The public: consumers or citizens? Participatory initiatives and the reform of public service media regulation in Germany

The German federal interstate treaties, as the regulatory framework for public service media (PSM), have recently been under reform. The starting point of the amendments is the so-called ZDF decision of the German Federal Constitutional Court from the 25th of March, 2014. The Federal Constitutional Court was confronted with the question of whether the composition of the broadcasting council in the second biggest public service broadcasting station in Germany, the ZDF (Zweites Deutsches Fernsehen, Second German Television), is compliant with the constitution. This resulted in reforms of numerous regulatory regimes in several German federal states. This article compares the decision-making process related to the WDR (Westdeutscher Rundfunk, West-German Broadcasting) (whose legislator is Northrhine-Westfalia) and the ZDF (whose legislator is Rhineland-Palatinate), the two biggest PSM broadcasters in Germany. In the case of these two German federal states, this paper strives to provide insight into the strategies of the state chancellery, the responsible legislative authorities, to negotiate a new regulatory framework. The paper also discusses the issue of the “implied audience” during the negotiations and civil society’s participation in media policy debates and media governance. The analysis is based on a systematization of the citizen and the consumer in media policy. This working hypothesis assumes that the implied image of the audience differs in the two federal states. The negotiations in Rhineland-Palatinate can be described as ambivalent in terms of how it understood the audience, whereas Northrhine-Westfalia rather addressed the audience as citizens. The study suggests that the ZDF decision created a momentum for broader media policy debates in Germany, which has long been a neglected issue, both in civil society and media regulation – as well as in communication studies

Modification of amino acids at shock pressures of 3 to 30 GPA: Initial results

Since the discovery of amino acids in the Murchison meteorite, much speculation has focused on their origin and subsequent alteration, including the possible role of secondary processes, both terrestrial and extraterrestrial. As collisional processes and associated shock waves seem to have affected the silicate portions of many primitive meteorites, a mixture of powdered Allende (125-150 m grain size) and nine synthetic amino acids (six protein and three nonprotein) were subjected to controlled shock pressures from 3 to 30 GPa to determine the effect of shocks on amino acid survivability. Preliminary characterizations of the recovered shock products are presented

Hypervelocity particle capture: Some considerations regarding suitable target media

Hypervelocity particles colliding with passive capture media will be traversed by shock waves; depending on the stress amplitude, the particle may remain solid or it may melt or vaporize. Any capture mechanism considered for cosmic dust collection in low Earth-orbit must be designed such that sample alteration and hence loss of scientific information is minimized. Capture of pristine particles is fundamentally difficult, because the specific heat of melting and even vaporization is exceeded upon impact at typical, geocentric encounter velocities. From the results of calculated and observed melting behaviors it is concluded that shock stresses in excess of 50 GPA should be avoided during hypervelocity particle capture on board Space Station and that stresses 20 GPa, even at 15 km/s collision velocities, should constitute desirable instrument design goals. Some principal characteristics of the capture medium that may satisfy these requirements are identified

Multimedia: How to Combine Language and Visuals

In the last decade, advanced computer technology has allowed for development of information systems and learning environments that combine language with other forms of human communication in innovative ways. Language in the form of written texts, for example, can be combined not only with static pictures or graphs as in printed material, but also with animation or video

The Discussion Goes on: What Is the Role of Euryarchaeota in Humans?

The human body (primarily the intestinal tract, the oral cavity, and the skin) harbours approximately 1,000 different bacterial species. However, the number of archaeal species known to colonize man seems to be confined to a handful of organisms within the class Euryarchaeota (including Methanobrevibacter smithii, M. oralis, and Methanosphaera stadtmanae). In contrast to this conspicuously low diversity of Archaea in humans their unique physiology in conjunction with the growing number of reports regarding their occurrence at sites of infection has made this issue an emerging field of study. While previous review articles in recent years have addressed the putative role of particularly methanogenic archaea for human health and disease, this paper compiles novel experimental data that have been reported since then. The aim of this paper is to inspire the scientific community of “Archaea experts” for those unique archaeal organisms that have successfully participated in the human-microbe coevolution

On the relation of classical and temporal planning

Abstract This paper explores a research strategy for a uniform and rational reconstruction of AI planning techniques. The strategy relies on two assumptions: (1) classical planners like STRIPS or SNLP are restricted variants of temporal planners like DEVISER, and (2) temporal planners may be best constructed atop a time map manager (TMM). The strategy aims at a reconstruction of timeless, classical as well as temporal systems in a TMM-based architectural framework. However, this paper shows that assumed restricted variants of DEVISER cannot be adequately recast in the TMM framework: this result is shown to hold for classical nonlinear planners like SNLP, and one reasonable extension by possibly simultaneous actions. Hence, in accordance with recent complexity results, this paper calls the intutively appealing research strategy into question. Motivation Classical planning in the tradition of STRIPS DEVISER The rational reconstruction of planners described in the literature is an important objective of current research. Chapman We are interested in planners which may be located in the middle-ground between classical nonlinear planners like NOAH When pursuing the research strategy assuming that any point in the spectrum is a restricted variant of DEViSER-style systems, and that general temporal planners may be adequately constructed on top of a TMM, two unexpected problems arise: equivalent recasting of neither (1) classical nonlinear planners nor (2) reasonable extension by simultaneous actions is possible within the TMM framework, when keeping the idea of clearly separating temporal reasoning and plan construction. These problems are caused by the facts that (1) conflict-free time map does not neccessarily represent a correct nonlinear plan, and (2) there is (at least) one sonable but not recastable alternative to TMM's built-in criterion for simultaneous exeeutability of actions. The paper has the following structure: After introducing basic definitions in section 2, two reasonable approaches to extending the planning framework by simultaneous actions are described in section 3. The TMMbased construction of the temporal, nonlinear planner 1 Recent complexity considerations 4

Physical properties of interplanetary grains

Morphological analyses of micrometeorite craters found on lunar rocks and laboratory simulation experiments are used to formulate a meteoritic interplanetary dust particle for optical scattering calculations that is roughly spherical and has a density of 2g cm/3. The model particle has chondritic elemental abundances and also contains a high content of finely dispersed carbon