The IEEE Leadership Wire

Index

***************************************************************************************************************** The IEEE LEADERSHIP WIRE is a report for top-level IEEE volunteers about IEEE affairs and organizational information. It is intended specifically for members of the IEEE Board of Directors, key Board committees and the six major operating boards. The newsletter is sent on or around the first of the month.
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CONTENTS:
*March Membership Highlights
*IEEE Receives OFAC Exemption For Publications Process
*IEEE Xplore(R) Release 1.7 Goes Live
*IEEE is Safe From Internet Security Flaw
*Volunteer Resources Available on IEEE Web Site
*IEEE Identity Standards Updated to Answer Common Questions
*Chris Brantley Accepts IEEE-USA Managing Director Position
*IEEE SPECTRUM Wins Four New Awards
*Annual Report, IEEE-USA Calendar Win Communicator Awards
*In the News
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**MARCH MEMBERSHIP HIGHLIGHTS**
IEEE membership totaled 315,095 in March. This is a 2.2 percent increase from March 2003. For the complete Membership Development Report, visit http://www.ieee.org/organizations/rab/md/mdprogrpt.html.

**IEEE RECEIVES OFAC EXEMPTION FOR PUBLICATIONS PROCESS**
On Friday, 2 April, the IEEE received a highly anticipated ruling from the U.S. Department of Treasury Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC). The ruling said the IEEE's publications process is "not constrained by OFAC's regulatory programs," thereby permitting the peer review, editing and publication of scholarly manuscripts from authors in Cuba, Iran, Libya and Sudan, which are embargoed by U.S. trade regulations.

The ruling also confirmed the IEEE's right to publish in both print and non-print media, to deliver its peer review comments or questions in any format, and to make both verbatim and idiomatic translations

Following the decision, the IEEE immediately resumed its normal scholarly publishing process for authors worldwide.

The OFAC decision is a direct result of intensive efforts by a team of staff and volunteers who have worked for more than a year to help U.S. government officials understand the intricacies of IEEE peer review and editing. The IEEE is continuing to pursue resolution of other OFAC issues affecting membership.

For more information, including the full text of the OFAC ruling, visit http://www.ieee.org/ofac.

**IEEE XPLORE(R) RELEASE 1.7 GOES LIVE**
On 29 April, the IEEE launched IEEE Xplore(R) Release 1.7. New features include:

a full-text search prototype that enables the search of metadata fields and the associated full-text journal/transaction content from 1996 forward. This currently represents more than 10 percent of the content in the database. The remaining content will be included in the full-text search function by the end of the year.
new reference links in more than 20 IEEE Computer Society journals, transactions and magazines. About 7,500 "Abstract Plus" records have been updated to include these linked references, enabling users to link to other content in IEEE Xplore and to external publisher sites via CrossRef. With this addition, reference linking is now available within most IEEE periodicals dating back to 1995 or 1996.

For more information, visit http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/xpl/ReleaseNotes.jsp.

**IEEE IS SAFE FROM INTERNET SECURITY FLAW**
On 20 April, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security issued a Technical Cyber Security Alert regarding a recently discovered Internet flaw. This vulnerability would allow attacks that could potentially disrupt communication over the Web.

The IEEE has already patched its systems and is protected against this threat. In addition, representatives from both MCI and Sprint, the IEEE's Internet connectivity providers, have assured the organization that they will follow all appropriate steps to prevent any risks in service.

**VOLUNTEER RESOURCES AVAILABLE ON IEEE WEB SITE**
A comprehensive listing of available online resources for IEEE volunteers is accessible from the left navigation bar of the IEEE home page. The URL for the page is http://www.ieee.org/organizations/vols/

**IEEE IDENTITY STANDARDS UPDATED TO ANSWER COMMON QUESTIONS**
The April release of the IEEE Identity Standards is now available at http://www.ieee.org/identitystandards. The updates provide the answers to several common questions, including:

The correct use of the IEEE Master Brand with the full name of IEEE publications, products, services, events, activities, staff departments and functional areas.

The correct use of the letters I-E-E-E and the full name of the organization.
The definition and use of the IEEE logo.
The definition and size of the Master Brand.
The minimum amount of space required around the Master Brand.
The prominence of the Master Brand.
The correct use of the Master Brand with other logos.

For more information on the use of the IEEE Master Brand, contact the Intellectual Property Rights office at mailto:copyrights@ieee.org or Corporate Strategy and Communications at mailto:corporate-communications@ieee.org.

**CHRIS BRANTLEY ACCEPTS IEEE-USA MANAGING DIRECTOR POSITION**
Early last month, Chris Brantley accepted the position of IEEE-USA Managing Director, following Tom Suttle's retirement on 1 April.

Chris joined the IEEE staff in 1989 as a senior administrator of Technology Policy for IEEE-USA. In 1993, he was promoted to manager of Government Activities. Chris was again promoted in 1999 to director of Government Relations & Operations.

**IEEE SPECTRUM WINS FOUR NEW AWARDS**
IEEE SPECTRUM has won three awards in the 2004 Society of National Association Publications (SNAP) Excel Awards Competition, and one in the Society of Publication Designers (SPD) 39th Annual Competition.

Here are the details:

The March 2003 article "The Irresistible Transistor" won the Gold SNAP Award in the "Magazines -- Feature Article (Circulation 100,001 and over)" category.
"Intelligence and Terrorism" from April 2003 won the Gold SNAP Award in the "Magazines -- Single Topic Issue (Circulation 100,001 and over)" category.
The 2004 IEEE SPECTRUM Media Kit won the Bronze SNAP Award in the "Media Kits" category.
The May 2003 article "Copyright Wars" won the SPD Merit Award in the "Illustration Spread/Single Page" category.

**ANNUAL REPORT, IEEE-USA CALENDAR WIN COMMUNICATOR AWARDS**
The 2002 IEEE Annual Report received an Award of Distinction from the Communicator Awards. Of the 3,743 entries in this year's competition, approximately 18 percent received this award.

In addition, IEEE-USA’s New Faces of Engineering calendar, which was prepared in connection with U.S. National Engineers Week, won an Honorable Mention. Approximately 10 percent of entries received an Honorable Mention.

The Communicator Awards is an international awards competition that recognizes outstanding work in the communications field.

**IN THE NEWS**
The IEEE, its members, and its products and services are mentioned frequently in journalists' reports on technology and the engineering profession. Here are just a few recent references.

20 April -- THE IDAHO STATESMAN (http://www.idahostatesman.com) featured Hewlett-Packard Co. (H-P) as a recipient of the 2004 IEEE Corporate Innovation Award. The story noted that H-P had garnered the "sweeping industry award" for its 20 years of developing and commercializing thermal inkjet technology. H-P previously received the IEEE award for the pocket scientific calculator in 1989, said the article.

Similar stories also ran in IT WEB and TMCNET (both online).

5 April -- ABC ONLINE (http://abcnews.go.com/wire/Business/ap20040405_850.html) reported that the U.S. Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) has ruled the IEEE is free to edit materials submitted from authors living in countries sanctioned by U.S. trade embargoes. According to the story, OFAC previously said that manuscript editing and peer review of scholarly work could violate the embargoes. The article cited IEEE President Arthur Winston who said the ruling "reaffirms the position IEEE has taken from the beginning that these publishing activities are protected by the First Amendment and exempt from OFAC regulations.

This story and similar versions appeared in over 30 media outlets including THE NEW YORK TIMES, THE WASHINGTON POST, THE LOS ANGELES TIMES and KTAR-RADIO 620 AM (Phoenix, Ariz.).

4 April -- In the "Manager’s Journal" column of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL (http://www.wsj.com), the IEEE 802.11 standards effort was used as an example of how to create a market. The article asserted that the industry collaboration required to encourage the adoption of the wireless networking standard shaped an emerging market into "a working ecosystem." The story noted that to move markets forward, companies spend considerable time and effort trying to be represented in the "right" IEEE Standards working groups.

1 April -- NEW KERALA (India) (http://www.newkerala.com/) highlighted developments in electronic nose technology recently published in "IEEE Transactions on Consumer Electronics." The story said the authors of the paper designed a device that can recognize odors of ten different smell groupings. Smell detectors are currently used in applications to detect odors that are unpleasant or that could make humans ill.

Similar stories on the research were also published in WEBINDIA123.COM, INNOVATIONS REPORT (Germany), and EUREKALERT.