Now Playing: Progress in in the eye of the beholder ...
If General Motors had developed technology like Microsoft -- we would all be driving cars with the following characteristics:

1. For no reason whatsoever, Buicks would crash twice a day.

2. Every time they repainted the lines in the road, you would have to buy a new car.

3. Occasionally, your car would die on the freeway for no reason. You would have to pull over to the side of the road, close all of the windows, shut off the car, restart it, and reopen the windows before you could continue. For some reason you would simply accept this.

4. Occasionally, executing a maneuver such as a left turn would cause your car to shut down and refuse to restart, in which case you would have to reinstall the engine.

5. Macintosh would make a car that was powered by the sun, was reliable, five times as fast and twice as easy to drive - but would run on only five percent of the roads.

6. The oil, water temperature, and alternator warning lights would all be replaced by a single "This Car Has Performed An Illegal Operation" warning light.

7. The airbag system would ask, "Are you sure?" before deploying.

8. Occasionally, for no reason whatsoever, your car would lock you out and refuse to let you in until you simultaneously lifted the door handle, turned the key and grabbed hold of the radio antenna.

9. Every time a new car was introduced, car buyers would have to learn how to drive all over again because none of the controls would operate in the same manner as the old car.

10. You would have to press the "Start" button to turn the engine off.

Now Playing: Convention Promotion Commission reorganized ?
The Natchez Board of Aldermen last week made major changes in the makeup of the commission charged with oversight of voter-demanded efforts to increase the number of visitors to this Southwest Mississippi destination.

Acting on the recommendation of New Orleans-based veteran tourism consultant Stu Barash, four sets of eyes were changed on the six-persons commission -- and charged with looking for innovated ways to market Natchez and Adams County.

When Barash was hired in 2004 by a grassroots group of concerned citizens, organized by an initially informal ad hoc Chamber of Commerce tourism council, the public confirmed it’s concern by opening private wallets and lockboxes -- a tsunami of donations caused City Hall to act with alacrity.

The four new appointees, selected in a semi-executive session across the street from the Mayor’s office, include a California land developer, a commercial plantation assistant general manager, a retired Louisiana school teacher and a downtown association executive. The commission, which has been bifurcated from City government, has only advisory authority and serves at the pleasure of the status quo -- but all six have authority to sign Convention and Visitors Bureau checks.

Barash’s 17-page, some say, $7,500 report also recommended a 40-person lay board to brainstorm tourism creativity -- such as Natchezians possibly greeting, in period garb, all Under-the-Hill Delta Queen Steamboat Company arrivals.

Where the old South still lives ?
The Natchez Department of Tourism Management and Development recently rescinded the section of the City’s long-standing Tourism Ordinance that permitted the collection of $1.00 from each visitor who toured the Historic District of “the oldest civilized city on the Mississippi” -- applicable to sightseers on motor coaches only.

While never consistently collected, some local tourism professional thought the expected City Hall revenue-producer never justified the threat of a tourist tax might make this antebellum gem seem less of a value than destinations in the MissLou.