World
Cup, by the numbers:
5,000,000,000: Viewers expected to watch the games
$100,000,000:
Estimated cost of voice and data network deployed by Avaya
3,500,000: RFID
embedded tickets
45000: Estimated number of network connections for TV production
2200:
Hours of feeds produced
2000: Staff of TV productions
2000: Press, commentators
1300:
Kilometers of cable for 12 venues
800: Camera positions
750: kilometers
of audio/video cables
736: Players
100: Fujinon HD lenses deployed
70:
TV studios
64: Number of matches broadcast in HD for 2006 FIFA World Cup
64:
Total number of matches played
48: Matches broadcast in HD for previous World
Cup (2002)
25: HD cameras used to cover each match (per stadium)
20: Outside
broadcast trucks
14: Panels on current FIFA football
12: Cities hosting
matches
9: PanAmSats used to send HD signal worldwide
6: Number of television
directors
1: Pool feed for broadcasters
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Kosher
is cool
Kosher Cool. "Kosher is hot," says Rabbi Eliyahu Safran,
commenting on the introduction of kosher Triaminic -- the first OTC medication
approved by the Orthodox Union, reports Leslie Berger in The New York Times. "The
Kosher market has been growing by leaps and bounds in the last decade,"
according
to Rabbi Safran. "There's been more and more demand from kosher consumers,
and big companies have been responsive," he says. Big companies such as Novartis,
which is not only rolling out kosher Triaminic cough syrup (in orange, grape,
berry and bubblegum) but also has kosher Maalox in the works. Rabbi Safran says
other pharma marketers are going to go kosher and that its not just consumers
who keep kosher who are driving the trend."They know another vigilant
pair of eyes are inspecting and verifying,"
says the Rabbi, noting that
many consumers "seek out a kosher label as an additional assurance of quality
control." Because a kosher seal -- "the initial U inside an O -- by
the Orthodox Union, www.ou.org, means the product is certified to be free of any
animal derivatives, vegetarians as well as the lactose intolerant are key consumers.
So too are Muslims, whose "dietary restrictions, known as halal, are similar
to those of Jews." Naturally, marketers endorse the idea as "a shrewd
way for a company to gain market share for a minimal investment." Says Menachem
Lubinsky of Lubicom Marketing Consulting, lubicom.com: "No one does it because
of social responsibility. They do it because it makes economic sense." That's
not to say that making Triaminic kosher was a snap. It "took about two years,"
and involved "vetting each of its 50 or so raw materials for any trace of
forbidden derivatives -- or possible contact with taboo items through machinery
or packaging." Obviously, the most common animal-based elements -- "the
emulsifier glycerin, traditionally made from beef tallow," for example, is
easily screened out and replaced with a vegetable-based substitute. In fact, a
company called Freeda Vitamins, freedavitamins.com, has been making kosher supplements
that way for years.
But Novartis is the first to bring it to the O-T-C world
and the market does indeed appear rich in potential. According to Rabbi Safran,
about "15 million to 20 million Americans buy kosher products" today.
And, according to Menachem Lubinksy, "sales of kosher products would be close
to $8.5 billion this year." Tim Manners
Reveries
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