chicanery. Metal and porcelain tags, like some of those used by R.J. Horner, have an annoying habit of falling off the back of a cabinet and reappearing elsewhere. Paper labels can be carefully removed and accurately duplicated with laser scanning technology available to anyone. In fact some very good new reproduction labels are boldly offered for sale for Globe-Wernicke and Macey bookcases on America’s universal auction site. Other “vintage” labels, including paper and foil, are offered for Hoosier, Knoll, Charles Eames and Herman Miller among others. In the Fall/Winter 2006-07 edition of Style 1900, a magazine devoted to Arts & Crafts, noted Arts & Crafts authority, author and collector Bruce Johnson responds to a reader’s concerns about fraudulent L. & J.G. Stickley labels. He said “Shopmarks sometimes render collectors temporarily blind to otherwise obvious clues.” He then cites author David Cathers who said in 1981, “Get to know the furniture first by examining it carefully – then look for marks of confirmation.”
This gets harder to do in some periods. In the late 19th century and the early 20th century, a great many cabinetmakers and factories did not label their work for a variety of reasons. That makes it awfully hard to confirm your suspicion (or hopes) that the cabinet might be a Pabst, Herter Brothers or Berkey & Gay cabinet. That leads to the next area of possible misdirection – the attribution game.
Many dealers and auctioneers, when at loss for descriptive material for a catalog or advertisement, easily fall into the “attribution pit.” This deep pit is surrounded by a long slippery slope lubricated with terms like “it looks just like …,” “it’s the same style as …” and “there was one at ...” et al. It has gotten to the point where almost any upholstered piece that features a carved head and face is “attributed to Jelliff.” It is true that John Jelliff of New Jersey did make some parlor sets that had heads and faces carved in them. But so did a number of other cabinetmakers and carvers. And Jelliff wasn’t even in the business when most of the Renaissance Revival sets attributed to him were made. Jelliff actually retired in 1860 and his company was taken over by an employee, Henry H. Miller, who continued the business under Jelliff’s name until 1890. So is that parlor set an artifact of John Jelliff & Co.? If it has the simple brand used by Miller after Jelliff retired, “J.J. Co.” it probably is. If it is unmarked it probably isn’t.
As far as distinctive features found in the attribution pit, all winged animals, griffins or not, were not made by R.J. Horner although most of them are attributed as such. And all Mission oak chairs were not made by some variation of the Stickley family as much as someone might want them to be and all oddly configured, angular chairs were not made by George Hunzinger no matter how quirky they are.
In many categories of the antiques and collectibles trade these concerns are justified based on the level of expertise used by potential crooks in producing fake objects and reproductions. To the uninitiated in the nuances of say American art pottery or folk art one object looks pretty much like another and one piece of modern art can be as undecipherable as the next. The use of molds to produce certain kinds of works of art makes reliable individual checks on authenticity difficult if not impossible. Of course with almost any category a professional or vigorous amateur who has dedicated his or her life to the pursuit of knowledge on the subject can easily detect a fake Roseville Futura vase or a bogus Buddy L tanker truck reproduction. It’s all the other folks in the beginning and middle phases of collecting and dealing who have a problem in this area.
But the area of antique furniture does not have quite so difficult a problem. It is significantly harder and much more expensive to duplicate an early 18th century Queen Anne chair than a 1920s toy truck and the duplication of a Federal sideboard clearly is a work of major proportion. And the return in most cases would result in a net loss for the faker. It’s just too hard to do a good fake of antique furniture. There have been some notable exceptions like the “17th century” turned chair made in the 1970s by Armand LeMontagne with the express purpose of embarrassing some museum officials as detailed by Myrna Kaye in her memorable book Fake, Fraud or Genuine? LeMontagne was so successful in his attempt that the museum officials did not believe him even after he confessed to the counterfeit.
For the most part, however, outright fake antique furniture is easily detectable by even the occasional collector who has a bit of interest in the subject and it generally is not worth the effort for the crook.
But there are other areas in the furniture category that do have room for some confusion and a bit wishful thinking or artful redirection. True American antique furniture pieces in good condition with a reliable provenance and some verifiable traces of the maker normally sell for higher prices than do “anonymous” similar pieces. While it is true that occasionally the impressive workmanship and style found on a genuine anonymous treasure will lead to a bidding battle at auction that recognizes the quality of the piece, it more often falls to the better-known name with a wider recognition.
That leads to two areas of potential concern, labeling and attribution. One of the best works on the subject of labeling is William C. Ketchum’s book American Cabinetmakers - Marked American Furniture 1640 – 1940 published by Crown in 1995. It is by far the most comprehensive work on an elusive subject that still leaves lots of room for more investigation. Ketchum illustrates such seldom seen marks as Duncan Phyfe’s paper label used between 1811 and 1815 when his shop was on Partition Street or the engraved label of Anthony Quervelle when he was on Second Street in Philadelphia. But Ketchum also shows the hand-signed marks of people like John Chipman, the Salem, Mass., cabinetmaker who signed a Chippendale blockfront secretary made between 1770 and 1790 and the brand of William Fiske on a Hepplewhite mahogany chair while working in Salem 1788-1793.
Brands and chalk signatures are hard to duplicate accurately, but paper labels and metal tags leave lots of room for chicanery. Metal and porcelain tags, like some of those used by R.J. Horner, have an annoying habit of falling off the back of a cabinet and reappearing elsewhere. Paper labels can be carefully removed and accurately duplicated with laser scanning technology available to anyone. In fact some very good new reproduction labels are boldly offered for sale for Globe-Wernicke and Macey bookcases on America’s universal auction site. Other “vintage” labels, including paper and foil, are offered for Hoosier, Knoll, Charles Eames and Herman Miller among others. In the Fall/Winter 2006-07 edition of Style 1900, a magazine devoted to Arts & Crafts, noted Arts & Crafts authority, author and collector Bruce Johnson responds to a reader’s concerns about fraudulent L. & J.G. Stickley labels. He said “Shopmarks sometimes render collectors temporarily blind to otherwise obvious clues.” He then cites author David Cathers who said in 1981, “Get to know the furniture first by examining it carefully – then look for marks of confirmation.”
This gets harder to do in some periods. In the late 19th century and the early 20th century, a great many cabinetmakers and factories did not label their work for a variety of reasons. That makes it awfully hard to confirm your suspicion (or hopes) that the cabinet might be a Pabst, Herter Brothers or Berkey & Gay cabinet. That leads to the next area of possible misdirection – the attribution game.
Many dealers and auctioneers, when at loss for descriptive material for a catalog or advertisement, easily fall into the “attribution pit.” This deep pit is surrounded by a long slippery slope lubricated with terms like “it looks just like …,” “it’s the same style as …” and “there was one at ...” et al. It has gotten to the point where almost any upholstered piece that features a carved head and face is “attributed to Jelliff.” It is true that John Jelliff of New Jersey did make some parlor sets that had heads and faces carved in them. But so did a number of other cabinetmakers and carvers. And Jelliff wasn’t even in the business when most of the Renaissance Revival sets attributed to him were made. Jelliff actually retired in 1860 and his company was taken over by an employee, Henry H. Miller, who continued the business under Jelliff’s name until 1890. So is that parlor set an artifact of John Jelliff & Co.? If it has the simple brand used by Miller after Jelliff retired, “J.J. Co.” it probably is. If it is unmarked it probably isn’t.
As far as distinctive features found in the attribution pit, all winged animals, griffins or not, were not made by R.J. Horner although most of them are attributed as such. And all Mission oak chairs were not made by some variation of the Stickley family as much as someone might want them to be and all oddly configured, angular chairs were not made by George Hunzinger no matter how quirky they are.
Sunday, December 2, 2012
A Warrior's Welcome In 'Billy Lynn'
Every two or three years, if I'm lucky, I get my hands on a novel that I simply can't shut up about, a novel I shout from my humble mountaintop to anyone who will listen, a novel that I hand-sell any time I have a literate audience of one or more. In many cases, I'll purchase this novel, over and over and over, and put it in the hands of readers. The last novel that knocked me for this kind of a whammy was Hesh Kestin's criminally underappreciated The Iron Will of Shoeshine Cats, which left me breathless with its mastery of character and suspense.
2012 has been a banner year for literary fiction. I've been crowing about a number of novels this year, from Jess Walter's Beautiful Ruins, to Maria Semple's Where'd You Go, Bernadette, both brilliant and inventive. But one novel this year blew the top of my head off like no other, and that was Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk by Ben Fountain.
When 19-year-old Spc. Billy Lynn, one of eight surviving members of the celebrated Bravo Squad, returns stateside from Iraq for an eight-day victory tour, he finds himself a national hero. Bravo's dog-and-pony show and its attendant media blitz culminates on Thanksgiving Day, during the halftime celebration of a Dallas Cowboys football game in Billy's native Texas. As Thanksgiving unfolds, amid an almost overwhelming flurry of activity, Billy confronts a barrage of questions about family, nation, patriotism, celebrity and love.
Like many of my favorite novels, the synopsis sounds rather uneventful — it's not. Though its scope may not be epic — a single afternoon — the novel has a profound thematic reach. Without ever hitting a false note, Fountain tackles the unwieldy subjects of Iraq, the war on terrorism, class, consumerism and politics. What's even more impressive is that he accomplishes all of this employing a tiny aperture, a lone point of view, a single location and does it in real time: No brow-beating, no navel gazing and no ranting. Just great storytelling, fully realized characters and sentences that crackle. In short, Fountain makes it look easy.
To read Billy Lynn is to engage in a pure, tactile state of sensory overload. You feel this story with your whole body — all the adrenaline, tension and nausea. The novel is a veritable decoupage of physical sensation — from the sodium glare of stadium lights, to the acid sting of bitterness in the throat; from the woozy disequilibrium of a Jack Daniels hangover, to the galloping heartbeat of unfettered carnality. Fountain achieves that rare level of evocation that makes readers feel as though they lived it.
Name another casino in America where a total stranger can walk up to the boss, pull on his mustache and ask, "Is that real?"
This is Rich Hoffman's world. The portly chief executive of Jackson Rancheria Casino Resort, instantly recognizable from the casino's comical TV ads, is routinely swamped with handshakes, hugs and autograph requests whenever he strolls through the venue.
"We're the kingdom for the common guy," said Hoffman, wearing a fedora and faded jeans during a walkaround last week. "People feel comfortable here."
Hoffman personifies the un-Vegas, down-home strategy of Jackson Rancheria, the smallest and least glitzy of the four Indian casinos in greater Sacramento. Its business is dwarfed by big competitors such as Thunder Valley, but after a couple of rough years, Jackson weathered the recession comparatively well. It just unveiled an $80 million remodel of its hotel, casino and restaurants, with a new VIP room for high rollers.
Industry consultants say Jackson Rancheria has built up a strong and steadfast following. Customer loyalty helped the casino withstand a series of infrastructure problems. It could also serve as a firewall if, as expected, more Indian casinos come to Amador County.
"It's just like kind of a family affair," said customer Dar Drittenbas, a retiree from Pioneer who gave Hoffman a hug.
The casino's owners, the Jackson Rancheria Band of Miwuk Indians, paid for the remodel with cash on hand, according to Hoffman. Not one cent was borrowed.
"The tribe has always been very conservative," Hoffman said.
Jackson's situation contrasts sharply with that of the struggling Red Hawk Casino in Shingle Springs, a relative newcomer to the market, which a year ago deferred principal payments on a $66 million startup loan and is now trying to restructure its finances.
That doesn't mean Jackson Rancheria has been immune to problems. The remodel, which took five years, was launched in part to remedy a series of major construction defects in the old facility.
Half the casino was shut down in 2008 after the discovery of water and mold problems that forced the temporary relocation of hundreds of slot machines to another building.
A year later, inspectors uncovered potential fire hazards that temporarily closed most of the resort's hotel.
Hoffman said Jackson Rancheria collected $50 million by suing its contractors, but the damage done to the facility was considerable. Just moving slot machines around was disruptive to customers, many of whom are loyal to a particular machine, he said.
"You couple that with the economic downturn – it was a rough couple of years," Hoffman said.
The soft economy prompted Jackson to lay off 265 workers and eliminate another 100 jobs through attrition. The remodel created 150 new jobs, and Jackson now employs 1,200 full- and part-time workers.
Other potential challenges lie ahead, in the form of new competition.
Two tribes are proposing to build major casinos within 15 miles of Jackson: the Buena Vista Rancheria of Me-Wuk Indians and the Ione Band of Miwok Indians.
While Amador County is fighting both proposals in court, Hoffman acknowledged the possibility that his corner of the casino universe could get more crowded.
"Any time you split the pie into more pieces, it's a challenge," he said.
Still, Hoffman said his casino could handle the newcomers but questions if their plans will be fully realized.
"With our position in the marketplace, and the good will we've created, it would be tough for them competitively to do a very large project," he said.
The rancheria casino's financials are a closely guarded secret. But Hoffman said its 1,600 slot machines take in an average of more than $200 a day. That translates into at least $116 million in annual revenue from slots alone.
Hoffman said he expects business to grow 8 percent next year, due to the improving economy and the effect of the remodel.
Jackson Rancheria was one of the first tribes in California to explore gambling. Under the leadership of the late Margaret Dalton, the tribe opened a bingo hall in 1984.
The remote location – several miles off Highway 49 – was and still is something of a handicap, and the bingo hall closed several times. A full-fledged casino didn't emerge until California voters approved Vegas-style gambling in 2000.
Getting into the business early paid off for the tribe, which has 20 members. Its gambling compact with the state, signed by Gov. Gray Davis in 1999, lets Jackson Rancheria keep more of its profits than many other casino tribes – especially those like Red Hawk that signed compacts with Davis' successor, Arnold Schwarzenegger. Members of the tribe get profit dividends from the casino, but Hoffman wouldn't say how much.
2012 has been a banner year for literary fiction. I've been crowing about a number of novels this year, from Jess Walter's Beautiful Ruins, to Maria Semple's Where'd You Go, Bernadette, both brilliant and inventive. But one novel this year blew the top of my head off like no other, and that was Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk by Ben Fountain.
When 19-year-old Spc. Billy Lynn, one of eight surviving members of the celebrated Bravo Squad, returns stateside from Iraq for an eight-day victory tour, he finds himself a national hero. Bravo's dog-and-pony show and its attendant media blitz culminates on Thanksgiving Day, during the halftime celebration of a Dallas Cowboys football game in Billy's native Texas. As Thanksgiving unfolds, amid an almost overwhelming flurry of activity, Billy confronts a barrage of questions about family, nation, patriotism, celebrity and love.
Like many of my favorite novels, the synopsis sounds rather uneventful — it's not. Though its scope may not be epic — a single afternoon — the novel has a profound thematic reach. Without ever hitting a false note, Fountain tackles the unwieldy subjects of Iraq, the war on terrorism, class, consumerism and politics. What's even more impressive is that he accomplishes all of this employing a tiny aperture, a lone point of view, a single location and does it in real time: No brow-beating, no navel gazing and no ranting. Just great storytelling, fully realized characters and sentences that crackle. In short, Fountain makes it look easy.
To read Billy Lynn is to engage in a pure, tactile state of sensory overload. You feel this story with your whole body — all the adrenaline, tension and nausea. The novel is a veritable decoupage of physical sensation — from the sodium glare of stadium lights, to the acid sting of bitterness in the throat; from the woozy disequilibrium of a Jack Daniels hangover, to the galloping heartbeat of unfettered carnality. Fountain achieves that rare level of evocation that makes readers feel as though they lived it.
Name another casino in America where a total stranger can walk up to the boss, pull on his mustache and ask, "Is that real?"
This is Rich Hoffman's world. The portly chief executive of Jackson Rancheria Casino Resort, instantly recognizable from the casino's comical TV ads, is routinely swamped with handshakes, hugs and autograph requests whenever he strolls through the venue.
"We're the kingdom for the common guy," said Hoffman, wearing a fedora and faded jeans during a walkaround last week. "People feel comfortable here."
Hoffman personifies the un-Vegas, down-home strategy of Jackson Rancheria, the smallest and least glitzy of the four Indian casinos in greater Sacramento. Its business is dwarfed by big competitors such as Thunder Valley, but after a couple of rough years, Jackson weathered the recession comparatively well. It just unveiled an $80 million remodel of its hotel, casino and restaurants, with a new VIP room for high rollers.
Industry consultants say Jackson Rancheria has built up a strong and steadfast following. Customer loyalty helped the casino withstand a series of infrastructure problems. It could also serve as a firewall if, as expected, more Indian casinos come to Amador County.
"It's just like kind of a family affair," said customer Dar Drittenbas, a retiree from Pioneer who gave Hoffman a hug.
The casino's owners, the Jackson Rancheria Band of Miwuk Indians, paid for the remodel with cash on hand, according to Hoffman. Not one cent was borrowed.
"The tribe has always been very conservative," Hoffman said.
Jackson's situation contrasts sharply with that of the struggling Red Hawk Casino in Shingle Springs, a relative newcomer to the market, which a year ago deferred principal payments on a $66 million startup loan and is now trying to restructure its finances.
That doesn't mean Jackson Rancheria has been immune to problems. The remodel, which took five years, was launched in part to remedy a series of major construction defects in the old facility.
Half the casino was shut down in 2008 after the discovery of water and mold problems that forced the temporary relocation of hundreds of slot machines to another building.
A year later, inspectors uncovered potential fire hazards that temporarily closed most of the resort's hotel.
Hoffman said Jackson Rancheria collected $50 million by suing its contractors, but the damage done to the facility was considerable. Just moving slot machines around was disruptive to customers, many of whom are loyal to a particular machine, he said.
"You couple that with the economic downturn – it was a rough couple of years," Hoffman said.
The soft economy prompted Jackson to lay off 265 workers and eliminate another 100 jobs through attrition. The remodel created 150 new jobs, and Jackson now employs 1,200 full- and part-time workers.
Other potential challenges lie ahead, in the form of new competition.
Two tribes are proposing to build major casinos within 15 miles of Jackson: the Buena Vista Rancheria of Me-Wuk Indians and the Ione Band of Miwok Indians.
While Amador County is fighting both proposals in court, Hoffman acknowledged the possibility that his corner of the casino universe could get more crowded.
"Any time you split the pie into more pieces, it's a challenge," he said.
Still, Hoffman said his casino could handle the newcomers but questions if their plans will be fully realized.
"With our position in the marketplace, and the good will we've created, it would be tough for them competitively to do a very large project," he said.
The rancheria casino's financials are a closely guarded secret. But Hoffman said its 1,600 slot machines take in an average of more than $200 a day. That translates into at least $116 million in annual revenue from slots alone.
Hoffman said he expects business to grow 8 percent next year, due to the improving economy and the effect of the remodel.
Jackson Rancheria was one of the first tribes in California to explore gambling. Under the leadership of the late Margaret Dalton, the tribe opened a bingo hall in 1984.
The remote location – several miles off Highway 49 – was and still is something of a handicap, and the bingo hall closed several times. A full-fledged casino didn't emerge until California voters approved Vegas-style gambling in 2000.
Getting into the business early paid off for the tribe, which has 20 members. Its gambling compact with the state, signed by Gov. Gray Davis in 1999, lets Jackson Rancheria keep more of its profits than many other casino tribes – especially those like Red Hawk that signed compacts with Davis' successor, Arnold Schwarzenegger. Members of the tribe get profit dividends from the casino, but Hoffman wouldn't say how much.
Sunday, November 25, 2012
His master's proud voice
When Varsity mentions that his real voice sounds very different to the character that made him a household name, Lam Pou-chuen breaks into a laugh and launches into the memorable lines.
"Nobita! Wake up la! Wake up la! Hurry and wake up la! Its time to go to school la! Otherwise you'll be late again la!"
These words have been heard in almost every episode of the Hong Kong-dubbed version of the Japanese cartoon Doraemon over the past 30 years.
While Lam's voice is deeply etched into the minds of Doraemon viewers of all ages, the cat with the magical gadgets is just one of Lam's great achievements in his 42-year career as a voice actor.
"Voice actors are similar to chefs. If you create a delicious dish that becomes popular, you too will become well-known," he says.
Lam never set out to be a voice actor. After graduating from secondary school, he applied for bank jobs, but failed. At that time, the dubbing industry was still in its infancy. Lam wrote to Television Broadcasts Ltd to apply for a job as a voice actor and was hired, and has been voice acting since.
During his early days, Lam did not have the chance to dub even a single word of dialogue. There were no training courses for him and other rookies. They were only assigned to produce sound effects like footsteps, doors opening and phones dialing.
"We did not have as much professional training as now. We just sat behind the seniors and learned from them while they were voice acting," explains Lam. "These days, there are professional voice actors giving lessons."
Among his mentors, Lam most appreciated the actor Tam Bing-man, who belongs to the first generation of voice actors in Hong Kong.
"I followed and learned from him since the first day. I call him `master."' Lam recalls.
Lam did not just observe and learn while making sound effects at the back of the studio - he made use of his time to perfect his art. After arriving home at night, he would read newspapers out loud to improve his articulation and pacing.
After months of learning, practicing and waiting, Lam finally got his chance in front of the microphone. The editing technology of that time meant that if an actor made a mistake, they would have to start over. Lam remembers being extremely nervous when he walked into the studio - even if he had just one line of dialogue.
"My character was a cop, with only one line: `Freeze! Drop your gun! FBI!"' Lam recalls. His debut in the movie Federal Bureau of Investigation went smoothly and he made the cut.
In 1982, Lam encountered his favorite role, Ding Dong (Doraemon). "It is because Ding Dong is vivacious. Besides, it was easier to catch the shape of the mouth, as his mouth is very big," Lam laughs.
Ding Dong became very popular soon after the cartoon was first broadcast. It has been 30 years since he first came across the character, which later reverted back to its original Japanese name, Doraemon.
Whatever the name, the cat has become synonymous with Lam, but he still feels a deeper connection with the Cantonese name, Ding Dong.
While a big Ding Dong fan, he has attracted a fan base of his own. Fans write letters to Lam, sharing their everyday lives with him.Most of the Doraemon dolls and figures at Lam's home are gifts from his fans, or souvenirs from his colleagues.
Among the gifts, Lam likes a remote-control Doraemon toy the most. "A fan delivered it to TVB. It's more than 30 years old," he says.
Apart from fans and gifts, what warms Lam's heart most is that his biggest fan is his own daughter, who also loved watching Ding Dong and listening to her father's voice on TV.
Influenced by him, she is now also working at TVB as a voice actor. Father and daughter have already acted in the same scene.
"I remember it was in Desperate Housewives, but it was not that special to me," Lam says.
Ding Dong's success opened up more job opportunities for Lam, with his voice appearing more frequently in advertisements.
The boom times for the Hong Kong movie industry in the 1980s kept voice actors, including Lam, always hopping. He was the designated voice actor for action star Sammo Hung Kam-bo and heart-throb Alexander Cheung Fu-sheng.
"There were a few times when I worked continuously for three to four days," recalls Lam. "After I finished my work at TVB, I earned extra income by voice acting for movies outside. After that, I went to work in TVB again.
"As there was no live recording on location in those days, voice actors needed to grasp the personalities and tone of voice of the characters by studying soundless demos. Directors and sometimes even the actors of the movies would come and explain the characters to them."
Though it was more difficult than television work, Lam especially valued the experience of working on movies because it enabled him to learn more from studying the characters of his roles.
Among the hundreds of movies he has voice acted, Lam's most memorable is the mentally disabled character he voiced in The First Mission, played by Sammo Hung. As Hung's regular voice actor in martial arts films, Lam found it a challenge to voice act for one of his non-action roles.
Still, that character was not the most challenging role Lam ever came across. That distinction goes to the character of Yue Buqun in a Taiwan TV drama The Smiling, Proud Wanderer (Xiaoao Jianghu) in the early 1990s.
"It gave me a hard time as the actor spoke in an unstable tempo, sometimes fast, sometimes slow. This is the most difficult situation in voice acting. When actors do not perform well in their own parts, it creates problems for the voice actors."
With more than 40 years in the industry, Lam has seen remarkable changes, but remains a consummate professional with exacting standards.
On the negative side, he has noticed more young voice actors have a problem of so-called lazy sounds or pronunciation. He also finds it an unhealthy trend for movie companies to invite stars to do the voice acting for animation features. "They cannot catch the mouth shapes and the emotions of the characters. But movie companies need gimmicks," Lam says.
Still, he remains highly enthusiastic about his job and is never bored. "Since we act for many different characters each day, I see every day as a new challenge for myself," he says.
Another thing he values: "We [voice actors] see each other day and night. The relationships between us are very close. We are like siblings, seeing each other more than we see our families."
In order to continue doing what he loves, Lam needs to keep his voice in good shape, but surprisingly, he says he does not have any special methods to protect his voice. "I eat deep fried food like ordinary people!" he jokes.
As he gets older, Lam has noticed his voice is not what it used to be. "Nothing can be done about it," he sighs. "My voice was sharper in the old days, but now it is much deeper. All I can do is try to imitate my voice from the past."
Lam has also experienced health problems in the past few years. In August, he was invited to the opening ceremony of the 100 Years Before the Birth of Doraemon Exhibition in Harbour City. But he had to pull out after injuring his leg.
Lam is also a diabetic and his vision is getting worse. Although it improved after laser eye surgery, his work has been affected.
"My eyes get tired after looking at the monitor in the studio for a long time," says Lam. "I have to reduce my working hours in these few years."
He says he has slashed his working hours from 60 hours per week in the past to 10 hours.
Despite his poorer health, the 60-year-old Lam has never thought of retiring.
"Take Tam Bing-man; he is still working in the industry at the age of 78. There is no retirement age in this industry," he says, showing his continued passion for voice acting. "I will keep on as long as I am capable of doing it!"
"Nobita! Wake up la! Wake up la! Hurry and wake up la! Its time to go to school la! Otherwise you'll be late again la!"
These words have been heard in almost every episode of the Hong Kong-dubbed version of the Japanese cartoon Doraemon over the past 30 years.
While Lam's voice is deeply etched into the minds of Doraemon viewers of all ages, the cat with the magical gadgets is just one of Lam's great achievements in his 42-year career as a voice actor.
"Voice actors are similar to chefs. If you create a delicious dish that becomes popular, you too will become well-known," he says.
Lam never set out to be a voice actor. After graduating from secondary school, he applied for bank jobs, but failed. At that time, the dubbing industry was still in its infancy. Lam wrote to Television Broadcasts Ltd to apply for a job as a voice actor and was hired, and has been voice acting since.
During his early days, Lam did not have the chance to dub even a single word of dialogue. There were no training courses for him and other rookies. They were only assigned to produce sound effects like footsteps, doors opening and phones dialing.
"We did not have as much professional training as now. We just sat behind the seniors and learned from them while they were voice acting," explains Lam. "These days, there are professional voice actors giving lessons."
Among his mentors, Lam most appreciated the actor Tam Bing-man, who belongs to the first generation of voice actors in Hong Kong.
"I followed and learned from him since the first day. I call him `master."' Lam recalls.
Lam did not just observe and learn while making sound effects at the back of the studio - he made use of his time to perfect his art. After arriving home at night, he would read newspapers out loud to improve his articulation and pacing.
After months of learning, practicing and waiting, Lam finally got his chance in front of the microphone. The editing technology of that time meant that if an actor made a mistake, they would have to start over. Lam remembers being extremely nervous when he walked into the studio - even if he had just one line of dialogue.
"My character was a cop, with only one line: `Freeze! Drop your gun! FBI!"' Lam recalls. His debut in the movie Federal Bureau of Investigation went smoothly and he made the cut.
In 1982, Lam encountered his favorite role, Ding Dong (Doraemon). "It is because Ding Dong is vivacious. Besides, it was easier to catch the shape of the mouth, as his mouth is very big," Lam laughs.
Ding Dong became very popular soon after the cartoon was first broadcast. It has been 30 years since he first came across the character, which later reverted back to its original Japanese name, Doraemon.
Whatever the name, the cat has become synonymous with Lam, but he still feels a deeper connection with the Cantonese name, Ding Dong.
While a big Ding Dong fan, he has attracted a fan base of his own. Fans write letters to Lam, sharing their everyday lives with him.Most of the Doraemon dolls and figures at Lam's home are gifts from his fans, or souvenirs from his colleagues.
Among the gifts, Lam likes a remote-control Doraemon toy the most. "A fan delivered it to TVB. It's more than 30 years old," he says.
Apart from fans and gifts, what warms Lam's heart most is that his biggest fan is his own daughter, who also loved watching Ding Dong and listening to her father's voice on TV.
Influenced by him, she is now also working at TVB as a voice actor. Father and daughter have already acted in the same scene.
"I remember it was in Desperate Housewives, but it was not that special to me," Lam says.
Ding Dong's success opened up more job opportunities for Lam, with his voice appearing more frequently in advertisements.
The boom times for the Hong Kong movie industry in the 1980s kept voice actors, including Lam, always hopping. He was the designated voice actor for action star Sammo Hung Kam-bo and heart-throb Alexander Cheung Fu-sheng.
"There were a few times when I worked continuously for three to four days," recalls Lam. "After I finished my work at TVB, I earned extra income by voice acting for movies outside. After that, I went to work in TVB again.
"As there was no live recording on location in those days, voice actors needed to grasp the personalities and tone of voice of the characters by studying soundless demos. Directors and sometimes even the actors of the movies would come and explain the characters to them."
Though it was more difficult than television work, Lam especially valued the experience of working on movies because it enabled him to learn more from studying the characters of his roles.
Among the hundreds of movies he has voice acted, Lam's most memorable is the mentally disabled character he voiced in The First Mission, played by Sammo Hung. As Hung's regular voice actor in martial arts films, Lam found it a challenge to voice act for one of his non-action roles.
Still, that character was not the most challenging role Lam ever came across. That distinction goes to the character of Yue Buqun in a Taiwan TV drama The Smiling, Proud Wanderer (Xiaoao Jianghu) in the early 1990s.
"It gave me a hard time as the actor spoke in an unstable tempo, sometimes fast, sometimes slow. This is the most difficult situation in voice acting. When actors do not perform well in their own parts, it creates problems for the voice actors."
With more than 40 years in the industry, Lam has seen remarkable changes, but remains a consummate professional with exacting standards.
On the negative side, he has noticed more young voice actors have a problem of so-called lazy sounds or pronunciation. He also finds it an unhealthy trend for movie companies to invite stars to do the voice acting for animation features. "They cannot catch the mouth shapes and the emotions of the characters. But movie companies need gimmicks," Lam says.
Still, he remains highly enthusiastic about his job and is never bored. "Since we act for many different characters each day, I see every day as a new challenge for myself," he says.
Another thing he values: "We [voice actors] see each other day and night. The relationships between us are very close. We are like siblings, seeing each other more than we see our families."
In order to continue doing what he loves, Lam needs to keep his voice in good shape, but surprisingly, he says he does not have any special methods to protect his voice. "I eat deep fried food like ordinary people!" he jokes.
As he gets older, Lam has noticed his voice is not what it used to be. "Nothing can be done about it," he sighs. "My voice was sharper in the old days, but now it is much deeper. All I can do is try to imitate my voice from the past."
Lam has also experienced health problems in the past few years. In August, he was invited to the opening ceremony of the 100 Years Before the Birth of Doraemon Exhibition in Harbour City. But he had to pull out after injuring his leg.
Lam is also a diabetic and his vision is getting worse. Although it improved after laser eye surgery, his work has been affected.
"My eyes get tired after looking at the monitor in the studio for a long time," says Lam. "I have to reduce my working hours in these few years."
He says he has slashed his working hours from 60 hours per week in the past to 10 hours.
Despite his poorer health, the 60-year-old Lam has never thought of retiring.
"Take Tam Bing-man; he is still working in the industry at the age of 78. There is no retirement age in this industry," he says, showing his continued passion for voice acting. "I will keep on as long as I am capable of doing it!"
Tuesday, November 20, 2012
Police want access to private sector cameras
The Police Department wants to partner with private companies in the city willing to have security cameras on their property fed to a high-tech video surveillance center being built at police headquarters.
Police Chief Gary J. Gemme said his department does not intend to continuously monitor the video feeds. Instead, he said, the video will be accessed only in instances of a shooting, robbery or other serious crime.
"If there is an incident going on, if there is an armed robbery in progress or if we get information as part of our investigations that a crime is going to be committed in a certain area, we will be able tap into the video cameras that already exist at that location," the chief said.
He emphasized that the police surveillance center, known as the Real Time Crime Center, will not be able to store video surveillance data.
"We don't plan on installing new cameras as part of this system and we don't have a system in place where we're going to set up cameras throughout the city that we're going to monitor from this location," Chief Gemme told the City Council Public Safety Committee Wednesday night.
"The Real Time Crime Center simply gives us the ability to look at what's out there, using existing cameras, very quickly for investigative purposes. It has no storage capabilities, so it's not a question of retaining data or monitoring multiple cameras around the clock to see what's going on in the city. To monitor all the cameras throughout the city, we'd probably need more than 1,000 monitors. This center will not be manned 24/7."
Chief Gemme said the Police Department has spent about $68,000 of the $75,000 state grant to create the Real Time Crime Center.
He said the video surveillance hub will be able to access video feeds from the cameras of private entities throughout the city. But to be able to do so, he said, the department first has to sign memorandums of understanding with each property owner.
"If we have a shooting or a homicide, we can immediately go into the Real Time Crime Center, (turn on) the existing cameras and take a look at the video to see if there is some information we can get out quickly to our officers as well as to the public," he added. "At that location, we're not going to access any information that we couldn't access by knocking on doors or canvassing neighborhoods, which is labor intensive."
Chief Gemme said police routinely use video from private surveillance cameras as part of their investigations. He said when there is an incident, police canvass the neighborhood to see if they can identify surveillance cameras that may be in place in that area.
"We do that on a regular basis and it's been instrumental in solving a lot of serious crimes in the city," he said.
The chief said when police identify a suspect or if there is information they need from something seen in the Real Time Crime Center, police will still have to go to the owner of the surveillance system to retrieve the video so it can be used as evidence in a criminal case.
He said that will need to be done because the Real Time Crime Center will not have any storage capacity within its system. Even if it did, he said, it wouldn't be practical to try to retrieve it once it was in the system because there would be no way of cataloging it.
Brian D. Halloran, president of the police patrolmen's union, spoke in favor of the Real Time Crime Center, saying it will be an invaluable tool in assisting police to do their job and, in the process, could help save lives as well.
"It's absolutely 100 percent the right thing to be doing and we back it," Officer Halloran said. "Having access to this kind of system will put officer safety paramount to everything else."
Enerati uses easy to deploy wireless sensors that give users real time feedback on how well their operations are performing. The solution gives small companies the ability to monitor electricity, gas and water usage in one minute intervals. In addition the service can track multiple locations concurrently. Enerati notification program alerts users automatically if certain events occur in real time and therefore allow users to react quickly, whether a freezer is not working properly in a small pizza restaurant or a pump is being overloaded at a local factory.
Low cost wireless sensors are manufactured by Current Cost, one of the largest suppliers of energy monitoring systems worldwide. The sensors wirelessly send real time updates to an internet connected gateway that automatically upload live data to the Enerati cloud. Installation usually takes less than one hour. Standard monitoring kits retail for $189 and are capable of monitoring the energy usage for one whole building. The standard kit can be expanded with 9 additional wireless sensors that can measure single outlets, other hardwired panels, solar installations, generators, water and gas meters.
Enerati offers three online subscription plans. The LITE plan is free and can be used single locations with only one sensor, The BASIC plan is $3 per month per location and shows up to 10 sensors with full analysis, reporting and alerts. The PROFESSIONAL plan is only $5 per month and is perfect for organizations with multiple locations.
Police Chief Gary J. Gemme said his department does not intend to continuously monitor the video feeds. Instead, he said, the video will be accessed only in instances of a shooting, robbery or other serious crime.
"If there is an incident going on, if there is an armed robbery in progress or if we get information as part of our investigations that a crime is going to be committed in a certain area, we will be able tap into the video cameras that already exist at that location," the chief said.
He emphasized that the police surveillance center, known as the Real Time Crime Center, will not be able to store video surveillance data.
"We don't plan on installing new cameras as part of this system and we don't have a system in place where we're going to set up cameras throughout the city that we're going to monitor from this location," Chief Gemme told the City Council Public Safety Committee Wednesday night.
"The Real Time Crime Center simply gives us the ability to look at what's out there, using existing cameras, very quickly for investigative purposes. It has no storage capabilities, so it's not a question of retaining data or monitoring multiple cameras around the clock to see what's going on in the city. To monitor all the cameras throughout the city, we'd probably need more than 1,000 monitors. This center will not be manned 24/7."
Chief Gemme said the Police Department has spent about $68,000 of the $75,000 state grant to create the Real Time Crime Center.
He said the video surveillance hub will be able to access video feeds from the cameras of private entities throughout the city. But to be able to do so, he said, the department first has to sign memorandums of understanding with each property owner.
"If we have a shooting or a homicide, we can immediately go into the Real Time Crime Center, (turn on) the existing cameras and take a look at the video to see if there is some information we can get out quickly to our officers as well as to the public," he added. "At that location, we're not going to access any information that we couldn't access by knocking on doors or canvassing neighborhoods, which is labor intensive."
Chief Gemme said police routinely use video from private surveillance cameras as part of their investigations. He said when there is an incident, police canvass the neighborhood to see if they can identify surveillance cameras that may be in place in that area.
"We do that on a regular basis and it's been instrumental in solving a lot of serious crimes in the city," he said.
The chief said when police identify a suspect or if there is information they need from something seen in the Real Time Crime Center, police will still have to go to the owner of the surveillance system to retrieve the video so it can be used as evidence in a criminal case.
He said that will need to be done because the Real Time Crime Center will not have any storage capacity within its system. Even if it did, he said, it wouldn't be practical to try to retrieve it once it was in the system because there would be no way of cataloging it.
Brian D. Halloran, president of the police patrolmen's union, spoke in favor of the Real Time Crime Center, saying it will be an invaluable tool in assisting police to do their job and, in the process, could help save lives as well.
"It's absolutely 100 percent the right thing to be doing and we back it," Officer Halloran said. "Having access to this kind of system will put officer safety paramount to everything else."
Enerati uses easy to deploy wireless sensors that give users real time feedback on how well their operations are performing. The solution gives small companies the ability to monitor electricity, gas and water usage in one minute intervals. In addition the service can track multiple locations concurrently. Enerati notification program alerts users automatically if certain events occur in real time and therefore allow users to react quickly, whether a freezer is not working properly in a small pizza restaurant or a pump is being overloaded at a local factory.
Low cost wireless sensors are manufactured by Current Cost, one of the largest suppliers of energy monitoring systems worldwide. The sensors wirelessly send real time updates to an internet connected gateway that automatically upload live data to the Enerati cloud. Installation usually takes less than one hour. Standard monitoring kits retail for $189 and are capable of monitoring the energy usage for one whole building. The standard kit can be expanded with 9 additional wireless sensors that can measure single outlets, other hardwired panels, solar installations, generators, water and gas meters.
Enerati offers three online subscription plans. The LITE plan is free and can be used single locations with only one sensor, The BASIC plan is $3 per month per location and shows up to 10 sensors with full analysis, reporting and alerts. The PROFESSIONAL plan is only $5 per month and is perfect for organizations with multiple locations.
Sunday, November 18, 2012
Can Xi Jinping bring about the change China needs?
In contrast to his predecessor, Hu Jintao, who always seemed to be reciting an officially approved text, the stocky, 59-year-old Xi seemed to speak with genuine personal feeling of what needs to be done in this nation of 1.3 billion people.
He talked of people's desire for a better life, for better jobs, education and health care – and for less pollution. He flashed his chubby smile unlike the ever dour Hu. His slightly bearlike stance contrasted with the ramrod backs of the Communist Party elite standing with him on the stage in the cavernous Great Hall of the People in Beijing.
There was even an impromptu element in an unexplained hour's delay in starting this final event of the week-long Communist Party Congress which has installed the country's new leadership.
Some observers with long memories of the old Soviet Union compared it to the early appearance of Mikhail Gorbachev as he sought to move the USSR towards a more relaxed and responsible system. But any comparison with Gorbachev would be an anathema to Xi and his colleagues – Gorbachev is a dirty name in China as the man who relaxed the Party's grip and brought disaster down upon it.
On the one hand, its leaders acknowledge the major challenges facing them but, on the other, they are extremely reluctant to alter the power structure or the reliance of economic growth which have produced many of these problems. Meanwhile they indulge in backstairs politicking worthy of any Western party.
They fear that political reform would bring the whole edifice tumbling down, Gorbachev style. They stress Party unity above all, particularly since the drama surrounding the fall of the maverick politician, Bo Xilai, who crashed to earth this year accused of crimes, corruption and womanising after the mysterious death of the British businessman, Neil Heywood, in his southwestern fiefdom of Chongqing – but whose real sin was to have emerged as a challenger to the consensus machine that runs the People's Republic.
The bureaucracy and powerful vested interests, especially in the huge state sector of the economy, oppose reform that could affect their privileged positions. Popular protests, running to some 150,000 a year, have been met by an expansion of spending on state security, now larger than the military budget. Media are tightly controlled and censors patrol the internet.
While individual liberties have greatly increased, anybody who tries to organise political opposition is likely to end up in jail, as in the case of the Nobel Peave Prize winner, Liu Xiabao who is serving 11 years for having organised a petition in favour of democracy. Xi may smile for the cameras but this remains an iron-fisted regime which has control in all forms at its heart.
Yet, outside the serried ranks of delegates in the Great Hall of the People, everyday life in Beijing and across China went on last week in a way that takes as little account as possible of the ruling autocracy. Rather than Communism or Confucianism, the "ism" that rules in today's China is materialism. Having had a terrible 30 years under Mao, the Chinese have grasped the opportunities of market-led economic reform with both hands.
Fees from Chinese students boost university funding in Britain, Australia and the United States; Chinese leaders may extol the riches of their country's culture and civilisation but they often send their children to study abroad – Xi Jinping's daughter is at Harvard under a pseudonym and Bo Xilai's son also studied there after having gone through Harrow School and Oxford.
The disjunction between the opaque, hermetically-sealed one-party system and this rapidly evolving society is the main challenge for the regime. For all his apparent normalness on Thursday, Xi's steady rise through the ranks of the provincial bureaucracy to power at the centre as Communist General is symptomatic of how things actually work in China.
This is not the meritocracy which China boosters proclaim as being superior to messy Western democracy. You only move up the ladder in China if you belong to the Party, and that covers only 6 per cent of the population. How you rise certainly depends on your performance, but also on your contacts.
Xi is the son of a revolutionary general who was purged in the Cultural Revolution of 1966-76 – the young Xi was "sent down" to the countryside where he lived in a cave and looked after pigs. When his father was rehabilitated as Deng Xiaoping launched economic reform at the end of the 1970s, the son worked for a prominent general and then rose through administrative and Party posts in booming coastal provinces.
He talked of people's desire for a better life, for better jobs, education and health care – and for less pollution. He flashed his chubby smile unlike the ever dour Hu. His slightly bearlike stance contrasted with the ramrod backs of the Communist Party elite standing with him on the stage in the cavernous Great Hall of the People in Beijing.
There was even an impromptu element in an unexplained hour's delay in starting this final event of the week-long Communist Party Congress which has installed the country's new leadership.
Some observers with long memories of the old Soviet Union compared it to the early appearance of Mikhail Gorbachev as he sought to move the USSR towards a more relaxed and responsible system. But any comparison with Gorbachev would be an anathema to Xi and his colleagues – Gorbachev is a dirty name in China as the man who relaxed the Party's grip and brought disaster down upon it.
On the one hand, its leaders acknowledge the major challenges facing them but, on the other, they are extremely reluctant to alter the power structure or the reliance of economic growth which have produced many of these problems. Meanwhile they indulge in backstairs politicking worthy of any Western party.
They fear that political reform would bring the whole edifice tumbling down, Gorbachev style. They stress Party unity above all, particularly since the drama surrounding the fall of the maverick politician, Bo Xilai, who crashed to earth this year accused of crimes, corruption and womanising after the mysterious death of the British businessman, Neil Heywood, in his southwestern fiefdom of Chongqing – but whose real sin was to have emerged as a challenger to the consensus machine that runs the People's Republic.
The bureaucracy and powerful vested interests, especially in the huge state sector of the economy, oppose reform that could affect their privileged positions. Popular protests, running to some 150,000 a year, have been met by an expansion of spending on state security, now larger than the military budget. Media are tightly controlled and censors patrol the internet.
While individual liberties have greatly increased, anybody who tries to organise political opposition is likely to end up in jail, as in the case of the Nobel Peave Prize winner, Liu Xiabao who is serving 11 years for having organised a petition in favour of democracy. Xi may smile for the cameras but this remains an iron-fisted regime which has control in all forms at its heart.
Yet, outside the serried ranks of delegates in the Great Hall of the People, everyday life in Beijing and across China went on last week in a way that takes as little account as possible of the ruling autocracy. Rather than Communism or Confucianism, the "ism" that rules in today's China is materialism. Having had a terrible 30 years under Mao, the Chinese have grasped the opportunities of market-led economic reform with both hands.
Fees from Chinese students boost university funding in Britain, Australia and the United States; Chinese leaders may extol the riches of their country's culture and civilisation but they often send their children to study abroad – Xi Jinping's daughter is at Harvard under a pseudonym and Bo Xilai's son also studied there after having gone through Harrow School and Oxford.
The disjunction between the opaque, hermetically-sealed one-party system and this rapidly evolving society is the main challenge for the regime. For all his apparent normalness on Thursday, Xi's steady rise through the ranks of the provincial bureaucracy to power at the centre as Communist General is symptomatic of how things actually work in China.
This is not the meritocracy which China boosters proclaim as being superior to messy Western democracy. You only move up the ladder in China if you belong to the Party, and that covers only 6 per cent of the population. How you rise certainly depends on your performance, but also on your contacts.
Xi is the son of a revolutionary general who was purged in the Cultural Revolution of 1966-76 – the young Xi was "sent down" to the countryside where he lived in a cave and looked after pigs. When his father was rehabilitated as Deng Xiaoping launched economic reform at the end of the 1970s, the son worked for a prominent general and then rose through administrative and Party posts in booming coastal provinces.
Wednesday, November 14, 2012
The Real Cyberforensics Used To Snoop On Petraeus
In an increasingly weird and tangled affair, Former CIA director David Petraeus, Marine General John R. Allen, Paula Broadwell, Jill Kelley, an unnamed FBI Agent, and others all used various anonymous accounts and message-masking techniques pioneered by terrorists and teens alike. They thought they were communicating with each other with discretion and secrecy.
That's because they're practiced in the field of cyberforensics--detailed Internet and technology detective techniques used every day all around the world. When it comes to the vast majority of activity by Internet users, it's amazingly easy to trace fake email addresses and anonymous blogs back to their owners. Or, put another way, if the director of the CIA's undercover ops can be cracked, so can yours. Here's how.
Cyberforensics firms regularly show up on retainer or on the payroll of law enforcement, lawyers of all stripes, lobbyists, and even intelligence agencies. Every activity on the Internet leaves identity breadcrumbs in the form of activity logs, cookies, GPS activity from mobile phones, and even logs of camera activity and keyboard use secretly copied from targets' computers. Given enough manpower hours, cyberforensics experts can reconstruct the tiniest minutiae of any phone or computer owner's lives. Law enforcement agencies and intelligence agencies also retain their own in-house cyberforensics experts.
The FBI gained access to anonymous Gmail accounts traced to Petraeus and Broadwell through a law, more than 25 years old, that gives law enforcement carte blanche to snoop in email accounts. Provisions of 1986's Stored Communications Act (SCA) allow “government entities” to access email records in storage for less than 180 days “if there is reasonable cause to believe a crime has been committed.” For email records that are older than 180 days, a warrant is required. Using the SCA, FBI investigators were able to obtain access to emails Broadwell and Petraeus wrote via Gmail over the past six months. Google routinely discloses government queries into Gmail's archives, and the Electronic Frontier Foundation and others have raised concerns over the SCA, an email bill written back in the halcyon days of Compuserve and GEnie.
Both Petraeus and Broadwell were savvy enough to use Gmail accounts with fake names. But while Petraeus knew his way around email, he wasn't savvy enough for Broadwell and him to take precautions that could have hidden any incriminating emails. Neither used identity-obscuring VPNs and rerouting solutions such as the Tor Project, which could have hindered the FBI from tracing, for instance, Broadwell's fake email account back to her North Carolina home. Apart from Tor, commercially available end-user solutions such as Hotspot Shield and LogMeIn Hamachi obscure the origination points of email messages with varying levels of success. It is important to note that many of those services, especially those that use American servers, may keep IP address logs that are accessible to investigators or hackers.
Darren R. Hayes, the head of Pace University's Computer Information Systems program and a computer forensics expert, tells Fast Company that there are numerous ways for anonymous email accounts to escape detection, or to at least make the process much harder. Commercial services such as GuerillaMail and Mailinator offer disposable, throwaway email addresses whose data can be held on foreign servers outside the reach of the American government; VPNs also make tracing emails much harder.
The FBI, NSA, local police departments, and other government entities can all access email account records and histories via sending requests to Google, AOL, and others. These accounts customarily request all information associated with an IP address--meaning that all the email addresses from a household, whether involved in an investigation or not, are culled by law enforcement.
Cyberforensics, though not regularly discussed in the press, are a booming industry. “These days, virtually all cases involve digital evidence. Whether the case is counterterrorism, kidnapping, drugs, or a white collar crime, digital evidence is key,” AccessData's Erika Lee tells Fast Company. AccessData, which sells computer forensics software to investigators parsing electronic records and corporations tracing the perpetrators of hacking attacks, is part of a field that does everything from parse the physical locations Facebook status updates were posted from to uncovering the Chinese cybercafes where multimillion dollar attacks on banks were launched from.
That's because they're practiced in the field of cyberforensics--detailed Internet and technology detective techniques used every day all around the world. When it comes to the vast majority of activity by Internet users, it's amazingly easy to trace fake email addresses and anonymous blogs back to their owners. Or, put another way, if the director of the CIA's undercover ops can be cracked, so can yours. Here's how.
Cyberforensics firms regularly show up on retainer or on the payroll of law enforcement, lawyers of all stripes, lobbyists, and even intelligence agencies. Every activity on the Internet leaves identity breadcrumbs in the form of activity logs, cookies, GPS activity from mobile phones, and even logs of camera activity and keyboard use secretly copied from targets' computers. Given enough manpower hours, cyberforensics experts can reconstruct the tiniest minutiae of any phone or computer owner's lives. Law enforcement agencies and intelligence agencies also retain their own in-house cyberforensics experts.
The FBI gained access to anonymous Gmail accounts traced to Petraeus and Broadwell through a law, more than 25 years old, that gives law enforcement carte blanche to snoop in email accounts. Provisions of 1986's Stored Communications Act (SCA) allow “government entities” to access email records in storage for less than 180 days “if there is reasonable cause to believe a crime has been committed.” For email records that are older than 180 days, a warrant is required. Using the SCA, FBI investigators were able to obtain access to emails Broadwell and Petraeus wrote via Gmail over the past six months. Google routinely discloses government queries into Gmail's archives, and the Electronic Frontier Foundation and others have raised concerns over the SCA, an email bill written back in the halcyon days of Compuserve and GEnie.
Both Petraeus and Broadwell were savvy enough to use Gmail accounts with fake names. But while Petraeus knew his way around email, he wasn't savvy enough for Broadwell and him to take precautions that could have hidden any incriminating emails. Neither used identity-obscuring VPNs and rerouting solutions such as the Tor Project, which could have hindered the FBI from tracing, for instance, Broadwell's fake email account back to her North Carolina home. Apart from Tor, commercially available end-user solutions such as Hotspot Shield and LogMeIn Hamachi obscure the origination points of email messages with varying levels of success. It is important to note that many of those services, especially those that use American servers, may keep IP address logs that are accessible to investigators or hackers.
Darren R. Hayes, the head of Pace University's Computer Information Systems program and a computer forensics expert, tells Fast Company that there are numerous ways for anonymous email accounts to escape detection, or to at least make the process much harder. Commercial services such as GuerillaMail and Mailinator offer disposable, throwaway email addresses whose data can be held on foreign servers outside the reach of the American government; VPNs also make tracing emails much harder.
The FBI, NSA, local police departments, and other government entities can all access email account records and histories via sending requests to Google, AOL, and others. These accounts customarily request all information associated with an IP address--meaning that all the email addresses from a household, whether involved in an investigation or not, are culled by law enforcement.
Cyberforensics, though not regularly discussed in the press, are a booming industry. “These days, virtually all cases involve digital evidence. Whether the case is counterterrorism, kidnapping, drugs, or a white collar crime, digital evidence is key,” AccessData's Erika Lee tells Fast Company. AccessData, which sells computer forensics software to investigators parsing electronic records and corporations tracing the perpetrators of hacking attacks, is part of a field that does everything from parse the physical locations Facebook status updates were posted from to uncovering the Chinese cybercafes where multimillion dollar attacks on banks were launched from.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)