Category: News

Filed under: Motorsports

Confused as to what to do with all the Barnes & Nobles and Amazon.com gift cards your in-laws pelted you with this Holiday season? Be confused no more! Legendary Race Cars is the book every pistonhead needs sitting on their night stand in 2010. We really hope you haven’t gone all Kindle on us, because Basem Wasef’s coffee table-sized book is loaded bow to stern with gorgeous photographs of some of the most desirable cars ever built, let alone raced. Wasef took all the non-vintage pictures, too, and they’re quite stunning.

What cars? Well, that’s the really fantastic part. Put it like this: had we been asked to write such a book, our choices wouldn’t have been much different. There are 25 legendary racers in all, spanning from motorsports earliest days right on up to the present. In truth, a great mix of racing machines.

The first car discussed is the Ford GT40 and the last is Sterling Moss’s Mercedes-Benz 300SLR – the No. 722 car. In between you get Carroll Shelby’s Aston Martin DBR1 and Cobra Daytona Coupe, all the Auto Union Grand Prix Cars, Senna’s McLaren MP4/4, Fangio’s Maserati 250F and of course the brutally awesome Porsche 917. Each car is discussed in informative, enthusiastic and playful detail, yet the text is never slavish or obsessive. If you want to know who cut the Maserati 8CM’s splines, look elsewhere.

And that’s not even the half of it, as Legendary Race Cars is loaded with more winners like Richard Petty’s Plymouth SuperBird, the first round the world winner, the Thomas Flyer, the Indy-dominating Marmon Wasp (first car to ever employ a rear-view mirror!), Audi’s Group B killer S1 Quattro, Schumacher’s Ferraris, McRae’s Subarus and even Ecurie Ecosse’s Jaguars.

Some of you might be familiar with Basem Wasef’s first book, Legendary Motorcycles. If you are, you’ll no doubt remember that Jay Leno wrote the introduction to that one. Not bad for your first book. For his second book, Basem got none other than Sir Stirling Moss to pen the foreword, which, for you whippersnappers who have no clue who Sir Stirling is, would be like getting Snoop Dogg to help you write an essay about gangsta rappers and marijuana.

Here’s part of what Moss has to say, “Selecting these 25 legendary cars cannot have been easy. Automobiles, like paintings and other works of art, have different effects on different people… I would hate to have been making the choice – but I am enormously proud and happy to have been invited to write the foreword for this book.” All we can do is say wow. For his third book, Mr. Wasef will no doubt be writing it in Colin Chapman’s blood. Until then, pick up a copy of Legendary Race Cars (It’s $23.10 right now at Amazon). You won’t regret it one iota. Make the jump to watch Basem Wasef discuss Legendary Race Cars with none other than Jay Leno, and don’t forget to check out the gallery that’s filled with some choice stills from the book.

Continue reading Book Review: Legendary Race Cars by Basem Wasef [w/VIDEO]

Book Review: Legendary Race Cars by Basem Wasef [w/VIDEO] originally appeared on Autoblog on Wed, 23 Dec 2009 14:57:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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You’re proud of that expanding belly.  You have new life there and are excited over the prospect.  You want the world to know.

Stork image: sxc.hu

So…you wear the tightest tops and jeans so everyone will know you’re “popping.”

However, is this in good taste?  Would you look more attractive in a flowing top that enhances your joyful state rather than produces a second skin?  There are…or used to be…lovely maternity dresses (an almost unheard of word these days of raggedy jeans), blouses or ample tees giving an elegancy to pregancy that’s missing in the fashion world of tight tops and below the belly bottoms. 

Or is it “old-fashioned” to wrap a gift of life with beauty?

Post from: Blisstree

Are Pregnant Women Too Exposed?

Andrew Farah, vehicle chief engineer for the Chevrolet Volt, took GM’s electric plug-in hybrid car for a lap around the parking lot in Dodger Stadium and burned rubber without burning fuel. We’re pretty sure Farah had to plug-in the car right after his run.

Click here for more news on the Chevrolet Volt.

Hit the jump for the video.

2011 Chevrolet Volt:

2011 Chevrolet Volt:

– By: Kap Shah

Photographer Alex Wild picks his favorite images of insects from the year. Bugilicious.

James Bullard, president of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, says in an interview with the Wall Street Journal that the economy is turning the corner, and while he doesn’t see the Fed raising short-term interest rates in 2010, he wants to consider other steps to tighten policy if the economy heats up, such selling mortgage backed securities.

“We might get 4% growth in the current quarter,” Mr. Bullard said. “That would be welcome and it would be stronger than the third quarter this year and hopefully it would set up some good momentum for the first half of 2010.”

Mr. Bullard is a voting member of the Federal Open Market Committee in 2010, meaning he is one of five of the twelve regional bank presidents who get a formal say in the direction of monetary policy. (There’s a regular rotation among bank presidents to decide who gets to vote every year.)

He’s an unconventional thinker at the Fed. While many other Fed officials believe that large amounts of slack in the economy will hold inflation down, he’s skeptical of the idea. And while many focus on the level of interest rates, Mr. Bullard says the Fed should focus on using its balance sheet and its large holdings of securities to manage financial conditions.

Here is what he said:

WSJ: You become a voting member in 2010. What’s your objective in terms of how you’d like to influence the policy debate in the next 12 months?

BULLARD: I don’t think voting is the critical element because of the way the committee works and has operated. Everybody is at every meeting. Everybody talks the same amount at every meeting. If you want to come in with important arguments that will sway the committee, you certainly have an opportunity to do that. And then at the end, everybody votes yes. You just have to make good arguments to get others to see it your way.

WSJ: What issues would you say are going to matter the most to you personally in the months ahead?

BULLARD: At the upcoming meeting here we’ll talk a lot more about the asset purchase programs and kind of play that going forward. I’d like to see some kind of state-contingent policy where we keep our options open about adjustments to that program. If the economy comes in very strong we could sell assets at an appropriate rate or if the economy comes in weaker, we may want to do more with that program. I would see that as a quantitative easing program that is generally regarded as successful in supporting the economy and supporting the recovery.

WSJ: It seems that the committee has set itself on a course to finish the program by the end of March. Do you see much will at the Fed to change the course that’s been set?

BULLARD: There are a lot of questions about strategy going forward. On the Fed’s balance sheet, normally we would hold Treasurys on the balance sheet and you would replace them as they mature. Now you have a very large balance sheet. Presumably you wouldn’t replace the mortgage-backeds as they mature. That is going to lead to a decline in mortgage-backeds. Is that the right pace of decline? Or do you want to be able to adjust that, augment that with sales or mitigate that by purchasing some back or purchasing some Treasurys to replace those?

WSJ: Would you describe yourself as a hawk or as a dove or as something else?

BULLARD: I started out saying I was a hawk and I very much see myself in that role. Inflation is very costly for the economy so I’d be very reluctant to let inflation get out of control or do anything that would jeopardize our low and stable inflation rate. It took a long time to earn that credibility coming out of the 1970s and the early part of the 1980s and I’d be loathe to give that up.

WSJ: Core CPI seems to have stabilized around 1.5%. Do you think core inflation is still falling?

BULLARD: I don’t really think so. That comes to this slack argument. I’m on the record not putting as much weight on the slack argument as others might. It is a factor but it is not as big a factor as many people make it out to be. You always have to look at slack in combination with inflation expectations. And right now, inflation expectations are about as uncertain as they’ve been since the 1980s. There are widely varying opinions about what might happen over the next three or four years. Some people think you might get a lot of inflation in this circumstance with a bloated balance sheet and fiscal deficits. Other people think that the economy will recover slowly and that will put downward pressure on core. I’d be in the former camp on this issue.

WSJ: A very accommodative stance was put in place in part based on an anticipation of downward inflation pressure. If it is not the case that there is any more downward inflation pressure, does that support an accommodative stance?

BULLARD: That would indicate that we’re starting to turn the corner that we’ve staved off the deflation threat. I think if you had a central bank that was not as aggressive as we were and was more passive in response to the downturn that swept the globe in late 2008 and early 2009, then you really would have gotten declines in prices and you would have gotten deflation and possibly that deflation would have set in and become an equilibrium where everybody starts to expect declining prices. I think we’ve avoided that outcome largely and we’re starting to turn the corner and now the question will be how to avoid the upside risks, the medium-term inflation risks that we’ve created with a very aggressive easing policy.

WSJ: What’s the hardest decision for the FOMC to make in the first quarter of 2010?

BULLARD: I think it will be how to set up the strategy for the asset purchase program. You could just say, ‘OK we’re done and we’re not going to purchase any more.’ Whether that is really optimal or not is really the question. What would be optimal about a policy like that? Should we be reacting to information as it comes in on the economy? You’ve got two tools on the table. One of the tools is the interest rate instrument which is at zero and is projected to remain there according to the committee for an extended period. So it seems like you should use the other tool to adjust to incoming information as it arrives during 2010.

WSJ: So you favor keeping the rate at zero and managing the balance sheet.

BULLARD: Yeah, definitely.

WSJ: We’ve had some stronger economic data in recent weeks. A number of the private economists we talk to have revised up their fourth quarter economic growth projections. How has your own view about the economy changed?

BULLARD: I’ve been more optimistic. I think the Christmas season is coming in a bit better than some have anticipated and what I have anticipated. The anecdotal reports from around the district and around the country seem a little stronger to me. We might get 4% growth in the current quarter. That would be welcome and it would be stronger than the third quarter this year and hopefully it would set up some good momentum for the first half of 2010. And we got a still-bad jobs report, but much-less-bad than all of the previous jobs reports in the previous two years. So hopefully we might get some jobs growth in the next couple of months here that would be very good news indeed.

WSJ: What is your outlook for growth and employment for the coming year?

BULLARD: I think we can grow at an above trend pace in the first half of 2010. And I think we’ll see the jobs numbers start to turn positive in the first half of 2010. If you talk to business leaders, they’re very reluctant to hire. They’re very cautious. They’re very cautious about their capital expenditures. But I think as they see the economy improving they’ll be caught without enough workers and without enough capital expenditure and they’ll have to revise up their plans.

WSJ: Everybody wants to talk about the term ‘extended period.’ When does that issue become a subject for debate? You talked about the balance sheet which you say will dominate discussion for at least the next couple of Fed meetings. When does extended period come into play?

BULLARD: I suppose it’s in play right now. Everybody is thinking about when the appropriate time to raise interest rates is. Right now would be too early. The recovery is just getting started and jobs growth hasn’t even turned positive yet. So it is a little bit too early to be talking about raising rates. That’s why I like to talk about other instruments that we can use and other margins that we can adjust on while we’re waiting for the conditions to be right to raise rates.

WSJ: One of the ideas that has gotten some attraction lately is the idea of raising the discount rate and thus to normalize gap between the discount rate and the fed funds rate which existed before the crisis. Do you think that would be a good idea?

BULLARD: At some point we’ll want to return that to a penalty rate. Financial markets have improved enough that you could probably return that to a penalty rate.

WSJ: Futures markets are showing a high probability that the Fed will start pushing up the fed funds rate by the second half of 2010. Does that sound right to you?

BULLARD: That isn’t the way the committee has behaved in the past. I would say with the forecasts that are out there, unless the data came in very strong, we’re probably not looking at that kind of scenario this year. It could happen but you’d have to have very strong numbers on the economy. That’s why I’ve been talking about this other strategy and other instruments that we can use.

WSJ: One of the ideas that came up in the FOMC meeting in November was that the Fed might want to sell down its MBS portfolio at some point.

BULLARD: The key thing about any sales is that you do it very slowly in a very controlled manner. It would just be a matter of remaining active in the market for MBS securities and not a matter of hurriedly trying to sell off a big chunk of the portfolio. You wouldn’t want to do anything like that. That would be very damaging. But you could think about small amounts of sales that would help us get our balance sheet back to normal at an appropriate pace that would still provide a lot of support to the recovery. If you start to make some moves to go back toward normal, it is still an accommodative policy. You can take small steps as the economy improves.

WSJ: Do you think the Fed’s balance sheet needs to start getting normalized?

BULLARD: As the economy improves, yes. We’ve got to get it to an appropriate size at an appropriate pace. This is a lot, more than doubling the monetary base. I don’t think it is threatening imminent inflation, but if you just leave it there without proper care you could get a lot of inflation out of that.

WSJ: Would you support or advocate supplementing the natural runoff of the Fed’s portfolio with sales?

BULLARD: I would like to look at it. I’d like to have it be an option that we can entertain if the economy comes in pretty robustly in 2010. We could sell off a little. Not in the way that would upset markets, but in a way that would help us get to an appropriate sized balance sheet at an appropriate time.

WSJ: How close are we getting to that point?

BULLARD: I don’t think we’re there yet. Of course, we’re not even done buying yet. And we’re going to have to see how the economy performs here in the fourth quarter and in the first quarter of next year. But I would want to be in a position to start thinking about it during 2010.

Small, economical cars have satisfied a niche of the auto market for decades.

The guys pictured are pushing a BMW Isetta, one of the first ever produced. It premiered in 1955, but only lasted a couple years. After making around 160,000 units, BMW ceased production of the original and started coming out with new and improved versions, which it continued to do until the early 1960s when the Isetta was retired for good.

Or so we thought! Word has it that BMW may unveil a new version next year to compete with Smart and other companies. Until it does, here’s a list of the smallest, cutest little buggers that are already street legal and turning heads.

Check out the world’s ten tiniest cars >

Join the conversation about this story »

See Also:

• The 10 Biggest Gas Guzzlers Of 2009
• The 10 Wackiest Ideas To Save The World From Global Warming
• The 10 Dumbest Green Gadgets

Yesterday, Blippy opened its doors beyond a private group of users it had been testing with. Their invites went quickly (we have more below), and despite the obviously controversial idea of opening your credit card purchasing data to your social graph, a lot of users jumped in and started sharing data. So many, in fact, that Blippy is already tracking well over $1 million in sales, we’re told.

Obviously, that’s a big difference from Blippy actually making $1 million, but eventually, that’s the idea. Still, the fact that users are willing to show off about 25,000 different purchases on the service shows that not everyone is so opposed to the idea.

“We are blown away! Yesterday was the first day that we invited people — who we didn’t personally know — into the site. We never imagined that we would hit $1 million in purchases in the first few months, much less the first day,” co-founder Philip Kaplan tells us.

He also tells us that the average purchase price being shared on the site is just over $46, but this figure is dropping as more purchases are being shared.

The invites Blippy gave us yesterday were gone within 20 minutes, so the company has given us 100 more. Simply use the code 1MILLION at signup.

[photo: flickr/moacirpdsp]

Crunch Network: CrunchBase the free database of technology companies, people, and investors

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The rumor mill has been cranking way too hard over Motorola as of late for us to feel confident in taking a stab at what they may launch, but Motorola has just more or less confirmed that they’ll be launching something at CES.

Got any guesses as to what it is? Drop it in the comments. We’ll come back on January 7th, run through all of them, and pick someone at random from those who got it right and send them a box of fun stuff we’ve got laying around the office.

Crunch Network: CrunchBase the free database of technology companies, people, and investors

What a crazy 10 years, right guys? It’s really flown past; the highs, the lows, the stuff in the middle that didn’t seem very impressive one way or another. For our final Engadget Show of the decade, we asked site founder Peter Rojas to join us for a look back at our picks for the most important and / or interesting gadget developments since 2000. A hardcore crowd came out just after a gigantic snowstorm to witness the proceedings, and now you get your chance to see how it all went down. This is a long one folks, so grab some popcorn and settle in for the show!

Note: The HD download below is on its way, so hold tight. The iPhone / iPod version and RSS versions are all fine.

Hosts: Joshua Topolsky, Paul Miller, Nilay Patel
Special guest: Peter Rojas
Produced and Directed by: Chad Mumm
Executive Producer: Josh Fruhlinger
Edited by: Tony Chen
Music by: Bubblyfish
Visuals by: CJ
Opening titles by: Julien Nantiec

Download the Show: The Engadget Show – 004 (HD) / The Engadget Show – 004 (iPod / iPhone / Zune formatted)

Subscribe to the Show:

[iTunes] Subscribe to the Show directly in iTunes (M4V).
[Zune] Subscribe to the Show directly in the Zune Marketplace (M4V).
[RSS M4V] Add the Engadget Show feed (M4V) to your RSS aggregator and have it delivered automatically.

Continue reading The Engadget Show – 004: The decade in gadgets, with special guest Peter Rojas!

The Engadget Show – 004: The decade in gadgets, with special guest Peter Rojas! originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 23 Dec 2009 14:15:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Asus Eee PC T101MT revealed by the FCC originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 23 Dec 2009 14:04:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Taking a step away from asking you what car you would purchase if you had a certain budget, we’re focusing our Question of the Day today around pickups (influenced by Editor Anna Tarasova). Out of the best pickups from the Big 3, which would you buy if you were shopping in the segment – the Ford F-150, Chevrolet Silverado or the Dodge Ram.

Let us know your answer in the comments section after the jump. Remember you can pick any trim-level of either truck.

Omar Rana (Editor in Chief): 2010 Ford F-150 SVT Raptor.
Stephen Calogera (Senior Editor): 2010 Chevrolet Sivlerado.
Kap Shah (Senior Editor – West Coast): “I go against the current. None of the above, GMC Sierra.
Anna Tarasova (Editor): 2010 Ford F-150 SVT Raptor.

– By: Omar Rana

The Board of Patent Appeals and Interferences (BPAI), a key panel within the Patent Office, has tightened the rules for American software patents. The recently-released decision builds on last year’s landmark ruling by the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit in the case of In Re Bilski. In that case, the Federal Circuit focused on business method patents and had left key questions about the patentability of software-related inventions unanswered. 

The new ruling will give thousands of American patent examiners guidance about how to apply the holdings of Bilski in software patent cases.

Narrowing the scope

The BPAI has first crack at reviewing the work of individual patent examiners and its decisions are subject to review by the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit. The new BPAI decision was actually released in August, but the panel only recently declared it “precedential.” This relatively rare step means that the nation’s patent examiners are required to take it into consideration as they work through the backlog of pending software-related patent applications. 

However, the decision may have a short shelf life: the Supreme Court is due to weigh in on Bilski in the Spring. If the Supreme Court overrules key provisions of the Federal Circuit’s Bilski ruling, the BPAI will need to go back to the drawing board once again.

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Here are the top 20 Signal vs. Noise posts of 2009 ranked by number of page views. (Posting will be slow until the new year.) Thanks to everyone for reading!

1. PRESS RELEASE: 37SIGNALS VALUATION TOPS $100 BILLION AFTER BOLD VC INVESTMENT
2. Hulu CEO: “We screwed up royally”
3. Now that’s advertising. Leather Creations Furniture.
4. The next generation bends over
5. Get Satisfaction, Or Else… and Follow-up on “Get Satisfaction, Or Else…”
6. Santa Monica BMW’s Checkmate
7. Forget the resume, kill on the cover letter
8. The bar for success in our industry is too low
9. A shorthand for designing UI flows
10. Mr. Moore gets to punt on sharding
11. Step one is admitting you have a problem
12. There’s always time to launch your dream
13. Writing Decisions: Headline tests on the Highrise signup page
14. Launch: Haystack – a better way for web designers to find clients and for clients to find web designers
15. Ryan’s talk on “UI Fundamentals for Programmers”
16. The method still works
17. Rework: Unveiling the cover
18. Open Source Icons
19. (1) Windows 7 Explorer vs. (2) Dance Dance Revolution
20. The different sketch styles of the designers at 37signals

And here are five posts from previous years that still managed to be among the most popular here this year:

• The 10 most popular newspaper typefaces
• Why we skip Photoshop
• Mini-Review: Amazon Kindle vs. Sony Reader
• Cool inventions
• Excerpts from Stephen King’s “On Writing”

(This post originally appeared on The Pragmatic Capitalist)

David Tepper isn’t exactly a household name, but he will be when 2009 is said and done.   Tepper, who runs hedge fund Appaloosa Management, is estimated to return over 120% after fees in 2009 and Tepper will personally make over $2B.  The manager of the $12B fund made a series of very bold bets that the U.S. economy would thwart depression and rebound sharply in 2009. He was right.

The fund specializes in distressed debt  and as we mentioned earlier this year 2009 was a once in a generation opportunity.  Tepper capitalized on it in a big way.  He has been reported to keep a pair of brass testicles on his desk, but the real thing was on full display in late 2008 and early 2009 as Tepper moved his fund into the most dangerous of dangerous sectors – the banks.  He reportedly purchased Bank of America near $3.72 and Citi near $0.79. With Bank of America trading at $15.33 and Citi at $3.34 Tepper’s fabulous year is perfectly summed up.

It hasn’t been all roses for Tepper’s investors over the years, however.  Despite an average return of 30% per year Tepper’s fund is known for its volatility and finished 2008 down by 25%.  An excellent year compared to the S&P 500, but a nail in the coffin for most hedge funds.  Nonetheless, Tepper’s investors stood by the billionaire and they’re glad they did.

But what is he investing in now?  Tepper doesn’t think the recovery move is over just yet.   Much like John Paulson (who rose to infamy shorting & then buying beaten down names during the crisis) he says rates will stay low and that valuations on stocks and bonds remain favorable.  Staying true to his brass, Tepper is running into the sector of the market where many analysts see the next crisis unfolding.  He is piling money into commercial real estate.  His fund currently has over $2B invested in CMBS and he remains a very large investor in the banks.

As of Appaloosa’s November 22nd SEC filing, the hedge fund was still largely invested in the banks.  A lone position in Microsoft represents the extent of their tech holdings.  Unlike John Paulson, who is broadly hedged with large holdings in healthcare and gold, Tepper is much more focused.  Their largest positions are as follows:

1.  Bank of America (BAC) $573MM

2.  Citigroup (C)  $385MM

3.  Wells Faro (WFC) $286MM

4.  Fifth Third Bancorp (FITB) $246MM

5.  Suntrust (STI) $192MM

The full holdings can be found here.  Please note that Appaloosa likely has substantial investments outside of their required SEC reporting:

Join the conversation about this story »

See Also:

• Check Out Hedge Funds’ 50 Favorite Stocks
• Why We’ll Never Cheer David Tepper Like We Do John Paulson
• How David Tepper Made $7 Billion Last Year Betting On Bank Debt

You like bacon? Who doesn’t?! Howsabout popcorn? Yes? If you find yourself short on time every day, perhaps you could combine bacon and popcorn by using BaconPop. Each bag is filled “with delicious, buttery, bacontastic popcorn,” according to ThinkGeek.

“Damn your tempations, Aamoth!” you scream. “I only eat Kosher food! I can’t eat bacon!” Well this has no actual bacon in it, just bacon flavoring. Although BaconPop NOW WITH REAL BACON CHUNKS! might be the next, next logical step for both bacon and popcorn.

Five dollars gets you three microwaveable bags and a whole lot of weird looks at work as you moan with delight inside your cubicle.

BaconPop – Bacon Flavored Popcorn [ThinkGeek.com]

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Play Borderlands. You’ll love it and the fact that Gearbox Software keeps releasing modest-sized expansions rocks. The last one, Dr. Ned’s Zombie Island, provided me with a weekend of fun and the next one previewed above, looks just as great. So sit back and watch the teaser trailer for Mad Moxxi’s Underdome Riot. Then go play Borderlands.

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While Internet companies such as Google use baked goods as names for their key strategic initiatives–recent ones related to its Android mobile operating system were called Donut and Eclair, for example–aggressive media giant News Corp. is definitely not going for sweetness in its unusual selection of a codename for its high-profile digital content effort.

That would be Project Alesia, a moniker which comes from a vicious siege from ancient times and which is widely considered to be one of the more decisive battle of all time.

And, that is apparently how top News Corp. (NWS) execs think is the best way to describe their plans to stop the decimation of premium content in the digital age and transform their business to take advantage of new means of distribution, according to numerous sources BoomTown spoke to this week about the unusual name.

“It takes a lot of determination to succeed in what is the biggest challenge newspaper and all media has ever faced,” explained one source. “So, the real path to success will require ingenuity and staying on course over time–perseverance, really, which was critical to that military victory.”

Interestingly, said several sources, the Project Alesia name was picked by James Murdoch, the chairman and CEO of Europe and Asia for News Corp.

Widely considered to be heir apparent to the company’s Chairman and CEO Rupert Murdoch, his father, James Murdoch is apparently a dedicated reader and student of Roman history.

But it’s actually been the elder Murdoch who been cast as the obvious general so far, conducting a recent series of public verbal attacks on Internet targets, especially Google (GOOG).

He has accused the search giant of “stealing” content, for example, while other News Corp. execs have echoed his jibes in various high-profile forums.

But James Murdoch has been a key player behind the scenes in the digital strategy, several sources said, an effort which also includes News Corp. Chief Digital Officer Jon Miller and Dow Jones CEO Les Hinton.

(Full disclosure: News Corp. unit Dow Jones owns this site.)

Of this top group, it was James Murdoch–who has slowly been emerging as a more high-profile player, especially internationally–who found inspiration in the past.

To get why, you’ll first need a short and truncated history lesson, which I culled from a variety of sources online and off:

Taking place in September 52 BC in what is now modern-day France, the Siege of Alesia (also referred to as the Battle of Alesia) pitted Rome’s famed leader Julius Caesar against the Gallic tribes under the command of Vercingetorix.

More importantly–besides being cited as one of the best uses of siege warfare and “circumvallation” (see more on that below)–the battle of Alesia was considered a turning point in bitter wars conducted by the Roman Republic to tame the Gauls, which had finally united as a single force in opposition to the Roman invasion.

The hard-fought win–in a battle where the Roman army was outnumbered five-to-one, outside a hill-top fort in Alesia–is often credited with reinvigorating Rome’s power over Gaul. After the loss, Gaul became a province of the Roman empire and was pretty much subdued for the next 500 years.

Alesia is often cited as one of Caesar’s greatest military victories and the fallout from it later led to his ascension to ultimate power in Rome (which was soon followed by his infamous assassination).

That’s not the ultimate end News Corp. is envisioning, of course, sticking with Alesia’s main themes of perseverance and innovation, said several people with knowledge of the digital content efforts.

And, no surprise, in the digital battles between traditional media and interlopers from the Web, guess who has been cast as noble Caesar and who plays the role of marauding heathens?

You know, the ones who even cast their women and children out of the fort into the middle of the siege when food started to run out? That would apparently be the Googlers, although if it were them, the food would be organic!

Not all comparisons are the same, said a source. For example, consider circumvallation, which is essentially the building of a series of encircling fortified walls around the enemy. Contravallation is also also part of the strategy, to protect from attacks by enemy reinforcements attacking from the outside.

One could easily imagine that means creating pay walls around premium content or de-indexing it from search sites like Google, both of which News Corp. has publicly talked about doing.

Not so!

“Traditional media companies are interested in investing in innovation too, so the idea of just putting up walls around content is a red herring,” said the source. “The idea is to find new ways of distributing media that also makes money, because why should journalism in [digital] ones and zeros be any different?”

Of course, with new stats showing sites like Google News and Yahoo News as the place consumers are going to be more and more of their news, that is a big issue in a longer fight, which will grind on for a very long time and well before any side can ever declare victory.

[The 1899 painting at the top is by Lionel-Noël Royer.]

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