Meet Heather Poe


This is Heather Poe. She?s a young woman, living in Los Angeles and attending college there, though it isn?t her hometown. She?s kind, happy, eager to please and a little bit geeky. She?s also one of the best features of one of my favourite games, Troika?s Vampire The Masquerade: Bloodlines.

You find Heather in the hospital, where she?s been rushed into the emergency room for some strange neck wound. As a newly turned vampire yourself, you know that there?s more to this story than meets the eye, but your heightened senses also tell you that she?ll survive her undead encounter if she just gets some fresh haemoglobin. Unfortunately, there isn?t a doctor to hand and the hospital is criminally understaffed.

Earlier, a friend of yours told you that vampire blood has certain special characteristics when drunk by humans ? mainly as a healing elixir. You pause, then slit your wrist to save her young life before disappearing back into the night. You have errands to run, after all. Little do you know that this isn?t the last time you?ll be seeing Heather.

She shows up a few nights later, grabbing you on the street and desperate to thank you. She?s babbling and doe-eyed and she knows far too much about you and your kind ? you?ll suffer reprisals if you don?t take this matter in hand, but now is not the time. You send her back to your haven ? that grotty motel in Santa Monica ? and tell her to wait for you.

You have a choice now. Your blood is mixing with Heather?s and creating a potent, mind-altering brew. The more time she spends with you, the more she falls under your thrall, whether you want her to or not. You know you should send her away, break the bond and tell her to forget all this silliness about vampires. You know you should, but a lot of reasons run through you mind for why you shouldn?t ? a lot of excuses.

You?re little more than a servant for others at the moment, so the idea of cultivating your own slave does have a certain appeal. Letting her go may bring the wrath of your superiors if she exposes you. You wonder about the direction you could steer Heather, making her serve you in a way that seems repugnant in the daylight hours.

That?s what's great about being a vampire; not casting a reflection. You can avoid a lot of guilt and shame when you don?t have to meet your own gaze.


Over the next few days or weeks, Heather changes. Sometimes you're the one pushing, telling her how to dress or to surrender her life savings. At other times, it?s the blood that changes her. She was eager to please at the beginning, but now her devotion is fanatical. One day you find she?s bought you home some food - still alive and locked in the bathroom. The longer the ?relationship? lasts, the more you get the idea that it isn?t going to end well, but the harder it becomes to end it.

Heather?s fate ultimately lies in your hands. She?s a nice, likeable person and you want to do well by her. At the same time, though, the rest of LA is working to reshape you. You may have been just an average guy a few weeks ago, but now you?re a vampire; suffering and cruelty is your stock and trade.

As you acclimatise to this new existence, you start to adapt. You already don?t have to look at yourself in the mirror, but now you?re learning to hide the rest of yourself behind your new definition of what you are. You are a demon. Once you accept that, it becomes very easy to do very nasty things to a very nice person.

Then, when the game ends, you realise what?s happened and you learn something about yourself. That?s why Vampire: Bloodlines is one of my favourite games.

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Why you should want to pay for apps

To pay or not to pay, that?s been the question since the very first moments of the App Store.

The question of whether or not to pay for software and exactly how much you should pay is far older than Apple?s App Store of course. The question stretches back to the early days of the BBS and shareware. But it?s become a hot topic yet again now that so many companies are looking for a way to consolidate customers into ?app stores?.

Specifically I think it?s important to consider why paying for apps, regardless of where you purchase them, isn?t just a good thing, but something you should absolutely want to do.

Free is free.

One of the biggest misconceptions about free apps is that if the label in the App Store or on a website says ?Free? that there is no cost to you.

There is always a cost. Sometimes that cost is up front and clear-cut. This app costs $9.99. Great, pay your $10 bucks and move on with your day, enjoying your app.

Sometimes however, especially in the case of apps that are offered without a price, the cost is hidden. Instead of paying for the app up front you may pay for it in one of many other ways over the course of using the app. The developer of a free app has several avenues of making money provided to them by Apple including in-app purchases and of course, advertising.

Let?s set aside in-app purchases for the moment because that does shift back to a discussion of fixed monetary cost. Instead, let?s talk about the ways that a user pays for an app that?s delivered to them free in an ad-supported model.

Take the recently hot Twitter app Tweetbot as an example. Tweetbot is currently offered at a $1.99 price point on the App Store, a price that seems like a huge luxury when the official Twitter app is free and offers very similar basic functionality.

All of those reasons why you wouldn?t pay for another Twitter client when the one you have is working fine just melt away once you start using Tweetbot?s clever crafted-with-care interface. Not only are many common Twitter tasks easier to do but the app is also much more satisfying to use than most Twitter clients. I asked Tweetbot co-creator Paul Haddad about why they chose not to go ad-supported in the already crowded Twitter client market

Paul was forthright about the fact that the designs of any of their apps simply wouldn?t work in an ad supported form, ?None of our previous apps would work with an ad model,? Paul told me, ?and I think for us it might cheapen the brand.?

The concept of keeping the aesthetic of an app and a brand clear of advertising isn?t new of course, but it?s becoming less common as the App Store shifts towards apps that are offered free as the developers hope that embedding ads in some portion of the app?s UI will deliver enough revenue to support it?s growth.

It would seem like the costs of advertising would be effectively zero for the user but a glance at many of the ad supported apps on the App Store shows that there is a huge cost in terms of aesthetics and usability. In order for ads to be displayed in portions of the app that users will be guaranteed to see and interact with, it?s hard to maintain the cohesiveness and integrity of your app.

You only have to look at the recent inclusion of the universally reviled ad bar across the top of the official Twitter app. Annoying and crass, it was quickly dubbed the #dickbar by the Twitter community and subsequently removed from the app by Twitter.

Haddad and his partner Mark Jardine run Tapbots as a two-man operation, aiming to produce apps of quality in a hands-on process rather than expanding to a larger team that wouldn?t maintain the same level of focus. Thanks to the fact that they charge for their apps, rather than rely on finicky revenue from ads, they?ve been able to do that.

?We?ve been profitable since day one,? Haddad says, ?and have purposefully planned not to grow so that we can keep our quality as high as possible. That?s probably not the answer you normally get but I don?t think we?re a normal company either. We?re looking to push the envelope on the platform, have fun and pay the bills, not become the next Microsoft [or] Apple.?

This boutique app mentality isn?t unique to Tapbots either. It?s an avenue that more and more developers are pursuing as they try to serve a customer base that wants to invest in an app?s ability to serve them, rather than just pump out whatever piece of software is hot at the moment and move on to another project when interest fades.

Investing in apps.

A veteran of Mac application development, Daniel Jalkut has plenty of thoughts about pricing and software. He?s the author of MarsEdit, a perennially popular offline blogging tool that has a cult-like following among many prolific bloggers.

MarsEdit is available for download via the Mac App Store or from Jalkut?s Red Sweater Software. You can grab a free version to try out the app and then purchase the full version for $39.99 after you?ve had a chance to check it out. I tried out MarsEdit after hearing about it for years and purchased it after a single day of use.

My snap decision to purchase MarsEdit has been rewarded with hours of time saved and many thousands of words typed and published with the tool. Using it for even a few minutes gives you the sense that someone has generally listened to requests from users and acted on them conscientiously.

I spoke to Jalkut in preparation for this article and my initial questions were about the way that charging for MarsEdit has allowed him to build his business as a small indie developer without funding from investors. He acknowledged that setting the correct pricing and collecting payment for his app was important but said that a feeling of investment in an apps success was even more instrumental in the success of MarsEdit.

?I would like to take a slightly different tack and point out that I think it?s important to give customers the *opportunity* to invest in the livelihood of a product,? stated Jalkut, ?I have found that pride of ownership is one of the most important things I can give to a customer, and without a reasonable price attached to that, I don?t think the pride would be as high.?

Taking pride in the way that a tool works for you isn?t limited to paid apps, there are many examples of fantastic free apps on the App Store for instance. ?But,? Jalkut says, ?I believe that something important clicks when they have spent hard-earned money to help support the tools that they use.?

He drew an interesting parallel in our discussion, one that stuck a chord with me. ?You?ll take more pride in the car you saved for and bought, than the hand-me-down from parents or another relative.?

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iPad Review: Sword and Sworcery EP

iPad Review: Sword and Sworcery EP

Posted on 11th Apr 2011 at 10:50 by David Hing with 12 comments

Superbrothers: Sword and Sworcery EP for the iPad is like nothing else you have ever played. Described as ?a 21st century interpretation of the archetypical old school videogame adventure? it uses beautifully crafted pixel-scapes to do for video gaming what the impressionist painters did for art.

A collaborative project from indie studio Capybara, rock musicians and art from the Superbrothers themselves, Sword and Sworcery EP is a essentially a point and click adventure game that sees you cast as a warrior out to destroy an ancient evil. To do that you?ll need to solve puzzles, fight bears and collect an artefact called the Megatome ? so far, so adventure-game. What sets is apart from the likes of Kings Quest however are the lashings of surrealism, abstraction and poetry that somehow never slips into infuriating pretentiousness.


The real star isn?t the music or the mysticism, however, but the visual style. It?s absolutely perfect, causing us to frequently stop playing for a moment or two just to admire the scenery ? no mean feat considering the outstanding visual quality of most modern games. The landscapes are rich and detailed and invoke a near painterly quality. There?s a rare sense of artistry to Sword and Sworcery that we?ve not seen in a long, long time.

Sword and Sworcery?s music is still exemplary, however. The sound design has been meticulously crafted, fitting perfectly with the gameplay and creating an absorbing atmosphere that genuinely hooks you in to the moment. The sounds and music towards the end of our first session built a huge amount of tension and it was only after the threat ? which we won?t name to avoid spoiling it ? passed that we realised that our eyes were stinging due to lack of blinking.

A major drawback of most iPad and iPhone games is that they fail to make the most of the touchscreen interface or try to shoe horn in an ineffective d-pad. Point and click games seem like an assured win for touch-screens however, so Sword and Sworcery is a natural fit. It doesn?t limit itself to the conventions of the genre though, using screen-tilting mechanics regular switches from landscape to portrait to keep things interesting. In landscape mode you?re able to move around with your sword and shield equipped, while turning to portrait position opens your Megatome ? a combination spell book and help guide.


Sword and Sworcery isn?t all hard-core art-game, however ? there are points of genuine humour and awesome subtlety. At one point, for example, you have to travel into your dreams to find a lost key, which involves following a bear which dances like Ricky Gervais in the Office. It?s a moment which, like the game as a whole, feels beautifully surreal and yet oddly poignant.

Verdict: Sword and Sworcery could be a landmark in history of mobile gaming, proving to be the first title we?ve seen on the iPad platform which so wonderfully blurs the line between gaming and ambient art. Pensive, intelligent and wonderfully rich, you can feel the deep love and adoration for gaming that has gone into this project and it shines from its every pixel.

Superbrothers: Sword and Sorcery EP is developed by a whole host of talented artist and is available for the iPad via the AppStore.

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Google?s Wael Ghonim takes long term sabbatical to fight poverty in Egypt

Wael Ghonim, the Google director that hit the headlines after he was kidnapped by Egyptian government officials during the political uprising in Egypt back in January, has today announced he is to temporarily leave the search giant.

Deciding to take a long term sabbatical to start a technology focused organisation to help fight poverty in his native country, Ghonim posted a message to his Twitter account, noting that the non government organisation would also foster education in Egypt:

?Decided to take a long term sabbatical from @Google & start a technology focused NGO to help fight poverty & foster education in #Egypt?

Ghonim was reported missing on January 28, reportedly captured by Egyptian authorities for his part in the protests calling for the removal of the country?s president, Hosni Mubarak.

Google appealed for help to find the missing director but Ghonim was to wait eleven days before his eventual release. Shortly after, the country?s president resigned from his position.

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Senate Resignation May Not Halt Release of Evidence

That formal testimony, scheduled for May 4, was the final step as Senate investigators prepared for what were almost certain to be Senate ethics charges against Mr. Ensign, Republican of Nevada. Mr. Ensign?s resignation is effective May 3.

In the letter, issued late Thursday, Mr. Ensign acknowledged he was stepping down to avoid further scrutiny ? hoping that his departure from the Senate would mean the end of any further questions about his affair with Cynthia Hampton, the wife of his former senior aide, Douglas Hampton.

But in interviews Friday, officials said the two leaders of the Ethics Committee ? both the top Democrat and the top Republican ? had decided not to let the investigation disappear. They are likely to take the unusual step of issuing a statement that details evidence of wrongdoing uncovered in the committee?s 22-month investigation, its largest in more than a decade. Those details could include interviews with dozens of witnesses and a review of records of Mr. Ensign and his family.

The investigators were focused in particular on the assertion by Mr. Ensign that the $96,000 payment made in April 2008 by Mr. Ensign?s parents was a gift to help longtime family friends and had nothing to do with any effort to keep Douglas and Cynthia Hampton from disclosing an affair that might wreck a political career.

Mr. Hampton, in an interview in 2009 with The New York Times, said that this was in fact a severance payment, made as part of an elaborate plan with Mr. Ensign to find Mr. Hampton work as a lobbyist so that he could maintain his wages after he left his Senate job. Mr. Hampton had been one of the senator?s closest friends and most influential aides until he learned that his wife was having an affair with Mr. Ensign.

Any charges against Mr. Ensign that the Ethics Committee might have made probably would have revolved around the payment.

If it in fact was a severance payment, it could represent an illegal campaign contribution by Mr. Ensign?s parents because Cynthia Hampton had served as the treasurer of his political campaign. A severance payment to her should have been recorded as a political expenditure.

The senator and his mother, Sharon Ensign, both provided sworn statements to investigators from the Federal Election Commission when it investigated the payment, asserting that it was in fact a gift to the Hamptons, who before the affair were close family friends.

Robert L. Walker, a defense lawyer representing Mr. Ensign, declined Friday to address questions about the matter.

The Ethics Committee also has been investigating if Mr. Ensign conspired to help Mr. Hampton, after leaving his office, violate a one-year lobbying ban by contacting Mr. Ensign?s staff to assist two Nevada companies that Mr. Ensign had helped him get work with. Mr. Hampton has said this was part of their mutual plan to transition him out of his Capitol Hill job.

All of this was to be addressed in the May 4 deposition ? a formal, sworn interview that is considered the final step before the Senate Ethics Committee would have voted on possible charges. At that point, if Mr. Ensign contested the charges and did not voluntarily agree to a punishment of some kind, the committee most likely would have moved to hold a public hearing on the accusations ? and released thousands of pages of documents it had gathered as part of its nearly two-year investigation.

That investigation record will most likely now never become public, as the rules require that the accused lawmaker be given an opportunity to review the record and contest any documents before they are released.

But the Senate Ethics Committee can still choose to make some kind of a public statement ? even after Mr. Ensign resigns ? detailing material it had turned up in its investigation, Senate officials said. It can also still make a referral to the Department of Justice asking it to consider criminal charges based on any evidence of wrongdoing it might have found.

Those choices will have to wait until the Senate is back in session, which does not happen until early next month. Senator Barbara Boxer, Democrat of California and chairwoman of the Ethics Committee, and Senator Johnny Isakson, Republican of Georgia, the vice chairman, are currently on a trip to China.

One Senate official on that trip, interviewed by telephone Friday, said that both of them expressed determination to not let the case against Mr. Ensign simply disappear as a result of his resignation.

?Neither one is interested in just dropping this,? the Senate official said, asking that he not be named, as he was not authorized to discuss the matter.

In a statement, Ms. Boxer and Mr. Isakson said simply that the case was not yet closed.

?The Senate Ethics Committee has worked diligently for 22 months on this matter and will complete its work in a timely fashion,? the statement issued late Thursday said. ?Senator Ensign has made the appropriate decision.?

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After 25 Years, Sealing Off Chernobyl

This coming Tuesday marks the 25th anniversary of the fire and core meltdown at Chernobyl?s nuclear reactor four. Even now, the site requires tremendous care so that the remaining nuclear material does not escape.

Within a few months of the accident, officials put a concrete enclosure called the ?sarcophagus? over the reactor, but the structure has been showing signs of wear ever since. It?s cracked; it lets the elements in and some radioactivity out. The yellow metal support structure visible in this photo was added to stabilize the sarcophagus, a process that was completed three years ago to prevent it from collapsing. Now, engineers financed by the European Bank for Reconstruction and Redevelopment, with contributions from the European Commission and countries including the United States, are working on two major remaining tasks (about $1.8 billion has been raised so far). Led by the consortium Novarka, they?re building new storage facilities for the spent nuclear fuel from other reactors on the site. And Novarka is undertaking one of the most complex construction projects ever, to create a seal that will go over the cracked sarcophagus. On an adjacent site, workers are building the foundations for a 100-meter-high steel structure that will be slid into place to seal it off until the reactor itself can be dismantled, in about 100 years.

The reinforced-concrete foundation for this structure, called the New Safe Confinement, is visible in the foreground of this photo. The gravel trench on the right is part of the track that will be used to slide the tremendous structure over the sarcophagus.

Credit: Volodymyr Shuvayev

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Meet Heather Poe


This is Heather Poe. She?s a young woman, living in Los Angeles and attending college there, though it isn?t her hometown. She?s kind, happy, eager to please and a little bit geeky. She?s also one of the best features of one of my favourite games, Troika?s Vampire The Masquerade: Bloodlines.

You find Heather in the hospital, where she?s been rushed into the emergency room for some strange neck wound. As a newly turned vampire yourself, you know that there?s more to this story than meets the eye, but your heightened senses also tell you that she?ll survive her undead encounter if she just gets some fresh haemoglobin. Unfortunately, there isn?t a doctor to hand and the hospital is criminally understaffed.

Earlier, a friend of yours told you that vampire blood has certain special characteristics when drunk by humans ? mainly as a healing elixir. You pause, then slit your wrist to save her young life before disappearing back into the night. You have errands to run, after all. Little do you know that this isn?t the last time you?ll be seeing Heather.

She shows up a few nights later, grabbing you on the street and desperate to thank you. She?s babbling and doe-eyed and she knows far too much about you and your kind ? you?ll suffer reprisals if you don?t take this matter in hand, but now is not the time. You send her back to your haven ? that grotty motel in Santa Monica ? and tell her to wait for you.

You have a choice now. Your blood is mixing with Heather?s and creating a potent, mind-altering brew. The more time she spends with you, the more she falls under your thrall, whether you want her to or not. You know you should send her away, break the bond and tell her to forget all this silliness about vampires. You know you should, but a lot of reasons run through you mind for why you shouldn?t ? a lot of excuses.

You?re little more than a servant for others at the moment, so the idea of cultivating your own slave does have a certain appeal. Letting her go may bring the wrath of your superiors if she exposes you. You wonder about the direction you could steer Heather, making her serve you in a way that seems repugnant in the daylight hours.

That?s what's great about being a vampire; not casting a reflection. You can avoid a lot of guilt and shame when you don?t have to meet your own gaze.


Over the next few days or weeks, Heather changes. Sometimes you're the one pushing, telling her how to dress or to surrender her life savings. At other times, it?s the blood that changes her. She was eager to please at the beginning, but now her devotion is fanatical. One day you find she?s bought you home some food - still alive and locked in the bathroom. The longer the ?relationship? lasts, the more you get the idea that it isn?t going to end well, but the harder it becomes to end it.

Heather?s fate ultimately lies in your hands. She?s a nice, likeable person and you want to do well by her. At the same time, though, the rest of LA is working to reshape you. You may have been just an average guy a few weeks ago, but now you?re a vampire; suffering and cruelty is your stock and trade.

As you acclimatise to this new existence, you start to adapt. You already don?t have to look at yourself in the mirror, but now you?re learning to hide the rest of yourself behind your new definition of what you are. You are a demon. Once you accept that, it becomes very easy to do very nasty things to a very nice person.

Then, when the game ends, you realise what?s happened and you learn something about yourself. That?s why Vampire: Bloodlines is one of my favourite games.

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Meet Heather Poe


This is Heather Poe. She?s a young woman, living in Los Angeles and attending college there, though it isn?t her hometown. She?s kind, happy, eager to please and a little bit geeky. She?s also one of the best features of one of my favourite games, Troika?s Vampire The Masquerade: Bloodlines.

You find Heather in the hospital, where she?s been rushed into the emergency room for some strange neck wound. As a newly turned vampire yourself, you know that there?s more to this story than meets the eye, but your heightened senses also tell you that she?ll survive her undead encounter if she just gets some fresh haemoglobin. Unfortunately, there isn?t a doctor to hand and the hospital is criminally understaffed.

Earlier, a friend of yours told you that vampire blood has certain special characteristics when drunk by humans ? mainly as a healing elixir. You pause, then slit your wrist to save her young life before disappearing back into the night. You have errands to run, after all. Little do you know that this isn?t the last time you?ll be seeing Heather.

She shows up a few nights later, grabbing you on the street and desperate to thank you. She?s babbling and doe-eyed and she knows far too much about you and your kind ? you?ll suffer reprisals if you don?t take this matter in hand, but now is not the time. You send her back to your haven ? that grotty motel in Santa Monica ? and tell her to wait for you.

You have a choice now. Your blood is mixing with Heather?s and creating a potent, mind-altering brew. The more time she spends with you, the more she falls under your thrall, whether you want her to or not. You know you should send her away, break the bond and tell her to forget all this silliness about vampires. You know you should, but a lot of reasons run through you mind for why you shouldn?t ? a lot of excuses.

You?re little more than a servant for others at the moment, so the idea of cultivating your own slave does have a certain appeal. Letting her go may bring the wrath of your superiors if she exposes you. You wonder about the direction you could steer Heather, making her serve you in a way that seems repugnant in the daylight hours.

That?s what's great about being a vampire; not casting a reflection. You can avoid a lot of guilt and shame when you don?t have to meet your own gaze.


Over the next few days or weeks, Heather changes. Sometimes you're the one pushing, telling her how to dress or to surrender her life savings. At other times, it?s the blood that changes her. She was eager to please at the beginning, but now her devotion is fanatical. One day you find she?s bought you home some food - still alive and locked in the bathroom. The longer the ?relationship? lasts, the more you get the idea that it isn?t going to end well, but the harder it becomes to end it.

Heather?s fate ultimately lies in your hands. She?s a nice, likeable person and you want to do well by her. At the same time, though, the rest of LA is working to reshape you. You may have been just an average guy a few weeks ago, but now you?re a vampire; suffering and cruelty is your stock and trade.

As you acclimatise to this new existence, you start to adapt. You already don?t have to look at yourself in the mirror, but now you?re learning to hide the rest of yourself behind your new definition of what you are. You are a demon. Once you accept that, it becomes very easy to do very nasty things to a very nice person.

Then, when the game ends, you realise what?s happened and you learn something about yourself. That?s why Vampire: Bloodlines is one of my favourite games.

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Senate Resignation May Not Halt Release of Evidence

That formal testimony, scheduled for May 4, was the final step as Senate investigators prepared for what were almost certain to be Senate ethics charges against Mr. Ensign, Republican of Nevada. Mr. Ensign?s resignation is effective May 3.

In the letter, issued late Thursday, Mr. Ensign acknowledged he was stepping down to avoid further scrutiny ? hoping that his departure from the Senate would mean the end of any further questions about his affair with Cynthia Hampton, the wife of his former senior aide, Douglas Hampton.

But in interviews Friday, officials said the two leaders of the Ethics Committee ? both the top Democrat and the top Republican ? had decided not to let the investigation disappear. They are likely to take the unusual step of issuing a statement that details evidence of wrongdoing uncovered in the committee?s 22-month investigation, its largest in more than a decade. Those details could include interviews with dozens of witnesses and a review of records of Mr. Ensign and his family.

The investigators were focused in particular on the assertion by Mr. Ensign that the $96,000 payment made in April 2008 by Mr. Ensign?s parents was a gift to help longtime family friends and had nothing to do with any effort to keep Douglas and Cynthia Hampton from disclosing an affair that might wreck a political career.

Mr. Hampton, in an interview in 2009 with The New York Times, said that this was in fact a severance payment, made as part of an elaborate plan with Mr. Ensign to find Mr. Hampton work as a lobbyist so that he could maintain his wages after he left his Senate job. Mr. Hampton had been one of the senator?s closest friends and most influential aides until he learned that his wife was having an affair with Mr. Ensign.

Any charges against Mr. Ensign that the Ethics Committee might have made probably would have revolved around the payment.

If it in fact was a severance payment, it could represent an illegal campaign contribution by Mr. Ensign?s parents because Cynthia Hampton had served as the treasurer of his political campaign. A severance payment to her should have been recorded as a political expenditure.

The senator and his mother, Sharon Ensign, both provided sworn statements to investigators from the Federal Election Commission when it investigated the payment, asserting that it was in fact a gift to the Hamptons, who before the affair were close family friends.

Robert L. Walker, a defense lawyer representing Mr. Ensign, declined Friday to address questions about the matter.

The Ethics Committee also has been investigating if Mr. Ensign conspired to help Mr. Hampton, after leaving his office, violate a one-year lobbying ban by contacting Mr. Ensign?s staff to assist two Nevada companies that Mr. Ensign had helped him get work with. Mr. Hampton has said this was part of their mutual plan to transition him out of his Capitol Hill job.

All of this was to be addressed in the May 4 deposition ? a formal, sworn interview that is considered the final step before the Senate Ethics Committee would have voted on possible charges. At that point, if Mr. Ensign contested the charges and did not voluntarily agree to a punishment of some kind, the committee most likely would have moved to hold a public hearing on the accusations ? and released thousands of pages of documents it had gathered as part of its nearly two-year investigation.

That investigation record will most likely now never become public, as the rules require that the accused lawmaker be given an opportunity to review the record and contest any documents before they are released.

But the Senate Ethics Committee can still choose to make some kind of a public statement ? even after Mr. Ensign resigns ? detailing material it had turned up in its investigation, Senate officials said. It can also still make a referral to the Department of Justice asking it to consider criminal charges based on any evidence of wrongdoing it might have found.

Those choices will have to wait until the Senate is back in session, which does not happen until early next month. Senator Barbara Boxer, Democrat of California and chairwoman of the Ethics Committee, and Senator Johnny Isakson, Republican of Georgia, the vice chairman, are currently on a trip to China.

One Senate official on that trip, interviewed by telephone Friday, said that both of them expressed determination to not let the case against Mr. Ensign simply disappear as a result of his resignation.

?Neither one is interested in just dropping this,? the Senate official said, asking that he not be named, as he was not authorized to discuss the matter.

In a statement, Ms. Boxer and Mr. Isakson said simply that the case was not yet closed.

?The Senate Ethics Committee has worked diligently for 22 months on this matter and will complete its work in a timely fashion,? the statement issued late Thursday said. ?Senator Ensign has made the appropriate decision.?

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