News In Brief

JUST TYPE 'DUBYA' INSTEAD

Pardons and executive orders weren't the only last-minute deeds of the departing Clinton administration, it turns out. In an apparent prank by some of the ex-president's aides, many of the "W" keys on office computers in the White House complex were discovered missing by staffers brought to Washington by new President George W. Bush. At least a few of them were found taped to the tops of doorways. Or, if not taken, the keys were defaced to obscure the initial by which Bush became best known during his campaign.

NEXT TIME, I'M NOT ANSWERING

The new head coach of England's national soccer team, Sven-Goran Eriksson, didn't get where he is because he's gullible. But reports say he has fallen big-time for at least one hoax: a radio interview via phone with a talk-show host pretending to be his predecessor. So much so, in fact, that after a series of probing questions, Eriksson thanked his caller "very, very much" and promised to set up a lunch date at the earliest opportunity.

Make your check out to...: new names for familiar firms

Prior to last year, Verizon wasn't in the general vocabulary. Now the name, which refers to the combined operations of Bell Atlantic and GTE, is all over radio and TV commercials. Verizon is just one of no fewer than 3,893 corporate names that were coined around the world in 2000, according to Enterprise IG, a consulting firm. The US had by far the most changes, with 2,976. Some of the world's other major new corporate names, as listed by Enterprise:

Accenture: new label for Anderson Consulting

BHP Ltd.: formerly Broken Hill Proprietary, of Australia

Cingular Wireless: shared operations of BellSouth and SBC Communications

KDDI: combination of Japanese communications firms DDI, IDO, and KDD

Target Corp.: previously Dayton-Hudson Corp., taking the name of its discount chain

WorldCom: simplified designation for MCI WorldCom

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