ABOUT VACATION AND WORK - In a recent Vacation and Technology Survey: 1,493 respondents reported on their use of technology during vacations. The complete results are at: http://www.masie.com/survey/ Here are a few tidbits: 32% of the respondents brought a laptop along; 49% of the folks checked email during their vacation; 696 people checked their work voice mail while on vacation; and 293 people read a business book on a recent vacation. (TechLearn Trends #139 17 Aug 99)

THOMAS EDISON STATE COLLEGE, RANKED ONE OF "TOP 20" - Forbes Magazine rated Thomas Edison among the top 20 Cyber-Universities. The university has been serving adults wherever they live and work since 1972. Adults earn credit for knowledge they already have and take high-quality, distance learning courses. The College offers 13 undergraduate degrees and the on-line Master of Science in Management with no residency for most programs. For more information on Thomas Edison see: http://www.tesc.edu (July-August 1999 issue of On the Horizon: http://horizon.unc.edu/horizon/online/html/7/4/)

THE MIND IS IMMORTAL - Business Week magazine in a recent issue discusses 21 ideas that may be key to understanding the next century. One idea is the simulation of an individual's brain activity, making it possible for future generations to converse with a virtual equivalent of the person years after his or her death. By the 2030s, technology may be developed to simulate a nervous system's electrical activity, allowing thoughts and feelings to be preserved. Initial versions of the hardware for this "Soul Catcher" have already been developed. A person's life could be recorded using tiny video cameras housed in eyeglass frames. These cameras could be linked to IBM's newest hard disk, which is the size of a quarter and stores 300 MB, or one month worth of data. IBM is also developing software to index video content automatically, allowing users to easily access a specific moment in their lives. By 2099, a "Soul Emancipator" will be able to access the hard data and reconstruct a person's thoughts and feelings, allowing future generations to receive realistic answers to questions posed to a person that has been dead for years. (Business Week 08/30/99)