Web Development Live

Two of Boise’s better-known high-tech companies are joining forces.MobileDataforce, which develops software for mobile computing applications, announced Tuesday that it had bought Treetop Technologies, a company that focuses on database management, Web design and Web development projects.The sale price was not disclosed.Kevin Benedict, CEO of MobileDataforce, said the purchase will better position his company for future growth.”We keep doing bigger and bigger worldwide projects that require bigger and larger enterprise databases and more complex skills and for 11 years Treetop has focused on delivering those solutions,” said Benedict, who will continue to lead the merged company. MobileDataforce was founded in 2000 as a information-technology consulting company but in 2004 started transforming itself into a mobile software company.Benedict joined the company in 2004 as CEO. Originally from the Seattle area, where he worked in the software industry, Benedict came to Boise in 1999 to take become an e-commerce manager for Micron Electronics, now MPC Corp.Founded in 1997 by Jason Crawforth, Treetop Technologies is one of Boise’s highest profile technology companies. In 2005, Inc. Magazine named the company the 18th fastest-growing software company in America. Crawforth, the CEO and an Idaho native, has been a leading voice in the Idaho tech sector’s effort to better promote itself and win more support from state leaders. Crawforth served for more than two years on the Governor’s Science and Technology Advisory Council before it was disbanded earlier this month.The merger will combine MobileDataforce’s 30 employees with 13 from Treetop. All employees will be located at MobileDataforce’s offices at 3380 Americana Terrace.Benedict said MobileDataforce had already been contracting with Treetop to provide things like database management, Web design, Web development and integration, so it made sense to combine the two companies.Although he’s relinquishing the CEO title, Crawforth said he will remain with MobileDataforce as a board member and the company’s chief strategy officer.Benedict said the company plans to hire more employees.”The merger was based upon growth, and we expect in the next 24 months to double the size of MobileDataforce,” Benedict said.MobileDataforce will benefit from Treetop’s client list, which includes companies like Bose, Hewlett-Packard and the state of Idaho, he said. Since the company was founded in 2000, Benedict said the demand for MobileDataforce products has grown each year. The company’s primary product is called PointSync, which allows users to develop custom software applications on mobile computing devices like personal digital assistants, cell phones and laptop computers. “Everyone is always pushing the envelope for efficiencies, and instead of having someone out with a clipboard writing things down and going back to an office and typing information in, we’re automating the entire process from end to end,” Crawforth said.Ken Dey: 672-6757

SOLO, Indonesia Former Indonesian dictator Suharto, a U.S. Cold War ally whose military regime killed hundreds of thousands of left-wing opponents, was buried Monday at a state funeral with full military honors as tens of thousands mourned.Throngs of Indonesians lined the streets to watch a motorcade carry his body to the family mausoleum. Many sobbed and called out the name of the man whose three-decade rule, though harsh, brought stability and economic growth to Indonesia.President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono led a ceremony televised live across the nation from the mausoleum near Suharto’s hometown of Solo, some 250 miles east of the capital. After a reading of Suharto’s military accomplishments, a shot was fired in his honor and Yudhoyono offered a salute.”We offer his body and his deeds to the motherland,” Yudhoyono said. “His service is an example to us.”Islamic prayers were said and as his body was lowered, mourners tossed flower petals into his grave. A military band played a dirge.Suharto died Sunday of multiple organ failure after more than three weeks on life support at a Jakarta hospital. He was 86.Yudhoyono had already declared a week of national mourning and called on Indonesians “to pay their last respects to one of Indonesia’s best sons.”"He was a great man,” said Sumartini, 65, who came from a nearby village with her four children to watch the funeral procession. “His death touched us deeply.”Suharto loyalists, who run the courts, called for forgiveness and a clearing of his name. But survivors want those responsible for atrocities to be held accountable.”I cannot understand why I have to forgive Suharto because he never admitted his mistakes,” said Putu Oka Sukanta, who spent a decade in prison because of his left-wing sympathies.Suharto was finally toppled by mass street protests in 1998 at the peak of the 1997-1998 Asian financial crisis.His departure from office opened the way for democracy in this predominantly Muslim nation of 235 million people, and he withdrew from public life, rarely venturing from his comfortable Jakarta villa.Suharto ruled with a totalitarian dominance that saw soldiers stationed in every village, instilling a deep fear of authority across this Southeast Asian archipelago that stretches across more than 3,000 miles.Since being forced from power, Suharto had been in and out of hospitals after strokes caused brain damage and impaired his speech. Poor health - and continuing corruption, critics charge - kept him from court after he was chased from office.The bulk of killings occurred in 1965-1966 when alleged communists were rounded up and slain during his rise to power. Estimates for the death toll range from a government figure of 78,000 to 1 million cited by U.S. historians Barbara Harff and Ted Robert Gurr, who have published books on Indonesia’s history.During Indonesia’s 1975-1999 occupation of East Timor, up to 183,000 people died due to killings, disappearances, hunger and illness, according to an East Timorese commission sanctioned by the U.N. Similar abuses left more than 100,000 dead in West Papua, according a local human rights group. Another 15,000 died during a 29-year separatist rebellion in Aceh province.Suharto’s five successors as head of state all vowed to end the graft that took root under his regime, yet it remains endemic at all levels of Indonesian society.With the court system paralyzed by corruption, the country has not confronted its bloody past. Rather than put on trial those accused of mass murder and multibillion-dollar theft, some members of the political elite consistently called for charges against Suharto to be dropped on humanitarian grounds.Some noted Suharto also oversaw decades of economic expansion that made Indonesia the envy of the developing world. Today, nearly a quarter of Indonesians live in poverty, and many long for the Suharto era’s stability, when fuel and rice were affordable.But critics say Suharto squandered Indonesia’s vast natural resources of oil, timber and gold, siphoning the nation’s wealth to benefit his cronies, foreign corporations and family like a mafia don.Jeffrey Winters, associate professor of political economy at Northwestern University, said the graft effectively robbed “Indonesia of some of the most golden decades, and its best opportunity to move from a poor to a middle class country.”"When Indonesia does finally go back and redo history, (its people) will realize that Suharto is responsible for some of the worst crimes against humanity in the 20th century,” Winters said.Those who profited from Suharto’s rule made sure he was never portrayed in a harsh light at home, Winters said, so even though he was an “iron-fisted, brutal, cold-blooded dictator,” he was able to stay in his native country.Like many Indonesians, Suharto used only one name. He was born on June 8, 1921, to a family of rice farmers in the village of Godean in the dominant Indonesian province of Central Java.When Indonesia gained independence from the Dutch in 1949, Suharto quickly rose through the ranks of the military to become a staff officer.His career nearly foundered in the late 1950s, when the army’s then-commander, Gen. Abdul Haris Nasution, accused him of corruption in awarding army contracts.Absolute power came in September 1965 when the army’s six top generals were murdered under mysterious circumstances, and their bodies dumped in an abandoned well in an apparent coup attempt against Sukarno, Indonesia’s founding father who helped win independence from the Dutch. Suharto, next in line for command, quickly asserted authority over the armed forces.What followed was a nationwide purge of suspected leftists, a campaign that stood as the region’s bloodiest event since World War II until the Khmer Rouge established its gruesome regime in Cambodia a decade later.Over the next year, Suharto eased out Sukarno, who died under house arrest in 1970. The legislature rubber-stamped Suharto’s presidency and he was re-elected unopposed six times.During the Cold War, Suharto was considered a reliable friend of Washington, which did not oppose his violent occupation of Papua in 1969 and the bloody 1974 invasion of East Timor. The latter, a former Portuguese colony, became Asia’s youngest country with a U.N.-sponsored plebiscite in 1999.President Bush sent his regrets over Suharto’s death. “President Bush expresses his condolences to the people of Indonesia on the loss of their former president,” said Gordon Johndroe, spokesman for the White House’s National Security Council.Even Suharto’s critics agree his hard-line policies kept a lid on Indonesia’s extremists and held together the ethnically diverse and geographically vast nation. He jailed without trial hundreds of suspected Islamic militants, some of whom later carried out deadly suicide bombings with the al-Qaida-linked terror network Jemaah Islamiyah after the attacks on the U.S. of Sept. 11, 2001.Meanwhile, the ruling clique that formed around Suharto - nicknamed the “Berkeley mafia” after the U.S. school they attended, the University of California, Berkeley - transformed Indonesia’s economy and attracted billions of dollars in foreign investment.By the late 1980s, Suharto was describing himself as Indonesia’s “father of development,” taking credit for slowly reducing the number of abjectly poor and modernizing parts of the nation.But the government also became notorious for unfettered nepotism, and Indonesia was regularly ranked as one of the world’s most corrupt nations as Suharto’s inner circle amassed fabulous wealth. The World Bank estimates 20 percent to 30 percent of Indonesia’s development budget was embezzled during his rule.Even today, Suharto’s children and aging associates have considerable sway over the country’s business, politics and courts. Efforts to recover the money have been fruitless.Suharto’s youngest son, Hutomo “Tommy” Mandala Putra, was released from prison in 2006 after serving a third of a 15-year sentence for ordering the assassination of a Supreme Court judge. Another son, Bambang Trihatmodjo, joined the Forbes list of wealthiest Indonesians in 2007, with $200 million from his stake in the conglomerate Mediacom.State prosecutors accused Suharto of embezzling about $600 million via a complex web of foundations under his control, but he never saw the inside of a courtroom. In September 2000, judges ruled he was too ill to stand trial, though many people believed the decision stemmed from the lingering influence of the former dictator and his family.In 2007, Suharto won a $106 million defamation lawsuit against Time magazine for accusing the family of acquiring $15 billion in stolen state funds.The former dictator told the news magazine Gatra in a rare interview in November 2007 that he would donate the bulk of any legal windfall to the needy, while he dismissed corruption accusations as “empty talk.”Suharto’s wife of 49 years, Indonesian royal Siti Hartinah, died in 1996. The couple had three sons and three daughters.

BALTIMORE Chris Danielsen fidgets with the cell phone, holding it over a $20 bill.”Detecting orientation, processing U.S. currency image,” the phone says in a flat monotone before Danielsen snaps a photo. A few seconds later, the phone says, “Twenty dollars.”Danielsen, a spokesman for the National Federation of the Blind, is holding the next generation of computerized aids for the blind and visually impaired.The Nokia cell phone is loaded with software that turns text on photographed documents into speech. In addition to telling whether a bill is worth $1, $5, $10 or $20, it also allows users to read anything that is photographed, whether it’s a restaurant menu, a phone book or a fax.While the technology is not new, the NFB and the software’s developer say the cell phone is the first to incorporate the text-to-speech ability.”We’ve had reading devices before,” Danielsen said, noting similar software is already available in a larger handheld reader housed in a personal digital assistant. Companies such as Code Factory SL, Dolphin Computer Access Ltd. and Nuance Communications Inc. also provide software that allows the blind to use cell phones and PDAs.Inexpensive hand-held scanners such as WizCom Technologies Ltd.’s SuperPen can scan limited amounts of text, read it aloud and even translate from other languages.However, the $2,100 NFB device combines all of those functions in one smart phone, said James Gashel, vice president of business development for K-NFB Reading Technology Inc., which is marketing the phone as a joint venture between the federation and software developer Ray Kurzweil.”It is the next step, but this is a huge leap,” Gashel, who is blind, said in a telephone interview. “I’m talking to you on the device I also use to read things. I can put it in my pocket and at the touch of a button, in 20 seconds, be reading something I need to read in print.”Ray Kurzweil, who developed the first device that could convert text into audio in the 1970s and the current NFB device, said portability is only the first step. Future versions of the device will recognize faces, identify rooms and translate text from other languages for the blind and the sighted.The inventor plans to begin marketing the cell phone in February through K-NFB Reading Technology. The software will cost $1,595 and the cell phone is expected to cost about $500, Kurzweil said.Dave Doermann, president of College Park-based Applied Media Analysis said his company is working on similar software for smart phones that could be used by the military for translation and by the visually impaired.”We don’t anticipate ours being that expensive, but unfortunately we’re not quite to the release yet,” said Doermann, who is also co-director of the University of Maryland’s Laboratory for Language and Media Processing.Doermann said the company, which has received funding from the Department of Defense and the National Eye Institute, hopes to have its software ready in the next 12 to 18 months.Kurzweil’s device uses speech software provided by Nuance, said Chris Strammiello, the director of product management at Nuance, who said the company has also developed a prototype reader that uses the Internet to access more powerful server-side computers.”As you can harness the power of remote environments and do that so quickly with the Web technologies, it gives a lot more capability, flexibility and options to the way you solve these type of problems,” Strammiello said.There are about 10 million blind and visually impaired people in the U.S., a number that is expected to double in the next 30 years as baby boomers age.Kurzweil said those with vision problems are not the only ones expected to benefit from the technology. Dyslexics, for example, are expected to be among the users of the current device because of its ability to highlight each word as it’s read aloud, helping them cope with their disability, which affects the ability to read. The highlighting function can also help them improve their reading skills, he said.”What’s new here is both blind people and kids can do this with a device that fits in their shirt pocket,” Kurzweil said.Marc Maurer, president of the National Federation of the Blind, said the device and its PDA predecessor are a “form of hand-held vision” that will make the visual environment “much more readily available to the blind.”—National Federation of the Blind: http://www.nfb.orgK-NFB Reading Technology Inc.: http://www.knfbreader.comKurzweil Technologies Inc.: http://www.kurzweiltech.com/ktihome.htmlApplied Media Analysis: http://appliedmediaanalysis.com

Two of Boise’s better-known high-tech companies are joining forces.MobileDataforce, which develops software for mobile computing applications,
announced Tuesday that it had bought Treetop Technologies, a company that
focuses on database management, Web design and Web development projects.
The sale price was not disclosed.The merger will combine MobileDataforce’s 30 employees with 13 from Treetop.
All employees will be located at MobileDataforce箂 offices at 3380 Americana
Terrace.Kevin Benedict, CEO of MobileDataforce, said the purchase will better
position his company for future growth.”We keep doing bigger and bigger worldwide projects that require bigger and
larger enterprise databases and more complex skills and for 11 years Treetop
has focused on delivering those solutions,” said Benedict, who will continue
to lead the merged company.Founded in 1997 by Jason Crawforth, Treetop Technologies is one of Boise’s
highest profile technology companies. Crawforth, the CEO and an Idaho
native, has been a leading voice in the Idaho tech sector箂 effort to better
promote itself and win more support from state leaders.For more details, pick up the business section of Wednesday’s Idaho
Statesman.Ken Dey: 672-6757

The first step toward responding to our state’s energy challenges is realizing they exist. The high price of gasoline, rising utility bills and the fact that Idaho imports the majority of its total energy needs leads to a general conclusion - the time is now to act!But there is no need to panic. There are numerous emerging opportunities presenting themselves to help meet our energy needs into the future. Energy-related developers are showing significant interest in Idaho. Proposed projects include nuclear, natural gas generators, wind, geothermal, biomass, methane digesters, pump storage hydro, interstate pipelines and transmission. And there is innovative activity to convert methane from dairy waste into pipeline-quality natural gas. Regarding transportation fuels, development of biofuels is expanding and more service stations are offering ethanol and biodiesel to Idahoans. There clearly is an interest in developing energy resources to serve Idahoans. When we focus on big-ticket items, there are five interstate transmission projects, three natural gas pipelines and two nuclear generation ventures that are exploring options here. This represents more activity than we have seen in decades. But why now? The reason for all this potential new supply is simple demand. We have seen tremendous growth, and our ability to manage it with the existing energy infrastructure is nearing capacity. It is time to build. And as a state, we have to be prepared to accommodate those projects that are economically feasible and cost-effective. Collaboration is under way among state, federal and local units of government to coordinate our efforts as these projects move forward. We cannot allow projects to fail because we lacked the ability to deal with them appropriately. As we confront our energy needs, we also must accept that factors beyond our control limit our options. A case in point is the impact that greenhouse gases have on our choices for generation resources. People can and do argue both sides of the science, but Wall Street has essentially settled that argument for developers. Investors simply will not risk their money on carbon-emitting resources. We already are feeling that impact in Idaho. Idaho Power and Rocky Mountain Power each had previously proposed building coal-fired generators in Idaho. Both utilities have scrapped those plans. They simply cannot build them until costs associated with greenhouse gases are resolved.So what can we build? Based on greenhouse gas realities, and the fact that renewables such as wind, solar and geothermal are not yet ready to meet our large-scale needs, our resource options are limited to the three “N’s” nuclear, natural gas, or nothing. Each of these options carries baggage. Nuclear is carbon-free, but concerns over waste and safety require our attention to overcome. Additionally, completion of a nuclear plant is 10 to 15 years away. Nuclear offers long-term solutions, but does not resolve our short-term requirements. Natural gas facilities are low-carbon emitters, but they expose utilities and customers to volatile fuel prices. And if we do nothing, our energy plan would likely need to include scheduled rolling blackouts.There clearly is no silver bullet. That is one of the reasons Gov. Butch Otter placed the 25 by ‘25 initiative under the Office of Energy Resources. The goal is to have 25 percent of Idaho’s energy provided by renewable resources by the year 2025. This challenge represents a tremendous opportunity to explore all renewable options and their financial viability. Additionally, it enables us to examine the role that carbon trading can play in pushing projects to fruition. Ultimately, the 25 by ‘25 initiative allows us to thoroughly investigate possible energy resources. We want to avoid stomping on innovation before it has a chance to bloom.There is something each of us can do. Through energy efficiency, conservation and demand-side management we can control the size of our energy bills and reduce the burden on our existing infrastructure. If you want to do your share, go to your utility’s Web site and explore some of the options that exist. You also will find some cash incentives there that could make your choices a little less expensive. The cheapest energy is the amount we do not consume. Working together, we can meet our energy needs. Paul Kjellander is the director of the state’s Office of Energy Resources.

FORT WORTH, Texas Fast food is getting faster.With just a few clicks of the mouse, Jane Cagle can order a small feast for her bosses at Travelocity. The 60-year-old administrative assistant overcame her skepticism about the accuracy of Web purchases and now uses the Internet to have food delivered from Jason’s Deli or Corner Bakery about three or four times a month.”For a business setting, online ordering is the only way to go,” she said, adding that virtually all of the company’s administrative assistants go online to buy lunches for meetings.More Americans - not just the young techie types who do all their shopping online - are skipping restaurant lines and ordering to-go meals over the Internet. In 2005, the National Restaurant Association reported that about 11 percent of restaurant consumers ordered online. That expanded to 13 percent last year and is expected to reach 18 percent this year.”Once the kinks have been worked out and the timing is down, I definitely think it’s one of those conveniences that consumers are going to want and start demanding,” said Sheri Daye Scott, editor of QSR, a magazine which tracks the fast-food restaurant industry. “I see it going well over 50 percent, especially if the text-message ordering takes off.”Pizza companies, viewed by many as pioneers in online meal ordering, are now allowing customers to order up a pie after punching a few buttons on their cell phone.Dallas-based Pizza Hut announced last week that its customers can now send a text-message order to a central reservations number and wait for a return text message to confirm. Papa John’s did the same thing in November.Industry experts say customers like using the Internet because they find that their orders are often more accurate than when they use the phone.On the phone, “You tend to get people who don’t really know what they’re doing,” said Tonie Steel, who sets up lunch meetings at the Lockheed Martin Recreation Association. “Then you have to call five times to confirm to make sure they get it right.”Steel said she has had a great experience with Jason’s Deli.”Most of the time, the only errors are my typing errors,” she said.Although online ordering has mainly taken hold in pizza joints and sit-down restaurants, there are signs it could move next into hotels and airports.The Omni Mandalay Hotel in Las Colinas, Texas, started a test program late last year where guests can order room service over the Internet. And you don’t have to pay for the hotel’s in-room Internet service to order. Currently, 1 in every 10 room-service orders comes from online, Omni officials said.The Irving, Texas-based company hopes to eventually roll out the service to all of its properties.Baltimore/Washington International Airport will soon have one of the first airport restaurants that takes online orders. Silver Diner, with a motif that takes customers back to the ’30s, ’40s and ’50s, is looking to be known for 21st-century service, said Mark Russell, director of new-store development for the 16-store chain.The company would like to have kiosks throughout the terminal as well as in the pilots’ lounge where customers can place orders. Or business travelers might whip out their cell phones as soon as they land and order meals that can be delivered to their gate.The company recently signed a franchise agreement with Creative Host Services that has Philadelphia next on the expansion list. He said Creative Host is also “very interested” in Dallas/Fort Worth Airport.More restaurants, including Jason’s Deli and Wingstop, are starting to adopt the technology that lets them take credit card numbers securely over the Internet.Andy Fang wishes that Chipotle, known for big burritos and long lines, would go that route.”It’d be nice to pay online, that way it would be even quicker in the store,” Fang said. Regardless, “it feels better than having to stand there for 30 minutes on your lunch break.”The 28-year-old administrative assistant with Sabre Airline Solutions said he’s been using the Internet for the past decade and will always opt to buy online if he can.Although ordering online is pitched as a quick and easy way to get a meal, some think it’s popular for just the opposite reason.”You’re not rushed,” said Chuck Bush, owner of Fuzzy’s Taco Shop, which has three stores in Fort Worth and Denton, Texas. “Your feet are up. I’ve got a little more time to browse.”As a result, the customer feels a little more comfortable indulging.”I may be the not-so-fit-guy who’s embarrassed to order the chips and queso,” he said. “It’s kind of discreet.”

WALNUT CREEK, Calif. Consuming large amounts of caffeine during pregnancy by drinking coffee, soda, tea or hot chocolate increases the risk of miscarriage, a new study reveals.Women who ingest 200 milligrams or more of caffeine per day are twice as likely to miscarry as women who consume no caffeine, the study by Kaiser Permanente found.That equals about two cups of coffee daily or five 12-ounce cans of soda.”We recommend avoiding caffeine, but if people are compelled to have it, we tell them for sure to limit it,” said Dr. David Walton, Kaiser’s regional chief of perinatology.Previous studies have shown a link between caffeine and miscarriage. But critics questioned those findings, arguing that the results may have been skewed since many healthy pregnant women reduce their caffeine intake because of nausea and vomiting.The Kaiser study addressed that issue by examining both women whose caffeine consumption changed during pregnancy and those who had no change.It also adjusted for such factors as a mother’s age, race and income level, and whether she smoked, consumed alcohol, used a hot tub or had a previous miscarriage.The study appears online Monday in the Web site of the American Journal of Obstetrics and Gynecology, www.ajog.org.”Caffeine crosses the placenta barrier easily,” said Dr. De-Kun Li, the study’s lead investigator.Once in the fetus, it may stay there longer because fetuses have an underdeveloped metabolic system, Li said.In large quantities, caffeine may also decrease placental blood flow and harm cell development, experts say.Not only should pregnant women limit their caffeine consumption, women who are attempting to become pregnant should consider doing so as well because the first 20 to 40 days after an egg is fertilized is a key time in its development, Walton said. As a result, harm could occur before a pregnancy is confirmed.The researchers examined caffeine use among 1,063 pregnant Kaiser members in the San Francisco area from October 1996 to October 1998.Interviewers asked the women about the frequency and amount of beverages they consumed and whether they changed their patterns after becoming pregnant.The researchers then estimated the amount of caffeine consumed by assuming that for every 150 milliliters of a beverage, coffee contains 100 milligrams of caffeine, tea 39 milligrams, soda 15 milligrams and hot chocolate 2 milligrams.Even decaffeinated coffee contains some caffeine. They estimated 2 milligrams.The researchers then compared caffeine use with rates of miscarriage during the first 20 weeks.”The increased risk of miscarriage appeared to be due to caffeine itself rather than other possible chemicals in coffee because caffeine intake from non-coffee sources showed the similarly increased risk of miscarriage,” the study found.While there was some indication that consuming less than 200 milligrams of caffeine daily might increase the risk, the numbers were not large enough to be statistically significant, and thus no conclusions could be drawn about smaller amounts of caffeine, Li said.Walton said he is concerned that women who had a miscarriage several years ago will now blame themselves because they drank coffee during their pregnancy. He noted that many other factors can lead to miscarriages.Kaiser urges pregnant women to drink no more than the equivalent of one or two cups of coffee per day, if they cannot avoid caffeine altogether.”What we’re trying to tell people is that a lot of times we use caffeine because we have bad lifestyles,” Walton said. “So if we can make our lifestyles better and exercise more and sleep better, then caffeine isn’t such a compelling part of our life.”We’re really trying to get across the message that healthy lifestyles can help us reduce our intake of things like caffeine.”Experts suggest seeking a natural energy boost by taking a brisk walk, doing yoga stretches, or snacking on dried fruits and nuts.

In the new movie “Cloverfield” a towering monster runs amok in New York City, knocking over buildings and collapsing bridges.No, it’s not a very original idea. But “Cloverfield” sells an old premise by telling the entire story through the footage shot on a video cam by a 20-something partygoer who witnesses these cataclysmic events.”The idea of a Godzilla-like creature trashing New York is pretty absurd,” observes Anthony Timpone, editor of Fangoria, a magazine devoted to horror, fantasy and science fiction.”But by telling the tale through `found footage,’ the filmmakers provide the sort of immediacy that might overcome the viewers’ objections. They’ve even cast the film with talented unknowns. … If it was Tom Cruise running around trying to evade the monster, it would take you out of the movie. But having unknown actors helps sell you on the story’s authenticity.”No matter how convincingly made, “Cloverfield” is unlikely to persuade anyone that it’s based on real events.Yet just a few years back a little movie called “The Blair Witch Project” did just that. The film so effectively employed “found footage” - purportedly left behind by members of a documentary crew who vanished in the Maryland woods - that thousands of gullible moviegoers became convinced it was the real deal.Called fake documentaries, mockumentaries or faux reality, movies that mimic documentary forms can range from the hilarious to the dead serious.Often, as in the comedies of filmmaker Christopher Guest (”Waiting for Guffman,” “Best in Show”), they have satiric intentions and slyly ridicule political and cultural norms and human foibles.Sometimes the format is used to make the scares scarier, as with “Cloverfield” or George Romero’s “Diary of the Dead” (scheduled to open Feb. 15), in which footage shot by students making a zombie movie reveals that they’ve captured real zombies on film.At other times, as with director Brian De Palma’s “Redacted,” the mockumentary format brings added realism to dramatic current events.In that film the rape and murder of an Iraqi girl by American soldiers is told entirely through the evidence left by a GI’s video, surveillance cameras, Web sites, news footage and a documentary film. It’s fake, but it looks real.As we’ve seen with “Blair Witch,” these movies can be quite convincing.Which raises an interesting question: Are we sophisticated enough to recognize when the images we see in theaters and on TV and the Internet have been faked? Are we smart to the scam?”I don’t think there is an easy answer to these questions,” said Craig Hight, a New Zealand educator and co-author of the book “Faking It: Mock-Documentary and the Subversion of Factuality.”"Audiences are familiar with mockumentaries after watching everything from `This Is Spinal Tap’ to `Blair Witch’ to TV’s `The Office’ to `Borat.’ So they are `sophisticated’ to the extent of their knowledge of the form.”People watch reality TV shows like “Survivor,” well aware that authentic images can be manipulated and rearranged, Hight said, and almost everyone recognizes that photographs and video footage can be digitally altered so convincingly that only analysts with sophisticated computer programs can detect the changes.”Despite all of these developments, I think we still have a common-sense belief in photographic images,” Hight said. “We go to the television set to see what really happened, to hear the emotion, to live something of the experience. We still seek those forms of media that we can assume are more `authentic’ or `raw.’ I think that’s a key part of the attraction of sites like YouTube, with so much amateur content.”In fact, the Internet is replete with sites offering bits of fuzzy footage recorded by just plain folks on their cell phone cameras. We assume that what we see really happened, whether it’s footage of skateboarders doing incredible stunts or of sidewalk fistfights.But there’s nothing to stop a tech-savvy provocateur from giving us staged or digitally manipulated footage and making it seem real by mimicking the look and feel of something recorded on a cell phone.It’s all part of a long tradition of selling fantastic fiction by making it seem real. Bram Stoker’s original vampire yarn “Dracula,” for example, was written as a series of diary entries, an approach that made the story seem plausible. Orson Welles’ infamous “War of the Worlds” radio broadcast in 1938 so perfectly mimicked a night of standard radio fare that when it was interrupted by fake news reports of a Martian invasion, mass hysteria followed.”We’re pushovers for this stuff,” said Chris Gore, movie critic and operator of the pop culture site filmthreat.com.”You could argue that there are no original stories left, but there are original ways of telling those stories. A film told in fake documentary style approaches the material in an entirely new way. And we’re eager - maybe too eager - to buy into the illusion.”An exhibition opening next month at the Smithsonian’s Hirshhorn Museum in Washington examines this very issue. The show, “The Cinema Effect: Illusion, Reality and the Moving Image,” explores (according to the exhibit’s program) “the ever-increasing impact of the cinematic on our perceptions and the ways in which the very boundaries between ‘real life’ and make-believe have become at least blurred, if not indecipherable.”Kristen Hileman, co-curator of the exhibit, said the show examines “how contemporary artists use a documentary aesthetic to create a convincing illusion of real life, or to present alternate views of reality.”One installation, created by a young woman who grew up in the Republic of the Congo, contrasts propaganda footage celebrating that country’s dictator with images of the artist participating in a march to honor his reign.”Only her movements are so mechanical and puppet-like that it forces you to examine how politicians and the media can create a spectacle that doesn’t at all represent what people are truly experiencing,” Hileman said.Another piece in the show uses a computer program to turn footage of the reading of the verdict of the O.J. Simpson trial into a cartoon. The change in medium, from news footage to animation, completely changes the viewer’s reading of the scene and forces us to consider how images can be manipulated.”You come away thinking that we really need to be savvy about what we’re looking at,” Hileman said.Younger audiences tend to be wiser to visual trickery than their parents, Hight suggests.”What’s somewhat shocking and disturbing for older audiences has become just a fact of life that young people deal with every day,” he said. “After all, we’ve got `The Daily Show’ giving us a constant lesson in deconstructing the news. It’s a new kind of literacy which is becoming more mainstream, and it’s created a more challenging environment for filmmakers to operate within.”Hileman said she endorses “a healthy cynical attitude” about the images we’re fed through the media.”That attitude is a manifestation of a culture becoming more self-aware about image use and the technological tools that can manipulate reality.”But at the same time, one of the big attractions of art is that people appreciate being fooled. We love the illusion, and part of the pleasure of being sucked in is knowing that the reality we’re being immersed in isn’t real.”The cinematic experience, after all, will always be about suspending our disbelief.”MEMORABLE MOCKUMENTARIES”Cannibal Holocaust” (1980): In this gruesome exploitation film, documentary footage left behind by a film crew in the South American jungle reveals a bloody encounter with an Indian tribe.”This Is Spinal Tap” (1984): A has-been Brit heavy metal band tours America in this hilarious faux documentary from Rob Reiner. Among the leads is Christopher Guest (see below).”84 Charlie Mopic” (1989): An American patrol in search of the Viet Cong is shown in the footage of an Army cameraman sent along to record their mission. Regarded by many as the most authentic Vietnam combat movie ever.The films of Christopher Guest: After starring in “Spinal Tap,” Guest adopted the mockumentary as his signature directing style. The result: largely improvised comedies like 1996’s “Waiting for Guffman” (about a small-town historic pageant), 2000’s “Best in Show” (the national dog show), 2003’s “A Mighty Wind” (folk singers) and 2006’s “For Your Consideration” (Oscar mania).”The Blair Witch Project” (1999): Made on the cheap, this atmospheric horror film felt so “authentic” many moviegoers assumed it was the real thing. One of the most lucrative movies ever released.”The Office” (2005- ): This popular workplace TV comedy employs documentary-style talking-head interviews in which characters speak directly to the camera.

LOS ANGELES Hollywood directors reached a tentative contract deal Thursday with studios, a development that could turn up the pressure on striking writers to settle their 2-month-old walkout that has crippled the entertainment industry.”Two words describe this agreement - groundbreaking and substantial,” said Gil Cates, chair of the Directors Guild of America’s negotiations committee. “There are no rollbacks of any kind.”Among other things, the three-year agreement establishes key provisions involving compensation for programs offered on the Internet.That issue has been a key sticking point between striking writers and the studios, which broke off talks on Dec. 7.The writers walkout has halted work on dozens of TV shows, disrupted movie production, turned the glitzy Golden Globes show into a news conference and threatened the upcoming Academy Awards ceremony.The deal between directors and the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers, which represents studios, was lauded by top executives from eight major companies, including Fox, Paramount Pictures Corp., The Walt Disney Co., CBS Corp., Sony Pictures Entertainment, Warner Bros., MGM and NBC Universal.In a joint statement, the executives said they hoped the agreement would signal the end of an “extremely difficult period for our industry.”They called on the writers guild to join in the kind of informal talks with industry leaders that preceded the directors’ negotiations, and said the deal with directors established a precedent for the industry’s creative talent to “participate financially in every emerging area of new media.”The Writers Guild of America said it would evaluate the terms of the directors’ proposed contract. The guild also reiterated that it has been calling on the studios to resume negotiations.”We’ve been making independent deals, so we’re in a negotiating mood,” said Writers Guild of America, West, President Patric Verrone, referring to interim agreements the guild has reached with companies such as United Artists and The Weinstein Co.Verrone declined to comment on specifics of the deal by directors or compare it to what the writers are seeking until he saw a copy of the proposed contract, which he expected to receive from the directors guild.Writers previously said directors do not represent their interests.Alliance President Nick Counter said in a statement that the directors’ talks focused on key issues, and the result was a groundbreaking agreement for the industry at large.”This deal was strongly influenced by the writers strike,” said Jonathan Handel, an entertainment lawyer in Los Angeles and a former counsel to the writers guild. “It shows all the earmarks of the improvements the writers were looking for - but it doesn’t achieve them by any means.”In the significant area of streaming media, the deal falls short of “fundamental fairness,” Handel said.However, he considers it unlikely the writers can get a better agreement.The deal with directors gives their union jurisdiction over programs produced for distribution on the Internet and sets a new residuals formula for some paid Internet downloads that essentially doubles the rate currently paid by employers, the guild said.In addition, it sets residual rates for ad-supported streaming and use of clips on the Internet.The deal was welcomed by others in Hollywood.”I’m very pleased with the new agreement and I hope it helps speed up the negotiations” with the writers guild, George Clooney said in a statement.Clooney has often commented on the need to resolve the strike to put thousands of people back to work in Hollywood.Roberta Reardon, president of the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists, which represents actors, singers, dancers, announcers and others, called the deal encouraging and said her guild was optimistic the writers guild would resume negotiations soon.The directors guild was well-prepared when it started negotiations Jan. 12.It had spent $2 million researching the potential value of new media over the next decade and held a series of meetings with key studio heads to establish a basis for the formal talks.Gil Cates, who’s been involved in union contract negotiations for three decades, served as lead negotiator for directors.He is also producing this year’s Academy Awards, which are imperiled by the writers’ standoff.Last Sunday’s Golden Globes show was reduced to a news conference after actors refused to cross writers’ threatened picket lines.NBC lost millions of dollars in ad revenue, and award winners were deprived of instant publicity that could have provided a box-office bump.New media issues also were expected to dominate negotiations with the Screen Actors Guild, whose contract expires in June.The directors guild said late last year that it would delay the start of talks to give writers a chance to come to an agreement with studios.But the guild clearly lost patience after negotiations between the writers and studios broke off last month and the strike dragged on.Among other things, the studios’ deal with directors says programs produced for the Internet will be directed by guild members, with the exception of low-budget shows, and payments for downloaded TV programs and movies will be based on a distributor’s gross.Distributor’s gross represents the amount received by the company responsible for distributing the film or TV program on the Internet.The writers guild was seeking 2.5 percent of such grosses, about three times what the directors’ deal provides. Interim deals the writers guild has made with studios provide for 2 percent compensation on downloaded films and 2.5 percent on TV programs, the guild said Thursday.Under the proposed directors agreement, companies are contractually obligated to provide the guild “unfettered access to their deals and data,” the guild said, calling that unprecedented transparency.In their talks, the writers guild and studios clashed over using a percentage of gross receipts to determine Internet compensation.The guild said it sought that approach but was told by the alliance it was an unworkable and unacceptable formula.The studios offered, for example, a flat $250 payment for a year’s use of an hourlong TV show on the Web.The guild balked, citing the $20,000-plus residual that writers now earn for a single network rerun of a TV episode.Also at issue for the writers guild is unionization of reality and animation writers.Talks broke down after the alliance demanded the guild take that and other issues off the table, claiming there had been an agreement to drop it.The guild’s next move may be influenced by history.There’s a lingering resentment among members over what they considered raw deals in the 1980s involving what eventually became lucrative home-video and DVD markets.The writers guild home-video deal was shaped by a deal made previously by the directors guild, following an industry practice of pattern bargaining. That created resentment among some writers guild members toward the directors guild.