Virginia Press to develop e-imprint works

CHARLOTTESVILLE, Virginia, March 31, 2002 -- The University Press of Virginia received a $635,000 Mellon grant to establish a peer-reviewed electronic-publishing program for original digital scholarship in the humanities. The project will run two years, said Nancy Essig, director. "This is a unique opportunity to experiment in applying the skills and standards of scholarly publishing to electronic projects, to attempt to resolve some of the issues that have stood in the way of scholarly electronic publishing, and to share what we learn with the academic and publishing community," Essig said. The new electronic imprint will publish large-scale scholarly projects that originate in digital form and involve computerized research, not simply electronic versions of print publications or e-books, she said. The Press will aim to publish two to 10 electronic publications a year in U.S. history, U.S. and British literature, architecture and archaeology.

UNIVERSITY PRESSES UNIVERSITY OF VIRGINIA PRESS

Court: Let Rosetta proceed

Vivendi takes $13 billion write-down

PARIS, March 5, 2002 -- An asset write-own that will improve the look of its books was announced by Vivendi International, whose far-flung properties include U.S. textbook publisher Houghton Mifflin. The write-down: US$13 billion. The announcement came amid growing investor doubts about Vivendi, whose stock as declined rapidly in 2002. The company has held Houghton in its diverse holdings since 2001. Other major U.S. holdings include Universal movies and MCA music. The company also has diverse media holdings in France.

CORPORATE PROFILE