C. Cesarsky	ESO Welcomes Finland as Eleventh Member State	2
K. Mattila et al.	Astronomy in Finland	3
ESO Press Release 23/04	Is this Speck of Light an Exoplanet?	11

Telescopes and Instrumentation

P.O. Lagage et al.	Successful Commissioning of VISIR: the Mid-Infrared VLT Instrument	12
H. Bonnet et al.	First Light of SINFONI at the VLT	17
R. Arsenault et al.	Third MACAO-VLTI Curvature AO System Now Installed	25
J.P. Emerson et al.	VISTA: The Visible & Infrared Survey Telescope for Astronomy	27
T. Wilson	ALMA News	32
L. Germany	News From La Silla	32
C. Izzo et al.	Gasgano & ESO Vimos Pipeline released	33
ESO Press Photo 27/04	The Milky Way above La Silla	35

Reports from Observers

R. Chini et al.	The Birth of a Massive Star	36
N. Christlieb, D. Reimers & L. Wisotzki	The Stellar Content of the Hamburg/ESO Survey	40
C. Cacciari, A. Bragaglia & E. Carretta	Flames Spectroscopy of RGB stars in the Globular Cluster NGC 2808	47
L. Pasquini et al.	VLT Observations of Beryllium in a Globular Cluster	50
P. Kervella et al.	Cepheid Pulsations Resolved by the VLTI	53
P. Padovani et al.	First Science for the Virtual Observatory	58

Other Astronomical News (in PDF format)

D. Alloin	Students at ESO/Santiago: The Period 1999-2004	61
A. Merloni & S. Nayakshin	Report on the joint MPA/MPE/ESO/USM Workshop on "Growing Black Holes: Accretion in a Cosmological Context"	62
H. Boffin & R. West	Report on a Brainstorming Meeting about the "ALMA Interdisciplinary Teaching Project"	63
D.H. Lorenzen	Obituary: Jürgen Stock 1923–2004	65
C. Madsen	Report on the EuroScience Open Forum 2004	66
Fellows at ESO	C. De Breuck, P. Kervella, C. Peroux	67

Announcements (in PDF format)

A. Renzini	A New Start for Public Surveys	68
Personnel Movements		69
ESO Vacancy	Desktop Publishing/Graphics Specialist	70
ESO Fellowship Programme		71