Music experts to look at effects of sharing on the Internet

The courts may have temporarily silenced the Napsters of the world, but the song-file Silk Road that is the Internet remains a bustling thoroughfare. In an effort to gauge how sharing on the Web and track sampling have transformed the music industry, the Krieger School's Communication in Contemporary Society program will present the panel discussion "The Art of Theft: Music in the Digital Age."

The event will be held from 4 to 6 p.m. on Saturday, Nov. 9, in 110 Gilman Hall, Homewood campus. Confirmed speakers are DJ Kool, an American/Def Jam recording artist; Larry Hoffman, a Grammy-nominated music historian and award-winning composer and producer; Scott Johnson, a music attorney and digital rights expert; and Stephen Janis, a producer/writer and vice president of A&R for Blazin Records.

For more information, call Advanced Academic Programs at 410-516-6057.

Big Brother and civil liberties: An MSE Symposium debate

Nadine Strossen, president of the American Civil Liberties Union, and NBC News analyst Christopher Whitcomb will debate "Big Brother: The Effect of Government Policies on Civil Liberties," at 8 p.m. on Thursday, Nov. 7, in Homewood's Shriver Hall.

The debate, co-sponsored by the JHU Information Security Institute, is part of the 2002 MSE Symposium, Changing Times: Who Are We? An Introspective Look at American Identity in the 21st Century, a student-run series examining the influence of various political, social and scientific advances on the collective American identity.

Strossen is a professor of law at New York Law School, who in 1991 became the first woman elected president of the ACLU. She has written and lectured extensively about constitutional law, civil liberties and international human rights.

A 15-year veteran of the FBI, Whitcomb serves as an on-air analyst for NBC News and writes a monthly column for Gentleman's Quarterly. He investigated acts of terrorism ranging from the World Trade Center bombing of 1993 to the USS Cole bombing in Aden, Yemen. Before joining the FBI, he worked as a speech writer and press secretary to Rep. Silvio O. Conte of Massachusetts.

NHLBI Proteomics Center to hold inaugural symposium

The new Johns Hopkins NHLBI Proteomics Center will be hosting its inaugural symposium from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Nov. 8 in 340 Phipps Building, East Baltimore campus. Hopkins faculty will cover the scientific rationale and mission of the Proteomics Center, which was created by an $18 million seven-year contract from the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute. The center will develop and implement new technologies and will investigate the proteomics of adaptation to ischemia and hypoxia in heart, lung and blood. Speakers are the leaders of the contract's biological and technological projects.

Registration is not necessary.

For a list of sessions, go to www.insidehopkinsmedicine.org/news/ news_detail_page.cfm?id=538.