EFTA02574045.pdf

From: Boris Nikolic Sent: Monday, August 26, 2013 2:46 PM To: Jeffrey Epstein Subject: FW: Press Snapshot: Monday, August 26th, 2013 See good arti=le re balmer below. Still awaiting for call reply Sent from my Windows Phone From: John Pinette Sent: 8/=FD26/2013 4:17 PM To: Bill Gates Cc: DL-Press Snapshot Subject: Press=Snapshot: Monday, August 26th, 2013 Hea=line Jou=nalist Out=et Ful= Text 1 EFTA_R1_01744511 EFTA02574045 Energy Nuclear Operator Raises Alarm on Crisis</=> Hiroko Tabuchi New York Times<=i> Article text The New Nuclear Craze Mark Bittman New York Times<=i> Article text Pipeline-Capacity Squeeze Reroutes Crude Oil Russell Gold Wall Street Journal Article text U.S. Electrical Grid on the Edge of Failure <http://www.nature.cominewsks-electrical-grid-o=-the-edge-of-failure- 1.13598> Jeff Tollefson Nature Article text 2 EFTA_R1_01744512 EFTA02574046 Technology<=pan lang="EN-GB" style="font-size:10.0pt; font-family:"Arial"=,"sans-serir> Ballmer Departure From Microsoft Was More Sudden Than Portrayed by the Company chttp://allthingsd.com/20130825/ballmer-departure-from-=icrosoft-was-more-sudden-than-portrayed-by-the- companyh =/span> Kara Swisher All Things D Article text The Decline of E-Empires <http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/26/opinion/krugman-the-decline-of-e=empires.html> Paul Krugman New York Timesc=i> Article text As Amazon Stretches, Seattle's Downtown Is Reshaped <http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/26/us/as-ama=on- stretches-seattles-downtown-is-reshaped.html> Kirk Johnson & Nick Wingfield New York Times<=i> Article text State Budgets and Heal=hcare Costs 3 EFTA_R1_01744513 EFTA02574047 How to Charge $546 for Six Liters of Saltwater Nina Bernstein New York Times<=i> Article text State= scramble to get health-care law's insurance marketplaces up and running<=a> <http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-s=ience/states-scramble-to-get-health-care-laws-insurance- marketplaces-up-an=-running/2013/08/24/8c3b5d12-0c0a-11e3-8974-f97ab3b3c677_story.html> Sarah Kliff and Sandhya S=mashekhar Washington Post=/i> Article text 80 House members: Shutdown better than Obamacare Charles Babingtonap> Associated Press Article text Berkshire Hathaway 4 EFTA_R1_01744514 EFTA02574048 Philanthropy Philanthropy: the givers club <http://www.livemint.com/Specials/vMhPPk6gloLwmWwfSpmW3N/Philanthro=y-the- givers-club.html> Cordelia Jenkins</=> Livemint and the Wall =treet Journal Article text Global Health and Deve=opment Pat on the back or force for good: what purpose do development awards serve? <http://www.theguardian.com/global- development/2=13/aug/26/development-awards-prizes> Mark Tran Guardian blog</=> Article text Education</=> 5 EFTA_R1_01744515 EFTA02574049 A Chance at Learning <http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/25/nyregion/a-chance-at-learning.ht=l> Ginia Bellafante<A> New York Times<=i> Article text Obama goes for college 'datapalooza' <http://www.washingto=post.com/local/education/obama-goes-for-college- datapalooza/2013/08/23/b93.0194-0bfc-1le3-b87c-476db8ac34cd_story.htmI> Nick Anderson Washington Post=/i> Article text Massively Online And Offline Too: How MOOCs Will Evolve In The Physical World <http://www.forbes.com/sites/giovannirodrigu=z/2013/08/25/massively-online-and-offline-too-how-moocs-will-evolve- in-the=physical-world/> Giovanni Rodriguez=/p> Forbes Article text Women and Children Indian Police Arrest Suspects in Two Gang Rapes <http://online.wsj.com/article/SB100014241=7887324906304579034600607425892.html> Sean Mclain and Khushita =assn Wall Street Journal Article text 6 EFTA_R1_01744516 EFTA02574050 Is there any space in the development debate for African experts? <http://www.theguardian.com/global-development- professionals-net=ork/2013/aug/23/aspen-new-voices-africa-fellowship> Andrew Quinn Guardian blog</=> Article text Child marriage campaigners in south Asia receive $23m cash injection <http://www.theguardian.com/global- development/2013/aug/23/child=marriage-india-bangladesh-nepal> Mark Tran Guardian blog</=> Article text ARTICLE TEXT Energy — Full text a=ticles Nuclear Operator Raises Alarm on Crisis <http://www.nyt=mes.com/2013/08/24/world/asia/nuclear-operator-raises- alarm-on-crisis.htmla Hiroko Tabuchi — New York Times The operator of Japan's=tsunami-hit nuclear power plant sounded the alarm on the gravity of the de=pening crisis of containment at the coastal site on Friday, saying that there are more than 200,000 tons of radioactive water in makes=ift tanks vulnerable to leaks, with no reliable way to check on them or an=where to transfer the water. 7 EFTA_R1_01744517 EFTA02574051 The latest disclosures ad= to a long list of recent accidents, leaks and breakdowns that have unders=ored grave vulnerabilities at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant site more than two years after a powerful earthquake and tsuna=i set off meltdowns at three reactors. They come two weeks after=the prime minister, Shinzo Abe, promised that his government would take a =ore active role in the site's cleanup, raising questions over how seriously he has taken that pledge. Mr. Abe's government has co=tinued to push for a restart of the country's nuclear power program, and=he heads to the Middle East on Saturday to promote Japanese exports to the=region, including nuclear technology. Mr. Abe also plans to lea= Tokyo's delegation to Argentina for the International Olympic Committee=92s final vote, set for Sept. 7, on the host city for the 2020 Olympics. Tokyo, 150 miles south of the stricken nuclear power plant, is ore of three finalists competing to host the games. The others are Istanbul =nd Madrid. Opposition lawmakers here=have demanded that Mr. Abe stay home and declare a state of emergency. "The nuclear crisis is =eal and ongoing, yet the government continues to look the other way," sa=d Yoshiko Kira of the opposition Japan Communist Party, which made significant gains in parliamentary elections last month. "The government should =eclare a state of emergency right now, and intervene to stop the outflow o= contaminated water," Ms. Kira said at an anti-nuclear rally outside Mr. Abe's office in Tokyo. Mr. Abe remains popular, =nd it is uncertain how large a liability the crisis at the Fukushima plant=will become for him. But it has become increas=ngly clear that the latest problems may be too large for the plant's ope=ator, the Tokyo Electric Power Company, or Tepco, to handle. Tepco has built nearly 1,=00 tanks at the sprawling complex to store as many as 335,000 tons of cont=minated water, the product of coolant pumped into the reactors to keep their cores from overheating, and groundwater pouring into their b=eached basements at a rate of 400 tons a day. This week, Tepco said one ta=k had sprung a huge leak. On Friday, Tepco presente= an even starker view of the situation, acknowledging that as much as 220,=00 tons of that water is stored in makeshift steel tanks similar to the one that is leaking. The operator said the 36-foot-tall cyl=ndrical tanks, meant as a temporary repository for the growing amount of r=diated water at the complex, used vulnerable rubber sealing and that their=ability to withstand radiation was not tested. 8 EFTA_R1_01744518 EFTA02574052 The tanks are susceptible=to leaks at the seams and through their concrete base, said Noriyuki Imaiz=mi, the acting general manager of Tepco's nuclear power division. A nearby drain can carry any leaked water to the sea, Mr. Imaizumi said, a=d high radiation readings along a section suggest that water has already t=aveled through the drain to the ocean. The makeshift tanks also =ack water level gauges, making it difficult to detect leaks. Only two work=rs are assigned to checking nearly 1,000 tanks on two-hour patrols twice a day, Mr. Imaizumi said. The Nuclear Regulation Au=hority, which the Japanese government ordered to more actively advise and =onitor Tepco's activities at the plant, had told the company to begin transferring the water from the makeshift tanks to better-built v=ssels. But after visiting the plant on Friday, an authority commissioner, =oyoshi Fuketa, said the vast quantities made doing so quickly "unrealist=c." A series of pits Tepco du= to store some of the water also began leaking earlier this year, forcing =orkers to transfer the water into the steel tanks. Experts have said they su=pect that more contaminated water is seeping out from under the melted-dow= reactors into the groundwater and the Pacific. Elevated levels of radioactive cesium in surrounding waters seem to confirm those s=spicions. Tepco has said those leak= are not directly from beneath the reactors, but from maintenance tunnels =hat run along the coast and remain contaminated from the early days of the disaster. But it also acknowledges =hat the water beneath the reactors is extremely contaminated, and experts =ay that if it does get into the ocean, it will surpass even the leaks that occurred in the disaster's early days. "That prospect scares m.," Michio Aoyama, a senior scientist in the Oceanography and Geochemistr= Research Department at the government-affiliated Meteorological Research Institute, said in an interview this month. "It's the ultimate, w=rst-case scenario," Professor Aoyama said. Back to=top 9 EFTA_R1_01744519 EFTA02574053 The New Nuclear C=aze <http://opinion=tor.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/08/23/the-new-nuclear-crazek Mark Bittman - New York Times There is a new discussion=about nuclear energy, prompted by well-founded concerns about carbon emiss=ons and fueled by a pro-nuclear documentary called "Pandora's Promise." Add a statement by James E. Hansen — who famously sounded th= alarm on climate change — and, of course, industry propaganda, and pres=o: We Love Nukes. Before we all become pro-=uclear greens, however, you've got to ask three questions: Is nuclear po=er safe and clean? Is it economical? And are there better alternatives? No, no and yes. So let'= not swap the pending environmental disaster of climate change for another=that may be equally risky. Despite all-out efforts a=d international cooperation, Fukushima, which scared Germany right out of =he nuclear power business, still isn't under control. Proponents of nuclear power promise new and safer technology, but these discussions a=e filled with "coulds"; no such plants exist. Nor would they reduce th= risks of proliferation. (Oh, that little thing.) Nor would they do much to=mitigate the all-too-infrequently discussed dangers of uranium mining, whi=h uses vast amounts of water in the West — an area that can ill afford it — and is barely regulated or even studied. Thousands of ur=nium mines have been abandoned, and no one seems to know how many remain t= be cleaned up. The cost of that cleanup, of course, will be borne by taxp=yers, not industry. Then there's disposal o= spent fuel, which is not contained at the same safety level as active fue=, itself a scary thought. Decades into the nuclear age there remains, incredibly, no real plan for this; a patchwork scheme by the Nucl=ar Regulatory Commission, which appears to be even more industry-friendly =han most federal agencies, was rejected by an appeals court last year, and=the Obama administration is standing by its campaign promise (shocking, I know) to abandon the nuclear reposito=y at Yucca Mountain in Nevada. The economic viability of=nuclear power is no more encouraging. Plants continue to close and generat=on rates continue to drop. Operators may indeed continue to make money on reactors, but that's only because federal subsidies are=enormous. Insurance costs are limited. Loans are guaranteed (the Solyndra =oan guarantee was half a billion dollars; in contrast, loan guarantees for=new nuclear plants may run $8 billion); cost recovery and return on investment are also assured for decades, and s=me operators are able to collect costs from ratepayers (and pay dividends =o shareholders) years before plants come online — even if they never com= online. 10 EFTA_R1_01744520 EFTA02574054 So they're economical a= long as you're the owner, because historically, subsidies for nuclear p=wer have been more than double the expense of power generation itself. While estimates of the costs of power generation vary wildly — a=lowing both proponents and detractors of any given power technology to mak= their cases — few of them take externalities (costs to the environment =r to public health, for example) into account. And nuclear power's externalities could exceed those for any ot=er form of power generation except coal. That's why we're redu=ing coal usage — if we had a strong climate policy it would be gone in a=couple of deades, and nuclear should be right behind it. It's likely that no new nuclear plants will be built before true renewables are able t= take the place of scary, highly damaging energy sources. Which brings us full circ=e: the new proponents of nuclear power say that since nuclear power is arg=ably preferable to coal, maybe we should subsidize the building of new plants. If those were the only op=ions, maybe that argument would be a sound one. But they're not. Energy =fficiency (remember that?), natural gas (imperfect, yes, but improvable) and wind are all cheaper. Even solar is already less expensive=than nuclear power in good locations. Some studies show that re=ewables can generate 80 percent of our electricity in 2050, using current =echnologies, while reducing carbon emissions from the electric sector by 80 percent. Climate change fears should be driving not old and d=sproven technologies but renewable ones, which are more practical. These t=chnologies remain relatively small — non-hydro renewables were around S =ercent of the total last year — but they're growing so fast (wind and solar use have quadrupled in the last =ive years) that just this week the chairman of the Federal Energy Regulato=y Commission predicted that solar power could soon begin to double every t=o years. Utilities are afraid that=solar power will be to the electrical grid what PCs were to mainframes, or=e-mail to the Postal Service: a technology that will simply kill its predecessors. Coal and nuclear power are both doomed, and the pro=it- making power grid with it. That's all to our benefit. Back to=top Pipeline-=apacity Squeeze Reroutes Crude Oil <http://online.=sj.com/article/SB100014241278873238382045790030934B317418.html> Russell Gold — Wall Street Journal 11 EFTA_R1_01744521 EFTA02574055 More crude oil is moving =round the U.S. on trucks, barges and trains than at any point since the go=ernment began keeping records in 1981, as the energy industry devises ways to get around a pipeline-capacity shortage to take petroleum =rom new wells to refineries. The improvised approach i= creating opportunities for transportation companies even as it strains ro=ds and regulators. And it is a precursor to what may be a larger change: the construction of more than $40 billion in oil pipelines =ow under way or planned for the next few years, according to energy advise= Wood Mackenzie. "We are in effect re=plumbing the country," says Curt Anastasio, chief executive of NuStar=Energy LP, NS +0.58% a pipeline company in San Antonio. Oil is "f=owing in different directions and from new places." U.S. oil production has r=ached its highest level in two decades, while imports have fallen dramatic=lly. A system built to import oil and deliver it to coastal refineries has become ill-equipped to handle rising production in Texas, N=rth Dakota and Canada's Alberta province. "All of the pipes ar= pointed in the wrong direction," says Harold York, an oil researcher=at Wood Mackenzie. "We are turning the last 70 years of oil-industry history in North America on its head, and we are turning it on its head in=the next 10 to 15 years." With oil prices persisten=ly above $100 a barrel, companies drilling new wells don't want to forgo r=venue while they wait years for new pipelines. That leaves them with trucks, trains and barges to move an increasing amount of crude.=/span> Oil delivered to refineri=s by trucks grew 38% from 2011 to 2012, according to the U.S. Energy Infor=ation Administration, while crude on barges grew 53% and rail deliveries quadrupled. Although alternatives are growing rapidly, pip=lines and oceangoing tankers remain the primary method for delivering crud= to refineries. In the Eagle Ford, a larg= four-year-old South Texas oil field, production has grown to more than 50=,000 barrels a day, from less than 1,000 in 2009, according to state statistics. Getting that torrent out of the sparsely populated re=ion has required modifications to the oil-delivery system. 12 EFTA_R1_01744522 EFTA02574056 For example, last year Nu=tar reversed a 16-inch pipeline built to carry crude imported from Africa =nd Europe northward from the Port of Corpus Christi. Now, the pipeline flows south, taking delivery from hundreds of trucks that fil= up at individual wells. Some of the 175,000 barrels a day moving through =he pipe is loaded onto barges at Corpus Christi and towed toward refinerie= near Houston. Earlier this year, Philli=s 66 began putting some of this crude on ships for a 2,200-mile journey ar=und Florida to its refinery in Linden, N.J. The heavy trucks moving E=gle Ford crude are causing headaches for residents and local officials, ri=ping up roads and causing traffic tie-ups. "These are rural roa=s built for 10 cars an hour, and now it's 100 vehicles an hour, and 75 of =hem are 80,000-pound trucks," says Tom Voelkel, president of Dupre Logistics LLC. The Lafayette, La., company started hauling crude in Eagle =ord in November 2011 and has more than 100 drivers full time in the region= The Texas Legislature app=opriated $450 million this year to repair and improve roads in oil-produci=g counties. "It doesn't even begin to reach where it needs to reach," says Daryl Fowler, the chief elected county official in Cu=ro, Texas, about a hundred miles southeast of San Antonio. "We've seen a fourfo=d increase in congestion around here," he says. "The roads are c=umbling." In July, the Texas transp=rtation department decided to convert 83 miles of state road in six oil-bo=m counties from pavement to gravel, to reduce repair costs and slow traffic. Trucks filled with Eagle =ord crude are also heading 100 miles west to a barge canal. The first barg= of crude departed in September 2011, heading south toward the Gulf of Mexico and refineries near Houston. Now the canal moves 1.6 mi=lion barrels a month, says Jennifer Stastny, executive director of the Por= of Victoria. "It's like putting y=ur 5-year-old to bed one night and he wakes up the next morning as a 16-ye=r-old, with the appetite and demands of a 16-year-old," she says. In North Dakota, trains m=ve 69% of the state's 800,000 barrels a day of crude, according to state f=gures. Energy companies say they value rail's ability to deliver crude to the highest-paying markets. 13 EFTA_R1_01744523 EFTA02574057 But the deadly runaway cr=de train crash in Canada's Quebec province in July, which incinerated a sm=ll town and killed at least 47 people, highlighted the risks of the mile-long crude trains crisscrossing the country. The U.S. governme=t is imposing new regulations on oil shipments by rail. Some state regulators won=er if their local efforts leave them prepared for a train accident, in par= because federal railroad rules pre-empt state and local control over trains. In Washington state, &quo=;we can't say (to train operators) you have to have oil-spill contingency =tans in order to operate," says Curt Hart, a spokesman for the state's Department of Ecology. "We do that for oil tankers, barges, l=rge commercial vessels and refineries." Home to five refineries, =he state levies a per-barrel tax on crude delivered by tankers and barges,=which pays for spill- response officials and inspectors. The tax doesn't apply to rail shipments. The American Association =f Railroads says it is prepared for growing crude shipments because it has=long carried hazardous cargoes. In 2008, major U.S. railroads carried 9,500 carloads of crude, the association says, and are on pace thi= year to carry 389,000. Most industry analysts be=ieve that while crude on trains will last, truck and barge traffic will de=line once new pipelines come into service. Environmental groups have=criticized some pipeline projects, including the Keystone XL, meant to mov= Canadian oil to Gulf Coast refineries. The federal government is still studying the Keystone pipeline and has yet to issue needed permit=. Steve Kean, president and=chief operating officer of Kinder Morgan Inc., KMI +0.30% one of sever=l interrelated companies that own or operate 82,000 miles of North American pipeline, says government agencies thoroughly vet new proje=ts. Falling imports, infrastr=cture investments and increased manufacturing are just some of the benefit= of newly abundant energy supplies, he says. "This has got to be one of the best things that has happened in our economy in the past =0 years. It is better than the iPad." 14 EFTA_R1_01744524 EFTA02574058 Back to=top U.S. Electr=cal Grid on the Edge of Failure <http://www.nat=re.com/news/us-electrical-grid-on-the-edge-of-failure- 1.13598> Jeff Tollefson — Nature Facebook can lose a few u=ers and remain a perfectly stable network, but where the national grid is =oncerned simple geography dictates that it is always just a few transmission lines from collapse. That is according to a ma=hematical study of spatial networks by physicists in Israel and the United=States. Study co- author Shlomo Havlin of Bar-Ilan University in Ramat-Gan, Israel, says that the research builds on earlier work by inc=rporating a more explicit analysis of how the spatial nature of physical n=tworks affects their fundamental stability. The upshot, published today in=Nature Physics, is that spatial networks are necessarily dependent on any number of critical nodes whose f=ilure can lead to abrupt — and unpredictable — collapsel. The electric grid, which =perates as a series of networks that are defined by geography, is a prime =xample, says Havlin. "Whenever you have such dependencies in the system, failure in one place leads to failure in another place, whi=h cascades into collapse." The warning comes ten yea=s after a blackout that crippled parts of the midwest and northeastern Uni=ed States and parts of Canada. In that case, a series of errors resulted in the loss of three transmission lines in Ohio over the c=urse of about an hour. Once the third line went down, the outage cascaded =owards the coast, cutting power to some 50 million people. Havlin says tha= this outage is an example of the inherent instability his study describes, but others question whether the =eam's conclusions can really be extrapolated to the real world.</=> "I suppose I should be =pen-minded to new research, but I'm not convinced," says Jeff Dagle, an =lectrical engineer at the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory in Richland, Washington, who served on the government task force that inve=tigated the 2003 outage. "The problem is that this doesn't reflect the=physics of how the power grid operates." Critical order Havlin and his colleagues=focused on idealized scenarios. They found that randomly structured networ=s — such as social networks — degrade slowly as nodes are removed, which in the real world might mean there is time to diagnose and =ddress a problem before a system collapses. By contrast, the connections o= orderly lattice structures have more 15 EFTA_R1_01744525 EFTA02574059 critical nodes, which increase the i=stability. The problem is that such orderly networks are always operating near an indefinable edge, Havli= says. To reduce that risk, he recommends adding a small number of longer =ransmission lines that provide short cuts to different parts of the grid.<=span> Benjamin Carreras, a phys=cist at Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee who has conducted simil=r work2, says that network theory can be useful for providing insight into electric grids but must be complemented with more complex mod=ls that attempt to represent both the physical realities and the responsiv=ness of the modern electric grid. Although in some cases adding long lines=can benefit the overall stability of an electric system, Carreras' work suggests that in certain circumsta=ces such an approach allows problems to propagate even farther. "More connections may s=abilize some processes, by, for instance, increasing the number of paths t= generators, but also may destabilize others," Carreras says. "One cannot make generic statements on this topic." Although local outages ca=sed by falling trees knocking down distribution lines are common, large-sc=le failures within the core ne transmission lines rarely occur on a modern electric grid. Before 2003, the last major blackout in t=e United States had been on the west coast in 1996, and more recently an o=tage has struck in the San Diego area. Dagle says that the 2003 =lackout stemmed from a combination of bad vegetation management — the fi=st three lines tripped after sagging into trees but were all within their load rating — and a series of monitoring and communications=breakdowns. Vegetation requirements have since been standardized, and a ne= generation of sensors is providing grid operators with more information a=out what is happening across the grid at any given moment. "Many more utilities ha=e much more data," Dagle says. "The next phase of our voyage is to mak= better use of that data." Back to=top Technology — Full to=t articles =/a>Ballmer Departure From Microsoft Was More Sudden Than Portrayed by the Company <http://allthingsd.com/20130825/ba=lmer-departure-from-microsoft-was-more-sudden-than-portrayed-by-the- compan=/> =br> Kara Swisher — All Things D 16 EFTA_R1_01744526 EFTA02574060 According to sources close to the situation,=the departure of CEO Steve Ballmer from Microsoft last week was more sudden than was depicted by the company in its announcement that he=would be retiring <http://=Ilthingsd.com/20130823/microsoft-ceo-ballmer-to-retire-within-12-monthsk within the next year in a planned smooth tran=ition. It was neither planned nor as smooth as port=ayed. While the decision to go seems to have technically been Ballmer's, i=terviews with dozens of people inside and outside the company, including many close to the situation, indicate that he had not aimed to l=ave this soon and especially after the recent restructuring of the company=that he had intensely planned. Instead, sources said Ballmer's timeline had been moved up drastical=y — first by him and then the nine-member board, including his longtime partner and Microsoft co-founder and chairman Bill Gates — afte= all agreed that it was best if he left sooner than later. That was due to a number of increasingly problematic issues on the imm=diate horizon — including a potentially nasty proxy fight, continued business performance declines and, perhaps most of all, that Bal=mer's leadership was becoming a very obvious lightning rod. Interestingly, Ballmer actually indicated that he had planned on stayi=g in his letter about his imp=nding departure <http://allthingsd.com/201.301323/steve-ballmers-memo-to-employees-=nnouncing-his-retirement-from-microsoftk noting: "My original thoughts on timing woul= have had my retirement happen in the middle of our transformation to a de=ices and services company focused on empowering customers in the activities they value most." That sentence spurred much chatter inside the company, including the p=rsistent rumor that Gates had dropped the bomb on Ballmer. That sentiment was further underscored when Ballmer's letter contained n= reference or thanks to Gates, with whom he has been tightly tethered over=the last several decades. Its absence has been much discussed internally a= Microsoft, where it has been seen as an unusual slight and a sign of a rift. Gates also did not reference his longtime business partner in any cele=ratory manner in Microsoft's announcement. "As a member of the succession planning committee, I'll work closely with the other memb=rs of the board to identify a great new CEO," said Gates, in the entiret= of the quote about Ballmer's retirement. "We're fortunate to have S=eve in his role until the new CEO assumes these duties." Other sources cautioned that it was not indicative of tensions between=the pair, but was done to minimize "lame duck concerns" that might arise if Ballmer was portrayed as already out the door. Those sources also insist that Gates never asked Ballmer to step down =ooner, although they acknowledge that he also did not — as Gates had in the past — disagree that it was best that he move on. "Did Gates instigate it? No," said one source with knowledge of th= situation. "But was he as supportive of Ballmer as he had been in the past? Maybe not." That was still a big change, of course. Gates — who has always been =nd remains the key decision-maker on Microsoft's board — had always been Ballmer's major backer, despite increasing pressure both ext=rnally and from other directors for him to step down. Gates had rejected such suggestions for years. That included former di=ector and Netflix CEO Reed Hastings, who many sources said had been one of the first to urge that the company replace Ballmer as CEO,=as well as from a spate of Wall Street investors complaining about the com=any's declining value in the Ballmer years. 17 EFTA_R1_01744527 EFTA02574061 As AllThingsD's John Paczkowski=wrote on Friday <http://allthingsd.com/20130823/steve-ballmer-just-made-769- milli=n/> : "Here's one metric by which Ballmer will b= judged harshly. On the last day of 1999, the day before he took over as CEO, Microsoft's market capitalization wa= $600 billion. On the day before he announced his intention to retire, it =as less than $270 billion." That's a damning number, of course, coupled with a widespread sentim=nt that Ballmer had missed critical trends in tech under his tenure. Despite a strong growth in revenue, investors and others had long =oncluded that Microsoft had thr=ved when Gates was CEO and waned under Ballmer's rule <http://allthingsd.com/20130823/for-ballmer-resistance- was-futile=> .=/p> Still, until recently, there has been no signal from the company indic=ting any change in top leadership. In fact, the management reorganization backed strongly by the board a month ago had essentially pl=ced Ballmer at the center of the structure under a plan described as "One Microsoft."=/span> <http://allthingsd.com/20130711/one-microsoft- ballmer-finally-annrunces-far-reaching-realignment-around-devices-and-services/> And, at the time of the restructuring announcement in July, Ballmer's definite=and clear message chttp://allthingsd.com/20130711/heres-microsofts-strategy-essay-a=d-reorg-announcement-memos/> was that he was there to stay: "Lots of change. But in all of this, many key things remains the sam=. Our incredible people, our spirit, our commitment, our belief in the transformative power of technology — our Microsoft technology —=to make the world a better place for billions of people and millions of bu=inesses around the world. It's why I come to work inspired every day. It=92s why we've evolved before, and why we're evolving now. Because we're not done. Let's go." Though early in its rollout, the changes have been jarring and created=a level of chaos at the company that has led to much grumbling internally. It also did not help that the restructuring was quickly follow=d by a dismal Q4 performance by Microsoft. As I wrote in mid-July <http://allthingsd.com/20130718/liveblogging-microsoft-q4-earning=-a-surfeit-of-surfaces-and- the-post-pc-era-troubleh : "Microsoft had a bad fourth quarter, mostly because many people=are not using PCs any more. In addition, the tech giant took a $900 millio= charge related to having to cut the price of its Surface RT tablet, which had — as you might imagine — an =mpact on results. Missed profit expectations, missed revenue, missed all o=er the ying-yang." With the prospect that the next quarter could be weaker still and with=numerous reports of late that there has been slowing of adoption from its new flagship Windows 8 offering, Ballmer and the board finally al=gned to move his departure date sooner. Most critical to that decision, source said, were increased board worr=es that recent pressure from activist investor Va=ueAct <http://allthingsd.com/20130603/microsoft-ponders-major-restructu=ing-amid-renewed-wall-street-focus- on-stock/> — which has a large stake in the company — had a good=chance of succeeding in its efforts to obtain a seat on the board of Micro=oft, especially if Ballmer stayed in place. And even if the software giant was able to thwart that from happening,=said several sources, such a public fight is untenable for the company, since it was likely to attract even more scrutiny to Ballmer=92s performance and perhaps even more investor action. ValueAct has until August 30 to notify Microsoft if it plans a proxy b=ttle, and sources said it still wants more that Ballmer's retirement. In talks, said sources, it has asked for an aggressive stock buyback and a=so a dividend increase, which might assuage its efforts to garner a board =eat. 18 EFTA_R1_01744528 EFTA02574062 Ballmer denied any pressure =rom ValueAct <http://seattletimes.com/html/businesstechnology/2021676856_ballm=rboardxml.html> specifically in his decision in an interview with =he Seattle Times, though sources said that was simply bluster. And, even with mounting pressure on him, Ballmer definitely portrayed =he change as his decision in an interview he gave to=ZDNet's Mary Jo Foley <http://www.zdnet.com/microsofts-ballmer-on-his-biggest-regret-th=-next-ceo-and- more-7000019810k last week, after his retirement announc=ment. "I would say for me, yeah, I've thought about it for a long time, =ut the timing became more clear to me over the course of the last few months," he insisted. When asked if Gates asked him to stay or go, he said no, apparently to=both. "Bill respects my decision. I mean, it's one of these things when if it's — you know, ultimately these kinds of things have =o be one's own personal decision." That statement also struck many inside the company as a quick shift. B=Ilmer, said sources, had been jumping enthusiastically into business review meetings, as part of the new structure, over the last mont=. In addition, he had expressed to many employees his excitement at being =art of the changes he had initiated. But, in meetings after the announcement, numerous sources inside the c=mpany said Ballmer seemed uncharacteristically chastened and quiet, in contrast to his usual confident and forceful manner. "He was definitely not leaving and then he suddenly was," said one=source. "Even if today's Steve made the choice, it was a choice yesterday's Steve did not want to." Another source, close to the board, perhaps explained it best: "If V=lueAct got on the board, I think Ballmer finally realized that meant it was going to be the hard way from then on out until he left and h= did not want that for a company he clearly loves and has been his life.=94 Now, those inside the company are turning to what comes next. While no= everyone on the board thought that Ballmer should step down without a new CEO in place, it's moot now as Microsoft turbocharges the =rocess — in place for several years now — to select its next leader.</=pan> But, though the committee is headed up by John Thompson, CEO of Virtua= Instruments and the former CEO of security software giant Symantec, most expect Gates — as usual — to be the key decision maker =n that choice, too. A Microsoft spokesman declined comment. Back to=top <=span> The Decl=ne of E-Empires <http://www.nyt=mes.com/2013/09/26/opinion/krugman-the-decline-of-e-empires.html> Paul Krugman — New York Times &nb=p; Steve Ballmer's surpris= announcement that he will be resigning as Microsoft's C.E.O. has set of= a huge flood of commentary. Being neither a tech geek nor a management guru, I can't add much on those fronts. I do, however, think = know a bit about economics, and I also read a lot of history. So the Ball=er announcement has me thinking about 19 EFTA_R1_01744529 EFTA02574063 network externalities and Ibn Khaldu=. And thinking about these things, I'd argue, can help ensure that we draw the right lessons from this part=cular corporate upheaval. First, about network exte=nalities: Consider the state of the computer industry circa 2000, when Mic=osoft's share price hit its peak and the company seemed utterly dominant. Remember the T-shirts depicting Bill Gates as a Borg (part of th= hive mind from "Star Trek"), with the legend, "Resistance is futile= Prepare to be assimilated"? Remember when Microsoft was at the center o= concerns about antitrust enforcement? The odd thing was that no=ody seemed to like Microsoft's products. By all accounts, Apple computer= were better than PCs using Windows as their operating system. Yet the vast majority of desktop and laptop computers ran Windows. Why? The answer, basically, is=that everyone used Windows because everyone used Windows. If you had a Win=ows PC and wanted help, you could ask the guy in the next cubicle, or the tech people downstairs, and have a very good chance of get=ing the answer you needed. Software was designed to run on PCs; peripheral=devices were designed to work with PCs. That's network external=ties in action, and it made Microsoft a monopolist. The story of how that sta=e of affairs arose is tangled, but I don't think it's too unfair to sa= that Apple mistakenly believed that ordinary buyers would value its superior quality as much as its own people did. So it charged premium =rices, and by the time it realized how many people were choosing cheaper m=chines that weren't insanely great but did the job, Microsoft's domina=ce was locked in. Now, any such discussion =rings out the Apple faithful, who insist that anything Windows can do Appl= can do better and that only idiots buy PCs. They may be right. But it doesn't matter, because there are many such idiots, myself=included. And Windows still dominates the personal computer market.=/p> The trouble for Microsoft=came with the rise of new devices whose importance it famously failed to g=asp. "There's no chance," declared Mr. Ballmer in 2007, "that the iPhone is going to get any significant market share." How could Microsoft have =een so blind? Here's where Ibn Khaldun comes in. He was a 14th-century l=lamic philosopher who basically invented what we would now call the social sciences. And one insight he had, based on the history of =is native North Africa, was that there was a rhythm to the rise and fall o= dynasties. 20 EFTA_R1_01744530 EFTA02574064 Desert tribesmen, he argu=d, always have more courage and social cohesion than settled, civilized fo=k, so every once in a while they will sweep in and conquer lands whose rulers have become corrupt and complacent. They create a new d=nasty — and, over time, become corrupt and complacent themselves, ready =o be overrun by a new set of barbarians. I don't think it's mu=h of a stretch to apply this story to Microsoft, a company that did so wel= with its operating-system monopoly that it lost focus, while Apple — still wandering in the wilderness after all those years — was =lert to new opportunities. And so the barbarians swept in from the desert.=/span> Sometimes, by the way, ba=barians are invited in by a domestic faction seeking a shake-up. This may =e what's happening at Yahoo: Marissa Mayer doesn't look much like a fierce Bedouin chieftain, but she's arguably filling the same fun=tional role. Anyway, the funny thing i= that Apple's position in mobile devices now bears a strong resemblance =o Microsoft's former position in operating systems. True, Apple produces high-quality products. But they are, by most accounts, little if =ny better than those of rivals, while selling at premium prices. So why do people buy them= Network externalities: lots of other people use iWhatevers, there are mor= apps for iOS than for other systems, so Apple becomes the safe and easy choice. Meet the new boss, same as the old boss. Is there a policy moral h=re? Let me make at least a negative case: Even though Microsoft did not, i= fact, end up taking over the world, those antitrust concerns weren't misplaced. Microsoft was a monopolist, it did extract a lot of m=nopoly rents, and it did inhibit innovation. Creative destruction means th=t monopolies aren't forever, but it doesn't mean that they're harmle=s while they last. This was true for Microsoft yesterday; it may be true for Apple, or Google, or someone not yet on our =adar, tomorrow. Back =o top State Budgets and Heal=hcare costs — Full text articles How to Cha=ge $546 for Six Liters of Saltwater <http://www.nyt=mes.com/2013/08/27/health/exploring-salines-secret- costs.htmlk Nina Bernstein — New York Times 21 EFTA_R1_01744531 EFTA02574065 It is one of the most com=on components of emergency medicine: an intravenous bag of sterile saltwat=r. Luckily for anyone who ha= ever needed an IV bag to replenish lost fluids or to receive medication, =t is also one of the least expensive. The average manufacturer's price, according to government data, has fluctuated in recent years from 4= cents to $1. Yet there is nothing eith=r cheap or simple about its ultimate cost, as I learned when I tried to tr=ce the commercial path of IV bags from the factory to the veins of more than 100 patients struck by a May 2012 outbreak of food pois=ning in upstate New York. Some of the patients' b=lls would later include markups of 100 to 200 times the manufacturer's p=ice, not counting separate charges for "IV administration." And on other bills, a bundled charge for "IV therapy" was almost 1,000 tim=s the official cost of the solution. It is no secret that medi=al care in the United States is overpriced. But as the tale of the humble =V bag shows all too clearly, it is secrecy that helps keep prices high: hidden in the underbrush of transactions among multiple buyer= and sellers, and in the hieroglyphics of hospital bills. At every step from manufa=turer to patient, there are confidential deals among the major players, in=luding drug companies, purchasing organizations and distributors, and insurers. These deals so obscure prices and profits that even particip=nts cannot say what the simplest component of care actually costs, let alo=e what it should cost. And that leaves taxpayers=and patients alike with an inflated bottom line and little or no way to ch=llenge it. A PRICE IN FLUX In the food-poisoning cas=, some of the stricken were affluent, and others barely made ends meet. So=e had private insurance; some were covered by government programs like Medicare and Medicaid; and some were uninsured. In the end, those factors=strongly (and sometimes perversely) affected overall charges for treatment= including how much patients were expected to pay out of pocket. But at the beginning, there was the cost of an IV bag of normal sa=ine, one of more than a billion units used in the United States each year.=/span> 22 EFTA_R1_01744532