Wednesday, September 29, 2010

managing your personal finance




  • Black & Decker recalls cordless mowers a third time



  • Daily Dispatch: Facebook and Skype to integrate messaging; Medical school gives students textbooks on iPhones



  • Bose to launch its first TV, the VideoWave Entertainment System



  • Finances may be among reasons that fewer 25-to-34-year-olds marry



  • Beware of rogue online pharmacies selling unsafe drugs



  • Video: "How's My Driving?" documentary on distracted driving and road rage



  • Daily electronics deals



  • NHTSA opens up defect investigations on Honda and Mini



  • Hanging on to old appliances



  • Stink bug: A home invader that lives up to its name





A lot of people are unemployed in this country, 14.9 million as of the latest BLS release a couple of days ago, and for some of those people, this has become what is coyly referred to as ‘the entrepreneurial moment’, the ‘ah-ha’ light-bulb realization that if they don’t create a job for themselves, there will be no job, no income, no mortgage payment, no groceries, no light, no heat, no gas for the car, nuthin’. Since 2008, over 5 million jobs have been lost, many of which will never, ever come back.


Welcome to Labor Day, 2010.


Some of these ‘lost’ jobs have been outsourced overseas. Some have just been cut. Some companies are using their cash to invest in technologies which will insure that they will never have to hire these folks back, at least not with the skills that they had when they were given a cardboard box and five minutes to empty their desks and get out the front door.


If there are people out there who have or are considering building their own ‘life raft’ it would surprise absolutely no one; though for some folks, entrepreneurship is so scary, they can’t imagine anything other than hiring on to someone else’s deal, no matter how horrible it is.


Sometimes, though, you don’t have any choice. One thing to remember, is that many of the most successful entrepreneurs in this country have not invented fuel cells, high tech photovoltaic films, high speed transit, a cure for cancer (or the common cold), or the answer for peace in our time. They are cleaning houses, making pizza, fixing computers/ipods/iphones/cars/furnaces/plumbing/household electric, managing other people’s systems, giving advice, making clothing for people who are outside the common size ranges in the stores.


Not exactly operating a basement boiler room financial situation, doing crazy financial stuff, or stirring up the pot on international finance.


At its most basic, it’s local; at its most interesting, it might even be regional. But it is still person to person; it’s still me doing business with you. Face to face. My hands and brain doing stuff to help you. Some of this is amazingly low tech – some of it is almost medieval.


This week’s fascinating story comes from the New York Times about a family of knife sharpeners who have thrown a new curve on this ancient of trades by providing two sets of knives to butchers, restaurants, food services (in Yankee Stadium, for heaven’s sake), and calling on a weekly basis to pick up the used set and providing the newly sharpened set.


Anyone who does any real work in a kitchen at all knows that your most important tools are a good set of knives and a good frying and sauce pan. With those three things, you can do almost anything (and yes, I have made cookies in the bottom of a frying pan; thank you for asking), but if your knives are dull, cutting anything becomes horrible work and you can injure yourself badly. “Every week, the company visits more than 800 clients and collects more than 8,000 knives to be replaced with freshly sharpened blades. The service costs $2.50 to $3.50 per knife.


The business started servicing mainly butchers and meatpackers, in territories handed down from father to son. To preserve the business for his children, Mr. Ambrosi expanded it to restaurants and even Yankee Stadium, in some cases deviating from long-held tradition. Many cooks and chefs take personal pride in their knives and their ability to maintain them, and would hesitate to release them to anyone else’s care. But sharpening a knife takes time and skill — and not every chef has both.”


Having a skill and honing (sorry) that so that you can provide something that someone else can not (or will not) do, whether it is being an electrician, a plumber, a welder, a knife sharpener, a shoe repair shop, a hair dresser, whatever it is – can make the difference in today’s international economy between being able to make a living for your family and holding your head in your hands. One of America’s biggest mistakes as far as education is concerned (and others might just argue with me) is that we “jumped the shark” in terms of absorbing people coming out of colleges.


Since the 1980s, kids coming out of college have had fewer and lower level opportunities. Jobs which absorbed high schoolers, now require a 2 or 4 year degree; job that required a college degree started to require a masters degree; some jobs which required a college degree and some internal training, now require advanced degrees – I even know of jobs that now require a legal degree to be hired which 30 years ago required a college degree and passing a test. So much emphasis was placed on going to college – and vocational training and the trades were so downgraded and derided that any family with a kid with two brain cells to rub together would not even THINK of encouraging that kid to go into the trades, unless the family was already in the business.


We’re now at a situation where companies, which shot themselves in the foot by sending skilled jobs overseas and now want to bring them back because costs overseas have risen and/or they are tired of their intellectual property being stolen and sold to others, can’t find the skills they want. Not to put too fine a point on this – those same companies have not done any training themselves; nor are they willing to do so. They got into the habit a long time ago of pushing the investment in training off on others. The government for one.


The other, which has willingly and consistently provided training in the trades for years are the unions. Organized labor. The Great Satan of the industrial world. The guys everyone loves to hate. The organizations which, according to many employers, stand in their way of succeeding in business.


But still, the organization which has kept skills alive in this country despite outsourcing, overseas sourcing, attacks from business and government, and general antipathy from great swaths of the American population in certain parts of the country.


So. On this frankly very sad Labor Day, 2010, I’d like to thank the American Labor Movement for remembering what America and Americans do best and what we need to do on an increasing basis if we are to put people back to work – or if we are to have businesses to call our own: Do stuff with our hands.


Thanks folks. You’re not perfection, but you’re willing to invest in Americans.


Happy Labor Day



Murata Seisakusho Robot Learns New Skill « Akihabara <b>News</b>

To pursue its growth Akihabara News is seeking for several more editors via an intership program for 6 to 9 months. Please send us a mail @ jobs@akihabaranews.com. Message. We are moving away from Feedburner, please update your RSS ...

<b>News</b> Roundup: Gordon Ramsay Responds to Chef&#39;s Suicide, Brad <b>...</b>

Gordon Ramsay has opened up about the death of 'Kitchen Nightmares' contestant Joseph Cerniglia. According to Entertainment Weekly, Ramsay expressed.

Kinect will talk to MSN Messenger Xbox 360 <b>News</b> - Page 1 <b>...</b>

Read our Xbox 360 news of Kinect will talk to MSN Messenger.


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G20 Summit, London, G20 London, G20 Protests, G20 Demonstrations by G20London2009


Murata Seisakusho Robot Learns New Skill « Akihabara <b>News</b>

To pursue its growth Akihabara News is seeking for several more editors via an intership program for 6 to 9 months. Please send us a mail @ jobs@akihabaranews.com. Message. We are moving away from Feedburner, please update your RSS ...

<b>News</b> Roundup: Gordon Ramsay Responds to Chef&#39;s Suicide, Brad <b>...</b>

Gordon Ramsay has opened up about the death of 'Kitchen Nightmares' contestant Joseph Cerniglia. According to Entertainment Weekly, Ramsay expressed.

Kinect will talk to MSN Messenger Xbox 360 <b>News</b> - Page 1 <b>...</b>

Read our Xbox 360 news of Kinect will talk to MSN Messenger.


bench craft company rip off benchcraft company scam



  • Black & Decker recalls cordless mowers a third time



  • Daily Dispatch: Facebook and Skype to integrate messaging; Medical school gives students textbooks on iPhones



  • Bose to launch its first TV, the VideoWave Entertainment System



  • Finances may be among reasons that fewer 25-to-34-year-olds marry



  • Beware of rogue online pharmacies selling unsafe drugs



  • Video: "How's My Driving?" documentary on distracted driving and road rage



  • Daily electronics deals



  • NHTSA opens up defect investigations on Honda and Mini



  • Hanging on to old appliances



  • Stink bug: A home invader that lives up to its name





A lot of people are unemployed in this country, 14.9 million as of the latest BLS release a couple of days ago, and for some of those people, this has become what is coyly referred to as ‘the entrepreneurial moment’, the ‘ah-ha’ light-bulb realization that if they don’t create a job for themselves, there will be no job, no income, no mortgage payment, no groceries, no light, no heat, no gas for the car, nuthin’. Since 2008, over 5 million jobs have been lost, many of which will never, ever come back.


Welcome to Labor Day, 2010.


Some of these ‘lost’ jobs have been outsourced overseas. Some have just been cut. Some companies are using their cash to invest in technologies which will insure that they will never have to hire these folks back, at least not with the skills that they had when they were given a cardboard box and five minutes to empty their desks and get out the front door.


If there are people out there who have or are considering building their own ‘life raft’ it would surprise absolutely no one; though for some folks, entrepreneurship is so scary, they can’t imagine anything other than hiring on to someone else’s deal, no matter how horrible it is.


Sometimes, though, you don’t have any choice. One thing to remember, is that many of the most successful entrepreneurs in this country have not invented fuel cells, high tech photovoltaic films, high speed transit, a cure for cancer (or the common cold), or the answer for peace in our time. They are cleaning houses, making pizza, fixing computers/ipods/iphones/cars/furnaces/plumbing/household electric, managing other people’s systems, giving advice, making clothing for people who are outside the common size ranges in the stores.


Not exactly operating a basement boiler room financial situation, doing crazy financial stuff, or stirring up the pot on international finance.


At its most basic, it’s local; at its most interesting, it might even be regional. But it is still person to person; it’s still me doing business with you. Face to face. My hands and brain doing stuff to help you. Some of this is amazingly low tech – some of it is almost medieval.


This week’s fascinating story comes from the New York Times about a family of knife sharpeners who have thrown a new curve on this ancient of trades by providing two sets of knives to butchers, restaurants, food services (in Yankee Stadium, for heaven’s sake), and calling on a weekly basis to pick up the used set and providing the newly sharpened set.


Anyone who does any real work in a kitchen at all knows that your most important tools are a good set of knives and a good frying and sauce pan. With those three things, you can do almost anything (and yes, I have made cookies in the bottom of a frying pan; thank you for asking), but if your knives are dull, cutting anything becomes horrible work and you can injure yourself badly. “Every week, the company visits more than 800 clients and collects more than 8,000 knives to be replaced with freshly sharpened blades. The service costs $2.50 to $3.50 per knife.


The business started servicing mainly butchers and meatpackers, in territories handed down from father to son. To preserve the business for his children, Mr. Ambrosi expanded it to restaurants and even Yankee Stadium, in some cases deviating from long-held tradition. Many cooks and chefs take personal pride in their knives and their ability to maintain them, and would hesitate to release them to anyone else’s care. But sharpening a knife takes time and skill — and not every chef has both.”


Having a skill and honing (sorry) that so that you can provide something that someone else can not (or will not) do, whether it is being an electrician, a plumber, a welder, a knife sharpener, a shoe repair shop, a hair dresser, whatever it is – can make the difference in today’s international economy between being able to make a living for your family and holding your head in your hands. One of America’s biggest mistakes as far as education is concerned (and others might just argue with me) is that we “jumped the shark” in terms of absorbing people coming out of colleges.


Since the 1980s, kids coming out of college have had fewer and lower level opportunities. Jobs which absorbed high schoolers, now require a 2 or 4 year degree; job that required a college degree started to require a masters degree; some jobs which required a college degree and some internal training, now require advanced degrees – I even know of jobs that now require a legal degree to be hired which 30 years ago required a college degree and passing a test. So much emphasis was placed on going to college – and vocational training and the trades were so downgraded and derided that any family with a kid with two brain cells to rub together would not even THINK of encouraging that kid to go into the trades, unless the family was already in the business.


We’re now at a situation where companies, which shot themselves in the foot by sending skilled jobs overseas and now want to bring them back because costs overseas have risen and/or they are tired of their intellectual property being stolen and sold to others, can’t find the skills they want. Not to put too fine a point on this – those same companies have not done any training themselves; nor are they willing to do so. They got into the habit a long time ago of pushing the investment in training off on others. The government for one.


The other, which has willingly and consistently provided training in the trades for years are the unions. Organized labor. The Great Satan of the industrial world. The guys everyone loves to hate. The organizations which, according to many employers, stand in their way of succeeding in business.


But still, the organization which has kept skills alive in this country despite outsourcing, overseas sourcing, attacks from business and government, and general antipathy from great swaths of the American population in certain parts of the country.


So. On this frankly very sad Labor Day, 2010, I’d like to thank the American Labor Movement for remembering what America and Americans do best and what we need to do on an increasing basis if we are to put people back to work – or if we are to have businesses to call our own: Do stuff with our hands.


Thanks folks. You’re not perfection, but you’re willing to invest in Americans.


Happy Labor Day



bench craft company rip off

Murata Seisakusho Robot Learns New Skill « Akihabara <b>News</b>

To pursue its growth Akihabara News is seeking for several more editors via an intership program for 6 to 9 months. Please send us a mail @ jobs@akihabaranews.com. Message. We are moving away from Feedburner, please update your RSS ...

<b>News</b> Roundup: Gordon Ramsay Responds to Chef&#39;s Suicide, Brad <b>...</b>

Gordon Ramsay has opened up about the death of 'Kitchen Nightmares' contestant Joseph Cerniglia. According to Entertainment Weekly, Ramsay expressed.

Kinect will talk to MSN Messenger Xbox 360 <b>News</b> - Page 1 <b>...</b>

Read our Xbox 360 news of Kinect will talk to MSN Messenger.


benchcraft company scam bench craft company rip off

Murata Seisakusho Robot Learns New Skill « Akihabara <b>News</b>

To pursue its growth Akihabara News is seeking for several more editors via an intership program for 6 to 9 months. Please send us a mail @ jobs@akihabaranews.com. Message. We are moving away from Feedburner, please update your RSS ...

<b>News</b> Roundup: Gordon Ramsay Responds to Chef&#39;s Suicide, Brad <b>...</b>

Gordon Ramsay has opened up about the death of 'Kitchen Nightmares' contestant Joseph Cerniglia. According to Entertainment Weekly, Ramsay expressed.

Kinect will talk to MSN Messenger Xbox 360 <b>News</b> - Page 1 <b>...</b>

Read our Xbox 360 news of Kinect will talk to MSN Messenger.


bench craft company rip off bench craft company rip off

Murata Seisakusho Robot Learns New Skill « Akihabara <b>News</b>

To pursue its growth Akihabara News is seeking for several more editors via an intership program for 6 to 9 months. Please send us a mail @ jobs@akihabaranews.com. Message. We are moving away from Feedburner, please update your RSS ...

<b>News</b> Roundup: Gordon Ramsay Responds to Chef&#39;s Suicide, Brad <b>...</b>

Gordon Ramsay has opened up about the death of 'Kitchen Nightmares' contestant Joseph Cerniglia. According to Entertainment Weekly, Ramsay expressed.

Kinect will talk to MSN Messenger Xbox 360 <b>News</b> - Page 1 <b>...</b>

Read our Xbox 360 news of Kinect will talk to MSN Messenger.


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Tuesday, September 28, 2010

manage personal finances

Having a hard time managing credit card debt problems? Try using Creditable, a web app that can help you tackle your debt head-on by tracking your progress, generating suggested achievable goals based on your situation, and by allowing you to interact with other people that can help you.

The best part about Creditable is that it is free and anonymous, thus it can still generate your personalized goals even without submitting a credit report.

Creditable requires users to sign up before being able to use it, but the registration only requires an email address so you don’t have to divulge your identity. You do not have to be worried about security issues when using the site since you won’t have to reveal any personal information.

Creditable will also produce goals that are particular for your situation which can serve as your guide that can help you out of your current credit issues.

Creditable also fosters an online community where people can ask about credit related issues and receive advice from other people, who may have gone through your current situation. In addition, you can easily find other users that have the same goals as yours, for more social support.

Features:

  • Manage your credits without revealing your identity.
  • Track the progress of your credit, works with multiple accounts.
  • Suggests achievable goals based on your particular situation.
  • Connects you with other people that have similar credit issues.
  • Provides personalized credit card suggestions when re-establishing credit.
  • Similar Tools: Mint, Paystr, Accpal, TripLittle.

Check out Creditable @ http://getcreditable.com

It cannot be shown that the NOAA OLE agents and the GCEL prosecutors proactively engage in expanding the AFF. Anecdotal evidence abounds of threats, coercions, extortion, and other hardball interrogation and collection techniques, but these are not evidence. Still, the IG found several anecdotes sufficiently credible to include in his January report. Watch the linked video of a fisherman testifying before a congressional subcommittee. This is sworn testimony, much stronger than a simple anecdote. Early in the tape, the fisherman tells of being grilled on his personal finances. As the tape goes on, the fisherman describes being fined some $27K and being threatened -- coerced -- with an increase to $125K if he insisted on going before the NOAA administrative judge. Further into his testimony, the fisherman relates an incident when he and one of his captains were offered full relief from a fine -- extortion -- if they would drop the dime on another target of the OLE. 

Obama: Fox <b>News</b> Has A Point Of View That Is &#39;Ultimately <b>...</b>

President Obama has given a lengthy interview to Rolling Stone publisher Jann Wenner for the upcoming issue of the magazine. The cover story is titled Obama Fights Back and boy does he ever. At least where Fox News is concerned.

Obama Says Fox <b>News</b> Promotes &#39;Destructive&#39; Viewpoint - NYTimes.com

Fox News Channel responds to President Obama's sharp critique of the channel in a Rolling Stone interview.

Critics &quot;validated&quot; Wii Dead Space Wii <b>News</b> - Page 1 | Eurogamer.net

Read our Wii news of Critics. ... Dead Space: Extraction explained 3 September, 2009. Latest News. Visceral wants to make Dead Space 3 . Wii's Dead Space heading to PSN/XBLA? . Dead Space 2 to have online multiplayer? ...

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Obama: Fox <b>News</b> Has A Point Of View That Is &#39;Ultimately <b>...</b>

President Obama has given a lengthy interview to Rolling Stone publisher Jann Wenner for the upcoming issue of the magazine. The cover story is titled Obama Fights Back and boy does he ever. At least where Fox News is concerned.

Obama Says Fox <b>News</b> Promotes &#39;Destructive&#39; Viewpoint - NYTimes.com

Fox News Channel responds to President Obama's sharp critique of the channel in a Rolling Stone interview.

Critics &quot;validated&quot; Wii Dead Space Wii <b>News</b> - Page 1 | Eurogamer.net

Read our Wii news of Critics. ... Dead Space: Extraction explained 3 September, 2009. Latest News. Visceral wants to make Dead Space 3 . Wii's Dead Space heading to PSN/XBLA? . Dead Space 2 to have online multiplayer? ...

Having a hard time managing credit card debt problems? Try using Creditable, a web app that can help you tackle your debt head-on by tracking your progress, generating suggested achievable goals based on your situation, and by allowing you to interact with other people that can help you.

The best part about Creditable is that it is free and anonymous, thus it can still generate your personalized goals even without submitting a credit report.

Creditable requires users to sign up before being able to use it, but the registration only requires an email address so you don’t have to divulge your identity. You do not have to be worried about security issues when using the site since you won’t have to reveal any personal information.

Creditable will also produce goals that are particular for your situation which can serve as your guide that can help you out of your current credit issues.

Creditable also fosters an online community where people can ask about credit related issues and receive advice from other people, who may have gone through your current situation. In addition, you can easily find other users that have the same goals as yours, for more social support.

Features:

  • Manage your credits without revealing your identity.
  • Track the progress of your credit, works with multiple accounts.
  • Suggests achievable goals based on your particular situation.
  • Connects you with other people that have similar credit issues.
  • Provides personalized credit card suggestions when re-establishing credit.
  • Similar Tools: Mint, Paystr, Accpal, TripLittle.

Check out Creditable @ http://getcreditable.com

It cannot be shown that the NOAA OLE agents and the GCEL prosecutors proactively engage in expanding the AFF. Anecdotal evidence abounds of threats, coercions, extortion, and other hardball interrogation and collection techniques, but these are not evidence. Still, the IG found several anecdotes sufficiently credible to include in his January report. Watch the linked video of a fisherman testifying before a congressional subcommittee. This is sworn testimony, much stronger than a simple anecdote. Early in the tape, the fisherman tells of being grilled on his personal finances. As the tape goes on, the fisherman describes being fined some $27K and being threatened -- coerced -- with an increase to $125K if he insisted on going before the NOAA administrative judge. Further into his testimony, the fisherman relates an incident when he and one of his captains were offered full relief from a fine -- extortion -- if they would drop the dime on another target of the OLE. 

Greetings FROM OUR HOME TO YOURS by Magda'70

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Obama: Fox <b>News</b> Has A Point Of View That Is &#39;Ultimately <b>...</b>

President Obama has given a lengthy interview to Rolling Stone publisher Jann Wenner for the upcoming issue of the magazine. The cover story is titled Obama Fights Back and boy does he ever. At least where Fox News is concerned.

Obama Says Fox <b>News</b> Promotes &#39;Destructive&#39; Viewpoint - NYTimes.com

Fox News Channel responds to President Obama's sharp critique of the channel in a Rolling Stone interview.

Critics &quot;validated&quot; Wii Dead Space Wii <b>News</b> - Page 1 | Eurogamer.net

Read our Wii news of Critics. ... Dead Space: Extraction explained 3 September, 2009. Latest News. Visceral wants to make Dead Space 3 . Wii's Dead Space heading to PSN/XBLA? . Dead Space 2 to have online multiplayer? ...

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Obama: Fox <b>News</b> Has A Point Of View That Is &#39;Ultimately <b>...</b>

President Obama has given a lengthy interview to Rolling Stone publisher Jann Wenner for the upcoming issue of the magazine. The cover story is titled Obama Fights Back and boy does he ever. At least where Fox News is concerned.

Obama Says Fox <b>News</b> Promotes &#39;Destructive&#39; Viewpoint - NYTimes.com

Fox News Channel responds to President Obama's sharp critique of the channel in a Rolling Stone interview.

Critics &quot;validated&quot; Wii Dead Space Wii <b>News</b> - Page 1 | Eurogamer.net

Read our Wii news of Critics. ... Dead Space: Extraction explained 3 September, 2009. Latest News. Visceral wants to make Dead Space 3 . Wii's Dead Space heading to PSN/XBLA? . Dead Space 2 to have online multiplayer? ...


Greetings FROM OUR HOME TO YOURS by Magda'70

http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/07_18/b4032066.htm

http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/07_18/b4032066.htm

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http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune_archive/1999/10/25/267811/index.htm

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http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/07_18/b4032066.htm

Friday, September 24, 2010

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(CNN)- With one day to go until the primary, an ugly GOP Senate nomination battle in Delaware is getting even uglier.


The Tea Party Express, the California based national Tea Party organization that's backing conservative candidate Christine O'Donnell, is demanding that Delaware Republican Party Chairman Tom Ross resign.


Ross is supporting former governor and nine-term state-wide Rep. Mike Castle in the contest. In May, at the state GOP convention, the moderate congressman and former two-term governor defeated O'Donnell, a conservative commentator and marketing consultant who ran unsuccessfully for the Senate in 2006 and 2008.


Tea Party Express endorsed O'Donnell earlier this summer and in the past two weeks went up with ads attacking Castle as too moderate. The group says they'll spend at least $250,000 on behalf of O'Donnell. A similar last minute blitz by the Tea Party Express last month was credited in helping conservative candidate Joe Miller top Sen. Lisa Murkowski in Alaska's Republican primary.



Ross has become very vocal in the past two weeks in criticizing O'Donnell and the Tea Party Express's involvement in the race.


Sunday night the Tea Party Express laid out an ultimatum.


"Tom Ross must resign within the next 24 hours or face immediate termination," declared Amy Kremer, Chairman of the Tea Party Express. "As Mike Castle's chief advocate, Mr. Ross has trashed Republican candidates, beliefs and principles, and shown a complete lack of character or integrity. He is a walking disaster who has brought irreparable harm to the Republican Party."


In an email release, the Tea Party Express said they were calling for the resignation in conjunction with a coalition of Delaware Republicans and conservative activists.


In a statement to CNN, the Delaware Republican Party fired back.


"As party chairman, Tom Ross is supporting the candidates that were elected by grassroots Delaware Republicans at the convention in May. A California political consultant who's never lived a day of her life in Delaware and is currently under investigation by the FEC for illegally coordinating with the O'Donnell campaign is the last person who should be calling for anyone's resignation," said Delaware GOP Communications Director Tom Doheny.


The investigation Doheney mentioned refers to a formal complaint the Republican Party of Delaware filed with the Federal Election Commission, accusing one of its own Senate candidates of illegally collaborating with the Tea Party Express. The Tea Party Express denies wrongdoing.


The series of TV and radio ads by the Tea Party Express attack Castle as a liberal candidate who "just keeps supporting the failed policies of Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid."


The Castle campaign has also fought back.


"Out-of-state interest groups have threatened to spend half a million dollars to fund the disgusting tactics being used by the O'Donnell campaign to make accusations," said Castle campaign manager Mike Quaranta.


Meanwhile, the Castle campaign has launched therealchristine.com, a site devoted to aggregating negative news about O'Donnell. O'Donnell has faced criticism over her personal finance issues and leftover debt from previous, unsuccessful bids for a Delaware Senate seat. She has also been accused of misstating the results of her run against Joe Biden.


The winner of Tuesday's primary will face off in November against New Castle County Executive Chris Coons, the presumptive Democratic nominee, in the battle to fill the final four years of Vice President Joe Biden's final term. Biden stepped down from the Senate after his election in November 2008 as vice president. Former Biden aide Ted Kaufman was named as an interim replacement. Kaufman is not running for a full term.


Follow Paul Steinhauser on Twitter: @PsteinhauserCNN



CNN's Alison Harding contributed to this report



Washington (CNN) - Fresh on the heels of Joe Miller's surprising win over Sen. Lisa Murkowski in the Alaska Republican Senate primary, the Tea Party movement is setting its sights on Delaware.


Now the Delaware Republican Party is taking heed – and taking on – the Tea Party-backed candidate in the state's Republican Senate primary, sparking a war of words between the state's establishment GOP and the Tea Party movement.


It's a race that pits conservative Tea Party favorite Christine O'Donnell against moderate Rep. Mike Castle, Delaware's former two-term governor and lone Congressman since 1993.


Both candidates' campaigns have become increasingly caustic, especially as Tea Party-backed candidates across the country have picked up win after win against GOP establishment candidates.


The Tea Party Express endorsed the conservative O'Donnell in July, and recently committed to spending at least six-figures in the state.


"We are launching an aggressive multimedia and multi-platform campaign to help propel Christine O'Donnell to victory, and we've only just begun," Amy Kremer, Chairman of the Tea Party Express, said in a statement.


The group originally planned to spend about $250,000 on the race, but is now considering expanding their presence with TV and radio ad buys in Philadelphia, said Tea Party Express political director Joe Wierzbicki.


A similar last minute media blitz by the Tea Party Express is credited with propelling Miller – a formerly little known candidate – to victory over Murkowski, the Republican Party-backed incumbent.


The group launched a series of TV and radio ads Thursday that support O'Donnell, and rail against Castle as a liberal candidate who "just keeps supporting the failed policies of Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid."


It's a move that has the Castle campaign fighting back.


"Out-of-state interest groups have threatened to spend half a million dollars to fund the disgusting tactics being used by the O'Donnell campaign to make accusations," said Castle campaign manager Mike Quaranta.


Meanwhile, the Castle campaign has launched therealchristine.com, a site devoted to aggregating negative news about O'Donnell.


Tom Ross, state committee chairman of the Delaware Republican Party, defended the negative nature of the site. "The stories might not be flattering, but they are factual. ...Sometimes it is necessary to make sure that the facts get out there," Ross said.


O'Donnell has faced criticism over her personal finance issues and leftover debt from previous, unsuccessful bids for a Delaware Senate seat. She has also been accused of misstating the results of her run against Joe Biden.


When asked to clarify her remarks in an interview Thursday with radio host Dan Gaffney of WGMD, O'Donnell seemed to grow increasingly frustrated, and ultimately blamed her statements on a grueling campaign schedule.


Ross, who is backing Castle, said that O'Donnell's history is troubling.


"This is a group and candidate that clearly seem to have a problem with facts. It is shocking that they would come in and support a candidate of Christine O'Donnell's ilk," he said.


"It is sad that the group didn't investigate the candidate that they're supporting… and surprising they would take their supporters' money that they donated and squander it in such a fashion," Ross said.


Ross also questioned whether O'Donnell is capable of pulling off an upset similar to Miller's win in Alaska.


"In Alaska, it was that Joe Miller is an Ivy League grad, a war hero, excellent standing in the community," Ross said. "Look at Christine O'Donnell. She has none of those attributes. She is career politician. She's run unsuccessfully for Senate three times."


Yet, Wierzbicki criticized Ross for dismissing O'Donnell, calling her a true conservative.


" is everything that is wrong with the establishment of the Republican Party. He should be fired for serving to undermine a Republican candidate who stands on conservative principles. It's his job to advance all Republicans in the state of Delaware. Instead he has become a tool for those who wish to thwart the Republican Party platform and turn the GOP into a Democrat-lite outfit. We find him reprehensible and shameless," Wierzbicki said.


Republican Gov. Chris Christie of neighboring New Jersey endorsed Castle Thursday.


The winner will face Democrat Chris Coons in the race for Vice President Joe Biden's former seat.




big white booty lexington

The American Spectator : Good <b>News</b>

Hard to avoid the good news these days. A few days back we learned that the war in Iraq was over. Well, sort of, anyway. The President explained that U.S. troops were done with combat but would remain in a support and advisory capacity. ...

Artnet <b>News</b>: Gang assaults Turkish galleries. Plus, Miami <b>...</b>

ARTNET NEWS. Gang assaults Turkish galleries. Plus, Miami Sculpture Biennial, Prospect 1.5 New Orleans, more.

Early Critics Weigh in on Benu : Good <b>News</b>/Bad <b>News</b> : Eater SF

After slaving away in the internationally acclaimed French Laundry kitchen with one Thomas Kellar for years, Corey Lee is on his own now at Benu. If you've never heard of...


The American Spectator : Good <b>News</b>

Hard to avoid the good news these days. A few days back we learned that the war in Iraq was over. Well, sort of, anyway. The President explained that U.S. troops were done with combat but would remain in a support and advisory capacity. ...

Artnet <b>News</b>: Gang assaults Turkish galleries. Plus, Miami <b>...</b>

ARTNET NEWS. Gang assaults Turkish galleries. Plus, Miami Sculpture Biennial, Prospect 1.5 New Orleans, more.

Early Critics Weigh in on Benu : Good <b>News</b>/Bad <b>News</b> : Eater SF

After slaving away in the internationally acclaimed French Laundry kitchen with one Thomas Kellar for years, Corey Lee is on his own now at Benu. If you've never heard of...


big white booty

The American Spectator : Good <b>News</b>

Hard to avoid the good news these days. A few days back we learned that the war in Iraq was over. Well, sort of, anyway. The President explained that U.S. troops were done with combat but would remain in a support and advisory capacity. ...

Artnet <b>News</b>: Gang assaults Turkish galleries. Plus, Miami <b>...</b>

ARTNET NEWS. Gang assaults Turkish galleries. Plus, Miami Sculpture Biennial, Prospect 1.5 New Orleans, more.

Early Critics Weigh in on Benu : Good <b>News</b>/Bad <b>News</b> : Eater SF

After slaving away in the internationally acclaimed French Laundry kitchen with one Thomas Kellar for years, Corey Lee is on his own now at Benu. If you've never heard of...



Paradise Harley Davidson by crosstrippin







Paradise Harley Davidson by crosstrippin






























tracking personal finances

This post is from staff writer Sierra Black. Sierra writes about frugality, sustainable living, and getting her kids to eat kale at Childwild.com. This post is part of Book Week at Get Rich Slowly.


Since my twin victories of paying off our last credit card and funding a summer of travel, my husband has begun to show interest in personal finance.


It’s not that he wasn’t supportive of my efforts before — he just preferred to support them from a safe, ignorant distance. A distance from which I handed him an envelope of cash each week to do the grocery shopping, he didn’t ask too many questions, and somehow we were climbing out of debt. He was more than happy to adopt any frugal-living strategy I suggested, as long as he didn’t have to think about the Big Picture.


That system worked, but I longed for more active participation from him. Not only because I wanted us to share equally in the journey toward financial freedom — I do want that — but also for a selfish reason. I wanted him to participate because he’s better at this stuff than I am. He’s a whiz at spreadsheets. The man has a Ph.d in Physical Chemistry. You don’t get one of those without doing a few math problems.


Lately, I’ve been getting my wish. My husband has been talking with a financial advisor at the university he works for, and having clear, honest conversations with me about our money.


This seemed like the perfect time for me to read Mary Hunt’s How to Debt-Proof Your Marriage.


Relationship first

Hunt’s book covers the basics of personal finance and debt destruction, with a special focus on doing it as a couple. Before she even begins talking about financial management, Hunt talks about strengthening the foundations of your marriage. You can’t have financial harmony without emotional intimacy, she says.


I couldn’t agree more. It’s clear in my own marriage that spending time relaxing together on vacation helped my husband and me both chill out and have better conversations during our family finance meetings too.


Hunt and I part ways in the chapters about how to achieve that emotional intimacy, though. She bases her prescription for marital bliss on traditional gender roles. She includes chapters for each sex on how to make deposits in the other’s Love Bank — a metaphorical bank of goodwill made of small, loving gestures.


The Love Bank is an adorable idea, one I’m tempted to put into practice here in my own home. I’m pretty sure I won’t be making my deposits to my husband’s Love Bank by biting my tongue when I disagree with him, though. Likewise, I don’t expect him to express his love for me by bringing me flowers and handling all the tough decisions for me like the natural leader of our family should.


Hunt is a generation (or two) older than I am, and what works for her marriage is so foreign to my young, feminist mind that it was actually a little hard to read. But leaving aside the details of how you get to an intimate marriage, though, she and I agree wholeheartedly that it’s important to get your emotional needs met before you can effectively work together with your spouse to manage your finances.


Money second

The personal-finance half of the book will be familiar to most GRS readers. Hunt advocates an approach similar to Your Money or Your Life and Dave Ramsey’s Total Money Makeover, one that begins with calculating your net worth and tracking your expenses. From there, she covers the basics of setting up an emergency fund, creating a spending plan, and starting a debt snowball (though she uses different terms for these steps).


Like her ideal of a healthy relationship, Hunt’s financial advice seems a little dated in places. A lot of it has to do with how to organize your three-ring binders, or how to painstakingly accomplish by-hand calculations that Mint can do for you in a few minutes. If you’re a devotee of the pen-and-paper approach, though, her chapters on how to track and plan your spending are rock solid and detailed enough to easily follow.


The one thing in this book that made me want to put it down, run to my office, and implement it on the spot was, in fact, her filing system. Hunt takes a few pages to go over exactly what personal records you should be keeping, and outlines an elegant effective way to organize them. I spent an hour tearing apart my filing cabinet yesterday as soon as I read those pages. I may not want my marriage to look much like hers, but I’m delighted to have made over my filing cabinet in Mary Hunt’s image.


Different views

There are a few areas where Mary’s financial advice deviates from the usual Get Rich Slowly formula. One is the matter of the debt snowball. She encourages readers to start saving 10% of their income towards an emergency fund immediately, while still paying the minimums on their credit cards. Only after saving up a fully funded six-month emergency fund would Hunt advise you to roll those savings into your credit card payments.


Given the relative interest rates on credit cards and savings accounts, this approach will almost certainly cost you money. If it works for you psychologically, though, by all means pursue it. No matter what order you do them in, the key steps of tracking your spending, creating an emergency fund, and snowballing your debt payments will lead you to financial security.


Another place where she breaks with conventional wisdom is in her savings and spending ratios. GRS readers are familiar with the Balanced Money Formula that encourages us to use 50% of our money for living expenses, 30% for fun and 20% for savings. Hunt advises 10% for giving, 10% for saving and 80% for spending.


The order of those percentages is vital to her. A devout Christian, Hunt feels that all the money that comes into your life is a blessing from God, and promptly giving 10% of it back to God shows you can be trusted with this blessing, and more of it will come your way.


I’m not a Christian, but I admire Mary’s faith and devotion to charitable giving. It’s a goal of mine to give 10% of my income. I’ve written about that here before, and readers made a persuasive case for waiting until my debts were paid before giving so much away. For now, I give a modest amount and look forward to giving more in the future.


I think that for Hunt, the psychological benefits of giving 10% and saving 10% before you make any spending decisions at all outweigh the financial benefits of paying off your debts as fast as possible and then beginning to accumulate and donate wealth.


It’s an interesting approach, and one that might work for a lot of people. Particularly if you’re a devoted Christian and looking for a personal-finance book that reflects your values, you’ll find a lot of good in How to Debt-Proof Your Marriage. If you’re looking for a book that’s totally focused on financial savvy and relationship skills, though, this might not be your best bet.









This post is from staff writer Sierra Black. Sierra writes about frugality, sustainable living, and getting her kids to eat kale at Childwild.com. This post is part of Book Week at Get Rich Slowly.


Since my twin victories of paying off our last credit card and funding a summer of travel, my husband has begun to show interest in personal finance.


It’s not that he wasn’t supportive of my efforts before — he just preferred to support them from a safe, ignorant distance. A distance from which I handed him an envelope of cash each week to do the grocery shopping, he didn’t ask too many questions, and somehow we were climbing out of debt. He was more than happy to adopt any frugal-living strategy I suggested, as long as he didn’t have to think about the Big Picture.


That system worked, but I longed for more active participation from him. Not only because I wanted us to share equally in the journey toward financial freedom — I do want that — but also for a selfish reason. I wanted him to participate because he’s better at this stuff than I am. He’s a whiz at spreadsheets. The man has a Ph.d in Physical Chemistry. You don’t get one of those without doing a few math problems.


Lately, I’ve been getting my wish. My husband has been talking with a financial advisor at the university he works for, and having clear, honest conversations with me about our money.


This seemed like the perfect time for me to read Mary Hunt’s How to Debt-Proof Your Marriage.


Relationship first

Hunt’s book covers the basics of personal finance and debt destruction, with a special focus on doing it as a couple. Before she even begins talking about financial management, Hunt talks about strengthening the foundations of your marriage. You can’t have financial harmony without emotional intimacy, she says.


I couldn’t agree more. It’s clear in my own marriage that spending time relaxing together on vacation helped my husband and me both chill out and have better conversations during our family finance meetings too.


Hunt and I part ways in the chapters about how to achieve that emotional intimacy, though. She bases her prescription for marital bliss on traditional gender roles. She includes chapters for each sex on how to make deposits in the other’s Love Bank — a metaphorical bank of goodwill made of small, loving gestures.


The Love Bank is an adorable idea, one I’m tempted to put into practice here in my own home. I’m pretty sure I won’t be making my deposits to my husband’s Love Bank by biting my tongue when I disagree with him, though. Likewise, I don’t expect him to express his love for me by bringing me flowers and handling all the tough decisions for me like the natural leader of our family should.


Hunt is a generation (or two) older than I am, and what works for her marriage is so foreign to my young, feminist mind that it was actually a little hard to read. But leaving aside the details of how you get to an intimate marriage, though, she and I agree wholeheartedly that it’s important to get your emotional needs met before you can effectively work together with your spouse to manage your finances.


Money second

The personal-finance half of the book will be familiar to most GRS readers. Hunt advocates an approach similar to Your Money or Your Life and Dave Ramsey’s Total Money Makeover, one that begins with calculating your net worth and tracking your expenses. From there, she covers the basics of setting up an emergency fund, creating a spending plan, and starting a debt snowball (though she uses different terms for these steps).


Like her ideal of a healthy relationship, Hunt’s financial advice seems a little dated in places. A lot of it has to do with how to organize your three-ring binders, or how to painstakingly accomplish by-hand calculations that Mint can do for you in a few minutes. If you’re a devotee of the pen-and-paper approach, though, her chapters on how to track and plan your spending are rock solid and detailed enough to easily follow.


The one thing in this book that made me want to put it down, run to my office, and implement it on the spot was, in fact, her filing system. Hunt takes a few pages to go over exactly what personal records you should be keeping, and outlines an elegant effective way to organize them. I spent an hour tearing apart my filing cabinet yesterday as soon as I read those pages. I may not want my marriage to look much like hers, but I’m delighted to have made over my filing cabinet in Mary Hunt’s image.


Different views

There are a few areas where Mary’s financial advice deviates from the usual Get Rich Slowly formula. One is the matter of the debt snowball. She encourages readers to start saving 10% of their income towards an emergency fund immediately, while still paying the minimums on their credit cards. Only after saving up a fully funded six-month emergency fund would Hunt advise you to roll those savings into your credit card payments.


Given the relative interest rates on credit cards and savings accounts, this approach will almost certainly cost you money. If it works for you psychologically, though, by all means pursue it. No matter what order you do them in, the key steps of tracking your spending, creating an emergency fund, and snowballing your debt payments will lead you to financial security.


Another place where she breaks with conventional wisdom is in her savings and spending ratios. GRS readers are familiar with the Balanced Money Formula that encourages us to use 50% of our money for living expenses, 30% for fun and 20% for savings. Hunt advises 10% for giving, 10% for saving and 80% for spending.


The order of those percentages is vital to her. A devout Christian, Hunt feels that all the money that comes into your life is a blessing from God, and promptly giving 10% of it back to God shows you can be trusted with this blessing, and more of it will come your way.


I’m not a Christian, but I admire Mary’s faith and devotion to charitable giving. It’s a goal of mine to give 10% of my income. I’ve written about that here before, and readers made a persuasive case for waiting until my debts were paid before giving so much away. For now, I give a modest amount and look forward to giving more in the future.


I think that for Hunt, the psychological benefits of giving 10% and saving 10% before you make any spending decisions at all outweigh the financial benefits of paying off your debts as fast as possible and then beginning to accumulate and donate wealth.


It’s an interesting approach, and one that might work for a lot of people. Particularly if you’re a devoted Christian and looking for a personal-finance book that reflects your values, you’ll find a lot of good in How to Debt-Proof Your Marriage. If you’re looking for a book that’s totally focused on financial savvy and relationship skills, though, this might not be your best bet.











bobby springs ferguson

&#39;Fox <b>News</b> Sunday&#39; to Host Kentucky Senate Debate - NYTimes.com

Jack Conway, Kentucky's attorney general and the Democratic candidate for Senate, and Rand Paul, the Republican nominee, have agreed to a live debate on "Fox News Sunday" on Oct. 3.

BREAKING <b>NEWS</b>: Lindsay Lohan Ordered Back To Jail; Bail Revoked <b>...</b>

9:08 am PST: The judge has thrown the book at Lindsay. Her bail was revoked. She was handcuffed and taken into custody. A probation hearing was set for October 22nd. Lindsay appeared stunned. 8:22 am PDT: Lindsay has entered the ...

Actual Real Life Good Internet <b>News</b>: Super Wi-Fi Coming Soon <b>...</b>

Most of the time, news about the internet is both hard to understand and seemingly bad. There are always stories coming out about net neutrality where you.


&#39;Fox <b>News</b> Sunday&#39; to Host Kentucky Senate Debate - NYTimes.com

Jack Conway, Kentucky's attorney general and the Democratic candidate for Senate, and Rand Paul, the Republican nominee, have agreed to a live debate on "Fox News Sunday" on Oct. 3.

BREAKING <b>NEWS</b>: Lindsay Lohan Ordered Back To Jail; Bail Revoked <b>...</b>

9:08 am PST: The judge has thrown the book at Lindsay. Her bail was revoked. She was handcuffed and taken into custody. A probation hearing was set for October 22nd. Lindsay appeared stunned. 8:22 am PDT: Lindsay has entered the ...

Actual Real Life Good Internet <b>News</b>: Super Wi-Fi Coming Soon <b>...</b>

Most of the time, news about the internet is both hard to understand and seemingly bad. There are always stories coming out about net neutrality where you.


big white booty

&#39;Fox <b>News</b> Sunday&#39; to Host Kentucky Senate Debate - NYTimes.com

Jack Conway, Kentucky's attorney general and the Democratic candidate for Senate, and Rand Paul, the Republican nominee, have agreed to a live debate on "Fox News Sunday" on Oct. 3.

BREAKING <b>NEWS</b>: Lindsay Lohan Ordered Back To Jail; Bail Revoked <b>...</b>

9:08 am PST: The judge has thrown the book at Lindsay. Her bail was revoked. She was handcuffed and taken into custody. A probation hearing was set for October 22nd. Lindsay appeared stunned. 8:22 am PDT: Lindsay has entered the ...

Actual Real Life Good Internet <b>News</b>: Super Wi-Fi Coming Soon <b>...</b>

Most of the time, news about the internet is both hard to understand and seemingly bad. There are always stories coming out about net neutrality where you.



2010_01_02_to_06_0034 by Vikram Chadaga







2010_01_02_to_06_0034 by Vikram Chadaga






























Thursday, September 23, 2010

Online Money Making Opportunities





U.S. Group Plans a Digital Library to Aid North African Research



August 29, 2010 21:04



From the Article:


To expand North Africa's research capabilities, a project financed by the United States plans to connect the region's universities and science institutes to a "digital library" that could eventually stretch from Morocco to Libya.


The U.S. Civilian Research and Development Foundation, a nonprofit created by the U.S. government to promote international science programs, is leading the effort and is initially working with Algeria, Morocco, and Tunisia to increase their access to the latest international research, give scientists greater opportunities to collaborate, and hopefully bolster their scientific work and scholarly publishing.


The foundation, which recently completed a similar virtual library in Iraq, is spending $1.5-million on the effort. The money is part of a $5-million grant awarded to the nonprofit by the U.S. Department of State to support scientific cooperation in the Middle East and North Africa.


"The U.S. government has a renewed interest in science cooperation generally in order to solve a number of problems: environmental, economic, security," says Eric Novotny, the foundation's senior vice president. "And there's a push toward engaging the Muslim world."



One goal is to consolidate universities' existing access to online journals, negotiating one subscription with each publisher. In addition, journal articles would be available in a single, unified index, making searches easier. Another goal is to increase the visibility of North African research. The plan is to establish an open-source system for Web publishing, which will make locally produced research available online, and to help local institutions set up peer-reviewed publications where none exist.


Mr. Dunlap says the digital library's interface will be in Arabic, English, and French. It will include software that facilitates online discussions, allowing researchers to view and comment on each other's unpublished articles and automatically alerting them if others are working on similar topics.


Access the Complete Article


Source: Chronicle of Higher Ed


See Also: Science Engagement Bibliography (via U.S. Civilian Research and Development Foundation)










Category:





  • Sorry, no categories.






Last Wednesday Apple rolled out iOS 4.1 to compatible devices including iPhone 4. Included in the update was Game Center, Apple's entry into the Social Gaming fracas which was previewed back in April but not really detailed to the general public until the company's music-focused event two weeks ago. But now Game Center's live. So what is it?


When I updated my iPhone to 4.1, the first thing I did was launch Game Center, set up an account, and click the "Find Game Center Games" button. I was taken to a page on the App Store listing GC compatible games. Being not only cheap but also highly susceptible to mass marketing that seeps into my subconscious without my realizing it, I downloaded FarmVille, Zynga's free*, massively popular social game that's apparently addictive, genius, a total ripoff of some other farm game that came first, and part of the reason so many people spend all day on Facebook.


Like so many popular social games, FarmVille is "free" to play but chock full of opportunities to spend real money on virtual goods.


I spent last Thursday, Friday and the weekend getting entirely addicted to FarmVille and also downloading City Story, another free simulation game that for my money is pretty much the same thing as FarmVille, just set in a city and devoid of Facebook integration. City Story also integrates with Game Center.



Over the course of the past four days, Game Center has slowly come online, shored itself up, and started to offer a peek into its own future. Though the app/ecosystem has officially launched, I'd liken it more to a "soft launch" than a full on shipping product at this point. FarmVille currently shows up when I load Game Center, but City Story does not. Some of the time when I launch FarmVille I get a "Welcome Back, nk126" Game Center message briefly overlaid at the top of the game screen, sometimes I don't. Once I got the message but it never faded away, rendering the game semi-unplayable because it was blocking some important bits of in-game info. And so on.


As for the Center itself, right now there's not a ton to it. Game Center will match you against an opponent for some head-to-head play, and the leaderboards are pretty nicely implemented, but you have to manually add friends, whereas competing (and far more mature) services like OpenFeint allow for importing of contacts from Facebook and Twitter. 


Granted, if I was playing games like WordsWorth that lend themselves more readily to one-on-one online play, I might be getting a little more out of Game Center already. So maybe I'll do that. Once I kick this farming addiction. I know, I know, I'm super lame. I get that. I'm just not yet at the point of being over it. But as it is, what I find interesting is that Apple isn't making a ton of noise about Game Center, but rather quietly deploying and ramping it up, likely while supporting big-time developers in their efforts to update popular titles with GC compatibility. 



One would imagine we'll see a big Game Center push once the new iPod Touches hit store shelves and the holiday shopping season kicks into gear. In the meantime, Game Center is up and sorta running but still no match for OpenFeint or Plus +. Thing is, while those platforms have maturity and adoption on their side, Apple has the insanely popular App Store ecosystem on its side. It's easy to imagine a near-term world where game developers would literally be fools not to develop with GC in mind given the sheer volume of compatible, connected iOS devices (and their gaming owners) already out in the field. 


Whether or not Apple can make Game Center a compelling, innovative, and stable social gaming platform - or, if "stable" is enough on its own - remains to be seen. Expect Game Center to slowly fill out and ramp up with games and gamers alike over the coming months.


Meantime look for me ("nk126") on Game Center and hit us up in the comments with your experiences using GC or a competing platform like OpenFeint on your mobile device!



Arrowheadlines: Chiefs <b>News</b> 9/23 - Arrowhead Pride

We're over the hump and headed into Sunday. The Kansas City Chiefs are seeing a lot of guarded love. For the most part, people can't ignore our record and at the same time can't ignore our offensive production. Here's today's news.

US committed to support Lebanon&#39;s Armed Forces - Arab <b>News</b>

At no time will Arab News attempt to alter the core meaning of a comment. 3. Reject the message, edit the message when the moderators judge it to be a personal attack, defamatory (or potentially defamatory), abusive, incite hatred or ...

&#39;Climate Change&#39;: even Porritt knows the game&#39;s up – Telegraph Blogs

caption id="attachment_100054982" align="alignnone" width="300" caption="Eat lead, eco loons!"] A mournful post from my old sparring partner the Ho...


robert shumake

Arrowheadlines: Chiefs <b>News</b> 9/23 - Arrowhead Pride

We're over the hump and headed into Sunday. The Kansas City Chiefs are seeing a lot of guarded love. For the most part, people can't ignore our record and at the same time can't ignore our offensive production. Here's today's news.

US committed to support Lebanon&#39;s Armed Forces - Arab <b>News</b>

At no time will Arab News attempt to alter the core meaning of a comment. 3. Reject the message, edit the message when the moderators judge it to be a personal attack, defamatory (or potentially defamatory), abusive, incite hatred or ...

&#39;Climate Change&#39;: even Porritt knows the game&#39;s up – Telegraph Blogs

caption id="attachment_100054982" align="alignnone" width="300" caption="Eat lead, eco loons!"] A mournful post from my old sparring partner the Ho...






U.S. Group Plans a Digital Library to Aid North African Research



August 29, 2010 21:04



From the Article:


To expand North Africa's research capabilities, a project financed by the United States plans to connect the region's universities and science institutes to a "digital library" that could eventually stretch from Morocco to Libya.


The U.S. Civilian Research and Development Foundation, a nonprofit created by the U.S. government to promote international science programs, is leading the effort and is initially working with Algeria, Morocco, and Tunisia to increase their access to the latest international research, give scientists greater opportunities to collaborate, and hopefully bolster their scientific work and scholarly publishing.


The foundation, which recently completed a similar virtual library in Iraq, is spending $1.5-million on the effort. The money is part of a $5-million grant awarded to the nonprofit by the U.S. Department of State to support scientific cooperation in the Middle East and North Africa.


"The U.S. government has a renewed interest in science cooperation generally in order to solve a number of problems: environmental, economic, security," says Eric Novotny, the foundation's senior vice president. "And there's a push toward engaging the Muslim world."



One goal is to consolidate universities' existing access to online journals, negotiating one subscription with each publisher. In addition, journal articles would be available in a single, unified index, making searches easier. Another goal is to increase the visibility of North African research. The plan is to establish an open-source system for Web publishing, which will make locally produced research available online, and to help local institutions set up peer-reviewed publications where none exist.


Mr. Dunlap says the digital library's interface will be in Arabic, English, and French. It will include software that facilitates online discussions, allowing researchers to view and comment on each other's unpublished articles and automatically alerting them if others are working on similar topics.


Access the Complete Article


Source: Chronicle of Higher Ed


See Also: Science Engagement Bibliography (via U.S. Civilian Research and Development Foundation)










Category:





  • Sorry, no categories.






Last Wednesday Apple rolled out iOS 4.1 to compatible devices including iPhone 4. Included in the update was Game Center, Apple's entry into the Social Gaming fracas which was previewed back in April but not really detailed to the general public until the company's music-focused event two weeks ago. But now Game Center's live. So what is it?


When I updated my iPhone to 4.1, the first thing I did was launch Game Center, set up an account, and click the "Find Game Center Games" button. I was taken to a page on the App Store listing GC compatible games. Being not only cheap but also highly susceptible to mass marketing that seeps into my subconscious without my realizing it, I downloaded FarmVille, Zynga's free*, massively popular social game that's apparently addictive, genius, a total ripoff of some other farm game that came first, and part of the reason so many people spend all day on Facebook.


Like so many popular social games, FarmVille is "free" to play but chock full of opportunities to spend real money on virtual goods.


I spent last Thursday, Friday and the weekend getting entirely addicted to FarmVille and also downloading City Story, another free simulation game that for my money is pretty much the same thing as FarmVille, just set in a city and devoid of Facebook integration. City Story also integrates with Game Center.



Over the course of the past four days, Game Center has slowly come online, shored itself up, and started to offer a peek into its own future. Though the app/ecosystem has officially launched, I'd liken it more to a "soft launch" than a full on shipping product at this point. FarmVille currently shows up when I load Game Center, but City Story does not. Some of the time when I launch FarmVille I get a "Welcome Back, nk126" Game Center message briefly overlaid at the top of the game screen, sometimes I don't. Once I got the message but it never faded away, rendering the game semi-unplayable because it was blocking some important bits of in-game info. And so on.


As for the Center itself, right now there's not a ton to it. Game Center will match you against an opponent for some head-to-head play, and the leaderboards are pretty nicely implemented, but you have to manually add friends, whereas competing (and far more mature) services like OpenFeint allow for importing of contacts from Facebook and Twitter. 


Granted, if I was playing games like WordsWorth that lend themselves more readily to one-on-one online play, I might be getting a little more out of Game Center already. So maybe I'll do that. Once I kick this farming addiction. I know, I know, I'm super lame. I get that. I'm just not yet at the point of being over it. But as it is, what I find interesting is that Apple isn't making a ton of noise about Game Center, but rather quietly deploying and ramping it up, likely while supporting big-time developers in their efforts to update popular titles with GC compatibility. 



One would imagine we'll see a big Game Center push once the new iPod Touches hit store shelves and the holiday shopping season kicks into gear. In the meantime, Game Center is up and sorta running but still no match for OpenFeint or Plus +. Thing is, while those platforms have maturity and adoption on their side, Apple has the insanely popular App Store ecosystem on its side. It's easy to imagine a near-term world where game developers would literally be fools not to develop with GC in mind given the sheer volume of compatible, connected iOS devices (and their gaming owners) already out in the field. 


Whether or not Apple can make Game Center a compelling, innovative, and stable social gaming platform - or, if "stable" is enough on its own - remains to be seen. Expect Game Center to slowly fill out and ramp up with games and gamers alike over the coming months.


Meantime look for me ("nk126") on Game Center and hit us up in the comments with your experiences using GC or a competing platform like OpenFeint on your mobile device!




www.myebooksresell.com by myebooksresell


robert shumake

Arrowheadlines: Chiefs <b>News</b> 9/23 - Arrowhead Pride

We're over the hump and headed into Sunday. The Kansas City Chiefs are seeing a lot of guarded love. For the most part, people can't ignore our record and at the same time can't ignore our offensive production. Here's today's news.

US committed to support Lebanon&#39;s Armed Forces - Arab <b>News</b>

At no time will Arab News attempt to alter the core meaning of a comment. 3. Reject the message, edit the message when the moderators judge it to be a personal attack, defamatory (or potentially defamatory), abusive, incite hatred or ...

&#39;Climate Change&#39;: even Porritt knows the game&#39;s up – Telegraph Blogs

caption id="attachment_100054982" align="alignnone" width="300" caption="Eat lead, eco loons!"] A mournful post from my old sparring partner the Ho...


robert shumake

Arrowheadlines: Chiefs <b>News</b> 9/23 - Arrowhead Pride

We're over the hump and headed into Sunday. The Kansas City Chiefs are seeing a lot of guarded love. For the most part, people can't ignore our record and at the same time can't ignore our offensive production. Here's today's news.

US committed to support Lebanon&#39;s Armed Forces - Arab <b>News</b>

At no time will Arab News attempt to alter the core meaning of a comment. 3. Reject the message, edit the message when the moderators judge it to be a personal attack, defamatory (or potentially defamatory), abusive, incite hatred or ...

&#39;Climate Change&#39;: even Porritt knows the game&#39;s up – Telegraph Blogs

caption id="attachment_100054982" align="alignnone" width="300" caption="Eat lead, eco loons!"] A mournful post from my old sparring partner the Ho...

















Wednesday, September 22, 2010

Secrets to Making Money





The company posted an article from Google Fellow and Engineer Amit Singhal on its public policy blog. It stemmed from “a debate” about fairness in search published by the Wall Street Journal. Singhal talks a bit more about Google's secrets and competition: 



"Making our systems 100% transparent would not help users, but it would help the bad guys and spammers who try game the system. When you type "Nigeria" you probably want to learn about the country. You probably don't want to see a bunch of sites from folks offering to send you money . . . if you would only give them your bank account number!"



"We may be the world's most popular search engine, but at the end of the day our competition is literally just one click away. If we messed with results in a way that didn't serve our users' interests, they would and should simply go elsewhere—not just to other search engines like Bing, but to specialized sites like Amazon, eBay or Zillow. People are increasingly experiencing the Web through social networks like Facebook. And mobile and tablet apps are a newer alternative for accessing information."



Singhal also says that Google reveals more about its ranking factors than any other search engine, and offers more tools to webmasters to take advantage. 



Sullivan appears to think the list should be published, without revealing how factors are actually measured, but Schmidt says even the list would reveal too much.





There are a couple juicy Kate Gosselin stories in this week’s tabloids. It’s hard to believe that Kate still rates gossiping about, but there’s plenty of negative dirt on her so you can see the appeal. First off, The National Enquirer has a story that Kate doesn’t pay attention to her kids at all except when the cameras are around. She’s said to be obsessed with making money and marketing herself, to the point that she only plays with her children when they’re being filmed or photographed. Kate makes a whopping $250k an episode so she can probably afford to give it a rest and let loose with her kids. It’s too bad that the stick up her butt is pretty much permanent. Here’s part of the Enquirer’s story:


Kate Gosselin is so obsessed with making money that she’s suffering a major meltdown and her kids are turning against her, sources tell the Enquirer.


The overwhelmed single mom leaves her children mostly in the hands of nannies, and now they prefer to spend time with their dad Jon, insiders say…


“When she’s not with the kids, she’s hustling for work. She knows that she’s not spending enough time with them, but she needs to earn the money to support them all.


“She cries to friends, ‘What am I supposed to do? If I slow down, this could all go away, and we’ll be out on the street!”


Her ex-husband Jon currently does not have a job, and Kate can’t count on any financial help from him.


With Kate so focused on cash, the family’s estate in Wernersville, PA is more like a corporate office than a family home, added another source.


“Everything is for show. You’re not there unless you or someone is being paid…


“Kate always said the kids love filming, and they do - because it forces her to interact with them.”


Even worse, the children… are starting to feel as if Kate loves them only when cameras are around, said the source.


“Kate will take the kids out to play, but she stays only long enough for photographers to get pictures of her with them. Then she goes back to work in her home office and the nannies take over,” the insider revealed.


[From The National Enquirer, print edition, September 6, 2010]


I don’t like this woman, but the story sounds straight from Jon. It even goes on to claim that the kids like him and his girlfriend better and call the girlfriend “mom.” If Kate had a 9-5 job she would be away from the house during that time. If she relies on nannies to watch the kids all the time and late into the night that’s one thing, but if she does it so she can work during the day I don’t see the problem. I don’t agree with her choice of career, namely putting her kids on television, but that’s different from bashing her for using nannies so she can work. However, she should be spending time with them when the cameras aren’t around, and if she’s not doing that then this criticism is dead on.




Star has another big story about Jon Gosselin’s “tell all” and how it’s going to expose Kate. We’ve already heard that he’s writing a book, but according to PopEater it’s going to be a parenting-type book that of course has no publishers yet interested.


Star claims that Jon will tell all, though, and that he’s going to reveal Kate’s secrets. According to Star, Kate was probably already sleeping with her married bodyguard back when she was living with Jon and they were not yet separated. I wouldn’t put it past Jon to rewrite history in an attempt to make himself look like the wronged party, but it could have happened this way. We know they’re boning now. Here are the highlights from Star. (These are paraphrased except where there are quotes.)


- Bodyguard Steve Nield was staying in the basement when Jon was still living in the house. “Although Kate had a habit of sleeping late, leaving Jon to wake and feed the kids, ‘She suddenly started going down there to ‘work out’ in the mornings.’” TLC staff eventually made Steve leave.


- Kate belittled Jon. “She’d scream at him and call him names in front of their family and friends… Kate is really aggressive… a few times he could tell she was about to get physical and he’d… walk away.”


- Kate begged Jon to take her back for the show. “He has tons of texts and voicemails from Kate telling him she loved him and they should stay together for the show. Even after all the women he’s been with, Jon believes he could have gone back to Kate as recently as this spring.”


Jon doesn’t have much that we don’t already know, and he’s trying to drum up interest in whatever book he can write that will sell. If he does paint Kate as a controlling meanie who doesn’t love her kids he’ll be able to earn a little money at least. It seems like these people’s 15 minutes are just about up, especially Jon’s. Maybe that’s why Kate is freaking out and trying so hard to get paid while she can.


Radar has new photos of Kate and Jon out with their kids - separately. These photos are from 4/22 and 3/4. Credit: Fame





Chemical industry <b>news</b>

Previously you would have found the latest Chemical Industry News from our news server site. Acquisitions, mergers, share prices, new chemical industry trading…

Arrowheadlines: Chiefs <b>News</b> 9/22 - Arrowhead Pride

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Google <b>News</b> Now Eight Years Old

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robert shumake

Chemical industry <b>news</b>

Previously you would have found the latest Chemical Industry News from our news server site. Acquisitions, mergers, share prices, new chemical industry trading…

Arrowheadlines: Chiefs <b>News</b> 9/22 - Arrowhead Pride

Good morning Chiefs fans. Another day means more Kansas City Chiefs news. Let's be sure to play nice in the comment sections today. We're all Chiefs fans even if we might have different (though no less passionate) visions of what this ...

Google <b>News</b> Now Eight Years Old

google-news-screenshot-old Google today announced on the official Google blog the eighth birthday of Google News. It's a huge milestone for the California-based search company, which launched the Google News service on the 22nd of ...






The company posted an article from Google Fellow and Engineer Amit Singhal on its public policy blog. It stemmed from “a debate” about fairness in search published by the Wall Street Journal. Singhal talks a bit more about Google's secrets and competition: 



"Making our systems 100% transparent would not help users, but it would help the bad guys and spammers who try game the system. When you type "Nigeria" you probably want to learn about the country. You probably don't want to see a bunch of sites from folks offering to send you money . . . if you would only give them your bank account number!"



"We may be the world's most popular search engine, but at the end of the day our competition is literally just one click away. If we messed with results in a way that didn't serve our users' interests, they would and should simply go elsewhere—not just to other search engines like Bing, but to specialized sites like Amazon, eBay or Zillow. People are increasingly experiencing the Web through social networks like Facebook. And mobile and tablet apps are a newer alternative for accessing information."



Singhal also says that Google reveals more about its ranking factors than any other search engine, and offers more tools to webmasters to take advantage. 



Sullivan appears to think the list should be published, without revealing how factors are actually measured, but Schmidt says even the list would reveal too much.





There are a couple juicy Kate Gosselin stories in this week’s tabloids. It’s hard to believe that Kate still rates gossiping about, but there’s plenty of negative dirt on her so you can see the appeal. First off, The National Enquirer has a story that Kate doesn’t pay attention to her kids at all except when the cameras are around. She’s said to be obsessed with making money and marketing herself, to the point that she only plays with her children when they’re being filmed or photographed. Kate makes a whopping $250k an episode so she can probably afford to give it a rest and let loose with her kids. It’s too bad that the stick up her butt is pretty much permanent. Here’s part of the Enquirer’s story:


Kate Gosselin is so obsessed with making money that she’s suffering a major meltdown and her kids are turning against her, sources tell the Enquirer.


The overwhelmed single mom leaves her children mostly in the hands of nannies, and now they prefer to spend time with their dad Jon, insiders say…


“When she’s not with the kids, she’s hustling for work. She knows that she’s not spending enough time with them, but she needs to earn the money to support them all.


“She cries to friends, ‘What am I supposed to do? If I slow down, this could all go away, and we’ll be out on the street!”


Her ex-husband Jon currently does not have a job, and Kate can’t count on any financial help from him.


With Kate so focused on cash, the family’s estate in Wernersville, PA is more like a corporate office than a family home, added another source.


“Everything is for show. You’re not there unless you or someone is being paid…


“Kate always said the kids love filming, and they do - because it forces her to interact with them.”


Even worse, the children… are starting to feel as if Kate loves them only when cameras are around, said the source.


“Kate will take the kids out to play, but she stays only long enough for photographers to get pictures of her with them. Then she goes back to work in her home office and the nannies take over,” the insider revealed.


[From The National Enquirer, print edition, September 6, 2010]


I don’t like this woman, but the story sounds straight from Jon. It even goes on to claim that the kids like him and his girlfriend better and call the girlfriend “mom.” If Kate had a 9-5 job she would be away from the house during that time. If she relies on nannies to watch the kids all the time and late into the night that’s one thing, but if she does it so she can work during the day I don’t see the problem. I don’t agree with her choice of career, namely putting her kids on television, but that’s different from bashing her for using nannies so she can work. However, she should be spending time with them when the cameras aren’t around, and if she’s not doing that then this criticism is dead on.




Star has another big story about Jon Gosselin’s “tell all” and how it’s going to expose Kate. We’ve already heard that he’s writing a book, but according to PopEater it’s going to be a parenting-type book that of course has no publishers yet interested.


Star claims that Jon will tell all, though, and that he’s going to reveal Kate’s secrets. According to Star, Kate was probably already sleeping with her married bodyguard back when she was living with Jon and they were not yet separated. I wouldn’t put it past Jon to rewrite history in an attempt to make himself look like the wronged party, but it could have happened this way. We know they’re boning now. Here are the highlights from Star. (These are paraphrased except where there are quotes.)


- Bodyguard Steve Nield was staying in the basement when Jon was still living in the house. “Although Kate had a habit of sleeping late, leaving Jon to wake and feed the kids, ‘She suddenly started going down there to ‘work out’ in the mornings.’” TLC staff eventually made Steve leave.


- Kate belittled Jon. “She’d scream at him and call him names in front of their family and friends… Kate is really aggressive… a few times he could tell she was about to get physical and he’d… walk away.”


- Kate begged Jon to take her back for the show. “He has tons of texts and voicemails from Kate telling him she loved him and they should stay together for the show. Even after all the women he’s been with, Jon believes he could have gone back to Kate as recently as this spring.”


Jon doesn’t have much that we don’t already know, and he’s trying to drum up interest in whatever book he can write that will sell. If he does paint Kate as a controlling meanie who doesn’t love her kids he’ll be able to earn a little money at least. It seems like these people’s 15 minutes are just about up, especially Jon’s. Maybe that’s why Kate is freaking out and trying so hard to get paid while she can.


Radar has new photos of Kate and Jon out with their kids - separately. These photos are from 4/22 and 3/4. Credit: Fame






Newspaper Insulation by humanbn


robert shumake

Chemical industry <b>news</b>

Previously you would have found the latest Chemical Industry News from our news server site. Acquisitions, mergers, share prices, new chemical industry trading…

Arrowheadlines: Chiefs <b>News</b> 9/22 - Arrowhead Pride

Good morning Chiefs fans. Another day means more Kansas City Chiefs news. Let's be sure to play nice in the comment sections today. We're all Chiefs fans even if we might have different (though no less passionate) visions of what this ...

Google <b>News</b> Now Eight Years Old

google-news-screenshot-old Google today announced on the official Google blog the eighth birthday of Google News. It's a huge milestone for the California-based search company, which launched the Google News service on the 22nd of ...


robert shumake

Chemical industry <b>news</b>

Previously you would have found the latest Chemical Industry News from our news server site. Acquisitions, mergers, share prices, new chemical industry trading…

Arrowheadlines: Chiefs <b>News</b> 9/22 - Arrowhead Pride

Good morning Chiefs fans. Another day means more Kansas City Chiefs news. Let's be sure to play nice in the comment sections today. We're all Chiefs fans even if we might have different (though no less passionate) visions of what this ...

Google <b>News</b> Now Eight Years Old

google-news-screenshot-old Google today announced on the official Google blog the eighth birthday of Google News. It's a huge milestone for the California-based search company, which launched the Google News service on the 22nd of ...