Press Release: Family History 3 named Family History Software of the Year for 2008

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Media Contact:
Howard Luxenberg
President, Enteractive Distribution Co.
phone: 860-236-8600; fax: 860-232-7575
hluxenberg@sprynet.com http://familyhistorian3.ning.com

Family History 3 named Family History Software of the Year for 2008

West Hartford, Connecticut, November 25, 2008 ­-- Your Family Tree magazine (UK) named Family Historian 3 the Family History Software of the Year for 2008. Family Historian 3 beat out other popular genealogy software programs such as Roots Magic 3 and Legacy 7.

"I was thrilled that Family Historian 3 won this this prestigious award from one of the U.K.'s leading genealogy magazines," Howard Luxenberg, president of Enteractive, stated.
Due to its easy to use features and product quality, Family Historian 3 has won many major awards and recognition from the top reviewers including Windows XP Magazine, Family Tree Magazine, Which? Computing, Univadis and others.

In recognizing Family Historian 3, the editors of Your Family Tree magazine particularly liked the extensive range of charts, "including the stunning All Relatives [chart]" They went on to add: "Apart from its charts, the program offers a good range of reports ­ all of which you can customize to meet your exact needs - website and family CD creation and a powerful merge and compare feature to import data from other GEDCOM files."

Product Features

According to Luxenberg, "This is a quality product that manages to combine ease of use with a remarkably rich set of features." The following are just a few of the important product features of Family Historian 3:
· 100% compatible with GEDCOM 5.5, the standard for shared genealogical data
· Lets you easily create beautiful family trees, CDs/DVDs & websites
· Family trees can include data, photographs, even video files
· Diagrams are interactive, so you can work visually
· Unique "All relatives" diagram shows all descendants and all ancestors (and their spouses)
· Bonus features: Six month subscription to WorldVitalRecords.com and CD Book "Getting Started in Genealogy Online"

More information about this Family History Software of the Year award from “Your Family Tree” magazine can be found on Enteractive Distribution web site http://FamilyHistorian3.ning.com.

Family Historian 3 runs on Windows Vista, XP Home and XP Professional, 2000, ME and 98.

# # #

Breitbart.com: Army manipulated general's photo

Army manipulated general's photo

Nov 14 08:18 PM US/Eastern
By RICHARD LARDNER
Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON (AP) - The Associated Press on Friday suspended the use of photos provided by the Defense Department after the Army distributed a digitally altered photo of the U.S. military's first female four-star general.

The image of Army Gen. Ann E. Dunwoody is the second Army-provided photo the AP has eliminated from its service in the last two months.

The AP said that adjusting photos and other imagery, even for aesthetic reasons, damages the credibility of the information distributed by the military to news organizations and the public.
"For us, there's a zero-tolerance policy of adding or subtracting actual content from an image," said Santiago Lyon, the AP's director of photography.

Santiago said the AP is developing procedures to protect against further occurrences and, once those steps are in place, it will consider lifting the ban. He said the AP is also discussing the problem with the military.

Col. Cathy Abbott, chief of the Army's media relations division, said the Dunwoody photo did not violate Army policy that prohibits the cropping or editing of a photo to misrepresent the facts or change the circumstances of an event. She did not know who changed the photo or which Army office released it, she said.

Dunwoody was promoted to full general on Friday at a Pentagon ceremony attended by Gen. George Casey, the Army chief of staff.

In the original photo, the general appears to be sitting at a desk with a credenza and bookshelf behind her. Three stars on her uniform identify her as a lieutenant general, her rank before Friday's promotion.

The altered photo, distributed by the Army and run on the AP's photo wire Thursday, shows Dunwoody in fatigues in front of an American flag. Her rank, affixed to the front of a soldier's tunic, is not visible.

"We're not misrepresenting her," Abbott said. "The image is still clearly Gen. Dunwoody."
In September, the AP banned use of a photo of Army Staff Sgt. Darris Dawson, who was killed in Iraq. Dawson's face and shoulders appeared to have been digitally altered.

Abbott said Dawson's unit did not have an official photo of him and wanted one that could be used for a memorial service.

"That photo was released to the public strictly by accident," she said. "We apologized for that."
Bob Owen, deputy director of photography at the San Antonio Express-News, was the first to notice the changes in the Dawson and Dunwoody photos, finding the earlier versions on the Internet.

Owen said he views all photos supplied by the Defense Department skeptically.

"Photo journalists lose their jobs over this," he said.
___
On the Net: U.S. Army: http://www.army.mil Copyright 2008 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

DesNews: Owner says Prop 8 opponents hacked into LDS site

http://deseretnews.com/article/1,5143,705262907,00.html

Owner says Prop 8 opponents hacked into LDS site

By Carrie A. MooreDeseret News
Published: November 13, 2008

Owners of a Web site that specializes in advice and information for members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints say their site was attacked the day following passage of Proposition 8 by people they believe opposed the measure.

Scott Proctor of Meridian magazine said the site was hacked into early Nov. 5, and its home page was replaced with "horrible, explicit lesbians films placed all over the cover." Engineers took the site down immediately after the break-in was discovered, he said.

The company's Internet technology director said the electronic breach occurred in "a very elegant way. They had to have someone who really knew what they were doing to accomplish it the way they did it."

The Web site was down for half a day as engineers worked to remove the pornographic material, he said. Proctor and his wife, Maurine, founded the site several years ago as a forum for information of interest to Latter-day Saints, and Maurine Proctor often writes articles about issues of importance to the LDS Church that are posted there.

"We feel like this was very specific targeting," by people who oppose the Web site's conservative content. The church's support of Prop. 8 has been among a variety of topics chronicled on the site. "We get hate mail all the time over this issue," Proctor said.

"It's like they have a little network that they e-mail and ask people to send mail in. Every time we post something (about same-sex marriage) we get a few dozen letters with the same tone, similar wording, and the most horrible language and hatred."

Proctor said the attack and the e-mails won't have any impact on the site's content. "You just have to keep going and present things as you see them," he said.

E-mail: carrie@desnews.com
© 2008 Deseret News Publishing Company All rights reserved

Press Release: The #1 Rated genealogy software in the UK is now available at 1500 Target stores

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Media Contact:
Howard Luxenberg
President, Enteractive Distribution Co.
phone: 860-236-8600; fax: 860-232-7575
hluxenberg@sprynet.com
http://familyhistorian3.ning.com

The #1 Rated genealogy software in the UK is now available at 1500 Target stores

West Hartford, Connecticut, November 12, 2008 -Family Historian 3, the highest rated family tree software in the U.K. is now available in the United States and Canada. This top rated software is initially being distributed in the nearly 1,500 Target stores nation-wide.

"Enteractive is thrilled to be bringing what is simply the best genealogy software product in the world to the U.S. and Canadian consumer," Howard Luxenberg, president of Enteractive, stated.

Due to its easy to use features and product quality, Family Historian 3 has won major awards and recognition from the top reviewers including Windows XP Magazine, Family Tree Magazine, Which? Computing, Univadis and others.

Family Historian 3 was named “Winner” and "Editor's Choice" by Windows XP Magazine in its August 2007 review of Family Historian, Family Tree Maker, Roots Magic, and Legacy genealogy software. The editors said that Family Historian 3 was "Packed with features, but the charts alone put this package in a class of its own." In this comparison of the top products, Family Historian was declared the "All-round winner."

Personal Computer World gave Family Historian 3 an overall rating of 5 Stars (out of a possible 5) and said "The range of features and sheer ease of use makes Family Historian an excellent tool for any genealogist" in its May 2006 review.

Family Tree Magazine (www.familytreemagazine.com) said "The best genealogy package just got better" in its review in July 2006.

Which? Computing (www.which.co.uk) rated Family Historian as the "Best Buy" and gave it the highest overall rating in its July 2008 comparison of the top 10 genealogy applications.

Univadis (www.univadis.co.uk) rated Family Historian 3 a "Strongly recommended" product and said "The programme is brilliant and dead easy to use and is ideal for beginners and experts alike."

Australian Family Tree Connections said "With the release of version 3 Family Historian has become one of the best, if not the very best, in its class."

In an indication of the powerful features and ease of use of Family Historian 3, the producers and researchers of the very popular BBC TV genealogy series "Who Do You Think You Are?" use Family Historian 3 as their family tree application of choice.

Product Features

According to Luxenberg, "This is a quality product that manages to combine ease of use with a remarkably rich set of features." The following are just a few of the important product features of Family Historian 3:
· 100% compatible with GEDCOM 5.5, the standard for shared genealogical data
· Lets you easily create beautiful family trees, CDs/DVDs & websites
· Family trees can include data, photographs, even video files
· Diagrams are interactive, so you can work visually
· Unique "All relatives" diagram shows all descendants and all ancestors (and their spouses)
· Bonus features: Six month subscription to WorldVitalRecords.com and CD Book "Getting Started in Genealogy Online"

Enteractive Distribution also announces a new web site to provide useful information to consumers and genealogists. This new web site http://familyhistorian3.ning.com provides modern consumer features such as a product blog, updated news about the product, discussion forum, store locator, FAQ, product support groups, and easy to use customer support features.
Family Historian 3 runs on Windows Vista, XP Home and XP Professional, 2000, ME and 98.

# # #

Ups and downs of a digital-age campaign

http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2008/11/08/ups_and_downs_of_a_digital_age_campaign/

Ups and downs of a digital-age campaign
By Eric Fehrnstrom
November 8, 2008

EARLY ON, I had a feeling the 2008 election was going to be different. As we prepared for the launch of Mitt Romney's national campaign, we looked to clean up his biographical entry on Wikipedia, the popular online encyclopedia edited by its users. Notoriously unreliable, it would serve as the first source of information for people curious about the then-unknown governor from Massachusetts.

A prankster beat us there: Romney's entry falsely claimed he spoke fluent Swahili and several different Bantu dialects. Despite our efforts to correct the record, over the course of the campaign more than one supporter would marvel to me about Romney's felicity with African languages.

There's something to be said for the old media filter. Despite its shortcomings, I kind of miss it.
In one positive sense, the still-evolving digital age means citizens with video cameras can have more impact than seasoned political reporters. The press corps may not have thought John McCain singing "Bomb, bomb, bomb Iran" was news at first, but they reconsidered when the Drudge Report linked to the video. Early GOP front-runner George Allen's "macaca" moment not only strangled his infant candidacy for president, but it torpedoed his 2006 reelection to the US Senate.

The lesson for us media handlers: Beware the innocuous-looking person with the YouTube account silently taping everything. He could destroy your day. Far less threatening was the reporter who abided by the conventional rules of journalism and knew the meaning of "off the record."

Yes, the Internet kept the mainstream media honest, and it opened new doors for candidates. Networking with tens of thousands of friends on MySpace and Facebook, it became easier to recruit volunteers. To raise money, there was no longer a need to rent a room and invite wealthy donors to munch on food and sip cocktails. Instead, donations came pouring in through the Web in response to an e-mail. In February 2007, Romney forever changed the traditional fund-raiser when he raised $6.5 million in a single day by gathering supporters at the convention center in South Boston and giving them laptops and phones.

But the Internet also allowed dirty politics to go viral. In 2004, Swift Boat Veterans for Truth paid millions of dollars for ads suggesting John Kerry's military service was dishonorable. In 2008, not a penny was spent to spread the false claim that Barack Obama was a Muslim. It received so much attention that an election-eve poll in Texas showed that nearly one-quarter of voters there believed it. Thanks to the irresponsible reporting of the left-wing site Daily Kos, another myth had it that Sarah Palin was not the mother of her infant son, Trig, and that the child actually belonged to her eldest daughter, Bristol.

Here in Massachusetts, a fringe group e-mailed conservatives around the country the absurd claim that it was Romney, not the Supreme Judicial Court, who legalized gay marriage. During the primary, I lost count of how many times Romney was asked about a feared North American union of Mexico, Canada, and the United States - a conspiracy spread by right-wing bloggers who believed all three countries would be linked by a single government, a common currency, and a 10-lane superhighway.

Where are the online gatekeepers? Gatekeeping is the most important function for the offline media. Editors decide which stories get published. They make sure rumors aren't printed. Sensitive information is double- and sometimes triple-sourced. Gatekeeping serves an important purpose in establishing the ethics of journalism. Sadly, it doesn't exist on the Web.
What can be done? Citizen-journalists and bloggers need to provide links to websites that contain factual data backing up their assertions. These connections add credibility. And while Internet libel suits can be difficult to win, they should be pursued more often.

Moreover, it would help if TV and newspapers resisted the temptation to get edgier in their own reporting. If you can't be "first" with the rumors, be first with the most comprehensive and factual account. In the current Wild West state of political reporting, you will be rewarded with loyal readership in search of honest and objective coverage.

Eric Fehrnstrom was senior communications adviser for Mitt Romney's presidential campaign.

© Copyright 2008 Globe Newspaper Company.

Breitbart: Internet collaboration still in infancy: Wikipedia founder

Internet collaboration still in infancy: Wikipedia founder

Nov 1 11:49 AM US/Eastern

The age of public collaboration over the Internet is still only in its infancy, Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales told AFP in an interview.

The 42-year-old web guru, in an effort to show Wikipedia's impact thus far, referenced a recent trip to a slum in India where he "met this young man on the street who told me that he had used Wikipedia to pass his 11th grade exams."

"Wow, that's really cool, right? We've had some impact, even in such a place where I'm talking to this guy, and there's mud streets, and cows, and it's really quite a different environment from London."

Wales's popular online encyclopedia allows anyone with an Internet connection to make entries and edit content.

Speaking on the sidelines of an awards ceremony in London, Wales said: "We're really just at the beginning, still, of collaborative efforts."

"In video, right now, we're still back in many ways in the Web 1.0 era," he said, referring to the age before so-called Web 2.0, the peer-sharing model of the Internet of which Wikipedia is almost the definitive example.

"If you look at almost everything on YouTube, it's individuals doing videos, either funny cat videos, or drunk girl videos seem to be quite popular there," he said with a smile.
"What we haven't seen yet in video is large-scale collaborative projects."
Off the top of his head Wales suggested a 90-minute collaborative web video created by interviewing people from all around the world, giving their views on the war in Iraq.
He joked: "This isn't going to be that popular, frankly, a 90-minute movie with people talking about Iraq -- it's going to have a small audience. This can't be produced in the old-fashioned way. It's totally possible now.

"That's just one dumb idea of mine, right? Imagine what we could get if we could get 100,000 people thinking about collaborative video efforts to create documentary films, or comedy, or art, or who knows what.

"So, I think we've still got a long way to go."
He acknowledged collaboration has its limits, noting that if "we said we want to write a novel about loss, and redemption, probably not so much public collaboration, that's really an individual vision and a view of the world."

"But for basic factual information, I think having an open public dialogue and debate and democratic process, seems to be very powerful."

Wales also warned that major steps had to be considered to stop governments abusing ordinary people's personal information, which is increasingly stored in vast computer databases.
He described potential government misuse of private citizens' data as a "concern."

"One of the interesting things to really think about is how, as we're using the Internet, we leave an enormous digital footprint everywhere," he said.

"And not just the Internet, but cell phones, everything else. I'm assuming, if anybody really cares enough, my movements all around the planet are pretty trackable by somebody.
"That's something most people don't think much about, and they don't think much about it because, frankly, no one cares what most people are doing."

He said, however, that as computing power increases, "we need to really think about what are the political controls we need to have in place to prevent governments from abusing that kind of information."

Wales's remarks come after a report last month which warned that European governments are rapidly eroding civil liberties in a bid to gain "unfettered" access to individuals' personal data in the name of tighter security.

The document by Statewatch, a non-profit online civil liberties monitoring group, criticised the EU for viewing data protection and judicial scrutiny of citizens' private information as "obstacles" to law enforcement.

Copyright AFP 2008