Jeff Cowart, a longtime newspaper journalist and associate director of API for the last five years, has been named director of the Extended Learning Center.

Seven seminars will be offered on-line this fall, API said, adding that the organization has spent 18 months doing "intensive" research and development of an on-line classroom model. The organization staged three pilot seminars in January and February on computer-assisted reporting, copy editing and circulation management; more than 60 newspaper workers participated in the pilot.

-- dmc

Bit bucket ...

"I contend that more money is spent advertising people's web addresses than is made in web commerce. Right now it is true -- maybe not next year, but it is now."
-- Tim Gill, Quark Inc., at Seybold New York

Real bits: At the New York Times, Richard Norbraten has been named an assistant to the editor for news technology; formerly a contract worker at the paper, Norbraten has been an assistant systems editor at the San Diego Union-Tribune and the Sacramento (Calif.) Bee. ... At the Journal of Commerce in New York, Bill SIMMons has been appointed senior vice president, production and technology. He will oversee all production and distribution for the 170-year-old newspaper; most recently, he was chief information officer with responsibility for technology standards in The Economist Group, owners of the JOC. ... At the Queensland Newspapers of Australia (publishers of four titles, including the Courier-Mail in Brisbane), Bob Howarth has been named group editorial technology manager. Previously Howarth was in charge of editorial technology for the Courier-Mail, and he continues to edit a monthly Braille edition of the paper. ... At the Fort Worth Star-Telegram in Texas, Chet Wakefield has been named senior vice president of operations, with responsibilities for information systems, production, the mailroom and electronic media. Most recently, Wakefield was vice president of information systems at Fort Worth's sister paper, the Kansas City Star. ...

School stuff: At the University of Kansas in Lawrence, James Gentry has been named dean of the school of journalism and mass communications; previously he was dean of the school of journalism at the University of Nevada, Reno. Under Gentry's leadership, the Nevada school became known as a leader in integrating digital media throughout its curriculum. ... At Investigative Reporters and Editors (IRE) of Columbia, Mo., Brant Houston has been named executive director; previously Houston was managing director of the National Institute for Computer-Assisted Reporting, a program sponsored by IRE and the University of Missouri school of journalism. ...

New media mavens: At the Sacramento Bee in California, Howard Weaver is named editorial page editor; previously Weaver was new media director for parent company McClatchy Newspapers. ... At Time Inc. New Media, Linda McCutcheon Conneally has been named president; previously she was vice president, sales and marketing, and before that had been director of marketing for Time magazine. ... At Inman News Features of Oakland, Calif., Jack Ivers has been named managing editor. Ivers, a former assistant news editor at the San Francisco Examiner, runs the organization's web site (http://inman.com/) and also edits feature stories and columns for the syndicate. ... At A.H. Belo Corp. of Dallas, Cornelius "Neil" Foote Jr. has been named director of Interactive Media Development for the company's Publishing Division. Foote currently serves as manager of interactive media for the Dallas Morning News. Previously he managed part-run advertising products, special sections and co-op advertising at the Morning News; before joining the paper, Foote organized conferences and managed recruiting and diversity programs for the American Society of Newspaper Editors. ... At Knight-Ridder New Media of San Jose, Calif., Ken Doctor has been named vice president/editorial; previously, Doctor was managing editor of Knight-Ridder's St. Paul Pioneer Press in Minnesota. In 1996, he helped create Pioneer Planet, the on-line component of the newspaper. ... At Landmark Communications of Norfolk, Va., Joe Fiveash has been named new ventures director; previously he was with InfiNet, the Internet publishing company and ISP serving the newspaper industry, also of Norfolk. Landmark is an owner, along with Knight-Ridder and Gannett Co., of InfiNet. ... At the News Journal of Wilmington, Del., Austin Bachmann has been named electronic information manager; previously Bachmann was director of business services for InfiNet. ...

Vendor vestibules: At Advanced Technical Solutions of Wilmington, Mass., Alden Edwards has been named president. Formerly the president of Autologic Information International Inc. and System Integrators Inc. and vice president for sales and marketing at Atex, Edwards replaces co-founder Raymond Toothaker, who promotes himself to chief executive officer. ... At Harris Publishing Systems Corp. of Melbourne, Fla., Don Rogers has been named general manager; Rogers will also continue as president of Hpsc division Baseview Products Inc. of Ann Arbor, Mich. He replaces W.Y. McCaslin, who will be working on special assignment. Rogers said he plans to alternate weeks in Michigan and Florida. ... At Optronics International Corp. of Chelmsford, Mass., Tony Fong has been named president and chairman of the company, after Fong Brothers Companies of Brisbane, Calif., acquired a majority interest in the firm. Fong is also chairman of Chang Zhou, a joint venture with the People's Republic of China to provide computer-to-plate imaging using Optronics products. Also at Optronics, Edward Chrusciel has been named executive vice president and is in charge of all company operations; previously Chrusciel was director of marketing. ... At Xitron Inc. of Ann Arbor, Mich., Brad Ross has been named sales manager for the western region. Ross has been a sales executive for Litho Development Research, Scitex and DuPont Printing and Publishing. ...

Confabs: The Digital Equipment Corp. Users Society is sponsoring Decus '97 May 17-22 in Cincinnati. Topics include Windows NT integration, mail and messaging, data warehousing, continuous computing and Internet commerce. For more information, point your browser at http://www.decus.org/ or call (508) 952-3142. ... Seybold Seminars Sydney will be May 19-23 in Australia. Session topics include "Apple in Publishing," "Extending Quark XPress," "Mac OS and Intranet Publishing," "The promises of electronic commerce" and "Traditional publishers' on-line experience." For information on the Web, go to http://seybold.net/, or call (415) 578-6900. ... Interactive '97, a conference and exhibition, will be held June 1-4 in Denver. For web-based information, go to http://interactive.sbforums.com/, or call (415) 578-6900. ... Web Broadcasting '97, a conference co-sponsored by Thunder Lizard Productions, Upside magazine and ZDNet, will be June 9-10 in San Jose, Calif. Speakers include Stephen Manes (New York Times), Walter Mossberg, (Wall Street Journal), Cary Lu (Macworld), Jesse Berst (ZDNet Anchordesk) and Gary Wolf (Hotwired). For more information, call (206) 285-0305, or browse to http://www.thunderlizard.com/. ... And a few of us will be going down to New Orleans on June 21-24 for a little clambake we call NEXPO '97. There'll be hundreds of suppliers, thousands of newspaper executives and only so many red fish to blacken, in addition to the MIT Media Lab offering three presentations: "The Electronic Paper: An Inkless Newspaper?"; "Bazaar: Your Personal Electronic Agent" and "Storyteller: A Perfectly Tailored Newspaper." For details, point your browser at http://www.naa.org/. ... #

From THE COLE PAPERS, May 1997, Copyright © 1997, All Rights Reserved.