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ASSOCIATED PRESS

Jan. 9, 2001 | NEW YORK (AP) -- Amazon.com CEO Jeff Bezos says it's a "product so revolutionary, you'll have no problem selling it." Apple Computer CEO Steve Jobs says it will change the ways cities are designed. Venture capitalist John Doerr has invested millions in it.

But what is IT?

Harvard Business School Press has paid $250,000 for a book about a mysterious invention with the code name "Ginger." Neither out.

The Harvard press declined to say when the book is coming out, but the invention's identity is expected to be revealed in 2002. The book will be written by Steve Kemper, a journalist whose articles have appeared in National Geographic, Smithsonian and elsewhere.

Reports of the deal first appeared Tuesday in Inside.com.

According to the inventor of "Ginger," Dean Kamen, his device will be an alternative to products that "are dirty, expensive, sometimes dangerous and often frustrating, especially for people in the cities."

The submitted proposal for the book states that Doerr expects "Ginger" to be as significant as the development of the World Wide Web. Another investor, Credit Suisse First Boston, thinks "Ginger" will be the most lucrative start-up in history and will make Kamen richer than Bill Gates. Bezos and Jobs were reportedly dazzled by a demonstration.

The 49-year-old Kamen lives in an hexagonally-shaped mansion on a hilltop outside Manchester, N.H., where visitors have included President-elect George W. Bush. His previous inventions include the first portable insulin pump and a wheelchair that can climb stairs.

Kamen recently received the National Medal of Technology, the country's highest award for technology. The Web site of his corporation, DEKA, describes him as an "inventor, physicist & snappy dresser."

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ASSOCIATED PRESS

Jan. 9, 2001 | PORTOFINO, Italy -- A flamboyant Italian countess has vanished from her hillside villa in a posh Mediterranean resort wearing nothing but her robe and slippers, police said Tuesday.

Search teams with dogs were combing the area Tuesday as helicopters scanned the coastline from above and divers probed beneath the water.

Police said the Countess Francesca Vacca Agusta, 58, was last seen leaving her mansion Monday evening in a robe and slippers.

The ANSA news agency said three people were in the mansion when she vanished: her niece, a Mexican man described as her companion and a maid.

Vacca Agusta was a household name in Milan high society in the 1990s.

She became embroiled in the "Clean Hands" corruption investigation, which eventually toppled Italy's political establishment, because of her then-companion, Maurizio Raggio.

Raggio was accused of helping launder kickback money for the late Socialist Premier Bettino Craxi. She and Raggio fled to Mexico in 1994 to avoid prison but were later extradited to Italy.

Craxi died a fugitive, Raggio spent several years in prison and Vacca Agusta got house arrest.

The mansion in Portofino where she served out her sentence was part of a divorce settlement with her aristocratic husband, an aviation magnate. it is reportedly worth $7 million.

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