On Monday, October 17th 2005, ABC aired The Oprah Winfrey Show, which introduced Oprah's audience to eight of the world's most inspirational women.

Oprah gave fellow celebrity friends an assignment. Identify a woman who "rules" in your opinion and/or a girl who is inspiring.

Journalist Diane Sawyer picked one of her favorite women in the world, Cynthia O'Neal. Alicia Keys was given the privilege of introducing Oprah and her audience to a young African American poet, a survivor of Hodgkin's Lymphoma and an inspirational leader, Sydnee Bush. Sydnee is only thirteen years old. And Gayle King, Oprah's best friend and O magazine Editor-at-Large, selected a beautiful, blind twenty-six year-old, who is bringing life to kids tied to their beds and living in the dark in Tibet.

Winfrey chose one of my favorite actresses on the planet, Academy Award-winning, Geena Davis. (The six-foot-tall actress won an Oscar as best supporting actress for the 1998 Lawrence Kasdan-directed film The Accidental Tourist. The film co-starred William Hurt and Kathleen Turner.)

Oprah said, "I know a lot of cool women who make me proud to spell my name, W - O - M - A - N."

The inspiration behind the idea to have some of Oprah's coolest, smartest friends select a fellow, "cool" woman came after Newsweek Magazine ran a cover story called "How Women Lead".

None other than Oprah Winfrey is on this week's cover of Newsweek, as the number one most powerful American woman in the country.

In addition, Forbes business magazine has just named Oprah as the world's most powerful celebrity.

Forbes rates celebrities' influence according to press coverage, Internet presence and estimated earnings between June 2004 and June 2005.

Oprah has racked up 21,671 press clippings this past year. The number of Web mentions on Google was 5,710,000 times. And her June 2004 - June 2005 pay amounted to $225 million. Only George Lucas earned more. And only Bill Clinton's name was searched more online out of the Top 100 Celebrities touted in Forbes.

While Oprah was selected a couple of years ago as one of the 100 Greatest African Americans of all time, it is the first time Winfrey appears as the Numero Uno celebrity on this year's Forbes Celebrity 100 list.

As a result of Oprah's recent recognition in Newsweek, Oprah and the producers at Oprah's Harpo Productions were inspired to ask the question, "Who are the women who are changing the world?"

Oprah's pick was the Academy award-winning actress Geena Davis.

Here is the play-by-play of Oprah's interview with Davis and the highlights of the other seven women featured on the Fall 2005 20th season of The Oprah Winfrey Show.

At 4:58pm Eastern Time on July 12th 2005, the SEC accepted Baidu's preliminary IPO prospectus and posted it on the SEC's EDGAR website.

According to a survey conducted by Shanghai iResearch Co., Ltd. (iResearch), Baidu.com Inc. is China's market share search engine leader.

Reuters and Dow Jones reported that the Chinese language Internet search provider is planning an initial public offering of as much as $80 million in Class A ordinary shares.

Baidu (pronounced "Buy Do" in English) is selling American Depositary Shares (ADS). One ADS represents one ordinary share.

Details about the number of ADSs to be offered and estimated price range for the IPO were not disclosed in the filing.

Dow Jones stated that the eventual price terms of an IPO often differ substantially from the valuation in the first registration.

Baidu's IPO will be the first for a pure-play Chinese search engine company.

Based in Beijing, The People's Republic of China, the company plans to list its stock with NASDAQ under the symbol "BIDU".

In Chinese, Baidu means "a hundred times". Baidu takes its name from a 12th-century Song dynasty poem about searching for a beautiful woman amidst the teeming masses.

Baidu's IPO prospectus states that Goldman Sachs (Asia) LLC, Credit Suisse First Boston and Piper Jaffray are the company's underwriters.

The Larry Page & Sergey Brin of China

Baidu.com, Inc.'s co-founder, Chairman & CEO is thirty-six year-old Robin Yanhong Li. According to his company's prospectus, Li currently owns 25.8% of Baidu stock.

Robin Li, Baidu.com Inc.'s Co-Founder, Chairman & CEO

Li has served as Baidu's Chairman of the Board since the company's inception in January 2000 and as its Chief Executive Officer since January 2004.

Li also served as Baidu's President from February 2000 to December 2003.

Prior to founding Baidu, Mr. Li worked as a staff engineer for Infoseek, a pioneer in the Internet search engine industry, from July 1997 to December 1999.

Mr. Li was a senior consultant for IDD Information Services from May 1994 to June 1997 during which time he received a patent related to a search engine technology which Baidu has not used and does not intend to use in its operations.

Mr. Li received a bachelor's degree in information science from Peking University and a master's degree in computer science from the State University of New York at Buffalo.

Eric Xu co-founded Baidu with Robin Li at the end of 1999 and helped drive the company to its success.

In August 2004, Xu resigned his position as Chief Strategy Officer.

Xu will continue his education at Stanford University's Graduate School of Business in the fall with the thought of one day going back to business in his first area of expertise: Life sciences.

Life sciences is the industry Xu is most passionate about.

A key member of Li's current managment team is Shawn Wang. Wang is Baidu's Chief Financial Officer.

Othe top management mentioned in the prospectus include: Baidu's thirty-four year-old Chief Operating Officer, David Hongbo Zhu, their thirty-nine year-old Vice President of Engineering, Jerry Jianguo Liu, and their thirty year-old Vice President of Marketing, Dong Liang.

Who Else Is Behind Baidu?

Baidu's current Board members include: Robin Li, as well as, Jixun Foo, a senior associate at Draper Fisher Jurvetson in Singapore, Asad Jamal, Co-Chairman and Managing Director of Draper Fisher Jurvetson ePlanet Ventures ("ePlanet") along with Greg B. Penner, previously a Senior Vice President and CFO of Wal-Mart Japan and a now a general partner of Madrone Capital Partners, an investment firm based in Menlo Park, California.