High-Tech Taps: DoD Approves Ceremonial Stand-in Bugle

Insight on the News, Oct 14, 2003

Byline: John Elvin, INSIGHT

High-Tech Taps: DoD Approves Ceremonial Stand-in Bugle

It is hard to think of anything more poignant than the sound of a bugle playing taps at a military funeral, the ultimate expression of gratitude to the departed warrior. Unfortunately, military funerals are many while buglers are few and far between. So severe is the bugler shortage that Congress passed a law in January 2000 permitting the playing of a recorded version of the musical military honor when a live bugler is not available.

Taking this a step further, the Department of Defense (DoD) recently approved the use of a high-tech substitute, a real bugle embedded with a device that plays a version of taps "virtually indistinguishable from a live bugler," according to the DoD's press office. It allows a stand-in for the bugler to simulate a rendition of the playing of taps that provides a visual experience reportedly indistinguishable from the real thing. The bugle device is so popular that orders placed now cannot be filled until early next year, according to the supplier.

Developed by private enterprise in cooperation with the DoD, the high-tech bugle has been tested over a six-month period at military funerals in Missouri, a state selected because of the quality of its military-funerals honors program. Family members and honor-guard members were surveyed to ascertain their level of satisfaction with the use of the new device. The endorsement level from families was 96 percent. The ceremonial bugle is not intended to replace a live bugler when available, and approval still stands for the use of a taped or CD version if preferred. More information about the ceremonial bugle is available at www.ceremonialbugle.com or by contacting S&D Consulting Int. Ltd., Box 193, 1636 Third Ave., New York, NY 10128 (212-426-3268).

Web Features 260 Million Porn Pages

The number of commercial pornography Webpages on the Internet is up by about 1,800 percent compared to five years ago, according to a survey by the global-content-filtering company K2H2. The company has identified more than 260 million pages it terms pornographic in content. Five years ago the figure stood at 14 million, the company said in releasing its survey results.

K2H2 said its findings add urgency to an alarm sounded by the Kaiser Foundation in a report indicating that large numbers of teen-agers surfing the World Wide Web are exposed to lewd material. In the Kaiser study, 70 percent of teens were found to have come across pornographic material accidentally on the Web. Many of the encounters occurred because porn marketers take over expired domain names of innocent sites. Other merchants deliberately register sites with innocent names such as "Telebubbies" and "Bobthebuilder."

K2H2 illustrated the ease with which anyone can access pornographic sites on the Web in a check on one search engine. "A search in Google on the word 'porno' returned over 80 million pages, and 'XXX' returned more than 76 million," the firm said in its report.

Is the Internet A Powerful Political Tool?

One of the great hopes of many in the political arena has been that the Internet might provide an easy way to reach that most precious element of the political public, the undecided voter. A new book by two political-science professors, Campaigning Online from Oxford University Press, refutes that, contending that while the Internet is an excellent way to stay in touch with supporters, it does not help substantially as an outreach tool.

Summing up the findings, Richard Davis of Brigham Young University said "there was a presumption that the Internet would activate the inactive, interest the less-interested and convert the undecided to a particular candidate. That hasn't panned out." He and coauthor Bruce Bimber of the University of California at Santa Barbara found through a comprehensive study of recent and ongoing campaigns (with particular emphasis on Howard Dean's use of the Internet) that the sites posted by or for candidates are for the most part serving to reinforce and connect with voters who already are committed.

"Voters are using the Internet, as they use any other medium, to reinforce what they already believe," Davis said in a statement accompanying announcement of the new book. "They don't want to spend a lot of time arguing with their computer screen, or with their television or with their newspaper. But they seek out in these media their predisposed values and have them reinforced."

One of the more interesting findings presented in the book is that the Internet can be a useful tool in low-profile races where the candidates are not getting a lot of attention from other media. The researchers found that voters who viewed sites related to state-level races came away with a greater knowledge of the candidates. "This could be a very useful tool for a candidate in a low-profile campaign, such as a city-council race or a state legislative race," Davis contends. But there's a slight problem. The challenge, he noted, "is getting people to the Website."