Case Study: A Content Company Weighs Becoming a Technology Company

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Markets Sink as Manufacturing Data Weighs on Investors

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Duquesne Law Dean Weighs in on 'Landmark' Health Care Decision

Duquesne School of Law Dean Ken Gormley said Thursday that the U.S. Supreme Court?s ruling upholding President Obama?s health care reform legislation was one of the most important decisions to come from the high court since the days of President Franklin D. Roosevelt, when it was faced with federal legislation aimed at bringing the country out of the Great Depression.

Duquesne Law Dean Weighs in on 'Landmark' Health Care Decision

Duquesne School of Law Dean Ken Gormley said Thursday that the U.S. Supreme Court?s ruling upholding President Obama?s health care reform legislation was one of the most important decisions to come from the high court since the days of President Franklin D. Roosevelt, when it was faced with federal legislation aimed at bringing the country out of the Great Depression.

Frequent Flier: An Environmentalist Weighs the Fallout of Flying

M. Sanjayan.

I FLY a lot. And honestly, flying now is a means to an end, although I used to enjoy it. It’s not that I hate it or am paranoid. It’s just that it’s a chore.

Q. How often do you fly for business?

A. Once or twice a week, mostly domestic, but also international about once a month.

Q. What’s your least favorite airport?

A. I hate to say it and know I will get criticized, but it’s Denver International. It should be a great airport, but it isn’t. There are no amenities, no decent meals, no nothing.

Q. Of all the places you’ve been, what’s the best?

A. East Africa. It’s where humans evolved, and it always feels like a homecoming to me. The temperature, the way it looks, the gestalt rekindles a cellular memory that when I’m there I’m in my ancestral home. I think it’s where humans really belong.

Q. What’s your secret airport vice?

A. I catch up on TV shows that I can’t watch at any other time. I’ve watched entire seasons of “Breaking Bad,” “Homeland” and “Downton Abbey” all in one trip.

As the lead scientist for the Nature Conservancy, I am fully aware of the ramifications of flying and its effect on the environment, but sometimes I have to do it. I do always ask myself the question: When I get to my destination, what can I deliver? In other words, is it really important for me to be someplace?

If not, I’m not going to go. I don’t go to meetings, conferences or events unless if I have a very specific role. And then, of course, there’s a personal toll. Flying can be tough on the body and spirit, even if you take good care of yourself.

I love seeing kids take their first flight. It can be so cool to fly as a kid, even today with all the hassle and limited service.

The first time I got to fly was as a 5-year-old on a KLM DC-8 from Colombo in Sri Lanka to Amsterdam. It was a huge thrill. My dad gave me the window seat and I stayed awake for as long as I could, following our path over darkened Asia and then Europe.

As I remember it, the food was fantastic. It was served in a tray that was partitioned into little quadrants. We ate with forks and knives, not with our hands as we did at home in Sri Lanka. Cheese was wrapped in foil, chocolate came in a Delft blue wrapper with a windmill stamped on it, and the juice wasn’t straight from an orange but a box. It was such a big deal to eat like a Westerner.

Since I often travel to remote locations, I rarely carry luggage. I want everything I need close at hand and I hate having to wait and guess whether my luggage will make it. If I really need something I don’t have, I can usually buy it locally. Occasionally, I don’t have a choice because a trip may be too long or too complicated for me to avoid taking my own gear. One time, I was particularly thankful that I put a red jersey in my carry-on.

A few years ago in Alaska, I was stranded with a Discovery Channel crew. We were on a sandy island on the Tana River in the gigantic Wrangell-St. Elias wilderness. The river was running ragged with heavy glacial melt and our rafts were no match for the white water.

We were drenched and miserable. To perhaps catch a passing plane’s attention, I actually wrote a message out on the sand beach with a big stick, just like you see in the movies. When I did see a plane coming, I whirled my red jersey over my head to catch the eye of the bush pilot.

The plane came in very low, the pilot read the message in the sand about our need for help, and then he tossed out a radio and a note, wrapped in his rain jacket. It was amazing. We used the radio to talk to him, and then we arranged a pickup.

The funny thing was that when I was writing out the message in the sand, which gave our GPS coordinates and pickup date, everyone who was with me had advice about what I should say, how big the letters should be, how to make it visible and so on. I mean, really?

Flagging down flying aircraft while you’re on an island is not as common as hailing a cab in rush hour. But everyone had an opinion.

As a scientist, I have to replicate experiments. This is one I don’t really want to repeat ever again.

By M. Sanjayan, as told to Joan Raymond. E-mail: joan.raymond@nytimes.com

DealBook: S.E.C. Weighs Suing Aletheia Manager

Federal regulators are preparing a civil fraud case against a prominent Los Angeles money manager, a government lawyer said at a court hearing on Wednesday.

The manager, Peter J. Eichler Jr., chief executive of Aletheia Research and Management, has received a so-called Wells notice from the Securities and Exchange Commission, an indication that the agency is considering an enforcement action.

Gary Leung, an S.E.C. staff lawyer, disclosed the potential lawsuit during a hearing in United States Bankruptcy Court in Los Angeles. Aletheia filed for bankruptcy protection on Nov. 11, and owes as much as $50 million.

A bankruptcy lawyer for Aletheia, Brian Davidoff, said that his client disputed the S.E.C.’s possible claims. A Wells notice typically gives the recipient a chance to dissuade the S.E.C. from proceeding with its case.

Regulators are said to be looking into accusations of improper trading, including whether client accounts were manipulated through the late allocation of trades. It is also examining whether money-losing trades were shifted from client accounts into Aletheia’s accounts, said a person briefed on the case who spoke on condition of anonymity.

The Justice Department has also taken an interest in Aletheia’s bankruptcy case. On Monday, prosecutors in the tax division of the United States attorney’s office in Los Angeles made a request with the bankruptcy court that it be notified of all pleadings filed in the case.

The S.E.C.’s warning is the latest setback for Mr. Eichler, who until recently was a highly regarded money manager. At its peak, Aletheia managed nearly $10 billion in assets and had a superior long-term investment track record that handily outperformed the Standard & Poor’s 500-stock index. The firm’s flagship growth strategy attracted business from Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley, which both invested their clients’ money in Aletheia funds. Both banks have terminated their relationships with Aletheia.

Aletheia also drew attention for its involvement in several prominent shareholder fights, including when it teamed up with the billionaire investor Ronald Burkle to wage a proxy battle with the bookseller Barnes & Noble.

Named after the Greek word for “truth and disclosure,” Aletheia was started in 1997 by Mr. Eichler, a former executive at Bear Stearns. He operated the firm out of wood-paneled headquarters at 100 Wilshire Boulevard in Santa Monica, a prestigious office building with commanding views of the Pacific Ocean.

But Mr. Eichler and Aletheia have been under a cloud since 2010, when a senior executive at the firm, Roger B. Peikin, filed an explosive wrongful-termination lawsuit. He depicted Mr. Eichler as a tyrannical boss who ruled Aletheia “with an iron fist” and operated the firm as his “personal fiefdom.” The complaint also accused Mr. Eichler of misconduct related to “general disregard for regulatory controls, wanton expenditure of corporate assets for Eichler’s personal benefit, and overall neglect of the business side of Aletheia’s operations.”

Aletheia has had mounting legal problems in recent years. It already had a dispute with the S.E.C. when, in 2011, it paid the agency $400,000 to settle civil charges related to deficient record-keeping.

The firm is also engaged in a legal fight with Proctor Investment Managers, a private equity firm based in New York, over the terms of a deal in which Proctor took a 10 percent stake in Aletheia.

Despite its legal woes and tepid performance across its funds, Aletheia still managed about $1.4 billion as of Sept. 30, according to securities filings.

Media Decoder Blog: Publishing Loss Weighs on Martha Stewart Earnings

Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia announced a big third-quarter loss on Friday morning, driven largely by the poor performance of its publishing unit. The net loss was $50.8 million, or 85 cents a share, compared with $9.7 million, or 36 cents a share, in the same period the year before.

“Our performance in the quarter was in line with our expectations but not our ambitions for the company,” Lisa Gersh, the company’s president and chief executive, said in a statement.

The company’s three-pronged business, which depends on revenue from publishing, broadcasting and merchandising, benefited from a modest rise in revenue from its merchandising operation. But they were not enough to compensate for the losses incurred by its magazines. Revenue in the publishing division fell to $27.6 million, from $33.2 million in the same period last year, and operating losses totaled $51.3 million, including a $44.3 million noncash write-down.

The announcement capped a rough week for the company, which lost its power at its Manhattan offices and had to use phone and e-mail to inform the staff about layoffs and cutbacks at two of its four magazines. On Thursday afternoon, the company said it would lay off about 70 of its 600 employees. It also announced it would cut back publishing the magazine Everyday Food from 10 issues to five and no longer sell it as a standalone magazine. It is becoming a supplement that will be sold with Martha Stewart Living.

The company is also selling Whole Living Magazine. If it does not find a buyer, the company will stop printing Whole Living by the year’s end.

Michael Kupinski, director of research for Noble Financial Capital Markets, said he was more optimistic because he had a clearer perspective of the company since “they’ve gotten rid of so many money-losing assets.”

He added: “The loss came in a little bit better that I was anticipating. To me this is probably one of the best opportunities to take a good look at Martha Stewart.”

US court weighs Arabic flash cards, airport stop

PHILADELPHIA (AP) - A U.S. appeals court will hear arguments Friday over a lawsuit filed by a college student handcuffed at a Philadelphia airport and questioned for hours about his Arabic language flash cards.

Duquesne Law Dean Weighs in on 'Landmark' Health Care Decision

Duquesne School of Law Dean Ken Gormley said Thursday that the U.S. Supreme Court?s ruling upholding President Obama?s health care reform legislation was one of the most important decisions to come from the high court since the days of President Franklin D. Roosevelt, when it was faced with federal legislation aimed at bringing the country out of the Great Depression.