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Edmund Carpenter, an archaeologist and anthropologist who, impatient with traditional boundaries between disciplines, did groundbreaking work in anthropological filmmaking and ethnomusicology and, with his friend Marshall McLuhan, laid the foundations of modern media studies, died on July 1 in Southampton, N.Y. He was 88.

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Adelaide de Menil

Edmund Carpenter during a trip to Greenland in the 1990s.

His death was confirmed by his wife, Adelaide de Menil.

Mr. Carpenter, a disciple of the anthropologist Frank Speck, started out excavating prehistoric Indian sites in the Northeast but soon showed signs of the intellectual restlessness that marked his entire career.

At a time when few anthropologists showed much interest in the Arctic and its peoples, he embarked on a series of expeditions among the Aivilik people and published several books on the Inuit: “Time/Space Concepts of the Aivilik” (1955), “Anerca” (1959) and “Eskimo” (1959), republished as “Eskimo Realities” in 1973.

His interest in language and culture led him into a fruitful collaboration with McLuhan when both taught at the University of Toronto in the 1950s. Together they organized the influential Seminar on Culture and Communication to discuss the role of radio, television, film and print in transforming human relations.

Mr. Carpenter took the lead in editing Explorations, the interdisciplinary journal that grew out of the seminar; it published writers like the anthropologist Dorothy Lee and the literary critic Northrop Frye.

In 1969, he and Ms. De Menil, a photographer whom he would later marry and a member of the family that founded the Menil Collection in Houston, went to Papua New Guinea to observe the effects of modern communications on tribal peoples. Invited by the Australian government, he accepted the post of research professor at the University of Papua New Guinea because it offered “an unparalleled opportunity to step in and out of 10,000 years of media history, observing, probing, testing,” he wrote in “Oh, What a Blow That Phantom Gave Me!” (1972), his best-known book. “I wanted to observe, for example, what happens when a person — for the first time — sees himself in a mirror, in a photograph, on films, hears his voice; sees his name.”

He was deeply skeptical about scientific claims of impartiality and worried about the destructive effects of modern life on tribal peoples. Although he continued to teach anthropology and supported numerous ethnographic filmmakers, he disengaged from the profession.

He taught intermittently in the United States and spent eight years at the Museum of Ethnology in Basel editing the papers of the art historian Carl Schuster, which were published in 12 volumes as “Social Symbolism in Ancient and Tribal Art: A Record of Tradition and Continuity” in the late 1980s and in a one-volume condensation, “Patterns That Connect: Social Symbolism in Ancient & Tribal Art.”

Edmund Snow Carpenter, known as Ted, was born on Sept. 2, 1922, in Rochester. As a boy he dug for artifacts at the family’s summer home at Gull Lake, Mich. At 13 he met Arthur C. Parker, a Seneca anthropologist and director of the Rochester Museum and Science Center, who invited him to take part in excavations of prehistoric Iroquoian sites.

He enrolled at the University of Pennsylvania in 1940 to study with Speck but joined the Marines a few months after Pearl Harbor. He saw action in New Guinea, the Solomon Islands, the Marianas and Iwo Jima. After the war ended, he was assigned to oversee several hundred Japanese prisoners, whom he put to work on an archaeological dig in Tumin Bay, Guam.

After being discharged from the Marines in 1946 with the rank of captain, he returned to the University of Pennsylvania, which awarded him a bachelor’s degree. He received a doctorate in 1950, writing his dissertation on the prehistory of the Northeast.

At the University of Toronto, where he began teaching in 1948, he became entranced by what he later called “the nonsensory spirit world of electronic media.”

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LARGO The allegations were startling: that three black detention deputies at the Pinellas County Jail were treating white inmates harshly while favoring black inmates.

A five-month internal investigation by the Pinellas County Sheriffs Office that was released this week never proved or disproved claims of racial preference claims that were made by inmates and fellow deputies.

But in the end, two detention deputies were suspended after investigators determined they had violated policies governing the treatment of inmates. The third deputy around whom many of the complaints swirled resigned in February before the investigation was finished.

Former Sgt. Lesley Rowe was demoted to deputy and given an 80-hour suspension for violating agency policies. Deputy Trina Landrum also received an 80-hour suspension for the same reason. Former deputy Melinda Mason resigned.

Investigators said Rowe witnessed Mason, her subordinate, belittling inmates over minor infractions, but Rowe didnt address it. Rowe also admitted she ordered deputies to withhold food from inmates who were talking during breakfast, which contradicts a Sheriffs Office policy.

Investigators determined Landrum witnessed Mason telling inmates to dump their food trays as punishment and didnt report it, and also threatened inmates that they would have to forfeit their meal for talking.

Rowe declined to be interviewed for this article. Landrum and Mason didnt return phone calls seeking comment.

According to the 925-page report, the allegations came to light in October when a jail corporal approached a captain and said three deputies in a housing facility for female inmates wanted out of the unit because inmates were being mistreated.

One of those deputies, Angela Fisher, had been keeping notes about questionable incidents and told investigators she had considered resigning because of the stress of working with Rowe and Mason.

Its incredibly stressful Nobody wants to go to an environment where youre looked at differently or you have to hear people belittle people or yell at them for hours at a time and stand there and listen to them say these things, Fisher told investigators.

Fisher and several other deputies said they didnt report the problems because they were afraid of retaliation by Rowe, a sergeant. At least five deputies said they believed Mason, Rowe and Landrum, or some combination thereof, were favoring black inmates and only came down hard on white inmates.

One deputy said some black inmates referred to the trio as the Black Squadron and seemed to believe theyd get preferential treatment from them.

However, that deputy said Landrum had addressed that issue with inmates at one point, making it clear she would not play favorites.

Most complaints centered on Mason, who deputies and inmates said had a habit of lengthy and degrading tirades against inmates. The incidents reported about her included:

That she took off her handcuffs, pepper spray and Taser, and challenged two different inmates to fight in separate incidents. Investigators said that put other deputies at risk and was contradictory to agency policy, which encourages jailers to de-escalate aggression.

One inmate said she was forced to stand and listen to Mason degrade her for more than an hour and a half after she moved to a different bunk. There is no policy assigning women to specific bunks in that unit.

The same woman said Mason told other inmates she was a snitch. She said she was scared to death of Mason and Landrum, and thought Rowe was part of their team.

Another inmate said Mason screamed at her for more than an hour and a half, threatened to hit her, and encouraged other inmates to criticize her.

Mason told investigators that she did not try to engage inmates in fist fights. She denied some of the allegations and admitted others, ultimately agreeing that she had violated agency policies.

Landrum told investigators that she had been fair and just with inmates and had never made an inmate dump a tray. She said she only told inmates they could be sent out of the chow hall because that was Rowes directive.

Rowe admitted violating agency policies, saying she felt some of her orders, such as dumping food trays, were based on discretion. She acknowledged that she witnessed Mason being verbally aggressive at times and failed to handle those situations properly.

All three deputies were reassigned. When asked how things were in the unit with their absence, the deputy who had thought about resigning had this to say: Peaceful.

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HATFIELD, Pa., June 15, 2011 /PRNewswire/ — Today, the School and College Organization for Prevention Educators (SCOPE) opened its doors and began welcoming its first members. SCOPE serves as an interdisciplinary hub for prevention educators. SCOPE is the first organization of its kind to encompass the full breadth and depth of the field of prevention. SCOPE prioritizes the advancement of primary prevention research, practice and implementation.

Schools, communities, agencies, colleges and universities all over the world employ prevention professionals who are tasked with addressing a range of high-risk violence, health and safety issues, but until now, no membership association has been able to bring these dedicated educators into community with one another. SCOPE fills that need.

SCOPE was created by a generous grant from the parents of a college student who wish to remain anonymous. Through their generosity, SCOPE can function and thrive independently as a not-for-profit association of like-minded professionals who serve the prevention needs of schools, colleges and communities in the United States and internationally.

Prevention professionals have historically joined professional associations, participated in listservs and attended conferences in their specific disciplines. This has resulted in the delineation of prevention efforts by subfields. SCOPE recognizes that there is more commonality to prevention efforts than there are distinctions. What alcohol abuse educators know can benefit what sexual violence prevention specialists do. Prevention of hazing and bullying have much in common. Additionally, we know that many areas of prevention intersect. SCOPE aims to bridge subfields by joining prevention professionals from across the prevention disciplines together to learn from one another, explore best practices and further shared goals.

Conferences focused at school, college and community audiences address sexual assault, eating disorders, peer education, advocacy, alcohol, hazing, drugs, suicide, mental health and other risks. Until now, no conference has gathered prevention professionals in a multi-disciplinary setting to guide, shape and lead the prevention field. SCOPEs Annual International Conference will bring school, college and community prevention educators together to share resources, apply research, and empower the synergies that result from bringing the disparate constituencies of prevention together into common cause.

Knowledge Groups are a central SCOPE resource. Knowledge Groups represent specific content areas relevant to the field of prevention. Members participate in one or more Knowledge Groups, as well as having access to topical materials. SCOPEs Knowledge Groups include:

• Advocacy
• Alcohol Abuse
• Bullying
• Bystander Intervention
• Drug Abuse
• Eating Disorders
• Hazing
• Mental Health
• Peer Education
• Primary Prevention
• Relationship/Domestic/Intimate Partner Violence
• Research
• Sexual Assault
• Social Norms
• Stalking
• Suicide

SCOPE embraces an ecological, inclusive, holistic, feminist, public health, evidence-based and multi-disciplinary vision of prevention. To effectively promote the aims of the prevention community, SCOPE members deeply examine the causes of violence, health and safety risks within society — including hate, intolerance, apathy, gender bias, racism, homophobia, stigmatization of mental health, objectification of the human body, ignorance, predation and discrimination — to foster effective, interconnected, strategic prevention.

For more information, please visit http://www.WeAreSCOPE.org or contact:

Michelle Issadore, M.Ed.
Executive Director
execdir@wearescope.org
610-993-0227

This press release was issued through eReleases(R). For more information, visit eReleases Press Release Distribution at http://www.ereleases.com.

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Our house in the western Catskills overlooks the Pepacton Reservoir, a 20-mile ribbon of water between Margaretville and Downsville. Maps on the Internet, depending on their scale and detail, will show you where the reservoir is in relation to nearby towns and roads. What they won’t show you, although every resident of the area knows about them, are the four towns — Arena, Shavertown, Union Grove and Pepacton — that were flooded in the middle ’50s so that the reservoir could be constructed. (Today, after more than 50 years, resentment against New York City remains strong.)

The maps and pictures of the reservoir are determinedly linear; the eye follows the water in its journey down Route 30 toward the city. But for the the old-timers, and the new-timers who have been caught up in the romance of the lost towns, the eye stops and looks down to what are now the geological layers of civilizations, one on the surface and claiming a literal, no-nonsense empirical reality (“If you want get from Andes to Downsville, you can travel on either side of the reservoir”), and the other below the surface, where lie subterranean Brigadoons that emerge not every hundred years but whenever the reservoir gets so low that pieces of a drowned culture suddenly and unnervingly come into view. At those moments the eye simply cannot travel the straight line encouraged by visible coherences and road signs; the natural pull of forward progress is forestalled and one begins to ruminate on what lies beneath our every step as we raise our feet to take the next one.

There is now a (relatively) new discipline in which this breaking down of time into spatial units that are read vertically rather than horizontally is the obligatory gesture. It calls itself GeoHumanities and its project is nicely encapsulated in the title of one of the essays in a collection that officially announces the emergence of a field of study. The collection is called “GeoHumanities: Art, History, Text at the Edge of Place”; the essay (by Edward L. Ayers, an historian and president of the University of Richmond) is entitled “Mapping Time.”

Ayers’s project is to map the changes that followed upon the emancipation of the slaves after the Civil War. He and his colleagues begin with a simple map and then they locate populations on the landscape and “put down one layer after another: of race, of wealth, of literacy, of water courses, of roads, of railways, of soil type, of voting patterns, of social structure.”

The layered picture that results can then be “read” and a story can be told, the story of complex relationships that are frozen by the analysis but which, of course, are really in motion. The next step is to acknowledge the motion by using cinematic techniques that present the passage of time as spatial units that succeed one another. “By converting time to motion,” says Ayers, “we can visualize the passage of time (as one watches the hands of a clock move).”

Ayers calls this technique of representation “deep contingency,” and he acknowledges its artificiality. The metaphor of a layered reality “is a fiction of course, since the layers continually interact and the ‘top’ layer of humans constantly changes the ‘bottom’ layer of landscape; but it is a useful fiction, since it reminds us of the structural depth of time and experience.” The project is a synthesis of geography (now renamed Geographic Information Science, or GIS) and history: “GIS is about patterns and structures; history is about motion; by integrating the two, we can see layers of events, layers of the consequences of unpredictability.”

That is, we can read events not merely historically, as the product of the events preceding them, but geologically, as the location of sedimented patterns of culture, economics, politics, agriculture. What is being attempted is a reorientation of perception, an alternative way of interpreting the world in which “space is not merely in the service of time, but has a poetics of its own, which reveals itself through a geographical or topological imagination rather than a historical one” (Paul Smethurst, “The Postmodern Chronotope”).

The interplay in these quotations between a literary and a geographical vocabulary tells us what GeoHumanities is all about; it is the elaboration, by methods derived from the humanities, of “the stratified record upon which we set our feet” (the title of another essay and a quote from Thomas Mann). It is the realization, in a style of analysis, of the “spatial turn,” a “critical shift that divested geography of its largely passive role as history’s ‘stage’ and brought to the fore intersections between the humanities and the earth sciences” (Peta Mitchell in “GeoHumanities”).

“Intersections” is perhaps too weak a word, because it suggests two disciplines that retain their distinctiveness but collaborate occasionally on a specific project. The stronger assertion, made by many in the volume, is that the division between empirical/descriptive disciplines and interpretive disciplines is itself a fiction and one that stands in the way of the production of knowledge.

An apparently empirical project like geography is, and always has been, interpretive through and through. “The map has always been a political agent”(Lize Mogel), has always had a “generative power” (Emily Eliza Scott), and that power can only be released and studied by those who approach their work in the manner of literary critics. Geography “demands a reader who is at once an archeologist, geologist and geographer, a reader who … is at all times attentive to the stratification of history, memory, language, and landscape and who can read obliquely through their layers” (Peta Mitchell).

If interpretive methods and perspectives are necessary to the practice of geography, they are no less necessary to other projects supposedly separate from the project of the humanities. And that is why, in addition to GeoHumanities, we now have Biohumanities (“the humanities not only comment on the significance or implications of biological knowledge, but add to our understanding of biology itself — Karola Stotz and Paul E. Griffiths), Disability Studies (of which the X-Men films might be both a representation and an instance), Metahistory (the study of the irreducibly narrative basis of historical “fact”), Law and Literature (the laying bare of the rhetorical and literary strategies giving form to every assertion in the law), Cultural Anthropology (an inquiry into the very possibility of anthropological observation that begins by acknowledging the inescapability of perspective and the ubiquity of interpretation), Cultural Sociology (“the commitment to hermeneutically reconstructing social texts in a rich and persuasive way” — Jeffrey C. Alexander and Philip Smith), and other hybrids already emergent and soon to emerge.

What this all suggests is that while we have been anguishing over the fate of the humanities, the humanities have been busily moving into, and even colonizing, the fields that were supposedly displacing them. In the ’70s and the ’80s the humanities exported theory to the social sciences and (with less influence) to the sciences; many disciplines saw a pitched battle between the new watchwords — perspective, contingency, dispersion, multi-vocality, intertextuality — and the traditional techniques of dispassionate observation, the collection of evidence, the drawing of warranted conclusions and the establishing of solid fact. Now the dust has settled and the invaded disciplines have incorporated much of what they resisted. Propositions that once seemed outlandish — all knowledge is mediated, even our certainties are socially constructed — are now routinely asserted in precincts where they were once feared as the harbingers of chaos and corrosive relativism.

One could say then that the humanities are the victors in the theory wars; nearly everyone now dances to their tune. But this conceptual triumph has not brought with it a proportionate share of resources or institutional support. Perhaps administrators still think of the humanities as the province of precious insights that offer little to those who are charged with the task of making sense of the world. Volumes like “GeoHumanities” tell a different story, and it is one that cannot be rehearsed too often.

Postscript: In my column on the conflict between faculty and administration at Idaho State University, I failed to mention that the provost, Gary Olson, is a humanities scholar who has written extensively about my work.

RIO RANCHO, NM — Rio Rancho city officials said four men in the fire and rescue department harassed a rookie male employee about his body, and now they?ll be punished.

Of the four employees, three will be suspended without pay and the fourth employee will get a written reprimand.

A fifth department employee was also suspended for trying to pressure the new employee for cooperating with the investigation.

The city will not release the names of the employees who have been disciplined

SuperSport rolled-off the Gaining Insight from Training (Gift) programme in Kenya that will see local trainees imparted with high quality television production skills on Wednesday.

The pioneer class of 41 is almost coming to an end of the six months course that will see the firm partner with Strathmore University in subsequent modules.

Speaking at the launch, Youth Affairs and Sports Minister, Dr. Paul Otuoma, lauded SuperSport for establishing the Gift programme to empower the country’s broadcast technicians in addition to promoting sport by sponsoring the Kenyan Premier League football and providing coverage for other disciplines.

“As a ministry we are proud of this initiative and their partnership since it shows the company’s commitment to this country. As a Government we are committed to ensuring the initiative works by providing any required State support.”
SuperSport’s Head of Africa Gary Rathbone said the giant broadcaster had partnered with Strathmore University to ensure it was affiliated to a learning institution of repute as well as providing the facility where subsequent training will be conducted.

“The Gift programme is much more than creating jobs for us but also creating dreams for better local television production personnel that will bring the best quality production. We will allow those we train to work for other stations in the country to share the expertise.”

SuperSport Director of Media Solutions, Africa, Andre Venter, said the programme would be conducted in six-month modules where some of those who complete the course would be absorbed into the firm’s activities with the rest offloaded elsewhere.

“We received over 240 applications for this course and we had to whittle it down. We are training them in three disciplines, vision control, camera and audio and the fourth VHS will be rolled after we get the right teacher for the job,” Venter added.

He stated SuperSport would procure television production equipment and install it at Strathmore for training purposes.

URBANA Innovative materials scientist John Rogers will use a $500,000 prize to do even more research in electronics that work with and fit to the human body.

A physicist, Rogers will receive the 2011 Lemelson-MIT Prize on Wednesday.

The award cites that Rogers research has helped create products and companies across disciplines in areas like health, fiber optics, semiconductor manufacturing and solar power.

The Lee J. Flory-Founder Chair in Engineering and an MIT alumnus, Rogers has been a professor at the University of Illinois since 2003. His recent work has created tiny eye-like cameras as well less-invasive surgical tools and biocompatible sensor arrays. He won a MacArthur genius grant in 2009.

This new prize is targeted toward mid-career folks who do innovative engineering, Rogers said Tuesday. Our latest emphasis is on biointegrated electronics, devices that have shapes to conform with internal organs or the surface of skin.

Rogers will accept the award during the Lemelson-MIT Programs fifth annual EurekaFest this week. He will give a presentation about his research and its end results.

The professor already has business in the Boston/Cambridge area.

He is co-founder and director of Cambridge maker of flexible semiconductor products mc10 Inc. and North Carolina-based solar power technology company Semprius Inc., among various other companies.

He said much of his work has commercial applications, and he would be interested in having more business in Champaign-Urbana.

We can start a business here, but there are challenges in access to capital. Places like Boston and San Jose have infrastructure in place for this, when you want to take it up to the next level, Rogers said.

He said the new prize money will allow us to pursue some very wild and crazy innovations.

Rogers, affiliated with the Beckman Institute for Advanced Science and Technology, has written more than 300 published papers and holds more than 80 patents, the UI noted in a press release.

Among his honors are election to the National Academy of Engineering, the Institute for Electrical and Electronics Engineers, the American Physical Society, the Materials Research Society and the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

LOS ANGELES-Lee amp; Associates has named 34-year industry veteran and longtime principal Duncan Lemmon as president of its West Los Angeles office as part of the companys continuing expansion and its bolstering of management. Lemmon succeeds Dave Wilson, who continues with Lee as an active shareholder and principal.

For the past 14 years, Lemmon has been a principal and shareholder in the Sherman Oaks office of Lee, specializing in retail, land and investments. The naming of Lemmon, who has spent more than half his career with Lee amp; Associates, is another sign of our commitment to the major markets throughout the US, said Lee amp; Associates CEO Edward J. Indvik in an announcement regarding the appointment.

Indvik said Lees West Los Angeles office has carved a niche as a pioneer in the conversion of industrial and commercial buildings into entertainment and creative space since opening its doors 16 years ago. In his new role, Lemmon will look to further expand Lees stretch into all real estate disciplines, including retail/mixed use, office, investment and industrial to match the offices depth in the creative/entertainment sector, the company said in its announcement. Lemmon noted that Lee is recruiting both seasoned and new brokers in order to help meet our goals over the next few years in these disciplines.

Since its founding in 1979, Lee amp; Associates has grown to a commercial real estate brokerage firm of 43 offices managed by the presidents and managing partners. A board of directors, elected from the pool of presidents/managing partners, is responsible for setting policy and shaping Lees strategic direction. Lee amp; Associates most recently has added its Greenville, SC and Kansas City, KS and Indianapolis offices, with more slated to come on board in 2011 and beyond.

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Andrew Hevesi is the state Assemblyman from Forest Hills.

#13;

When you hear the word Jujitsu, what do you think of?  I think of the agility, strength, and discipline that must be needed to study this style of martial art which dates back to the Samurai. The same is true of other fighting arts, like Judo, Karate, and Brazilian Jujitsu.  To many observers, these are art forms built on honor and mastered with determination.  But ironically, when these fighting styles are combined and practiced in the same ring, many people and public servants suddenly have a strong aversion.

#13;

This combination of rigorous disciplines is exactly what would be allowed under the proposal to allow mixed martial arts (MMA) in New York State.  As someone who appreciates mixed martial arts and recognizes the financial benefits to taxpayers, I find this split reaction frustrating.  But I understand why it exists.  There is a stigma associated with mixed martial arts; one that I believe is outdated and unfair.

#13;

Many people still view MMA as violence for the sake of violence, with brutality as its sole objective; basically like professional wrestling, but real.  While there was a time when that was accurate, today the reality could not be more different.

#13;

As recently as two decades ago, the sport could be aptly described as a bunch of undisciplined, vicious street fighters battling each other without weight classes, regulation, or regard for the safety of the fighters.  But today’s MMA has been changed into one of the most highly regulated sports, with appropriate weight classes and rules, professional referees and medical personnel mandated to protect the fighters.  Not only has the fighting changed, but the fighters have changed as well.

#13;

As the sport grew from its early days, masters of various martial arts were drawn to compete as the ultimate test of their discipline.  Over time, these skilled martial artists replaced the street brawlers of the sports’ early days.  Today, when you watch an MMA event, you are watching some of the most highly trained, disciplined, and tactically intelligent fighters in the world.  Just to be competitive, these athletes must master multiple disciplines including jujitsu, judo, karate, Brazilian jujitsu, Greco-Roman wrestling, Thai-boxing, and boxing. 

#13;

Yet the stigma persists, in part because opponents of MMA perpetuate the myth.  I believe it is time to change our collective perception of mixed martial arts, because the truth is the sport has changed.

#13;

But there is another reason for New York to allow mixed martial arts events, as 31 other states already do: the financial benefits. Bringing mixed martial arts events to New York State would create a new, consistent revenue source in the midst of a financial crisis.  Period. 

#13;

After my colleagues and I in state government spent the last six months making tough fiscal decisions that impose significant consequences for New York’s families, it is irrational and illogical for us to dismiss the prospect of allowing a well-regulated, widely accepted industry in New York State as a revenue generator.  

#13;

A debate on this issue is necessary and should happen immediately. Considering that the State Senate has already passed this legislation, I respectfully call upon the leadership in my house, the Assembly, to bring the bill legalizing MMA in New York to our Democratic conference and then to the floor of the Assembly for a vote. 

#13;

While I recognize that this is a contentious issue, and MMA is not something everyone would choose to watch, I am confident that my colleagues and I, when we debate this issue, can conduct ourselves in the same way mixed martial artists do, with professionalism, conviction, and respect for one another.

AUSTIN, TX–(Marketwire – Jun 14, 2011) – NocPlace has developed a business web application that is designed to provide information to members that will help them prevent failures in various functions and disciplines at their companies. Network down time, for example, has a huge impact on customer satisfaction and enterprise revenues but there have been significant limitations on attempts to take proactive steps to avoid failures. The NocPlace web tool solves this with an information stream.

Prevention, in almost every instance, is about education and information, said NocPlace CEO Jack Holt. Our technology connects you to information that is relevant to your company, regardless of your issues or your infrastructure. We connect you to people who are working in similar business and technology environments.

NocPlace is using the Founders Showcase in San Francisco on June 15^th to demo its app, which is called Wit. The beta version automatically connects users to panels of people like you, from companies like yours, with issues like yours. The application enables Wits members to immediately get answers on various business issues from trustworthy sources and experts while also discovering new channels of relevant discussion. Wit curates information feeds so member-users only see what is helpful to their situations, and it uses a patent-pending algorithm to match professionals working on the same topics.

What if you knew in advance a particular piece of gear or a software patch had an issue? asked Andi Gillentine, COO of NocPlace. That information would allow you to take steps to make certain your network remained operational. NocPlace and Wit enable you to be proactive about stopping all kinds of business failures, whether its infrastructure or operations.

NocPlace will be among dozens of companies taking part in the demo table competition at Founders Showcase at the Mission Bay Conference Center in San Francisco this week. 100 investment firms are registered to participate in the event and assess new technology. The showcase is a quarterly gathering that connects startups with potential investors during an evening of networking and concept pitching.

NocPlace is also hosting the Founders Hangover the next day, a beer and tapas lunch to answer follow up questions and expressions of interest. Details at: http://bit.ly/mGDz4G and visit www.nocplace.com.