Web contest takes whack at updating Enron logo

01/31/2002

By DOUG BEDELL / The Dallas Morning News

WIRED WATCH

Bruce Sterling, Austin-based sci-fi writer and social critic, was worried about the fate of the Enron logo in light of the Houston company's collapse. That "fanciful E" with bright red, green and blue insets seemed to need a radical update in light of the evolving scandal.

The winner: Jim Vandewalker's redesign of the Enron logo.

"When companies merge or change names or even re-org, a logo redesign is very often Job One," said Mr. Sterling on his ViridianDesign.org website. "But when companies croak in a grotesque welter of scandal and bankruptcy, nobody does a thing about the logo!"

Mr. Sterling put out the call to his "Viridians" – mostly subscribers to his wide-ranging newsletter on design and ecological issues – to update the Enron logo. They submitted more than five dozen versions.

Designer Jim Vandewalker took first place for an "apt depiction of Enron as a sticky, colorful, bleeding mess attempting to vanish down a black hole."

The prize? A hundred shares of Enron stock.

Don't be tempted to go to this party

If you receive an e-mail message entitled "My Party," beware. It could be the product of a rapidly spreading computer worm making its way this week across Asia and Europe.

Clicking on the attached file, www.myparty.yahoo.com, begins sending out copies of the worm to those in the user's e-mail address book. Although it may slow e-mail and Internet connections, this worm does not leave a payload and does not damage infected computers, says McAfee.com, which has posted repair instructions.

Philips snubbing redesigned CDs

As major record labels roll out a new breed of compact disc designed to prevent Napster-style trading over the Internet, Dutch consumer electronics maker Philips – co-creator of the CD format – is refusing to play along.

The new discs now making their way into record stores in the United States and Europe contain countermeasures that prevent playback on computers and, in some unintended cases, normal CD players as well.

"What we've seen so far is troublesome and cumbersome," said Gerry Wirtz, general manager of the Philips copyright office. "We worry [the labels] don't know what they're doing."

Net notes

Sales of videocassette recorders fell about 35 percent in 2001, while sales of DVD players rose almost 50 percent, says industry figures released last week. The Consumer Electronics Association projects that 14.9 million DVD players will be sold in 2002.

TV networks, film studios and consumer electronics companies are developing technology that will keep consumers from swapping TV shows and movies in Napster-like fashion online.

Thousands of Internet users who installed popular software for sharing music and other computer files also unwittingly accepted a program that tracked their Web surfing habits. The companies that produce LimeWire , Grokster and KaZaA have since posted new versions of their software without the tracking program.

Compiled from staff and wire reports