The USIA's Fulbright Program is celebrating its 50th anniversary of sending scholars around the world. See for details on Fulbright grants. [Chip Harman , 3/5/96. net-hap.]

Initiatives in Environmental Technology Investment is a bimonthly newsletter from the DOE Office of Science and Technology, explaining DOE technology-exchange and development opportunities. . [Patsy_Hosner@wpi.org, newjour, 3/8/96.]

Microsoft is sponsoring a lab grant program that will award $20M in software licenses for Microsoft development tools to colleges and universities. . [EDUPAGE, 3/14/96.]

A 1990 report from Stanford's Center for Economic Policy Research says that it takes 1-2 generations for a fundamental new technology to mature and assimilate, and that the greatest benefits start coming about 2/3 through the transition. General economic performance and prosperity plunge during the first half of the maturation period. Futurist David Pearce Snyder says that the big payoff in computing will begin in the next 5-10 years. [The Futurist, 3/96, p. 8. Innovation, 3/5/96. NewtNews.] (The Stanford report is "Computer and Dynamo: The Modern Productivity Paradox in a Not Too Distant Mirror.")

The number of telecommuters may go from 10M last year to 30M by the year 2000. Telecommuters are 15%-20% more productive, on average, but it can take up to 18 months to adjust. Virtual workers (?) may also need technical support 24-hours-a-day, plus quick maintenance support. [IW, 1/22/96, p. 32. Network News, 2/10/96.]

There's a new book out on "The Rise and Resurrection of the American Programmer." Twice as many programmers are employed in the US as in Japan, and US productivity is high. A Czech computer expert says, "By relying on sophisticated tools, Americans have shifted the competitive arena from sweat labor to imaginative design." [WSJ, 3/12/96, A3. EDUPAGE.] (So, what sophisticated tools have we mastered?)

IBM is passing out merit raises averaging 8% this year -- twice what most companies are paying. [NYT, 2/27/96, C3. EDUPAGE.]

Salary survey info for LAN programmers can be found in LAN Magazine, 3/96. [Network News, 2/10/96.]

How much does a supervisor make for managing one shift of a help desk operation? The national average is $41K, ranging from $36K in the South Central US to $47K in the Pacific region. [Help Desk Institute of Colorado Springs. Network World, 2/26/96, p. 47. NewtNews, 3/12/96.]

Ernst & Young has published their Worldwide Executive Tax Guide, 1996 Edition, on . 130 countries are covered. [Network News, 2/10/96.]

Legal issues, employee rights, etc., for people in computer fields, are the subject of the jdav list from . [Travis L. Hayden , 2/12/96.]

Results of the 1995 CRA Taulbee Survey of US/Canadian CS faculty salaries have been posted to , in Acrobat and postscript formats. Statistical results are in the 3/96 Computing Research News (CRN). Graphs are on the website, and further tables will be posted in HTML. [CRA Bulletin, 3/4/96.] (We have a Computists' Communique ad in this month's CRN, on p. 11.)

The Computing Research Association (CRA) is also putting CRN on . This hardcopy newsletter is distributed six times per year to researchers and decision makers in academia, government and industry. Articles since 1/95 are in HTML format; issues back to 1991 are available in Acrobat and postscript formats (and soon HTML). See also the CRA Bulletin archives at , or sign up with a "subscribe cra_b firstname lastname" message to . [, CRA Bulletin, 3/4/96.]

NETEX, The Internet Experience Digest, is for discussion of what's happening on the net and what it means. Send a "sub netex your name" message to . [Timothy N. Trimmer , NEW-LIST, 1/30/96.] (Another such list is NetWatch Digest, from . It includes a web page for downloading Internet software. CompuNotes also covers Internet and the commerial online services, from . [Travis L. Hayden , 2/12/96.])

E-Conf is a new list about electronic conferencing -- including phone, video, IRC, newsgroups, e-lists, MUDs/MOOS, WWW, etc. -- training, and "virtual organizations." Send a "subscribe" subject line and null message to . [Mike Gurstein , NEW-LIST, 2/18/96.]

France's Minister of Culture and some "cyberspace crusaders" in Quebec are working on a French vocabulary for the Internet, plus French-language searching software. [Montreal Gazette, 3/11/96, A1. EDUPAGE. Bill Park.] (Once we get machine translation, we can read the whole stream in French or in Klingon.)

OCC-L, the On-Line College Classroom, is for those planning to teach college classes online. Send a "subscribe occ-l your name" message to . [Jim Shimabukuro , NEW-LIST, 1/20/96.]

Windows 95 users should like sword from , winnews from , and perhaps the tips ezine from . Sword's web page offers software for download. [Travis L. Hayden , 2/12/96.]

Yale University (New Haven, CT), Neuroengineering and Neuroscience Center: PhD researchers in pattern recognition, signal processing, ML, adaptive control, NN, or image analysis.

UNevada/EE (Reno): CE prof. in embedded controller design and intelligent/adaptive applications.

GE (Schenectady), Information Technology Lab: PhD researcher in data mining and knowledge discovery.

NEC USA's Computers & Communications Research Labs (San Jose): researchers in multimedia databases, image retrieval, HCI, authoring, etc.

CMU/CS (Pittsburgh): MS German technical leader for machine translation; also a Portuguese knowledge engineer.

CMU Robotics Institute: scientist for robot-assisted surgery.

Information Extraction & Transport, Inc. (IET; DC): US research engineers for computer vision applications.

UNottingham (UK): PhD RAs in diagrammatic knowledge acquisition.

Oxford University: head of Oxford Text Archive. Also a computing officer, corpus resource development officer, possibly other programmers.

Learning in distributed AI systems: J. of Experimental and Theoretical AI (JETAI). 4/7/96 initial contact, then 11/1/96; Gerhard Weiss , +49 89 2105 2407, +49 89 2105 8207 Fax. . [DAI-List, 3/9/96.]

Artificial intelligence: Crossroads, the ACM Student Magazine. 5/6/96; . . [Frank Klassner , comp.ai, 3/8/96.]

Advanced computational methods; Advances in AI in Economics, Finance and Management (refereed book). E.g., intelligent search (tabu search, simulated annealing, GA) or NNs applied to business problems. John D. Johnson , (601) 232-5492. [comp.ai.neural-nets, 3/6/96.]

Electronic news delivery: Information Processing & Management. 4/15/96 (extended); Michael Shepherd . [dbworld, 3/6/96.]

Simulation of social behavior: Int. J. in Computer Simulation. Alain Senteni . . [DAI-List, 3/18/96.]

ewm-all is a list for European women academic mathematicians, including job ads and fellowship announcements. Send a "join emw-all your name" message to (or to , if you use VAX email). [Educom UPDATE, 1/15/96.]

COMB-L is for discussions in combinatorial mathematics. Send a "subscribe comb-l your name" message to . [Ken W. Smith , NEW-LIST, 1/19/96.]

The BUGS list is for users of the BUGS software for Bayesian inference on complex statistical models using Markov chain Monte Carlo techniques. Send a "join bugs your name" message to . BUGS software is free from the MRC Biostatistics Unit. [, new-list, 2/15/96.]

SIMUL_MODEL (Simulacion y Modelacion de sistemas dinamicos) covers dynamic systems modeling and simulation. In Spanish. Send a "subscribe simul-model your name" message to . [Gabriel Lera , NEW-LIST, 2/20/96.]

ECONOMETRIA covers econometrics, economic statistics, and mathematical economics. In Spanish. Send a "subscribe econometria your name" message to . [Ignacio Diaz-Emparanza , NEW-LIST, 3/3/96.]

List about Fuzzy Logic and Technologies (LFLAT) is from the Spanish Assoc. of Fuzzy Logic and Technologies. In Spanish. Send a "sub lflat your name" message to . [Antonio F. Gomez Skarmeta , NEW-LIST, 3/3/96.]

SAMO, for sensitivity analysis of model output, discusses uncertainty analyses and the relative importance of model parameters in determining model predictions. Send a "join samo your name" message to . [, new-lists, 11/27/95.]

ITHURS (Intelligent Technologies in Human-Related Sciences) is for discussion of systems that make intelligent decisions under uncertainty. Application areas include finance, economics, management, operations research, control engineering, law, medicine, etc. Technologies include fuzzy logic, NN, GA, DAI, fuzzy ES, Tabu search, ML, chaos theory, pattern recognition, clustering, etc. Send a "subscribe ithurs your name" message to . . [Enrique Lopez Gonzalez , NEW-LIST, 3/12/96.]

Learning Robots is a new list with a European focus. Send a "subscribe learningrobots" message to . . [Volker Klingspor , comp.robotics.research, 3/8/96. David Joslin.]

The HomeOwners Finance Center Web site has a mortgage calculator, current interest rates, mortgage dictionary, and other useful files. . [Dick Lepre , 5/10/95. net-hap, 7/7/95.]

Mark Kantrowitz distributes a SCAMS-L list for reporting suspicious scholarship-service offers. One recent report warned of likely problems with National Scholarship Foundation (NSF) of Delray Beach, FL, also known as or associated with Better Business Foundation (BBF), D&B or DBF National Business Reporting Bureau, Kimberly Credit Alliance, and Credit Management Services Group. Don't send money without knowing who you're dealing with. To subscribe to the list, contact . Mark's other financial aid info is on . [, 3/12/96.]

(Mark signs off with "If you must pay money to get money, it might be a scam." True, but legitimate opportunities also require investment. There's still a lot of paranoia on the net about services that charge in advance. Just be reasonably cautious.)

Frugal Tip of the Week offers a weekly tightwad tip and an archive of previous tips. . [, net-hap, 1/8/95.]

Paul Saffo has found a way to save time reading magazines: he reads them standing up. [IW, 10/30/95, p. 30. Network News, 12/2/95.] (Your bones need weight on them for a couple of hours per day. That may be why teenagers like to eat standing up. Most of us could use some standing time, or even yoga-style stretching while watching TV.)

OverTheBackFence is a list for friendly information sharing, jokes, problems, and support, to demonstrate that email friendships are just as valuable as friendships with neighbors over the back fence. Send a "subscribe otbf" message to . [Reggie and Jeff Dwork , NEW-LIST, 1/23/96.]

Bad Hair Days List is for sharing your troubles with compassionate people on the Internet. . [, net-hap, 12/21/96.]

The Relationships List is an unmoderated sharing of day-to-day and long-term issues of "bonded" emotional partnerships. Send a "subscribe relationships" message to . [Jack Schnapper , NEW-LIST, 3/11/96.]

-- Ken