Monday, May 7, 2001		Lens on IT

Apple CEO Steve Jobs holds up the new Apple iBook notebook computer during a press event at Apple headquarters in Cupertino, California. The new iBook, which at 4.9 pounds will be the lightest and smallest full-featured consumer notebook on the market, will be available for purchase in mid-May. 

Phil Yialeloglov (left) and Scott Lee-Guard wear the iTrack mobile communication system designed by Canberra-based Cisco Systems . The system allows the user, who carries a personal computer, a GPS and a Web cam, to transmit and receive data, voice and video remotely in a field situation. The technology has the capability to turn a soldier into a walking computer enabling troops to call up comrades whether they are metres away or overseas and immediately identify their position to the nearest metre with the GPS. 

An elderly Malaysian digs for tantalum in Butterworth, in the northern Malaysian island state of Penang. The diggers are playing hide-and-seek with the police for a chance to unearth tantalum, a mineral dumped as mining waste decades ago but considered valuable enough to risk a life today . Two men and a young mother died earler in April when a floor caved in as they dug for the mineral, which used mainly to make capacitors.

Chinese construction workers stop their work to watch a dancer preparing herself for an outdoor performance to promote Chinese-made computer products in Beijing . Chinese continued to enjoy their May Day holiday as the authorities extended the holiday to a week-long break to boost comsumer spending in China.

South Korean Yang Hyun Seung, a professor of electrical engineering and computer science at the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST) poses with a robot named AMI (Artificial Intelligence Multimedia Innovative Human Robot) in Taejon, 152 km south of Seoul. AMI, meaning friend in French, is able to handle intricate manual tasks with its well-crafted hands and arms, according to KAIST. It can recognise a human voice while perceiving an object and measuring the distance involved in real time. The robot can detect and avoid obstacles while walking by the myriad sensor systems and displays its emotions such as joy and sorrow on a flat-screen installed on its chest.

— Reuters photos