News Services

It was pushing 11 on a Friday night, and Austin Raishbrook wanted to be prowling the streets of Los Angeles looking for murder and mayhem. Mired in a pocket of messy downtown traffic, the 32-year-old British transplant clenched the wheel of his Police Interceptor Crown Victoria and cursed out loud. Every few seconds, he turned his attention to the laptop computer glowing beside him, checking for any fresh crash alerts on an internal California Highway Patrol website.

Internet search leader Google Inc. on Friday began hosting material produced by the Associated Press and three other news services on its own website instead of only sending readers to other destinations. The change affects hundreds of stories and photographs distributed each day by the AP, Agence France-Presse, the Press Assn. in Britain and the Canadian Press.

As Yahoo Inc. editors plan updates this week to their popular online news service, a computer program at Google Inc. tirelessly scours the Web for items to display on the company's competing news site. Few endeavors highlight the differences between Yahoo and Google -- two of the most popular destinations on the Internet -- more than their approach to news. Although Yahoo News is the most visited news site by U.S.

City News was bringing breaking news to Chicago in the days of streetcar messengers and Al Capone, and it evolved through the teletype era and into the computer age. But it couldn't survive the lightning speed of the Internet, its owner said Thursday.

A new service allows city residents seeking the latest crime information around their neighborhoods or workplaces to receive e-mail updates of recent police reports for the areas. Officials believe the free Neighborhood eWatch service unveiled Monday is the first of its kind nationally. Under the system, residents can request daily e-mail notifications for police activity within a mile of their homes or businesses. The reports cover 17 types of crime.

TELEVISION Oprah Declines Bush Invitation to Travel In a measure of Oprah Winfrey's clout, the Bush administration reportedly asked the talk-show host to join an official U.S. delegation to tour Afghanistan's schools, celebrating young girls' return to the classroom. Winfrey begged off, however, saying she didn't have the time.

THE ARTS Sills Sets Departure Date From Lincoln Center Beverly Sills, the former opera great who has led Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts for eight years, announced Monday that she is resigning at the end of the month. "I feel privileged to have served this great performing arts center, and very happy to have, hopefully, made a difference in the city where I was born and love so much," Sills said in a statement.

MOVIES Australian Census: The Force Is With Them The Australian Bureau of Statistics said Tuesday that more than 70,000 people in Australia identified their religion as Jedi in last year's census. As in Alec Guinness' Obi-Wan Kenobi and "Star Wars." Chris Brennan, president of the Star Wars Appreciation Society, speculated that only 5,000 of the Jedi respondents were "hard-core" believers. Another 50,000 put it down for fun, and the others "did it just to give the government a bit of curry."

TELEVISION Amanpour Stays at CNN: Despite speculation that she might jump to another outlet, Christiane Amanpour is staying with CNN, where her international reporting has made her one of the news network's stars. The network, which is bracing for reorganization and budget cuts, said Monday that Amanpour has signed a new multiyear contract.

MOVIES Mom Didn't Know Either: Movie fans weren't the only ones caught off guard by this week's news of the Tom Cruise-Nicole Kidman split. Kidman's mother, Janelle, tells People magazine in its next issue that the couple's friends and family didn't hear of the split until the morning it was announced. "We are all very upset," she says.