October 2000, Vol. 11, No. 10

Road rules

Every four years, conventions and Olympics tax news technology

It was a simple plan: have interactive editing terminals operate at 1984’s Democratic National Convention, conveniently held but a mere 1¢ blocks from the newspaper’s digs in downtown San Francisco. And hell, if we were going to do that, why not set up interactive editing terminals at the Summer Olympics, conveniently held but a mere 600 miles south?

We thought the most convenient way to do this would be to have the telephone company -- and remember, back in 1984 there was only one telephone company -- install a dedicated "high-speed" data line between the convention hall and the newspaper offices and then, a few weeks later, relocate the line to run to Los Angeles.

Of course, "high-speed" in those days was 9600 bits per second (the consumer modem you can buy today runs about six times faster over standard telephone lines). And, it turned out, the telephone company wasn't too experienced with these new-fangled data lines.

My most striking memory of the 1984 Democratic National Convention was not the crowds or the hoopla (I never got anywhere near the convention center during the actual convention), but sitting in an underground cement wiring vault with a telephone technician trying to convince him that if he merely switched the red and green wires, all would be well.

Sixteen years later, newsgatherers at the political conventions were able to transmit stories and pictures with relative ease, as technology had jumped by leaps and bounds toward an era where reporters and photographers on the road could be in constant contact with the newsroom.

To give us an assessment of how things went during this year’s conventions and Olympics, I asked Senior Correspondent John Bryan (who in real life is in editorial systems at the Los Angeles Times) to chat up newspaper technologists about the role of technology -- new and old -- in providing our readers with the stories of the presidential nominations and world athletic events.

Inside, Bryan hits some of the high points of what went on and how difficult -- or easy, by comparison -- the whole thing was.

Our next stop is to analyze the firestorm that is the Linux operating system and how it affects the publishing industry. Jason Zappe, formerly an editor with Copley News Service, who until recently was a systems analyst at the Daily Breeze of Torrance, Calif. (he has just relocated to Miami to be a systems editor at the Herald), gives us the background on Linux and insight as to how it has -- and will -- impact publishing technology.

Our third story this time is a look at digital rights management. Contributor Kellie K. Speed talks to a variety of suppliers of technology that prevents unauthorized use of digital material, such as stories, graphics and photos. Though a number of the suppliers believe the newspaper industry will come to digital rights management in the future, none appear to be there now.

Lastly, Copy Editor Aimee Beck brings us up-to-date on the long-running saga that asks the question, "When will newspapers move beyond a news transmission protocol that was developed during the Carter Administration?"

By the time this newsletter is in your hands, the International Press Telecommunications Council should have approved the final component of a new transmission standard that will replace the hoary ANPA 1312 standard, first adopted in 1979.

That is, of course, the amazing thing about this issue: none of the topics would have been discussed in 1984 -- there was no World-Wide Web and there weren't but a few desktop computers, much less free operating systems for them. Data transmissions were mired in very slow speeds and there weren't many who understood its complexities.

Back in the wiring vault of Moscone Center in San Francisco 16 years ago, the cold of the cement crept up my ankles to my calves as I tried in vain to get the telephone technician to just try switching tip and ring. With but a few hours before delegates were scheduled to swarm into my fair city, he finally acquiesced and data flew across the 1¢ blocks at the unheard-of speed of 9600 bits per second.

-- David M. Cole, dmc@colepapers.net