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Why The 'Third Party Doctrine' Undermines Online Privacy Protections
from the fourth-amendment dept
There's been an interesting discussion going on between my colleague Jim Harper and legal scholar Orrin Kerr about the third party doctrine, the legal principle that, in effect, you lose your Fourth Amendment rights when you relinquish information to a third party. The doctrine has become increasingly important with the rise of modern technology because we now entrust a host of private data -- including our email, cell phone calling data, credit card transactions, and more -- to private companies, and the third party doctrine would seem to suggest that Fourth Amendment protections would not extend to such information. A couple of weeks ago, Kerr posted a draft paper defending the doctrine, arguing that it brings clarity and simplicity to privacy law and avoids the need for "a complex framework of sui generis rules." Jim strongly disagrees with Kerr, arguing that the third party doctrine was always misguided and that recent technological changes have simply made these flaws more evident.
Jim points out that when the Fourth Amendment was drafted, the vast majority of peoples' private activities occurred inside the home, and so it made sense to make the home focus of Fourth Amendment protections. But as people began conducting more and more of their lives outside of the home, with telephones, email, credit cards, and so forth, using the four walls of the home as the boundary for Fourth Amendment protection made less and less sense. And indeed, that's precisely what the Supreme Court recognized in the famous 1967 case of Katz v. United States, which held that the Fourth Amendment applied to wiretapping of public pay phones because the Fourth Amendment protects "people, not places." The same principle ought to apply to our emails, credit card transactions, and other data of a private nature: what matters is not where the data is located or who has custody over it, but whether the subject of surveillance had a reasonable expectation of privacy in his use of that data.
Kerr responded that "the real judges and Justices that make the rules" have recently shown greater sympathy for Kerr's view of the Fourth Amendment as a narrow doctrine of criminal procedure rather than a broad charter for protecting peoples' privacy. I agree with Jim that this isn't really responsive to his argument. Whether judges currently do see things Kerr's way tells us little about whether they ought to view them that way. Judges have gotten the Fourth Amendment wrong in the past. After all, Katz overruled Olmstead v. United States, a decision that had allowed warrantless wiretapping almost four decades earlier. So the fact that the courts have not yet extended Fourth Amendment protections to email or other digital records doesn't prove that a future court won't recognize that such information is as crucial to personal privacy as paper records and phone calls. Sticking with the third party doctrine would make the Fourth Amendment less and less relevant as technology changes because more and more private information to be held by third parties. If we want the Fourth Amendment to continue to be an effective protection for peoples' privacy, and I think we do, it needs to be continuously updated to reflect changing technological realities.
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Rings, bracelets, pendants, crowns.
thousands years. It is impossible to count how many died in caused by clash of views on order of things and representation of higher deity of deities on our planet. Horsemen of Apocalypse offers you a way to signify your step forward in the direction of syncretically peaceful balance in the world of violent clashes of visions – a coexistence ring, featuring 7 sides of our diverse societies summing up together into one humanity on the Earth. Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Buddhism, Atheism and Confucianism were chosen by us as representatives of world’s most widespread religions and spiritual teachings to be carved on one ring together for the first time. We have also left one side blank as the history of the world is going on and you should always be aware of possibility to be witnessing a rise of another holy revelation. And you can always choose the side or the sides visible to the viewers from the top and the bottom of your finger in this perfectly equal-parted ring.
The ring is casted from .925 sterling silver in Belgium via 3D printing technologies with the highest precision and accuracy to the details, eliminating the slightest probability of imperfections.
Signature “Aut Caesar, aut nihil” Ring
“Either Caesar, or nothing” – that was the way in which Cesare Borgia, one of the most prominent representatives of wealthy and influential Italian family of Renaissance period, Borgia familia, put his devotion to uncompromising approach in his political career. Being an inspiration of the demiurge of political science Niccolo Machiavelli, he left an indisputable mark in history of politics as an art and exquisite technique of political power engineering. The ring features the signature of the brand – bold OF symbol, which meaning is multiple: apart of preposition, it is sword and shield; attack and defense. “It looks a little dangerous” - that is the comment you are likely to receive from astonished person seeing the ring first time on your hand. “horsemen” and “apocalypse” are surrounding the symbol from two sides, creating several layers of volume and enriching aesthetic impression of the design, while Cesare Borgia’s motto is carved on the top of the ring in signature Horsemen of Apocalypse font. The ring is casted from .925 sterling silver in Belgium via 3D printing technologies with the highest precision and accuracy to the details, eliminating the slightest probability of imperfections.
Signature “audentes fortuna iuvat” Ring
“Fortune favors the bold” – was coined by Virgil in Aeneid X, 284. A supportive motto for self-determined, self-assured individuals ready for enormous and unique challenges ahead and having no fear of taking a risk when the circumstances call for it. Allegedly, it was final words of Pliny the Elder before he left the docks at Pompeii to rescue people from the eruption of Vesuvius in 79. The ring is representing the signature of Horsemen of Apocalypse – OF symbol, curved around the finger in the most elegant way. It looks as it dropped on your finger as melted silver and solidified in a beautiful design on it directly. The versatility of the design and the shape of the ring gives you opportunity to choose the way it appears in front of yours and external viewers sight. The ring is casted from .925 sterling silver in Belgium via 3D printing technologies with the highest precision and accuracy to the details, eliminating the slightest probability of imperfections.
"Semper" signature pendant
Semper eadem (“always the same” – latin) was a personal motto of Elizabeth Tudor, arguably one of the most magnificent monarchs in the world history and vivid promoter of symbolic resource in politics. Her personal image and style significantly influenced her epoch not only in England, but in a whole Europe. Being famous for exquisite diplomatic skills and rapid changes of temper, she was constant and devoted to her values. Semper in motu (“always in motion” – latin) – authorless wisdom, highlighting importance of constant change and adaptation to changing environment in order to survive and stay competitive. Unity of these seemingly contradicting wisdoms is representing bold and brave life concept: being constantly sincere in principles and being always true and faithful to your inner self (“Semper eadem”), at the same time evolving flexibility in mind and skills via constant learning and self-development (“Semper in motu”).
The pendant is casted from .925 sterling silver in Belgium via 3D printing technologies with the highest precision and accuracy to the details, eliminating the slightest probability of imperfections.
We see perspective in contemporary fashion development as a fusion of three core characteristics.
Fashion is a form of art and art is everything that pleases our eye in the natural feeling for beauty and harmony. We rely on fashion as a source of preservation, re-invention and revolutionising visual elegance and grace, bringing forward the understanding of concepts such as “beautiful”, “harmonic”, “essential”, “timeless” and “priceless”. In our works a balanced approach in using the old and the rediscovered new with a touch of unseen progressive futurism lays a foundation for the creation of culturally enriching and forward-looking designs.
The modern society is dictated by technological progress that enables people to unveil the limitless potential of their imagination and creativity. The advancement in the fields of wearable tech, gadgets and smart fabrics is changing how we interact with our surroundings, and it would be a folly for the fashion industry to ignore this trend. We aim to foster a collaboration between art and science, which is intended to result in the creation of incredibly beautiful, trendy and smartly functional garments, clothing and accessories.
Fashion has a strong potential of being a tool for the identity and development of an individual as well as for education and politics. We infuse philosophy, history, politics and visual arts into our designs. We believe that fashion (apparel and accessories) is capable of playing a role of an emotional armour of references for reflective individuals.
Why, how, where and by whom it all had been started.
Fashion, in many cases, lacks a reference point and roots. Aesthetics and beauty, which are nowadays common among the majority of designers, do not need an elaborate interpretation. The yet speeding up cycles of the fashion market dictate the necessity of a very practical approach to design – it should be instantly liked by the potential buyer. We think this approach, if happens to be totally leading, impoverishing fashion as art and a language of interpretation of much more than a certain mood of a particular designer, balanced by somewhat as analysis of already going on trends. We believe that fashion can do much more than that and be a meeting point of craftsmanship, art, innovation, philosophy of beauty and aesthetics. It is a powerful tool of communication and transmission, influential soft power.
“Fashion is not something that exists in dresses only. Fashion is in the sky, in the street, fashion has to do with ideas, the way we live, what is happening” – said ingenius Coco Chanel.
With this approach in mind, we came to crystallisation of our vision into Horsemen of Apocalypse.
Horsemen of Apocalypse, if to so to speak in the language of definitions, are the infamous four riders from the Christian Hell – namely War, Conquest, Famine and Death. They were meant to draw the line of human existence at the point where God would not be able to bear it anymore. Despite of using this name and the symbols of riders, we put into this a different meaning. Horsemen of Apocalypse are our vivid representation of intolerance towards short-sightedness and non-reflectiveness. Our motto is “reflect, or they come” – and our mission is to raise awareness of as many people as possible about importance of self-evolvement, reflection, searching for answers themselves rather than follow ready-made, manipulative answers by the other.
As symbols, Horsemen of Apocalypse are reminding about inevitability of harshest judgement for those who often practice judging others. The Four are neither negative, nor positive heroes for us: they are just bright and vivid symbols of the consequences of being not reflective, intolerant, unwise, short-sighted, limited.
A symbol cannot be one-sidedly interpreted, and its solemnly one-dimensional interpretation is the source of numerous follies and lethal misunderstandings, which we observe around the world every single day since the beginnings of the society. We are certain that everyone has to be empowered to collect his or her own universe of meanings using cultural heritage and references accumulated by the humanity through its long history.
There is a certain, significant amount of irony in our aesthetics.To overcome your fear, you need to learn to sincerely laugh about its cause. We believe, that through witty irony you can tell things which need to be voiced and expressed, but cannot be due to excessive political correctness. We believe that it causes us all a lot of stress, misunderstandings, pain and even costs many lives. We believe, that richness of human semiotics and symbolism, collected through ages of cultural heritage accumulation, used in a right way might serve a cause of widening the minds of even the most stubborn. In our designs, we use numerous references to humanity’s culture: political and science history, art and philosophy, religions and theories of universe.
Horsemen of Apocalypse was created for people, who are determined in personal self-development and would never be satisfied with what they have received fully. We create for people who instantly learn, educate and develop. It is aesthetics for brave, reflective, smart, in a way witty and ironic people, gifted with a decent sense of humor. They see and feel zeitgeist and trends, but have deep respect for gift given us by the past. They are cosmopolitan, open-minded and respectful. They believe in continuity and path dependence. They are intolerant towards only one thing – intolerantness. They question everything. They are social, easy fitting in any group, but still keeping a distance of a certain longevity from any of them. Many might call them snobbish and pretentious, but they know that source of it is jealousy. All in all, Horsemen of Apocalypse are for those, who manage and influence trends rather than blindly follow something that is given.
An uncompromised perfection and attention to detail is crucially important for us and is incorporated into the DNA of Horsemen of Apocalypse. Any piece or design we produce is a whole. This is achieved when the production quality, material, design, aesthetics, philosophical reflection, semiotics and symbolism in a design are flawlessly orchestrated into an intricate, heavenly symphony. We are committed to technological progress and use for our production and designing processes the latest technologies to ensure harmony of old and new. We are aesthetic, hi-tech and narrative.
Horsemen of Apocalypse was initiated in late 2011 in Paris by Finnish computer programming guru Timo Tuominen (based in Berlin) and Russian creative strategist and political consultant Denis Maksimov (based in Brussels). Thriving to create pieces we felt the world lacked we began with conceptual prints on clothing, engraved with experimental and destructive processes. This resulted in the first non-commercial collection, Angry Dead Birds, which, while a seemingly witty play of words, was a depiction of extinct species of birds.
From contemporary menswear the brand quickly diverged into other directions, becoming more a definition of ideology and aesthetics rather than an aspiring clothing manufacturer. The original concept of producing all buttons and clasps in silver evolved first into pendants and later into all-encompassing jewelry. While Horsemen of Apocalypse did not abolish clothing from its catalogue, the focus was for the moment shifted to pursue the perfection of all metal.
We regard fashion as a composition of soft power, technological progress and art, represented in physical products of wearable designs. Fashion has enormous education and development potential, which is bullied now by the process of speedy commercialization of the industry, praising “fashion fast foods”. In the age of wearable hi-tech and limitless access to information and education sources, fashion can play significant role in making people’s lives smarter, richer and comfier, while becoming even more profitable as an industry. Our ultimate aim is to marry beautiful aesthetics, advantages of functionality provided by the technological progress and meaningful narrativity of designs, turning clothing and accessories into emotional armour.
You are what you wear
Every piece of design we produce we treat as an object of art, filled with inspiring references. As Oscar Wilde put it: “One should either be a work of art, or wear a work of art”.
Fashion is art
One of the most widespread and practical iteration of it.
Ultimate quest for beauty
The purpose of art is to define beauty in big things of the age, said Margaret Bourke-White. The purpose of fashion, as a subdivision of art, is to hit the golden ratio of zeitgeist between practicality and a prime of haute couture.
Fashion is power and influence
Fashion has incredible soft power potential to influence people through materialisation of ideas for making world change.
Uncompromised perfectionism and timelessness
A true luxury is timeless, which has to be ensured with quality of materials, execution and impeccable design.
Fashion is intelligence
Fashion should have a stronger intellectual edge in parallel with visual appeal, promoting knowledge, ideas, defending values and pushing people to be more reflective.
Message from within to without
Clothing and accessories as single pieces or composition of designs bear meanings and messages, which are helping to create a certain mood and inspiration for the bearer (your “emotional armour”) and influence perception by the outside viewers.
Fashion is a visual diary of humanity
Fashion is capable of fusing humanity’s rich historical heritage with visions of future; by doing that, fashion is playing a role of provider of humanity’s continuity.
Collection of wisdoms, thoughts and ideas that are incorporated in our designs.
audentes fortuna iuvat. (latin)
“Fortune favors the bold” - Pliny the Elder before he left the docks at Pompeii to rescue people from the eruption of Vesuvius in 79. Luck is not coming to those who sit and wait - it has to be won over and captured.
Aut Caesar, aut nihil. (latin)
“Either Caesar, or nothing” - quote by Cesare Borgia, one of the most prominent representatives of wealthy and influential Italian family of Renaissance period, Borgia familia, representing his uncompromising approach to politics. Being an inspiration of the demiurge of political science Niccolo Machiavelli, he left an indisputable mark in history of politics as an art and exquisite technique of political power engineering.
Auri natura non sunt splendentia plura. (latin)
"All that glitters is not gold". The proverb has a long history and the earliest form is thought to have come from Alanus de Insulis or Alain de Lille, a French monk of the 12th century. It also famously used in Shakespeare's "Merchant of Venice":
"...There is a written scroll! I'll read the writing.
All that glitters is not gold;
Often have you heard that told:
Many a man his life hath sold
But my outside to behold..."
Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man's character, give him power. (Abraham Lincoln)
Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. (Lord Acton)
Qu'on me donne six lignes écrites de la main du plus honnête homme, j'y trouverai de quoi le faire pendre. (Armand Jean du Plessis, cardinal-duc de Richelieu et de Fronsac)
To live is the rarest thing in the world. Most people exist, that is all. (Oscar Wilde)
Most people are other people. Their thoughts are someone else's opinions, their lives a mimicry, their passions a quotation. (Oscar Wilde)
Truth is the question of standpoint and mystery is only interesting if no one delivers it away. (Karl Lagerfeld)
To be a king and wear a crown is a thing more glorious to them that see it than it is pleasant to them that bear it . (Elizabeth I)
There are three classes of people: those who see, those who see when they are shown, those who do not see. (Leonardo da Vinci)
It is always easier to fight for one's principles than to live up to them. (Alfred Adler)
The problem with winning the rat race is you're still a rat. (Lily Tomlin)
Never give a sword to a man who can't dance. (Confucius)
Horsemen of Apocalypse commences a continuous art project “Contemporary Muses”, devoted to exploration of connection between past, present and future through philosophy, religion, ideas and beauty interconnected and interpreted via language of certain spaces, enforced by modern artistic geniuses. It is devoted to praise importance of enlightenment, reflection, study of the past and future.
First photo project - “The Power of Music” - features renown violinist Iskandar Widjaja on the set of the inside wall of the Pergamon Altar and the Ishtar Gates. The power of artistic genius is inbuilt into the struggle of Gigantomachy, where Iskandar, as modern Hercules, parts with Olympians in defeating Giants. In the end, he emerges victorious at the Ishtar Gates - the symbol of greatness of the Ancient World.
Horsemen of Apocalypse jewelry, Dandy of the Grotesque clothing and 18th century violin and bows are the defenders’ weaponry and armor against the darkness.
This is an allegory to eternal struggle between beautiful, open, meaningful against soulless, narrow, senseless.
The set is produced in Berlin, in March 2013.
Model - Iskandar Widjaja
Concept & Art Direction, Styling - Denis Maksimov
Photography - Alina Rudya
Design Direction - Timo Tuominen
Jewelry - Horsemen of Apocalypse
Clothing - Dandy of the Grotesque
All rights reserved (c) Horsemen of Apocalypse UG
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Why Cameron got a chilly reception in Moscow
Talking Point: the Cold War might be over, but Britain should be wary of getting into bed with its old enemy
DAVID CAMERON'S visit to Russia - the first by a British prime minister in six years - was a pragmatic attempt to repair the strained relationship between two former Cold War enemies. But Russia might view it as an admission of weakness on our part.
Hopes of rapprochement
When David Cameron's told a group of Russian students his anecdote about a KGB attempt to recruit him when he was a student in Russia, the humour was "lost in translation", says Oliver Wright in the Independent. "But the mood of the trip was better than most had hoped for."
Snubs were feared, but in the end the visit passed without incident. "There were no breakthroughs on difficult issues, but no one expected there would be. What they did get was a strong signal that Russia wants to build a stronger relationship with Britain."
Admission of weakness
Well, Britain was certainly keen on the relationship, says Simon Tisdall in the Guardian. David Cameron's call in Moscow for a "new approach based on co-operation" revealed the prime minister's pragmatic side. Britain needs the business and that's why Cameron wants to put an end to the "tit-for-tat politics" of the recent past. But Putin, Russia's "dominant, domineering leader", will probably interpret it as "a no-trousers admission of political and economic weakness".
It hardly seems worth the £215m in trade deals and 500 British jobs that Downing Street reckons it has got out of the trip. Britain should be wary of getting into bed with Putin's autocracy. "If the EU took a stronger, unified stand on issues of democratic principle in Russia, perhaps the Kremlin might take notice," says Tisdall. But the trend has been for a German and French collaboration approach. "Britain was more or less alone in making a stand against Putinism. Now Cameron has shuffled into line."
Spy games continue
But the ongoing row over the murder of the Russian spy Litvinenko has overshadowed this visit, says Ben Macintyre in the Times. Russia believes Britain is "stuck in a cultural time warp, still fighting the secret battles of the Cold War" and obsessed with seeing Russian spies around every corner. Yet Litvinenko's murder, and Moscow's refusal to extradite the man suspected of killing him, is only one aspect of "a new round of muscle-flexing by an emboldened Russian intelligence service".
The ideological impetus might have changed, writes Macintyre, but Russia, with a former KGB officer at the helm, "is currently engaged in a serious intelligence assault on the West". It's fitting that the film adaptation of John le Carre's classic Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy coincided with Cameron's visit. "Cameron needs Smiley more than ever". ·
Comments are now closed on this article
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Read Damian Green's speech to the Conservative party conference in full on politics.co.uk.
There is some debate about what was the biggest disaster of the Labour years. The economy; the benefit system: John Prescott But unarguably one of their catastrophic failures, and therefore one of the biggest challenges for our Government is immigration.
It’s really easy to rant and rave about immigration. And it’s really important not to. Labour talked tough but acted weak. We talk calmly but act firmly.
This country needs a tough, practical immigration policy that pushes the numbers down.
Down to levels where people feel comfortable. Down to levels which ease the strains on housing, schools, and the health service. Down to levels which help all our communities live at ease with one another.
The facts speak for themselves.
NET MIGRATION LEVELS
In the eighties and nineties under Conservative Government net immigration never rose above 77,000 a year. It wasn’t one of the big difficult issues, so those who came here could just get on with their lives and contribute to our economy and our society.
Look what happened after the Labour victory in 1997. The numbers rose sharply and stayed sky high. It might have been conspiracy, it might have been cock-up. Who knew with that lot? The fact is that from the first day to the last of Labour’s years in power immigration was out of control—and the British people won’t forget that.
THE LAST TWO YEARS
Look at the last three years. That’s after they introduced the Points-Based System that was supposed to end the crisis.
In all net migration under Labour reached more than 2.2 million – that’s four times the population of the city of Manchester. We are determined to bring annual net migration back down to sustainable levels.
And we saw that, in terms of controlling immigration, a Points Based System on its own is pointless. You need radical action of the type we have been taking in the past 18 months to set us on a new course.
WHY DO PEOPLE COME HERE?
The first thing to do is to recognise what drives people to come here in the first place. Most people move for one of three reasons: labour, learning, or love.
Changing this to the more prosaic language we have to use in the Home Office, we see that – alongside a few other reasons - 35 per cent come here to work, 42 per cent as students, and 14 per cent through the family route, as a spouse, partner or close relative.
At least those are the reasons they tell us. Some are not telling the truth. For example we found a woman who we arrested on her way up the aisle for a sham marriage. In her wedding dress which was many sizes too big for her and looked ridiculous was her return air ticket from Holland. Here one day, back the next. We stopped her, and we are stopping more and more of these criminals.
So we need to be careful in separating the genuine applicants from the rest. This is particularly important for those seeking asylum. Too many people confuse general immigration with asylum. Over the past ten years the numbers trying to claim asylum have fallen dramatically. Last year’s figure, less than 18,000 was the lowest for twenty years.
I am not understating the need for big change here. In one of the most startling pieces of Labour’s incompetence on immigration, which is a competitive field, they discovered a backlog of over 450,000 asylum cases which had been stuck in a warehouse and forgotten about. We are finally mopping up the last vestiges of that appalling neglect, and I can tell you that I will not to let that sort of backlog build up again under this Government.
And what about immigration from other European countries? In 2005 Britain was the only big economy to open its doors completely to the eight new countries who joined the EU. Labour Ministers were shocked that they all came here. They predicted 13,000 would come. The actual number— around 750,000. That’s another mistake we will not repeat. I can tell you that every new country joining the EU will go through a transitional period before they have full access.
What’s interesting is that now that particular Labour disaster is in the past, the vast majority of net migration into the UK comes from outside the EU. Only around ten per cent comes from movements inside the EU.
The lesson from all of this is that you have to act on all the main routes at the same time if you are going to have any long-term effect on immigration. The system is like a balloon where if you squeeze only on one side the air finds somewhere else to go. Workers, students, and family immigrants have to be dealt with, and that is precisely what we have been doing since we came to power.
We started with a limit on those who come here to work, as we promised to do in the Coalition Agreement.
The limit on unskilled workers is straightforward: it’s zero. Our first responsibility is to help unemployed British workers.
The limit on skilled workers is 21,700, and they have to have an offer of a specific job. Too many people were claiming to be skilled, and coming here without a job. We discovered in our early days that a third of those who came here as highly-skilled workers were either taking unskilled jobs, or were unemployed. We have stopped that.
I saw, in our office in Delhi, a man being interviewed for his visa. He said he was coming for a skilled job working on a busy production line making machinery. He needed an interpreter for his visa interview. He would not be safe on a busy, dangerous production line.
We have the limit in place, and every month since it came in the quota has not been filled. So we are bringing the numbers down, and meeting the needs of British business. Many people told us that an immigration limit would damage our economy. They were wrong, and they have been proved wrong.
By far the biggest numbers come as students. Well over a third of these students are not studying at universities but at colleges which have what I might politely call varying levels of academic rigour. We found one college that had 940 students and two lecturers. The students were required to turn up one day a month. Another that was based in London, at which every single one of its students was working in West Wales.
So the bogus colleges have to go. We have already revoked the licenses of 69, suspended the licenses of another 76, and introduced a much more rigorous regime of inspection. We are also demanding that every student can show a decent command of English if they come to learn in this country.
We have set out new limits on the type of student who can bring in their dependants not undergraduates.
And we want former students to stay on only if they have a job offer—no more hanging around for years just looking for a job. We estimate that these measures, when they are fully in place, will cut net migration by more than 60,000.
The universities and colleges also need to play their part. We did a study in Delhi last June, and found that more than a third of student applications contained a forged document. We check them, but I am going to make sure that the colleges make their own checks. We will continue to welcome genuine students, coming to study at genuine institutions, some of which are the best in the world. But no longer will we tolerate the abuse of the student visa for people who really want to come here to work—that is going to stop.
Next, we move onto the family route. We are in the final days of consulting on our proposals. We have suggested:
Tough new powers to tackle sham marriages, and the terrible scourge of forced marriages. This too often means young women treated practically as slaves. That has no place in modern Britain in any community.
A language test so that everyone who wants to settle here as a spouse or partner has to show they have a basic command of English before they arrive.
Making people prove that they have a genuine relationship. They will need to stay together for five years, instead of two which is the current rule, before the new arrival gains the right to settle here, and the full right to claim benefits.
We know the behaviour that needs to be stopped. We have found hundreds of people who came here to get married, dumped their spouse once they were entitled to stay here, and within two years had brought another spouse in from overseas. That’s not romance, it’s fraud, and we are going to stop it.
And we will make sure that it’s not possible for someone to come here, get married, and live off benefits. The sponsor will have to show that they can support their new partner.
SETTLING IN THE UK
Moving on to those who come and stay, we need to make the rules much clearer.
In 1997 10,000 people who came here to work qualified for settlement. By 2010 the number was 84,000.
We propose a stricter system which puts an end to the assumption that settlement will automatically be available to those who come here as skilled workers.
ENFORCEMENT AND REMOVALS
Part of the problem is, of course, getting rid of those who have been allowed in and have no right to stay.
Over the last 12 months we removed nearly 55,000 people.
Last week I was in Nigeria negotiating a deal which will allow us to remove Nigerian prisoners to serve their sentences in Nigerian jails.
By April next year we won’t only be counting everyone in at the border if they are travelling from outside the EU, we will be counting them all out as well. It was one of Labour’s early acts in 1998 to stop doing this. We think it’s necessary—we will bring back these checks.
And we are setting up at Border Police Command as part of the new National Crime Agency, giving us a unified dedicated force to fight immigration crime at our border and overseas. In opposition we promised a Border Police Force—it’s on its way.
INVESTORS ENTRPRENEURS AND THE HIGHLY TALENTED
Precisely because we are putting in place all these controls, we can work harder to attract those we really want—the best and the brightest who will spark our economy and bring cultural and scientific inspiration.
We have created a specific route for investors and entrepreneurs, who will create tomorrow’s jobs.
We also have a new route for those with exceptional talent in the arts, science and engineering. This is designed especially for young people. We want Britain to be the natural home for the next generation of great performers or Nobel Prize winners.
None of this is easy, and the results will not be immediate. Those who say that because the numbers were bad in 2010 they will be bad in 2015 are being short-sighted.
We worked for years in opposition to warn about the problem and to prepare solutions. We started the work to bring immigration back under control the day David Cameron led us into Government, and under his leadership, we have carried on that work every day since.
It is the absolutely the aim of these measures to bring net migration back to those sustainable levels, in the tens of thousands, that we saw before the last
Labour Government wrecked the system.
There are of course, think tanks, newspapers and vested interests who stand against us. But I will be driven, this Government will be driven, by the most important interest group of all—the British people.
Overwhelmingly, whatever their politics, whatever their background, whatever their race or religion, they want us to bring immigration back under control. It is one of the most important tasks of this Government and we will do it.
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Friday, February 25, 2011
Log in or register to PaintSquare save your results and track your cumulative quiz score!
Previous Quizzes from the Past Week
Thursday, February 24, 2011
True or false: Siloxane sealers are typically applied at 1-2 mils dry film thickness on concrete substrates.
Wednesday, February 23, 2011
What is another name for "wet storage stain"?
Tuesday, February 22, 2011
The term “mastic,” as in epoxy mastic, often refers to what characteristic?
Monday, February 21, 2011
Hydrophobic contaminants on concrete may include what types of materials?
Friday, February 18, 2011
Which of these organizations provides standards and technical information about the use of cathodic protection for corrosion control?
More previous quizzes
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A Union County Public Schools project manager with the Facilities, Planning and Construction Department, has won a gold medal in a national competition held recently in Missouri. Timothy Hales, 26, became the national champion in the fourth-annual SkillsUSA Geospatial Technology competition in Kansas City, Missouri, in late June. With more than 5,400 contestants from across the US competing in 91 events, Hales was thrilled when he won his competition.
“It was fun, and I’m always up for a challenge,”
said the three-year-veteran UCPS employee. “I knew I had to give my absolute best. You can’t do more than that. I am very pleased and excited that I won. It begins a new chapter in my career. To be recognized on a national level will open a lot of doors for me in the future.”
Hales’ project used geographic information systems (GIS) to analyze the best location for a horticultural training facility on the Porter Ridge campus. His project entailed creating a three-dimensional digital model of the campus. First he created a campus base map and then he performed a site suitability analysis. Three suitable locations on the campus were determined for the garden based on the open spaces available, sunlight, air circulation, slope and drainage, wind protection, and precipitation and irrigation.
The contest was sponsored by Digital Quest, Inc. from Mississippi, (which has offices at NASA — the John C. Stennis Space Center) and Environmental Systems Research Institute (ESRI) from California. It was open to college and postsecondary students across the United States who are studying geographic information systems (GIS), global positioning systems (GPS) and Remote Sensing (RS) technologies.
Hales, who recently got an Associate’s Degree in Applied Science in geospatial technology, represented Central Piedmont Community College in the competition, where he received his degree. The project, which began in May, had to be completed in five weeks. “I took this on because it was a challenge and a great learning opportunity,” Hales said. “I look for opportunities to grow and I saw this as an opportunity to grow as an individual and professionally.”
Contestants had to do a presentation before judges and then orally defend their GIS project, as well as take a written technical knowledge test and a hands-on test of Geospatial Technology skills. Hales, who paid his own way to the competition, was happy to win $1,000 cash scholarship, which he used to reimburse his travel expenses to Kansas City. He also received a complete ArcGIS and four Extensions software package worth $10,000.
“These will enable me to develop further research,” he said. “It’s an opportunity to learn more about this technology on my own time. And I hope to use the software to give back to the community.” During the competition process, Hales became Spatial Technology And Remote Sensing (STARS) certified, which means he is prepared to perform geospatial and geographic information systems.
“We’re very proud of Timothy,”
said Don Ogram, UCPS Planning Manager who supervises Hales. “He’s a very talented young man. His potential is limitless.”
Hales has his own website about geographic information systems (GIS). You can see that website at http://gispathway.com
This article was provided courtesy of the Communications Office of the Union County Public Schools.
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Female entrepreneurship, and, in particular, the contribution of their ventures to aggregate economic activity has gained increasing attention over recent years in terms of theory, practice and policy. This concise book explores how women fit into the contemporary entrepreneurial discourse by...
Published December 13th 2012 by Routledge
Gender, Work and Engineering
Women in the developed world expect to work in the labour force over the course of their lives. On finishing school more girls are entering universities and undertaking professional training for careers than ever before. Males and females enter many high status professions in roughly equal numbers....
To Be Published July 15th 2013 by Routledge
This volume brings together the work of outstanding feminist scholars who reflect on the achievements of feminist political economy and the challenges it faces in the 21st century. The volume develops further some key areas of research in feminist political economy – understanding economies as...
To Be Published October 14th 2013 by Routledge
The Economic Crisis and the Future for Gender Equality
Austerity has become the new principle for public policy in Europe and the US as the financial crisis of 2008 has been converted into a public debt crisis. However, current austerity measures risk losing past progress towards gender equality by undermining important employment and social welfare...
To Be Published August 12th 2013 by Routledge
Coming Out of the Margin
Since the coming into force of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (1992) and its associated Kyoto Protocol (1997), there have been growing efforts by gender equality and women’s empowerment advocates, both at the governmental, inter-governmental and nongovernmental levels to...
To Be Published October 30th 2013 by Routledge
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ALL IS eerily quiet on the corporate front. Even though the global economy continues to grow strongly, and the economic recovery is nearly a year old even in America, corporate investment, and mergers and acquisitions, remain at low levels even though firms are sitting on record piles of cash.
This, in turn, is causing growing concern about whether the recovery can continue, or at least continue with much strength. As The Economist noted earlier this month, “If cautious firms pile up more savings, the prospects for recovery are poor.”
Why are firms so cautious? One likely factor is that they regard the outlook for the economy as highly uncertain, particularly in America and Europe. The recent combination of volatility and a declining trend in developed-world stockmarkets has reinforced concerns that already abounded in companies' executive suites, that the recovery so far has relied too much on government spending. That, given all the recent political talk about the need for public austerity to fend off bond-market vigilantes, may not continue. Meanwhile, private-sector demand remains anaemic.
A second factor is that firms have much less need to invest now because their capacity utilisation remains at historically low levels, points out Carsten Stendevad of Citigroup's Financial Strategy Group. Currently, for example, industrial-capacity utilisation in America is 73%. That is up from the recessionary low of 69%, but well below the 80%-plus level it was at in the years before the economic meltdown in September 2008, and during much of the 1990s. Since plants still have so much spare capacity, managers see little justification for capital spending. Citigroup forecasts that in developed countries, industry's capital spending will fall by 3% this year after a 10% fall last year. In emerging markets, capex is expected to grow by 8% this year—not a bad rate, but far short of last year's roaring 21% growth.
Where are the deals?
The lack of mergers and acquisitions—the much predicted new merger wave having failed to materialise—also owes something to the continuing uncertain economic outlook. Perhaps more important, though, is the fact that potential acquisition targets tend to find selling especially hard to stomach when their share price is some way below recent highs, as is generally the case today.
In one respect, corporate fears seem to have eased a bit, however. After the financial markets collapsed in 2008, especially the commercial-paper market on which many large firms relied for meeting their short-term financial needs, cash became king. Although cash reserves are now at record levels, the hoarding seems to be peaking. The clearest evidence of this is the return of the share buyback, a popular method of returning cash to investors. In the first half of this year, share repurchases have surged close to pre-crisis levels, says Mr Stendevad, a sign that firms feel they no longer need to cling to every last penny for fear of another systemic financial collapse.
Pressure from investors to hand back even more of those cash piles is likely to grow, especially if economic growth falters, says Mr Stendevad. Firms have been able to boost profits in the past year mainly by cost-cutting, something that is unlikely to be as easy in future. It will be no surprise if instead firms use share repurchases to drive up their earnings per share, returning to the pre-crisis trend in which buybacks accounted for one-third of total earnings per share growth for firms in the S&P 500 during 2003-08.
Receiving more money this way will no doubt please investors. Alas, its benefits for the economy are likely to be much smaller, at least in the short-term, than if firms spent the money instead on profitable new business opportunities that can quickly generate new jobs. For now, the only place companies seem likely to do much of that sort of investing is in the developing world, which while better than nothing, is unlikely to cheer up the venerable economies of America and Europe.
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I am looking for information on the Mc Limans, Myers, Shoch, Guthrie, and Stewart families from the Lancaster and Chester County areas of Pennsylvania. I have traced back to the following ancestors (but additional information would be welcome):
- John Mc Limans, born in 1781 in Ireland and Ann ?. (The Mc Limans family is said to have originated from Scotland so I would like to find information on his parents and their birthplaces).
- Jacob Myers, settled in Germantown, PA between 1710 & 1718 (wife unknown at this time).
- Sebastian Shoch, born in Germany (unknown)and Mary ?. They came to the United States around 1827.
- Adam Guthrie, born in 1794 and Phoebe Jones.
- James Elkannah Stewart, born in 1783 and Elizabeth Andrews, born 1834.
I am also looking for information on the Duvall, Spencer, Tucker, and Miles families from the Grayson County, VA and Ashe County, NC areas. I have traced back to the following ancestors (but additional information would be welcome):
- John Duvall, born Feb. 1856 in NC and Cynthia Greer, born abt. 1876 (daughter of Eli Greer & Anna Pugh).
- John Calvin Spencer, born 1849 or 1850 and Mary Frances, born abt. 1850.
- John P. Tucker, born 1826 in NC and Elizabeth Bonum (spelling?), born in 1826 in VA. (Family history has it that either John and/or Elizabeth were Cherokee. Would like to find documentation of this.
- Turner Miles, born abt. 1810 possibly in Atkins Co., NC and Polly Stikes, born abt. 1815.
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You think you know all there is to know about vampires? You don’t - not
unless you’ve read David Wellington’s 13 Bullets and his latest novel featuring vampire huntress Laura Caxton, 99 Coffins. These vampires aren’t the romanticized, cape-wearing, dual-fanged bloodsuckers that we’ve come to know and love from Bram Stoker’s Dracula to present-day bestsellers like Twilight by Stephanie Meyers. Oh, no. The vampires of Wellington’s books don’t have fangs; they have a full set of translucent razor-sharp pointed teeth, like sharks. They bite huge chunks out of their victims and drain the blood by swallowing it that way, rather than by using hollow fangs like a thirsty man uses a straw on a Big Gulp.
There are other differences. The vampires in 99 Coffins aren’t immortal if left unmolested by vampire hunters. With increasing age comes a corresponding increased need for more and more blood - and that merely to stay alive, not to maintain youthful vigor and strength. They can still enjoy an existence much longer than a mortal man’s, but if you encountered one from, say, the time of the Civil War battle of Gettysburg - as Caxton does - you’d expect that the vampire would seem fairly old and decrepit.
That’s far from what faces our intrepid heroine in 99 Coffins. State Trooper Caxton faces a veritable army of ravenous, bloodthirsty vampires who, though cadaverous-looking, gain tremendous strength from the blood of their victims, almost as if they’ve just become vampires recently instead of almost a century and a half ago. Left unchecked, Laura figures that many vampires could kill the entire population of present-day Gettysburg in one night.
Where, when, and why did so many vampires suddenly show up to endanger the inhabitants of Pennsylvania? That’s what makes 99 Coffins a “historical novel.” The novel is told in alternating chapters from the points of view of Laura Caxton (in the third-person) and Union soldiers from the Civil War. Some soldiers, perhaps sick and dying or wanting to bring a faster end to the war and thinking that sacrificing themselves would help accomplish this, agreed to become vampires with the aid of ancient female vampire Justinia Malvern. Justinia still clings tenaciously to a very precarious existence, despite being over 300 years old, and Caxton and her vampire-hunting mentor consult her advice via computer keyboard at various points in 99 Coffins.
Discovered by Marcy Jackson, “a criminal justice major” who as an undergrad working on a student dig with archaeologist Jeff Montrose and Professor John Geistdoerfer at Gettysburg hit a wooden floorboard “with her trowel and thought it sounded hollow,” the ninety-nine coffins at first seem to be little more than a fascinating archeological find. But one of the coffins, the hundredth one, was smashed to pieces, its contents gone.
On the strong suspicion that the hundredth coffin had contained a vampire somehow reunited with his heart (the only way to bring it back to life, once the heart has been removed), the horribly mutilated vampire hunter Jameson Arkeley from 13 Bullets enlists Laura Caxton once more to destroy any vampires that might somehow have managed to make it alive to our times. Though Laura discovers vampire skeletons in the other coffins, she’s relieved that, at least, no hearts are anywhere around. Yet somehow, one coffin is smashed, one vampire has been reunited with its heart, and he is on the loose - and someone alive must be helping him. As Arkeley has told Laura, it’s never a good thing “to underestimate a vampire.”
If one vampire could be reunited with its heart, cheating the inevitable decline of strength that time wreaks on all things, could the same possibly happen to the other ninety-nine? If the hearts could be wrapped in tar, and stored in a barrel, could an entire army of vampires be raised, to devastating effect? What hope can one person, albeit one with the authority to form her own small army of policemen, National Guardsmen and others, have to vanquish an almost invulnerable opposition, each of whom with one bite can tear an arm or leg or head off, with one bite can kill?
99 Coffins will keep you up late into the night reading - and double-checking under your bed and in your closet at bedtime, and making you jump at sudden noises. When the wind blows your curtains, can you be so sure it really is the wind, and nothing more? I missed Jameson Arkeley’s not taking a more active role in the novel, but Laura Caxton comes into her own as a character and does a great job kicking vampire ass. When Arkeley does take a more active role late into the novel, it’s the proverbial icing on the cake. If you love the horror genre, you owe it to yourself to check out 99 Coffins.
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When discussions of flopped biofuel company IPOs arise, Gevo (GEVO) inevitably leads the list of names. It's easy to see why: the company's share price has fallen 88% from its starting value, and roughly 94% from peak to trough (see figure). The most recent bout of bloodletting occurred in late September, when the company announced that its goal of achieving commercial-scale corn biobutanol production at its first large facility in Luverne, MN by the end of 2012 would be missed, with production instead occurring sometime in 2013. At the time the company said that it would produce corn ethanol at the facility until the technical difficulties with biobutanol production were worked out, allowing the company to generate revenues despite the delay. Shares are falling again following yesterday's Q3 earnings call, however, when CEO Patrick Gruber stated that the Luverne facility hasn't begun ethanol production yet, and won't unless it "makes economic sense." As I've discussed elsewhere, this standard is unlikely to be achieved in the near future. In other words, it appears that the Luverne facility will remain idle until the difficulties with biobutanol production are fixed.
That's not to say that this sort of event is out of the ordinary. Scale-up of new biorenewable pathways is notoriously difficult, particularly when independent actors in the form of microbes are involved. It is virtually unheard of for a new biochemical pathway to commercialize as smoothly as those that have been around for thousands of years have (e.g., corn and cane ethanol). These things are to be expected. Furthermore, Gevo's cash situation means that a delay of a few months won't put it in mortal peril (as opposed to a company like KiOR (KIOR), for example). In July the company issued $45 million in 10-year convertible notes, which will incur $3.4 million in annual interest payments but leave Gevo with $92 million in cash on hand. Even assuming continued quarterly losses of roughly $12 million while waiting for Luverne to come online, the company has enough cash to last at least seven quarters. While it would likely prefer to use that cash for future commercialization projects, it's in no danger of declaring bankruptcy anytime soon.
The conference call also briefly touched on advanced biobutanol production, which the analysts on the call really didn't pay much attention to. Its mention in the transcript caught my eye, however, as this has the potential to eliminate my concerns regarding the economics of corn biobutanol production in the U.S. As a reminder, Gevo's business model involves retrofitting existing corn ethanol facilities to biobutanol production. Biobutanol has several advantages over ethanol, both as a commodity chemical, where current market prices are over $2800/metric ton, and as a transportation fuel due to its higher energy content and higher blend limit. That said, the market for biobutanol as a commodity chemical is relatively small, and my concern is that only a handful of facilities can produce enough to swamp the commodity chemicals isobutanol market, at which point it will need to take advantage of the much larger transportation fuel market. The problem with the latter is that a fall in fuel yields occurs on a feedstock basis when converting from corn ethanol to corn biobutanol production, so fuel biobutanol prices must be quite high to offset this efficiency loss. While corn biobutanol meets the definition [pdf] of a renewable fuel (the largest biofuel category) under the RFS2 and therefore qualifies for RINs, the low RIN value for the category ($0.036/RIN) means that the company will only receive $0.047 per gallon of biobutanol produced, even after accounting for the fact that every gallon of biobutanol qualifies for 1.3 RINs due to its higher energy content. This is unlikely to be enough to merit biobutanol fuel production, particularly at current feedstock costs.
Advanced biobutanol is a very different story. A little background is important here: corn ethanol was the predominant biofuels pathway at the time the RFS2 was created by the Energy Security and Independence Act of 2007, and was considered to be the "gateway biofuel" to cellulosic ethanol production. Corn ethanol was also coming under significant attack at the time that the RFS2 was being designed, with a UN official calling it a "crime against humanity" and a former Environmental Defense Fund lawyer accusing it of causing widespread rainforest destruction within the span of a few months. As a result of these accusations, Congress inserted a short clause in the definition of advanced biofuels under the RFS2 (the second-largest category, which primarily covers cane ethanol) stating that ethanol from corn starch cannot qualify, regardless of how small its carbon footprint is. (Both the food versus fuel and rainforest destruction accusations have been thoroughly refuted in recent years by empirical analysis, although nobody accuses Congress of adhering too closely to scientific rigor and the legislation is unlikely to be revised as a result.) Importantly, however, the exclusion just applies to ethanol made from corn starch; no mention is made of other alcohol fuels made from corn starch (of which biobutanol is a member).
According to the Q3 earnings call, Gevo is teaming up with Midwest AgEnergy Group to explore the conversion of a planned 65 million gallon per year [MGY] corn ethanol facility in South Dakota to biobutanol production. Midwest AgEnergy Group also produces renewable electricity, and Gruber indicated in the earnings call that the carbon footprint of any corn biobutanol produced at this facility would be small enough to qualify as an advanced biofuel under the RFS2 as a result. (As a reminder, the biofuel definitions under the RFS2 primarily depend on each biofuel category's lifecycle greenhouse gas reduction threshold relative to gasoline in 2005, with advanced biofuels requiring a 50% reduction.) Having its biobutanol qualify as an advanced biofuel would bring two major benefits to Gevo. First, the RINs for that category are currently trading at $0.40/RIN, or roughly 10x the value of the renewable fuel RINs. Each gallon of advanced biobutanol would receive $0.52 in RINs if produced today, for example. Second, advanced biofuels production is falling short of its mandated volume; production is on track in 2012 to achieve 428 MGY of the mandate's 500 MGY requirement. Approximately 90% of that amount is imported (primarily in the form of Brazilian cane ethanol) and the mandated volume will double by 2014, so domestically-produced biobutanol will have a competitive advantage for the advanced biofuel RINs.
Advanced biobutanol production is still a year or more in the future. While an attractive long-term prospect for Gevo's entry into the transportation fuel market, the company will first need to demonstrate its ability to produce biobutanol on a commercial scale at its Luverne facility. While the recently announced production delay is to be expected for a commercial-scale facility employing a new pathway, the company's prospects look best if it begins production soon. While Gevo has enough cash to last it several quarters at current spending rates, management (and shareholders) would undoubtedly rather see this used to bring additional capacity online, especially advanced biobutanol capacity. Gevo investors have had a particularly rough ride since the company's IPO and its recent production delay is an unfortunate reality of the "Valley of Death" conditions endured during initial commercialization. That said, its entry into the isobutanol and advanced biobutanol markets will result in some attractive returns, provided it can get the Luverne facility up and running.
Disclosure: I have no positions in any stocks mentioned, but may initiate a long position in GEVO over the next 72 hours.
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LA GRANGE — In her letter (June 6), Marcella Meyer asserts that our efforts to provide children and teens with sex/contraceptive education are "doomed to failure." She claims that we have been "throwing money" at this effort for the last 30 years with no positive effect and says that because the problem is cultural, no amount of "technology" can help.
I most strongly disagree with her conclusions. Though the problem is in part cultural, education can have an extremely positive effect. Study after study has shown that when kids have a good base of knowledge to work with, they will tend to postpone sexual activity and be more likely to use contraception regularly once they do become sexually active.
We have seen an increase in teen pregnancy in recent years not because education doesn't work, but because education isn't really being tried. Contraceptive information is irregular, often provided too late and much too often not provided at all. I can say positively, from my experience in public schools during this era of "throwing money" at sex education, that most kids are not learning about contraceptive measures. In many schools, I fear, sex education is not covered at all or is covered without discussing birth control options.
I believe this is in large part due to the fact that the school systems are afraid of distressing people like Ms. Meyer, who are completely ready to ignore the facts and condemn contraceptive education before it has been given a fair chance.
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I am ready to give this On-line KAL / Video tutorial stuff a try. Bear with me and please lend constructive critiques. This is new territory for me and you are all going to be my Guinea Pigs.
For my first project with this new yarn I wanted to do a two color fairsile/stranded project. I have been admiring the Inspira Cowl by celerystalk on Ravelry . I've been itching to make this. I immediately cast on and then read the pattern (I do know I'm supposed to read patterns before I start but I like to live dangerously). It is a 2 x 2 rib with color change every 2 x 2. Well, I like to carry both yarns in my left hand but when you try to do 2 colors and involve purl stitches also, it can get a little all thumbsy. Then I remembered I had figured out how to purl without bringing the yarn to the front. Aha! What a great idea for a video tutorial, aha! what a great project for an online KAL!
I contacted the designer, celerystalk, and asked her permission to use her pattern. She said yes! So here goes!
- Inspira Pattern
- Drops Big Delight ,1 MC & 1 CC - 2 skeins total *or Aran weight yarn 424 yds* total in two different colors.
*(I've modified my version to make it a little bigger so I don't know for sure how much yarn I'll use but I am assuming two skeins will be enough)
- 24" - 40" circular needle to get a gauge of approx 19 st x 22 rws over 4" and a circular of the same length but one size smaller for firming up the neck area. I knit very loosely so I am using a US 8 needle. The pattern originally called for a US 10. Because this is a cowl / shoulder warmer you can be just a little off with your gauge and it shouldn't cause problems.
- Stitch marker to mark the beginning of your rounds.
Definitely do what celerystalk recommends and read the knitty gritty parts at the end of the pattern! After you are through reading take some time to admire her "field notes". She has included three hand drawn images of her inspiration. I wish my mind worked like that. I'm tempted to frame her illustrations.
First thing I want to note to you is that I added on an additional 20 stitches because I want this to fit over a light jacket. So let's start with the cast on. I'm doing a long tail cast on.
*I measure the amount of "tail" that I will need by casting on ten stitches, then unravel and measure how many inches it took to knit the ten stitches. Call that A. Divide the number you are supposed to cast on by ten, call that B. multiply A by B and give you a close estimate of the number of inches to allow for the tail portion of the long tail cast on. I usually add a few more inches. I'd rather trim a long end than have to start all over.
If you hold both yarns in your left hand like I do; here is a video on a trick I taught myself a long time ago and almost forgot about it until I started this project.
It's fun to see the start of the staggers along with the slow color shifts.
Here is where we do a decrease round to create a shoulder shape. I also changed needle size to a smaller needle to have a slightly firmer fabric.
Important Note - I had to use a second skein of my main color, the brown, because I increased the number of stitches cast on.
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Allentown has had more success than Bethlehem with its education foundation,… (LEE A. BUTZ, CONTRIBUTED…)
The proposal to jump start fundraising in the Easton Area School District sounds simple enough.
Contract with a consultant, form an education foundation, hire an executive director and start soliciting businesses and alumni for donations. Then, sit back and watch as the foundation generates revenue for a district whose gaping budget holes are as routine as the school bus showing up every morning.
A consultant who proposed the plan in November says a foundation can raise hundreds of thousands of dollars for a district projecting a multi-million-dollar deficit. But before agreeing to the contract, school directors want evidence that an urban district actually can have a successful education foundation.
"Just because it sounds good, I'm not ready to jump on it right away," said school director Frank Pintabone, an insurance salesman who says he knows sales pitch when he sees one. "I will be doing my research."
The good news for Easton is that foundations at some urban districts are thriving and creating new opportunities at their schools. The bad news is that in the neighboring Bethlehem Area School District, the foundation has failed to live up to expectations.
While Easton was told it could expect a foundation to bring in $150,000-$300,000 a year to fund class trips and innovative programs, Bethlehem's experience demonstrates there's no guarantee.
A foundation's success or failure has nothing to do with where it is located, said Bob New, the retired businessman-turned-education foundation guru trying to strike a deal with Easton. They can succeed or flop just as easily in urban districts as in suburban districts, he said . The keys to success — none of which Easton has in place at this point — are a supportive superintendent, a strong board of foundation directors and at least one part-time staff member.
That formula has worked for the Lancaster Foundation for Educational Enrichment, which reported $402,000 in gross revenue during fiscal 2010-11. The foundation, formed in 1989, pays each of three part-time staff members between $20,000 and $30,000 a year and has its own office at J.P. McCaskey High School.
Though Lancaster County is mostly rural, the school district, which includes Lancaster and Lancaster Township, is decidedly urban, said Laura Olin, the foundation's former executive director and current associate director. Lancaster city had a 28 percent poverty rate in the 2010 census, which was 3 points higher than the city of Easton's. But Lancaster's foundation hasn't been stunted by its less-than-affluent base .
"We aren't trying to have the parents donate," said Olin, who is in her 12th year with the foundation. "If they want to, that's wonderful, but that's not our target."
The largest donations come through Pennsylvania's Educational Improvement Tax Credit Program, which allows businesses to give earned income tax money directly to educational foundations instead of the state. The foundation staff solicits those donations annually, explaining to businesses that they are losing the money anyway and can help the community through the tax credit program.
EITC money was integral in launching honors courses at the middle school, Olin said. The foundation paid for textbooks and other materials, helping the district offer the courses in 2007 for the first time at its four middle schools.
"It has really been a great boon to us," Olin said.
The Norristown Area Education Foundation in Montgomery County is trying to follow Lancaster's lead.
Like Easton, the Norristown district is made up of an urban center and wealthier suburbs. Its foundation, established in 2005, hired part-time director Jessica Schneider last fall in hopes of taking fundraising to the next level.
Schneider, who said her salary is about $30,000, sees herself as the eyes, ears and mouth of the foundation. She meets with teachers and community members, updates the foundation website, writes a newsletter and compiles an annual report.
"These are all things that could never be done before because no one had the time," Schneider said.
The foundation has given $76,991 since its inception, including $15,000 for digital design equipment at Norristown Area High School. Though it reported only $50,000 in revenue two years ago, the foundation has already raised $150,000 and counting this year, Schneider said.
Bethlehem's foundation, founded in 1999, has never had such a prosperous year. Most of the $26,783 in reported revenue for fiscal 2010-11 is what foundation president Mollie Santee calls "donor-restricted" funding, such as memorial scholarships that the foundation administers over the course of several years.
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A proposal endorsed by Mayor Stephanie C. Rawlings-Blake would make the city's west side into an arts district, which the administration hopes will help turn around the ailing neighborhood.
This is not the solution. Why? Baltimore already has two arts districts -- Highlandtown/Patterson Park and Station North. It doesn't need a third.
The city declared Highlandtown/Patterson Park an arts district in 2003. That same year, the Creative Alliance at the Patterson (pictured), a mixed use arts/performance space, opened. Offering art exhibits and cutting edge performances, the Creative Alliance was supposed to be the cultural anchor for an arts renaissance in Highlandtown.
Nearly seven years later, Highlandtown/Patterson Park hasn't seen a sliver of the artistic explosion and revitalization that was supposed to happen. Aside from the Creative Alliance and the Southeast Anchor Library, Highlandtown/Patterson Park doesn't have much more in the way of arts than it did in 2003.
Where are all the galleries and performance spaces that were supposed to open? Where are the low budget theaters? ...
Though the city designated Station North an arts district in 2001, it didn't take off until the past few years, when there was a push from the city and neighborhood organizations to cultivate new businesses.
Since then, Station North has come to life. There are new restaurant/clubs such as Joe Squared, the Metro Gallery and the Windup Space, theaters such as the Strand and Single Carrot, as well as the Hexagon, a DIY live music venue. Change came from the ground up, with artists and bartenders taking chances and opening their own businesses.
Meanwhile, the Creative Alliance has kept chugging along out in Highlandtown/Patterson Park. Take one of the Creative Alliance's organizers out for drinks and ask them how they really feel about the city's commitment to cultivating the neighborhood's arts scene and see what they say. You'll probably get an earful.
At this point, Baltimore is one for two in terms of arts districts. Can this city sustain a third? And is the west side the right place for it?
The Hippodrome Theater at the France-Merrick Peforming Arts Center (pictured, bottom) was the Creative Alliance of the west side -- an anchor for the rest of the neighborhood. But the city took a different approach with the west side, catering more to developers than artists.
At first, it looked like it would work. New businesses such as Maggie Moore's Irish Pub & Restaurant, World of Wings and Bedrock Billiards sprung up, alongside fancy new apartments. The Bromo Seltzer tower was restored and converted into studio space for local artists.
These days, the west side is a ghost town. Bedrock and Maggie Moore's, which begot Lucy's, are both now closed. So is World of Wings Cafe. Several of the buildings which were supposed to be converted into loft apartments sit vacant. It's proof that the old saying 'If you build it, they will come,' doesn't always ring true.
Now, the administration wants to make the west side an arts district. Even with a significant push from the top down, it's an unlikely solution. Baltimore isn't big enough to sustain three arts districts. The west side could end up siphoning arts and culture from Station North.
If anything, this seems like a stop gap measure -- a way to temporarily get the west side back on its feet while the long-awaited Super Block comes to fruition. If it ever does, the west side will be more of a retail center than an arts district.
Instead of designating the west side an arts district, the city should focus on building up the two arts districts it already has. That's a plan artists and local business owners can get behind.
(Baltimore Sun photos by Jed Kirschbaum and Algerina Perna)
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Strife-torn Syria remained calm one hour after the ultimatum for a ceasefire set by UN and Arab League envoy Kofi Annan came into force at 3am GMT, monitors said.
“An hour after the ultimatum expired, the situation is calm in all regions,” said Rami Abdel Rahman, chairperson of the Syrian Human Rights Observatory.
But after breaking a commitment to pull back forces from population centres by Tuesday under the agreement, there were still no signs of a withdrawal by state forces.
The Syrian regime, which has carried out bloody repression of protesters, promised it would end its military operations on Thursday morning but warned its forces would reply to any “terrorist” attack, a reference to the rebels who have said they would respect the ultimatum if Damascus did so.
President Bashar al-Assad’s regime, lambasted by much of the international community for failing to live up to its promises, was very much under the limelight after the United States warned it would “judge the Assad regime by what it does, not by what it says”.
Damascus should have withdrawn its troops from contentious urban areas on Tuesday under Annan’s plan, but it did not.
The opposition said there was no sign of compliance on the ground as regime forces pounded protest centres anew in violence that monitors said killed 25 civilians on Wednesday.
The violence has claimed more than 10 000 lives, mostly civilians, since the revolt against Assad broke out on March 15 last year.
US President Barack Obama and German Chancellor Angela Merkel agreed in a telephone call that the UN Security Council, which gave its blessing to Annan’s plan, needed to “take more resolute action” on Syria.
Syria has been described as a nation at war with itself. View our special report
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What can I do with an Indiana will?
A will, also called a "last will and testament," can help you protect your family and your property. You can use a will to:
- leave your property to people or organizations
- name a personal guardian to care for your minor children
- name a trusted person to manage property you leave to minor children, and
- name an executor, the person who makes sure that the terms of your will are carried out.
What happens if I die with out a will?
In Indiana, if you die without a will, your property will be distributed according to state "intestacy" laws. Indiana's intestacy law gives your property to your closest relatives, beginning with your spouse and children. If you have neither a spouse nor children, your grandchildren or your parents will get your property. This list continues with increasingly distant relatives, including siblings, grandparents, aunts and uncles, cousins, and your spouse's relatives. If the court exhausts this list to find that you have no living relatives by blood or marriage, the state will take your property.
Do I need a lawyer to make a will in Indiana?
No. You can make your own will in Indiana, using Nolo's do-it-yourself will software or online will programs. However, you may want to consult a lawyer in some situations. For example, if you think that your will might be contested or if you want to disinherit your spouse, you should talk with an attorney. Nolo's will-making products tell you when it's wise to seek a lawyer's advice.
What are the requirements for signing a will in Indiana?
To finalize your will in Indiana:
- you must sign your will in front of two witnesses, and
- your witnesses must sign your will.
Do I need to have my will notarized?
No, in Indiana, you do not need to notarize your will to make it legal.
Should I use my will to name an executor?
Yes. In Indiana, you can use your will to name an executor who will ensure that the provisions in your will are carried out after your death. Nolo's will software and online will produces a letter to your executor that generally explains what the job requires. If you don't name an executor, the probate court will appoint someone to take on the job of winding up your estate.
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Released 31 August 2011
You are in: Latest News » Honor & Remember - September 11, 2001...
In honor of the nearly 3,000 killed during the attacks on September 11, 2001, The Salvation Army Nashville Area Command will be holding a memorial service at the Magness-Potter Community Center located on 611 Stockell Street, Nashville, 37207, on September 9, 2011.
Community volunteers will gather at 10:00 a.m. to begin preparing balloons that will include names of all the victims. A ceremony will begin at 10:30 a.m. During the ceremony, 25 balloons will be released during a moment of silence.
The community is invited to share in this worship time.
The Salvation Army is hosting this memorial service to remember those who lost their lives on that tragic September day ten years ago.
The Salvation Army was one of the first agencies to respond immediately after the attacks, serving first responders like the police and firemen.
Locally, The Salvation Army in Nashville sent several volunteer groups up to serve during the aftermath of the 9/11 Terrorist Attacks.
Lt. Col. White said, "It is important to our staff and volunteers at The Salvation Army here in Nashville to have a memorial service because our organization was there immediately following the terrorist attacks, praying for the people who lost their lives, serving food and beverages to those first responders."
For more information on the ceremony taking place, please contact Jennifer Eldridge at 242-0411. Volunteers are still welcome to come assist with the memorial balloons.
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Created on Monday, 26 November 2012 Written by REUBEN MEES
Ohio has more stringent rules regarding bounce houses compared to other states, according to owners of Bellefontaine’s Belle Bounce rental company.
Local youths bounce inside a bounce house during a block party on Court Avenue on June 16. The popular activity has come under scrutiny by the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission. (EXAMINER FILE PHOTO | REUBEN MEES)
“In Ohio, you have to be licensed and insured to rent bounce houses and the same guys (Ohio Department of Agriculture inspectors) who inspect us inspect Kings Island and Cedar Point,” Mike Joseph said.
Read a related article, "Study: Bounce houses a party hit but kids' injuries soar," below
“Some states have no rules at all. You don’t see bounce houses blowing across the interstate in Ohio like happened in Arizona.”
Unlike other states, bounce house rental companies are required to follow certain rules before turning renters loose.
Some of those include setting up a bounce house with proper stakes or sandbags and instructing adult supervisors on the safe use of the apparatus, Mr. Joseph said. Bounce houses also cannot be set up when winds exceed 15 mph.
“A bounce house should always be supervised, for the commercial ones in Ohio that’s required,” he said.
He also said there is a list of dos and don’ts renters are made aware of, such as no flipping, no candy, no jewelry among others.
Problems still can exist with smaller units or units rented from companies that are not certified to rent the bounce houses.
“Most of those (problems) are with the ones people own at home; they aren’t the commercial ones,” Mr. Joseph said. “Knock on wood, we’ve never had anything more serious than kids bumping their heads together, but if they have one at home or rent a rental and get no training, problems can arise.”
And there are inherent risks as with any other sporting activity.
“In any kind of sport, a rollercoaster or anything, there is a risk,” Mr. Joseph said. “As it’s children, it’s the adult supervisor who should make sure it is being used safely.
“We want kids to have fun, but we have to do it safely.”
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Note: this week, I’ll be examining trends in social media and/or philanthropy and attributing a “naughty” or “nice” rating to them. This is the third of five reviews.
Last week, I asked my Twitter followers to help me identify some naughty or nice trends for this series. One follower was especially exuberant about her topic – unpaid interns running a company’s social media presence. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you six passionate comments from Vik Gill:
- “Nonprofits so cash-strapped they have to use unpaid interns for social media [is a] bad idea!”
- “Why would you trust the social media presence of your business to somebody who has no social media work experience?”
- “The fact that a student has been playing around on Twitter and Facebook does not a social media expert make.”
- “Unless you are giving interns the most trivial tasks, the amount of damage they can do to your brand is unquantifiable.”
- “How much do you really know about social media if you think someone with no experience is the best person to build your brand?”
- “Using social media interns creates limitations that arise from a business model that requires free labour to sustain it.”
I’ll cut Vik some slack for the improper spelling of “labor” because she’s British and they think they invented the language.
Vik’s points are spot-on. When we are uncomfortable with a task, we instinctively want to stick the responsibility on someone else. Interns are young, so they know computers; interns are free, so it makes sense to assign them the duties that don’t generate any revenue.
And if you accept those conclusions, I look forward to your 2012 tales from the unemployment line.
It’s easy to assign your interns (or even younger/entry level employees) to social media. It may even seem logical to do so. But social media is increasingly becoming the way corporations, nonprofits, peer groups, causes and more engage their audiences. Our online ambassadors need to be passionate and knowledgeable if they hope to grow and indoctrinate supporters. Interns often have enthusiasm, but it’s not their job to personally invest…it’s their job to figure out what they’re good at and what they want to do with their professional lives.
At the same time, it’s hard to determine social media ROI. It can often feel like we’re shouting into the ether. It may even seem like our Tweets and posts and likes and shares are often a colossal waste of time. But they’re not. One fan’s passion can spread to thousands of his or her peers. It’s difficult to do social media well, but is it any harder than a hundred other tasks in our competitive marketplace? Skimping on social media is just a cop-out for business leaders afraid to invest in something they don’t completely understand.
As 2011 draws to a close, it’s comforting to see that most successful brands have accepted the fact that not doing social media means money left on the table. In 2012, here’s hoping that more will realize that doing it incorrectly can jeopardize their future.
Oh, and if you couldn’t figure it out, using interns to run your social media community is a big, fat naughty!
Previously in “Naughty or Nice”:
12/19 – Listing your Klout score on your resume
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There are hundreds of ways to cheat the federal government. Every dollar wasted to fraud is a dollar that won't go to legitimate purposes. So Medicare and Medicaid fraud steals twice — first from the taxpayers and secondly from people who need care.
These are some of the most common forms of cheating by health care providers:
- Taking kickbacks for referrals
- Billing for services not performed
- Double billing
- Unbundling a group of services in order to bill more for them
- Unnecessary medical treatment or services
- Padding claims
Pigott & Johnson has handled scores of such suits on behalf of the United States and private whistleblowers.
Nationwide Medicare Fraud Attorneys Serving You
Brad Pigott served as a Presidentially-appointed United States Attorney, and Cliff Johnson served as an Assistant United States Attorney responsible for health care fraud enforcement.
Thanks to Medicare and Medicaid reimbursement, there are more reports of fraud in health care than any other sector. This is a sad commentary on ethics at drug companies, hospitals, nursing homes and other health care businesses.
On the other hand, the number of successful qui tam lawsuits means that honest people are speaking up about what they know is wrong. Every day, more corruption is uprooted, and cheaters are learning they may not get away with it.
Pigott & Johnson Knows How the System Works
Having prosecuted False Claims Act cases on behalf of both the Department of Justice and individuals, the lawyers at Pigott & Johnson know how the system works. The system also knows and respects us.
Many of our clients are in the southern states from Virginia to Texas. But we are a nationwide firm, and we have filed cases in every part of the U.S. Our assets going into each suit are our long experience working with the U.S. Department of Justice, our commitment to seeing clients through the process, and a dislike for companies that steal from U.S. taxpayers.
We invite you to visit our information pages on where fraud occurs and what you can do to stop it:
- Medical equipment, ambulance and diagnostic imaging
- Hospitals and outpatient therapy
- Nursing homes, hospices and home healthcare
- Prescription drugs
- Other providers
If you have information of fraud against a U.S. government agency, speak to the nationwide qui tam lawyers at Pigott & Johnson at toll free 877-423-4901 — or send them a confidential e-mail, using this form.
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FCC wireless report shows less market competition, spurs debate over FCC response
The Federal Communications Commission said that the wireless industry has become more concentrated and that consumers are sharply increasing their use of text messaging and Internet data services on cellphones.
Those trends had commissioners calling for greater scrutiny over competition in the cellphone industry and two Republican regulators warning against further rules.
In its open meeting today, the FCC’s wireless bureau released its annual competition report and said the concentration of the mobile industry has increased 32 percent in 2009 from 2003. The same measure of industry consolidation increased 6.5 percent since 2008.
“So without denying those things that are right in the wireless world – and they are many – the facts also tell us that some things are not right,” Democratic Commissioner Michael Copps said. “We are going to need an extra dose of vigilance going forward and use whatever policy levers we have available to ensure good outcomes for American consumers.”
Republican members of the FCC warned against using the report to extend new rules. One rule that has been hotly contested is net neutrality – which the wireless industry has argued against because of the capacity constraints of wireless networks.
The report “appears to lay the foundation for more regulation,” said Robert McDowell, a Republican member. “I cannot support the theory that government policy would produce better results than the market.”
FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski said in the meeting that the results of the report weren't definitive on the question of competition.
“This report does not seek to reach an overly simplistic yes-or-no conclusion about the overall level of competition in this complex and dynamic ecosystem, comprised of multiple markets," he said. "Instead, the report complies with Congress’s mandate to assess market conditions by providing data on trends in competition and choice over time.”
May 20, 2010; 11:58 AM ET
Categories: Broadband , FCC
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The comments to this entry are closed.
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History of Online Comics, Pt. 7: The Beginnings of a "Modern" Age? by T Campbell
Conventional wisdom held, as late as 2001, that the only sustainable economic models for online comics were ad-based. Either the comic carried advertising in some fashion, or it was itself an advertisement for its own merchandise. "Pay-to-read" models were mostly based upon speculation and mostly spectacularly unsuccessful. Even Scott McCloud found his position as comics pundit threatened over his endorsement of "micropayments".
Tycho of Penny Arcade was one of several cartoonists who took McCloud to task for it: "This guy's take on human nature is spun from pure fancy. He imagines that other people – in fact, that everyone-- would gladly pay for things if given the chance to do so. That is demonstrably, empirically false-- most especially so on the Internet, and most damningly so where content is concerned." They eventually mended fences, but the point of wisdom had been made.
However, Joey Manley was never much for listening to conventional wisdom.
In almost every way, Manley is an unusual figure in the world of webcomics. The founder of FreeSpeech.org. A former novelist. A cigar smoker who lives with his longtime boyfriend in Kentucky. An actual Colonel... from Kentucky. Most importantly, a man who comes off as an enlightened statesman, more mature than the crazy creative types surrounding him – yet still a guy who gets it.
This last trait is a hard-won one, resulting not only from Manley's many years of experience managing online content (begun in 1995), but also from a talk show he put together in 2001: "Digital Comics Talk" (archival version here). Manley pursued this while vice-president of streamingmedia.com; at that time, it was his business to report on online entertainment of all forms.
His transition from journalist to participator was not entirely planned. Streamingmedia.com, like many content sites at the time, was paring its resources to the bone, which meant letting Manley go and depriving him of the equipment he needed to produce the show. The contacts he'd made, however, were sufficient to help him launch a new career.
He lacks the charming self-deprecation of Crosby. Keenspot once sold itself as "Almost as Good as Porn," but the slogans for Manley's sites have no false modesty: "The New Mainstream," "Quality Comics at a Good Price," and the slogan with which he introduced Modern Tales…
Manley has many thoughts on the world of webcomics and webcomics publishing, but his core belief, on which he founded Modern Tales in March 2002, is that certain people will gladly pay for content if given the chance to do so. At least, that they will if it's the right content.
"My long-term goal," he's said in interviews, "is that some or all of the MT cartoonists will be able to make a living solely from their webcomics work within five years of Modern Tales' launch."
Witness this copy, which appears in every Modern Tales site when a non-subscriber reaches the archives:
The future of webcomics as a workable living for cartoonists is in your hands!
Most of the money you spend on a… subscription goes directly to the cartoonists. Because they deserve it. Don't you think?
The price is not much, not really, c'mon: $2.95 a month! Okay! Do it! Yes!
For that $2.95, subscribers to Modern Tales had access to over thirty features. As in Keenspot and other collectives, these features' schedules varied from daily to weekly. Some of these strips were by names familiar to comics fans, others already had online audiences upon joining. Manley's connections were paying off.
Perhaps that precedent was the deciding factor. Or perhaps Manley's pitch was better than any that had ever come before. Or perhaps it was the timing, or some combination of the three. At any rate, within two weeks of its launch, Modern Tales was profitable… and had 700 subscribers, where Manley had expected 500 for the year.
The growth has remained strong to the present, strong enough to generate numerous spinoffs with more specialized appeals: serializer.net, for fans of alternative comics; Girlamatic, which features mostly female cartoonists, and Graphic Smash, for action comics. Manley has also given several sites to individual cartoonists with strong track records: AmericanElf.com, JazzAgeComics.com, RumbleGirls.com and Whimville.com.
All of these sites offer small free samples on a regular basis, but none of them would work if not for the belief – once anathema online, but rapidly coming back into fashion – that one gets what one pays for. The number of low-quality webcomics is reaching flood-tide levels, and demand continues to rise for some kind of gatekeeper who can keep readers from wasting their time.
No, Manley – and Modern Tales – have plenty of cheer, but none of Crosby's – Keenspot's – self-deprecation. Everything about MT's sales pitch is dead earnest. When you ask people to pay up front, they have to believe unwaveringly that their money will be well spent.
For similar reasons, Modern Tales has not dipped a single toe into movies, television or comic book stores. Its business is comics, and it remains focused upon comics. It has published some comic books for its members, but strictly on a print-on-demand basis. Its few stall-outs like "The DivaLea Show," an heir to "Digital Comics Talk," have faded into the background without slowing the site's overall momentum much. This approach may not flirt with glamor the way Keenspot's does, but Modern Tales's profitability has been ironclad throughout its history.
ModernTales.com began as a catch-all site, and so it remains at present. Though the site itself may shift to a more specific identity in time, Modern Tales the larger company will probably remain as broadly based as possible. From Manley's release: "we've got manga-styled werewolf/cop dramas butting heads (or, um, maybe some other body part) with Fancy Froglin, medieval fantasy side by side with "straight" autobiography, space-opera-charged science fiction right next door to Borgesian metafiction. And we like it all (as do our thousands of subscribers)."
That may be the greatest challenge Modern Tales faces in the years ahead. Its subscribers tend to love comics… not just the comics that they read, but comics in the abstract. Although this trait reflects the entire webcomics audience to some degree, it's especially important to the business model of Modern Tales' sites, which rely largely upon a taste for variety. The history of mainstream entertainment, such as variety shows and movie genres, suggests that this taste is an elitist one.
Odder still, attempts to create a Modern Tales-like site geared toward a more specific audience have generally fallen flat.
Here history becomes autobiography. In 2002, Manley recruited me for the Modern Tales spinoff AdventureStrips.com (archival version here): the only unsuccessful major Modern Tales spinoff to date. In 2003, he drafted me to edit Graphic Smash. Editor Chris Mills engineered AdventureStrips.com to resurrect the classic adventure strips of the 1930s and 1940s. It was a goal I greatly admired, and the site seemed a sure thing.
But it failed. And I was left the daunting task of taking a similar theme – action comics – and making it commercially viable.
I have to conclude that my critical decision was the choice not to pursue an exclusive agenda. Such a plan would exclude too many strips that have gone on to become mainstays. But more, it would have dampened readers' initial curiosity: the most frequent worries that readers voiced, before Graphic Smash began, was that I would use my position to create thirty clones of my own work.
From this conclusion, we can further conclude that the webcomics audience is still elitist at present – not as elitist as superhero fandom, perhaps, but more so than the motion picture audience.
The trend, however, is toward mainstreaming. More and more people are getting faster connections, reading from work and home. The people who grew up with the Internet of the 1990s are beginning to have children who can type. Webcomics have none of the distribution problems of their printed cousins, nor are they yet marginalized by broadband video downloads. Currently, their audience numbers have nowhere to go but up.
When they go up, who will profit? Modern Tales is well-adapted to the audience as it is, but can the business continue to grow with the webcomics field?
The initial signs are promising. Not only are the spinoff sites increasingly specialized, but Modern Tales has continued to roll out new features that increase its accessibility: a "Swapmeet" merchandise section (paralleling Keenspot's Keenswag, but with a higher stake for cartoonists) and RSS feeds and a "syndication" feature. Manley is happiest as an innovator, and frequently asks questions on his blog and elsewhere ("Do Webcomics Have A Mainstream Already?") that seem designed to take him to the next big thing. Maybe several next big things.
But there is a "next big thing" for Modern Tales that stands to change the whole webcomics landscape. And that landscape is already bringing some big things of its own, from other directions, with no help from Keenspot or Modern Tales. We'll discuss those big things… and the big castles they might build… in the next, and probably last, chapter of the History of Online Comics.
T Campbell is a staff contributor for Comixpedia.
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Tanya Sarne had headed a series of companies over 20 years, and Ghost has been the most successful one.
She was born in 1949, the daughter of a French-Jewish mathematician who escaped from the Nazis to London during the war. Her mother was a Romanian journalist. When a small child, she was the subject of a Pathe Pictorial film called "Cindarella" detailing a young girl's progress through a modeling school. Tanya herself modeled from the age of 14, took up go go dancing in Knightsbridge and did a screen test for director Rossano Brazzi in Rome. She turned down films and came home to London and entered Sussex University. She married pop star Mike Sarne.
After traveling in the United States, South America and Europe, she started a business in 1976 imported Peruvian alpaca knitwear. She introduced the Scandinavian labels In Wear and Laize Adzer to the UK market and in 1978 established her own sportswear lin MIZ.
In 1985 she and designer Katharine Hamnett, gave her new company it's name, Ghost. The name stems from a remark that "it doesn't stand a ghost of a chance." She now runs her million-pound empire which has turned into a high-status label before her very eyes. Tanya designs the hugely successful line of summer dresses which Marks and Spencer sells. She has developed a technique and a look that is never out of fashion and has both uniqueness and longevity. She thinks about the proportions of real women, not underfed models.
Ghost makes loose, flowing separates that can be added to each season. Made from woven viscose yarns, the clothes are designed before dyeing and are cut larger to allow for the shrinkage process. The result is a vintage crepe-type fabric. Many of the clothes have elasticated waists. Long waistcoats, trousers with wide and narrow legs, tunics and A-line skirts, are all popular Ghost pieces. There are 9 Ghost stores in the U.K. one on Bond Street, New York, and a flagship store in Los Angeles.
See All products by Tanya Sarne
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The gender agenda: Gillard and the politics of sexism
IN JUNE 2009, 23-year-old Giorgia Boscolo became Venice's first certified female gondolier, breaking into an occupation that traditionally had been passed from father to son with the result it had been all-male for 900 years. To qualify, Boscolo had to demonstrate she could manoeuvre the narrow gondola, which is 10.66 metres long and weighs 227 kilograms, through Venice's winding waterways using a single oar, all the while speaking English and telling stories to her tourist passengers. She also had to be able to predict the treacherous Venetian tides and currents.
Other women had tried and failed to pass the rigorous 400-hour course, so Boscolo clearly has what it takes. Except in the eyes of her gondolier father, Dante. He was reported as saying that while he was proud of his daughter and believed she'd eventually gain the experience to be good at it, ''I still think being a gondolier is a man's job''.
Julia Gillard would undoubtedly feel some sympathy for Giorgia Boscolo. She too has passed the tests, steered her minority government through the treacherous currents of federal politics, all the while trying to find the right language to convey to voters the journey she is taking them on. Her tenure has been controversial, characterised by mistakes and by a collapse in her party's electoral support.
Some of the criticism of Prime Minister Julia Gillard has related more to her gender than her politics. Photo: Andrew Meares
Gender will no doubt be the last thing on the minds of caucus tomorrow when it meets to decide her future. Yet, from the moment she became leader in June 2010, she has run into the view that ''being a prime minister is a man's job''. Even if it is not expressed in the brazen terms used by Dante Boscolo, this attitude underpins much of the hostile commentary on Gillard. It is ironic that this should be the case, given the initial rapture that greeted Gillard's elevation to the top job, yet there can be no doubting that Australia's first woman prime minister has had to endure levels of vitriol never before seen in federal politics. And it is extremely personal.
''The vilification of the Prime Minister [has] reached unprecedented levels,'' Geoff Kitney wrote in the Australian Financial Review this month, while the Sydney Daily Telegraph's Simon Benson reported on February 5: ''People … believe they can say things about the PM which, if she were a bloke, would never have been said … Underlying this is obviously a belief that the harder and more personal the attack, the more likely she is to break - because she is a woman … John Howard copped it from the left, but never as bad as the language that is often used against Gillard.''
Looking at this vituperation, you would never know that Australia has in fact had 10 female heads of government. We should be used to women running the show. As Bob Katter put it recently, how can we be a sexist country when the Governor-General, the Queensland Governor and the Queensland Premier are all women? (Not to mention the Tasmanian Premier, the ACT Chief Minister and the Prime Minister.)
But Gillard is the first to run the entire country; she is in a totally different league, and one that evidently many of us are not entirely comfortable with. It has not happened before and so we tend to obsess about the externals: her hair, her clothes, her make-up, her voice. She finds it hard to get traction with the electorate on what has been a remarkable record of legislative reforms.
Many (on both sides of politics) make the case that Gillard's current unpopularity is due not to her being a woman but to a combination of incompetence, untrustworthiness and a retrospective and increasing revulsion at the means by which she became prime minister. ''It's fair to say that the way Kevin Rudd was removed from office has a lot to do with how people see her,'' says Julie Bishop, Deputy Leader of the federal opposition.
Her very tenure is portrayed as illegitimate. Yet in the eyes of a number of past and present women political leaders, such criticisms are evidence that in politics (and, to a large extent, also in the corporate world) women are held to a different standard. ''Change is never pretty. There is always blood on the floor, but having a woman do it - that offends the natural order of things,'' says a Labor frontbencher. ''There is the idea that women should not seize power.''
''The judgments made about Julia are exactly the same as those that were made about me,'' says Kerry Chikarovski, who seized the leadership of the New South Wales Liberal Party to become leader of the opposition from late 1998 to early 2002. ''I was asked: How did I feel about having the blood of Peter Collins on my hands? She has been judged in the same way.''
In politics there is usually no other way. A fortunate minority - Anna Bligh and Brendan Nelson come to mind - were able to step into a vacancy created by the leader resigning or losing his seat, but most leaders have tussled the job away from a usually unwilling incumbent. Like Gillard, Paul Keating toppled a sitting prime minister, but there were two important differences. Unlike Hawke, Rudd did not contest the ballot that put Gillard in the job because his support had collapsed. It is ironic, therefore, that her legitimacy is questioned in the way it is. The other difference is that Bob Hawke accepted his party's verdict and, while he was certainly not happy about it, he did not engage in a relentless undermining of his successor, thereby becoming a permanent millstone around Keating's neck.
And, amazingly, the fact that Gillard subsequently won an election and negotiated four separate agreements with independents and the Greens to form a minority government is seen by her critics not as a crowning achievement but as sneaky and treacherous. What does a girl have to do!
ARE women leaders treated differently from men? And are such differences a disadvantage or, worse, outright discrimination? And how do women themselves feel about the ongoing vilification of the Prime Minister? These are very hot questions at present, especially after the near hysterical reaction from politicians and much of the media to Senator Bob Brown's recent comment that ''quite a bit of the criticism [of Gillard] is sexist and unfair and unrelenting''.
To explore this, I speak to a number of past and present women political leaders, seeking to draw on their experiences as well as their opinions. The Prime Minister declines to be interviewed and others prefer not to go on the record; some are happy to go public with their thoughts.
The conversations are a somewhat sobering reminder that, despite the quite respectable number of women political leaders Australia has now produced, our comfort level has not undergone a commensurate improvement. There is disagreement about the basic proposition: ''I achieved the confidence of my electorate, the leadership of my party and the premiership of my state,'' says former New South Wales premier Kristina Keneally. ''I can't ever consider that I experienced some kind of disadvantage because I am a woman. I won't lend support to such a thesis.''
Most of the others have stories to tell of differences and disadvantages.
Gillard has been criticised for not having children (''deliberately barren'', in the infamous phrase of Senator Bill Heffernan) but so has Julie Bishop: ''Sometimes it's used as a slur,'' she says. ''As public figures we are subject to very harsh judgments by people.''
For the increasing number of women politicians who do want to combine their career with having children, there are issues men never have to deal with. ''It might mean you have to travel with the Esky and the breast pump and the baby if you want to make it work,'' says Sophie Mirabella, shadow minister for industry, whose second baby was born in June 2010, a few weeks before the federal election was called.
Nicola Roxon, the Attorney-General, gets irritated that ''the media is more interested in me as someone with a young child than anything to do with policy. My male colleagues who have young children don't get asked these questions.''
''You literally cannot win,'' says a cabinet minister. ''You are criticised if you dedicate yourself to your career and don't have children. Or if you do have them, you're told you are neglecting your family. Or, when you spend time with them, that you are not doing your job properly.''
Often women politicians overcompensate, feeling they need to prove they are totally up to the job. ''The successful women I see are tremendously good at their jobs, and are phenomenally well prepared, '' says a Labor frontbencher. ''They turn up at local events with a written speech, while the men just turn up.''
Clare Martin, who was chief minister of the Northern Territory for 6½ years until 2007, agrees that women often overachieve in the diligence stakes. ''I can see with Julia, she's like me. I read all my briefs, I knew what I was doing when I went to a meeting.'' Martin now says, in retrospect: ''I worked too hard. I got very tired. You are not flexible enough when you are tired.''
Yet these issues pale before the avalanche of hatred that has at times almost crushed Gillard. At an anti-carbon tax rally in Canberra in March last year, angry protesters held up signs that said ''JuLIAR'' and ''Bob Brown's Bitch'' and ''Ditch the Witch''. It was a long way from the mockery that Australia's first two women premiers, Carmen Lawrence and Joan Kirner, had to put up with. ''Lawrence of Suburbia'' and ''Spot on Joan'' (a reference to her clothes) seem pretty tame by comparison.
It was nasty and it was personal but it was also sexist for using that word. A ''bitch'' is ''a malicious or disagreeable woman'', says Macquarie Dictionary. It is one of Kevin Rudd's preferred descriptions of the Prime Minister, according to Andrew Probyn, federal political editor of the West Australian newspaper.
''Women are expected to be tougher than tough, but there is a fine line between that and being a bitch,'' says Chikarovski, acknowledging the negative power of the 'b' word.
And although Liberal women recall that John Howard was mocked for his eyebrows, his glasses, his voice and his tracksuits, no one can point to an example of a gender-specific term being used to attack Howard, or any male politician for that matter. ''Is there a comparable male term to 'bitch'?'' asks Judi Moylan, the Liberal member for Pearce and a former minister for women. She could not think of one.
On July 6 last year, Sydney broadcaster Alan Jones said on air, referring to Gillard: ''The woman is off her tree and quite frankly they should shove her and Bob Brown in a chaff bag and take them as far out to sea as they can and tell them to swim home.'' The comments caused outrage. Tony Abbott joined in the denunciation and Jones later said he regretted the remarks but by then they had become part of the firepower that was being aimed at Australia's first female prime minister.
These inflammatory (and verging on violent) sentiments have now become commonplace in Parliament. During the last sitting, Christopher Pyne compared Gillard's leadership to ''a person with a gangrenous wound [and] the body is now seeking to excise the sick limb''. Nicola Roxon considers the Abbott/Gillard contest to have gone ''beyond the normal push and shove of Parliament''. She says the level of personal abuse and vitriol in the current parliamentary debates are of a substantially different nature from anything we have seen in the past.
SO IN Parliament and in the community, it is now apparently deemed OK to subject the Prime Minister to cruel, violent and often gender-specific commentary and insults. And many in the media join in. The Herald Sun described her as ''coquettish'' and ''giggling'' with President Obama. Andrew Bolt described her as ''weak, even girlish'' with the US President.
But it is on talkback radio where the hatred really gets out of hand. She has been labelled, by hosts Alan Jones or Ray Hadley or by callers to these programs: ''a menopausal monster'', ''a lying cow'', ''a lying bitch'', a ''vitriolic, bitter, lying, condescending facade of a prime minister'', ''a horrible mouth on legs'' and ''brain dead''. One of Alan Jones' listeners even said: ''Does she go down to the chemist to buy her tampons or does the taxpayer pay for them as well?'' (These were included in a compilation on The Hampster Wheel by The Chaser on ABC TV last November.)
''I can't remember ever seeing anything like 'Ditch the Witch' and I can't imagine Jeff Kennett sanctioning that by his appearance,'' says Joan Kirner, who was premier of Victoria from 1990 to 1992. ''The level of media and political sanction that has been given to this gender bias attack is greater.''
''There is an ugly part to the community and if you give them license it will emerge,'' says Clare Martin, reflecting on the ''Ditch the Witch'' signs. ''Wedge politics always brought people out and made them feral.'' In the territory, it would happen with potent issues such as land rights, especially when claims could affect access to fishing areas or parks or waterfront areas in Darwin. ''We managed it by talking calmly and acknowledging it was an issue,'' recalls Martin. ''Not by feeding that hysteria.''
The problem with these attacks on Gillard has been that there was no one to calmly dispense with them. ''I started to get really scared for Julia's sake when Alan Jones said she should be taken out to sea,'' Kirner says.
Much of the attack on Gillard goes to her competence, not her gender. ''Our feedback is that people feel let down, especially women,'' says Bishop. ''Her competence, honesty and integrity are being questioned and these are not gender-related.''
Chikarovski disagrees: ''I feel there is an undercurrent in a lot of the commentary. Whenever she makes a decision that is unpopular and she is criticised for it, it is said she is not up to it because she's a woman.''
After Bob Brown made his comments about sexism, many commentators seemed to wilfully miss the point and claim that Brown was suggesting that any criticism of Gillard (or other women) was sexist. Some went even further, stating that if a woman said it, it could not be sexist.
In fact, women can, and do, dish out sexist commentary about other women. For instance, a Labor frontbencher tells me of an occasion when Kate Ellis, the young and attractive Minister for Employment Participation, Childhood Education and Childcare, went to the dispatch box in the House of Representatives to answer a question.
''Here comes the weather girl,'' called someone from the opposition benches.
''It was Sophie Mirabella,'' says the person telling me the story. ''We all heard her.''
When I put this to Mirabella, she initially says: ''That was not me. I like Kate Ellis.'' I tell her that government members had told me they'd heard her say it. Did she in fact say it? ''I can't recall,'' she replies, then counters with her own example. ''When Mark Latham referred to Janet Albrechtson as a 'skanky ho','' she says, ''there was not a whimper from the women in the Labor Party.''
But for other women, such attacks are unconscionable, even across party lines. ''There is a view that is really vicious, that [Gillard] is not able to do the job,'' says Chikarovski. ''I have said loud and clear, I don't agree with a lot of her policies but I do think she doesn't get any credit for some of the things she's done. She has been very courageous. She has managed to get legislation through the Parliament; she has managed a very difficult process in which she's got the results and has managed to do it in the face of tremendous pressure from interest groups.''
Some are worried that these attacks on Gillard will jeopardise future opportunities for women in politics.
''If Julia Gillard, as an eminently capable person and leader, is not able to continue serving as the first woman prime minister, it will set us back decades,'' says Mary Crooks, executive director of the Victorian Women's Trust. ''Every time someone makes an attack on her authority to lead (as distinct from her policies), they are sending a subliminal message to every woman and girl that they are not welcome to sit at the table of real political power.''
The trust is currently working on an initiative that will encourage people to challenge the ''debasing and relentless attacks on our country's first female prime minister''. This will be a non-partisan effort, says Crooks, ''because of the importance to our nation's maturity and future development that capable women are deemed able to hold senior and powerful office''.
Although the picture might look rosy at the moment, as Bob Katter says, there are already signs that the surge in women's political representation might be stalling, or even going backwards. The 2010 federal election saw women's representation in Canberra decline from 27.3 per cent to 24.7 per cent. And while women in politics, like Giorgia Boscola the gondolier, are going places they have never been before, there are plenty of barriers that have yet to be breached. ''I am now often the only woman in the meetings,'' says Roxon. ''When I had [the] health [portfolio], there were usually lots of women in the room. Now, often the only other woman in the room is the Prime Minister.''
Anne Summers' latest book is The Lost Mother (MUP).
Follow the National Times on Twitter: @NationalTimesAU
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More Google Android phones on the way
It looks like 2009 will be a big year for Google’s fledgling Android mobile platform.
In mid December, 14 new members joined Google’s Open Handset Alliance, a group that will help develop the search giant’s open-source mobile operating system. The new members include Vodafone, the world’s largest mobile operator, as well as Garmin International, Sony Ericsson and Toshiba.
Technology news site Cnet recently reported that Sony Ericsson expects to release a new Android phone in the middle of the year, while Samsung and Garmin are also expected to launch their first Android phones in 2009.
Google is doing its bit to spread the Android message. According to reports, the search giant gave 85% of its staff (around 18,000 people according to reports) customised versions of the HTC Dream, the first commercial Android handset, as Christmas presents.
Google has also developed an updated version of Android, known as Cupcake. The new version includes fixes for bugs with email and new features such as speech recognition, virtual keyboards and video capture.
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By Navesh Chitrakar
Born and raised in Kathmandu’s Newar community I am familiar with Lord Ganesh. His elephant head attached to a human body makes him easy to identify. Ganesh is honored at the beginning of rituals and ceremonies as we celebrate religious festivals.
This month, I had the opportunity to take pictures of Living God Ganesh after I asked one of my friends who was close to the living god’s family. I was pleased and surprised that the family was willing to accept me since they don’t normally allow pictures to be taken.
The first thing I saw was a six-year-old boy sitting on the sofa and yawning. The boy was the living god but he looked totally different from how he had looked when I saw him on the streets during festivals. In his home, the sofa was his throne.
As he bathed I took some pictures, never realizing before that his hair was so long. What struck me was he was just like an ordinary child. He was very playful and would hide from his mother when she came looking for him. He did his homework and loved to draw pictures. And just like any regular child, he loved to dance.
I thought to myself what makes him a living god? Is it people’s belief or is it just tradition that has been followed from ancient times? Maybe the question will remain unanswered. For me, he was a very sweet boy kept inside a closed box. I never saw him wearing colorful clothes like other children instead he had clothes made especially for different occasions.
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These days, there are hundreds of different types of washes, lotions, powders, and oils designed to keep your new baby’s skin clean, soft, and protected. Unfortunately, as with skincare for adults, many of these products contain chemicals that can negatively affect your baby’s long-term health. Chemicals such as sulfates, parabens, and phthalates have recently been found to be harmful and should be avoided in all skincare products. Luckily, there are many products on the market that are conscious of the harmful affects and have been produced with health and safety in mind. Just Hatched is a wonderful line of body wash, shampoo, and lotion designed using natural ingredients to safely keep baby’s skin healthy. In addition, Just Hatched products are priced with budgets in mind. Unlike some other all natural, chemical free products, Just Hatched products are priced similarly to traditional baby washes and lotions. Just Hatched products smell wonderful and contain naturally based ingredients including tapioca, milk, sugar, and coconut. To learn more about these wonderful products visit http://www.justhatched4babies.com/jh/.
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- Worldstart's Tech Tips Newsletter - http://www.worldstart.com -
Google Earth 5
Posted By On February 9, 2009 @ 6:43 PM In Free Downloads,Using The Internet | Comments Disabled
Awhile back, I was telling you about the release of Google Earth 4. Well, lucky for you, Google has released version 5! The new version has some really cool new features you just have to check out!
If you’ve used Google Earth before, you probably already know about many of the features, such as being able to look up anywhere on the planet and see awesome aerial satellite photos. Well, version 5 even introduces something you’ve never seen before! With Google Earth 5, you can go below the ocean and explore the sea floor. How cool is that?!
Other than looking into the ocean, you can also look into the past. With the new version of Google Earth, you can click on the clock icon and see how places looked in the past and how they have changed over time. That feature is awesome for looking at progress while something was being built, such as a stadium or sky scraper.
If you think you might like all of the new features, you can check out Google Earth 5 for yourself right here. Enjoy!
Article printed from Worldstart's Tech Tips Newsletter: http://www.worldstart.com
URL to article: http://www.worldstart.com/google-earth-5/
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First coined by the Egyptian Google marketing manager Wael Ghonim, the term "Revolution 2.0" is used to describe the new grass-roots strategies and tactics used by protesters initially in Egypt - but that which became pervasive throughout the entire Middle East Region. In fighting against despotic rule, people were demanding democracy, regime change and a voice in their respective governments. Revolution 2.0 points to freedom of expression that people are able to secure globally through their social networks and the Internet at large.
The power of the online connection has proven so successful in rallying the already restless populace throughout the entire Middle East - including tha states of Algeria, Tunisia and Yemen - that governments have stepped in to curtail usage. Taking the lead of dictatorships that were limiting online access after the recent overthrow of Egypt's government, Libyan ruler Muammar Gaddafi followed suit in targeting the shut-down of Facebook, Twitter and even major Arabic new networks such as Al-Jazeera.
In Bahrain, New York Times reporter and two-time Pulitzer winner, Nicolas Kristof was empathetic on Twitter, as he feared that the government was close to prohibiting his means to communicate. He was especially impresed by the courage and the emotional contagion emanating from the pro-democracy protesters demonstrating in the Pearl Roundabout.
While street protests are the obvious offline option, how can the Middle Eastern people combat the opposition online? In Iran, there may be a model emerging that neighboring countries may be able to emulate. The idea is to conduct pre-emptive strikes against the government before they use their individual "kill switches" to turn off the Internet.
Anonymous and its "Operation: Iran" is a collective providing users with special advice forums and tools to fight the Iranian government's censorship. The anti-government movement has also encouraged Iranian citizens to use DDOS (distributed-denial-of-service) attacks in an effort to take down key government Web sites like Khamenei.ir, the Web site of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei, as well as leader.ir and president.ir.
Similar to other underground organizations, its difficult to put a label on Anonymous, which lacks leaders, has no headquarters and was a grass-roots organization that grew out of image-sharing forums in the United States. A participant using the screen name "arash" is a hacker who is working with Anonymous to fight government censorship and cypbercontrol in his native country of Iran
He describes this aspect of Revolution 2.0 as a "fluid movement" and in this YouTube video created by the group, he depicts violent scenes of revolt against government oppression, while a digitally-modified narrator details Anonymous' mission:
Anonymous is the same hacktivist group that successfully disrupted a number of Web sites in support of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange in a separate operation called "Operation Payback" (see more on this topic at "Social Media Payback Can Be A Bitch Sometimes.")
As history plays out its next steps in the Middle East, like social media and Web 2.0, Revolution 2.0 will continue to evolve with new layers of direction, insight, strategies and operational tactics added by its participants. It's a crowd-sourced operation being played out on a global stage.
Wael Ghoni was quoted in a recent 60 Minutes interview with Harry Smith stating: "I call this Revolution 2.0" because it is like "Wikipedia… where everyone is contributing content" and adding to the dialogue anonymously. "Everyone was contributing small pieces, bits and pieces. We drew this whole picture. We drew this whole picture of a revolution, and — no one is the hero in that picture," he added.
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Of Bombs and Comics
My first reaction to Binyamin Netanyahu’s exhibition of comics at the UN General Assembly was shame.
Shame that the supreme elected representative of my country would stoop to such a primitive rhetorical device, bordering on the childish.
(One Israeli commentator suggested putting him on a rug with a lot of paper and Indian ink, and letting him play to his heart’s content.)
He was speaking to a half-empty chamber (Israeli TV was careful not to show the entire hall during the speech), and the audience consisted of second-grade diplomats, but these were still educated people. Even Netanyahu must have realized that they would despise this display.
But Netanyahu was not talking to them at all. He was talking to the Jewish audience at home and in the US.
This audience was proud of him. He succeeded in touching their deepest emotions.
To understand this, one must recall the historical memories. Jews were a small, powerless community everywhere. They were completely dependent on the Gentile ruler.
Whenever their situation was in danger, the Jews chose the most prominent person among them to plead their cause before the emperor, king or prince. When this “pleader” (Shtadlan in Hebrew) was successful and the danger was averted, he won the gratitude of the whole community. In some cases, he would be remembered for generations, like the mythical Mordecai in the Book of Esther.
Netanyahu fulfilled this function. He went to the very center of Gentile power, today’s equivalent of the Persian Emperor, and pleaded the case of the Jews threatened with annihilation by the current heir of Haman the Evil (same Book of Esther).
And what an idea of genius to exhibit the drawing of the Bomb! It was reproduced on the front pages of hundreds of newspapers and on TV news programs around the world, including the New York Times!
For Netanyahu this was “the Speech of his Life”. To be precise, as one TV commentator dryly pointed out, it was the 8th Speech of his Life at the General Assembly.
His popularity soared to new heights. Moses himself, the supreme pleader at the court of Pharaoh, could not have done better.
But the crux of the matter was hidden somewhere between the torrents of words.
The “inevitable” attack on Iran’s nuclear installations to prevent the Second Holocaust was postponed to next spring or summer. After blustering for months that the deadly attack was imminent, any minute now, no minute to spare, it disappeared into the mist of the future.
Why? What happened?
Well, one reason was the polls indicating that Barack Obama would be reelected. Netanyahu had doggedly staked all his cards on Mitt Romney, his ideological clone. But Netanyahu is also a True Believer in polls. It seems that Netanyahu’s advisors convinced him to hedge his bet. The evil Obama might win, in spite of the Sheldon Adelson millions. Especially now, after George Soros has staked his millions on the incumbent.
Netanyahu had the brilliant idea of attacking Iran just before the US elections, hoping that the hands of all American politicians would be tied. Who would dare to restrain Israel at such a time? Who would refuse help to Israel when the Iranians counter-attacked?
But like so many of Netanyahu’s brilliant ideas, this one, too, flopped. Obama has told Netanyahu in no uncertain terms: No attack on Iran before the elections. Or else…
The next President of the United States of America – whoever that may be – will tell Netanyahu the same after the elections.
As I have said before (excuse me for quoting myself again), a military attack on Iran is out of the question. The price is intolerably high. The geographic, economic and military facts all conspire to prevent it. The Strait of Hormuz would be shut, the world economy would collapse, a long and devastating war would ensue.
Even if Mitt Romney were in power, surrounded by a crowd of neocons, it would not change these facts one bit.
Obama’s case is very much strengthened by the economic news coming out of Iran. The international sanctions have had amazing results. The skeptics – led by Netanyahu – are in disarray.
Contrary to the anti-islamic caricature, Iran is a normal country, with a normal middle-class and citizens with a high political awareness. They know that Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is a fool and if he had really wanted to produce a nuclear bomb, would he have made all these idiotic speeches about Israel and/or the Holocaust? Shouldn’t he have kept his mouth shut and worked hard at it? But since he is about to go away anyhow, no need to make a revolution just now.
The practical upshot: Sorry, no war.
The whole affair brings up again the Walt-Mearsheimer controversy. Does Israel control US policy? Does the tail wag the dog?
To a very large extent, that is undoubtedly the case. Enough to follow the present election campaign and perceive how both candidates treat the Israeli government obsequiously, competing to outdo the other with words of flattery and support.
Jewish votes play an important role in swing states, and Jewish money plays a huge role in financing both candidates. (O tempora, o mores! Once there was a Jewish joke: A Polish nobleman threatens his neighboring nobleman: “If you hit my Jew, I shall hit your Jew!” Now one Jewish billionaire threatens another Jewish billionaire: If you give a million to your Goy, I shall give a million to my Goy!”)
The Obama administration’s Middle East policy staff is manned by Zionist Jews, down to the US ambassador in Tel Aviv, who speaks better Hebrew than Avigdor Lieberman. Dennis Ross, the grave digger of Middle East peace, seems to be everywhere. Romney’s neocons, too, are mostly Jews.
Jews have a huge influence – up to a point. This point is extremely significant.
There was a minor illustration: Jonathan Pollard, the American-Jewish spy, was sent to prison for life. Many people (including myself) consider this penalty unduly harsh. Yet no American Jew dared to protest, AIPAC kept quiet and no American president was swayed by Israeli calls for clemency. The US security establishment said No, and No it was.
The war on Iran is a million times more important. It concerns vital American interests. The American military opposes it (as does the Israeli military). Everybody in Washington DC knows that this is no side issue. It touches the very basis of American power in the world.
And lo and behold, the US says NO to Israel. The President says coolly that in matters of vital security interests, no foreign country can order the US Commander in Chief to draw red lines and commit himself to a war. Especially not with the help of a comic-book drawing.
Israelis are astounded. What? We, the country of God’s chosen people, are foreigners? Just like other foreigners?
This is a very important lesson. When things really come to a head, the dog is still the dog and the tail is still the tail.
So what about Netanyahu’s Iran commitment?
Recent I was asked by a foreign journalist if Netanyahu could survive the elimination of the “military option” against Iran, after talking for months about nothing else. What about the Iranian Hitler? What about the coming Holocaust?
I told him not to worry. Netanyahu can easily get out of it by claiming that the whole thing was really a ruse to get the world to impose tougher sanctions on Iran.
But was it?
People of influence in Israel are divided.
The first camp worries that our Prime Minister is really off his rocker. That he is obsessed with Iran, perhaps clinically unbalanced, that Iran has become an idée fixe.
The other camp believes that the whole thing was, right from the beginning, a hoax to divert attention from the one issue that really matters: Peace with Palestine.
In this he has been hugely successful. For months now, Palestine has been missing from the agenda of Israel and the entire world. Palestine? Peace? What Palestine, What peace? And while the world stares at Iran like a hypnotized rabbit at a snake, settlements are enlarged and the occupation deepened, and we are sailing proudly towards disaster.
And that is not at all a comic book story.
URI AVNERY is an Israeli writer and peace activist with Gush Shalom. He is a contributor to CounterPunch’s book The Politics of Anti-Semitism.
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By Robert Simonson
01 Jul 2012
|Photo by Joan Marcus|
For more than 30 years, the Theatre Development Fund has been working on increasing stage show accessibility. Its unflagging efforts have made a trip to the theatre more appealing to a wide variety of people with physical disabilities. TDF Accessibility Programs (TAP) have created open-captioned and American Sign Language-interpreted performances on Broadway and off, shows for theatregoers with mild to profound hearing loss, and audio-described performances for people who are partially sighted or blind.
Now TDF has found a way to include yet another underserved constituency hungry for live entertainment.
Families attending these shows arrive confident they will find a friendly and accommodating environment. TDF buys out the entire house, then resells the tickets only to moms and dads with children on the autism spectrum, including Asperger's syndrome. One of the restrooms is converted into a family bathroom, where adults may enter with kids. A safe area is set up in the lobby or lounge area where families can take a break from the show. And the auditorium is peopled not only with ushers, but with educators and service providers who are schooled in the care of autistic kids.
"With kids on the spectrum, you can't just go to a performance," says Steven Chaikelson, the father of three boys, including twins Jamie and Daniel, who are autistic. "So it's wonderful to go to a show where, if Jamie begins singing 'The Muffin Man,' it's kinda OK. And if I have to leave with Daniel because he can't handle it and we have to wait outside for a bit, that's OK, too."
Chaikelson is a general manager who has worked on many Broadway and Off-Broadway shows, including The Lion King. Years ago Chaikelson would take his sons to the occasional theatre show. "The problem was that Jamie would vocalize during the performance and Daniel was really terrified of the environment. For many years, we hadn't gone to see anything." Everything changed with the special initiative performance of The Lion King. "Daniel made it through the whole performance. He didn't have to get up. Daniel cried at the end because he didn't want it to end."
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What is included in the resume content?
Use the categories below which are most appropriate to your situation.
In order for a resume to make a positive impression, you must develop a theme. Do you want to show your extensive work history? Do you want to highlight your educational background or stress your skills/qualifications and achievements as well as duties and responsibilities. For more information, link to Organization and/or Resume Format.
The heading is always at the center or the left-hand side of the resume or near the top of the page. List your name, temporary or permanent street address and e-mail address. Do not forget to include your home or work telephone number if you are comfortable with prospective employers calling. If using an answering machine be certain you have recorded a message that is clear, concise and businesslike.
Including a "job objective" is optional but highly recommended. This indicates what your job goal is; be specific. In twelve words or less, clearly state what type of job you want. Avoid overused phrases, such as "utilizing my skills" or "offering a potential to grow" without being specific about how to accomplish that goal.
Indicate the school or college you have attended, any seminars, workshops, military training or special courses you have taken. If you have taken college courses, list the college, city, major, most recent degree awarded and when you graduated. You may also list your grade point average (G.P.A.), if desired but specify on what scale (e.g., 3.5 on a 4.0 scale). If you are just beginning college, list the high school, as well as any significant college courses you have studied. If you have been out of high school for a number of years, omit the high school; a significant career history may be more meaningful. If your career history is more important than the education, list the experience first and place the education later in the resume.
Employment, Work History, Experiences, Work Experiences, Military or Volunteer Positions.
(Need not be paid to be included.) This is a critical section of the resume and probably the most extensive area. Begin with your current or most recent job and use reverse chronological order. List the information in this order:
Name of the employer and dates (if applicable)
City and state of the employer
A summary of your accomplishments and responsibilities
For a military entry, current or most recent rank and job classification
When writing the summary of accomplishments and responsibilities, explain concisely the duties relevant to the position you are seeking. Emphasize the responsibilities and skills that would readily transfer to your next job. Be careful not to overstate your duties. Use action words to describe your qualifications. Use key words if you are writing a scannable resume.
Other Related Work Experience.
In today's job market, internships, apprenticeships, co-ops and other related experiences are very important. State as briefly as possible those activities which are relevant to the job for which you are applying. This information could be similar to that provided for work experience.
List certification and licenses in your field of expertise, indicating the dates and type of test taken for licensure. Include the number of the license, if appropriate.
Skills, Accomplishments or Achievements ( optional ).
If you are creating a functional resume, divide into skill headings, with specific examples bulleted under each section. Begin with the skill for which you are applying. Some of the headings may include: communication, management, leadership, customer service, financial skills, etc.
Awards and Achievements.
If you have won athletic awards, presented research at a professional conference or were recognized for community involvement or a competition then consider including them.
Memberships or Professional Organizations.
List any memberships, campus activities or professional organizations you are currently or were engaged in that relate to your career objective. Indicate office(s) held.
Hobbies or Interests ( optional ).
This section may be included if you have hobbies or interests which demonstrate and highlight skills, abilities and characteristics about you. Some examples are: work with your hands, theater, art work, travel, historic preservation, hiking or even hunting.
This section is rarely used in resumes today, but should you feel some personal information relates to the job objective, it may be included in the resume or in the cover letter.
Preparing a separate sheet of four or five professionally related references is acceptable. References are not normally included with your resume but may be furnished upon request on a separate sheet of paper. Divide references into work related, professional and personal.
Final considerations are the selection of text, fonts, paper, printing and mailing methods.
Text The most popular typefaces are ( new century schoolbook, bookman, times, courier ).
Fonts (type size). Two types are generally used, 10-point and 12-point. An exception to this could be a header typed in a large font to highlight your name.
Paper and Envelopes. Resumes, cover letters and thank you letters should be printed on a high quality cotton paper. These choices reflect your style, your attention to detail and thoroughness. Variations are acceptable in some instances if they accentuate or highlight your field of interest or expertise.
Printing Methods. Always use a quality method of printing, such as a laser printer. If you do not use this, then have your resume typeset. Use graphics very sparingly or not at all unless their use appears appropriate for the field for which you are applying.
Mailing/Distribution. If you fax a resume, use white paper. Use the largest font which comfortably fits within your resume margins. Always mail or deliver a original to the prospective employer the same day. When doing a global job search, consider the electronic resume. Some local printing companies can help with the service of on-line resumes, but consider the fees and confidentiality issues involved in this choice.
Career and Employment Services
Gannon Bldg, Room 218
Phone: (517) 483-1172
Additional contact information »
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Anchor Intro: The holiday season is now in gear, although maybe not high gear. According to the National Retail Federation, the average American will be spending about $830 on holiday shopping this year, up only 2 percent from last year. But there are ways you can stretch that gift dollar. Bankrate.com has some tips.
SOT: "I have a lot of people to buy for. I have a big family -- there's eight of us. Just brothers and sisters -- 32 people. So, I'd say I'm going to try to stay around 2,000."
Voice over 1: Playing Santa is an expensive hobby. But there are simple ideas you can use all year round to reduce both expense and your stress.
Voice over 2: First advice? Make a budget. Decide how much to spend, divide it among the people you're shopping for, and stick to it. And cross yourself off. The National Retail Federation says the average person spends close to a hundred bucks on themselves while holiday shopping.
Voice over 3: Next, if you use a credit card that offers a cash-back reward, now could be a great time to cash in. And some cards offer double cash with select retailers, so a $20 reward could turn into a $40 gift certificate.
Voice over 4: Use the Internet to comparison shop. Even if you don't buy online, you can use it to see if local merchants will compete with the prices you find.
Voice over 5: Did you get gift cards last year that you haven't used up? Maybe it's time for you to turn them into a gift for somebody else.
Voice over 6: And use imagination instead of cash. What kid wouldn't like to receive a get-out-of punishment free card?
SOT: "It's a nice gesture to try to turn things around a little bit so it's more from the heart than from the pocket."
Standup: Bottom line? The way to save money all year long is to do what Santa does: Make a list, check it twice. Use your imagination instead of your money. For Bankrate.com, I'm Kristin Arnold.
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What kind of Disney Vacation is most important to you?
The one where you visit a park, and in any given day, you ride as many rides as you can. You leave for the park at the crack of dawn and you stay until it closes.
You might take advantage of an early morning at a park, but you stop to see characters, have a meal that you reserved through priority seating, and do some spontaneous activity such as pin trading, or picture taking.
In otherwords: Is the quality of your vacation more important than the quantity of the attractions that you experience?
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“Manhood” Born of the Past
We are failing boys.
We bombard them with images of sexuality they cannot possibly understand.
They see pornography at too young an age and are unable to form healthy concepts of intimacy or sexuality.
They are taught that women are objects, and any woman who feels otherwise is undesirable. They are taught that submissive is sexy. They are taught a thousand incorrect things about fellow human beings.
All of a sudden these boys are men. They are full of fear, rage, and libido. They are unable to understand women, so they continue to reenact what they see in pornography and on television. We still wonder why there is such a problem with sexual violence in this country.
We need to redefine what it means to be a man in our society. The concept of “being a man” is becoming an issue of public health. I have heard manliness defined as objectifying women. “Real” men interact with women solely for the purpose of having sex with them. “Real” men do not see women as human beings, let alone equals. A “real” man views women as a commodity, nothing more.
The Present Rape Culture
One only needs to look at RAINN’s statistics to understand the magnitude of this problem:
1/6 women will be a victim of sexual assault.
60% of sexual assault goes unreported.
Every 2 minutes someone is sexually assaulted in the US.
The statistics are overwhelming.
It’s hard to contemplate what they really mean.
It is easy to feel helpless looking at them.
The question remains: “Well, what can I do about it?”
Of course you could volunteer, donate, or otherwise become involved. But most people won’t, and that’s expected.
If you’re not going to volunteer your time, help change the dialogue.
Don’t subscribe to the notions of victim blaming.
Reporting sexual assault is a harrowing, invasive, and often humiliating procedure. False reporting statistics can be confusing and contradictory.
Two comprehensive studies (The British Home Office and The Victoria Police) found that false reporting statistics are very low. Between 2-3%
A significant other can still be a rapist.
Rape is rape. Past sexual encounters between a rape victim and rapist do not discredit an allegation of rape.
Alcohol and choice of clothing do not make rape any less severe.
A person is entitled to wear what they want and (if over the age of 21) legally allowed to drink. While this certainly may put them in a dangerous situation, it does not put them at fault.
Words Have Power.
When you say “slut,” “whore,” “bitch,” “cunt,” or a variety of other demeaning words, you are subscribing to an ideology. A very ugly one.
How do we redefine what has become ingrained in our culture?
We must start at an early age. We need to stop “Role Models for Girls” and “Role Models for Boys.” We need role models for all genders.
Imagine if boys learned to look up to women at an early age. No boy is born a compulsive chauvinist. No boy is born hating women. No boy is born a rapist.
As a society, we need to stop focusing on our differences. We need to ignore what it “means to be a girl” or what “every man has to do.” Why not focus on what it means to be a human being?
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When do I need to start being a leader? It’s a question I hear often from entrepreneurs. The answer is simple: Sooner than you think.
You start leading as soon as someone starts following. In a brand-new company, the very act of engaging someone else in your cause (whether enlisting the aid of a co-founder or hiring your first person, paid or not) is a clear signal that you are now in a leadership role.
An entrepreneur with the founding vision of an organization – no matter what his or her official title may be -- will always be looked upon to provide an ongoing explanation of that vision. This act of explaining, of making sense of things, is a core element of leadership.
Some entrepreneurs don’t want the burden of leadership. Others are afraid of it, or don’t know what to do. Some want to have wholly collaborative companies that require only an abbreviated form of leadership. Others hope to have someone else be the leader, or that leadership will not be necessary until the company is bigger, profitable, or has more products – that leadership will somehow wait to start.
But the moment that your solo enterprise becomes the work of two, you receive from this other person a form of permission and expectation to provide leadership. And you have an obligation to step up to the challenge.
For some entrepreneurs, this means stepping into a formal leadership role (such as CEO or a head of a function.) For others, it involves remaining an individual contributor, or a serving in a non-executive management position. However, for all first-time entrepreneurs it requires the recognition that you must provide a specific kind of presence and direction to your new organization.
Especially in a startup or early-stage business, people gravitate to the founding entrepreneur because there is often little more to the organization than this visionary and her or his vision. As the organization grows, people will want, and need, to check-in and see that they are still “on course,” both individually and as a company. With a few exceptions, the founding entrepreneur (CEO or not) is a highly-observed individual in an organization. Others in the company will continually look to de-code their signals. If the founder is also the CEO, this visibility increases, as does the pressure to provide clear and cohesive leadership.
Here are a few things for an entrepreneur to consider about the timing of leadership:
Leadership is a now activity. Leadership waits only for a follower, not for some future phase of your company. While you may think that you can wait to address these responsibilities, you really can’t if you want the organization to have the best possible opportunity to thrive.
Leaders are made. Warren Bennis said, “The most dangerous myth is that leaders are born – that there is a genetic factor to leadership, that people have certain charismatic qualities or not. That’s nonsense. Leaders are made rather than born.” While this perspective is a larger topic for future columns, the point here is that if you are afraid or unwilling to lead, some magical leader will not appear to do it for you. Even if you hire a CEO to run the company, as a founding entrepreneur your will always be looked upon to lead. If you don’t meet this challenge, you forfeit an enormous opportunity to help the organization stay connected to its roots. And when this connection breaks, it is difficult to repair.
Start with questions. As you step into leadership, ask yourself:
The practice of leadership is a complex and continual process. And while there are no easy solutions, your growth as a leader will be impacted by how you take your first steps.
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Late this evening in the small land of Serverville a milestone has been reached in the development of our world. The ongoing Transcontinental Railroad project has finally been completed. The enormous project took upwards of 2 weeks to complete, which is equivalent to around 200 Minecraftonian days for you non block heads out there. A vast pool of resources had to be used to complete the task, with minerals for the tracks coming out of the Glaserton caves, Mount Doom, Ocean Mine, and various generous donations from citizens’ personal mines. The finished track spans the length of 2 Minecraftonian maps starting from the station in the rainy lake land of Glaserton, then crossing the Glaserton archipelago, after which it crosses Squid Ocean over a soon to be beautiful work in progress suspension bridge by our very own architect jackson12345. The railroad then weaves it’s way past Mount Doom heading straight towards the Snow Zone and the station in the town of Snorigim.
The finished track required a mineral count of more than 200 ingots gold and more than 400 ingots of iron, and the cutting down of countless trees to complete the track’s safety fence. The monumental project of laying the track and fencing was taken up by two Serverville Minecraftonians solely. Thanks to the efforts of Origim and Glasenator, Serverville citizens can now travel freely and quickly between the two towns. This quick way to travel to previously distant Sonorigm is sure to bring much commerce and tourism to the snowy quiet town. Plans for a ice skating and hockey rink are soon to be passed by the Snorigim zoning committee.
The ceremony for the completion of the railroad was held at the marker where the two sides of the track were first joined. Before christening the railroad, a short memorial was held in remembrance of all Minecraftonians, sheep, pigs, cows, chickens, zombies, spiders, skeletons, and creepers who lost their lives in the construction of the track. 3 creepers and a spider also attended the ceremony, most likely to pay their respects. A full documentation of the Transcontinental Railroad with videos and diagrams will be available in the next issue of Minecraft Weekly.
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Warwick is reachable from our Alvechurch, Gayton and Worcester
Canal Boat Holidays marinas.
Starting Marina(s) : Alvechurch Marina | Gayton Marina | Worcester Marina
Canal(s) : Grand Union | Birmingham & Worcester | Oxford | Birmingham & Fazeley
River(s) : n/a
< Back to articles menu
Situated on the banks of the River Avon Warwick has become famous for its historic buildings which have featured in many TV's drama series such as 'Dangerfield', 'Pride and Prejudice', 'Tom Jones' and 'Moll Flanders'.
The Grand Union Canal runs through the town and was built for industrial transport, especially coal. The Canal joins two of England's largest cities, Birmingham and London and is 135 miles long and has 160 locks. The Hatton Flight, just west of Warwick, is a flight containing 21 locks over just two miles. Opened in 1799 it was built to carry locally mined coal to the power stations and factories of the Black Country. It was also a vital link connecting London with the Midlands.
Warwick Castle was founded almost 1,100 years. In 914AD Ethelfleda, daughter of Alfred the Great, ordered the building of a 'burh' or an earthen rampart to protect the small hill top settlement of Warwick from Danish invaders. In 1705 the world famous gardener Lancelot 'Capability' Brown was commissioned to landscape the gardens. If you visit today go back in time to 1898 and be a guest at a house party hosted by Daisy, Countess of Warwick meet Daisy and her friends preparing for their party. The Castle has experienced some of the bloodiest and frightening times in history are you brave enough to visit the dungeons ? Or be taken back to 1345 when the town was gripped by the plague? Enter the labyrinth of lost soles a scary mirror maze or view close up the implements of torture and execution.
There has been a Church on the site of St Mary's since Saxon times. The imposing tower of St Mary's Collegiate Church can be viewed from almost anywhere in Warwick. Rebuilt by Sir William Wilson in 1704 after the great fire of Warwick. Climb the 134 steps to the top of the tower and marvel at the glorious views of the town, the surrounding countryside and the Castle.
The Lord Leycester Hospital has never been an actual hospital but the word hospital is used in its ancient sense meaning “a charitable institution for the housing of the needy, infirm or aged”. In the reign of Queen Elizabeth I it became a place of retirement for old warriors and their wives. Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester converted the buildings of the dissolved Warwick Guilds into a retreat for the old soldiers. Today it still remains an independent charity providing a home for ex-Servicemen and their wives.
St. Johns House museum tells the history of the 6th Foot (Royal Warwickshire Regiment). Hear the story of the "Warwickshire Lads" revealed through a mix of real objects, uniforms, weapons, equipment, medals, pictures, documents. St. John's House Museum occupies the ground floor of this 17th century historic house. Explore the Victorian school room and the kitchen to explore and experience of how people lived in the past.
Set amidst historic building are a vast array of antique shops and second hand bookshops. Warwick has a great variety of cafés, restaurants and other eateries. For Centuries Warwick has been hosting the annual Mop Fair and Runaway Mop Fair and are the towns oldest traditions. It first started nearly seven hundred years ago when the event was for a hiring local labourers. During the industrial revolution came along rides which became a feature of the Mop. In the beginning pedalled rides then steam power and now the white knuckle rides of today.
Experience the thrill of the races visit Warwick Racecourse next to Warwick Castle, the racecourse is one of the oldest in the country with racing having taken place since the 1700s.
More articles ...
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Robert Fontenot’s sculptures, made out of bread dough, present the viewer with extremely humorous, yet severely violent worlds. He’s the author and designer of three books. Two of which are about the histories of ancient mythologies and the other of which is an illustrated history of performance art – that is, in my opinion, far more entertaining than Roselee Goldberg’s classic Performance Art: From Futurism to the Present. However, skillfully sculpting the human form’s most revealing gestures is not Robert Fontenot’s only mastered practice. He also has an ongoing series, where he embroiders textiles, as well as another project entitled Recycle LACMA – in which he buys deaccessioned items from the museum at auction and then turns them into items of use. For example, he transformed a Brocade evening dress into a fully functional fanny pack. If you have your wits about you, then it won’t take long to recognize the awesomeness of Robert Fontenot’s work.
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Wood and Metal
Metal is slowly replacing wood as a major residential roofing material. Cedar shakes and shingles have a classic, natural look, but they are typically less fire-resistant and require more maintenance than metal roofing. The wood must be painted, cleaned and dried regularly.
Metal roofs start at about the same price as cedar, but metal roofs require minimal maintenance and are very lightweight and weather-resistant. They look best on modern homes, and they are a good option in southeastern states because they can withstand tropical storms. They require professional installation, but homeowners can save money by covering existing shingles and avoiding tear-off costs.
Consider cost, durability, aesthetics and climate when choosing a roofing material. While asphalt shingles are the most popular material, stone, wood, rubber or metal may be the best choice for your home.
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Project Glass: Developers' verdicts on Google's headsetContinue reading the main story
Google's augmented reality headsets still remain prototypes, but it appears the firm is determined to bring them to market.
It showed off the devices during one of the flashiest tech presentations to date at its I/O developers conference on Wednesday.
The presentation involved live videos streamed from headsets worn by skydiving employees and daredevil cyclists, as well as the announcement that attendees could pre-order test versions of the product.
Project Glass can record and stream video and display information through a small transparent screen above the user's right eye.
The product is controlled by voice or via a small touchpad on the right arm of the device; can be connected to the internet via a tethered phone; and lasts for about six hours thanks to an attached battery - although the All Things D site reports that Google intends to extend that to a day.
Web searches, email, and photos can be seen in-frame, and the company intends to add more functions over time.
Google aims to release the eyewear to consumers before the end of 2014, but developers are being offered the chance to buy an "explorer" edition to start work on related software.
The catch is that they are being charged $1,500 (£965) for the privilege, must be US-based, have attended the conference and will have to wait for delivery until "early next year".
The BBC spoke to four developers at I/O to see what they made of the announcement.
$1,500 is really a drop in the bucket when you think about what they've actually been able to do.
I used to do research and development at Motorola [part of which is now owned by Google] and for 12 years we were developing all sorts of technology to make it very easy for people in public safety - first responders, police, fire and rescue - to carry out their mission-critical missions.
Time and concentration are the most important aspects of their job and when you are in a very stressful situation like trying to save someone's life or fight a fire, focusing on your phone or another device, is very, very difficult.
So having glasses that allow you to see in your field of view information that's relevant to a mission that you're trying to carry out in a very stressful situation is incredibly valuable.
$1,500 is nothing - the prototypes that we used to work with were $15,000.
Mr Kostresevic was the 427th developer to pre-order Project Glass.
It's a far-out idea - it's still in its infancy I think.
It's an interesting concept but I don't see myself wearing a device like that because I wear prescription glasses.
Will there be something I can put on my prescription glasses? I don't know.
I don't see everybody wearing the device all day.
When I go to work, should I take pictures of my desktop every five minutes?
It kind of spoils the view if everybody is wearing these devices on their heads. I like to see people's faces as they are.
It's also maybe a bit intrusive if they start blinking - and oops - you've taken a picture.
Just a week before Google I/O, I was walking down the street with my girlfriend and looking for a place to eat. We had four restaurants in a four-block radius, and we checked them out on foot.
I had help on my phone and never bothered to look it up because it's this cumbersome experience of reaching into your pocket, grabbing the phone, launching the app, waiting for it to figure out where you are, telling it what restaurants [to research] and then clicking it.
So I remembered Glass, and I told my girlfriend: "If I had those glasses, I could have just looked at the restaurant, seen the average Zagat ratings and the average price.
So there definitely is a lot of use cases.
As awesome as the Android phone was five years ago when I first started using it, it has started feeling too cumbersome.
A much better experience would be to look at what I'm interested in and have the information that I want displayed automatically.
Mr Kostresevic was the 574th software developer to order Project Glass.
In the long arc of wearable computing, I just think that what we are going to see in retrospect, is this technology - Glass - is a new interface to the internet, and that is all it is.
When we look back 10 years or so in the future, it's going to be so cheap to integrate computing and communication into everything that it's going to stop being about gadgets.
The real impacts of wearable computing are most likely to come in things that don't look like computers at all.
When you add smarts and functionality to things that are around us all the time - like a purse, wallet or anything that you carry with you - you don't have to invent a new device to get the best use out of wearable computing.
Computing is infusing every physical object that we interact with, so I think that's going to end up being the more important angle.
It's not that we're inventing new gadgets that people can wear. We are taking things that people wear or can carry with them and infusing them with intelligence, computing and connectivity.
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When it comes to resumes, less as more seems contradictory since it's tempting to want to fit your life's work on a single sheet of paper. Instead, focusing on just three big accomplishments can help create a stronger resume.
Resumes are often challenging in that people tend to run on limited space and push the margins to really accept all they've accomplished in their work life. It's natural to think the more you can show on a single page, the better off your standing will be. Instead, Mark Suster suggests emphasizing only three key jobs or tasks to create a knockout resume.
Many people feel the need to tell the reader everything they worked on rather than the 3 biggest accomplishments. I always advise people to only put the things that had the biggest impact to maximize the chance that they'll actually be seen.
Since it's important for your resume to highlight the best of your experiences, focus on just a few major accomplishments over the course of your work history. You'll still want to mention the traditional stuff, such as where you worked, but emphasize the accomplishments you're most proud of.
While there may be cases where it's more beneficial to avoid resumes altogether, they're often a job application requirement. When you need to submit a resume, you're often better served by a concise resume that can be offset by your own personal site or LinkedIn profile that outlines your previous work, education, and other achievements.
Got any great resume tips that have helped you in the past? Share them in the comments.
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I’m the director of behavior and training at an organization that rescues pit bulls and finds new homes for them. I create training programs, called “protocols,” for the dogs in our care. These include teaching the dogs how to behave in a home environment — things like house-training; being polite and not jumping on counters, tables, and people; waiting at doors and for food bowls; and obeying commands like sit, down, stay, come, leave it, and drop it. If a dog presents an issue, like resource-guarding (e.g., when a dog growls if you approach his food bowl) or reacting to other animals on leash, then our staff and I create a program for that individual dog. Then we offer behavior assistance to our adopters after adoption, so any issue they have, they give us a call and we schedule a meeting with them. There are dogs that misbehave, but usually it’s just a miscommunication between the human and the dog.
I didn’t have formal training for this job. I actually went to school for finance and bank management. I was selling real estate when I adopted a 5-month-old pit bull named Dixie from the MSPCA in Boston. That was 12½ years ago. About three weeks after I brought her home, she started escaping from her crate and trying to escape the house. She would bloody her paws, drool everywhere, and urinate all over. I eventually brought her to an appointment with an animal behavior consultant. Within a few weeks, the doctor offered me a part-time job as one of her trainers. I was intrigued by the behavior work, so I would sit in on appointments and observe any chance I got. A few months later, the doctor’s behavior assistant left the practice and I was offered her job. I learned more at this practice helping with the behavior appointments than I could have ever learned with any training. So I feel incredibly lucky. Dixie the pit bull completely changed my life.
At my current job, we try to take dogs from animal-control facilities because they need it the most, but we also take dogs from cruelty situations. The last cruelty case we did was about two months ago, in Texas. The woman had 298 dogs on the property. Originally, she started out as a pit bull “rescuer” — I’m guessing she got overwhelmed, I don’t know what happened. The dogs had been sealed in their crates and they were hosing them out and pouring in food through the top. The Humane Society had confiscated all of the dogs and we got a call asking if we could come in and evaluate them and help them get placement. Most of them were pit bull–type dogs, but there were all kinds of dogs on the property. There was a 160-pound I-don’t-know-what-the-heck-it-was furry dog that they were calling a “wolf dog” (I’m sure it was just a really big mixed-breed dog), all the way down to this cute little white fluffy thing. We went in and evaluated them, but we were pleasantly surprised; the majority of dogs really were not a problem and were well-behaved. We took 17 of the dogs back with us, and then a number of other groups helped and pulled dogs as well.
We don’t do show training, but we do have an assistant dog program. Those dogs go into foster care with one of our assistant trainers, not me, and she trains them for placement with people with disabilities. She teaches them different behaviors based on the needs of the client. A dog could learn to pull a wheelchair and then stand still so the human can use the dog as a brace to get himself up. Or it could learn to lie next to the human if they are having a seizure or call for help. The hearing dogs alert their human to sounds like a phone, smoke alarm, or someone at the door. Right now we have three dogs in there that should be placed shortly; we typically have between three and five dogs at a time, because they all have to be fostered in the trainer’s home as well. It’s a new program, and I believe that our first dog is being placed in about two weeks.
When I worked at an all-breeds practice, I didn’t notice the discrimination against pit bulls as much. It’s a dog. Now that I’m more focused on that issue, it’s like, wow, I had no idea that people actually thought this way about a dog. I think the media does a lot of damage, and “pit bull” has become more of a social construct than actually about those dogs. And everything’s a pit bull; if it did something wrong, it’s somehow a pit bull, and you’ll get the media to come if you say “pit bull.” Even if the media shows up and it’s a golden retriever, as long as you said “pit bull,” somebody’s coming.
As told to Alanna Okun
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‘Tell my mother I miss her’
A new report from Christian Solidarity International:
Coptic Christian women in Egypt are disappearing in greater numbers from their homes, their schools, and their places of work. They go missing while returning from church, picking up their children from school, or traveling to the sick bed of an aging parent. They are often held as captives, subjected to physical and psychological abuse in the form of rapes, beatings, domestic labor without pay, forced marriage and forced conversion to Islam.
D. was 19 when she disappeared on May 20, 2011. She went to work as a computer technician and never came home. Her mother reported her missing at 6:00 PM that evening. At 11:00 PM, the police came to their home and told the family that she had married a Muslim man. The family reluctantly accepted the fact that their daughter had gone of her own accord.
D. called her father, an army officer, on June 20. As soon as the father realized that it was his daughter, he pushed the “Record” button on his cell phone. Through sobs, his daughter apologizes to her father and asks him to tell her mother that she misses her. Her cries are interrupted by the sounds of someone entering the room. The line goes dead. When K, the father, calls back, a man answers the phone and says, “She is unconscious now but let me tell you something, this girl is more important to me than anything else. I swear to God, if something happens to her, I will kill all of you and I will burn the church. You know that I can do that!”
Multiply Justice believes these atrocities will only increase in frequency under a Muslim Brotherhood government. You can read the full report and its recommendations. You also can sign a petition urging action on behalf of non-Muslim minorities in the Middle East.
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The co-founder of a company that rents cameras and other gear to filmmakers will be recognized by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, the academy said Friday.
Denny Clairmont, co-founder of Clairmont Camera, will be awarded the John A. Bonner medal at next month's scientific and technical award ceremony.
The Academy said Clairmont Camera has fostered the exchange of ideas between camera users and manufacturers.
The medallion is named in honor of the late director of special projects at Warner Hollywood Studios and is awarded for "outstanding service and dedication in upholding the high standards" of the Academy.
Among the 22 other scientific and technical award recipients also announced were Mark Noel and John Frazier for developing a winch system that allows cars and other heavy props to be flown on wires, and Eric Tabellion and Arnauld Lamorlette for the creation of a computer-generated illumination technique that was first used in "Shrek 2."
Clairmont and the other winners will be toasted at the Feb. 12 ceremony at the Beverly Wilshire hotel. Portions of the show will be incorporated into the 83rd annual Oscar ceremony at the Kodak Theatre on Feb. 27.
The Associated Press
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Faculty members are actively involved in the arts outside the classroom. They exhibit nationally, participate in professional organizations, and secure important commissions and grants for their work. Students are also encouraged to take their education beyond the classroom. For a theatre student
, that means performing on campus and at The Warehouse Theatre, located in downtown Greenville. For visual arts students, the program’s Riverworks Gallery
, also located downtown, provides an opportunity to exhibit their work.
Successful graduates have the skills for a wide range of career opportunities in visual arts-related professions. Employment is typically found in advertising, public relations, graphic design, web site design, and professional photography.
Learn about real-time job openings and salary information through Career Coach.
This program does not train students to become simply technicians or implementers of technology; instead, our teaching/learning process facilitates students’ understanding of education being a lifelong development.
Students build both their confidence and their portfolios while participating in rigorous problem solving and conceptual assignments.
Students entering these programs typically have a strong interest in art, but usually have little or no formal training. They are able to take that interest and in one of the program’s tracks, build skills in a specific discipline.
Courses offered within the recommended fine arts transfer tracks (see below) allow access and transfer to bachelor’s degree programs. Students who want to transfer courses have the security of knowing that GTC classes are SACS accredited. In addition, the VPA has transfer agreements in place with USC Upstate and Savannah College of Art and Design.
Read more about our agreement with USC Upstate...
Read more about our agreement with SCAD...
Students in the Visual and Performing Arts programs at Greenville Technical College typically seek an Associate of Arts (A.A.) degree by completing specific programs of study in one of these transfer tracks.
We offer a Certificate of Arts for the following areas, each including advanced training but without the additional general education courses required for a degree.
For more information about our graduation rates, the median debt of students who completed the program, and other important information, we encourage you to review our gainful employment disclosure information for Fine Arts, Graphic Design, and Web Site Design
Greenville Technical College is accredited by the Commission on Colleges of the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools
to award associate degrees, diplomas and certificates.
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A new story in the LA Times! Near and dear to my dark city.
Southern Arizona’s black skies have turned the region into an international hub for astronomy. A proposed mine and its floodlights could threaten that.
Southern Arizona’s dark skies established the region as an international hub for astronomy in the 1960s. Observatories and other sky-gazing research facilities have brought prestige — and millions of dollars — to the state. Today, riches on the ground — or, more specifically, below it — also have the potential to enrich the state, resulting in an odd collision between mining and astronomy. [Continue reading]
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Every year around this time I begin to look at my children appraisingly. I assess them, like a census taker for gender, height, weight and coloring. Then, armed only with a pen and a pad and the workings of my agitated mind, I sit alone in a room and think.
I am thinking, of course, of Purim costumes. And how this year, finally, my family will join the ranks of those most organized of families, those paragons of virtue, those models of creative efficiency, The Ones With The Themes. This year, I resolve, my children will be dressed in unison, my mishloach manot foods will match their costumes and the whole pretty package will be topped off with a perfectly rhymed poem, explaining the relevance of this theme and how it ties into both medieval Shushan HaBirah and the year 2009.
Then after some hours of feverish scratching and scrawling in the darkened room, I emerge with my notebook and my list of idea. “Hi guys!” I call brightly to my children in the kitchen. They look at me suspiciously. They have calendars and they know what time of year it is. “So, listen up,” I say undaunted by their narrowed eyes. “I’ve got some ideas for Purim costumes here!”
Then I clear my throat and begin to read. “So what do you say, we can be Indians or cowboys or a baseball team! Animals in the zoo! Different types of shampoo! Girls dressed as boys and boys dressed as girls! All the different brachot! The seasons of the year! Pandas and kangaroos!
There is silence at the table. I realize that I am shouting and my children look a little frightened. I take a deep breath and begin my sales pitch again. “We can be bees and flowers! We can hand out honey! Or exotic vegetables! Or circus performers!”
There is no response. “What about types of law enforcement!” I call out desperately, my eyes darting from side to side. “Or characters from Tanach! Major household appliances! Continents of the world! What do you say guys?” I am hoarse by now and the list is almost finished.
“Come on kids,” I plead and I turn to my husband for encouragement. His lips are pursed and he shakes his head sadly. Then silently but decisively he turns his back and begins to wash the dishes. I scowl at his back. Stick in the mud! Party Pooper! I can see that I will have to go it alone.
“Come on you guys,” I say again, weakly.
“I want to be a butterfly!” my three year old says. I sigh. “But you were a butterfly last year,” I say.
“I know,” she answers, smiling proudly, “and I really, really liked it.”
“And I want to be Queen Esther,” says my six year old.
“But, hey,” I wheedle, “Everyone is gonna be Queen Esther. Wouldn’t you like to be different? Wouldn’t you like to be a washing machine?” I smile crazily.
A puzzled look crosses my daughter’s face. “No, Mommy,” she says gently, slipping her little hand in mine. “People are not washing machines. People use washing machines for clothing. See?”
I have just been schooled by a six year old. I nod glumly.
“And, I’m gonna be a soldier,” my eleven year old says. He is bored with this conversation. He’s heard it repeated every year since he was born. “How about a quarterback instead?” I ask, thinking wistfully of the gigantic shoulder pads still sewn into my Sheva Brachot outfits.
“Nope. A soldier,” he answers. “Sorry.”
“It’s okay,” I whisper, although it is not and I think spitefully of all the things I’ve done for them over the years. Can’t they do this one little thing for me?
I turn to my nine year old, my easy- going, pliable boy. Happy go lucky, accommodating, willing…. In short, my last hope. “What do you say sweetie?” I ask. “Wanna be a Chinaman?”
And his eyes are so soft and so kind as he looks at me. And his voice is so gentle and so sweet as he says, “I really want to be a pineapple.”
A pineapple? Who wants to be a pineapple? I wonder. And how is that better than a knight or a Chinaman or a dishwasher or a quarterback? But I am a grown up now so I don’t say everything I think. I only sigh and get to work manufacturing the necessities for soldiers and butterflies and pineapples and queens.
And on Purim when the families with the themes come to my door all dressed in their matching orangutan outfits, I suffer a pang of jealousy. Then I turn from the door and I look at my children’s shining faces, their eager pride, their joyous sense of self and I know that I did the right thing. Because flitting around my house is the most delicate butterfly, the most beautiful queen, the sweetest pineapple and the bravest soldier.
And really, who wants a bunch of orangutans anyway?
Yael Zoldan is a Brooklyn girl, who lives in Passaic, New Jersey, with her husband and children. Somewhere between carpool and laundry she finds the time to write.
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AlJazeeraEnglish·Jan 5, 2013
On the campaign trail four years ago, US presidential candidate Barack Obama shared his views on whistleblowers. He said: “Often the best source of information about waste, fraud and abuse in government is a government employee committed to public integrity, willing to speak out. Such acts of courage and patriotism … should be encouraged rather than stifled.”
As president, the reality has been very different. During his first term in office, six whistleblowers have been charged under the Espionage Act for allegedly mishandling classified information. That is twice as many as all previous presidents combined. In the first half of this full edition special, we blow the whistle on President Obama’s America.
Filed under: Dandelion Salad Posts News Politics and-or Videos 2, Dandelion Salad Videos, Politics Tagged: | 1917 Espionage Act, Barack Obama on Dandelion Salad, Domestic Spying on Dandelion Salad, Drake-Thomas, Jesselyn Radack, Manning-Bradley, Meet the new boss the same as the old boss, Whistleblowing, wikileaks
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Too many parents are being interrogated and blamed for their parenting when they’re trying to do the right thing. This needs to stop.
3 Things I’ve Read Recently
1. Many parents say they feel hurt when others criticize their parenting.1
2. When a parent blames and shames another parent, the parent on the receiving end feels inadequate.2
3. “It’s always easier to solve someone else’s problems than one’s own,” says psychologist Mona Spiegel.3
Here’s My Take on It:
The other day I received a scathing e-mail from another parent, criticizing me for how I was raising one of my teenagers. The e-mail stung. It felt like a snakebite, with a piercing blow followed by a lingering venom that zapped my energy. I had two initial reactions: strike back or run away. Instead, I reminded myself that I was being the best parent that I could be and that this other parent was probably deeply wounded and saw me as an easy target. Still, the words of the e-mail hurt, and it caused me to stop and doubt myself.
I called a close friend to talk about it. She reminded me that we live in a contentious society. We argue about politics. We fight about religion. It’s not surprising that parents attack other parents. That’s a tragic, sad truth about our society today. In fact, there’s a whole website about how to handle critical parents called www.mymommymanners.com. Isn’t parenting hard enough without other people harshly judging us? Shouldn’t we be focusing our energy on parenting our own kids—instead of other kids?
Yes, all kids are our kids, but expressing a concern about a child is different than reprimanding a parent. Yes, we may have different philosophies about parenting, but if we’re doing our best to love and raise our kids the best we can, we should be supporting each other, not cutting each other down.
Ask your partner or other adult: “What can we do when other parents harshly judge our parenting?”
- Find out more about parenting well at Positive Parenting
- Read more about how parents judge each other in USA Today‘s article Why do mothers judge one another and their parenting?
Are some parents blaming other parents too much? What do you think? Share your comments below.
1. Liz Szabo, “Why Do Mothers Judge One Another and Their Parenting?” USA Today, May 25, 2010.
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Alexander Litvinenko didn't mince words. On Oct. 19, at a public meeting in London, he introduced himself as a former Russian kgb officer, and proceeded to accuse President Vladimir Putin of sanctioning the murder two weeks earlier of a crusading Russian journalist, Anna Politkovskaya. Litvinenko, who fell out with his erstwhile employers after claiming they had ordered him to assassinate Boris Berezovsky, an oligarch and high Russian official of the Yeltsin years, now exiled, had met Politkovskaya on several occasions. At one of their last meetings, he said, she had told him about threats she'd been receiving. "She asked, 'Do you think they can kill me?'" Litvinenko told a rapt audience at the Frontline Club, a British organization that promotes independent journalism. "I told her quite frankly: Yes, they can." Litvinenko ended with his accusation. "I know that a journalist of her stature could not be touched without sanction from the Russian President himself," he said. "Anna was a political opponent, and this is why she was killed."
It was a moment of high drama, but it paled beside what happened next. Last Thursday, Litvinenko himself died in a London hospital, after having ingested a "major dose" of the radioactive toxin polonium-210 that destroyed his immune system, according to Britain's Health Protection Agency. Scotland Yard said that traces of polonium-210 which is so rare and volatile that producing quantities large enough to kill requires access to a high-security nuclear laboratory were found at a sushi restaurant called Itsu in Piccadilly where Litvinenko had eaten lunch on the day he got sick. Traces of the isotope were also found at his north London home and at the Millennium Hotel in Grosvenor Square, which he had also visited.
Exactly how or why the dose was administered, and by whom, remains a mystery. The Litvinenko case revived memories of perhaps the most notorious assassination carried out during the cold war, the 1978 murder in London of Georgi Markov, a Bulgarian dissident who was working for the bbc. He was killed with a ricin-tipped umbrella while waiting for a bus, in a case that has never been solved. Just as in that Markov case, the death of Litvinenko has already given rise to a flurry of conspiracy theories, including speculation among defenders of Putin's government that the poisoning had been arranged by Russian exiles or Western intelligence agencies to discredit Moscow.
But Litvinenko when he was alive and his friends had little doubt about who's to blame. In a message dictated two days before his death and read out by his friend Alexander Goldfarb to the press, Litvinenko, 43, said: "You may succeed in silencing one man, but the howl of protest from around the world will reverberate, Mr. Putin, in your ears for the rest of your life."
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Wed August 29, 2012
Despite Critics, Gambia Plans Dozens Of Executions
Originally published on Wed August 29, 2012 6:16 pm
There is growing international criticism over plans by Gambia's hard-line president to execute all of the country's death-row inmates within the next couple of weeks.
Gambia's leader, President Yahya Jammeh, has long faced criticism for his human rights record. In a recent speech marking the end of Ramadan, the Muslim holy month, the president vowed to put to death all prisoners facing the death penalty by mid-September, as a way to curb crime.
"By the middle of next month, all the death sentences would have been carried out to the letter. There is no way my government will allow 99 percent of the population to be held to ransom by criminals," Jammeh said in a speech on Aug. 19, broadcast on Gambian national television the following day.
Despite pressure from human rights groups, his African peers and Western powers, including the U.S., Jammeh has already begun to carry out the executions.
In a statement Monday, the government said nine inmates were executed by firing squad Sunday — six civilians and three soldiers. These were the first executions in Gambia in nearly 30 years.
US Criticizes Executions
The US State Department on Tuesday criticized "the lack of transparency and haste under which these executions were effected and the apparent lack of due process in the proceedings leading to these death sentences."
The US called on Jammeh "to immediately halt all executions in order to review all of The Gambia's capital cases and ensure that they are in accordance with The Gambia's domestic law and its international obligations."
Paule Rigaud, Amnesty International's deputy Africa director, says there are 38 more death-row inmates, including some that her group classifies as political prisoners.
"We fear strongly for their safety now, that they could be the next ones to be executed," she says.
Amnesty International called the executions a hugely retrograde step on a continent where many countries are abolishing capital punishment.
The government of neighboring Senegal says two of those executed recently were Senegalese, and a third remains on death row.
Visibly furious, Senegalese President Macky Sall joined international calls for Gambia to halt the planned executions.
Sall cut short a visit to South Africa to deal with the Gambia issue and with floods in Dakar, Senegal's capital. Sall told reporters at a late-night news conference Tuesday that Gambia had not bothered to observe standard diplomatic protocol by informing the Senegalese government of the executions.
"I have asked the prime minister to summon the ambassador of Gambia. ... If he does not show up at the appointed time [on Wednesday], he will leave Senegal," said Sall.
The deaths of the two Senegalese nationals are clearly straining the already delicate relations between the neighbors.
Sall traveled across the border for talks with his Gambian counterpart in his first official visit after being sworn in earlier this year.
Senegal wants Gambia's cooperation to end the simmering separatist rebellion in Senegal's southern region of Casamance.
The rebels are believed to have backing from Gambia, which is a sliver of land surrounded by Senegal, its much bigger neighbor.
Tiny Gambia does not generally make world headlines. It is a popular beach holiday destination, attracting sun-seeking tourists from the former colonial power, Britain, and other northern Europeans.
The Gambian president says activities such as drug trafficking, homosexuality, murder, terrorism and banditry will not be tolerated in his country.
In a rare interview last November, Jammeh, 47, dismissed accusations that he has silenced dissent and imprisoned his political opponents.
"Those who accuse me of human rights violations, let me tell you one thing: We have so many people that have been sentenced to death. Nobody has ever been executed. Do you think I'm afraid of executing them? No," he told the BBC. "So, if I don't execute people that have been condemned to death by law, do you think I want to earn a one-way ticket to hell by killing people that have not been tried by any court of law?"
Jammeh seized power in a military coup 18 years ago and has since kept a tight grip on Gambia. The one-time army captain has traded his military fatigues for flowing white gowns — and claims to be able to cure AIDS.
The president also says a good leader should remain in power as long as God sees fit.
"My fate is in the hands of the almighty Allah. I will deliver to the Gambian people, and if I have to rule this country for one billion years I will, if Allah says so," he told the BBC. "My position is very clear. I would defend Africanness even on ... planet Mars. I will not bow down before any human being except the almighty Allah. And if they don't like that, they can go to hell. I don't care what they say."
Jammeh won a fourth presidential term in November in elections the US State Department described as neither free nor fair.
MELISSA BLOCK, HOST:
Now to an outpouring of international condemnation over news that Gambia has executed nine death row prisoners. These are the first executions in the tiny West African nation in almost 30 years. Gambia's leader has long faced criticism for his human rights record. In an end of Ramadan speech, he vowed to kill all prisoners facing the death sentence by mid-September, as a way to curb crime. But critics say some of those inmates were jailed without due process for opposing the president.
NPR's Ofeibea Quist-Arcton has the story from neighboring Senegal.
OFEIBEA QUIST-ARCTON, BYLINE: Despite pressure from rights groups, his African peers and Western powers, President Yahya Jammeh has carried out his threat to begin executing inmates on death row. In a statement, the Gambian government said nine were executed by firing squad on Sunday - six civilians and three soldiers.
Amnesty International earlier said the nine were killed overnight on Thursday. Paule Rigaud is Amnesty's deputy Africa director.
PAULE RIGAUD: We are urging the president not to carry out any further executions because this is bringing back Gambia into the small group of countries that execute in Africa. And people on death row were either sentenced for murder or treason and who, indeed, could be political prisoners.
QUIST-ARCTON: Neighboring Senegal says two of those killed were Senegalese. Amnesty International called the executions a hugely retrograde step on a continent where many countries are abolishing capital punishment.
In a rare interview with the BBC last November, Jammeh dismissed accusations that he has silenced dissent and imprisoned his political opponents.
YAHYA JAMMEH: If I don't execute people that have been condemned to death by law, do you think I want to earn a one-way ticket to hell by killing people that have not been tried by any court of law?
QUIST-ARCTON: Yahya Jammeh seized power in a military coup 18 years ago and has since kept a tight grip on Gambia, making alleged coup-plotting a treasonable offence. The one-time army captain has traded his military fatigues for flowing white gowns and claims to be able to cure AIDS. The president says a good leader should remain in power as long as God sees fit.
JAMMEH: I will not bow down before any human being except the Almighty Allah. And if they don't like that, they can go to hell. I don't care what they say.
QUIST-ARCTON: Jammeh won a fourth presidential term in November, in elections the State Department described as neither free nor fair. State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland expressed concerns over news of the executions.
VICTORIA NULAND: We have regularly called on the Gambia to ensure that it fulfills its international obligations, provides for due process throughout its judicial system. And we have expressed our concerns about the way they do that.
QUIST-ARCTON: President Jammeh says his critics should be aware that Gambia is a sovereign country whose constitution authorizes the death sentence.
Ofeibea Quist-Arcton, NPR News, Dakar. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright National Public Radio.
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Mitsuo Aida Museum
Calligraphy & Poetry at The Tokyo International Forum in Yurakucho
Mitsuo Aida Museum, Calligraphy & Poetry at The Tokyo International Forum in Yurakucho
Calligrapher and Poet
As a brush-and-ink calligrapher and poet, Mitsuo Aida continued to pursue his own words and his own calligraphy, not imitating anyone.
As a young man in the period of upheaval during and following World War II , he established his original style and produced a great number of works while contemplating the preciousness of life. He wrote, “I merely express the natural way people should be as humans and the true way to live. To accomplish that, I borrow the format of brush-and-ink calligraphy.” (From Okagesan published by Diamond, inc.)
Mitsuo Aida honestly expresses himself in an unfeigned manner as a human, not hiding his own weaknesses and dependence on others. At times, the effects of his writings permeate softly into the hearts of people living in the “now.” And at other times, his writings reach out and grab you with gripping force.
Adults / University students - 800 yen
Junior/ Senior high school students - 500 yen
Elementary school students - 200 yen
KUDOS members can apply for complimentary passes (subject to availability) by submitting the KUDOS Ticket Application Form.
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Fish Kill Investigated at Oxford in Johnson County
OXFORD – A fish kill in Rhine Creek at Oxford in Johnson County appears to have originated at a local agriculture chemical facility and is being investigated by the Iowa Department of Natural Resources.
AgVantage of Oxford reported a chemical release from rinse tanks at its facility on Thursday morning. The liquid, estimated at approximately 200 gallons, pooled on the ground and some reached the nearby Rhine Creek where approximately 100 dead minnows had been found by early Thursday afternoon. The rinse that was spilled was mostly water containing residue of agricultural chemicals sold by the company.
AgVantage was working on cleaning up the liquid on Thursday. DNR investigation of the incident is continuing.
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California Seizes Guns as Owners Lose Right to Keep Arms
Wearing bulletproof vests and carrying 40-caliber Glock pistols, nine California (STOCA1) Justice Department agents assembled outside a ranch-style house in a suburb east of Los Angeles. They were looking for a gun owner who’d recently spent two days in a mental hospital.
They knocked on the door and asked to come in. About 45 minutes later, they came away peacefully with three firearms.
California is the only state that tracks and disarms people with legally registered guns who have lost the right to own them, according to Attorney General Kamala Harris. Almost 20,000 gun owners in the state are prohibited from possessing firearms, including convicted felons, those under a domestic violence restraining order or deemed mentally unstable.
“What do we do about the guns that are already in the hands of persons who, by law, are considered too dangerous to possess them?” Harris said in a letter to Vice President Joe Biden after a Connecticut school shooting in December left 26 dead. She recommended that Biden, heading a White House review of gun policy, consider California as a national model.
As many as 200,000 people nationwide may no longer be qualified to own firearms, according to Garen Wintemute, director of the Violence Prevention Research Program at the University of California, Davis. Other states may lack confiscation programs because they don’t track purchases as closely as California, which requires most weapons sales go through a licensed dealer and be reported.
“Very, very few states have an archive of firearm owners like we have,” said Wintemute, who helped set up the program.
Harris, a 48-year-old Democrat, has asked California lawmakers to more than double the number of agents from the current 33. They seized about 2,000 weapons last year. Agents also took 117,000 rounds of ammunition and 11,000 high-capacity magazines, according to state data.
“We’re not contacting anybody who can legally own a gun,” said John Marsh, a supervising agent who coordinates the sometimes-contentious seizures. “I got called the Antichrist the other day. Every conspiracy theory you’ve heard of, take that times 10.”
The no-gun list is compiled by cross-referencing files on almost 1 million handgun and assault-weapon owners with databases of new criminal records and involuntary mental-health commitments. About 15 to 20 names are added each day, according to the attorney general’s office.
Merely being in a database of registered gun owners and having a “disqualifying event,” such as a felony conviction or restraining order, isn’t sufficient evidence for a search warrant, Marsh said March 5 during raids in San Bernardino County. So the agents often must talk their way into a residence to look for weapons, he said.
At a house in Fontana, agents were looking for a gun owner with a criminal history of a sex offense, pimping, according to the attorney general’s office. Marsh said that while the woman appeared to be home, they got no answer at the door. Without a warrant, the agents couldn’t enter and had to leave empty- handed.
They had better luck in nearby Upland, where they seized three guns from the home of Lynette Phillips, 48, who’d been hospitalized for mental illness, and her husband, David. One gun was registered to her, two to him.
“The prohibited person can’t have access to a firearm,” regardless of who the registered owner is, said Michelle Gregory, a spokeswoman for the attorney general’s office.
In an interview as agents inventoried the guns, Lynette Phillips said that while she’d been held involuntarily in a mental hospital in December, the nurse who admitted her had exaggerated the magnitude of her condition.
Todd Smith, chief executive officer of Aurora Charter Oak Hospital in Covina, where documents provided by Phillips show she was treated, didn’t respond to telephone and e-mail requests for comment on the circumstances of the treatment.
Phillips said her husband used the guns for recreation. She didn’t blame the attorney general’s agents for taking the guns based on the information they had, she said.
“I do feel I have every right to purchase a gun,” Phillips said. “I’m not a threat. We’re law-abiding citizens.”
No one was arrested. Most seized weapons are destroyed, Gregory said.
“It’s not unusual to not arrest a mental-health person because every county in the state handles those particular cases differently,” Gregory said by e-mail. “Unless there’s an extenuating need to arrest them on the spot, we refer the case” to the local district attorney’s office, she said.
Agents more often arrest convicted felons who are prohibited from buying, receiving, owning or possessing a firearm, Gregory said. Violation of the ban is itself a felony.
The state Senate agreed March 7 to expand the seizure program using $24 million in surplus funds from fees that gun dealers charge buyers for background checks.
Andrew Arulanandam, a spokesman for the National Rifle Association, a gun lobby based in Fairfax, Virginia, that says it has more than 4 million individuals as members, didn’t respond to a request for comment on the program.
Sam Paredes, executive director of the Folsom-based advocacy group Gun Owners of California, praised the program, though not how it is funded.
“We think that crime control instead of gun control is absolutely the way to go,” he said. “The issue we have is funding this program only from resources from law-abiding gun purchasers. This program has a benefit to the entire public and therefore the entire public should be paying through general- fund expenditures, and not just legal gun owners.”
To contact the editor responsible for this story: Stephen Merelman at email@example.com
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As robots, artificial intelligence and other labor saving innovations penetrate the economy, traditional jobs that entail making things or providing routine services — Toro is testing a robotic lawn mower for golf courses, for Pete’s sake — could disappear. The only jobs that will be left, it seems, are those in which we humans entertain one another.
In apparent confirmation of this view, the American consumption of “entertainment” services — sports, music, theater, art — is one of the economy’s stronger growth sectors. Spending rose steadily over the 2000s until taking a hit in the 2007-2008 recession. The number of sports- and entertainment-related jobs also has grown — 30% over the past decade, reports Joshua Wright in New Geography.
The most entertainment-intensive metropolitan regions (measured by jobs as a percentage of the workforce) are, not surprisingly, Los Angeles (2.06 times the national average), Nashville (2.02 times), San Francisco (1.51 times), New York (1.43 times) and Las Vegas (1.29 times).
Also, no surprise, Virginia MSAs rank fairly low in sports/ entertainment intensity. The Washington metro ranks just above the national average — politics is a blood sport, after all — while Richmond ranks just under. Among the nation’s 50 metro areas, Hampton Roads ranks near the bottom.
Now, here’s what’s interesting for my ongoing analysis of the Richmond region’s creative class: Among the MSAs studied, Richmond ranked No. 2, behind Austin, in the growth in the number of sports/entertainment jobs between 2008 and 2012. Austin truly rocks. Ranking 6th in the country for sports/entertainment occupational intensity, the region grew the number of jobs in that category by 18.4%. But Richmond increased the number of jobs by 13.4%.
It’s not clear which specific occupational categories are leading the way in Richmond. Wright’s data does not drill that deep. But given the dearth of professional sports in the Richmond region, it’s difficult to imagine that the number of referees, umpires, coaches, scouts and professional athletes accounts for much of the increase — although the region does have exceptionally active amateur athletic programs. Based on my personal acquaintances, I’m guessing that musicians and singers predominate.
Be that as it may, the increasingly bohemian tint to the Richmond workforce augurs well for developing a culture of creativity and innovation, the traits needed to excel in a globally competitive knowledge economy. The downside is that these guys aren’t making much money. An average hourly wage of $15.50 an hour translates into annual income of about $31,000 a year.
Actually, the story is a bit more complicated than that. Wright makes the point that the big growth has been among the self-employed and free-lancers — “moms and dads coaching their kids (or serving as referees) in soccer, office workers moonlighting in a band that does local gigs, men and women working part-time for the local stage company as an actor or director.”
In other words, many people are working in the sports/entertainment occupations either because they got laid off from their regular jobs or they see the work as a supplementary source of income. Given my druthers, I’d like to see more scientists and entrepreneurs making fat salaries and creating massive wealth that trickles down to the rest of us. But, hey, you take what you can get. At least the town is a fun place to live.
Hat tip: FreeDem
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US 4010894 A
A fluid container particularly useful in a centrifuge system for separating the various fractions in blood. The container comprises two circular sheets of flexible material, having central openings therein. The outer peripheral edges are sealed together, as well as annular-like portions extending outwardly from the central opening. Concentric-like inner and outer annular-like channels are thus formed at the outer peripheral portion of the assembly. Radial arcuate portions are sealed off, thereby providing interrupted annular-like channels. At a first end of the inner annular-like channels, an inlet tube is provided, extending outwardly from the central opening and communicating with the first end of the inner annular-like channel. At the outlet or second end of the inner annular-like channel, there is provided a radially extending inter-channel connector, which comprises a sealed off portion extending between the adjacent ends of the inner and outer annular-like channels. Also at this outlet end of the inner channel, a radially enlarged region is provided, acting as a first collecting chamber, into which an outlet tube is sealed, extending from the inner opening. A second collection chamber is provided at the outlet end of the outer annular-like channel. A plurality of outlet tubes extend radially outward from the center of the bag to open within the second collection chamber at different radial distances. Through these outlet tubes, selected separated portions of the fluid are withdrawn from the bag.
1. A flexible collapsible centrifuge fluid container comprising two circular pieces of material sealed together at the outer periphery and each having a central opening, the edges of the openings being sealed together,
a plurality of sealed-together annular-like portions of said two pieces of material, forming a plurality of separate concentric-like annular channels, and
inlet/outlet tubes sealed in said material and communicating with said channels.
2. A container as claimed in claim 1 in which said material is medical-grade polyvinyl chloride.
3. A container as claimed in claim 1 further characterized by at least one radially sealed means for sealing said pieces of material to form said interrupted annular-like channels.
4. A container as claimed in claim 3 in which two radially extending seal means are provided to form a connecting passage between the annular channels.
5. A container as claimed in claim 4, wherein said channels are connected by said seal means to provide a serial flow path through the innermost of said channels, through said connecting passage, and through the outermost of said channels.
6. A flexible collapsible centrifuge fluid container comprising two circular pieces of material sealed together at the outer periphery and each having a central opening, the edges of the openings being sealed together,
a plurality of sealed-together annular portions of said two pieces of material, forming an inner concentric annular-like channel and an outer concentric annular-like channel, and
inlet/outlet tubes sealed in said material and communicating with said channels.
7. A container as claimed in claim 6 in which said material is medical-grade polyvinyl chloride.
8. A container as claimed in claim 6 further characterized by at least one radially sealed means for sealing said pieces of material to form said interrupted inner and outer annular channels.
9. A container as claimed in claim 8 in which two radially extending seal means are provided to form a connecting passage between the annular channels.
10. A container as claimed in claim 9, wherein said channels are connected by said seal means to provide a serial flow path through the innermost of said channels, through said connecting passage, and through the outermost of said channels.
Previous centrifuges for separating the components of blood are known in which the centrifuge bowl or chamber is reusable. These devices must be thoroughly cleaned and sterilized after each use, a costly and time-consuming procedure.
Bag-like containers for holding blood or other fluids for processing are known in the art as shown, for example, in U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,064,647 -- R. P. Earl; 3,096,283 -- G. N. Hein; 3,145,713 -- A. Latham, Jr.; 3,239,136 -- G. N. Hein; 3,244,362 -- G. N. Hein; 3,244,363 -- G. N. Hein; 3,297,243 -- G. N. Hein; 3,297,244 -- G. N. Hein; 3,326,458 -- H. T. Meryman et al; 3,456,875 -- G. N. Hein; 3,545,671 -- E. D. Ross; 3,679,128 -- H. P. O. Unger et al; 3,708,110 -- H. P. O. Unger et al; 3,724,747 -- H. P. O. Unger et al; 3,748,101 -- A. L. Jones et al; and 3,858,796 -- H. P. O. Unger et al. Also, IBM Technical Disclosure Bulletin, Volume 17, Number 2, July 1974, pages 404 and 405. However, none of this prior art discloses a bag configuration as herein disclosed and claimed, including interrupted annular-like channels as centrifuging channels.
In citing the above prior art, no representation is made nor intended that a search has been made, that better art than that listed is not available, or that other art is not applicable.
It is a general object of this invention to provide an improved centrifuge container.
A particular object of the invention is to provide an improved fluid container for centrifuging blood to obtain different fractions thereof.
Another object of the invention is to provide an improved fluid container for centrifuging blood, which is simple and economical in construction, disposable after a single use.
The foregoing and other objects, features and advantages of the invention will be apparent from the following more particular description of a preferred embodiment of the invention, as illustrated in the accompanying drawings, and described in connection therewith in the annexed specification.
Briefly described, the improved fluid container provided by this invention comprises two connected interrupted annular-like containers or channels. It is preferably formed by sealing two identical circular pieces of suitable flexible elastic material, such as medical-grade polyvinyl chloride, at the periphery thereof and at selected interior portions, to thereby provide at least two concentric interrupted annular-like channels. The parts are proportioned and arranged so that one end of the inner channel, a first enlarged chamber or volume is provided from which selected blood fractions can be withdrawn via a first outlet tube. The first channel is connected by a passage to the inlet end of the outer channel.
An inlet tube is molded into or sealed into the bag, having its interior end opening into the inlet end of the first or inner channel. A plurality of outlet tubes are provided, opening into the enlarged end of the outer channel, each tube extending radially outwardly to a different distance, so that the various blood fractions which exist at different radial locations as a result of the centrifuging, can be selectively drawn off.
In the drawings:
FIG. 1 is a diagrammatic plan view of a centrifuge fluid container comprising a preferred form of the invention; and
FIG. 2 is a diagrammatic sectional elevation view of the container of FIG. 1, taken at the section 2--2.
Similar reference characters refer to similar parts in each of the several views.
Referring to the drawings, the fluid container is circular in shape as can be seen in FIG. 1. Two circular pieces of suitable plastic material 1a and 1b, forming the top and bottom of bag, are sealed together at their periphery, as by suitable heat and pressure, forming a fluid-tight weld 3 at the outer edge of the bag, as seen in FIG. 2. FIG. 1 illustrates the appearance of the bag with the top piece 1a removed. At a first predetermined distance radially inward from the periphery, a second sealed portion 5 is provided, extending almost around the circumference of the bag as shown.
A central opening 7 is provided in the circular pieces, and the juxtaposed edges are welded to form the interior boundary seam 9 as shown.
An outer annular-like channel 11, formed principally by the welds 3 and 5, is not continuous around the periphery of the bag, being interrupted by the radially extending weld 15. One end of the channel 11 is enlarged to form a collection and outlet chamber 17. First and second outlet tubes 19 and 21, respectively, extend into this chamber from the central opening 7. Tube 19 opens into the inward portions of the chamber, and tube 21 opens into the outward portion of the chamber, the tubes having different radial lengths, as can be seen from the drawing.
The other end of the first or outer annular channel 11 is connected to the outlet of the second or inner annular channel 23 by a radial connecting channel 25 formed by the welds or sealed portions of 1a and 1b. The radially sealed means for forming this connecting channel comprises an inwardly directed hook-shaped sealed portion 26, at one end of the ring-like sealed portion 5, which separates the inner and outer channels, as well as the radial seal means 15. The outlet end of the inner channel 23 is enlarged to form a collection and outlet chamber 27. An outlet tube 29 is provided for this chamber, extending, as shown, from the central opening 7 to the outer portion of chamber 27.
At the other or inlet end of the inner channel 23, there is provided an inlet tube 31, extending radially outward from the central opening 7 to the channel 23, as shown.
In use, the bag is placed in the bowl of a centrifuge which may be constructed in general accordance with the teachings of U.S. Pat. No. 3,748,101. The inlet and outlet tubes are connected to a suitable rotating seal to permit the admission of whole blood and withdrawal of the selected fractions. The centrifuge bowl cover (not shown) is grooved to receive the channels when filled, as shown in the cross-section view of FIG. 2. Whole blood enters the bag through the rotating seal and tube 31. The blood then flows around the innermost channel 23 of the processing bag where it is subjected to a radial G force induced by bowl rotation. At the end of this first separation channel is the small collection volume 27 where the packed red cells are accumulated for removal through the tube 29. The radial distance, channel cross-section area and the angular rotation are selected to provide separation which will produce platelet-rich plasma (PRP) at an efficiency of approximately 60%. The PRP is not removed from the system at this point, however, but is led via channel 25 to the outermost separation channel 11. The PRP flows around this channel and is separated into platelet-poor plasma (PPP) and a platelet concentrate (PC). These fractions are withdrawn through their respective tubes 19 and 21.
Previous experience with batch and continuous flow platelet separation indicates that the separation parameters to produce PC from PRP should be approximately four times those required to produce PRP from whole blood. Using as a measure, G multiplied by the time exposed to the G force, as a measure of the separation ability of a particular channel, it can be shown that R.sub.1 should be approximately 0.8R.sub.2.
From the foregoing, it will be apparent that the present invention provides a novel centrifuge container which is advantageous from the standpoint of being economical to fabricate and because the economy is adapted to single use, wherein the bag with its associated tubing, etc., is used one time and then discarded, thereby relieving the duties of cleaning and sterilization required with reusable centrifuge containers.
While the invention has been particularly shown and described with reference to a preferred embodiment thereof, it will be understood by those skilled in the art that various changes in form and details may be made therein without departing from the spirit and scope of the invention.
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California drivers have long suffered from the state's geographical isolation from the nation's major oil pipelines that pump crude to domestic refineries.
That forced California to rely on much more expensive imported oil. In 2012, California imported more than half of its oil from overseas (50.7%) for the first time ever.
But that has begun to change. In the short term, analysts say California prices should fall to the $3.75 to $4 range for a gallon of regular gasoline in the coming weeks.
Longer term, there should be more relief as the nation's railroads move record amounts of cheap, domestic oil on tank cars, with some of it headed for California.
In 2008, BNSF, a railroad that serves the West Coast, moved 1.3 million barrels of oil. In 2012, it moved 100 million barrels. Most of BNSF’s oil originates in North Dakota.
"You could say that 'there's a train a-coming,'" said Tom Kloza, chief oil analyst for the Oil Price Information Service, "and its carrying oil."
Patrick DeHaan, senior energy analyst for GasBuddy.com, said that access to cheaper domestic crude should mean that California gasoline prices will be cheaper in the long run.
"The elephant in the room is rising oil production from places like North Dakota and Canada," DeHaan said. "Everyone wants the cheap oil."
What companies are involved? Chevron Corp. of San Ramon is one that talks about it. Valero Energy Corp., the nation's biggest refiner, is another. So is Phillips 66, formerly the refining arm of oil giant ConocoPhillips.
"Frankly, rail looks to us that it's going to be very, very viable into the West Coast," said William R. Klesse, chairman and chief executive of Valero.
Chevron officials say they are already moving cheaper oil from North Dakota into California, some on barges.
"We know how to get it in there. It's kind of trains, planes and automobiles," Michael K. Wirth, executive vice president for downstream and chemicals for Chevron, said at a conference for investors earlier this month.
"We use rail cars to terminal where we've barged into Richmond. So it's doable and we have done it and we'll continue to do it," Wirth said.
Meanwhile, a third straight week of gasoline price drops has brought some individual Southern California gas station prices below $4 in recent days, according to the Automobile Club of Southern California's Weekend Gas Watch.
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Are you living your dream with horses?
Many people take up riding because of a dream…to become one with an animal as powerful and graceful as the horse, to communicate and ride in synergy, to harness the special bond between horse and rider. Too often, the dream never becomes reality. Instead, we discover riding to be a battle of wills, full of resistance and frustration for our horses and ourselves. Instead of communication, mutual trust and respect, we are taught to use force, manipulation, strong bits and artificial aids. What limited success we experience with these measures is hollow, because in the process we have destroyed the relationship with our horse. Too many of us experience dangerous rides, or even injuries from a bad fall, sell our horse hoping to find a “better fit,” or give up the dream altogether and stop riding.
The dream is possible. You can have a relationship with horses that is better than anything you have imagined. We believe that riding is the ultimate relationship, and that every experience you have with a horse should increase your respect, trust and connection to each other. We can help you and your horse to have the bond you long for and make your dream a reality. With our riding and natural horsemanship programs, you will learn to establish confidence, responsiveness, safety and fun with your horse.
Capture that feeling of partnership you dreamed of as a child, where a horse understands your very thoughts and the ride between you is a dance.
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Issues, Etc. has a post on Lutheranism vs. Calvinism. I'm more or less in total agreement with the pastor on the first two of the five Calvinistic points. However, he loses me when talking about limited atonement.
At 29:37 in the audio, he begins to tell a story about a friend from seminary who was a Calvinist, and this Calvinist's need for assurance of absolution following a grievous sin. The pastor goes on to explain from 31:40 - 32:46 that because Christ has taken the form of man, that he represents all men. Every sin has been paid for, for every man. Obviously a Calvinist would disagree with taking the atonement to this extent.
In the scriptures, Christ was spoken of as the last Adam, a title which confers universality (in the same way that the first Adam did). They also say that Christ is the atoning sacrifice for the sins of the whole world (1 John 2:2). How is it that if Christ is the last Adam and is the atoning sacrifice for the sins of the whole world that we still speak in terms of particular redemption and also limits as to who the atonement covers?
Edit: As an example of what I'm asking, please consider John Owen's argument for Limited Atonement that if Christ has paid for the sins of all people and some still end up paying for their sins in Hell, then we have two realities that appear unthinkable:
Christ's precious, perfect blood was shed in vain for some people.
God's justice was satisfied in Christ, and now he's also executing his justice on those in hell. How can this be justice, then?
These points make the case for Limited Atonement in the Calvinistic sense, but it seems to stand in opposition to the scriptures I cited above. It makes the 2nd Adam less effectual than the first and it means that Christ is not the propitiation for the sins of the whole world. 1 John 2:2 leaves no room for a "potential" propitiation. So how does Limited Atonement harmonize with scriptures such as these?
Note: At this point in time, I would call myself a Calvinist. I've done so for about 10 years. I'm not new to this, but I'm not as willing to accept the "L" in "TULIP" any longer on ground of logical proceedings that seem to contradict scripture. Thus, I'm seeking to learn what I may be missing.
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First phase of Campbell Soup's shutdown takes toll
290 Campbell's workers laid off
Some 290 workers were laid off Friday as Campbell's shut down soup production at its Sacramento County plant.
The plant produced soup since it opened in 1946. Originally workers diced fresh vegetables and even plucked chickens at the site as soup was produced in large quantities.
"I'm 58 years old, so I'm going to be like, starting over," said Jeff Pattillo, who was let go. "I'm going to find something else that's going to be fun and enjoyable -- and then eventually, retire."
Workers were given a can of soup as they departed the plant. Some had their co-workers sign the cans as a memento.
“I guess it really hasn’t sunk in yet. I’m still absorbing the reality of the fact that I’m not at Campbell’s soup any more,” Pattillo added.
Frank Schulz had already packed up his moving truck and loaded his car onto a trailer, with plans to move to Oregon.
"I just recently lost my wife, and now with Campbell's closing, I just don't have a whole lot of reason to be here, so I'm going back home and start over again," Schulz said.
The company plans to shutter the entire plant by July, letting a total of 760 workers go.
A spokesperson said the company was shuttering the plant because soup sales had declined and the company had improved production at other sites.
The country's largest soup producer has also been using other forms of packaging at other plants.
Beverages and sauces are still being processed at the plant for the time being.
Workers were notified of the closing last fall.
The Sacramento County plant is Campbell Soup's oldest plant in the U.S.
A spokesperson for Campbell's said the company plans to sell the site once the shutdown is complete.
Copyright 2013 by KCRA.com All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
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What Silicon Valley companies are doing the best job of attracting talent? This turns out to be a complicated question, not to mention great fodder for bored designers to try to answer visually.
Recently an infographic started making the rounds, showing the ratios of employees moving between six top tech companies. This was published on the blog of a social job referral service called Top Prospect, generated using two years of their data. The story they told was one of small, up-and-coming companies poaching talent from more established companies.
A designer (Gene Lu) took issue with the fact that all the flow arrows were given equal weight, masking some important relationships. He did a nice redesign adapting the original to paint a clearer picture. The flow lines scaled to volume do a much better job of visually showing who the winners and losers in the “talent war” are.
However, there’s a more fundamental problem with the data underlying both these interpretations. Here’s a hypothetical to highlight the issue: Let’s say we have two equally-awesome companies looking to hire as fast as possible. They have the same low turnover rates of 1% per year. However, one company is much larger than the other. Company A has 10,000 people and Company B has 1,000. After a year, 10 people will have moved from B to A, but 100 people will have moved from A to B. So, even with everything being equal, the natural movement of people in the workforce automatically gives the smaller company a 10x ratio of hires.
This makes some intuitive sense. Even a large company that’s doing well will have a huge number of employees leaving in any given year. Having some of those people end up at a smaller company isn’t all that surprising.
So, I decided to run the numbers again, but this time scaling all the ratios according to the number of employees at each company. You can see the calculations on this spreadsheet. The resulting graphic is below.
This is a much different picture. Microsoft, with its huge employee base (almost 90k), is actually retaining its people quite well. It may seem to a small company like LinkedIn that tens or hundreds of ex-Microsofters showing up is a big trend, but to the Microsoft leviathan that’s a drop in the bucket. Scaling the ratios by company size shows in fact that there are a disproportionate number of LinkedIn employees actually leaving for Microsoft.
Otherwise, the scaled ratios are all relatively small. Google, Facebook, and Apple are at close to parity. The only other big story here is a sad one, and that’s the hemorrhaging of talent that Yahoo is undergoing.
Now, there are a lot of potential issues with this visualization as well. Is a linear scaling the correct way to adjust for company size? What about the base data itself? This data comes from Top Prospect’s small, proprietary sample. Fast Company has noted that the data might be skewed since it’s a Facebook-seeded referral service.
For these reasons and many others that I haven’t anticipated, I actually generated the infographic you see above with a tool I cobbled together using standards-compliant HTML, CSS, and JS. It’s up now. You can it to try out a different model or assumption, and generate new infographics.
For example, it was easy to pull Microsoft out and see the results right away. Enjoy!
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This November, the citizens of Columbia County will be asked to vote for a proposed $44 million dollar Capital Improvement Bond Referendum paid for by a 1-mill property tax increase. Included in the list of projects are Bowen Pond and Mullins Pond, as well as other projects related to water resources.
While the homeowners have expressed a keen interest in knowing the facts surrounding Bowen Pond, little has been said publicly about how and why Columbia County acquired this property. The public deserves a clear, factual explanation of the events that led Columbia County to acquire this property and how much money it has and will cost Columbia County taxpayers.
The citizens of Columbia County deserve a report that would include a history of the Bowen Pond, all communications, reports, recommendations, agreements and results of the due diligence performed prior to the land transaction. Included in this report should be any engineering and environmental reports, evaluations, recommendations and cost analysis related to the site. The report should be prepared and made available to the public prior to the bond referendum in November.
Public and private dams and retention/detention ponds serve this community as the first line of defense in flood protection. The health and safety of our community is protected by these very structures. A failure in any of these structures is not an option. The county needs to have a thorough understanding of the locations and the current condition of all dams within the county. If both Bowen and Mullins Ponds need repairs in excess of one million dollars, one might ask, "What are the conditions of the other dams in the county? How much is that going to cost? Who will pay for it?"
As a member of the Association of State Dam Safety Officials, I have learned that many communities regulate private and public dams through their county engineer. These counties have established policies and procedures to regulate and maintain the dams. These programs enable a county to manage the overall network of dams in a community and in case of emergency, provide the needed information to make critical, real time decisions.
Therefore, I call on Columbia County to prepare a Columbia County Dam Safety Report. We need a complete understanding of the current conditions, recommendations for repairs, status of repairs, nonconformities, costs and emergency actions plans of these important flood control devices.
In the interest of public safety and open, transparent government, providing the Bowen Pond Report and the Columbia County Dam Safety Report will go a long way in establishing voter confidence and trust.
Scott Nichols is a Democratic candidate for the District 1 seat on the Columbia County Commission.
The Columbia County News-Times ©2013. All Rights Reserved.
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With just 21 jars of baby food left on its shelves, the United Churches of Algiers food bank has closed until further notice, Director Sheila Riviore said.
The food bank, located in the city of New Orleans' Arthur Monday Center at 1111 Newton St. in Old Algiers, served its last five customers for the time being Thursday morning. Food ran out before the 15 people still waiting in the hall could be served, Riviore said.
"People are coming to our door for help, and we're not able to help,'' Riviore said.
District C Councilwoman Kristin Gisleson Palmer, who recently toured the Arthur Monday building to explore how the space at the center is being used, said she found it "very disheartening'' that the food bank is closed. "It's the only food bank in that geographic area. I'm very, very disturbed."
Riviore said that before Hurricane Katrina, various churches in Algiers supplied the food bank with 75 percent of its goods, with Second Harvest Food Bank Greater New Orleans and Acadiana supplying the rest.
But after Katrina, "it turned around. Now we rely solely on Second Harvest, and churches fill in the blanks."
Riviore said she is grateful for whatever Second Harvest can provide, but she said donations to that nonprofit group appear to be down also, and United Churches hasn't been able to get the type of food it needs to serve its clients.
Palmer urged members of the public to step up donations.
She also said she is urging the new city administration to repair Hurricane Katrina damage at the Monday center. The roof was damaged, and much of the second floor is still unusable, crowding many agencies into the bottom floor. "I've been promoting it to the new administration as one of our priorities. It's very crowded right now.''
Riviore said she appreciates the help that churches are bringing to her, but "it's a small amount. Some churches are actively giving, but we have a far greater number of churches that are not participating.''
On a daily basis, 25 to 30 people show up for food at United Churches, Riviore said.
"We have had several fights break out because of a lack of resources," Riviore said. "People are going through a lot these days. They're working a short rope. tensions are high."
In better times, the food bank would serve about 15 to 20 clients a day, Riviore said.
The food stamp office on Gen. Meyer Avenue often refers clients to United Churches for additional food assistance. But "I called them to notify staff until further notice to tell people it's closed.''
To donate to United Churches of Algiers, call 504.361.1661 or e-mail email@example.com. The office is open Monday through Thursday, from 8 a.m. to 1 p.m.
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When we walk on the streets we love to spit or throw stubs.
Children walked with bare foot and takes germs to home,
We need to control spreading disease that is motive hubs.
Few things are common it's not right to spread rubbish,
To gain rubbish, to protect rights or to fight for nothing,
We never care for environment and love for breathe fresh.
Neighbour fights for rubbish and hate to clean front of street,
Live in jealousy, finds opportunity for degrading each other,
minor dispute they failed to solve, education is their defeat.
They fight for growing tree branches or a place for parking,
They 're kind supporter, love to throw rubbish in the garden,
Loud music they play for nonsense to prove they are king.
Sometimes genius people loose courage and live in stress.
The entire life they fight against the system to defeat a neighbour,
Then blames politics to stop cost a vote, is democracy mess?
Their nature changes their behaviour they dispute for little gain,
The entire life they struggle for peace and never sleep for a night,
They live in dreams and failed to find a solution of their sustain.
What's a problem to live on earth whom do we need to detain?
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A Protestant man overlooked for a top job with Northern Ireland Water because of his religion has been awarded £150,000 in compensation.
Alan Lennon said the substantial sum reflected the seriousness of the discrimination he endured.
"I am pleased that this case has finally been resolved," Dr Lennon said. "I took the case primarily to challenge what I believe to be serious flaws in the public appointments system and the level of compensation agreed marks the seriousness of what occurred."
Dr Lennon agreed to accept £150,000 after an employment tribunal ruled, in June, that he had been subjected to religious discrimination by the Department of Regional Development (DRD).
The tribunal found that former Sinn Fein minister Conor Murphy breached a code of practice when he appointed Sean Hogan to the position as chairman of NI Water in March last year. Mr Hogan was the only Catholic applicant for the job. Four others, all Protestants, were turned down.
Mr Murphy has consistently denied any allegations of discrimination.
Dr Lennon added: "I note that commitments have been made by the department to review these processes and it is vital for public confidence in government in Northern Ireland that this case acts as a springboard for change. I hope that this will result in a more transparent and equitable public appointments process."
The Equality Commission provided help to Dr Lennon in bringing his case against the DRD. Evelyn Collins, chief executive of the Equality Commission, said: "The commission supported this case to establish that public appointments, including those which involve the exercise of a minister's discretion, are fully within the protection of anti-discrimination legislation.
"If unlawful discrimination occurs it is important that there is a sufficient degree of transparency and accountability in the appointments process to enable it to be challenged, and an effective remedy for the person discriminated against is an essential part of that."
In July the current Ulster Unionist Roads Minister Danny Kennedy said his department would not appeal against the tribunal's decision because of cost implications for the public purse.
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Developer's Reading List, January 24, 2012 The latest books off the press cover code readability, Java performance, hunting for and prying open security defects, game testing, architecture, and even OpenVMS.
Charlie Hunt and Binu John
A detailed, comprehensive explanation of measuring and improving Java performance. The book starts with descriptions of the principal factors that affect performance on the JVM. It then shows how to measure the performance and tease out the various causes through specific benchmarks. More than half the book is devoted to tuning the JVM and the applications to squeeze out the maximum performance. This information is relayed with tips and techniques, as well as deep dives into the various tools and JVM options that are currently available (and, it appears, little-known). The appendices provide extensive coverage of JVM options and present source code with illustrative techniques of performance refinement that are possible.
This book is, without a doubt, the most comprehensive treatment of Java performance. My only frustration with it is that it covers only Oracle technologies. So, only the HotSpot JVM is discussed (although many of the techniques are clearly applicable to other JVMs) and only Oracle’s Java servers. The more than occasional references to Solaris were also a bit annoying. But these limitations aside, this is an excellent treatment and worthy of a place on the bookshelf of most Java developers. Highly recommended. — Andrew Binstock
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If you think Washington wineries are essentially producing only chardonnay and riesling for white wines and cabernet, merlot and syrah for reds, I’m guessing you haven’t been shopping for wines lately.
Washington wineries have been venturing out into several other varietals as of late; some you’re probably familiar with, others may be entirely new to you.
Compared to Europe, which is home to several hundred different types of wine grapes, Washington’s production is just a blip on the radar, with probably only about 20 to 30 varietals we currently produce well. But let’s put things in perspective – they’ve been growing grapes in Europe for hundreds of years, while we’ve really taken winemaking seriously for only the last three to four decades.
One area where I’ve seen noticeable improvement in the market is in the number of red wines Washington wineries are currently offering. Ten years ago you got just the basics, with a few then-considered “exotic” varietals blended in. Now you can easily find stand-alone varietals such as sangiovese, tempranillo, barbera, malbec, petite sirah, and zinfandel, to name just a few.
One of the reasons for this is that wine consumption has increased and consumers have become much more wine savvy. They demand variety and quality and if they can’t find it from Washington wineries they’ll simply look elsewhere.
As a result, growing and winemaking techniques are compelled to improve, and grapes that were once considered by some in the State’s wine industry to be too finicky or invasive to grow are being planted – and flourishing.
During the next few weeks I’ll give you several recommendations on some newer Washington varietals that are becoming increasingly popular, and comparable, to those grown in other parts of the world.
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Crown Princess Victoria and Prince Daniel of Sweden are expecting to become parents for the first time in early March. In this connection the Swedish Royal Court has issued a press statement explaining how the birth will be announced and the traditions attached to it.
The first thing that is going to happen is that the Marshal of the Realm will inform the leaders of the realm and then make the news public at the royal website and the Royal Court's Facebook page.
A formal witness confirmation will take place the day after the birth, or if the birth takes place on a Saturday, the witnesses - the Speaker, the Prime Minister, the Marshal of the Realm and the Mistress of the Robes - will sign the confirmation on the first Monday. The witness confirmation is in other words a document with a seal and signatures of the above-mentioned persons.
The King will also convene the Council of State, in which he will formally inform the members of the government of the royal baby's title, names, call name and which ducal title he or she will receive. The Council of State will, as with the witness confirmation, take place the day after the birth or on the following Monday if the birth takes place on a Saturday.
We can also expect a 2 x 21-gun-salute from Skeppsholmen in Stockholm as well as from "the salute stations" in Boden, Härnösand, Karlskrona and Gothenburg. According to the ceremonial instructions of the Swedish Armed Forces (Instruktion för Försvarsmakten, ceremonier; Cerl FM 2010), the salute will take place as soon as the Swedish Armed Forces is formally informed about the birth, but not between 9 p.m. and 8 a.m. and not on Sundays between 10 a.m. and 1 p.m.
In addition a traditional Te Deum - a thanksgiving church service - will take place in the Royal Chapel the day after the birth, unless the birth takes place on a Saturday, as the Te Deum then will be on the following Monday. Invited guests are members of the closest family, representatives of the Riksdag (the Swedish Parliament), the Government and other representatives of the official Sweden as well as members of the court. Invitations to the Te Deum have already been sent out.
See also The Local's article on the same subject, published earlier today.
Postscript 7 February 2012: The Royal Court of Sweden has now provided a translation of the said press release, "Tradition and customs on the occasion of a royal birth".
Updated on 7 February 2012 at 00:15 (postscript added).
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OTTAWA — While the number of impaired driving cases is rising in Canadian cities, Ottawa is bucking the national trend with the lowest rate in the country, according to the latest report by Statistics Canada.
There were 827 police-reported cases of impaired driving in Ottawa in 2011 — a 41-per-cent decrease compared with 2001.
But the Ottawa police officer who manages strategies to curb drunk driving said there were too many factors at play to draw conclusions from those statistics.
“The numbers are dropping, yes, but does that mean we’re not as good at catching impaired drivers? Does it mean there are less impaired drivers? Does it mean that we’re too busy to look for impaired drivers?” said Sgt. John Kiss.
More significant is that the number of accidents and subsequent deaths are down, Kiss said.
“That’s good news — that’s the bottom line,” he said.
Ottawa police stopped nearly 7,000 vehicles at checkpoints in December, resulting in just three impaired driving charges. The number is consistent with previous years but Kiss said officers working at the checkpoints also noticed a responsible attitude from drivers and passengers.
“They remarked on the fact they were surprised by the large number of people that had clearly planned ahead and were either taking taxis or had designated drivers or used Operation Red Nose,” Kiss said.
The Statistics Canada report suggested that in 2011, Ottawa had a rate of 87 impaired driving cases per 100,000 people. Gatineau’s rate was 209 per 100,000, still well below the national average of 262. Kelowna, B.C. was the impaired driving capital with a rate of 583 cases per 100,000, followed closely by St. John’s, NL at 560.
Across the country, there were 90,277 reported cases — the vast majority for drunk driving and the remaining 1,886 for drug impairment. That represents a two-per-cent increase over 2010 — but a two-per-cent decrease over 10 years.
Ontario had the lowest rate among all provinces and territories — 130 — which represents a 28-per-cent decrease over 10 years. The only other province with a rate below the national average was Quebec with 211 cases per 100,000.
The report also detailed that:
• Drivers between the ages of 20 and 24 have the highest impaired driving rate, which declines slowly as age increases.
• Men represent 82 per cent of all cases.
• Drivers accused of impairment are found guilty in more than four of five cases.
• Half of impaired drivers are stopped by police between 11 p.m. and 4 a.m.
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MP1 - Mastering Piece
The field of audio mastering has emerged with its own set of standards and criteria. Numerous specialized hardware and software tools are offered to the mastering engineer nowadays – tools that can remove unwanted parts of the signal or that can enhance, optimize or restore sonic elements of the recording under consideration.
The ADAM MP1 “Mastering Piece” provides the ultimate monitoring tool for the final stage of the recording process. Since this is the last chance anyone has to sculpt, change and fine tune a recording before it becomes available to the public, it is crucial for a mastering engineer to know for certain that their monitors provide them with the most honest and revealing sonic “picture” possible. It was to answer this need that the MP1 was created.
The MP1 reveals what is actually present in an audio recording with an unprecedented degree of sonic precision, offering every discerning mastering engineer the chance to hear his/her work more accurately and in greater detail than ever before.
In designing the MP1, we examined the leading edge of today’s loudspeaker technology at every frequency band. We started with a 12” side-firing HexaCone woofer, driven by a no-compromise 500 W PWM amplifier. A very stable bass reflex cabinet, where the woofer could be mechanically tuned to a 23 Hz corner frequency (-3 dB point) is responsible for an extremely pure sound that is free from overemphasizing artifacts, resulting in especially tight and solid bass response. One can immediately appreciate the accuracy of these monitors when listening to an acoustic bass.
The range between 80 and 600 Hz is reproduced by ceramic cones, which exhibit the best stability-to-weight ratio of all solid diaphragms. Combined with our ART midrange and tweeter units, these are the most advanced and precise drive units available.
The control panel on the front allows the MP1 to adapt to different room acoustics in order to optimize performance in any given situation.
In addition to input sensitivity, there are controls to adjust the individual levels of the tweeter and midrange amplifiers as well as shelving filters on both ends of the frequency band, thus allowing for maximum flexibility of positioning within the control room as different room absorption may be equalized.
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by Catherine Doherty.
In August 1973, Catherine wrote the following article to introduce the readers of Restoration to the Ottawa house. It was a new kind of venture—the first of our houses that did not perform a concrete work among the materially poor.
Madonna House has come to Ottawa. The director is Arlene Becker and her assistant is Diane Lefebvre. His excellency, Archbishop Joseph Plourde, has blessed the venture and given us this building which belongs to the archdiocese.
We are responsible for everything else, for which we are deeply grateful, for that’s what we asked for. That’s all we ask from every head of the diocese when we come to it.
We desire to be responsible for the rest, like oil for the furnace, gas for the stove, the telephone, and all the rest of it. We want to be beggars. That is to say, we simply want to ask, hoping that we shall receive what we need, which is very little.
As usual, people will want to know what we are going to do in Ottawa. Well, I don’t think we are going "to do" very much. Mostly we will "be". That is to say, we will witness to Christ with our presence.
The essence of Madonna House is difficult to transmit but perhaps this little introduction might help:
"The apostolate of Madonna House and its members are pilgrims in this world proclaiming the second coming of Christ when all things will be restored to him.
"Like all pilgrims, the members travel in poverty to find security only in Christ; journey in chastity to serve and love Christ in men; live in obedience to be concerned only with the Will of God."
Then again, perhaps, what we call our Little Mandate [words expressing the essential spirituality of Madonna House] will clarify who we are and what we want to be:
"Arise—go! Sell all you possess. Give it directly, personally to the poor. Take up My cross (their cross) and follow me—going to the poor—being poor—being one with them—one with Me.
"Little. Be always little—simple, poor, childlike.
"Preach the Gospel with your life without compromise. Listen to the Spirit. He will lead you.
"Do little things exceedingly well for love of Me.
"Love—love—love, never counting the cost.
"Go into the market place and stay with Me. Pray. Fast. Pray always. Fast.
"Be hidden. Be a light to your neighbors’ feet. Go without fears into the depth of men’s hearts. I shall be with you.
"Pray always. I will be your rest."
No, we are not going to do anything, meaning that we are not going to teach catechism or enter into the field of social action or community action.
We just, I guess, will be—spending part of our day in prayer and another part in welcoming anyone who comes to visit us with the humble hospitality of our humble means. The house is open to talk about God.
Perhaps on some window—or will it be a glass door?—we will put up a sign: "God is spoken about here. Anyone is welcome."
Editor: Talk about an impossible task, a leap in faith! But this is the vision that Arlene and Diane and all who came after them have tried to live.
Arlene is still there. Martha came as a brand new staff worker when the house was nine years old, and she was formed by Arlene in her poustinik vocation.
For the past thirty years, she and Martha were together, sometimes with others, sometimes not. They developed a deep friendship, and somewhere along the line, they were made co-directors of the house.
If you enjoy our articles, we ask you to please consider subscribing to the print edition of Restoration; it's only $10 a year, and will help us stay in print. Thanks, and God bless you!
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The Kids Are Tuned Out -- Of Your Branded Messages
In the big, grand world of MediaPost conferences, the session that usually proves most illuminating is when we get actual people, who don’t work in this business, on stage. (No, none of us who read -- or write -- this column qualify as actual people; we are overanalytical wonks.) What the people on those panels tell us is what media, devices and platforms they use -- and how, or whether, branding really has any impact on their daily lives.
Guess what? Branding always barely registers. While I’ve seen this to be the case during other times we’ve held this session, yesterday’s version, during our first Brand Marketers Summit, telegraphed this louder, and more clearly, than ever before. It’s important for marketing’s future to note that the panelists were the youngest we’ve ever had: two 15-year-old girls, one 14-year-old boy (who is very closely related to yours truly), and two 13-year-old twin boys, all of whom threw the proverbial glass of cold water on the notion that branding messages are something they seek out when they are consuming media and communicating on digital devices.
That’s pretty damning when one stops to consider that every single panelist seemed to be plugged in some, if not all, of their waking hours -- or at least as much time as their parents and battery life would allow. (One of the teen girls admitted that she switched to the iPad only when her phone was taken away by her parents or because her phone needed charging.) There were complaints about pre-roll ads; one of the 13-year-old boys sung the praises of watching TV ad-free on Roku. Though some of the panelists followed brands, there was generally puzzlement as to why someone would actually follow a brand on Facebook or Twitter. As my offspring said on stage, it’s not as though friending a brand on Facebook is going to improve his day. Or that’s the belief, anyway, probably because few brands think of that as the goal.
While every generation I’ve come in contact with pridefully proclaims themselves immune to advertising messages, what makes these soon-to-be adults so fascinating is their technologically enabled ability to ignore marketing messages at will. I’d argue that a lot of this has to do with social media. Yes, as expected, all of the panelists seemed to devote much of their screen time to connecting with others, through one-to-one technologies like texting and Skype, to broader platforms like Facebook, Twitter and Instagram (a platform that the girls seemed rabidly interested in and the boys not so much). Most of those platforms, you’ll note, aren’t exactly overloaded with advertising.
This, of course, explains why marketers are so rabid about figuring out social media and why marketing budgets continue to flow in its direction, even though the kids don’t care. Fortunately, a prescription to cure their marketing disinterest was offered up by one of the girls, who said that if brands asked her opinion and showed they really did care about her, she might pay attention.
That’s simple advice, too often forgotten. From the mouths of teens.
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Colorado Climate Network Programs
Among the Network priorities adopted by the Steering Committee is tracking state legislature actions, Hickenlooper Administration goals and initiatives, and state agency policies relevant to local programs, and informing Network members about all of these. RMCO’s legislative lobbyist already tracks and informs Network members of legislation of potential interest to them. Listed below are the legislative updates that summarize important information and update the status of such legislation and policies:
Fourth Network Workshop:"State and Local Emissions Inventories - Better Tools for Better Decisions"
April 30, 2013, 1-4 p.m., Denver Department of Environmental Health,
200 W. 14th Ave., Denver
Regularly updated inventories of heat-trapping pollution are essential for charting progress
emission-reduction goals of state and local governments and for guiding new policies. This workshop
brought together leading local and state government inventory specialists to focus on how to improve
and make better use of state and local inventories to shape better decisions. The workshop featured
an unique opportunity to see the preliminary results of a new state inventory and to discuss it with the
staff of the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment. The workshop also offered
presentations on and exploration of the range of inventory methodologies used by Colorado
local governments and discussions about moving toward more consistency between state and local inventories and
among local inventories. Other topics included how to get the most out of inventories to communicate
progress and shape policies.
See workshop agenda, presentations, and local government inventories here.
The Network's Third Annual Conference: "Climate Change Vulnerabilities and Preparedness - Actionable Intelligence for Local Governments."
December 11, 2012, 8:30 a.m. - 5 p.m., City of Aurora Municipal Building, 15151 E. Alameda Parkway
Community leaders understand that even as they work to reduce heat-trappings emissions they must also prepare for the challenges and threats of a changing climate. This conference was designed to help attendees learn about Colorado’s unique vulnerabilities to climate disruption and what can be done to create communities more resilient to those threats. Highlighting the conference was the keynote address by Gov. John Hickenlooper, what RMCO believes to be his first speech as governor focused on climate change, which he called the “single greatest risk the globe faces.”
The Colorado Climate Network is grateful to the City of Aurora and its staff for hosting the conference, and to its prime sponsors - Avago Technologies, Stratus Consulting, and the Town of Vail, and its sponsors - the Colorado Municipal League, CSU Center for Multiscale Modeling of Atmospheric Processes, Denver Department of Environmental Health, and Populus, LLC.
See complete conference presentations, session synopses, and post-conference survey here.
Second Annual CCN Conference - December 11, 2011
"Communicating the case for local climate action: A how-to conference for local officials, staff, and others" was rated a success by the 70 attendees from local governments, non-profits, university programs, businesses, and state and federal agencies. The Network's second annual conference, was held on December 8, 2011 at the Aurora Municipal Building. The conference focused exclusively on climate communications, to equip conference attendees with information and techniques to help them more effectively communicate with others to build support for undertaking and implementing local climate programs.
Inaugural CCN Conference - December 15-16, 2010
More than 90 local government officials and staff as well as leaders from other government, business, education, and nonprofit fields attended the first-ever Colorado Climate Network Conference, making the conference a success. The conference served as a major effort to strengthen and carry out the goals of the Network, which launched in 2009 to support local climate programs. Featuring presentations, workshops, and group discussions, the conference helped arm participants with the tools needed to meet the challenges and seize the opportunities facing climate, sustainability, and clean energy programs in Colorado.
Third Network Workshop - October 12, 2012
"Waste reduction - the forgotten solution to climate change" brought together attendees from
Network members as well as non-members with resource experts to discuss waste reduction strategies
that work and that make significant contributions to reductions of heat-trapping gases. Considered
were what local governments can do and what the state government should do to promote reduce
Second CCN Members-Only Workshop - March 9, 2012
"The Network’s role on state policy" workshop featured open discussions with key policy leaders from the Governor's Policy Office, the Governor's Energy Office, other state agencies, regional planning agencies, non-profits, and local programs. The goal was to identify and prioritize climate protection actions at the state level (including legislation, regulations, policies, technical support, funding, and partnerships) that the network can advance, especially in areas that cannot be fully addressed locally.
First CCN Members-Only Workshop - October 14, 2011
"Demand side versus supply side: Which basket to put your eggs in?" was the featured topic of this first, model workshop of what will be a series of Network-member-only workshops. An open discusson led by program leaders from Fort Collins and Vail addressed a key question facing all local climate programs: how much to focus on demand-side programs (energy efficiency) and how much on supply-side programs (clean energy sources). There was additional discussion of the City of Boulder's decision to ask citizens to vote on creating a new municipal utility.
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CASE STUDY 6/98
Local authority housing loan - disclosure of personal data by a local authority to a financial institution - whether such data are in the public domain - statutory discretion to make personal data publicly available does not take precedence over data protection law
The complainant received a letter from a bank inviting her to convert her local authority housing loan to a housing loan provided by that bank. The bank informed the complainant that the offer was unique to people who held mortgages from the local authority in question. The complainant queried this matter with her local authority. It admitted that it had passed names and addresses to the bank, in order to allow the bank to advise people of its re-mortgage facilities. The local authority said that no loan account details had been passed to the bank. The complainant raised the matter with my Office, complaining that her personal details had been disclosed without her knowledge or consent, in contravention of the Data Protection Act.
The local authority confirmed to my Office that it kept data relating to loan account holders for the purpose of administering its loan accounts, and that it had not obtained the complainantís consent to the disclosure of her name and address to the bank. However, the local authority was of the opinion that these details were already in the public domain, because whenever a local authority borrower is approved for a loan, a County Managerís Order is drafted, and all such orders are included as part of the local authorityís minutes which are publicly available documents.
In considering this matter, I had regard to section 1(4)(b) of the Data Protection Act, 1988, which provides that the Act does not apply to "personal data consisting of information that the person keeping the data is required by law to make available to the public". This provision would mean that, if the names and addresses of the local authorityís housing loan account holders were required by law to be made available to the public, then the disclosure of such data by the local authority could not have been in breach of the Data Protection Act.
Accordingly, the local authority was requested to indicate whether the County Managerís Orders were required by law to be made available to the public. The local authority pointed out that there was a legal obligation to make such orders and to retain records of them, by virtue of the County Management Acts of 1940 and 1955. However, while that legislation allowed the County Manager discretion to record the names and addresses of housing loan account holders, the local authority was unable to cite any statutory requirement to place such personal data in the public domain. In the absence of any such statutory requirement, I could only conclude that the data in question were subject to the Data Protection Act, 1988, in the normal way.
Accordingly, I upheld the complaint against the local authority. All data controllers, and in particular those in the public sector, should note that statutory discretion to make personal data publicly available is not the same as a statutory requirement to do so. It is only the latter that takes precedence over the normal application of data protection principles.
» Permanent Link
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|Unrepentant mass murderer; who do you imagine is paying for |
the monthly salary that is sent to his family? Answer at
the bottom of this post [Image Source]
Over the past decade, Britain, Germany, Italy, Spain, France, Austria, Sweden and the Netherlands have paid more than $130 million to terrorist groups, mostly through mediators, to free European hostages... The so-called global war on terror has been hobbled by these payoffs. [NY Times]He makes a reasonable point. But if this hobbled the fight against the terrorists, then what about the far larger sums shoveled into the maw of the Palestinian Arab terror machine throughout the past decade? And continuing. It's a theme we have addressed here numerous times. Some examples:
- 6-Oct-06: Crying Poor: The Terror-Laden Rise and Rise of the Palestinian National Payroll
- 1-Mar-11: Finally, some sanity on European funding of Palestinian Arab terror
- 20-May-11: Rewarding the Palestinian Arab terrorists: is this being done in your name
- 7-Jun-11: International terror victims group asks EC to intervene against PA's promotion of terror
- 28-Jul-11: Taxpayer-funded salaries to convicted Palestinian Arab terrorists. What a good idea.
- 26-Oct-12: Ordinary Europeans and their politicians fund Palestinian Arab terror. How do they respond when confronted with the evidence?
- 7-Jan-13: Ongoing European funding of terrorism continues despite laws, rules and policies prohibiting it
What we have written in those posts and keep repeating is that European tax-payers are the major source of the money that is used by terrorism-addicted regimes - in particular the Palestinian Authority or as it now prefers to call itself, "The State of Palestine" - to reward and encourage the people who have already murdered and who aspire to murder in the near future the children of the people whom their religious and secular leaders teach them to hate. Refer to the excellent, though sadly not-up-date, EU Funding site for more background.
In a recent post, we quoted Douglas Murray, associate director at the London-based Henry Jackson Society think-tank, who wrote about this under the headline "Palestinian Terrorists on the Payroll" [online at the WSJE site]. Here's a reminder of a small part of what he writes there:
...Many British taxpayers, struggling to pay their family's way through a recession, might rightly wonder why their money is going to pay as much as £2,000 a month to people serving the longest sentences—those who have targeted Israeli buses and other civilian targets with suicide bombers, for instance. That is higher than the average wage in nearly all of Britain. You might be forgiven for wondering, if you were a struggling teaching assistant in the North of England, why failing to tick "suicide bomber" on your careers form should have left you so much worse off than a terrorist in the Middle East...Most of the politicians and civil servants who facilitate this disgraceful funding process with the money of ordinary citizens know they are doing it. So do many in the news media. And when ordinary folks have it explained to them, they become furious.
So why is it that the scandal continues with so little rational intervention? It's not a new issue. We published an article about this in a major European newspaper more than nine years ago. See the Wall Street Journal Europe, September 26, 2003 edition: "Blood, Money and Education" [online here]. It has some very critical things to say about a certain British politician who we believe was up to his eyebrows in involvement with covering up the EU funding of Palestinian terrorism at the time. Today he is the UK government's man in charge of the BBC.
The portrait at the top of this post is of Abdullah Barghouti. He manufactured the bomb-in-a-guitar-case for the Hamas operation that targeted the Sbarro restaurant in central Jerusalem; the explosion killed 15 people, left a 16th unconscious until today, and injured more than 130. A large proportion of the casualties were Jewish children, one of them our daughter. Barghouti's monthly salary, amounting to thousands of shekels and growing, is paid to his family by the "moderate" PA, largely funded by unwitting taxpayers in the UK, India, Norway, Ireland, France, Japan and the United States, as well as from the European Union aid budget.
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Sunday, January 24, 2010
I Say No to GMOs
The only way to ensure that your food supply is completely safe from human-centric genetic tampering is to buy from local, organic farmers, or to grow it yourself.
I do both.
I say NO to GMOs!
For the record, though, I was unaware of exactly what GMO meant. The idea of human beings trying to manipulate animal or plant genes didn't really bother me so much, because the fact is that human beings have been tampering with genes since before we even knew, exactly, what genes were.
All animal breeds and plant hybrids are the result of human intervention.
The difference is that an AKC registered beagle puppy has all dog genes, or at least all canine genes. A Maine coon cat is all feline.
A genetically modified tomato, by contrast, is not all tomato. In fact, it's not even all plant. Some of it is animal genes, which are added in a laboratory.
And something like that, no matter how many times we tried different pollinating techniques, would never ... NEVER ... occur naturally. There's just no way to force a fish and a tomato plant to produce offspring, which is the way dog breeds and plant hybrids were produced ... before we got so damned crafty in the laboratory.
The problem is that we can not possibly know what it might do to us ... or our future generations through our genes. It may do nothing, but it might do a lot of something really awful. We know what eating real food (whole foods like fresh fruits and vegetables and wild and domesticated animals) will do to us, because we have millions of years of evidence.
For the last hundred years, especially for people in this country, the bulk of our diet has been processed foods, and we've never been in worse condition health-wise. We already know what happens to our bodies when we primarily consume foods that are so highly processed that they don't even remotely resemble anything that grows. If those are bad for us, how worse the food that looks natural, but isn't?
Why take the chance?
I didn't know exactly what GMOs were, but I did try to stay away from them. Now that I know a bit more, I will stop trying to stay away from them, and just do it ... for me and for my family.
The good news is that it will save us thousands of dollars per year, because if we've resolved to avoid GMOs, and we can't guarantee that the restaurant we're patronizing doesn't use GMO crops in their food, then we can't eat out, right?
Saving money should make Deus Ex Machina happy ... even if it does mean no more Chinese take-out :).
**I owe thanks to Phelan for posting the video on her blog ;).
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STOCKHOLM & WASHINGTON -- (BUSINESS WIRE) -- Tobii Technology, the global leader in eye tracking and pioneer of gaze interaction, was presented with four “Best of Show” honors from top industry media organizations last week during the 2013 International Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas for the introduction of Tobii REX, the company’s groundbreaking new computer peripheral powered by Tobii Gaze. CNET, Mobile Geeks, Popular Science and Übergizmo celebrated Tobii for having one of the most innovative technologies introduced at the show that is expected to have a major impact on the future of human computing.
“We are extremely honored that Tobii REX and the Tobii Gaze interface were so well-received by so many. We absolutely believe that the integration of gaze into multi-modal computer interaction will dramatically enhance how we all use computer technology in the future, and Tobii REX is an important milestone in taking us closer to realizing this,” said Henrik Eskilsson, CEO of Tobii Technology. “We are very pleased the product has received such strong, positive interest from the many developers, manufacturers and tech enthusiasts we met at CES.”
Tobii received the following awards during CES:
“The new Rex is small enough to sit on your laptop between the monitor and keyboard. It can also comfortably attach to the bottom of most desktop monitors. More interesting than its rectangular design, though, is the fact that it lets you navigate through Windows 8 with just your eyes and a single keystroke.” -- Seth Rosenblatt, CNET
“Tobii’s technology uses your eyes to replace your mouse cursor, and the company’s monitor-mounted REX peripheral now allows virtually anyone to take advantage of it … Tobii has launched the REX, a $995 developer module that hopefully will be a consumer product in the near future. The REX attaches to the underside of your LCD monitor. After about 30 seconds of training, the REX’s electronic eyes follow your own, allowing you to control your cursor with just your eyes. It’s amazingly accurate, although you’ll still need to ‘click’ with your keyboard.” -- Popular Science
“Tobii, a company specialized in eye tracking technology, launched the Tobii REX, touted to be the world’s first gaze interaction computer peripheral for the consumer market. Tobii REX is based on Tobii Gaze, which is a revolutionary and award-winning eye-tracking-based interface that was introduced in 2012, where users are able to control the computer simply by using their eye gaze alongside other controls like touch, mouse and keyboard. We tried the new Tobii REX device at CES Unveiled last week and were impressed by its accuracy …Tobii REX will be available for consumers this fall, developers can buy it now.” -- Übergizmo
Read more about Tobii REX on Übergizmo: Tobii REX Unveiled.
“We knew that Tobii would be showing off their Eye Tracking-Hardware at CES and we were impressed by what we saw. We visited the Tobii booth and got up close and personal with Tobii Rex … I am convinced that the technology is taking us closer to the future and will allow us to improve the way we use PC’s.” -- Malarie Gokey, Mobile Geeks
Read more about Tobii on Mobile Geeks.
Ordering Tobii REX
Developers interested in trying Tobii REX are welcome to go to www.tobii.com/rexdev to order the $995 Tobii REX Developer Edition.
Tobii REX Limited Edition will be made available to consumers by this fall. To receive notification when orders can be placed for the limited edition of 5,000 units, go to www.tobii.com/rexvip.
About Tobii Technology
Tobii Technology is the global leader in eye tracking and gaze interaction. Tobii delivers comprehensive, market-leading gaze solutions and OEM eye-tracking components for applications such as computers, games and vehicles. Tobii’s eye-tracking technology has accelerated the development of gaze interaction in personal computing, transformed research in many fields and enabled communication for thousands of people with special needs. Founded in 2001, Tobii continues to achieve rapid annual growth and receive awards and recognition for its accomplishments. Based in Sweden, Tobii has a global presence, with offices in the U.S., China, Germany, Japan and Norway, as well as a worldwide network of resellers and partners. For more information, visit www.tobii.com.
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DARLINGTON, Pa. (AP) -- Chesapeake gas drilling company is refusing to obey a cease-and-desist order issued by a western Pennsylvania township in a dispute over local zoning laws and drilling rights.
Darlington Township Solicitor Garen Fedeles said Wednesday that Chesapeake Energy is ignoring the stop-work order issued Friday by a zoning officer.
Darlington maintains Chesapeake is violating a zoning regulation by proceeding with the work without final township approval. Chesapeake argues that it has the right to drill now.
Fedeles said if the dispute goes to court and the township is successful, Chesapeake could be fined $500 per day.
Chesapeake spokesperson Jacque Bland said in a statement that the Oklahoma City-based company has offered to discuss the issue further with the township, but believes Chesapeake has a valid lease on the land and is entitled to drill.
"We would not be preparing and drilling this well were that not the case," Bland said.
At the heart of the issue is an area where the company is already embroiled in a dispute with several property owners. The owners maintain the original 2005 drilling leases were improperly executed and the company should make no changes to the properties, pending resolution of the disagreements.
But Chesapeake sued in March, saying the company needed to cut down some trees before a protected bat species emerged from hibernation. A judge sided with Chesapeake.
Attorney Jordan Yeager, who has represented several families and municipalities in disputes with gas drilling companies, said he's heard of one similar case in northeastern Pennsylvania. Yeager said Chesapeake's challenge may be part of a broader legal battle over how in interpret Pennsylvania's new gas drilling law.
The law was supposed to take effect April 15, but a judge ordered a temporary halt to the provision that puts limits on the power of municipalities to regulate the natural gas exploration industry.
The order came as a victory for seven municipalities that had sued. But the judge also suggested that the towns' wider challenge to the constitutionality of the new law is questionable.
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With her poll numbers down after the entrance of Rick Perry into the GOP presidential race, Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN) is shifting her campaign message from a focus on the economy to the social issues that first launched her political career. In multiple town halls in Iowa this week, Bachmann reminded supporters that “as much as this election will be about jobs,” “we can’t forget the undergirding of our nation and those are the values, the principles that we stand for.” She urged voters not to “settle” on a candidate who lacks a track record of defending traditional social issues and reviewed her own accomplishments — from championing a constitutional amendment against same-sex marriage as a state senator in Minnesota to advocating anti-abortion legislation in Congress.
“As president I want you to know I’ll fight for life and for marriage, because we can have a president who believes in the power of prayer,” Bachmann says in a new video, “a president who is steadfast on the values of life, of marriage, and faith and with your support for my candidacy for the president of the United States, this will be the year conservatives don’t have to settle.” Yesterday, Bachmann went even further, announcing that she would sponsor The Heartbeat Informed Consent Act, “a bill in Congress that seemed aimed directly at evangelical voters.” The measure would require all abortion providers “make the heartbeat of the unborn child visible and audible to its mother as part of her informed consent.” From Bachmann’s statement:
“A pregnant woman who enters an abortion clinic is faced with a decision that will forever change two lives. That’s why she must have the very best information with which to make that decision. The ‘Heartbeat Informed Consent Act,’ that I introduced today, would require that abortion providers make the unborn child’s heartbeat visible through ultrasound, describe the cardiac activity, and make the baby’s heartbeat audible, if the child is old enough for it to be detectable.
“A study by Focus on the Family found that when women who were undecided about having an abortion were shown an ultrasound image of the baby, 78% chose life. An unborn baby’s heartbeat can be detected as early as five weeks after conception and ultrasound technology is an amazing medical advance that provides a window for a pregnant woman to see her unborn child. My legislation will not only enable this technology to be better used to protect life, but also to ensure that a woman who is considering abortion is finally able to give full and informed consent.”
Bachmann’s support for federally-mandated ultrasounds undermines her strong opposition to government requirements in health care. Her bill would institute an onerous bureaucratic regulation that inserts the government into medical decision making and creates another level of unnecessary federal regulation. As the Guttmacher Institute explains, every state already “requires that a patient consent before undergoing medical treatment” and provides adequate and appropriate information about the procedure. Bachmann is seeking even greater federal intervention and is relying on government regulations to talk women out of undergoing a medical procedure — a decision that is best left to the woman and her doctor. Six states currently mandate “that an abortion provider perform an ultrasound on each woman seeking an abortion, and require the provider to offer the woman the opportunity to view the image.”
Bachmann’s new-found emphasis on social issues is not without risk, the Associated Press notes. “[P]revious candidates boosted by Iowa’s evangelical voters have failed to capitalize on that success once the campaign left the state” and voters seem especially uninterested in the message in 2012. A recent ABC News/Washington Post poll found that just 3 percent of Republican respondents said social issues were the most important issue affecting their vote.
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Shaykh Ahmad al-Faruqi as-Sirhindi
May Allah Sanctify His Soul
"If God causes one to approach Him,
He reveals Himself to him as the object of his desire, without his knowing,
As the fire of Moses, which he saw through the eye of his need,
And who is the Divinity which he did not recognize.
If thou understandeth my words
thou knowest that thou hast need of the apparent form:
If Moses had searched for something other than the fire
He would have seen Him in that, and not inversely."
Ibn cArabi, Fusus al-Hikam
He was the Pearl of the Crown of the Knowledgeable Saints. He was the Treasure of Those who Came Before and of Those who Came After. In him were combined all their favors and generosity. He was the Sinai of Divine Manifestation, the Furthermost Lote Tree of the Unique Knowledge, and the Fountain of the Hidden Prophetic Knowledge. He was the Genius of Scholars and he was the Sultan of the Earth, which smiled when he was born and was honored by his existence. He was the perfect Perfected Guide. He was the Caller to Allah's presence, the One Qutb and the Unique Heavenly Imam. He was the Reviver of the Second Millennium, Sayyidina wa Mawlana (our Leader and Master) ash-Shaikh Ahmad al-Faruqi as-Sirhindi, ibn ash-Shaikh cAbdul Ahad son of Zainu-l-cAbidin son of cAbdulhayy, son of Muhammad son of Habibullah, son of Raficuddin, son of Nur, son of Sulayman, son of Yusuf, son of cAbdullah, son of Ishaq, son of cAbdullah, son of Shucayb, son of Aad, son of Yusuf, son of Shihabuddin, known as Farq Shah al-Qabidi, son of Nairuddin, son of Mahmud, son of Sulayman, son of Mascud, son of cAbdullah al-Waci al-Asghari, son of cAbdullah al-Waci al-Akbar, son of Abdu-l-Fattah, son of Ishaq, son of Ibrahim, son of Nair, son of Sayyidina cAbdullah (r), the son of Amir al-Mu'minin, the khalif of the Prophet , Sayyidina cUmar al-Faruq (r).
He was born on the day of 'Ashura, the 10th of Muharram in the year 971 H., in the village of Sihar Nidbasin. In some translations it is called Sirhind in the city of Lahore, in India. He received his knowledge and education through his father and through many shaikhs in his time. He made progress in three tariqats: Suhrawardiyya, Qadiriyya, and Chistiyya. He was given permission to train followers in all three tariqats at the age of 17 years. He was busy in spreading the teachings of these tariqats and in guiding his followers, yet he felt that something was missing in himself and he was continuously searching for it. He felt an interest in the Naqshbandi Sufi Order, because he could see by means of the secrets of the other three tariqats that it was the best and highest. His spiritual progress eventually brought him to the presence of the Ghawth and Qutb of his time, ash-Shaikh Muhammad al-Baqi, who had been sent from Samarqand to India by the order of his shaikh, Muhammad al-Amkanaki. He took the Naqshbandi Order from the shaikh and stayed with him for two months and some days, until Sayyidina Muhammad al-Baqi opened to his heart the secret of this tariqat and gave him authorization to train his murids in the Order. He said about him, "He is the highest Qutb in this time."
The Prophet predicted his advent in one of his hadith when he said, "There will be among my nation a man called Silah. By his intercession many people will be saved." It was mentioned in the collection of Suyuti, Jamc ul-Jawamic. What confirmed the truth of this hadith is what Imam Rabbani wrote about himself: "God has made me the Silah between the two Oceans." Silah means "connection." So he meant that God had made him a connection between the two oceans -- the two knowledges, external and internal. Shaikh Mir Husamuddin said, "I saw the Prophet in one of my dreams standing on the minbar (pulpit) and praising Shaikh Ahmad as-Sirhindi. The Prophet was saying, 'I am proud and happy with his presence among my Nation. God has made him a reviver of the religion.'"
Many saints predicted his advent. One of them was Shaikh Ahmad al-Jami (q). He said, "After me will appear seventeen men of the People of God, all of whom are named Ahmad and the last one among them will be at the head of the millennium. He is going to be the highest of them and he is going to receive the state of Unveiling. He is going to revive this religion."
Another to predict his advent was Mawlana Khwaja al-Amkanaki (q). He said to his khalif, "A man from India is going to appear. He will be the Imam of his century. He will be trained by you, so hurry to meet him, because the people of God are awaiting his arrival." Muhammad al-Baqi (q) said, "That is why I moved from Bukhara to India." When they met he told him, "You are the one whose appearance the shaikh Muhammad Khwaja al-Amkanaki predicted. When I saw you I knew you were the Qutb of your time. When I entered the region of Sirhind in India, I found a lamp which was so big and so bright that its light reached up to the heavens. Everyone took from that lamp's light. You are that lamp."
It is said that the shaikh of his father, Shaikh cAbdul Ahad, who was a shaikh of the Qadiri Order, had been given a jubba (cloak) from his shaikh which had been passed down from the Ghawth al-Azam, Sayyidina cAbdul Qadir al-Jilani (q). Sayyidina cAbdul Qadir had said about it to his successors, "Keep it for that one who is going to appear at the end of the first millennium. His name is Ahmad. He is going to revive this religion. I have dressed him with all my secrets. He combines in himself both the internal and external knowledge."
The Seeking of the Kings and the Kings of Seeking
Sayyidina Ahmad al-Faruqi said,
"Let it be known to you that the Heavenly Guardians attracted me because They wanted me to be attracted, and They facilitated for me the passage through time and space (at-tayy) in the different states of the seeker. I found that God is the Essence of all matter, as it had been said by the People of Sufism. Then I found God in all matter without incarnation (hulul). Then I found God together with all matter. Then I saw Him ahead of everything and then I saw Him following everything. Finally I reached a state where I saw Him and I saw nothing else. This is what is meant by the term, Witnessing the Oneness, which is also the state of Annihilation (fana'). That is the first step in Sainthood, and the highest state in the Beginning of the Way. This vision appears first on the horizons, then secondly in the Self. Then I have been lifted to the station of Subsistence (baqa') which is the second step in Sainthood.
"This is a station which many saints did not speak about because they did not reach it. All of them speak about the station of Annihilation, but following that state is Subsistence. In that state I found all creation another time, but I found that the essence of all these creations is Allah, and Allah's Essence is the Essence of Myself. Then I found Allah in everything, but in reality in myself. I was raised to a higher state, to find Allah with everything, but in reality He was with myself. Then I was lifted to see Him preceding everything, but in reality He was preceding myself. Then I was lifted to a state where He was following everything, but in reality He was following myself. Then I saw Him in everything, but in reality He was in myself. Then I saw everything and I didn't see God. And this is the end of the Stations by which They had brought me back to the beginning. In sum, they lifted me to the Station of Annihilation, then to the station of Existence, then they brought me back to be with people, in the Station of the common people. This is the highest state in guiding people to the Presence of God. It is the perfect state of guidance, because it matches the understanding of human beings."
He said, "I accompanied today one who has reached the End of Ends, the Qutub of all Creatures, the Perfect Man, Shaikh Muhammad al-Baqi. Through him I received incredible blessings, and by his blessing I was granted a power of attraction that allowed me to reach every human being that Allah had created. I was honored to attain a station that combines the state of the Ending with the state of the Beginning. I achieved all the states of Seeking and I reached the Ending, which is the meaning of 'Reaching the name of ar-Rabb' (the Sustainer), by the support of the Lion of God, Asadullah, cAli ibin Abi Talib, May God ennoble his face. I was raised up to the state of the Throne, which is the Reality of the Truth of Muhammad , by the support (madad) of Shaikh Shah Baha'uddin Naqshband. Then I was lifted even higher, to the state of Beauty, which is the state of the Truth of the Muhammadan Qutbs, by the support of the Prophetic Holy Spirit.
"I was supported by Shaikh Ala`addin al-Attar, from whom I received the states of the Greatest Spiritual Poles (al-qutubiyyati-l-cuzma) from the Presence of Muhammad . Then Allah's Heavenly Care attracted me and I ascended to a State that is beyond that of the Qutubs, the Special Original State. Here the support of al-Ghawth al-Aczam, Abdul Qadir Jilani (q) pushed me up to the State of the Origin of Origins. Then I was ordered to come back down, and as I was descending I passed by all 39 tariqats other than the Naqshbandiyya and the Qadiriyya. I looked at the states of their shaikhs and they greeted me and saluted me and they threw on me all their treasures and all their private knowledge, which unveiled to me realities which had never been unveiled to any person in my time.
"Then on my descent I met Khidr , and he adorned me with the Heavenly Knowledge (cilmu-l-ladunni) before I reached the state of the Qutubs."
"Abu Dawud said in an authentic hadith that the Prophet said, 'Allah will send at the beginning of every century someone by whom the religion will be revived,' but there is a difference between the Reviver of the Century and the Reviver of the Millennium. It is like the difference between one hundred and one thousand."
"In a vision, the Prophet gave me good tidings: 'You are going to be a spiritual inheritor and Allah is going to give you the authority to intercede on behalf of hundreds of thousands on the Day of Judgment.' He bestowed on me with his holy hand the authority to guide people, and he said to me, 'Never before have I given that authority to guide people.'"
"The knowledge that is emerging from me is coming from the state of Sainthood, but I am receiving it from the Light of the Prophet Muhammad . Saints are unable to bring forth such knowledge, because it is beyond the knowledge of saints. It is the Knowledge of the Essence of this Religion and the Essence of the Knowledge of Allah's Essence and Attributes. No one before has spoken about it and Allah has granted me to be the one to revive the religion in its second millennium."
"Allah unveiled to me the Secrets of the Unique Oneness and He poured into my heart all kinds of Spiritual Knowledge and its refinement. He unveiled to me the Secrets of the ayats of Qur'an so that I found beneath every letter of the Qur'an an ocean of knowledge all pointing to the High Essence of Allah Almighty and Exalted. If I were to reveal one word of the meaning of it they would cut off my head, as they did to Hallaj and to Ibn 'Arabi. This is the meaning of the hadith of the Prophet , in Bukhari, narrated by Abu Huraira (r), "The Prophet poured into my heart two kinds of knowledge, one of which I have revealed and another which if I were to reveal they would cut my throat."
"Allah, Almighty and Exalted, has shown me all the names of those who are entering our Tariqat, from the day of Sayyidina Abu Bakr (r) to the Day of Judgment, both men and women, and all of them are going to enter Paradise, with the intercession of the shaikhs of the Tariqat."
"Al-Mahdi will be one of the followers of this Tariqat."
"One day I was in association with my followers doing dhikr and it came to my heart that I had done something wrong. Then Allah opened to my eyes, 'I have forgiven anyone who sits with you and anyone asking intercession by means of you.'"
"Allah has created me from the residue of His Prophet ."
"The Kacba was always coming and making tawaf (circumambulation) around me."
"Allah Almighty and Exalted said to me, 'Anyone for whom you pray janaza (funeral prayer) will be forgiven, and if anyone mixes earth from your grave with the earth of their grave, they will be forgiven.'"
"Allah said, 'I have given you special gifts and perfections which no one will receive other than you until the time of the Mahdi.'"
"Allah gave me an incredible power of guidance. Even if I direct my guidance to a dead tree, it will become green."
One great shaikh wrote to him asking, "The states that you reached and you are speaking about, did the Sahaba receive them, and if they did, did they receive them at one time or did they receive them at separate times?" He answered, "I cannot give you an answer unless you come into my presence." When the shaikh came, he immediately unveiled to him his spiritual reality and cleaned the darkness of his heart until the shaikh fell prostrate at his feet and said, "I believe, I believe! I see now that these states were all revealed to the Sahaba simply by looking at the Messenger ."
One time in the month of fasting, Ramadan, he was invited by ten of his murids to break fast with them. He accepted the invitation of each of them. When it came time to break the fast, he was present at each of their houses, breaking the fast, and they saw him in each of their houses at the same time.
One time he looked at the sky and it was raining. He said, "O rain stop until such and such hour." It stopped until the exact time he had said, after which it started raining again.
One time the King ordered that a man be executed. That man came to Shaikh Amad and said, "Please write a stay of execution for me." He wrote to the Sultan, "Don't execute this man." The Sultan was afraid of Sayyidina Ahmad al-Faruqi and pardoned the man.
One time a murid made intention to visit Shaikh Ahmad al-Faruqi (q). On his way he was invited to be the guest of a man who disliked the shaikh. The murid, however, didn't know this. After dinner, the host began reviling the shaikh. As he went to sleep that night, in his heart he was saying, "O Allah, I came to visit the shaikh, not to hear someone curse the shaikh. Forgive me." Then he slept and when he awoke he found that the man had died. He went quickly to the shaikh and began to tell him the story. Sayyidina Ahmad al-Faruqi raised his hand and said, "Stop! There is no need to tell me what happened. I am the one who caused it."
"I was authorized to give Tariqat in three tariqats: Naqshbandi, Suhrawardi and Chistiyya."
He was so famous that the scholars of external knowledge in his time became jealous of him. They went to the king and told him, "He is saying things that are not accepted in the religion." They pushed the King until he put him in jail. He stayed in jail for three years. His son, Shaikh Sayyid, said, "He was under very intense security in jail. Guards surrounded his room on every side. Yet every Friday he would be seen in the big mosque. No matter how much security he was under, he would disappear from prison and appear in the mosque." From this they knew they could not put him behind bars and therefore they released him.
He wrote many books, one of the most famous of which is the Maktubat.
In it he said,
"It must be known that Allah has placed us under His Obligations and His Prohibitions. Allah said, 'Whatever the Prophet gave you, take it, and whatever he prohibited you, leave it.' [59:7] If we are going to be sincere in this, we have to attain to Annihilation and the love of the Essence. Without these we cannot reach this degree of obedience. Thus we are under another obligation, which is to seek the Way of Sufism, because this Way will lead us to the state of Annihilation and the love of the Essence. Each Order differs from the other in its states of perfection; so too does each Order keep the Sunnah of the Prophet and have its own definition of what that entails. Every order has its own way of keeping the Sunnah of the Prophet . Our Order, through its shaikhs, requires us to keep all the commands of the Prophet and to leave all the things he prohibited. Our shaikhs don't follow the easy ways (rukhas) but insist on keeping the difficult ways. In all their seeking they keep in mind the verse of Qur'an, 'Men whom neither business nor trade will divert from the Remembrance of Allah' [24:37].
"In the journey leading to the unveiling of the Divine Realities, the seeker moves through various stages of knowledge of and proximity to His Lord:
- "Moving to Allah is a vertical movement from the lower stations to the higher stations; until the movement surpasses time and space and all the states dissolve into what is called the Necessary Knowledge (cilm ul-wajib) of Allah. This is also called Annihilation (fana').
- "Moving in Allah is the stage in which the seeker moves from the station of Names and Attributes to a state which neither word nor sign can describe. This is the State of Existence in Allah called Baqa.
- "Moving from Allah is the stage in which the seeker returns from the heavenly world to the world of cause and effect, descending from the highest station of knowledge to the lowest. Here he forgets Allah by Allah, and he knows Allah with Allah, and he returns from Allah to Allah. This is called the State of the Farthest and the Nearest.
- "Moving in things is a movement within creation. This involves knowing intimately all elements and states in this world after having vanished in Annihilation. Here the seeker can achieve the State of Guidance, which is the state of the prophets and the people following the footsteps of the Prophet . It brings the Divine Knowledge into the world of creation in order to establish Guidance.
"The entire process is like threading a needle. The thread seeks the eye of the needle, passes through and then proceeds down to where it began. There the two ends meet, form a knot and secure the entire thread. They form a whole, thread, eye and needle, and any material they catch is sewn into the fabric of the unity."
"It must be known to everyone that the Naqshbandi shaikhs chose to guide their murids first through the movement from Allah, travelling from the higher states to the lower. For this reason they maintain the common veils over the spiritual vision of the murid, removing the veil of ordinary consciousness only at the final step. All other tariqats begin with the movement to Allah, moving from the lowest states to the highest, and removing the common veils first."
"It is mentioned in the Hadith of the Prophet , 'Scholars are the inheritors of the prophets.' The knowledge of prophets is of two kinds: knowledge of laws and knowledge of secrets. The scholar cannot be called an inheritor if he does not inherit both knowledges. If he takes only one knowledge he is incomplete. Thus the real inheritors are the ones who take the knowledge of the laws and the knowledge of the secrets, and only the saints have truly received and protected this inheritance."
He left behind him many more books. He died on the 17th of Safar 1034 H. at the age of 63. He was buried in the village of Sirhind. He was a shaikh in the four tariqats: Naqshbandi, Qadiri, Chisti and Suhrawardi. He preferred the Naqshbandi, because he said, "It is the Mother of all tariqats."
He passed the secret of the Tariqat to Shaikh Muhammad al-Macsum (q).
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Aerial spherical panoramas used to be a “black art”. Only a select few individuals had figured out how to successfully shoot a series of images from an RC helicopter that captured the entire environment below. Those few individuals kept their secrets only revealing little bits here and there.
Anyone interested in getting into shooting aerial spherical panoramas had to learn the “hard way”….. that was then. Now you have PhotoShip One!
Watch this tutorial on the basic elements required for acquiring images for a spherical aerial panorama.
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Time Management for Designers
We designers spend most of our time on the computer and have lots of distractions to keep up with. Interesting stuff is only a click away. It’s even harder for those of us who work at home. At any time, the kids come bounding in with stories to tell, things to show and sometimes when my toddler sees me holding my graphic pen instead of the mouse, she grabs the latter and clicks on whatever big X she sees on the upper right.
So how do we get things done? I’ve got a few time management tips to share that have worked for me.
Plan the day before
I believe in goal-setting, planning years in advance then moving backwards yearly, quarterly, monthly, weekly then finally to daily. This exercise instantly distinguishes the important from the urgent. The important tasks are those that will lead to achieving goals. The urgent will be client work. We tend to only do the urgent ones and neglect the rest. Plan the day to include both the important and the urgent. It’s best to plan at least a day before so you can jump right into getting things done.
Break up your day into chunks of time
Schedule and put a reasonable time limit for each task. Make time for client work, personal projects, marketing, email, social networking, reading, breaks, etc. Commit to focusing on one activity within the scheduled time. You’ll actually get more things done by focusing on each than with multi-tasking.
Do the most difficult/most frustrating/most hated tasks and projects FIRST
…and do it right. Yes it isn’t as much fun as that other project but you’ll have to do it eventually anyway so best do it first and get it out of the way. You’ll be more creative and more productive without that nagging voice telling you to do that other project already. And for all your work, do it right and give it your best on the first draft. This will minimize the number of revisions later on and save up some time so you can spend them on other things.
Assess your day and plan the next
Evaluate how you did—how much you accomplished, what worked, what didn’t, which activities were a waste of time—then plan your activities for tomorrow.
What time management tips can you add?
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If we consider a hike through the woods as a metaphor for the Christian walk, it is easy to understand our need to stay on the narrow way. To leave that path is to risk danger, disorientation, and destruction. That makes sense. We get it.
What is surprising is that we can sometimes feel lost and alone, even when we’ve been careful to stick to the path and not wander off. Sometimes life’s circumstances deal heavy blows, and we cannot begin to imagine God’s purpose in allowing such things. We feel abandoned.
I remember taking my children on an outing to the park many years ago. We packed a picnic and ate in the cool shade of the woods surrounding the playground. After we had finished our lunch, I gave the kids permission to play among the trees, provided they stay where I could see them. They enjoyed a rousing game of tag with friends while moms visited nearby.
After a while, I noticed my third-born, who was only four or five at the time, standing next to a tree with his hands over his face. At first I assumed the children had moved on to hide-n-seek and that David was “it,” but as I watched, it became apparent my little one wasn’t counting — he was crying. Although my eyes had been on him the entire time, he’d lost sight of me and had become frightened. I ran to comfort and reassure him that just because he couldn’t see me didn’t mean I had quit watching him.
I like to reflect on that distant afternoon as I travel along life’s path, especially when the way seems dark or threatening. We may not always know what lies around the next bend, we may not fully perceive God’s abiding presence, we may not understand the route He asks us to follow, but we can rest assured that He loves us, that He guides our steps, and that His eyes are upon us the entire way.
“The steps of a good man are ordered by the Lord, and He delights in his way. Though he falls, he will not be cast down, for the Lord upholds him with His hand.” (Psalm 37:23-24)
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CHICAGO – The Illinois Academy of Family Physicians (IAFP) today endorsed Governor Rod R. Blagojevich’s landmark All Kids proposal that would make Illinois the only state in the nation to provide affordable, comprehensive health insurance for every child in the state. The Illinois Academy of Family Physicians (IAFP) is a professional medical society that represents 2,100 practicing family physicians throughout Illinois. IAFP joins more than 400 organizations representing medical facilities, doctors, nurses, educators, labor, child advocates and clergy that have endorsed the Governor’s plan since he introduced it two weeks ago.
“Many family physicians are part of the safety net which provides care to those who need it, regardless of their ability to pay,” said Fredric D. Leary, M.D., President of the IAFP in a statement. “The Governor’s All Kids plan will provide stability and peace of mind for parents so their children can get the care they need and deserve. It will also help physicians meet the needs of those children.”
“Family physicians know first hand how important health care is for children,” said Gov. Blagojevich. “I am so pleased that the Illinois Academy of Family Physicians will be joining with us in the effort to make sure each and every child in Illinois has access to the health care they need and deserve.”
In Illinois, 253,000 children are without health insurance. More than half of Illinois’ uninsured children come from working and middle class families who earn too much to qualify for programs like KidCare, but not enough to afford private health insurance. The Governor’s program would make comprehensive health insurance available to children, with parents paying monthly premiums and co-payments for doctor’s visits and prescription drugs at affordable rates.
Senate President Emil Jones and House Speaker Michael J. Madigan are the lead sponsors of legislation creating the All Kids health insurance program and have vowed to push for its passage during the upcoming fall veto session so the program can be up and running by July 1, 2006. The organizations vowed to help the Governor build support to pass his All Kids plan and to help enroll children in the plan, should it pass.
Based on adjusted 2003 Census data, approximately 253,000 children in Illinois do not have health insurance. Twelve percent of children in Cook County, the state’s most populated county, are uninsured. In Pulaski County at the southern tip of Illinois, nearly 15% of children lack health coverage. In St. Clair County, 9.3% of children do not have health insurance. In Sangamon County, home to Illinois’ capitol, 8.6% of kids are not insured. Even in suburban DuPage County, one of the twenty-five wealthiest counties in the United States, 7.2% of children have no health insurance.
The Governor’s All Kids program would offer children access to comprehensive health care, including doctor’s visits, hospital stays, prescription drugs, vision care, dental care and medical devices like eye glasses and asthma inhalers.
Research shows that uninsured children suffer because they do not have access to adequate medical care. For example:
· The Kaiser Family Foundation found that uninsured children are 70% less likely than children with insurance to receive medical care for conditions like ear infections, and 30% less likely to receive medical attention when they are injured.
· A National Health Interview Survey found that 59% of uninsured children did not see a doctor for a check-up in the past year and 38% of children have no regular place to go for medical care. These factors put uninsured children at higher risk for hospitalization or missed diagnoses of serious conditions.
Participants in the new program will pay monthly premiums and co-payments for doctors visits and prescriptions, but unlike private insurance that is too expensive for so many families, the rates for All Kids coverage will be based on a family’s income. The state is able to offer All Kids insurance coverage at much lower than market rates for middle-income families by leveraging the significant negotiating and buying power it already has through Medicaid.
For example, a family with two children that earns between $40,000 and $59,999 a year will pay a $40 monthly premium per child, and a $10 co-pay per physician visit. A family with two children earning between $60,000 and $79,999 will pay a $70 monthly premium per child, and a $15 co-pay per physician visit. However, there will be no co-pays for preventative care visits, such as annual immunizations and regular check ups and screenings for vision, hearing, appropriate development or preventative dental. These premiums for middle-income families are significantly more affordable than typical private insurance premiums of $100 to $200 a month, or $2,400 per child annually.
The state will cover the difference between what parents contribute in monthly premiums and the actual cost of providing health care for each child, expected to be $45 million in the first year, with savings generated by implementing a primary care case management model (PCCM) for participants in the state’s FamilyCare and All Kids health care programs. Participants will choose a single primary physician who will manage their care by ensuring they get immunizations and other preventative health care services and avoid unnecessary emergency room visits and hospitalizations. Patients with chronic conditions like asthma or diabetes will have a single care manager to make sure they are getting the treatments and ongoing care they need to avoid acute care. Primary care physicians will make referrals to specialists for additional care or tests as needed. By ensuring patients get adequate preventative care on the front end, fewer people will need expensive specialized care or emergency care for critical conditions.
Twenty-nine other states, including North Carolina, New York, Texas, Pennsylvania and Louisiana, have realized significant savings by using this model for their Medicaid programs. Based on independent analyses, the Department of Healthcare and Family Services estimates the state will save more than $56 million in the first year by implementing the PCCM model in all state health programs but those that serve seniors and the blind.
The Illinois Academy of Family Physicians full statement of support follows:
Statement in support of Gov. Rod Blagojevich’s All Kids proposal.
Attribute to Illinois Academy of Family Physicians president Fredric D. Leary, M.D.
“The Illinois Academy of Family Physicians (IAFP), representing over 2,100 practicing family physicians throughout Illinois, is pleased that the Blagojevich administration has proposed a system to provide all Illinois children with health care insurance.
Many family physicians are part of the safety net which provides care to those who need it, regardless of their ability to pay. The Governor’s All Kids plan will provide stability and peace of mind for parents so their children can get the care they need and deserve. It will also help physicians meet the needs of those children.
The American Academy of Family Physicians (AAFP) has a proposal for ensuring health care coverage for all U.S. residents (http://www.aafp.org/x13723.xml
). The principles of the All Kids program meet our goals for providing affordable basic services for children.
We look forward to collaborating with the Governor, the Department of Healthcare and Family Services, and the General Assembly to work out the details of the All Kids program.
Our hope is that the final legislation and rule-making will ensure that all children have a family physician or pediatrician as the primary care provider. The Illinois Academy of Family Physicians also will work with all the interested parties to ensure that this new system meets the needs of the physicians who will be entrusted with the care of these precious patients.
As an organization, IAFP remains true to our principles of high-quality comprehensive care for our patients. In that mission, one of our prime tenets has always been access to care – and All Kids offers improved access for children in Illinois.”
More information about All Kids is available online at www.allkidscovered.com.
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When buying a metal detector for the first time do not depend on information from others. Even if he or she is a friend, he or she may not provide full information. Most of the users are also identified t a particular brand or model. This makes it hard for them to know of any new model or brand in the market. Due to technological advancements new gadgets have come to the market. With such new detectors no one may be familiar with them. It is therefore important to carry out the intensive research for a high quality metal detector.
Are you in need of often using your detector in a beach or lake? Or do you have ample time to dedicate to make a more intense search for a metal detector to use for your hobby? It is true that most of the detectors in the market are all well performing. It is a true fact that the more you spend the more features you receive. This in turn helps in identifying target items more easily and smoothly.
Locations such as coastal areas, places with many old relics and gold prospecting areas are ideal for a treasure hunter. If you are to do some special expeditions, then you need to take time choosing a suitable detector. Some advanced detectors have multiple operational modes and can be used in different detecting exercises.
Many manufacturers will just promise great performance however each type of brand or detector model has different features and aspects. Some detectors may be heavier while others may require a lot of adjusting. For travelling purposes, one need to consider the ease with which the detector folds. This allows quick and safe packing enhancing travelling.
The number of people using the detector is a crucial factor to consider. For a family detector you need to consider the size of the pole as well as its weight. Some detectors are adjustable allowing the arm to be raised or lowered to fit the user appropriately. Moreover, the box with board and control tools can be removed off the pole and mounted in a small pouch. You will be amazed by the urge to always wanting to do this.
The truth is that you need to pay more for the many features of this advanced detector. The best way to make a purchase is by identifying how much you are willing to spend. You then compare this purchase against previous ones made or even other detector prices. If you like high rated products then detectors of that class are available too. Maybe you can begin the hobby without starting with an advanced metal detector.
Critically examine spending $175.00 to $275.00 or 300.00$ to 500.00$ for a nice metal detector. It is always good to purchase a less superior detector and learn to use and control it perfectly. Full purchase will entail some accessory items such as trowels, scoops headphones and coil covers. Don’t waste time since you may miss that special detector by a pinch of time.
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- About Us
- Public Information
- Grantee Login
For more information contact:
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
OKLAHOMA SMOKERS WHO QUIT FOR ONE DAY CAN QUIT FOR LIFE
OKLAHOMA CITY (November 15, 2010) - On Nov. 18, thousands of Oklahoma tobacco users will find themselves right where Cindy Lea and Shane Sellers were in 2008 – wanting to quit smoking and looking for the right time to do it. Using the Great American Smokeout as their quit date, the Tahlequah, Okla., couple gave up their cigarettes for an hour, then a day, and now, they have been smoke-free for two years.
“At $5-a-day between us, we were just tired of the expense,” said Cindy Lea. “And, the health risks with smoking are really sobering. When you see visuals of the lungs of people who’ve spent a lifetime smoking, it’s just awful to think that may be happening to you or someone you love. Plus, Shane’s kids always wanted us to quit and when we did, they were super proud of us. Their support really made it all worth doing.”
November 18 marks the 35th Anniversary of the American Cancer Society’s Great American Smokeout. Oklahomans who are ready to quit tobacco for a day or for life are encouraged to make a plan and get support. Support can be a spouse, friends, your physician or professional quit coaches from the Oklahoma Tobacco Helpline at 1-800-QUIT-NOW (1-800-784-8669). Free coaching, patches or gum are available.
For Cindy Lea and Shane, they used each other as support. They announced their intention to quit to a public audience through their jobs as radio personalities in Tahlequah at Lakes Country 102.1.
“We made a public announcement that we were going to quit and we set our date for the Great American Smokeout,” said Cindy Lea. “We prepared in advance and made sure we were in a good place both mentally and physically, since that is often a key hurdle that prevents you from quitting.”
Almost immediately after quitting, smokers start to experience the benefits of being tobacco free. According to the American Cancer Society, within 20 minutes of quitting, blood pressure decreases and pulse rate drops. Within a day, oxygen level in blood returns to normal and the chance of a heart attack decreases significantly. Other important health benefits follow and within a year of quitting, the risk of coronary heart disease is lowered to half of that of a smoker.
“I won’t lie. That first month was a bit of a rollercoaster, but we did whatever it took to keep our minds off smoking,” said Cindy Lea. “We took walks to relieve our stress levels and I even took a straw and cut it in half and “smoked” it if I really needed to do something with my hands.”
When asked about the economic benefits of quitting smoking, Cindy Lea and Shane were very happy with the results.
ABOUT THE GREAT AMERICAN SMOKEOUT
The Helpline is funded by TSET (Oklahoma Tobacco Settlement Endowment Trust), the Oklahoma State Department of Health and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Last year, the Helpline served more than 37,000 Oklahomans.
# # #
TSET, a constitutional endowment trust committed to improving the health of the Oklahomans, was created by an overwhelming majority vote of the people in 2000. The foresight of Oklahoma voters is beginning to make a substantial impact through community grants, in combination with the other research and programs funded by TSET, including the Oklahoma Tobacco Helpline (1-800-QUIT-NOW). Funding from TSET will be available to create better lives through better health for generations to come. To learn more go to: www.tset.ok.gov.
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The bill from China has arrived, how much do you owe?
In the past four years you borrowed $20k from China.
The Communist government of China is now entitled to anywhere between one to two years of your full household income - and they aim to collect. According to statistics released by the US Treasury Department and the Census Bureau, the US now owes foreign governments about $47,495 per household.
It's time to start paying, China wants its money.
China is the largest foreign holder of US debt.
Imagine hearing that you must work for the Chinese government for the next year or more, simply to pay your portion of the national debt.
Worst of all, some of this money is owed to nations whose relationship with the US is decidedly lukewarm.
For some shocking figures, one merely has to compare 2009 to present. In the four years Obama has been in office, household indebtedness to foreign states increased from $27,000 per household to $47,000.
That means your family just borrowed $20,000 from other countries without you realizing it. The signature on the loan is Obama's but the bill is yours.
Of course, purveyors of debt suggest that not all debt is bad and that it's okay because our children will pay this easily, thanks to their rising productivity level, but this apologetic is fatally flawed. US productivity is by no means increasing enough to keep pace with our growing, already debilitating debt.
What did we get for this money? Improved infrastructure? Better education? A squadron of new stealth bombers? No, not even that. In fact, any government official would be hard pressed to point out just exactly what we did with all that money.
Still, it has to be paid back, these are loans, not gifts. The popular solution is to merely pass the bill to the next generation, but sticking our children with the bill merely worsens what is already an unbearable situation.
Of course, the bad news doesn't end with this, there's one more thing to consider. About half of all US households do not pay income taxes. They may pay lesser sales taxes and so on, but no payroll or income taxes whatsoever. And while some of these households no longer pay because of retirement or military service, or other very legitimate reasons, the fact remains that only about half of all Americans are paying the bill.
So while you're paying installments in the interest to China, be advised - your share of the bill just doubled because your neighbor's not paying a dime.
The good news: Foxconn is hiring.
© 2012, Distributed by NEWS CONSORTIUM.
- - -
Pope Benedict XVI's Prayer Intentions for January 2013
General Intention: The Faith of Christians. That in this Year of Faith Christians may deepen their knowledge of the mystery of Christ and witness joyfully to the gift of faith in him.
Missionary Intention: Middle Eastern Christians. That the Christian communities of the Middle East, often discriminated against, may receive from the Holy Spirit the strength of fidelity and perseverance.
Keywords: China, debt, foreign, owe, deficit, loans
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I'm not quite sure how much compressor run time should be, but If its the same as a fridge, ambient temp does play a huge roll. I don't know how accurate this is, I was told this by another tech, not a book, or a school but.
A good rule of thumb is:
The ambient temp around the machine is 90 degrees
That machine will run 90% of the time.
The ambient temp around the machine is 82 degrees
It will run 82% of the time.
Now this is a good rule of thumb for a Fridge like I said. I don't think it will apply to a Air conditioner.
I have way less experience in Air Conditioning.
I bet one of our other techs will be able to help you out alittle better then me.
Now if it was a Maytag washer. I'd be all over that for ya!
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The Wall Street Journal's James Taranto illogically claimed that recent comments from a National Urban League activist prove that voter ID laws do not suppress minority votes. Despite Taranto's defense of his flawed theory, research clearly indicates that voter ID laws target minority voters.
In his Wall Street Journal column, Taranto highlighted comments by Chanelle Hardy, a vice president at the National Urban League. According to Talking Points Memo, Hardy stated that Republican efforts to pass voter ID laws may have backfired by increasing enthusiasm among African American voters and increasing turnout. Taranto argued that Hardy's comments contradict claims from voter ID opponents that the laws restrict the rights of eligible minority voters.
Taranto's argument is absurd: an increase in voter enthusiasm in a specific group does not prove that other members of that group did not have their voting rights restricted. This claim is similar to one made in 2011 by Taranto's fellow voter ID proponent Hans von Spakowsky who argued at the time that high turnout in Georgia in 2008, following the passage of voter ID laws, proved that the legislation had no effect on voting rights. Justin Levitt, a professor at Loyola Law School, pointed out that von Spakowsky's logic was also flawed:
"There's a basic -- and I mean basic -- misconception here," Levitt said. "It's called the correlation-causation fallacy, and anybody who's had statistics for a week can talk to you about it."
"Mr. von Spakovsky and I agree on one thing, that the turnout studies don't show great impact, but that's because they can't," Levitt said. "You can't draw any real conclusions about that."
"I'll give you an example. Mr. von Spakovsky supports voter ID restrictions. I oppose them. Mr. von Spakovsky has no facial hair. I have facial hair. But certainly opposition to voter ID doesn't cause facial hair," he said.
Taranto also ignored research that has consistently shown that voter ID laws disproportionately target minority voters. A September 12 Associated Press article highlighted a study by the University of Chicago's Cathy Cohen and Washington University's Jon Rogowski who concluded that as a result of the voter ID laws passed and being enforced at the time, "as many as 700,000 minority voters under 30 may be unable to cast a ballot in November."
On December 23, 2011, the Department of Justice's Civil Rights Division found that minority voters in South Carolina were "nearly 20% more likely to lack DMV- issued ID than white registered voters" and that "[n]on-white voters were therefore disproportionately represented, to a significant degree, in the group of registered voters who, under the proposed law, would be rendered ineligible to go to the polls and participate in the election."
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By Howard Meyerson
GRAND RAPIDS, MI – Anglers will again be able to keep five salmon per day in 2013. Salmon fishing was that good this year. Many reported excellent Chinook salmon fishing throughout the summer on Lake Michigan.
But state officials remain concerned about a dwindling lake forage base. They suggest this year’s success may hint of trouble to come.
The five salmon limit will stay in place, they say, to reduce pressure on the alewife population which has been found to be at low-ebb.
“Typically we see catch rates go up when Chinooks are in prey search mode. They are more apt to grab a spoon than when there is a lot of bait out in the lake,” said Jay Wesley, the Michigan Department of Natural Resources southwest Michigan fisheries supervisor. “It indicates the fish are on the feed more, or that there are a lot of fish out there when there is not enough bait to support them.”
Michigan raised the salmon limit to five per day limit in 2010 after limiting anglers to three for many years following the late 1980’s Lake Michigan Chinook salmon crash due to bacterial kidney disease.
Whether the limit is five or three on any given year is based on two criterion. It stays at five if more than 13 percent of charter anglers catch three salmon per trip; also if the catch rate is .165 salmon per hour or better. If they catch less, the daily limit goes to three the following year.
“The bag limits got close to the benchmarks over the last three years,” Wesley said. “The catch effort per hour averaged .25 fish for 2009, 2010 and 2011. This year it jumped to .35 fish per hour and the catch per day average that was around 15 percent over those years jumped to 27 percent.
“It was a fantastic year and the best in the last 15 to 20 years, but is it sustainable? Probably not.”
The decision to maintain the 5 salmon limit was announced at the Lake Michigan Citizens Advisory Committee October meeting in Grand Haven. It got little fanfare, according to Wesley, but some charter anglers are concerned.
Ed Stowe, a 32 year veteran fishing charter captain from Ludington said he prefers a three fish limit. That’s plenty, he said, for a majority of his customers who return the next season and still have year-old salmon in the freezer.
But “the waste issue” as he puts it, is only part of his concern. Stowe disagrees with the DNR about the alewife situation.
“We have them all year-long. I don’t know about the southern part of the lake,” said Stowe, owner of Stowaway Charters. “We just had one of the best years we’ve had – limit catches and all of them were full of alewives that were six and seven inches long.
“In Ludington, Pentwater, Manistee and Frankfort, we have seen more bait fish of various sizes, not just the little one and two inchers.”
Captain Phil Retherford, owner of Catch-A-Bunch Charters in Grand Haven, agrees that salmon fishing was good in 2012. But he is indifferent about the daily limit.
“It doesn’t matter,” Retherford said. “Overall we had a good year and a lot of walk-on customers. A small percentage of them care (about the limit). They come on the boat and say: ‘How many can we catch?’ When they find out five, they say ‘Oh wow.’”
Other social factors that pushed the daily salmon limit from three to five in 2009, when the proposed change was discussed, are less of a concern these days, according Dennis Eade, executive director for the Michigan Steelhead and Salmon Fishermen’s Association, better known as the Michigan Steelheaders.
Gas prices were higher then. His membership is largely recreational anglers. They were concerned about the cost to travel from the east side of the state to Lake Michigan. They wanted to keep as many salmon as possible when they made the occasional trip.
“That’s not being heard as often as it was in 2009,” Eade said. “It’s not as big an issue.
“If you want to fish kings you can go north on Lake Huron. It’s not unusual to catch two or three different kinds of fish there. The walleye and steelhead fishery has come back so well they (the anglers) have reprogrammed themselves.
“We are pleased the limit remained five for next year,” he said. “We are concerned about the forage. If more adult salmon are removed, we are more likely to keep a forage base.”
Copyright © 2012 Howard Meyerson
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An affordable, high-resolution 3D printer for professional creators.
Thanks for an amazing Kickstarter campaign! The next chapter of 3D printing is just beginning.
Pre-order your Form 1 at Formlabs.com
Read about the Form 1 on:
Are you frustrated that low-end 3D printers don’t have the quality to make the true beauty of your designs real? Do you dream of having the power and resolution of a truly professional machine on your desktop? We’ve created an easy-to-use system that rivals the output of high-end printers at a fraction of the cost.
Formlabs is disrupting 3D printing.
Our reason for starting this project is simple: there are no low-cost 3D printers that meet the quality standards of the professional designer. As researchers at the MIT Media Lab, we were lucky to experience the best and most expensive fabrication equipment in the world. But, we became frustrated by the fact that all the professional-quality 3D printers were ridiculously expensive (read: tens of thousands of dollars) and were so complex to use. In 2011, we decided to build a solution to this problem ourselves, and we are now ready to share it with the world.
High resolution belongs on your desktop.
We’ve been hard at work for over a year, and with your help, we’re ready to take the Form 1 into full-fledged production. By supporting this effort, you’ll be the first to get your hands on an amazing 3D printer AND help usher in a new era of 3D printing - an era in which your creative output is no longer limited by price or dauntingly complex machines.
The Form 1 will change creative design.
We’ve gone to extraordinary lengths to design a complete 3D printing experience:
- The Form 1 printer is engineered to produce high resolution parts with the touch of a button
- Form software is intuitive and simple to use so you can spend less time setting up prints and more time designing
- The Form Finish post-processing kit keeps your desktop organized so that you can easily put the finishing touches on your masterpiece
Read on for more details on what you’ll help bring into the world (and onto your desktop) if you support this effort.
Hardware - The Form 1:
For most designers, the extruded plastic (i.e. FDM) of low-end printers is simply not capable of the high resolution and quality surface finish necessary for professional work. So, we decided to go straight for the real deal: a stereolithography printer we call the Form 1.
Stereolithography (SL) is the gold standard for accuracy and resolution in the 3D printing world, reaching layer thicknesses and feature sizes that are worlds ahead of what is possible with FDM. The process is pretty straightforward - a laser is used to draw on the surface of a liquid plastic resin that hardens when exposed to a certain wavelength of light. The laser draws and hardens a layer at a time until the entire model is built. It’s simple, reliable, and quiet.
Unfortunately, SL is traditionally one of the most expensive 3D printing processes. With pricey lasers and high-precision optical components, SL 3D printers can easily cost tens or even hundreds of thousands of dollars. Until now. Check out these pictures of parts made with the Form 1 as compared to a currently available FDM printer:
After a great deal of research, engineering, and experimentation, we’ve figured out how to do it at a much, much lower cost, making this premium technology available to everyone.
The results are amazing: the Form 1 can print layers as thin as 25 microns (0.001 in) with features as small as 300 microns (0.012 in) in a build volume of 125 x 125 x 165 mm (4.9 x 4.9 x 6.5 in). This means you can print complex geometries with the exquisite details and beautiful surface finish that will make your creations stand out.
Form print software:
Great hardware is only half the battle. We painstakingly designed our Form software to have a simple, intuitive user experience that streamlines the process of importing .STL models from any 3D CAD package. Generating smart support structures for complex geometries and sending jobs to the printer is as easy as a few clicks.
A key advantage of the Form software is the ability to precisely generate thin, breakable support structures that serve their purpose during printing but are easily removed afterward. Test users have delightfully compared this part removal to a feeling almost like separating Velcro. You can finally print those designs with crazy overhangs!
When the Form 1 is released, it will come with our first material - a neutral matte gray that is great for look-and-feel models, standalone parts, or even as a base color for painting.
After a successful launch (thanks to your support!), we will continue development of an entire palette of materials for your printer. A variety of colors, transparency, flexibility, and even burnout capability for lost wax casting processes are all possible with SL.
Accessories - Form Finish kit:
With any 3D printing process, there are key finishing steps to get your print into its final and ready-to-use form. With SL, each part comes out of the printer with a small amount of liquid resin on its surface.
We’ve designed the Form Finish kit - a finishing tray and accessories set to assist you and keep your workspace clean and organized during this process.
After printing, all you need to do is remove the build platform from the printer, set it into the tray, snap the model off its supports, and use the rinsing basket to clean the print for final use. Check out our website for step by step photos!
We are ready for full production with your support.
So where are we in this whole process? We’ve:
- Formed an awesome team in Boston, Montreal, and London
- Engineered the system to be mass-manufactured
- Built and tested 7 generations of prototypes
- Tested a wide range of material formulations
- Written and optimized thousands of lines of code
- Tested a production run of alpha units
We’re nearly ready to set up full-scale manufacturing to get your Form 1 delivered as soon as possible. We take this last crucial step seriously, and we’ll need a lot of support to do the job right. That’s why we’ve turned to Kickstarter to get the production lines up and running!
If you decide to pitch in, you’ll get a discount and be one of the first to have our product on your desktop. But more importantly, you’ll play a huge part in starting this revolution in 3D printing by providing your feedback and creating amazing things with the Form 1. We can’t wait to see what you can design!
What do the Gyrocube and T-Shirt rewards look like?
They look like this:
Special thanks to:
Charlie the formlab[rador]
Risks and challenges Learn about accountability on Kickstarter
Similar to many Kickstarter projects, we face several key risks and challenges in sparking this revolution in 3D printing. The primary risks for us include:
To achieve the level of simplicity in user experience that we have, we have to design and engineer a very complex system. We have taken two key steps to ensure our engineering success. 1) We have formed an amazing team of engineers and designers, and 2) we test our printers with an obsession for perfection. In the last year, we have built 7 generations of prototypes, a production run of alpha machines, we will have a run of beta machines with significant user testing, and we keep enormous amounts of data to guide our future work.
SUPPLY CHAIN AND LOGISTICS
Many Kickstarter campaigns can encounter problems when taking their prototypes to production. This includes issues finding suppliers and engineering products for mass-production. Smooth execution is absolutely essential to overcoming such risks. We take this lesson seriously and have been working for months negotiating with suppliers, testing component quality, and building a team that can execute on our promises. Our plans are nearly in place, and we now mainly require the resources to execute them.
Finding the right people is a challenge for any endeavor. Success in 3D printing requires a team of talented, passionate, and motivated designers, engineers, and entrepreneurs. We have already formed a truly awesome (and fun!) team, but we will have to bring in more Formlings to realize this dream. In fact, we are actively looking for new members to join Formlabs and hit the ground running! Check out our website for more information.
Shipping prices vary by location and country. It’s simpler (and cheaper for you) to handle this separately. After the Kickstarter is over and we are ready to start shipping, you will receive an invitation to go to our website and enter your shipping information to pay the appropriate amount. Shipping costs vary by location, but if you live in the US it will probably be somewhere around $50.
Unfortunately, international shipping is not as easy or cheap as we would like it to be. Prices vary by country and what taxes and other regulations your government has. If you order a Form 1 package through Kickstarter to be delivered outside the USA, we ask that you assume responsibility for all these charges. After our Kickstarter project ends, you will be asked to log into our website and pay the appropriate shipping charges.
First off, we love all of the support, from home and abroad! That makes us regret having to set a different price internationally. Over time, as our team and operations grow, we have every intent to improve our international capabilities. At the moment, the additional handling, regulatory requirements (e.g. CE), shipping costs in case of replacements, and support needs abroad demand more of our small team. We would rather charge more and follow through on our promises than charge less and disappoint you. That said, we are proud to offer a printer as powerful as the Form 1 at a price well below comparable machines in the USA and abroad.
We currently have no manufacturing or assembly operations outside of the USA, so we cannot reduce our costs by shipping from a different country. We really do care about being able to ship our product to anywhere in the world, so please bear with us as we get off the ground!
We are already working hard to plan our supply chain and manufacturing operations to make sure you get your Form 1 as soon as possible. We feel comfortable targeting February 2013 for our first full-production shipments in the USA/Canada, and March 2013 for our first International shipments.
The entire Form 1 is 12 x 11 x 18 in (30 x 28 x 45 cm) when closed. When the cover is opened, you need about 10 inches clearance on the back, and 3.5 inches on top. The Form Finish Kit is about 15 in x 15 in.
We have not yet set an ongoing price. Our Kickstarter supporters are definitely receiving special treatment for believing in what we do!
We estimate ongoing resin prices of around $149 per liter, but Kickstarter supporters who buy a Form 1 print package will be guaranteed at least 1 liter per month for $129 ($0.13 per cubic centimeter) or cheaper for the life of their printer. This is compared to available resin from traditional suppliers, which currently costs around $300-$800 per liter, and is less than a tenth the cost of online print services. We are not offering resin for sale over Kickstarter above the 1 liter included with Form 1 purchases. We will have resin for sale after Kickstarter and ready for delivery in time with the arrival of your Form 1.
Depending on your printing output and part size, 1 liter of resin can go a long way. Our 53mm tall rook, for example, uses ~13 cubic centimeters of resin. You could theoretically print 76 rooks per liter of resin!
Our first resin is still in its final stages of development and testing, so we can’t give hard performance numbers yet. We can say that the material is similar to the acrylate-based materials found in other SL and inkjet based 3D printers. These acrylate materials typically have elastic modulus and tensile strength that are comparable to ABS used in FDM machines. They typically have somewhat lower impact strength than FDM ABS. You can use our resin for functional parts, but they will usually have some degree of change in properties over time. We appreciate your patience as we finalize our resin.
After a successful launch (thanks to your support!), we will continue development of an entire palette of materials for your printer. A variety of colors, transparency, flexibility, and even burnout capability for lost wax casting processes are all possible with SL. We enjoy seeing all of your enthusiasm for new capabilities. We cannot release any more information on materials until we are ready to commit to specific performance promises. Thank you for your patience.
Our resin has a NPCA HMIS health safety rating of 2 (moderate), meaning that it should be carefully handled, like many common household chemicals. As with all chemicals, you should take care to limit exposure of the liquid resin to bare skin, and most definitely avoid ingestion. The cured (printed) resin, however, is very safe for handling. Finished resin-based parts are non-hazardous and can be disposed of as common waste. We will absolutely provide an MSDS before shipping the material. For a preliminary MSDS see: formlabs.com/pages/material
We are confident that we can ship resin overseas given the NPCA HMIS health safety rating. Part of what we are working on right now is ensuring we will ship all of our promised products. In the very unlikely case that we are unable to ship either your printer or your resin to you for regulatory reasons, we can offer a refund. We appreciate your patience as we prepare more information.
We've engineered our resin to work well with the Form 1. It's a huge part of the technical work that has gone into this project. The resin properties are closely linked with the Form 1 design. As a result, we won't be able to offer support for third party resins due to variations in properties. We do, however, see a bright future in resin development at Formlabs.
With the Form 1, you simply pour resin into the holding tray as necessary for your prints. The printer cover blocks UV light so that you can leave resin sitting while you are not printing. The resin has a very long shelf life, longer when stored in its bottle.
Form is not a design package. But it is an amazingly easy and intuitive tool to take your designs from any 3D CAD package and allow you to simply set up and start the print process. The Form Software will accept standard .STL files. We are working to have Form available on all major operating systems. Because the bulk of 3D CAD users are on the PC, this is our first priority, followed quickly by Mac.
3D print manufacturers often use layer thickness to define “resolution”, although any one metric provides an incomplete analysis of printer capabilities. The Form 1 can create layers as thin as 25 microns, which is much finer than other desktop machines. Another metric, the minimum feature size is 300 microns, which is limited by the diameter of the laser spot. Minimum feature size refers to the smallest possible bumps and ridges on a part. In general, the Form 1 can print a part at half the scale that an FDM machine would to achieve the same level of detail. The Form 1’s laser, however, has extremely precise movement capabilities in the X/Y plane. For example, the spot is 300 microns, but it can be moved as little as a few microns at a time, allowing for the impressive surface finish.
Our build speed is comparable to other high resolution printers. It varies depending on the type of print. A typical printing rate is around 15mm of height per hour. We’re designing this printer to be a serious workhorse. The Form 1 has less moving parts than most high resolution printers, and we have been running the prototypes in our office pretty much all day, every day during months of development.
Check out our video from Maker Faire of our first public demonstration! Our next stop is the 3D Print Show in London. Other than that, we hope to show off our printer in a variety of venues. We’ll do our best to accommodate requests, but please understand that we are getting A LOT of interest, which is a good thing, but it stretches our show and tell resources a bit ;)
At this time, we are very busy working on the details to get the Form 1 out the door, and we cannot accommodate individual sample requests. We will post an update when we are able to offer this. (post Kickstarter)
We can’t promise anything yet, but we know it’s very important and are working on it as a high priority. We’ll guarantee that you receive a working printer, and are planning to take extra special care of those of you who have supported us from the beginning.
Well, let’s get this one off the ground and into the world, and then we’ll see. Great to see you looking to the future!
pledged of $100,000 goal
seconds to go
Sep 26, 2012 - Oct 26, 2012 (30 days)
Pledge $5 or more
VIRTUAL HIGH FIVE: You get a .STL model of the Form 1 to print on your existing 3D printer! The miniature version can keep you company while you wait for the real deal to come in the mail (if you order one). We also put a call-out to you on our website. Form on!Estimated delivery: Nov 2012
Pledge $29 or more
Formlabs TEAM T-SHIRT used by our staff when sporting the colors at official events. Good form ;) (Includes USA Shipping. International shipping paid separately)Estimated delivery: Dec 2012
Pledge $39 or more
Your own PRINTED GYROCUBE with Formlabs logo. One of the absolute coolest prints out there. Your designer friends will be formally jealous. (Includes USA Shipping. International shipping paid separately)Estimated delivery: Jan 2013
Pledge $2,299 or more
25 backers All gone!
INITIAL FORMATION: Help start a revolution! The full Form 1 package including the printer, 1L resin, and Form Finish Kit. You are first in line for main production delivery! (Shipping paid separately. USA ONLY)Estimated delivery: Feb 2013
Pledge $2,499 or more
99 backers Limited (1 of 100 left)
SPECIAL PER-FORM-ANCE: The full Form 1 package including the printer, 1L resin, and Form Finish Kit. You are second in line for delivery! (Shipping paid separately. USA ONLY)Estimated delivery: Feb 2013
Pledge $2,699 or more
300 backers All gone!
FUNCTIONAL FORM: The full Form 1 package including the printer, 1L resin, and Form Finish Kit. You are ahead of our website sales for delivery! (Shipping paid separately. USA and Canada ONLY)Estimated delivery: Mar 2013
Pledge $2,699 or more
241 backers Limited (9 of 250 left)
KEEPING FORM: The full Form 1 package including the printer, 1L resin, and Form Finish Kit. You are ahead of our website sales for delivery! (Shipping paid separately. USA and Canada ONLY)Estimated delivery: Apr 2013
Pledge $2,999 or more
99 backers All gone!
INTERNATIONAL FORM: The full Form 1 package including the printer, 1L resin, and Form Finish Kit. You are ahead of our website sales for delivery! (Shipping paid separately. INTERNATIONAL ONLY. See FAQ)Estimated delivery: Mar 2013
Pledge $2,999 or more
250 backers All gone!
FORM ABROAD: The full Form 1 package including the printer, 1L resin, and Form Finish Kit. You are ahead of our website sales for delivery! (Shipping paid separately. INTERNATIONAL ONLY. See FAQ)Estimated delivery: Apr 2013
Pledge $5,000 or more
8 backers Limited (2 of 10 left)
COLLECTOR'S FORM: Full printer package with Form 1 signed (laser engraving!) by the entire Formlabs team!! Early shipment.Estimated delivery: Feb 2013
Pledge $8,000 or more
3 backers Limited (1 of 4 left)
FORM-ALLY TRAINED: Full printer package with Form 1 signed (laser engraving!) by entire Formlabs team...and you can come meet us at our Cambridge headquarters for a private CAD and print lesson from one of us!!! Early shipment. (Travel not included)Estimated delivery: Jan 2013
Pledge $10,000 or more
3 backers Limited (1 of 4 left)
TOP FORM: Come to a private dinner with the team, get an invitation for you and a friend to come to our launch party, and a signed Form 1 printer package! If we sell out of these, it will be a very good party. (: (Printer delivered ~ January 2013. Travel not included)Estimated delivery: Nov 2012
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By Susan Heavey
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Former Representative Gabrielle Giffords, who was severely wounded two years ago in an Arizona shooting, is launching a group aimed at curbing gun violence and raising enough money to challenge the well-funded gun lobby.
Giffords, starting the effort called Americans for Responsible Solutions with her husband former astronaut Mark Kelly, told ABC News that Congress must do more to prevent gun violence.
The two are gun owners, but in the wake of a string of recent mass shootings, they said more must be done to push common-sense efforts to reduce such violence.
"Enough," Giffords, who was shot in the head while meeting with constituents in Tucson, Arizona, told ABC in an interview aired on Tuesday.
The initiative aims to "encourage elected officials to stand up for solutions to prevent gun violence and protect responsible gun ownership," the group said on its website, americansforresponsiblesolutions.org.
It will push for background checks for private gun sales and look at ways to better address mental illness, among other efforts, Kelly told ABC.
Gifford's group is set to take on the National Rifle Association, which in 2011 spent over eleven times more on lobbying than all gun control lobbyists combined.
Her group has set up a political action committee for donations to "raise the funds necessary to balance the influence of the gun lobby," it said on its website.
"Until now, the gun lobby's political contributions, advertising and lobbying have dwarfed spending from anti-gun violence groups. No longer," Giffords wrote in an opinion piece published Tuesday in USA Today
She added: "winning even the most common-sense reforms will require a fight ... Achieving reforms to reduce gun violence and prevent mass shootings will mean matching gun lobbyists in their reach and resources."
The announcement comes just days after Giffords visited Newtown, Connecticut, and met with families of the victims of last month's Sandy Hook Elementary School massacre in which 20 children and six teachers were killed.
Giffords also recently met with New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who heads his own mayors' initiative that is also pushing for what he calls "reasonable" gun controls.
In the wake of the December 14 Connecticut shooting, President Barack Obama has pledged to take swift action to reduce gun violence and has tapped a task force due to report later this month with possible measures.
The task force, led by Vice President Joe Biden, is reportedly weighing action beyond reinstating a ban on assault weapons and high-capacity magazines to include universal background checks and a national gun sales database, among other steps.
The wave of shootings and the threat of tighter gun restrictions has spurred intense reaction on both sides.
Consumer demand for guns appears to have soared in recent weeks, according to FBI data.
Gun control supporters worry that other looming issues such as the nation's debt crisis could hamper efforts in Congress to push through new legislation.
Bloomberg's group launched its own new ad on Tuesday with the mother of child who was killed in the Arizona shooting.
(Reporting by Susan Heavey; Editing by Vicki Allen)
(c) Copyright Thomson Reuters 2013. Check for restrictions at: http://about.reuters.com/fulllegal.asp
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(MONEY Magazine) -- I recently retired and want to make my retirement portfolio -- now invested in 15 different mutual funds -- simple, cost-effective and easy to manage. I'm thinking of consolidating everything in a target-date retirement fund. Should I invest in one fund or several? -- Bill, Lady Lake, Fla.
Yikes, 15 funds!
That's not as bad as the woman I recently wrote about whose money was spread among 29 different funds. But it's still way too many, and makes managing your portfolio more difficult than it has to be. And that's the last thing you want when you're settling down to enjoy retirement.
So I applaud your idea of trimming your portfolio.
But if you really want to make things easier on yourself, you're much better off sticking to just one target-date fund that offers broad diversity and reasonable costs.
Why, you may ask, do I advocate limiting yourself to only one target fund when doing so would seem to flout the cardinal investing rule of diversification? After all, if one target fund is good, wouldn't two be better, and three better still?
The answer is no.
The whole point of investing in a target-date fund is to get a fully diversified portfolio of stocks and bonds (and in the case of target funds for older investors, some cash) inside one fund. You invest in such a fund if you don't want to go to the trouble of building and maintaining a diversified portfolio on your own.
But a target-date fund offers more than just a diversified mix of stocks and bonds. It also offers a long-term strategy. As you age, the fund's portfolio automatically changes its asset allocation, shifting more of its assets out of stocks and into bonds (and eventually cash as well). Thus, the fund becomes more conservative as you get older and, presumably, want more protection from market setbacks.
But not all target funds offer the same mix of stocks and bonds or time their shift out of stocks and into bond at the same pace, even though they may have the same target date in their name.
Nor do they all hold exactly the same lineup of investments. One, for example, may offer inflation protection by investing in TIPS, or Treasury Inflation Protected Securities, while others may add real estate or commodity exposure.
Each target fund's portfolio has been designed, in theory at least, to offer its own individual balance of risk vs. return by combining a particular group of assets.
So if you combine two or more funds that take different approaches -- and most do, at least to some degree -- you would likely end up with a mish-mash of assets instead of a coherent portfolio. That would make it more difficult for you to see how your retirement savings is allocated among different types of investments at any given time, not to mention how that allocation morphs over time. You would give up much of the simplicity and ease of management you're seeking.
Which is why I think you're better off going with just one target-date fund, but taking care to choose a target fund that makes sense for you.
How do you do that?
Start by making sure you're comfortable with the fund's current asset mix. For example, a 2010 target-date fund -- which is geared toward someone who's recently retired or is about to retire -- might have anywhere from, say, 25% in stocks to more than 50% in equities. But you also want to look at the fund's "glide path," or how today's stocks-bonds mix will move more toward bonds in the future.
Take the 2010 target-date funds of the Big Three in the target-date arena: Fidelity, Vanguard and T. Rowe Price. All are fairly close in their stocks-bond allocations today: Fidelity and Vanguard are roughly 50-50, while T. Rowe Price is 55-45.
But the similarity ends there. Fido's 2010 fund's equity exposure drifts down gradually until it hits 20% within 10 to 15 years. So if you bought this fund at age 65, by age 80 you would be in a fund that has 20% in stocks, 40% in bonds and 40% in short-term investments. The fund would then stick with those allocations.
Vanguard's 2010 fund, by contrast, takes about 10 years to get to a 30% stocks-70% bonds mix, where it would then remain. So at 75, you would have 30% of your assets in the fund invested in stock, and the stock position wouldn't drop below that amount. So Vanguard's fund is a bit more aggressive than Fido's.
T. Rowe Price's 2010 fund, meanwhile, pushes the envelope even more. Not only does it start out with a bit more in stock -- 55% vs. 50% -- it also transitions to bonds more slowly. After 15 years, the fund would still have 35% in stocks and it takes 30 years for the fund to hit its low point in stock exposure of 20%. So if you bought this fund at 65, you'd still have 35% in stocks at age 80 and wouldn't hit 20% until 95.
I don't think you can say one of these funds has the "best" mix. The percentage of stocks you want at retirement and beyond depends on a number of factors, including the total amount of money you have, how dependent you are on your target-fund stash for regular income, what other resources you have to fall back on and, of course, how comfortable you are seeing the value of your portfolio jump around. The point, though, is that you want to choose a fund with a current stocks-bonds blend and glide path that you're comfortable with.
You can get information about a target fund's asset mix and glide path by calling the fund company or, for more detailed info, checking out its prospectus. Many fund companies also provide quite a bit of detail on their various target funds on their web sites, as do Fido, T. Rowe and Vangy.
If you want to see how a particular target fund has performed in markets good and bad, you can plug its ticker symbol the Quotes box at Morningstar.com.
As I noted in a recent video, people who own target-date funds in their 401(k)s may also get more detailed information about them under recent disclosure requirements proposed by the Department of Labor.
You also say that you want your portfolio to be "cost-effective." To borrow a phrase from the great Smokey Robinson, I second that emotion. So in addition to a target-date fund's allocation and glide path, you also need to check out its costs.
On that score, it's hard to beat Vanguard. It's 2010 fund charges a miserly 0.17% in annual expenses, largely because the fund invests nearly all its assets in its own low-cost index funds.
T. Rowe and Fido charge 0.64% Rowe and 0.67% respectively, which is still relatively low by comparison to many 2010 funds that have expense ratios of 1% to 1.5%.
One final note: Sticking to one target-date fund doesn't necessarily mean you have to keep your entire retirement portfolio in that one fund. Let's say, for example, you're attracted to Vanguard's low costs, but would like a slightly more aggressive approach. In that case, you could put a small a portion of your money into a broad stock index fund.
Conversely, if you're looking to go a bit more conservatively, you could stick some of your stash into a bond index fund or a cash equivalent, like a money fund, savings account or CD.
Yes, this arrangement wouldn't be as streamlined as keeping all your dough in a single target fund. But adding one all-stock or all-bond fund would certainly complicate things a lot less than taking on another target-date fund that may have five or more asset classes.
|Overnight Avg Rate||Latest||Change||Last Week|
|30 yr fixed||3.66%||3.58%|
|15 yr fixed||2.79%||2.72%|
|30 yr refi||3.64%||3.57%|
|15 yr refi||2.79%||2.72%|
Today's featured rates:
Glass employees speak openly on public concerns More
Between ballooning student loans, credit cards and money owed to family members, graduates of the class of 2013 are facing an average $35,200 in debt, a Fidelity survey found. More
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War Is Over (If You Want It)
Who doesn't remember John Lennon and Yoko Ono's 1970 anti-war statement? At the height of the fighting in Vietnam, these posters appeared as billboards in key cities around the world. The tag line 'if you want' confused a lot of people, but what John and Yoko were saying is that it is an individual choice to be made, we each can choose to live a life without violence, to put war behind us.
And, luckily, they're saying it again. 40 years later, Yoko Ono has put these posters up for free download at her site ImaginePeace.com. Plus they're available in many different languages.
CLICK HERE TO GO STRAIGHT TO THE DOWNLOAD PAGE.
You can think what you want about Yoko; Dragon Lady, she broke up The Beatles (not true), she has sold every napkin John Lennon ever scribbled on (maybe true), whatever, but she has never wavered on speaking out for peace and against war -- any war. Like John Lennon, she advocates non-violence.
How nice to remember at Christmas. Peace.
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Most Active Stories
Sat December 10, 2011
How Religious Conservatives Shape The GOP Race
SCOTT SIMON, HOST:
While Newt Gingrich may not have universal appeal among Tea Party voters, he seems to be drawing wide support from a key Republican constituency, Christian conservatives. The religious right has significant influence in many early voting states, including Iowa, which has its caucuses coming up on January 3rd.
Yesterday, we spoke with Bob Vander Plaats. He has an influential conservative Christian organization called The Family Leader. Its offices are just outside of Des Moines, Iowa. And with many national polls currently showing Newt Gingrich with a significant lead over Mitt Romney, we asked how the former House speaker has been able to capture the attention of religious conservatives in away Mitt Romney so far has not.
BOB VANDER PLAATS: Well, first of all, speaker Gingrich has showed up to Iowa. Mitt Romney, for all intents and purposes has really, you know, dissed the state. He's dissed an organization like ours. He's refused to show up at a lot of different caucus events that really could have elevated his campaign. And you know what? I think speaker Gingrich has really been bolstered a lot by his debate performances.
SIMON: I'm struck by the fact that what you say has nothing to do with conservatism or religion.
PLAATS: Well, you know, as far as religion, the social issues are very important to us. And obviously Governor Mitt Romney has been inconsistent on a lot of issues that are important to us, whether it be the sanctity of human life or the foundation of God's design for the family - one man, one woman marriage. It's not that he's just been on both sides of an issue. He's been passionately on both sides of an issue.
SIMON: Is that Romney's religion an issue with you?
PLAATS: No. As a matter of fact, with our base of supporters, very rarely does the fact that Governor Romney is a Mormon even come up. It's way more on the trust gap in his leadership on issues. For example, he led public health care in Massachusetts, universal health care. And President Obama says he modeled ObamaCare after the Massachusetts health care plan.
Well, Governor Romney still says he was right with the Massachusetts health care but he would repeal ObamaCare. Those are things that just don't line up for us.
SIMON: Mr. Vander Plaats, let me put a question to you the way Ross Douthat, he New York Times op-ed columnist generally taken to be a conservative writer stated it. He said the real issue for religious conservatives isn't whether they can trust Gingrich; it's whether they can afford to be associated with him. And Mr. Douthat went on to mention questions about Newt Gingrich's personal life, and the fact that he pursued an impeachment case against President Clinton at the same time he was conducting his own extramarital affair.
PLAATS: Well, there's no doubt, you know, those are issues. And those are issues that I've had the opportunity to speak with speaker Gingrich about several years ago. I think with speaker Gingrich and his personal life it's well-documented. You know, but several years ago he is come clean saying, you know, he was wrong. He's been repentant. As much as we don't like what happened, the heart of our faith is still forgiveness.
Now, what I would say, Scott, if this was a road to Des Moines conversion, where this just happened a few weeks ago or a few months ago, saying, hey, I'm running for president. By the way, I messed up. I'm sorry. I don't think it'll play real well.
SIMON: Mr. Vander Plaats, let me pose with a question that kind of looks ahead to the November election.
PLAATS: You bet.
SIMON: Is there a better living example of a multi-generational, Christian family than the family that lives in the White House now?
PLAATS: You know, I've been very open in applauding President Obama and Michelle Obama - First Lady Michelle Obama - and the example that they have been for families with their personal life. However, I think people would see that his policies for this country have been very anti-family. And, as a matter of fact, it's one that families can't afford another four more years of.
I think this is going to be a referendum on his leadership policies, not on his example and role modeling of a family unit out of the White House.
SIMON: Bob Vander Plaats, who heads Family Leader, a conservative Christian organization in Des Moines. Thanks so much for being with us, sir.
PLAATS: Oh, thank you, Scott. I really appreciate it. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright National Public Radio.
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- "Hazardous" air, murky skies in Singapore from Indonesian fires
- Rupee at record low as India seen lacking options to brake fall
- Rupee slumps to record low; bonds, stocks slump
- UPDATE 1-U.S. states, greens delay lawsuit, await Obama climate plan
- Finance minister holds meeting with officials over rupee fall
Budget 2011: Changes in income tax exemptions
NEW DELHI |
NEW DELHI (Reuters) - In his budget for the coming financial year, Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee on Monday announced raising the personal income tax exemption limit from 160,000 rupees to 180,000 rupees in FY2012.
“This measure will provide a uniform tax relief of 2,000 rupees to every taxpayer of this category,” Mukherjee said in his speech.
Mukherjee said he has limited his proposals to initiatives that require urgent attention, as the government's policy on direct taxes has been outlined in the DTC, which is before parliament.
“We were expecting around two lakh that is what the market speculation was, just raised about 20,000 which is hardly anything,” said Mohit Oberoi, a businessman.
The finance minister also extended 20,000 rupees exemption for investment in infra debt funds for another year.
Qualifying age for senior citizens will be reduced to 60 years from 65 years while the exemption limit will be increased from 2,40,000 rupees to 2,50,000 rupees, Mukherjee said.
The finance minister also proposed the creation of a new category of very senior citizens aged above 80 years, who will be eligible for a higher exemption limit of 5,00,000 rupees.
(Reporting by India Online)
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This article was originally distributed via PRWeb. PRWeb, WorldNow and this Site make no warranties or representations in connection therewith.
SOURCE: Progressive Dental Marketing
Dr. Robert Mokbel now provides the kind of periodontal disease treatment results patients are looking for with the new Laser Assisted New Attachment Procedure, which utilizes a laser to remove bacteria that cause gum disease as well as infected gum tissue. This makes the procedure very gentle and minimally invasive, particularly when compared to traditional methods of treatment that use a scalpel to remove the diseased tissue.
Fountain Valley, CA (PRWEB) January 05, 2013
Robert Mokbel, DDS, uses the Laser Assisted New Attachment Procedure to fight gum disease in a gentle yet effective manner. LANAP is the only FDA cleared laser procedure used for periodontal disease treatment. The specialized laser uses wavelengths that target the bacteria and diseased tissue while not harming healthy gum tissue. The procedure generally causes little pain or discomfort and requires very little recovery time. It has been studied and tested both in this country and in other countries and has the data to prove its effectiveness.
Gum disease is a problem that is reaching epidemic proportions in the United States with more than 100 million adults estimated to be suffering from it. Only a small percentage of those affected actually seek the necessary treatment to eliminate the disease. While many people only think about the dental problems the disease can cause, it is actually much more of a problem than most people think. When a person has periodontal disease, they essentially have open wounds in the gums that give bacteria or infections access to the bloodstream. This means that infection can spread to other parts of the body and increase the incidence of disease. Gum disease has been linked to such issues as stroke, diabetes, respiratory disease and heart disease, just to name a few.
It is likely that some people avoid getting periodontal disease treatment because they are afraid of possible pain from the treatment procedure. With the new LANAP laser surgery, there is minimal discomfort, so this fear can be relieved. Others may avoid the procedure because they feel they don't have time to spare. LANAP patients are often able to return to business as usual later the same day they have the procedure, so this issue is also put to rest.
The bottom line is that periodontal disease treatment is necessary both for oral health as well as for overall optimal health. With so few dental professionals certified on the procedure, patients from across the state visit Dr. Mokbel to receive treatment. More information about LANAP can be found at http://www.scdentalimplants.com.
Robert Mokbel, DDS is a prosthodontist offering patients personalized laser and implant dentistry for Fountain Valley, CA for over 28 years. Dr. Mokbel received his Prosthodontic degree in Paris, France where he did four years of research in prosthetics and in occlusion and attended Periodontal courses, He then arrived at USC where he taught prosthetics since 1983. He is part of one percent of dental professionals providing the most recent FDA cleared laser procedure for gum disease and periodontal treatment. To learn more about Robert Mokbel, DDS and his services visit his website at http://www.scdentalimplants.com.
For the original version on PRWeb visit: http://www.prweb.com/releases/prweb2013/1/prweb10293665.htm
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Wii Sports Resort (Wii)
Since late 2005, Nintendo has been promising that the Wii Remote would change the way we played games by replacing button-presses with real-world motions. The original Wii Sports, packaged with the Wii, single-handedly sold millions of Wii systems at $250 a pop, many to people who had never before considered picking up a game console.
But Wii Sports' proof of concept for a marvelous, motion-controlled future was aided by a significant helping of smoke and mirrors. Extended play showed that the Remote wasn't accurate enough to detect the angle of a tennis racket as it made contact with the ball, or correct swinging form in Baseball or Golf. The cracks in the motion-control scheme really started to show in the Boxing mini-game, with matches that universally devolved into a mess of random Remote- and Nunchuk-swinging that had little to no correlation to the action on-screen.
You can tell that my friends and I didn't take this screenshot because one of the players is attempting to block.
There was a ray of hope in the original Wii Sports: The bowling mini-game, unlike the others, showed the real promise of motion controls by accurately detecting the angle and power of your Remote swing as you hurled the virtual ball down the lane. Here, finally, was a game where the Wii Remote was used in a way that couldn't be emulated by a traditional controller -- where how you moved the Wii Remote was just as important as the fact that you were moving it at all.
Most third-party Wii developers failed to follow the example of the bowling mini-game, or even the other, less-accurate Wii Sports games. Instead, the Remote in most Wii games was used as a crude cudgel, a binary detector used to activate moves -- punches, sword-swings, magic spells, etc. -- that we've been seeing in games for decades now. Perversely, instead of replacing button-pressing altogether, shaking the Wii Remote simply became another way to push yet another button.
So we come to the Wii MotionPlus accessory and Wii Sports Resort, Nintendo's bid at true, accurate motion controls. The value of the upgrade is apparent the first time you gently wave a kendo sword from side to side, or twist a frisbee disc in your hand, or dip and push a canoe oar through the water, and see your on-screen Mii do the exact same actions in the exact same way. This feedback loop between the Remote in your hand and the Mii on the screen is immediate and satisfying in a way it never was with the pre-animated approximations of the past. For the first time, it feels like the Remote really is the object the Mii is handling, not just a white hunk of plastic with a touchy accelerometer inside.
Once the "Gee Whiz, It Works!" phase of the proceedings fades away, it's up to the actual games in Wii Sports Resort to prove that this new technology can be used to improve gameplay. The 12 sports in Wii Sports Resort are frustratingly inconsistent on this score.
At the top of the heap are the games deep enough to let a strong player improve through more accurate physical movements. In Archery, for instance, you have to calm your breathing and steady your bow hand to have any hope of curving a shot around barriers and through strong winds to hit a moving target 45 yards away. In Table Tennis, knowing when to twist your wrist under the ball for a floating drop shot, and when to slam it over the ball for a devastating smash, is the difference between victory and defeat. And while it's easy enough to throw a straight shot for your pooch to catch in Frisbee Dog, curving the disc through floating balloons to hit a target requires precise combinations of angle, power and release timing that can take quite a bit of practice to master.
After these three enjoyable, endlessly replayable options come the games that have interesting and accurate motion controls, but don't have enough depth to put them to good use. The Basketball mini-game does an excellent job of transforming a quick overhead flick of the Remote into an on-screen three-point shot, but once you've figured out how to make that first basket, the same exact motion will sink a million more. Swordplay, which promised to be an excellent demonstration for the accuracy of Wii MotionPlus, succumbs in multiplayer to the same Remote-flailing that undid Wii Sports Boxing. And scooping the Remote back and forth across your body to propel a canoe can be frenetic fun -- especially with friends -- but the motion is so repetitive and simple that the whole event can be essentially mastered in a single play.
At the bottom of the barrel are the games in which the Wii MotionPlus accessory -- and motion control in general -- seem completely incosequential. Simply tilting the Remote back and forth to power a board up and over a motorboat wake (Wakeboarding), using the Remote and Nunchuk like pedaling feet (Cycling), flying a dogfighting plane, or guiding a falling skydiver (both in the Air Sports section) all fail to garner much lasting interest. Though the jet-ski controls in Power Cruising are accurate enough, the simple course design means the races also don't have nearly enough staying power.
Some of the second- and third-tier games are redeemed slightly by additional play modes that shake up the gameplay a bit. Indeed, working through hundreds of computer-controlled opponents with a kendo sword is surprisingly more difficult and satisfying than simply taking a swing at your friends, as is passing the ball to computer-controlled allies in a simplified version of a basketball pick-up game. Even the surprisingly relaxing Island Flyover mode, where you lazily fly around looking for unexpected landmarks on the vibrant Wuhu Island, is a welcome addition. But none of these modes are really enough to extend the basic shallowness of these games. They come off as the kind of one-note mini-games that have characterized the Wii up to this point, not the fully fleshed-out games that are needed to show off its new potential.
I haven't yet mentioned the two Wii Sports Resort sports that have made a return from the original game: Golf and Bowling. That's because the new technology and intervening years seem to have done very little to change these games. True, the straightness of your Mii's golf swing is now somewhat dependent on the straightness of your Remote swing (though I could never seem to get the form just right). And there are a few new holes and modes to test your skills. But overall, these two rehashes felt like a way of padding the Sports Resort lineup from 10 to an even dozen.
Even when the gameplay itself feels phoned in, though, little presentational touches help carry the game along: The way your Mii's hand stays up after the final shot in a three-point contest. The way your dog happily wags its tail and whistles as it returns a thrown frisbee. The way the game populates its cast with popular characters uploaded to the Check Mii Out Channel. These and other small moments show that the game wasn't phoned in, even if some of the gameplay seems to be.
Wii Sports Resort and Wii MotionPlus are a sign not just of failure on Nintendo's part, but also of a battle rejoined. It's a battle to create true verisimilitude in gaming, to eliminate the barrier of the controller and create an experience as close to a true simulation as possible. It's a shaky first volley against the coming onslaught of Sony's and Microsoft's own motion controllers, but it's one that should keep Nintendo in the game for a little bit longer.
This review is based on a retail copy of the game provided by the publisher.
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http://www.crispygamer.com/gamereviews/2009-07-27/wii-sports-resort-wii.aspx
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s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697974692/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516095254-00015-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.956441
| 1,621
| 1.632813
| 2
|
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