Liberty Newsprint Dec-17-09 by Liberty Newspost

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16/12/09 - 17/12/09

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Healthcare reform by Christmas may be a fading dream By Donna Smith (Front Row Washington)

support’s been going down continuously as people learn more more about the bill,” Submitted at 12/16/2009 3:17:56 PM McConnell said at a news Democrats’ hopes of passing a conference. sweeping healthcare overhaul in The Senate slowdown began just the Senate by Christmas may as Democratic leaders appeared be fading as Republicans step up to be within reach of the 60 efforts to delay a vote while votes needed to pass the bill. public support for one of S e n a t o r J o s e p h President Barack Obama’s top Lieberman appears ready to back domestic priority continues to the legislation after enraging erode. liberal Democrats by forcing Republicans forced the Senate them to jettison the public option to begin reading aloud a 667- and a proposed alternative that page amendment by independent would have allowed uninsured Bernie Sanders that would people between the ages of 55 replace much of the 2,074-page and 64 to buy into Medicare. bill with a single payer healthcare Democratic leaders are now system. It had no chance of focused on Democratic Senator passing, and Sanders withdrew B e n N e l s o n w h o r e m a i n s the measure after it became clear undecided as he reviews a it would take well into the night potential compromise on abortion to read it. language that would ensure no Senate Republican leader Mitch public money is used to finance McConnell has said other elective abortion services. parliamentary maneuvers may be Senator Dick Durbin, the second u s e d t o s l o w t h e b i l l a s leading Democrat in the Senate, Democratic leaders aim for said that in the end they may just a final vote before Christmas. have to force any fence sitters to “The opposition’s been going up, make a decision.

“We may not be able to say we have this all signed in blood as we call the matter for a final vote,” he told reporters. “When members are confronted with the possibility of seeing an end to this healthcare debate and an end to the opportunity to expand healthcare, they may have to

Onion: Internet Archaeologists Find Ruins of 'Friendster' (Little Green Footballs)

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make that important decision.” Time is running out. If Senate Democrats have any hope of bringing the healthcare bill to a final vote before Christmas. They have to start the procedural process on the final round of votes by the end of the week. But senators are still awaiting the

details and official cost estimates of an amendment by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid that will make the final compromises and adjustments to the bill ahead of the final vote. Senator Max Baucus, who helped write the healthcare bill, said the first procedural vote could occur at about 1 a.m. Monday morning. If Republicans, who remain united in their opposition to the bill, do not allow an earlier vote, the Senate may not get to passage until late Christmas Eve. Bah Humbug! For more Reuters political news, click here. Photo credit: Reuters/Jim Young (Obama discusses healthcare Tuesday beneath a portrait of Republican President Theodore Roosevelt, an early advocate of national health insurance ); Reuters/Jason Reed (Senator Max Baucus before a committee healthcare vote in October)

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CIA working with Palestinian security agents By Ian Cobain (World news and comment from the Guardian | guardian.co.uk)

agencies was so great they could be considered "an advanced arm of the war on terror". While the CIA and the Submitted at 12/17/2009 10:16:49 AM Palestinian Authority (PA) deny US agency co-operating with the US agency controls its Palestinian counterparts who Palestinian counterparts, neither a l l e g e d l y t o r t u r e H a m a s denies that they interact closely s u p p o r t e r s i n W e s t B a n k in the West Bank. Details of that Palestinian security agents who co-operation are emerging as h a v e b e e n d e t a i n i n g a n d some human rights organisations allegedly torturing supporters of a r e b e g i n n i n g t o q u e s t i o n the Islamist organisation Hamas whether US intelligence agencies in the West Bank have been may be turning a blind eye to working closely with the CIA, abusive interrogations conducted the Guardian has learned. by other countries' intelligence Less than a year after Barack agencies with whom they are Obama signed an executive order working. According to the that prohibited torture and Palestinian watchdog al-Haq, p r o v i d e d f o r t h e l a w f u l human rights in the West Bank interrogation of detainees in US a n d G a z a h a v e " g r a v e l y custody, evidence is emerging deteriorated due to the spreading the CIA is co-operating with v i o l a t i o n s c o m m i t t e d b y security agents whose continuing Palestinian actors" this year. use of torture has been widely Most of those held without trial documented by human rights and allegedly tortured in the groups. West Bank have been supporters The relationship between the o f H a m a s , w h i c h w o n t h e CIA and the two Palestinian Palestinian elections in 2006 but agencies involved – Preventive is denounced as a terrorist Security Organisation (PSO) and organisation by the PA – which General Intelligence Service (GI) in turn is dominated by the rival – is said by some western Fatah political faction – and by diplomats and other officials in the US and EU. In the Gaza the region to be so close that the Strip, where Hamas has been in American agency appears to be control for more than two years, supervising the Palestinians' there have been reports of its work. forces detaining and torturing One senior western official said: Fatah sympathisers in the same "The [Central Intelligence] way. Agency consider them as their Among the human rights property, those two Palestinian o r g a n i s a t i o n s t h a t h a v e services." A diplomatic source documented or complained about added that US influence over the the mistreatment of detainees

held by the PA in the West Bank are Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, al-Haq and the Israeli watchdog B'Tselem. Even the PA's human rights commission has expressed "deep concern" over the mistreatment of detainees. The most common complaint is that detainees are severely beaten and subjected to a torture known as shabeh, during which they are shackled and forced to assume painful positions for long periods. There have also been reports of sleep deprivation, and of large numbers of detainees being crammed into small cells to prevent rest. Instead of being brought before civilian courts, almost all the detainees enter a system of military justice under which they need not be brought before a court for six months. According to PA officials, between 400 and 500 Hamas sympathisers are held by the PSO and GI. Some of the mistreatment has been so severe that at least three detainees have died in custody this year. The most recent was Haitham Amr, a 33-year-old nurse and Hamas supporter from Hebron who died four days after he was detained by GI officials last June. Extensive bruising around his kidneys suggested he had been beaten to death. Among those who died in GI custody last year was Majid al-Barghuti, 42, an imam at a village near Ramallah. While there is no evidence that

the CIA has been commissioning such mistreatment, human rights activists say it would end promptly if US pressure was brought to bear on the Palestinian authorities. Shawan Jabarin, general director of al-Haq, said: "The Americans could stop it any time. All they would have to do is go to [prime minister] Salam Fayyad and tell him they were making it an issue.. Then they could deal with the specifics: they could tell him that detainees needed to be brought promptly before the courts." A diplomat in the region said "at the very least" US intelligence officers were aware of the torture and not doing enough to stop it. He added: "There are a number of questions for the US administration: what is their objective, what are their rules of engagement? Do they train the GI and PSO according to the manual which was established by the previous administration, including water-boarding? Are they in control, or are they just witnessing?" Sa'id Abu-Ali, the PA's interior minister, accepted detainees had been tortured and some had died, but said such abuses had not been official policy and steps were being taken to prevent them. He said such abuses "happen in every country in the world". Abu -Ali sought initially to deny the CIA was "deeply involved" with the two Palestinian intelligence agencies responsible for the

torture of Hamas sympathisers, but then conceded that links did exist. "There is a connection, but there is no supervision by the Americans," he said. "It is solely a Palestinian affair. But the Americans help us." The CIA does not deny working with the PSO and GI in the West Bank, although it will not say what use it has made of intelligence extracted during the interrogation of Hamas supporters. But it denies turning what one official described as "a Nelson's eye to abuse". The CIA's spokesman, Paul Gimigliano, denied it played a supervisory role over the PSO or GI. "The notion that this agency somehow runs other intelligence services … is simply wrong," he said. "The CIA … only supports, and is interested in, lawful methods that produce sound intelligence." Concern about detainee abuse is growing in the West Bank despite an effort by the international community to create Palestinian institutions that will guarantee greater security as a first step towards creating a Palestinian state. More than half of the PA's $2.8bn (£1.66bn) budget came from international donors last year; more than a quarter was swallowed up by the ministry of the interior and national security. Human Rights Watch and al-Haq have said that in raising the security capacity of CIA page 7

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Give teenagers a taste for moderation | Jessica Reed By Jessica Reed (World news and comment from the Guardian | guardian.co.uk) Submitted at 12/17/2009 10:01:22 AM

If quality is emphasised over quantity, there is no right or wrong to allowing teenagers a drink – adults must set a good example As commenter zounds pointed out, there are precious few ways to discuss chief medical adviser Liam Donaldson's recommendation that no young person under the age of 15 should drink at all without giving birth to an anecdotal haemorrhage where cultural stereotypes, generalisations about class and personal experiences blend together to produce a perplexing read. Take a comment from our contributor, American-born JeanHannah Eldelstein, who said she never touched an alcoholic drink before it was legally allowed, and she doesn't regret it one bit. Imogenblack started drinking at 16. Her sister started years earlier, and both are now responsible social drinkers. Shemarch and her husband allowed their children to have a taste on special occasions; they grew up to be typical moderate drinkers. Others sadly turned out to like drinks a little too much. And so it goes on. I spent the first 21 years of my life in Touraine, one of France's famous wine-producing regions. The vast majority of my friends,

no matter their background, did have a taste of rosé or desert wine once in a while. They're now not only moderate drinkers, but quite a few of them also are keen connoisseurs of wine with a deep appreciation for the product they like to consume. I would venture that if a child is introduced to wine as a beverage to be savoured and respected, with a focus on quality rather than quantity (and it does require some pedagogy from the responsible adults), this attitude is likely to be remembered and adopted after the tumultuous years of early adulthood and its alcohol-fuelled rite of passage have come and gone. After all, if the emphasis is put on sensual pleasure very early on, rather than intoxication no matter the taste, an affinity for sipping on a good Riesling – rather than one for dirt cheap tetra-packed wines – will naturally develop. Kids will be kids, and experiments with alcohol aren't going to disappear any time soon – to deny the existence of a desire for intoxication among European adolescents is either foolish or misguided. The trick, I think, is to make it to the other side safely, and reach responsible patterns of adult consumption early on. My university years were spent in Rennes, in Brittany, which holds the record of the most intoxicated region of France. Many of my Friday and Saturday nights were spent among the student crowds surrounding the

aptly named Rue de la soif(Thirst street). Funny or embarrassing anecdotes relating to intoxication were worn like badges of honour, told and retold to circles of friends until they reach mythical heights, while the tragic ones, from the inebriated street fight to serious car accidents, were quickly swept under the carpet. According to a report published by the University of Rennes II, nine students out of 10 had drunk before, with beer the alcohol most regularly consumed by young people (I doubt students are often looking for the best organic ale). Only 12% of young people admitted to drinking more than 10 units in a month, and 17 was the age at which adolescents started to consume drinks on a monthly basis. Truth be told, these numbers didn't strike me as either alarmist or frightening. So how does alcohol consumption among young people look across Europe? Not surprisingly, European countries seem to differ not on the number of young people who had tried alcohol (most 16-yearolds in all European countries had already had a go), but on levels of intoxication and regularity of alcohol consumption. In terms of intoxication, and especially repeated intoxication, according to the Institute of Research on Alcoholic Drinks, French teenagers and those from Greece and Latin countries such as Malta or Italy, have rather low

rates compared to young people living in Anglo-Saxon and Nordic countries. In 1999, only 3% of young Greeks admitted to having been drunk three times or more during the last 30 days compared to 30% for Danish youth. The report points out that Anglo-Saxon countries are always situated in the higher bracket, both in terms of consumption frequency and repeated intoxication. Nordic countries are characterised by quite a low daily consumption, but frequent intoxication. Latin countries do not seem to share this popular youthful culture of "getting drunk": the figures are relatively low, even in the case of frequent consumption. Frequent consumption is therefore not necessarily synonymous with a lack of moderation: it all depends on cultural behaviour. French adults remain the highest consumers of alcoholic beverages in Europe. In other words, they drink an awful lot, but never so much that they lose control of their own consumption. I'm not sure either configuration is better, but if looking at the number of injuries, driving incidents or even sexual abuse linked to excessive alcohol consumption, the Latin model seems to produce fewer negative side-effects. Likewise, on medical terms, binge drinking is especially hard on the liver and blood pressure, whereas true moderation is less harmful (or as my grandfather used to say, a

glass of wine a day never killed anyone. That he knew of, anyway). Available data tells us that Donaldson isn't right or wrong: if born in England into a family that does not abuse alcohol, a young person is more likely to follow the drinking patterns already established by his country and peers, regardless of whether or not she or he was sipping beer with parents aged 11. As epidemiologist Marie Choquet points out, we can put forward the hypothesis that wilful intoxication is a model that tends to fade with age. It is therefore down to us adults to show a good example to our teenagers. I am reminded of the words of food activist Michael Pollan on eating responsibly: "Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants." A similar quote could be drafted when it comes to alcohol: "Savour quality, artisan drinks with friends. Not too many. Do not drive." • Alcohol • Wine • Food & drink • France • Young people Jessica Reed guardian.co.uk© Guardian News & Media Limited 2009 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions| More Feeds

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Leaked UN report shows cuts offered at Copenhagen would lead to 3C rise By Jonathan Watts, Suzanne Goldenberg, John Vidal (World news and comment from the Guardian | guardian.co.uk) Submitted at 12/17/2009 10:03:14 AM

UN secretariat initial draft shows gap of up to 4.2 gigatonnes of CO2 between present pledges and cuts required to limit rise to 2C Read the UN analysis document here A confidential UN analysis obtained by the Guardian reveals that the emissions cuts offered so far at the Copenhagen climate change summit will lead to global temperatures rising by an average of 3C. The analysis seriously undermines the statements by governments that they are aiming to limit emissions to a level ensuring no more than a 2C temperature rise over the next century, and indicates that the last 24 hours of negotiations will be extremely challenging. A rise of 3C would mean up to 170 million more people suffering severe coastal floods and 550 million more at risk of hunger, according to the 2006 Stern economic review of climate change for the UK government as well as leaving up to 50% of species facing extinction. Even a

rise of 2C would lead to sharp decline in tropical crop yields, more flooding and droughts. The paper was drafted by the UN secretariat running the Copenhagen summit and is dated 11pm on Tuesday evening. It is marked "do not distribute" and "initial draft". It shows a gap of up to 4.2 gigatonnes of carbon emissions between the present pledges and the required level of 44Gt, which is required to staying below a 2C rise. No higher offers have since been made. "Unless the remaining gap of around 1.9-4.2Gt is closed and Annexe 1 parties [countries] commit themselves to strong action before and after 2020, global emissions will remain on an unsustainable pathway that could lead to concentrations equal or above 550 parts per million, with the related temperature rise around 3C," it says. The goal of keeping the increase in global average temperatures below 2C, relative to preindustrial levels, has become the figure that all rich countries have committed to trying to achieve in Copenhagen. However, 102 of the world's poorest countries are holding out for emission cuts that would result in a temperature increase

of no more than 1.5C. Anything below that, they say, would leave billions of people in the world homeless, unable to feed their people and open to catastrophic weather-related disasters. "Further steps are possible and necessary to fill the gap. This could be done by increasing the aggregated emission reductions to at least 30% below the baseline levels, further stronger voluntary actions by developing countries to reduce their emissions by at least 20% below business as usual and; reducing further emissions from deforestation and international aviation and marine shipping," says the internal paper. Greenpeace campaigner Joss Garman said: "This is an explosive document that shows the numbers on the table at the moment would lead to nothing less than climate breakdown and an extraordinarily dangerous situation for humanity. The UN is admitting in private that the pledges made by world leaders would lead to a 3C rise in temperatures. The science shows that could lead to the collapse of the Amazon rainforest, crippling water shortages across South America and Australia and the near-extinction of tropical coral reefs, and that's just the start of it."

The talks remained on a knife edge on Thursday, with world leaders meeting for the first time this evening at a dinner hosted by the Queen of Denmark. One great obstacle - the fate of the Kyoto treaty - was solved today with China and the developing world seeing off attempts to kill the protocol. But the row caused much time to be lost and whether enough time remains to salvage a strong deal is still in question. The biggest remaining obstacles that remain are who pays for the fight against climate change and how much, emissions cuts and how promises of cuts are verified. Earlier, US secretary of state, Hillary Clinton, pushed the negotiations forward by committing the US to contribute to a $100bn (£62bn) a year fund from 2020. Indonesia today followed China's lead in softening its opposition to international monitoring of carbon cuts. Earlier this week, Rajendra Pachauri, who heads the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), told the Guardian that even with 1.5C rises, many communities would suffer. "Some of the most vulnerable regions in the world will be worst affected. These will be the largest countries in the developing world. They have

little infrastructure that might protect them from climate change. The tragedy of the situation is that those countries that have not at all contributed to the problem of climate change will be the ones that are most affected," he said. "Some parts of the world, which even with a 1.5C rise, will suffer great hardship and lose their ability to lead a decent and stable form of existence. If we are going to be concerned about these communities, then maybe 1.5C is what we should be targeting. But if we can find means by which those communities can be helped to withstand the impact of climate change with substantial flow of finances, then maybe one can go to 2C." • Copenhagen climate change conference 2009 • Climate change • Carbon emissions • Flooding • Drought • Sea level Jonathan Watts Suzanne Goldenberg John Vidal guardian.co.uk© Guardian News & Media Limited 2009 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions| More Feeds

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Silvio Berlusconi leaves hospital four days after attack By John Hooper (World news and comment from the Guardian | guardian.co.uk) Submitted at 12/17/2009 10:26:37 AM

Italian prime minister vows to go on 'with more strength and determination than before' Silvio Berlusconi left hospital today/yesterday[THURS] after spending four nights under medical supervision following an attack with a souvenir model of the Milan cathedral. The 73-year-old Italian prime minister waved weakly and looked grim as he was slowly driven away in a motorcade from San Raffaele hospital in Milan late this/yesterday[THURS] morning, his face covered in bandages. Berlusconi later said in a statement released by his office that he would go on "with more strength and determination than before". "I will remember two things about these days: the hatred of a few and the love of many, many Italians," he said. Initial news reports said the motorcade was heading for

Arcore, Berlusconi's villa on the outskirts of Milan, but journalists stationed there reported that, hours after he had left hospital, he had not returned home. A Swiss media report quoted the mayor of Gravesano, in southern Switzerland, as saying the prime minister was expected to check into a clinic in the town, amid reports that he was to have cosmetic surgery on injuries caused by the attack. The prime minister's staff declined to comment on his destination. Last night Berlusconi's doctors put off a decision on his discharge from hospital for the third time since he was admitted on Sunday. His personal physician, Alberto Zangrillo, said: "His condition is reassuring, and we are reassured." Zangrillo said Berlusconi was in considerable pain and unable to eat normally. The physician said earlier this week that the prime minister, while still bloodied, had told him there was a "climate of hatred" and that he had expected to be attacked.

Berlusconi lost half a litre of blood after he was hit with an angular souvenir replica of Milan Cathedral. He was left with a broken nose, two chipped teeth and cuts inside and around his mouth – unpleasant injuries, but not necessarily such as to warrant a four-day stay in hospital. On Tuesday Zangrillo said the blow to the prime minister's head had inflamed a long-standing neck complaint. A medical bulletin issued last night by the San Raffaele hospital said that was one reason for keeping him in and his general clinical condition was "good and satisfactory". As Italy's interior minister, Roberto Maroni, expressed concern over the possibility of copycat attacks, a man was arrested trying to reach Berlusconi's bedroom. Police said he had entered the hospital through the underground car park and taken the lift – an explanation that raised further doubts about the prime minister's security. Police said the 26-year-old man from Turin appeared to have

psychological problems. They said he had not been carrying any weapon, although ice hockey sticks were found in his car. A judge approved the jailing of Berlusconi's assailant, Massimo Tartaglia, who is being held in the neuro-psychiatric observation centre at San Vittore prison in Milan. The judge ruled there was a risk of the 42-year-old committing other violent acts. The cabinet will today discuss proposals to black out venomously anti-Berlusconi websites and tighten security at public gatherings. Maroni said the internet crackdown would not be put into effect at once but into a bill that would be debated in parliament. • Silvio Berlusconi • Italy John Hooper guardian.co.uk© Guardian News & Media Limited 2009 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions| More Feeds

Browser makers hope WebGL will remake 3D By Stephen Shankland (Webware.com)

Don't believe WebGL is real? but plenty of development is Here's how to try the 3D browser n e e d e d f o r t h i s g r a p h i c s technology yourself. It works, f o u n d a t i o n t o m a t u r e .

Originally posted at Deep Tech

Stepfather confesses to sticking 42 needles into boy's body (World news and comment from the Guardian | guardian.co.uk) Submitted at 12/17/2009 10:18:33 AM

Two-year-old Brazilian boy found with metal sewing needles inside his body, including some in his lungs The stepfather of a two-year-old boy found with 42 needles in his body has confessed to jabbing them into him as part of a religious ritual, Brazilian police said today. Roberto Carlos Magalhaes claimed that a woman who went into a trance commanded him to stick the needles into the boy's body, a police inspector, Helder Fernandes Santana, said. He said three people, including the stepfather and the woman, had been arrested. Doctors found 42 needles in the boy, who was in stable condition in the city of Salvador after a 240 -mile flight to a hospital in Barreiras with a special heart unit. • Brazil guardian.co.uk© Guardian News & Media Limited 2009 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions| More Feeds

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Yemen 'kills 34 al-Qaida members in raids' By Ian Black (World news and comment from the Guardian | guardian.co.uk)

targets, had been found in Sana'a. Those captured in Abyan included foreigners. Diplomats and analysts said Submitted at 12/17/2009 10:26:58 AM Yemen's president, Ali Abdullah Ministry of defence says 17 Salih, was anxious to promote his others involved in terrorist determination to defeat al-Qaida organisation detained in military amidst concern that the terrorist operations organisation – generally on the Yemen today claimed to have back foot elsewhere – had been killed 34 members of al-Qaida consolidating its presence in and captured 17 others in security Osama bin Laden's ancestral operations in a country in which homeland. a growing jihadi presence is Having been effectively defeated ringing alarm bells in the west. in neighbouring Saudi Arabia, alYemen's ministry of defence Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula said troops, backed by aircraft, has shifted operations to Yemen, had mounted "successful pre- taking advantage of a weak state emptive operations" against al- facing a fully-fledged rebellion in Qaida targets including a training the north and unrest in the south, camp in the southern province of as well as endemic poverty, rapid Abyan and in the Arhab district population growth and other north of the capital, Sana'a. chronic problems. An opposition source said scores US officials recently described of civilians had been killed in one Yemen as a "reserve base" for alair attack. Qaida activities in Pakistan and Pro-government media reported Afghanistan, a concern shared by that eight al-Qaida operatives, Britain. with explosive belts prepared for Recent talks between the US suicide bombing attacks on s e c r e t a r y o f s t a t e , H i l l a r y schools and Yemeni and foreign C l i n t o n , a n d h e r S a u d i

counterpart, Prince Saud alFaisal, focused on the Yemen situation. It was also one of the main items at this week's summit of the Gulf Cooperation Council in Kuwait. News of the action against alQaida coincided with reports that Saudi infantry, supported by aircraft and artillery, had mounted new operations to block infilitration across the border between the two countries by Yemeni Houthi rebels. The Al-Arabiyya TV channel reported that the rebels had fired katyusha rockets into Saudi territory. Yemeni forces mounted an offensive against the Houthis in August, with the Saudis joining the operation in early November after rebel forces crossed the border. Tens of thousands of people have been displaced by the fighting, triggering concern amongst relief agencies. The Houthis claimed 70 civilians were killed in a Saudi attack this week.

Yemen has repeatedly accused its arch-rival Iran of backing the rebels. Iran and the Houthis in turn claimed US planes had been involved in the recent air strikes, although the White House denies military involvement in the region. The Houthis have posted videos on the internet showing people trying to clear rubble covering human bodies. Yemen has also refuted allegations of US invovlement. "It is false rumour," a military source told the army's 26 September website. • Yemen • Al-Qaida • Iran • United States • Saudi Arabia Ian Black guardian.co.uk© Guardian News & Media Limited 2009 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions| More Feeds

Sprint Nextel's moves Boost Mobile head to oversee 4G development By Brian White (BloggingStocks) Submitted at 12/16/2009 6:00:00 PM

Filed under: Launches, Consumer experience, Sprint Nextel Corp (S) Sprint Nextel Corporation ( S) is taking the executive that was in charge of its Boost Mobile prepaid brand when subscriber growth exploded almost a year ago and putting him in charge of the company's 4G wireless expansion efforts. Continue reading Sprint Nextel's moves Boost Mobile head to oversee 4G development Sprint Nextel's moves Boost Mobile head to oversee 4G development originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Wed, 16 Dec 2009 18:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds. Read| Permalink| Email this| Comments

Oracle earnings preview: Holding its own as Sun deal closes By Trey Thoelcke (BloggingStocks)

JAVA), is scheduled to discuss its financial results for the second quarter of fiscal 2010 in a Submitted at 12/16/2009 6:30:00 PM conference call Thursday, Filed under: Earnings reports, December 17, at 5:00 PM (ET). Forecasts, Oracle Corp (ORCL) You can catch the live webcast of Enterprise software giant Oracle t h e c a l l o n t h e c o m p a n y ' s Corporation ( ORCL), which w e b s i t e . finally completed the deal to The three months that ended in its proposed acquisition of Sun acquire Sun Microsystems, Inc. ( November saw Oracle deny that Micro would reduce competition

and detailed its plans for Sun. Analysts surveyed by Thomson Reuters are looking for Oracle to report that earnings for the quarter rose two cents per share from a year ago to $0.36. Revenue is expected to the same as a year ago, or $5.7 billion. Continue reading Oracle earnings preview: Holding its

own as Sun deal closes Oracle earnings preview: Holding its own as Sun deal closes originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Wed, 16 Dec 2009 18:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds. Permalink| Email this| Comments

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Spanish region set to ban bullfighting By Giles Tremlett (World news and comment from the Guardian | guardian.co.uk) Submitted at 12/17/2009 9:57:17 AM

Catalan parliament prepares to vote on law giving fighting bulls the same level of protection from cruelty as other animals Bullfighting looks set to be banned in part of Spain as the Catalan parliament prepares to vote tomorrow to prohibit one of the country's most emblematic, and bloodiest, traditions. In a move that campaigners hope will mark the beginning of the end for bullfighting in the country that invented it, a petition with 127,000 signatures was delivered to the region's parliament earlier this week. Under local laws, the parliament must first vote on whether to accept the petition and then draw up a law, which would be subject to a second, definitive vote in several months' time. The law is likely to be passed, with minority separatist and farleft parties in the region committed to supporting the ban, while the major parties allow their deputies to vote freely.

Separatists claim bullfighting is not a Catalan tradition. Deputies have made it clear that, while they may ban bullfights, they will not prohibit Catalan fiestas in which bulls are chased through the streets and tormented, sometimes with balls of fire attached to their horns. The petition calls for a change in Catalonia's animal cruelty law that would see fighting bulls, which are currently excluded, protected from any kind of torture. "If the deputies are going to behave like proper representatives of the people, then they must accept the ban," said Manuel Cases, of the Catalan Animals Rights Association. "Seventy percent of Catalans are against bullfighting." The move has sparked an impassioned debate in a country where matadors are big stars. Bullfighting is referred to as "the national fiesta" and reviews are published in the arts, rather than the sports, pages of newspapers. Among those battling for bullfighting to continue are a group of local artists and writers,

including artist Miquel Barceló and theatre director Calixto Bieito. "Banning the bullfight means banning part of our liberty," they said in a manifesto published yesterday. They are backed by a group of left-wing Spanish intellectuals who are unconditional supporters of celebrity matador José Tomás. Tomás has done much recently to revive enthusiasm for bullfighting in Barcelona and other parts of Catalonia after years of decline. Campaigners hope, however, that if the ban goes ahead other Spanish regions will follow suit. "Everywhere in Spain the majority of people say they do not like bullfights," said Cases. "Over time, this will have to be prohibited. Otherwise we will be back in the stone age." • Spain • Animal welfare Giles Tremlett guardian.co.uk© Guardian News & Media Limited 2009 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions| More Feeds

CIA continued from page 2

the PA, donor countries have a responsibility to ensure it observes international human rights standards. At the heart of the international effort is the creation of the Palestinian national security force, a 7,500-strong gendarmerie trained by US, British, Canadian and Turkish army officers under the command of a US general, Keith Dayton. Many Palestinians blame Dayton for the mistreatment of Hamas sympathisers, although the general's remit does not extend to either of the intelligence agencies responsible. Some in Dayton's team are said to have been warned by senior CIA officers that they should not attempt to interfere in the work of the PSO or GI. Privately, some of them are said to fear that the mistreatment of detainees, and the anger this is arousing among the population, may undermine

their mission. One source said: "I know that Dayton and his crew are very concerned about what is happening in those detention centres because they know it can jeopardise their work." • CIA • Palestinian territories • United States • Hamas • Gaza • Torture • Human rights • Israel • Middle East Ian Cobain guardian.co.uk© Guardian News & Media Limited 2009 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions| More Feeds

Rebooting A Christmas Story By Steven Leckart (Wired Top Stories) Submitted at 12/16/2009 5:00:00 PM

decoder ring were cool back in 1983, but they're quaint today. Here's Wired's update.

The classic movie's air rifle and

Nike Earnings Preview: Another Upside Surprise for Q2? By Trey Thoelcke (BloggingStocks)

stands by embattled Tiger Woods, is scheduled to discuss its financial results for the second Submitted at 12/17/2009 8:30:00 AM quarter of fiscal 2010 in a Filed under: Earnings reports, c o n f e r e n c e c a l l T h u r s d a y , Forecasts, NIKE, Inc'B' (NKE) December 17, at 5:00 PM (ET). t h e c a l l o n t h e c o m p a n y ' s Nike Inc. ( NKE), which said it You can catch the live webcast of

website. Continue reading Nike Earnings Preview: Another Upside Surprise for Q2? Nike Earnings Preview: Another Upside Surprise for Q2? originally appeared on

BloggingStocks on Thu, 17 Dec 2009 08:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds. Permalink| Email this| Comments

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Options Update: Research Before the Bell: Futures in Motion December Lower After Fed Options Active into EPS Statement, Ahead of Data By Paul Foster (BloggingStocks)

Track Data, suggesting traders taking positions for near term price movement. Submitted at 12/17/2009 8:00:00 AM Continue reading Options Filed under: Research in Motion Update: Research in Motion (RIMM), Options December Options Active into Research in Motion( RIMM) EPS closed at $64.67. Research in Options Update: Research in Motion is expected to report Q3 M o t i o n D e c e m b e r O p t i o n s EPS today. January option Active into EPS originally implied volatility is at 55, March appeared on BloggingStocks on is at 52; versus its 26-week Thu, 17 Dec 2009 08:00:00 EST. average of 54. RIMM December Please see our terms for use of 60 straddle is priced at $5.30, feeds. Permalink| Email this| January is at $8.45 according to Comments

By Melly Alazraki (BloggingStocks)

Filed under: Before the bell, International markets, Market matters, Citigroup Inc. (C), Bank of America (BAC), Economic data, Oil, Federal Reserve U.S. stock futures fell Thursday morning after finishing relatively flat and mixed the day before. The Federal Reserve's statement Wednesday afternoon added to concerns about future tightening, even as the central bank left key rates at a record low for now. Several economic reports are due this morning, including jobs data. Continue reading Before the

Jobless Claims Further Sour Street's Mood By Mark Fightmaster (BloggingStocks)

Is Viacom a Viable Idea for the New Year?

Submitted at 12/17/2009 7:45:00 AM

crude oil and treasurys reacted negatively to the news. Continue reading Jobless Claims Submitted at 12/17/2009 9:30:00 AM Further Sour Street's Mood Filed under: Before the bell, Bad Jobless Claims Further Sour news, Economic data What Street's Mood originally appeared started as a rough morning have on BloggingStocks on Thu, 17 become even rougher after the Dec 2009 09:30:00 EST. Please weekly release of jobless claims. in the past week to total 480,000, see our terms for use of feeds. I n i t i a l j o b l e s s c l a i m s reversing the recent trend. While Permalink| Email this| Comments unexpectedly increased by 7,000 the dollar remained higher, both

By Steven Mallas (BloggingStocks) Bell: Futures Lower After Fed Statement, Ahead of Data Before the Bell: Futures Lower After Fed Statement, Ahead of Data originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Thu, 17 Dec 2009 07:45:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds. Permalink| Email this| Comments

Forgot your anniversary? Facebook's got it covered By Josh Lowensohn (Webware.com) Submitted at 12/17/2009 9:44:00 AM

Forgetful significant others get a reprieve from Facebook, which just introduced way to get reminded when it's your anniversary. Originally posted at Web Crawler

Submitted at 12/17/2009 9:00:00 AM

Filed under: Time Warner (TWX), Walt Disney (DIS), Viacom (VIA), News Corp'B' (NWS), Media World Looking for an idea in the media sector? Disney's ( DIS) stock has been doing well. News Corp. ( NWS) is near a 52-week high. Time Warner ( TWX) is on a roll, too. Continue reading Is Viacom a Viable Idea for the New Year? Is Viacom a Viable Idea for the New Year? originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Thu, 17 Dec 2009 09:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds. Read| Permalink| Email this| Comments

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It's OK. I Love My Old Gear, Too [Old Gadgets] By Chris Jacob (Gizmodo) Submitted at 12/17/2009 9:40:03 AM

You'd think a guy who writes about tech all day would have the latest and greatest gear. Confession time: I don't. In fact, most of it's pretty old and I sort of like it that way. The winter months are the hardest time to not want new stuff. We're inundated with sales, and in a few short weeks we'll be ogling next year's tech at CES. As the resident Gizmodo "no I won't upgrade my PowerBook" curmudgeon, I'm here for support. Take a look at the gear I use, and how despite its age, all (well, most of) it has plenty of life left. I Call Him FrankenPod No, you're not seeing things. The image above is indeed a picture of my primary media player, and yes, it is an iPod mini. Go ahead, get the Borat jokes out of your system. Done? Okay, now hear me out. Don't judge a book by its cover. As far as I'm concerned, this little guy can blow away nearly any other MP3 player on the market. Under the hood, I swapped the 6GB microdrive with a 16GB Compact Flash card. I can easily change it out for a 32 or a 64GB card once prices come down. It's also running what I consider to be the most feature-rich firmware around, Rockbox. What looks like a beat-up iPod mini is actually a robust, nearly indestructible flash-based portable audio player, all built for

a fraction of what a new one costs. The mini isn't the only old iPod that's easily moddable. Considering about 118% of the United States' population has an old iPod lying around somewhere by now, chances are you've got what you need for a fun weekend project. Even if your heart's set on the Zune HD's OLED display or the Touch's app catalog, some love and a little elbow grease can breathe old life into that old iPod, and give you a great secondary PMP. The Little Computer that Could

When I walked into Gizmodo HQ on my first day, I was nervous. Some of that anxiety was the new job jitters, but I was mostly afraid that my 12" PowerBook wouldn't cut it. Gizmodo moves fast, and my aging machine certainly doesn't. I was on the verge of upgrading, but decided to see how my old hardware fared before taking the plunge. Long story short: It did the job. Barely. But through compromise, I made it work. I love Firefox and all of its extensions, but Safari runs at half the resource

another that could feasibly last for 4+. Whenever that computer comes out, I'll probably bite, but until then I'm happy squeezing a little extra life out of my aging hardware. Look at how you use your computer. If you're rendering all day, never leave Photoshop, or doing any other heavy computing and you need the speed, then upgrade. But the rest of us can probably hold off a little longer, even tech-obsessed gadget bloggers. Nice Peeling Chrome Paint, Dude I'm fairly certain I'm the only writer at Gizmodo without a smartphone. Yes, dumbphones must die, and someday I will upgrade this one. But for now, it makes calls, texts, and even has an almost acceptable music player built in that works in a pinch. Google services run surprisingly well in a WAP browser, too, so I can get email load. Photoshop Elements does and read my RSS feeds when what I need without the huge necessary. footprint of CS. With a little Would I love to have a thought as to what applications I smartphone? Sure. (Hey Brian was running, which ones I didn't Lam and Jason Chen, skip down need, and where I was willing to a few sentences) But it's also c o m p r o m i s e , m y p l u c k y really nice to be disconnected P o w e r B o o k a n d I m a d e i t sometimes. My Gizmodo email through the summer. account receives a very steady As much as I love the little guy, stream of emails, to say the least. it's not like I haven't thought I like being able to walk away about replacing him. I almost from the computer and cut pulled the trigger on a new myself off every once in a while, MacBook last month. At the last without my phone constantly minute I decided that instead of reminding me that there's work to buying a computer that would IT'S page 10 last me 2-3 years, I wanted

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IT'S continued from page 9

be done (Okay overlords, you can read on from here). Just Because it's Old Doesn't Mean it Sounds Worse No, this stereo doesn't do DTSHD Master Audio. It has zero HDMI ports. But it still does 2channel audio pretty well, more than well enough for what I need it to do. Repurposing old stereo equipment is one of the best ways to build a great system on the cheap. The turntable and receiver are my dad's old gear, coupled with a pair of speakers I yanked off of a CD player I've had since I was 14. The setup won't win me any audiophile cred, but it definitely does a much-better-than-OK job at playing music. Not to mention that it's pretty cool to listen on the same equipment my dad once used. When I was 17, I found his old record collection in the basement and immediately started spinning it on his long-forgotten turntable. Call me corny, but I think it's pretty awesome to know that 30some years ago he was listening to the same records on the same deck. If you aren't lucky enough to have access to your parents' old stereo equipment, it's not uncommon to find some real gems at your local thrift shop on the cheap, tossed away by someone who thought McIntosh is a cheap Apple knock-off.

Okay, so Maybe I Want to Upgrade Some of It I do have one thing that I desperately want, and will upgrade to soon: an HDTV. I've never owned anything besides tube TVs under 20 inches. The fact that flat-panel prices are finally reasonable, combined with the digital switchover makes it prime time for me to jump the CRT ship. I want to say that it always makes sense to hold onto your old TV after you upgrade, but in this case it might not. Television sets were at their saturation point well before HDTVs came along. In 2009 there were more TVs per household than people. By now it's likely that you just don't have room for a fourth or twelfth tube anywhere. If you find yourself needing to dispose of an aging TV, please do so properly. Donate it. Sell it on Craigslist. Or look into electronics recycling centers in your area. An old TV may not have a place in your house or apartment, but it might find a place in someone else's home. It certainly doesn't belong in a landfill. See? I'm Not a Total Luddite I might roll with old stuff, but I'm not some sort of quasi-neoluddite. Plenty of other gadgets in my arsenal are much more recent than what you see here. I have a PS3, my music gets fed to my stereo through a Squeezebox,

and I do have another receiver that handles multichannel audio, albeit a relatively cheap and older one (and in case you're wondering, I did take these pictures with a DSLR, but it's not mine). So yes, even I don't always live by the "never upgrade" mentality. Planned obsolescence and the industry's fast pace make it impossible to live by that creed. But I also think that a lot of the time we feel "forced" to upgrade we're really being driven by gadget lust, that powerful desire which makes us overlook the benefits of using old stuff. Here's what I always think about when that ol' familiar "gotta have it" feeling hits. The biggest and most obvious perk: buy new stuff less often, save money. I don't know about you, but if I walk away from a big purchase, I feel like I've won. It's like trapping money that was trying to escape from my bank account. And if you've got a bit of the treehugging hippy spirit in you, you'll feel good about cutting down on your e-waste output, even if only by a little bit. Not to mention the freedom old gear provides. I imagine it's similar to the feeling of operating the Mars rovers. I know that my gadgets have gone far beyond their planned mission length, so I throw them around without caring if they get damaged. And once that old gear inevitably goes

belly up, I'll feel no remorse upgrading something that lasted for so long. But that doesn't mean I won't be sad to lose my gadgets. I've heard other tech junkies say that we should never fall in love with technology, because we'll just end up heartbroken when it's time to say goodbye. In my opinion, that emotional connection is exactly what we need nowadays. If we all try to love our gadgets, to start treating them more like companions than disposable tools, a lot more perfectly good gear could be saved from an untimely retirement. I know more than a few of you out there are eyeing some new toys for the holidays. I am too. But before we let upgraditis get the best of us, let's consider what we already have. Maybe it's still good enough. Maybe there's a new part that could make our gadgets better, and provide a fun modding project to boot. Take it from me: There's almost always some way to squeeze extra life out of old gear. Now, if you'll excuse me, there's an old Dell tower around here somewhere that's begging to become a NAS.

Second Fuse UI video shows wild, dynamically lit 3D interface By Paul Miller (Engadget) Submitted at 12/17/2009 1:23:00 PM

We only got the briefest of glimpses at the new UI approach in Synaptics' collaborative Fuse concept handset, and now TAT (The Astonishing Tribe, the folks behind the original Android UI), has posted a brief clip that gives a better idea of the full UI. It's pretty wild, with some sort of rendering engine that really emphasizes depth, lighting and motion. We're not sure it's the most usable UI on the planet, but it's certainly one of the oddest we've witnessed. Check it out in motion after the break. Continue reading Second Fuse UI video shows wild, dynamically lit 3D interface Second Fuse UI video shows wild, dynamically lit 3D interface originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 17 Dec 2009 13:23:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds. Permalink Phone Arena| TAT| Email this| Comments

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Product Photo Awards: Arcade Putting Pro By Doug Aamoth (CrunchGear)

MY GOD THAT MANEATING TIGER THAT ESCAPED FROM THE ZOO IS Submitted at 12/17/2009 8:30:00 AM COMING RIGHT AT US!” Product photography is an art The kid, meanwhile, seems to be form. It must appeal to the looking right at the director. senses, tickle one’s fancy, instill “Don’t look at the camera, Carl, a sense of urgency – I NEED IT! look at me. Okay back straight, Take this Arcade Putting Pro shoulders square aaaaand… putt. game, available at JCPenney.com T h e r e y o u g o . M a n , t h a t on clearance for $30. turquoise shirt is showing up The golf balls are MOVING! great on camera. Turquoise is You can tell because of the 2010’s color of the year, mind whooooosh lines. The father is you.” EXCITED! His son is about to “Okay guys, let’s break for sink a putt! He may also be lunch,” announces the director. excited because he bears an “Dad, I’m going to need you to uncanny resemblance to Adam stick around, Carl you’re all done Sandler’s friend Peter Dante. for the day. Nice work. Everyone But something strange is afoot. else, let’s get set up for the Peter Dante looks excited, yet second product shot. This next apprehensive, as if something off one will be used for Amazon’s camera is about to happen. product page and I’m gonna need Something BAD!“My son is Randy and Beverly in here. about to sink this putt but OH Randy, same story as Carl but

look straight down. Beverly, I need to you scream as you notice the tiger charging at you. Dad, you’re going to be wearing a non -identifying red baseball cap, a ringer tee, and I want you to look directly at me as though you’ve been huffing glue while riding

the city bus all morning. Perfect.” And that’s the story behind the Arcade Putting Pro product photos. As for the product itself, a JC Penny customer says: “Purchased game to use at a fall festival. Set up at my house for a trial by adults, no children. Game

started falling apart within 5 minutes. The plastic screws that connect the main part of the game to the mat would not stay in. Used the 2 replacements sent; same thing happened. The folding plastic brace that lifts the main part of the game fell off continuously. I used metal screws to reinforce so that I can hopefully get some use from it.. Very poorly made- not worth the price.” So there you have it. An otherwise poor-quality product that’s been saved by exceptional marketing photos. Clearance! Arcade Putting Pro[JC Penney via dealnews]

FSJ's Anti-AT&T Manifesto Makes Me Raise My Fist in Solidarity [At&t] By Adam Frucci (Gizmodo) Submitted at 12/17/2009 9:00:00 AM

Fake Steve Jobs' new"chat" with AT&T's Randall Stephenson from a few days ago has him hitting brilliant new heights. He really nails why AT&T's network failures are so infuriating. This is essential reading, if you missed it. While I'm ranting, let me ask you something, Randall. At the

risk of sounding like Glenn Beck Jr. - what the fuck has gone wrong with our country? Used to be, we were innovators. We were leaders. We were builders. We were engineers. We were the best and brightest. We were the kind of guys who, if they were running the biggest mobile network in the U.S., would say it's not enough to be the biggest, we also want to be the best, and they'd say, How can we get even once they got to be the best, better? What can we do to be the

best in the whole fucking world? What can we do that would blow people's fucking minds? They wouldn't have sat around wondering about ways to fuck over people who loved their product. But then something happened. Guys like you took over the phone company and all you cared about was milking profit and paying off assholes in Congress to fuck over anyone who came along with a better

idea, because even though it might be great for consumers it would mean you and your lazy pals would have to get off your asses and start working again in order to keep up. Yes, this is in the arrogant, blustery Fake Steve voice, but make no mistake: there's nothing sarcastic about the message or the content here. [ Fake Steve Jobs]

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TV Armor Review: Better Than a Broken TV, I Guess [Review] By Mark Wilson (Gizmodo) Submitted at 12/17/2009 8:20:00 AM

TV Armor is a clear, acrylic shield for your LCD or plasma set. You know, for if your little Hellspawn thinks that pounding a GI Joe against the television is funny. The Price $150 as tested, for a 40-42" screen. The Verdict If you had a very nice TV and a very naughty child, I could see the appeal of TV armor. The hardest part of installation is pulling the plastic film off the TV armor itself. Once that's done, you stick a few felt adhesive pads on the back, then set the armor directly over your television (it hooks from the top). Even without the straps, I found the shield extremely wellbalanced. That is, before I proceeded to bang the crap out of it with my remote. I basically tried to stab my Samsung to death with a blunt DirecTV remote. And I failed (which was a good thing).

Blackberry email down across most carriers By Matt Burns (CrunchGear) Submitted at 12/17/2009 8:51:52 AM

While I'm not sure it could withstand a brick coming straight at it, TV Armor didn't flex enough to contact my TV's real glass screen at all during my remote test. However, the armor wasn't left completely unscathed. Some of the remote's plastic left little spots on the screen (and items like keys are sure to scratch the surface). But, I guess if you were investing in the product, you'd want it damaged rather

than your TV. As for glare and general watchability, it roughly doubles reflections coming off the screen. I found the sacrifice adequate, though depending on your precise lighting situation, results may vary. (The glare off a fully open window can get pretty intense at certain angles.) So it's your call. But if I may be as bold as to suggest, for $130, the money spent on TV Armor

could buy a lot of Ritalin and child muzzles. [ TV Armor] Solid construction Minimal effects on overall image quality Once it scratches, does that defeat the point or completely justify the device? Increases glare moderately

Oh noes! BIS is down for nearly everyone in the States and Canada. It’s really just the email service. Web browsing, SMS, BlackBerry messenger, and phone calls are seemingly fine. We’ll keep you updated, but it seems like a good time to give your thumbs a rest. You’ll have to get back to work soon enough. [ CrackBerry via Gizmodo] Update: RIM has confirmed the outage, but didn’t state when the service will be restored.

BlackBerry email down / delayed in North America By Nilay Patel (Engadget) Submitted at 12/17/2009 12:17:00 PM

Go nna be a long day for BlackBerry users: RIM's confirmed to multiple outlets that its BIS servers are acting up and

that email services are being delayed -- and we're actually hearing that they're just down, period. BlackBerry Messenger still works, though, so you can still BBM your BFF or whatever the kids do nowadays. No word on service restoration, but we'll

update you when we find out. P.S.- That's two months in a row with significant BIS problems-what's up with that, RIM? [Thanks to everyone who sent this in] BlackBerry email down /

delayed in North America originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 17 Dec 2009 12:17:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds. Permalink| Yahoo, CrackBerry| Email this| Comments

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AT&T to offer 'incentives' to customers willing to limit data usage By Donald Melanson (Engadget) Submitted at 12/17/2009 12:55:00 PM

AT&T exec #1: You know, our network's really getting slammed with all these people using their unlimited data plans to download things and do stuff online all the time. Any ideas how we can fix it? AT&T exec #2: We could put out more WiFi hotspots. People seem to use those. Sometimes. AT&T exec #1: Sure, but that's not going to make a dent in places like New York City. I mean, have you used an iPhone there? AT&T exec #2: We have these things called MicroCells that people can use at home, if they live in North Carolina. Maybe more people could use those? AT&T exec #1: Yeah, that's

good. But people like to use their cellphones outside their house too. What happens then? AT&T exec #2: Well, what if we offered customers incentives to use less data?

AT&T exec #1: Now you're talking! What sort of incentives could get them to do that? AT&T exec #2: Hmm.... Well, readers, are there any incentives that would get you to use less data? Feel free to offer your suggestions for AT&T in the comments below. And don't worry about actually paying more for data (yet, anyway), as AT&T 's Ralph de la Vega is now saying that "we have not made any decision to implement tiered pricing," which is a slight backtrack from previous hints to the contrary. AT&T to offer 'incentives' to customers willing to limit data usage originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 17 Dec 2009 12:55:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds. Permalink| Wall Street Journal| Email this| Comments

Jon Stewart on the Final Tea Party of the Year (Little Green Footballs) Submitted at 12/17/2009 10:15:02 AM

The targets are almost too easy, i n ” is hilarious but Stewart’s take on Tuesday’s n o n e t h e l e s s . [ V i d e o ] incredibly loony tea party “die-

Someone call the RIAA: Amazon accidentally sends out Lil Wayne album despite the fact that it’s been delayed till February By Nicholas Deleon (CrunchGear) Submitted at 12/17/2009 10:00:07 AM

Oops! As I’m sure you all know, famous rapper Lil Wayne has a new album in the works. It was supposed to come out next week, but was pushed back for whatever reason. No big deal, albums get pushed back all the time. (See: Detox. We’ll have flying cars by the time that comes out.) Anyhow, apparently Amazon didn’t get the memo since it sent out copies of the album to about 500 people who pre-ordered it. And as if you had to ask: yes, the album has already been pirated. I guarantee you can find it on Canal Street (to say nothing of “the Internet”) by the end of the day today. The album, Rebirth, has been pushed back to February 1, primarily to give its first single, “On Fire,” some more time to get heat. Amazon hasn’t said anything about the accidental release yet. If you were to ask me, and you’re not, I’d tell Lil Wayne’s

record label, Universal, to just release the album now. It’s all over the Internet, so anyone who wants to download it can—why wait till February to buy it? And once it hits the Internet, it’ll hit the streets (Canal Street, and your local city’s equivalent) by the end of the work day today. Best use this little snafu to your advantage. Besides, it’s not like you need to market or advertise Lil Wayne. The guy is huge. I can’t speak to the latest album, but the comments I’ve seen aren’t exactly glowing…

Zune HD Twitter App Won't Let You F#&$ing Swear [ZuneHd] By Brian Barrett (Gizmodo) Submitted at 12/17/2009 9:35:03 AM

In the most random and

unfortunate we've seen Ninjawords HD Twitter

act of censorship since the iTunes debacle, the Zune app automatically

whitewashes any bad words that

show up in your timeline. We've reached out to Zune to see if there's a way to adjust settings to switch it off, but if that's how

Microsoft rolls, well, what a b%tch move. [ Engadget]

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Shock study: Wii Fit alone won’t get you into shape (nor is it supposed to, by the way) By Nicholas Deleon (CrunchGear) Submitted at 12/17/2009 9:10:33 AM

Shocking study coming out of the University of Minnesota that says Wii Fit won’t get you into shape, despite what you may think. Well, to be specific, the study says the game won’t produce “significant changes in daily physical activity, muscular fitness, flexibility, balance or body composition.” The study, which took place

over six months, looked at eight families in North America and gave them the game for three months, then took away the game for three months. It found that families used the game an average of 22 minutes per day. You’ll recall that Americans watched TV for an average of 18 hours per week, or 2.57 hours per day. Yeah. That’s the thing: Wii Fit isn’t exactly heavy training, so using it for only 22 minutes per day and

changing nothing else about your lifestyle wouldn’t produce any sort of noticeable fitness result.

Ericsson demos 42Mbps HSPA Evolution for the laypeople By Darren Murph (Engadget)

upgrades start rolling out. Granted, we've seen mobile data Submitted at 12/17/2009 11:08:00 AM rates tickle the 42Mbps mark Talk about making good on a before, but those showcases were promise... and then some. Back hardly ready for public in March, Ericsson proudly consumption. Meanwhile, proclaimed that it would be able Verizon and AT&T are spending to make 21Mbps look like child's bundles arguing about their play by reaching 28Mbps before still, it's now available for mass c o m p a r a t i v e l y g l a c i a l " 3 G the dawn of 2010, and now the deployment. Unfortunately, networks." Way to go, America. company is tooting its horn once details beyond that were few and Ericsson demos 42Mbps HSPA m o r e a f t e r d e m o n s t r a t i n g far between -- we're guessing Evolution for the laypeople 42Mbps equipment to common Ericsson just needed an avenue to originally appeared on Engadget folk over in Stockholm, Sweden. gloat -- but we suspect carriers on Thu, 17 Dec 2009 11:08:00 Reportedly, it's the planet's first like Telstra will be pushing out EST. Please see our terms for 42Mbps HSPA achievement on their own releases once the use of feeds. Permalink| Ericsson| commercial products, and better Email this| Comments

The game is supposed to help train you into the habit of taking in less calories than you burn, how to be conscious of that fact that a hamburger has more calories than a banana, etc. So use Wii Fit to develop healthy habits, which is what Nintendo has always said the game was about, and not to look like Brock Lesnar or George St. Pierre. Hard work is hard.

Hands-on: Bing for iPhone By Jessica Dolcourt (Webware.com) Submitted at 12/16/2009 11:34:00 AM

The new Bing 1.0 for iPhone offers a viable alternative to Google's searching and mapping dominance. Originally posted at iPhone Atlas

Video: Much progress has been made on Dungeons and Dragons for Microsoft Surface By Nicholas Deleon (CrunchGear) Submitted at 12/17/2009 10:30:44 AM

Remember Dungeons & Dungeons for the Microsoft Surface? It looks to be coming along nicely.

This here video(it’s sorta long at 7 minutes long) shows what the team at Carnegie Mellon University have come up with so far. Excerpt photo was Flickr’d via Kotaku

Russian firm DST on a roll, upping stake in Facebook? By Caroline McCarthy (Webware.com) Submitted at 12/17/2009 6:08:00 AM

The investment company's stake

in Facebook is now over 5 percent, a Russian newspaper reports--and it also just powered Zynga's $180 million round. Originally posted at The Social

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Nexus One Google Phone Could Arrive on TMobile January 5th [Googe] By Sean Fallon (Gizmodo) Submitted at 12/17/2009 9:36:00 AM

According to Reuters, Google will have two versions of the Nexus Oneâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;one unlocked and one on a service contract with TMobile. The phone could be available directly from Google as early as January 5th. "In the long term Google will become a seller and get commission from operators," the source said, adding that other operators are expected to follow

T-Mobile's lead eventually and agree to Google's terms. Reuters also quotes Baird Research analyst Will Power on how Google's choice to market

their own phone shakes up the smartphone market, but mostly screws other Android makers: "We expect the launch of a new competitive device to be

directionally negative for most of the existing smart phone markers, including Apple, Research in Motion, Nokia Oyg, HTC, Motorola Inc, Palm Inc, Samsung and others, while perhaps most negative for the existing Android partners." If Google's choice to go the traditional route with carriers is true, it would, of course, dash any possibility that they might be giving this thing away for free. Let's just hope the unlocked version comes cheap. [ Reuters]

Firefox 3.5.6 patches critical security holes By Stephen Shankland (Webware.com) Submitted at 12/16/2009 11:31:00 AM

A memory corruption bug and two issues with Ogg media technology are among the 62 fixes in the latest version of Mozilla's browser. Originally posted at Deep Tech

Starlight 64 stakes its claim for 'world's smallest' N64 mod By Joseph L. Flatley (Engadget) Submitted at 12/17/2009 11:33:00 AM

Until that iPhone N64 emulator guy makes with the goods, it looks like folks wanting the full Nintendo 64 experience "on the go" are going to have to turn to the generous talents of the

modding community. Claiming to be "officially" the world's smallest (we don't know who the sanctioning body is for this title, so we'll let him duke it out with the N64Mini guy), YouTube member spiritwalker47's portable console is quite a number: featuring a 5-inch display, n e c e s s a r y c o n t r o l s , a n d a polycarbonate case with all the

presumed battery life of three hours or so, the Starlight 64 is perfect for all your portable retro gaming needs. In addition, this guy has a docking station that throws composite video, SVideo, and up to four controllers into the mix. Ready to see the thing in action? Of course you are. Video's after the break.

Continue reading Starlight 64 stakes its claim for 'world's smallest' N64 mod Starlight 64 stakes its claim for 'world's smallest' N64 mod originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 17 Dec 2009 11:33:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds. Permalink| ModRetro| Email this| Comments

Vexia Econav GPS nags you about your driving By Joseph L. Flatley (Engadget) Submitted at 12/17/2009 10:43:00 AM

If the folks at Vexia are to be believed, green transportation is not about fancy electric vehicles or, heaven forbid, riding your bike -- nope, it's about having a GPS that offers advice on your

driving. Both the Econav 480 (4.3-inch) and 380 (3.5-inch) can be configured for your specific automobile make and model, after which your usual calm, solitary driving experience is replaced by the cold mechanical voice of a satnav as it admonishes you for excessive past the speed limit, and so forth. acceleration, breaking, driving With other Econav models out in

Spain for a while now, these guys are finally available to environmentally conscious Britons at prices starting at ÂŁ149 (depending on model and map collection). And what about the states? It looks like you'll be stuck taking driving direction from Homer Simpson for the time being.

Vexia Econav GPS nags you about your driving originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 17 Dec 2009 10:43:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds. Permalink Tech Digest| Vexia| Email this| Comments

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BlackBerry Internet Service Outage Kills Email On Virtually Every Carrier Nationwide [BlackBerry] By John Herrman (Gizmodo)

Sony e-readers get Florida gets its own exclusive Dow Jones, Tesla dealership New York Post content By Matt Burns (CrunchGear)

By Donald Melanson (Engadget)

Wall Street Journal PLUS, a digital edition of the morning paper that also features an update Submitted at 12/17/2009 11:52:00 AM of the day's events after the close Hoping to read the New York of the markets. Owners of the Post on an e-reader anytime Sony Reader Daily Edition will soon? Then your choices just got also naturally be able to get the quite a bit more limited, as the day's papers wirelessly delivered newspaper has signed a deal that t o t h e i r r e a d e r s , w i t h will see Sony offer the only subscriptions running between version of the paper for digital $9.99 and $19.99 a month. reading devices. Joining it are Sony e-readers get exclusive various exclusive offerings from Dow Jones, New York Post D o w J o n e s & C o m p a n y , content originally appeared on including The Wall Street Journal Engadget on Thu, 17 Dec 2009 and MarketWatch, which won't 11:52:00 EST. Please see our be completely exclusive to Sony terms for use of feeds. Permalink| readers, but will be available in P R N e w s w i r e | E m a i l t h i s | special editions only available on C o m m e n t s Sony readers -- that includes The

someone walks in with $100k in available credit. This will make Tesla’s tenth I can see it now. Instead of dealership in the States and the putzing around in electric golf only one in the South. It’s also carts, retirees will soon be the home of the region’s only cruising in Tesla Roadsters. The Tesla mobile service team that car is essentially a gigantic actually goes to the Tesla and dramatically more powerful owner’s home or business for golf cart anyway. It’s not like maintenance calls. they need to worry about the 244 Plus, should seniors need a place mile range. The bingo hall and to shelter funds, they should be golf course is probably right reminded that some cars have around the corner from their proven to be a more secure retirement compound anyway. investment than Wall Street. The South Florida Dania Beach Trust me, you would rather dealership opens today and will i n h e r i t a T e s l a R o a d s t e r be offering test drives through t h a n m u t u a l f u n d s a n y w a y . the weekend. And anytime Submitted at 12/17/2009 9:35:07 AM

Submitted at 12/17/2009 8:11:42 AM

BlackBerry's BIS email servers have apparently shit the bed, big time: users across the country (and in Canada too!) are reporting that while internet services in general work, email has been out all morning. Berry havers: what say you? [ CrackBerry]

Google project shows when Web content is hiding By Stephen Shankland (Webware.com) Submitted at 12/16/2009 11:30:00 PM

The Browser Size tool provides an overlay to reveal how likely it is people are reading the extremities of a Web page. Originally posted at Deep Tech

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Amateur Artist Wants To Ban All Sales Of Old Baltimore Ravens Game Films Over Logo Copyright By Mike Masnick (Techdirt)

LaCie 2Big: The First USB 3.0 RAID Drive [Storage]

SodiumOne: Sony’s possibly legitimately fun game in Home By Nicholas Deleon (CrunchGear) Submitted at 12/17/2009 8:00:21 AM

Sony hasn’t given up on Home, its virtual world filled with avatars and overall weirdness. It just launched Sodium One, which is the latest Home world you and your avatar can spend the day in. There’s a game to go along with it, one that looks an awful lot like Wipeout, which isn’t bad at all. The actual game, Salt Shooter, does have a ludicrous premise, but it’s hardly the only one with that affliction: “This entertainment event, set in a

future of advanced technology where man and machine meet on a vast salt plain to turn deadly battle into extreme sport[lol wut?], resides only in the evergrowing world of PlayStation Home.” Like I said, ludicrous. My guess is that once you play it you won’t pay any attention to the story. Sony’s giving away 1,500 vouchers for full Salt Shooter unlocks, so best to login as soon as possible for your chance to win. More Salt Shooter less random stupidity:

Submitted at 12/17/2009 5:52:52 AM

Copycense points us to an ongoing lawsuit by a guy seeking to bar the Baltimore Ravens and the NFL from making use By Mark Wilson (Gizmodo) commercially of any game Submitted at 12/17/2009 9:16:39 AM involving the Ravens from 1996 to 1998. At issue was that this You can't buy them until early guy claimed his logo design was 2010, but LaCie's next generation copied by the team. A few years 2Big drives will be the first USB back, William Patry detailed the 3.0 devices to support dual- ridiculousness behind the original S A T A - d i s k R A I D 0 / 1 lawsuit and how it had resulted in configurations, promising real many more ridiculous lawsuits: time HD video editing and burst Bouchat, a security guard in speeds up to 275MB/s. [ BW] Baltimore, believed that the Baltimore Ravens had infringed a design he claims to have created for the team's logo. He sued the team and the NFL's licensing arm. In my opinion, there was no evidence of access and the thus By Rafe Needleman the case should have been (Webware.com) summarily dismissed. In my Submitted at 12/16/2009 5:24:00 PM opinion, the case was a shakedown. But, applying the Asking subscribers to pay for the fatally flawed theory of striking same content twice will not work. similarity, the case went to a jury. Originally posted at Rafe's Radar The jury found liability, and the Fourth Circuit affirmed in an awful decision that drew an excellent dissent by Judge King, 228 F.3d 489 (4th Cir. 2000), amended by and pet. for reh'g en banc denied. 241 F.3d 350. Judge

Dear newspapers: I will pay for your content, once

King's dissent is the best thing yet written on why striking similarity is inherently inconsistent with basic copyright principles, and as to the facts in Bouchat, devastating to the plaintiff's claim and the majority opinion. While Bouchat "won," he wasn't given any money, because he had failed to register his design before it was put into use. But he's since sued various other companies, and this latest lawsuit is an attempt to say that no one can show those old films because they use "his" logo, despite the lack of evidence of actual copying (which, if copyright were actually about copyright would be necessary). The lower court turned him down, noting that the use of the logo was incidental and fair use, but Bouchat is (of course) appealing. This is, again, in line with Patry's analysis that this is nothing more than a shakedown. He's not really interested in stopping the sale of these videos. He wants the team to pay him a big chunk of money so that it can keep selling the videos. This is not what copyright is intended to do, but it's what happens when copyright law gets out of control. Permalink| Comments| Email This Story

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Microsoft: Blood, Sweat and Bing [2009 in Review] By Ben Parr (Mashable!) Submitted at 12/17/2009 7:19:17 AM

For decades, Microsoft has been a technological giant that nobody can ignore. This year has been a unique one for the Redmond, Washington-based company. It announced layoffs and revenue shortfalls, both rare occurrences in the company’s 34+ year history. With Google breathing down its neck and Apple posting record profits, Microsoft decided to use 2009 to strike back and go on the offensive. From the launch of Windows 7 to the rise of Bing and the Microsoft-Yahoo search deal, here is a review of the key events, trends, and products that shaped Microsoft in 2009. Microsoft’s Early 2009 Struggles For the first five months of the year, Microsoft wasn’t making a lot of news, and when it did, it wasn’t good. While Steve Ballmer, Microsoft’s CEO, painted a rosy picture of the company’s future with his Consumer Electronics Show keynote speech on January 7th, 2008, Microsoft was struggling with negative sentiment against Windows Vista, a European Union investigation against bundling Internet Explorer with Windows, and the first major layoffs in the company’s history. There were a few small product partnerships and events that occurred during the first few months of 2009, especially in

terms of social media. For example, Microsoft partnered with MySpace on Windows Mobile and Silverlight and announced Microsoft Recite, a mobile notetaking application. Microsoft also started cutting the fat, and not just in terms of layoffs. It closed some longstanding but obsolete projects such as Microsoft Encarta and Flight Simulator. Internet Explorer 8 The biggest release Microsoft made during the first three months of 2009 however was Internet Explorer 8, the newest edition of its popular web browser. With the help of random celebrity endorsements, social media, vomiting ads, and its reach with Microsoft Windows, IE8 has reached nearly 20% market share. Overall though, IE has been on the decline while Chrome, Safari, and Firefox have all been growing. Couple this with the backlash against IE6(still the world’s most popular browser) and Google’s release of Chrome Frame for IE, and you get a mixed picture of the future of IE. Currently, Microsoft is working on Internet Explorer 9, which is focused on adhering to the world’s web standards and improving IE’s speed. 2009’s Turning Point: Bing While the release of IE8 was important, it was nothing compared to the search bombshell that Microsoft had up its sleeve.

tremendous. They held a Bingathon, ran innovative TV ads, and bet big on Twitter, which all paid off — at least in the beginning. In its first month, Bing became bigger than Digg, Twitter, and CNN. From there, Bing kept growing. Microsoft’s success was so pronounced that For years, Microsoft has tried to G o o g l e e v e n a s s i g n e d t o p take down Google at its own engineers to study Bing and game. However, MSN, Live reacted to its moves. Microsoft Search, and all of its other and Yahoo attempts failed to make a dent in Bing’s launch was only the first Google’s market share. Instead part of Microsoft’s plan to take of choosing to fade away into down Google. After Microsoft web search obscurity in 2009, failed to acquire Yahoo last year, Microsoft decided to double the tech giant explored other down with one of the biggest bets options for beating Google on its in the company’s history. own turf, including ones At the end of May, it was involving Yahoo. In April, revealed that Microsoft was reports surfaced that Microsoft launching a new rival to Google still wanted to partner with called Bing. Bing was not only a Yahoo. rebranding of Microsoft search, As it turns out, those reports but Microsoft’s reinvention of were true. In July, Microsoft and the search engine. Bing Maps, Yahoo signed a pact that gave Twitter integration, Visual Microsoft control of Yahoo Search, and other innovations Search in return for a 10 year were central to the Bing revenue share agreement experience, and to Microsoft’s favoring Yahoo. While the deal adoption strategy. won’t take effect until 2010, it M i c r o s o f t ’ s p l a n t o s p u r has essentially given Microsoft adoption for Bing (and take another 15-20% share of the people away from Google) was search market. simple: first, they’d create and Microsoft has set the stage for change perceptions about both 2010 to be an epic battle between Google and Bing by utilizing ad Bing and Google search. Still, campaigns and community we have to wonder: can outreach. Second, they’d drive Microsoft actually make inroads trial and bet that the Bing into Google’s domination of experience would make people search, or will it be the same stick around. story as before? Competition on T h e a d c a m p a i g n w a s Multiple Fronts

Microsoft not only renewed its competition with Google in search, but it opened up new battles with its major rivals on multiple fronts. In July, Microsoft decided to directly address the threat posed by Google Docs with Microsoft Office 2010, which will include access to a web-based version of its popular office suite. The tech giant also launched an assault on its other major rival, Apple, which has been steadily making inroads into the computer and OS markets. In July, Microsoft struck back against Apple’s “Mac vs. PC” ads with its Laptop Hunters campaign, which portrayed PCs are more versatile and cheaper than their Apple-made counterparts. Not only that, but Microsoft went after Apple’s stronghold on the portable MP3 player market with the September launch of the Zune HD. It’s also taking a preemptive strike at the fabled Apple Tablet with the foldable Courier Tablet. It even opened Microsoft Stores to compete with Apple’s strong retail presence, going so far as to steal Apple Store employees. Much like Bing, it will take a year or several years to know whether these campaigns and new products will be successful in defeating Microsoft’s sworn enemies. Nobody can say, however, that Microsoft didn’t try everything to bury its MICROSOFT: page 27

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Ask TUAW: Syncing photos, compressing and transferring large files, virtual printers, and more By Mat Lu (The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW))

between different macs is with Dropbox; I even found a handy tutorial. This would cost Submitted at 12/17/2009 11:00:00 AM something ($9.99 per month for F i l e d u n d e r : F e a t u r e s , 50 GB / $19.99 for 100 GB), but Troubleshooting, Ask TUAW w o u l d b e n e a r l y s e a m l e s s . Welcome back to Ask TUAW, Unfortunately, it doesn't meet our weekly troubleshooting Q&A your requirement of running on column. This week we've got your own server. But if you questions about syncing photo really want to do that I don't l i b r a r i e s , c o m p r e s s i n g a n d think you'll really be able to transferring large files, creating a continue using iPhoto. (In virtual PDF printer, increasing principle you might do it with a screen readability, and more. network disk, but I suspect you'd As always, your suggestions and f i n d t h e p e r f o r m a n c e h i t questions are welcome. Leave u n a c c e p t a b l e . ) your questions for next week in If all you want to do is host a the comments section at the end bunch of photos on your own of this post. When asking a server you might check out question, please include which Gallery which is a server-based machine you're using and what PHP application that offers version of Mac OS X is installed various photo organizing and on it(we'll assume you're running sharing features. Naturally, you Snow Leopard on an Intel Mac if could access that from any of you don't specify). your Macs. Ben asks Pat asks I have a large iPhoto library and I have a third party database m u l t i p l e m a c s i n m u l t i p l e application running on 4D that locations. What is the best online prints records to attached printers solution to put my library online without going through the Mac s o t h a t I c a n OS X print dialog window (it v i e w / d o w n l o a d / u p l o a d m y brings up a software specific pictures from any computer dialog that allows font and font anywhere? I am looking for size selection as well as which something that I can host on my types of records to print). This is own site for security if possible running on a Mac Mini with OS not a shutterfly type solution. I 10.4.11 installed. I would like to also do not have nor want a .mac print to a pdf file but my account. application won't give me the My initial thought is that the best built in print to pdf option. I can way to share an iPhoto library select different printers in page

setup. Is there a Mac OS X pdf engine that can be installed like a print driver that appears in my page setup dialog box that the database will recognize? What you need is CUPS-PDF. You might want to grab a slightly older version for your OS X 10.4 machine, but it will create a virtual printer that you should be able to select within the print dialog. When you do that it dumps your "prints" as PDFs into a folder on your Desktop. Nirgal asks I recently was faced with the need to compress an approximately 50 Gig file, so that I can send it by FTP in less than 10,000 years. I know about the built-in compress utility in Leopard/Snow Leopard, command-line options like tar, gzip, and cpio, and StuffIt and other 3rd party apps. My question is, are any of these options noticeably faster than the others? And, in general, are there any advantages to using StuffIt instead of the built-in file compression in OS X? You certainly don't need to bother with StuffIt, which is more of an artifact of the Mac past than really relevant these days. Frankly, what I would suggest is that you use RAR. In addition to good compression performance, RAR also allows you to break up big files into several smaller files, each of

which is easier to upload/download. In fact, if you also includes some PAR files, you'll also get an automated recovery method if something becomes corrupted along the ways. There are several Mac RAR utilities like UnRarX and RAR Expander, but if you want to use PAR files you'll probably want MacPAR deLuxe. Maxintech asks Is there a way to record the sound coming from iphone to computer? I'm recording a tutorial for a game and in certain parts of the game are played simultaneous sounds which difficult to put the sound manually when editing the video. I recorded others tutorials and muted the original video and synchronized the sound manually, but in this case is impracticable. I think you could simply use a 1/8" audio patch cable from the iPhone. For the best results I'd use the output from an iPhone dock (or similar) to the line in. If you don't have a line in on your Mac, you may need a USB audio interface like the iMic from Griffin. iGO asks Is there a setting to make all the system Fonts, Menu's, Text, LARGER, globally? We don't wish to change the native resolution, which displays

everything beautifully, but the native resolution display (1920x1200) makes everything too small. While there has been lots of talk about resolution independence in OS X, it has not yet appeared as general feature. With TinkerTool you can adjust some of the default font settings in OS X. Unfortunately, it will not affect things like the menubar font. While it's not entirely practical she could also use the zoom feature when necessary. Once turned on in the Universal Access Preference Pane it allows you to zoom in on the part of the screen under the mouse cursor if you hold down the Control key and scroll (with a mouse scroll wheel or even two-fingers on the trackpad). Other than that, I'm afraid you would actually have to change the screen resolution to make everything appear bigger. Josh asks I have a 27" iMac and a new Mac Mini both running 10.6.2. Is it possible to use Target Display Mode and something like Teleport or Synergy to control the Mini? Or is a second, separate display - directly attached to the Mini - needed? While, in principle, I think you could do that I suspect you'd be better off to run the Mac mini headless and just use Screen ASK page 20

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Songwriters Guild: Network Neutrality Means More Piracy By Mike Masnick (Techdirt)

against it are so over-the-top ridiculous that it's actually making me wonder why. There There has been an effort made are reasonable arguments against by some to try to connect the mandating neutrality, but these totally unrelated issues of groups don't make them. n e t w o r k n e u t r a l i t y a n d That it's the SGA making these u n a u t h o r i z e d f i l e s h a r i n g arguments initially shouldn't together. There is no connection come as a surprise. The group between the two, but that won't has a rather antiquated view of stop busy lobbyists from doing business models and modern their best to drum up such a technology, and its boss has connection. Copycense points us d e c l a r e d i n t h e p a s t t h a t t o t h e n e w s t h a t G r o v e r songwriting would not occur Nordquit's group has decided to without copyright-- an obviously push this line of nonsense by incorrect statement. The SGA p a r r o t i n g c l a i m s b y t h e has become a caricature of itself Songwriter's Guild of America in the last few years. Rather than ( S G A ) t h a t a c c e p t i n g n e t admitting that the market is neutrality is akin to encouraging changing and working with piracy. How? That's not clear, songwriters to help them adapt, it b e c a u s e t h e r e ' s r e a l l y n o has basically decided the only connection at all. The best they reasonable strategy is to go can say is that net neutrality crying to the government for would prevent efforts to crack more protectionism, and greater down on file sharing (except, mandatory licensing fees. This is every plan for net neutrality has an odd group for the anti-net explicitly had exceptions for such neutrality types to team up with, things). I've said it before and I'll since most of them claim their say it again: I am not in favor of reasons for being against net laws mandating neutrality, but neutrality is to get away from the arguments made by those government meddling in the Submitted at 12/17/2009 7:30:00 AM

internet industry. And then they go and team up with the SGA, who's entire purpose is to encourage more government meddling in the music business? Politics makes strange bedfellows indeed... Separately, it's probably worth noting that ITIF, a "think tank" in DC and which has been a huge anti-net neutrality voice, has just come out with a poorly researched, poorly argued, joke of a report on"reducing digital piracy." In it, they promote kicking people off the internet (based on accusations, not convictions) under a three strikes regime, and also that ISPs should filter and monitor their networks to try to stop infringement. Apparently, ITIF is not a big fan of your privacy... but it's own... well, just try to find out who funds ITIF? That's secret. Funny how that works. Otherwise the report repeats a bunch of sweeping claims that have no support in reality, and does not back them up. It states, repeatedly, that you can't compete with free, even as many

ASK continued from page 19

Sharing to control it. If you turn on Screen Sharing in Sharing Preference Pane on the mini (and smart businesses do that every the mini is on the same network day. The report advocates DRM, as the iMac) you should see it in and amusingly fails to mention the Finder sidebar on the iMac the massive failure of every and easily be able to connect to DRM system to date, and the it. If necessary you could connect harm it has done to legitimate the mini to the iMac in Target users. But, of course, it saves Display Mode in order to set it up most of its focus on supporting and from then on just use Screen "technical measures" from ISPs Sharing. to inspect your content and stop TUAW Ask TUAW: Syncing you if they think you're doing p h o t o s , c o m p r e s s i n g a n d anything wrong. Welcome to the transferring large files, virtual big brother state. The report also printers, and more originally supports ACTA, even though it appeared on The Unofficial admits it doesn't know what's Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Thu, i n c l u d e d . B a s i c a l l y , i t ' s 17 Dec 2009 11:00:00 EST. "recommendations" straight from Please see our terms for use of the entertainment industry, with feeds. no basis in reality. And, with a Read| Permalink| Email this| nice "net neutrality" tie-in. Comments Those ties seem likely to get closer, which is unfortunate. Funny that those who keep claiming they want the government to "stay out" of the internet, are so keen to have them very actively involved when it comes to copyright. Permalink| Comments| Email This Story

RIM confirms BlackBerry e-mail outage (CNET News.com) Submitted at 12/17/2009 9:07:35 AM

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fivefilters.org featured article: Normalising the crime of the century by John Pilger. Available tools: PDF Newspaper, Full Text RSS, Term Extraction.

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Study: The road ahead for electric cars (CNET News.com)

percent of drivers estimated to commute 33 miles per day or less." While hybrid and all-electric Cost will be a key factor in the cars are about five years away evolution of the market. The Pike from becoming commonplace, report says it's debatable whether 2010 will be a crucial year in hybrid and all-electric cars will determining how an electric car prove cheaper to drive mile for is designed, built, fueled, and mile, given fluctuating gas prices used, according to a paper and the cost of lithium-ion released Thursday by Pike batteries. A survey cited in the Research. report, meanwhile, found that The auto industry is already only 17 percent of drivers would headed toward official decisions pay a premium for a PHEV over on technology and standards, and a gas-powered car. still to come is a natural market Once the market of evolution determining industry e n v i r o n m e n t a l l y c o n s c i o u s leaders. drivers is saturated, automakers The most interesting part of the will have to come up with a plan report is how Pike Research B, according to Pike Research. analysts see driver habits and "If a significant consumer electric cars evolving. audience fails to embrace the Currently, the report said, many initial class of PHEVs because of automakers, like General Motors t h e c o s t , i t i s l i k e l y t h a t w i t h i t s C h e v y V o l t , a r e automotive OEMs may shift to following a strategy in which the designing vehicles with shorter plug-in hybrid electric vehicle all-electric range, and smaller, (PHEV) being offered "seeks to less costly battery packs," said satisfy the approximate 80 the report. Submitted at 12/17/2009 8:21:44 AM

The group's paper, "Electric Vehicles: 10 Predictions for 2010," was published in conjunction with HybridCars.com, leaving the reader to question some of its more subjective conclusions on hybrids vs. electric cars or efficient gas-powered vehicles. But the report also includes many interesting statistical predictions for anyone following the evolution of the green transportation industry: • By 2015 there will be 5.3 million places around the world to plug in and recharge a car. • Despite a U.S. push to revive its failed auto manufacturing economy with green technology manufacturing, it will actually be Asia that becomes the "dominant supplier and consumer of electric vehicles and batteries." Pike Research attributed this to the Chinese government's initiative to produce 500,000 electric vehicles per year. • The U.S. electrical grid

upgrade will be sufficient to handle the influx of plug-in hybrids and all-electric cars overall, but neighborhoods with a concentrated volume of EVs could overwhelm a local utility. • Most people will charge their cars at work or home, and use public charging stations sparingly and mostly when traveling. • The majority of people will charge their cars after work between 4 p.m. and 8 p.m. putting a strain on local utilities, which will then in turn offer incentives for charging after 10 p.m. The full paper is available for free download from Pike Research. fivefilters.org featured article: Normalising the crime of the century by John Pilger. Available tools: PDF Newspaper, Full Text RSS, Term Extraction.

Video: Are Climatologists Censoring Scientific Journals? (A: No) (Little Green Footballs) Submitted at 12/16/2009 9:16:55 PM

Here’s another excellent video debunking the claim that climatologists are “censoring” scientific journals to stifle critics and skeptical scientists.[Video]

Star Trek Stops Women From Becoming Computer Scientists By Lisa Grossman (Wired Top Stories) Submitted at 12/17/2009 3:00:00 AM

The male, geeky, Star Trekloving stereotype of computer scientists may be deterring women from joining their ranks, according to a new study.

Russian Investment Firm DST Now Owns 5% of Facebook By Stan Schroeder (Mashable!) Submitted at 12/17/2009 6:36:32 AM

A couple of days ago, we wrote that Russian venture capital firm Digital Sky Technologies (DST) had invested around 180 million dollars in Zynga, the company behind popular Facebook games such as FarmVille and Mafia Wars.

The same group already invested $200 million in Facebook back in spring, which got them a 1.96 percent stake in the company, and now they’ve purchased another $200 million in common shares from Facebook’s employees. According to Russian newspaper Kommersant, DST bought the them another 3 percent stake, shares at $14.77 per share; which brings the total to around 5 altogether, this investment got percent.

Comparing this to the first time DST invested in Facebook, it sounds like a pretty good deal. Back at the time, many were speculating that Facebook’s 15 billion dollar valuation was nothing but hot air and that the social network was actually worth two or three billion dollars. In the meantime, the economic situation has gotten better, Facebook has amassed another

150 million users and it finally started earning money. DST is serious about Facebook, and if the optimistic revenue predictions for 2010 and beyond come true, the price they paid for their stake might turn out to be quite cheap. Reviews: Facebook Tags: DST, facebook

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First Look: Snagit for Mac Public Beta By Steven Sande (The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW)) Submitted at 12/17/2009 10:00:00 AM

Filed under: Software, Switchers, First Look Switchers were elated earlier this year when TechSmith, developers of the fabulous Camtasia screen recorder application for Windows, finally shipped their flagship app for the Mac. Those switchers were probably also wishing that TechSmith would create a Mac version of their screen capture application, Snagit. Well, their wishes have been granted! TechSmith has announced the public beta version of Snagit for Mac, and a first look at the application shows that it's a worthy screenshot snapper for the platform. The company has made the beta available for feedback on operation and features, so this is a perfect time to download the program and give it a try. After installing the application and launching it, all that is visible is a small "tab" that pops out from the side of the Mac screen when you hover over it. The tab has a drop-down for choosing the capture mode and a red button for taking the screen shot. There are two capture modes -- all-in-one

capture and window capture. Window capture mode displays all open windows ExposĂŠ-style, and you click on one of the windows to select it for capture. Once captured, it appears in a screen where you can annotate the screenshot in a number of ways, or add effects. At this time, there are no effects and the app shows that the feature is coming soon. In the all-in-one capture mode, clicking the red button brings up a set of gold crosshairs that you direct across the display using your trackpad or mouse. Bringing the crosshairs to bear on a

window causes that window to be selected for capture. There's one really cool feature of Snagit that comes into play in either capture mode. If the window you've selected to capture is a scrolling window, Snagit will grab the entire length and width of the window, not just what's visible. After a window has been captured, it appears in an application window. It's here that you can apply a number of tools, including labels (notepad or cartoon balloon), arrows, stamps (including many accents and cursors), markers and highlighters, a blur tool for

Video: Oceans in a World 2 Celsius Degrees Warmer By Wired.com Video Department (Wired Top Stories)

The Center for Ocean Solutions and the International League of Conservation Photographers

interview leading scientists on how climate change could affect the world's oceans.

hiding personal information in screen shots, lines, shapes, fills, and erasers. Each tool is highly configurable, with choices of line widths, shapes, and foreground and background colors. Each screenshot appears in a scrolling pane at the bottom of the Snagit window, and the application also auto-saves your captures for future reference and work. In my initial "play" with the application, I found it to be easy to use, full-featured, and a serious competitor to Apple's free Preview app (which provides screenshot and annotation tools) and my personal favorite, Snapz

Pro X (which has no annotation tools). No price or release date has been set yet for Snagit, and there are definitely some features that are still in the works, but it looks as if Snagit for Mac could be a real winner in the screenshot capture application genre. TUAW First Look: Snagit for Mac Public Beta originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Thu, 17 Dec 2009 10:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds. Read| Permalink| Email this| Comments

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Biden to unveil $2 billion in broadband grants (CNET News.com) Submitted at 12/17/2009 8:29:00 AM

Vice President Joe Biden(Credit: WhiteHouse.gov) Vice President Joe Biden on Thursday is scheduled to announce $2 billion in grants that will be used to build broadband networks in underserved communities. The funding, which is part of the$7.2 billion that was set aside for broadband in President Obama's $787 billion economic recovery deal earlier this year, will start with an initial $182 million investment in 18 broadband projects in 17 states. Biden is announcing the stimulus grants in Dawsonville, Ga. The money is specifically meant to expand affordable broadband access to underserved areas of the U.S. Officials would not name which companies will be getting the grants that were announced on Thursday. From BlackBerry smartphones to broadband Internet connections, President Obama understands that technology is an important economic and educational driver. High speed Internet access is seen as the cornerstone of the president's technology agenda, and he has emphasized the need for getting affordable broadband access to every American. "The new broadband access will help underserved and often hard-

hit communities overcome the distance and technology barrier by expanding connectivity between educational institutions, enabling remote medical consultations, and attracting new businesses as well as the jobs that come with them," the White House said in a statement. The Federal Communications Commission is currently working on developing a national broadband plan that will provide a road map for achieving the goal

of getting every American affordable access to high-speed Internet. A full report on the plan is due to Congress in midFebruary. Blair Levin, who is heading up the task force developing the national broadband plan for the FCC, has estimated that it could take as much as $20 billion to $350 billion to achieve the ultimate goal of ubiquitous broadband access. But he has acknowledged publicly on

several occasions that the bulk of the investment will come from the private sector. "The private sector is essential to this effort," Levin said. "Government spending will be limited. And competition is the best way to drive innovation. " Still, at a meeting at the FCC on Wednesday, he said government funding will be necessary in places where the private sector is unable to find a viable business case. And he has proposed overhauling the $7 billion-a-year Universal Service Fund, which provides telephone access to rural communities, as one way to help fund such projects. "Where funding is limited and where it's difficult to make a business case and where we don't want to go through the process of new legislation, there are ways to better utilize existing assets," he said. But the USF alone will not be enough. And given that it will likely take years to expand the program, grants and government funding pumped into the system now will at least get the ball rolling on new deployments. fivefilters.org featured article: Normalising the crime of the century by John Pilger. Available tools: PDF Newspaper, Full Text RSS, Term Extraction.

UK Charities Find Out They Need To Pay Yet Another Music Royalty By Mike Masnick (Techdirt) Submitted at 12/16/2009 11:23:00 PM

Just in time for the holiday season, SteveD alerts us to the news that PPL, Phonographic Performance Limited -- a separate UK licensing group, which collects for performers and producers (unlike PRS, which is for songwriters/record companies) -- is pushing forward with demands for charity shops to pay up for a license on top of the license they already pay PRS. In the past, the UK government exempted charities from having to pay the PPL license, but they've now removed that exemption, and like so many music collections societies, PPL didn't bother to consider how it would look to shake down charity shops, and apparently just drove forward with plans. Nice of them. This is what happens, of course, when you create the statutory ability to shake down anyone who plays music. That right just expands more and more, and the musicians and songwriters never have to actually give people a reason to buy: they just sit back and collect. Permalink| Comments| Email This Story

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Public Enemy Not Selling Well Enough On Sellaband: What Went Wrong? By Mike Masnick (Techdirt)

pricing seemed quite high for what people were getting, and there was little effort to actually There have been a bunch of "connect with fans." It was companies popping up lately that really just a very high-priced way have allowed bands to help "pre- of getting people to fund the next finance" an album, by getting album. fans to commit to pay up in So it doesn't come as much of a exchange for some sort of added surprise that Public Enemy is benefit. We've covered in great struggling to reach its goal. It d e t a i l h o w J i l l S o b u l e has raised over $70,000, which is successfully used just such a nothing to complain about, but method (on her own, not with a that's well short of the $250,000 startup) to finance her last album. goal. Earlier this year, though, the There are definitely some concept got a lot of attention important lessons to be learned when the group Public Enemy from this. These sorts of models signed up with the company require a lot more than just S e l l A B a n d t o t r y t o r a i s e putting it out there and expecting $250,000 by the end of the year fans to automatically support to finance its latest album. While you, no matter how big an act we were impressed by such a you might be. Jill Sobule worked well-known act trying such a really hard to cultivate and system, we did note when it was connect with her committed announced that the "benefit" fanbase, and that's what helped given by the group didn't really her hit her goal. Public Enemy seem that compelling. The didn't seem to put much effort Submitted at 12/17/2009 9:44:00 AM

into that at all. Second, pricing really does matter. In giving people a "reason to buy" something, that doesn't mean you just slap a price on stuff. The price needs to be reasonable and make sense to people. Public Enemy's offerings just seemed pricey all around, even to fans of the group. At $100 you got a CD and a chance to buy a second CD at 50%, along with your name in a booklet? Eh. What's so exciting about that. At $250 they add in a t-shirt? That's $150 just for a t-shirt? You had to go all the way up to $500 before they would even autograph the CD. Sure, $1,000 for a 3 year unlimited backstage pass could be cool if you were going to see the band a lot, but that was the first offering that really seemed potentially worth the money for a serious fan. So, I think there are some important lessons here. We've

mainly focused on pulling lessons from the success stories, but the lessons from failures can be just as valuable. And, in this case, it goes back to our standard formula of Connect with Fans (CwF) and give them a Reason to Buy (RtB). Unfortunately, it doesn't look like Public Enemy really did much of either. They just expected the fans to come to them, and they priced everything too high, without giving really compelling lower end options. Because of that, they certainly got some people to pay up -- and, again, raising $70,000 is nothing to put down -- but it fell well short of the goal. In some ways, what they did is like a cargo cult: copying all the superficial aspects of what worked before, but not the really important stuff. Permalink| Comments| Email This Story

Insurgents Intercept Drone Video in King-Size Security Breach By Noah Shachtman (Wired Top Stories) Submitted at 12/17/2009 7:15:00 AM

In Iraq and Afghanistan, the U.S. military depends on an array of drones to snoop on and stalk insurgents. Now it looks as if

insurgents are tapping into those serious military security breaches same drones' broadcasts, to see in years. what the flying robot spies see. It's potentially one of the most

Apple Celebrates the “12 Apps of Christmas” in Holiday Ad [VIDEO] By Christina Warren (Mashable!) Submitted at 12/17/2009 9:56:27 AM

Apple has a history of holidaythemed ads. Who can forget those old Mac ads from the early 1990s, or the animated“I’m a Mac” series? This year, Apple has decided to take its “There’s an App for That” campaign and dress it up for the holidays, “Twelve Days of Christmas” style. Like all of the “There’s an App for That” ads, the spot highlights some of the more unique and convenient applications available in Apple’s App Store. The most awe-inspiring app is, of course, featured at the end: What apps are on your Christmas list? [via iLounge] Tags: ad, app store, apple, video

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Fashism Saves You From Fashion Faux Pas in Real-Time

PC shipments turn positive in third quarter

By Christina Warren (Mashable!)

(CNET News.com)

Submitted at 12/17/2009 9:40:18 AM

This post is part of Mashable’s Spark of Genius series, which highlights a unique feature of startups. If you would like to have your startup considered for inclusion, please see the details here. The series is made possible by Microsoft BizSpark. Name: Fashism Quick Pitch: Fashism is a place to get advice on your style. Anytime. Anywhere. Users submit questions and the community votes and gives constructive feedback. Crowdsourcing for your style advice. Genius Idea: Launched during Fashion Week in September, Fashism (love the name) is a way for individuals to use the Internet for style advice and feedback. Does this top make me look fat? Do these boots work with this jacket? Should I get this hat or this hat? By posting photos and asking questions you can get instant fashion feedback. Fashism has a really simple premise. After you sign up (which is an easy, non-evasive process), you can upload a photo and ask a question. Visitors to the site can answer “yes” or “no” (or choice a or choice b), in a manner

this idea would really pop with a Facebook connection. Even just having the ability to share a link directly on your wall could be really handy. Do you ever use the Internet to get fashion advice? Let us know! Sponsored by Microsoft BizSpark similar to “Hot or Not” and the BizSpark is a startup program like. Based on how people vote, that gives you three-year access you can instantly see the t o t h e l a t e s t M i c r o s o f t percentage of yeas and nays. development tools, as well as Users can also comment on your connecting you to a nationwide photo if they want to add n e t w o r k o f i n v e s t o r s a n d additional feedback. Users are incubators. There are no upfront awarded points for offering costs, so if your business is helpful feedback, and you can privately owned, less than three view the hottest looks and the years old, and generates less than most discussed pictures. U.S.$1 million in annual revenue, Admittedly, Fashism is designed you can sign up today. to appeal to the more fashionEntrepreneurs can take conscious user, but the look of advantage of the Azure Services the site, its ease of use and the platform for their website hosting irreverent sense of humor are all and storage needs. Microsoft good things. The concept itself is recently announced the“new actually pretty strong — not CloudApp()” contest– use the everyone has a built-in network Azure Services Platform for of Tim Gunn-types, and some of hosting your .NET or PHP app, us prefer to get advice from and you could be the lucky strangers or other fashion fans winner of a USD 5000* ( please (who might be more truthful). see website for official rules and Fashism also integrates with guidelines).” Reviews: Facebook, T w i t t e r , a l l o w i n g u s e r s t o PHP, Twitter connect their account to the Tags: crowdsourcing, fashion, s e r v i c e u s i n g O A u t h a n d fashism, twitter automatically tweet links to any of their Fashism uploads. Twitter integration is great but we think

year, up from 287.6 million in 2008. Much of the growth will come PC shipments are the latest tech from emerging regions, which sector showing signs of life. now account for half of the For the third quarter, worldwide market. Portables should enjoy computer shipments rose 2.3 an 18.1 percent gain in shipments percent from the same quarter a in 2010, but desktop shipments year ago, their first gain after are likely to be flat. Netbooks three consecutive quarters of will grow, but at a slower pace, declines, according to IDC's due to the appeal of new ultralatest Worldwide Quarterly PC thin portables. Overall, IDC Tracker report released on forecasts double-digit gains in Thursday. PC shipments each year to 2013, Hot back-to-school demand when the number of units could boosted overall shipments. reach as high as 444.4 million. Portable PCs enjoyed a 33.5 "Once again, the PC market increase from a year ago, but shows its resiliency," said Loren desktops continued their descent Loverde, program director of reflecting the consumer drive to IDC Worldwide Trackers, in a mobile computers. statement. "The speed of market The decline in commercial PCs stabilization and growth in key also began to slow in the third segments reflect the essential role quarter, indicating to IDC that IT of personal computing today. spending should gradually revive Technology evolution and falling over the next few quarters, with a prices remain a compelling solid rebound expected in the combination. As commercial second half of 2010. spending recovers in 2010, we Thanks to the latest results, PC expect to see robust growth over shipments are expected to show the next several years." gains of 1.3 percent for 2009, fivefilters.org featured article: rising to 10.3 percent next year. Normalising the crime of the The total number of shipments is century by John Pilger. Available likely to hit 291.4 million units tools: PDF Newspaper, Full Text this year and 321.4 million next RSS, Term Extraction. Submitted at 12/17/2009 9:24:43 AM

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Development of VLC for Mac 64-bit is on hold, project needs developers By Michael Grothaus (The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW)) Submitted at 12/17/2009 1:00:00 PM

Filed under: Multimedia, Video, Freeware, Developer Development on the 64-bit version of VLC Player for Mac has hit the pause button. The Videolan team is looking for Mac development talent to help move the project forward, and revamp the program's interface to be more Mac-like. While the team says that reports of VLC Mac's death are 'greatly exaggerated,' they could definitely use some help. As we've mentioned before, VLC is a free, open source media player that supports various audio and video formats (MPEG, DivX/Xvid, Ogg, and many more) as well as DVDs, VCDs, and streaming protocols. While the 32-bit version still works fine on Snow Leopard, the 64- bit version (which briefly appeared as 1.0.3, only to disappear again with 1.0.4) is intended to be higher-performance; it also would work more seamlessly with the 64-bit version of Handbrake. The news of VLC for Mac's 64-

bit freezeout started today with this post on videolan.org: This is going to sound like a PBS sponsorship drive, but it needs to be said: While VLC is an open source project provided to you free of charge, as with other open source projects, its existence depends on everyone who provides support to the project. This support can come in many forms, such as: - joining the team and contributing code - spending time in the forum helping out other VLC users

- making a donation Every bit helps, since without it the community dies and the project with it. As mentioned [earlier] we are in desperate need of Mac developers who can help maintain the Mac side of VLC. If you or someone you know is in position to join the team then please let us know. Until we have more Mac developers then the 64 -bit version of VLC for MacOS X will be on hold! Though the new QuickTime X Player has much room for improvement, I've

gotten quite used to it and watch all my movie files in it save WMV (which QuickTime plays via the Flip4Mac plugin). From some reason, QTX requires WMV files to go through a loading process before you can skim through the video. On VLC there is no loading process for WMV files before you can skim. This is only one of the many benefits of using VLC, as I'm sure many of our readers can attest. There are still some alternatives to VLC, including 3ivX, FFmpeg and Perian. There's also this little preference pane to make QTX more enjoyable. But these are all alternatives, not replacements for this great app. Here's hoping that the holiday spirit will inspire a few Mac devs to step up and keep VLC moving forward. TUAW Development of VLC for Mac 64-bit is on hold, project needs developers originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Thu, 17 Dec 2009 13:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds. Read| Permalink| Email this| Comments

Darts for Geeks: Statistician Cracks the Game's Secrets By Cameron Bird (Wired Top Stories)

Ryan Tibshirani was tired of losing at darts, so the Stanford statistics student put his math

skills to use, calculating where he should aim to maximize his points. His app's online for pub

athletes everywhere.

Google Says It's Okay with Ad-Blocking Extensions [Google] By Kevin Purdy (Lifehacker) Submitted at 12/17/2009 7:30:00 AM

You might think Google would find the fast-growing number and popularity of ad-blocking extensions for Chrome problematic, given that the search firm rises and falls on advertising revenue. But an engineering director for Google said at a conference last week that, while the company thinks about ad blocking "a lot," it's not something that needs to be fought against. "I think there will be a nice equilibrium. If people get too aggressive with ads, then ad blockers will become more popular and companies will get less aggressive with ads. The market will sort itself." The always-barb-lined Register takes a slightly different tack on the remarks: " ... Most people won't install ad blockers on Chrome because people are fundamentally lazy." [ The Register via Slashdot]

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Going to Vermont for a White Christmas? Relax - you'll have 3G service

MICROSOFT: continued from page 18

competition in 2009. Windows 7 Throughout all of these events however, Microsoft had a glaring black eye that everybody could see. Windows Vista, whose many problems and poor sales numbers By Steven Sande (The Army buddies together for a first quarter of 2010, Barre, t h r e a t e n e d M i c r o s o f t ’ s Unofficial Apple Weblog tribute to the lodge owner, who is Montpelier, and Northfield will stranglehold on the OS market (TUAW)) the General you served under in finally see the light of 3G and even its position as a kingpin WW2? g o o d n e s s g l o w i n g i n t h e i r of technology. With Apple’s Submitted at 12/17/2009 8:00:00 AM There will be no problems this i P h o n e s . Snow Leopard and Google’s Filed under: Odds and ends, White Christmas, since AT&T is Wait a second... I didn't see Pine Chrome OS breathing down its iPhone So, you and your song- in the process of lighting up their Tree in that list. Maybe it's not neck, Microsoft couldn’t afford and-dance partner have decided 3G network in Vermont starting going to be a Merry Christmas another OS failure. that you're going to follow a few today. This week, service will after all! The company bet the farm on classy dames that you met at a r o l l o u t i n B e n n i n g t o n , A tip of the TUAW Santa hat to Windows 7. They had extensive nightclub in Florida up to Pine B r a t t l e b o r o , B r o w n s v i l l e , Vermont resident Bradley M. for ad campaigns and Windows 7 Tree, Vermont, where they're Killington, Vernon, Warren, sending us the news. launch parties to build up the g o i n g t o b e s p e n d i n g t h e West Dover, and White River TUAW Going to Vermont for a hype that this thing was fast, Christmas holidays performing Junction. By New Year's Eve, White Christmas? Relax - you'll sleek, simple, and not Windows their sister act at a lodge. The service will be extended to have 3G service originally Vista. only problem is, you have AT&T Burlington, Colchester, Essex appeared on The Unofficial It paid off. Windows 7, released service and you've heard that 3G Junction, Fayston, Hartford, Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Thu, on October 22nd, garnered service is nonexistent anywhere J a m a i c a , J e f f e r s o n v i l l e , 17 Dec 2009 08:00:00 EST. positive reviews and in fact beat in the Green Mountain State. Middlebury, Rutland, South Please see our terms for use of Vista’s initial sales by 234%. How are you going to be able to Burlington, St. Albans, Stowe, feeds. Microsoft needed a hit, and as of stream a live video from your Waitsfield, West Rutland, West Read| Permalink| Email this| the end of 2009, Windows 7 has iPhone 3GS to the Ed Harrison Townshend, West Wardsboro, Comments delivered. Its impact on the show so you can get your old Williston, and Winooski. In the bottom line is still unknown, but it’s likely that Microsoft will have strong momentum heading into 2010. What’s Next? Microsoft was busy in 2009.

Bing, IE8, Windows 7, and Microsoft Office 2010 were just a few of the many big projects it launched this year. While we don’t expect to see as many big game-changing products coming out of Redmond in 2010, we do believe that the battle between Microsoft and its competitors will heat up as these products mature and Microsoft pushes to make inroads into search and beyond. We want to know what you think, though. How did Microsoft do this year? What was its greatest success and its biggest flop? And most importantly, what do you think the technology titan will be doing in 2010? Let everybody know your thoughts in the comments below. Reviews: Bing, Chrome, Firefox, Google, Google Docs, Internet Explorer, Microsoft Office 2010, Safari, Windows 7, Windows Vista Tags: apple, bing, Google, microsoft, zune

Twitter: Already on Holiday? By Adam Ostrow (Mashable!) Submitted at 12/17/2009 8:01:13 AM

Twitter is once again “ frozen in time” this morning as users’ timelines fail to display the most recent tweets of those they follow. Instead, users are seeing

tweets from about 10 minutes ago, and very few of them at that. We’ve been noticing the problem for at least 30 minutes (as of 11 a.m. ET), both on Twitter’s website and in thirdparty applications. Twitter showing at least some tweets as search, however, seems to be they happen (and you can see all

the people complaining about their timelines). No update yet from Twitter on what’s happening and when it might be resolved. We’ll keep you posted. Update (12:00pm ET): Twitter says “We are aware of and

investigating the causes of timeline delays and missing tweets.” Reviews: Twitter Tags: twitter

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Newsagents In London Are Paying To Offer Free London Evening Standard By Mike Masnick (Techdirt) Submitted at 12/17/2009 3:56:41 AM

Earlier this year, we noted that while many newspaper execs were complaining about "free," the owners of the London Evening Standard had decided to make their paper copy free and that had resulted in much greater circulation and(importantly) lower distribution costs. Part of the issue was that the paper stopped distributing to certain newsstands and newsagents as terrific app that's well-reviewed just not being worth it. Yet, as and buzzworthy, and if it doesn't reader mowgs points out, some end up in the right place at the of those newsagents so badly right time, it still won't be want the paper -- even if it's free s u c c e s s f u l ( o r a t l e a s t a s -- that they're now paying the s u c c e s s f u l a s y o u w a n t ) . newspaper to carry it, even while Everyone is still working to giving it away for free: The unlock success in the App Store, Evening Standard editor, Geordie but with over 100,000 products Greig, said today that the paper on the shelves, it has become had been besieged by inquiries increasingly more difficult for the from newsagents wanting to good apps to stand apart. stock the paper as a way to attract TUAW An app with everything customers, even though they but sales originally appeared on w e r e n o l o n g e r p a i d a The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Thu, 17 Dec 2009 09:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds. Read| Permalink| Email this| By Alison Hawkes (Wired Top Comments Stories)

An app with everything but sales By Mike Schramm (The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW)) Submitted at 12/17/2009 9:00:00 AM

Filed under: Gaming, iPhone, App Store TriplePoint PR's site has a post on their blog about Orbital [ iTunes Link], an iPhone game released a while back that I presume is one of their clients. Obviously, they've done their job: we're talking about the game, which is $.99US or available in a lite free version [ iTunes Link]. But they've also provided us with a little insight into just how things are going in the app's release, and they picture they paint says "not well." Oh, sure, it's been reviewed well, there's a little bit of buzz about it, and the game itself, says the firm,

is good (trust them at your own risk, but they sound like they really do enjoy it). So what's the problem? It's not selling. To be fair, it is selling. They've sold less than 100,000 units, they say, and even half of that is a nice chunk of sales. But apparently that's not a success, and they're wondering why. Piracy is their first guess -- we've heard before that piracy can be a huge issue, even on cheap apps. They say the game had an 80% piracy rate in the first week, which has since dropped down to 24%. I'm not convinced piracy can be blamed completely -there's no guaranteeing that all pirates would have bought a real copy anyway. But certainly there's something going on here -- you can have a

commission. "What has happened is that entrepreneurial London has taken over. Little companies have got together and have decided to distribute the Standard in little places we decided we couldn't afford to go to," Greig told the BBC Radio 4 Media Show. "We used to pay a large commission to newsagents to sell the Standard. We now have dozens of newsagents paying us 2p a copy to have copies in their shop ... which they then give away," he said. Separately, he noted that the rise in ad revenue to the paper has been dramatic, and that they're making two to three times as much in ad revenue on certain days. But, you know, it's "impossible" to support journalism while giving away the content for "free." Rupert Murdoch says so. Permalink| Comments| Email This Story

Seismic Convoy Explores What's Shaking America Submitted at 12/16/2009 5:00:00 PM

Some 400 mobile seismic stations inch eastward across

North America, as the researchers behind the US Array Project work to explain the slow quakes rumbling across the Pacific Northwest.

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Vancouver Olympics Unhappy With 'Cool Sporting Event That Takes Place in British Columbia Between 2009 and 2011 Edition' Slogan By Mike Masnick (Techdirt)

though the Vancouver Olympics can't officially do anything to Lululemon, it has decided to try We've been covering how the shaming the company instead, Olympics has been able to get expressing disappointment that various governments around the the company has "has broken the world to grant it extra special spirit of Olympic trademark intellectual property protection regulations." Of course, even so, on certain words and phrases, the Olympic officials seem to with the upcoming Vancouver misunderstand what's going on Olympics being no exception. In here. They claim:"We expected that case, you have to be careful better sportsmanship from a local of the use of "Vancouver," Canadian company than to "Olympics," and even "2010." produce a clothing line that with ways to remotely activate So, clothing maker Lululemon attempts to profit from the software without this patent (yes, decided to come up with a line Games but doesn't support the that's sarcasm). As the Register that mocks these restrictions, Games or the success of the notes in the link above, even with a brand new line of clothing Canadian Olympic team." But, of some of the software products called:"Cool Sporting Event That course, that's not what's going on listed as violating this patent Takes Place in British Columbia here at all. They're not trying to don't seem to involve activation Between 2009 and 2011 Edition." profit off of the Olympic Games. at all, raising serious questions Note how careful the company is They're trying to profit off of the about how they could possibly to avoid any of the restricted ridiculous free speech restrictions put in place by the Olympics for violate this patent. This sounds words. Nicely done. Of course, guess who isn't no good reason. like yet another case of someone h a v i n g r e a d t h e b o o k happy? Reader Joe McEnaney Permalink| Comments| Email Rembrandt's in the Attic and alerts us to the news that, even This Story deciding to go trolling for companies to sue with a meaningless patent. Permalink| Comments| Email By Jason Paur (Wired Top This Story pieces together: a heavier-thanStories) air machine flying under its own power, and controlled by pilot. Submitted at 12/16/2009 9:00:00 PM This could go places. The Wright brothers put all the Submitted at 12/17/2009 8:40:00 AM

Secretive Patent Holder Sues Lots Of Companies For Remote Activation Software By Mike Masnick (Techdirt) Submitted at 12/17/2009 1:33:06 AM

Brian points us to the news of yet another questionable patent lawsuit filed by yet another shell company, yet again in Eastern Texas against a ton of software companies. The patent in question ( 5,222,134) is for a "secure system for activating personal computer software at remote locations," and was originally filed back in 1991 and granted in 1993 -- meaning that the patent is actually nearing end of life. Odd, then, that it was suddenly noticed that all these companies were infringing. The

lawsuit is filed by a shell company called BetaNet, and no one seems willing to speak. The lawyers representing BetaNet won't say who is behind the company, or how they even got the patent. This is typical. Many of these types of lawsuits are filed by shell companies to hide who is actually behind them. As for the defendants, here's the list: Adobe, Apple, Arial Software, Autodesk, Carbonite, Corel, Kodak, IBM, Intuit, Microsoft, McAfee, Online Holdings, Oracle, Rockwell, Rosetta Stone, SAP, Siemens, and Sony. Obviously, none of those companies could have come up

Dec. 17, 1903: Bicycle Brothers Make Aeroplane Work Wright

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iPhone, iPod touch Forgot your anniversary? Facebook's leading product search for Christmas got it covered (CNET News.com)

can see it, they can also see the date. Although they will not be Submitted at 12/17/2009 9:44:00 AM alerted to it the same way they Lately Google seems to have put are for something like a birthdayforth most of the little niceties -something Facebook says could that turn forgetful, or otherwise eventually change. inept people into functional Maybe this is the first step in m e m b e r s o f s o c i e t y . L a t e Facebook creating something Wednesday Facebook rolled out similar to its now-removed one of its own features that falls friends timeline feature, but for within that category. Now those relationships, so that users will be who are lucky enough to be in a able to get a chronological view relationship can plug in when of every relationship other users their love affair began. Facebook have had. Though in truth, this is will then send both of those users likely just another way to make it a reminder (in the form of an easier to sell advertising for event) when it's coming up. things like chocolates, flowers, Facebook users in a relationship jewelry and "sorry I missed our can now add in their anniversary anniversary" cards. dates in order to get Facebook to fivefilters.org featured article: send yearly reminders.(Credit: Normalising the crime of the CNET) century by John Pilger. Available Right now the feature has the tools: PDF Newspaper, Full Text s a m e p r i v a c y l e v e l a s a RSS, Term Extraction. relationship, so if your friends

By Mike Schramm (The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW))

searches in the UK were for Apple's handhelds. Of course, just because one in 34 people are searching for an Submitted at 12/17/2009 7:30:00 AM iPhone or iPod doesn't mean that Filed under: Hardware, Internet, they'll be huge gifts necessarily -iPhone, iPod nano, iPod touch maybe the searching just means This is an interesting little that they want one, not that statistic, but it could be very they'll be getting one. But there's telling about what's going on in no question that as big as Apple's terms of sales this holiday 4th quarter has been so far, it's season. 9to5Mac says that over in going to get even bigger, in the the UK, the iPhone and the iPod UK and probably everywhere touch are the current most else as well. searched-for products this TUAW iPhone, iPod touch holiday. iPhone made up 1.75 leading product search for percent of all product searches Christmas originally appeared on last week, and 14% of mobile The Unofficial Apple Weblog p h o n e p r o d u c t s e a r c h e s . (TUAW) on Thu, 17 Dec 2009 Meanwhile, the iPod touch was 07:30:00 EST. Please see our in second place at 1.29 percent, terms for use of feeds. and the iPod nano was actually Read| Permalink| Email this| third, at .5 percent. Over three Comments percent, then, of all product

USA turning The Freshman into a TV series By Allison Waldman (TV Squad) Submitted at 12/17/2009 12:35:00 PM

In 1990, there was a really funny movie that came out that involved transporting a Komodo dragon, Marlon Brando recreating a Mafia-like big man in the style of Don Vito Corleone, high stakes gourmet dining, iceskating, film school and romance. It was called The Freshman, and USA Network is turning it into a new series. If you've never seen it, do yourself a favor and rent it. Andrew Bergman wrote and directed that 1990 film, and he was lucky enough to get Marlon Brando to play Carmine Sabatini. Even though Brando blasted the film before its release -- said it would be a turkey -- he eventually came to appreciate the experience. Continue reading USA turning The Freshman into a TV series Filed under: OpEd, Celebrities, Reality-Free Permalink| Email this| | Comments

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“Nightline” Bests “Tonight Show” For 25th Consecutive Week In Total Viewers

The Most Influential Twitter User in the World Is…

By Bill Gorman (TVbytheNumbers) Submitted at 12/17/2009 10:20:33 AM

By Adam Ostrow (Mashable!) Submitted at 12/17/2009 9:15:34 AM

How do you measure influence on Twitter? While follower count is perhaps the most obvious metric, other activities, like the numbers of times you’re retweeted, provide a bit more insight. Along those lines, INQ Mobile has just released their 2009 Twitter influence study, determining the most influential Twitter users in both the UK and the world. The winner? Not Oprah, not Ashton and not Diddy, but Mashable’s founder and CEO Pete Cashmore! Of course, news publishers naturally have an advantage in these types of studies – by posting dozens of articles daily to Twitter, they’re likely to get far more retweets than a random tweet about “that dirty money.” And despite all of the hoopla

about her joining the service, the incredibly influential Oprah is yet to make much use of Twitter, while other celebs post less frequently with updates that are more personal (or mundane) in nature. Nonetheless, we’ll take the recognition where we can get it, and congratulate Pete on another cool achievement to close out the year. You can read more in The Telegraph and The Daily Mail. Reviews: Mashable, Twitter Tags: mashable, pete cashmore, twitter

Pics: Madonna Turns Domestic Diva (ETonline - Breaking News) Submitted at 12/17/2009 9:54:00 AM

Madonna turns domestic diva in

her new Dolce & Gabbana ads -ET has the pics people are talking about!

Apple Movie Trailers website getting an iTunes Store-style overhaul? By Michael Grothaus (The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW))

[ fivefilters.org: unable to retrieve full-text content] via press release: “NIGHTLINE” BESTS “TONIGHT SHOW” FOR 25th CONSECUTIVE WEEK IN TOTAL VIEWERS “NIGHTLINE” TIES “LETTERMAN” IN A18-49 RATING “NIGHTLINE” GROWS AMONG TOTAL VIEWERS SEASON TO DATE WHILE “TONIGHT SHOW” DECLINES -49% ABC News “Nightline” placed second among Total Viewers and Adults 25-54 for the week of December 7, 2009, according to Nielsen Media Research. This marks the twenty-fifth consecutive [...]

the trailer for Iron Man 2 looks amazing! We'll let you know if any other trailers get the iTunes Store Submitted at 12/17/2009 12:00:00 PM treatment. Filed under: iTS, Multimedia, Thanks Space Taker! iTunes TUAW Apple Movie Trailers A reader has tipped us off that website getting an iTunes StoreApple's Movie Trailer site has s t y l e o v e r h a u l ? o r i g i n a l l y gotten an iTunes Store-style look. appeared on The Unofficial W e l l , f o r t h e I r o n M a n 2 Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Thu, Exclusive Trailer page anyway. 17 Dec 2009 12:00:00 EST. Right now the rest of the site Please see our terms for use of seems to have retained its old feeds. look. Is this a slow rollout, or is Read| Permalink| Email this| By Hamilton Nolan (Gawker) Iron Man just that cool that he Comments Submitted at 12/17/2009 8:41:07 AM gets his own design? Either way,

Shaolin, Inc. [Money Matters] The Shaolin Temple, Buddhist kung-fu mecca, may be part of an IPO. Awesomest sellout ever?

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BlackBerry E-mail Not Facts Not a Stumbling Block for Working For Some Malkin Users (Little Green Footballs)

Submitted at 12/16/2009 3:31:16 PM

By Adam Ostrow (Mashable!)

Michelle Malkin rants again: Public school lunacy of the day: A second-grader in Taunton, I woke up this morning thinking MA was kicked out of school, I’d either become a lot less suspended, and ordered to popular overnight or that undergo a mental evaluation something was once again wrong for… with BlackBerry e-mail. As it …drawing a picture of Jesus turns out, it’s the latter, as Christ on the cross. Research In Motion confirms that (Hat tip: Michael Graham) BlackBerry e-mail is not working One picture of Jesus gets a kid for some of its customers across booted from the classroom. North America. But Fort Hood killer Nidal On my end, not a single e-mail Hasan’s years of jihadist threats has arrived since around 2 a.m. got him…a promotion and access ET, though Gmail tells a much microblogging service is having to open season on our troops. different story. According to its own problems. And GLSEN founder Kevin RIM, phone, e-mail, and texting No BlackBerry? No Twitter? Jennings’ not-safe-for-school should still be working though. I Welcome to perhaps the most radical activism got him…a job voiced my BlackBerry frustration productive Thursday of the year. as Safe Schools czar. a little bit earlier this morning on Reviews: Gmail, Twitter Lunacy. T w i t t e r , b u t , m o s t o f y o u Tags: Mobile 2.0 Of course, there are a few probably didn’t see it as the problems with Malkin’s description of the story. For example, the fact that it’s not true at all. Taunton officials dispute reports on Jesus sketch. School officials say that the account in yesterday’s Taunton Daily Gazette was rife with errors and that the father’s Submitted at 12/17/2009 8:16:10 AM

description of what happened is untrue. “The report is totally inaccurate,’’ Julie Hackett, superintendent of the Taunton public schools, said in an interview in her office yesterday. “The inaccuracies in the original media story have resulted in a great deal of criticism and scrutiny of the system that is unwarranted.’’ Dino F. Ciliberti, editor of the Gazette, did not return calls yesterday. Hackett said the student, age 9, was never suspended and that neither he nor other students at the Maxham Elementary School were asked by the teacher to sketch something that reminded them of Christmas or any religious holiday, as the Gazette and other media reported and the father suggested, although his story changed as he explained it. She said it was unclear whether the boy, who put his name above a stick figure portrait of Christ on the cross, had drawn the picture in school, which his teacher discovered Dec. 2. “ Religion had nothing to do with this at all, 100 percent nothing to do with it,’’ Hackett said, adding

that Taunton is known as “ The Christmas City.’’ Another little detail that Malkin failed to mention is that the child drew a picture of himself on the cross, not “Jesus Christ.” And he even labeled it with his own name. But why let measly old facts get in the way of a good “Christian persecution” rant? UPDATE at 12/16/09 3:44:04 pm: A representative comment at Malkin’s site, out of hundreds of similar comments: On December 15th, 2009 at 10:12 am, b-cat said: Satan is running the school system. And they’re yelling for the teacher to be hunted down and exposed: On December 15th, 2009 at 10:43 am, RedDog said: ordered to undergo a mental evaluation for&##x2026; Ordered by whom? That person should be publicly exposed (along with the apparatchik school teacher who informed on the child) then reprimanded. The reprimand should become part of her &##x201C;permanent record&##x201D;.

HTV: Shia Labeouf and Carey Mulligan's Daytime Date (ETonline - Breaking News) Submitted at 12/17/2009 8:54:00 AM

HTV steps out with Shia Labeouf and Carey Mulligan as they enjoy a couple's day out!

The two are snapped walking crafts store. hand in hand around the valley, The 'Transformers' star still later taking a cab to an arts and wears a bandage over his hand

from his accident earlier this year.

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A Solution for the 'Black Carbon' Problem?

'Nine,' 'Up in the Air,' Rule SAG Nominations

(Little Green Footballs)

(ETonline - Breaking News)

produce one-quarter of all socalled “black carbon,” a sooty pollutant that’s adding to the Here’s an interesting suggestion planetary heat burden. for one thing we could do right “We know how to cook without away to slow down climate smoke,” said Veerabhadran change for “only” $15 billion. Ramanathan, a University of Weaning humanity from its C a l i f o r n i a , S a n D i e g o f o s s i l f u e l h a b i t w i l l t a k e climatographer. “A clean stove decades, and it will take decades costs $30. Multiply that by 500 more for global warming to stop. million households, and it’s only But one simple measure could $15 billion. This is a solvable slow warming in some of Earth’s problem.” most sensitive regions, effective After floating to the atmosphere, immediately — and it would cost black carbon mixes with dust to just $15 billion. form a solar heat-absorbing That’s a rough price tag for particulate layer. Raindrops form providing clean stoves to the 500 around the particles, trapping million households that use open even more heat. Soot deposited fires, fed by wood and animal by the rain heats up, too. dung and coal, to heat their The climate dynamics of the homes and cook. Those fires black carbon process have been Submitted at 12/16/2009 1:45:21 PM

fully described only in the last decade, but scientists now say their short-term impact sometimes rivals that of carbon dioxide. As much as one-half of the 3.4 degree Fahrenheit rise in Arctic temperatures since 1890 is attributed to black carbon. By disrupting weather patterns, it may be responsible for weakening seasonal rains in South Asia and West Africa. And black carbon is also a major reason why Himalayan glaciers, which provide water to hundreds of millions of people, are vanishing. UPDATE at 12/16/09 1:57:26 pm: Here’s a video showing how the “clean stoves” work:[Video] (From StoveTeam International.)

a Cast in a Motion Picture, along with 'An Education,' 'The Hurt Locker' and 'Inglourious ET has the latest... Basterds.' The nominations for the 16th Along with Clooney, nominees Annual Screen Actors Guild for Outstanding Performance by Awards are in and the movie a Male Actor in a Leading Role musical 'Nine' and the George are Jeff Bridges for 'Crazy Heart,' Clooney dramedy 'Up in the Air' Colin Firth for 'A Single Man,' received many of the top nods. Morgan Freeman for 'Invictus' Both movies were given nods and Jeremy Renner for 'The Hurt for Outstanding Performance by Locker.' Submitted at 12/17/2009 6:09:00 AM

John Birch Society to Cosponsor CPAC 2010 (Little Green Footballs)

plenty of other extreme right wing groups on their cosponsor list too, but the addition of the If anyone is still wondering why Birchers puts the frosting on the I want absolutely nothing to do cake: Conservative Political w i t h w h a t t h e s o - c a l l e d Action Conference Cosponsors. “conservative” movement has There was a time when this become, please note that one of l u n a t i c h a t e g r o u p w a s t h e c o s p o n s o r s f o r t h e marginalized and shoved out to Conservative Political Action the fringes, as they deserved, but Conference (CPAC) in 2010 will people like Glenn Beck and Ron be … the antisemitic, racist, Paul have been working hard at are at CPAC. conspiracy theory-promoting bringing them back to the I’d say “unbelievable,” but it’s John Birch Society. There are mainstream — and now here they Submitted at 12/16/2009 11:24:56 AM

sadly all too believable. The right wing is completely off the rails, over the cliff, and plunging toward the rocks. Disgusting. UPDATE at 12/16/09 11:42:26 am: And at the same time, the “Liberty Council” (it’s in quotes because this is a theocratic group that actually believes in the exact opposite of liberty) is threatening to pull out of CPAC if homosexual group GOProud remains as a cosponsor. (Content

warning: the link goes to Google’s cache of a really ugly homophobic right wing site.) So they’re fine with racists and conspiracy mongers, but want to purge the gay people. UPDATE at 12/16/09 1:21:27 pm: Also note Sarah Palin’s apparent connection to the John Birch Society: The magazine on her desk in this photo is the official publication of the JBS.

Politics/ Tech Tips/ Entertainment/

Amazon Christmas Deals - 2 Days Left (Little Green Footballs) Submitted at 12/16/2009 2:15:08 PM

There are two days left to order from Amazon in time for Christmas with free Super Saver Shipping, and they have quite a few exceptional deals going; here are a few that may interest you: Windows 7 Netbooks Starting Under $350 Blu-ray Players Under $200 The cutting-edge HP Photosmart Premium TouchSmart Web Allin-One Printer Movies & TV Gift and Boxed Set Sale Up to 40% Off Kitchen & Home Gifts Amazon Kindle Wireless Reading Device Top Holiday Deals & Frustration -Free Packaging in Toys Bestselling AT&T Phones from

$.01 Extra Discounts on Magazine Subscriptions Over 30% off the Canon PIXMA iP100 Mobile Photo Printer Diamond Stud Earrings- Best Deals of the Season Video Games- 18 Days, 18 Deals Logitech Harmony One Advanced Universal Remote Cuisinart 1-1/2-Quart Automatic Ice Cream Makers (Note: if you click through to Amazon from one of our links, LGF gets a small percentage in referral fees on all qualifying merchandise, without raising the cost to you, so you get terrific deals and help support us at the same time.)

Submitted at 12/17/2009 6:31:00 AM

ET has the latest... Our Kevin Frazier was on the scene as the Screen Actors Guild Awards nominations were announced very early Thursday morning and in an all-new video

Cutting Your TV Watching in Half Burns Calories Equivalent to Walking Eight Miles Per Week [Television] By Adam Pash (Lifehacker) Submitted at 12/17/2009 9:15:00 AM

The New York Times reports on a study examining how watching less TV affects average (five hours/day) TV-viewers. The results: Cutting television in half resulted in the equivalent of walking roughly eight miles/week in calories burned. Photo by(A3R) angelrravelor (A3R). The results reported in The Archives of Internal Medicine were a bit different from what the researches expected: Although some participants did report getting more exercise by walking their dogs more often or signing up for a yoga class, most of the people didn't use their television-free time for scheduled physical exercise. One person used the extra time to organize photo albums, others reported reading more or playing board games with their children. Many said they spent the time doing more household chores or paying blog just for ETonline, he gives bills. the SAG 411 on all of the shows, But even those minor changes in movies and actors that got that activity level counted a lot. While the group that reduced television coveted nod. Click here for a full list of SAG viewing burned off an additional nominees and also click here for a look back at the past SAG Awards fashions!

Video Blog: Kevin Frazier Gives the SAG 411 (ETonline - Breaking News)

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120 calories a day compared with the previous three weeks, the control group became even more sedentary, moving about 100 calories less than before. The additional activity that resulted from less television time is the equivalent of walking about eight miles a week. The takeaway, while pretty obvious (less TV is likely going to be a healthy thing), is still interesting. We should also note that the participants in the study were overweight, but it seems the findings would still have some

impact one way or another. It's easy to kick off your shoes after a long day at work and just unwind and tune out to the TV, but you can also find other activities short of go-go exercise that'll still make you a healthier person in the long-runâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;and organizing photo albums sounds pretty relaxing in its own right. How Less TV Changes Your Day[NYT]

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Tech Tips/ Media/

What's Your Screen Resolution? [Reader Poll]

MediaDailyNews: Belo Taps Hendrickson As CFO

By Adam Pash (Lifehacker) Submitted at 12/17/2009 8:45:00 AM

Google released a tool today—called Browser Size—designed to show web developers what parts of a site users can see without scrolling. It's not exclusively tied to screen resolution (you don't have to maximize your browser), but it got us wondering. (Click the image above for a closer look.) We want a better idea of what kind of screen resolution our readers are rocking on their gear. If you're not sure how to figure it out, Windows users can just fire up your Display Properties from the Control Panel and find the

Settings tab; Mac users, launch the Displays preference pane from System Preferences. Then let us know: What's Your Screen Resolution?( polls) I did my best to come up with as

many common resolutions as possible based on the results of a screen resolution survey posted on Wikipedia, so hopefully we don't have too many of you in the Other category. As we said, your screen resolution doesn't

necessarily reflect your browser window's resolution (unless you're always browsing maximized, and even then you won't take up the whole height or width of the screen unless you put your browser in fullscreen mode), but we're still curious. So give it a look and give us more details on your setup in the comments. In the meantime, web developers may be interested in checking out Browser Size for a better idea of what segment of their userbase may not be able to see important parts of their sites. Browser Size[Google Labs via Google Code Blog]

(MediaPost | Media News) Submitted at 12/17/2009 6:43:57 AM

Belo Corp. said Dennis A. Williamson, executive vice president and Chief Financial Officer, will retire next March and Carey P. Hendrickson, a 17year veteran of Belo's financial organization, will become senior vice president and Chief Financial Officer. He becan his Belo career in 1992. fivefilters.org featured article: Normalising the crime of the century by John Pilger. Available tools: PDF Newspaper, Full Text RSS, Term Extraction.

Get the Classic Network Activity Indicator Back in Windows 7 [Downloads] By Jason Fitzpatrick (Lifehacker) Submitted at 12/17/2009 6:30:00 AM

Windows 7: If you miss having a network activity icon that actually indicates if your network is active or not, this handy little hack will swap the static Windows 7 icon for the classic version. When we shared an app that turned your keyboard lights into network indicators, many of you wondered what the point

was—Windows has a network indicator in the system tray. In Windows 7 however the indicator is static. The classic little two-computer icon that blinks to indicate network activity is missing from Windows 7, replaced by an icon that simply indicates if the computer is or is not connected to a network. The solution is a tiny application called, appropriately enough, Network Activity Indicator for Windows 7. Download the

application and park your standard Windows 7 network indicator in the hidden portion of your system tray, placing the icon

for the Network Activity Indicator in the appropriate place in the system tray. If you'd like step by step instructions with

pictures on how to do this, check out the via-link below to see the tutorial at The How-To Geek. Once you've performed the swap, you'll have the old network activity indicator back and its familiar blinking screens. Network Activity Indicator for Windows 7 is freeware, Windows only. Have a little app that makes life easier? Let's hear about it in the comments. Network Activity Indicator for Windows 7[via HowToGeek]

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DIY Big Mac Tastes Great, Causes Less Guilt [Recipes] By Kevin Purdy (Lifehacker) Submitted at 12/17/2009 7:00:00 AM

Got that craving for two beef patties, one-and-a-half buns, and some special sauce? Consider skipping the drive for the cardboard-boxed classic and make your own Big Macs at home, courtesy of the Local Lemons blog's recipe and writeup. It's a fairly gourmet take on the afternoon-slowing double burger, but it aims for authenticity. Here's writer Allison Arevalo's description of what's going into this homemade Mac: To mimic the sauce, I made an olive oil aioli and combined it with homemade French dressing and organic shallots from La Tercera Farms. My thinly sliced pickles were from Happy Girl Farms, and the ground chuck was Niman Ranch. The cheese was a difficult match, but mild cheddar proved to be a shoo-in for

American, and Clover's organic was a perfect match. I admit, I did not make the buns, though they were locally baked and I painted on the sesame seeds with an egg wash. I almost feel bad posting a link to a fairly great-looking burger right before lunch. Tag or bookmark the recipe for your weekend, though, and consider

having a few friends over to ensure you get good use out of your homemade patties, sauce, and McD-like buns. And for more remarkable simulations of commercial food favorites, check out our top 10 homemade versions of things we love. Big Mac: Make Your Own[Local Lemons]

Report: Tiger Woods' Wife 'Not Rushing to Divorce' (ETonline - Breaking News)

a source tells ABC News that the 29-year-old former model is going to "take her sweet time" to ET has the latest... divorce him. In yet another report stating that "She's not rushing to divorce," Tiger Woods' wife Elin is the source told ABCNews.com. looking to divorce the pro golfer, "She's going to take her sweet Submitted at 12/17/2009 8:12:00 AM

time. She wants all the dirty laundry to be out on the table before she signs anything." But the source assures that despite Elin not putting a speedy end to her marriage, the "divorce is 100 percent on."

Create Goo.gl Shortlinks Without the Google Toolbar [URLs] By Kevin Purdy (Lifehacker)

Chrome user, you can install the goo.gl shortener extension and do your link shortening with a Geez, Google really wants you toolbar button. to install its toolbar, right? They The appeal of goo.gl-shortened usually introduce new web l i n k s i s t h e i r t h e o r e t i c a l features, like their goo.gl URL longevity, but, at the moment, shortener, into it first, leaving they lack the statistics and developers to figure out non- tracking that makes the de facto toolbar executions. Luckily, a s t a n d a r d , b i t . l y , w i d e l y webapp and Chrome extension a p p e a l i n g . W e ' l l s e e w h a t are on it. improvements come along, but Digital Inspiration points us for now, you can grab Google's toward both a webapp that spits server re-direction benefits out a goo.gl URL in one click, without having to keep their after pasting in a full URL first toolbar installed. Shorten URL (don't forget the http:// bit, or using goo.gl[ Alexandre Gaigalas you'll get an empty result). If via Digital Inspiration] that's a bit too much work for goo.gl shortener[Google Chrome tossed-off links, and you're a Extensions] Submitted at 12/17/2009 6:00:00 AM

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The Heart of Dartness Determines Jessica Simpson Calls Your Dartboard Sweet Spot [Games] Tiger Woods Story 'A Joke' By Kevin Purdy (Lifehacker)

wrote an app that analyzes 50 of your throws and figures out where you should aim for your Every so often, your best chances at a high score. uncoordinated hands get The webapp requires Java to run, wrangled into a game of barroom and doesn't account specifically darts. If you'd like a better chance for specialty games like at victory instead of apologies, a cricketâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;although, in most few Stanford students' webapp games, a high score is never a can analyze your game and bad thing. If you've got your own provide your personal beststrategies for faking it like a chance target. billiards room hero, tell us about As Wired's write-up explains, always aiming at the bullseye it in the comments. The Heart of darts is a game where the isn't a good long-term strategy. Dartness[stat.stanford.edu via difference between hitting a 20 or Facing down his own non-expert Wired] a 1 is very, very small, and tossing skills, Ryan Tibshirani Submitted at 12/17/2009 8:10:00 AM

(ETonline - Breaking News) Submitted at 12/17/2009 5:18:00 AM

Jessica Simpson isn't pulling any punches when it comes to rumors that she got "touchy feely" with Tiger Woods. In a cover story on the latest Star magazine, the singer is shown taking a picture with the golf star with a caption that says "Touchy Feely." The headline reads:

"Tiger & Jessica The Shocking Inside Story. Tiger's shameless come-on, Jess makes HER move; what happened next!" Jessica is seemingly bemused by the story, taking to her Twitter to make her thoughts known. "Can't believe that I'm on the cover of Star magazine with Tiger Woods," she writes. "What a JOKE!"

Reader Poll: Top 10 Web Products of 2009 (Last Chance to Vote!) By Richard MacManus (ReadWriteWeb)

selected by the RWW community, will be announced tomorrow. Here is the current top Submitted at 12/17/2009 7:00:00 AM 10, in alphabetical order: We're down to the final day of Sponsor voting for ReadWriteWeb's Adobe AIR reader-selected Top 10 Web Facebook Products of 2009. You can vote Feedly for up to 10 products, from a list Google Apps o f 1 0 0 s e l e c t e d b y t h e Google Chrome ReadWriteWeb authors over Google Maps December. Hulu Make your picks in the poll iPhone platform embedded below. You can cast Twitter up to 10 votes. If you don't see WordPress one of your favorites in the list, What are your favorite products note it in the comments and we'll of 2009? (multiple choice)( count that as a vote too. polling) Top 100 Web Products The year's top 10 products, as of 2009, Alphabetical

Aardvark ActivityStreams Adobe AIR Amazon EC2 Android platform Appsfire Apture Arduino Basecamp BBC's Semantic Music Project Bing Blip.fm BNO (Breaking News

Online) box.net Boxee Brightkite ChartBeat Cisco Collaboration Citysense Clicker Cliqset Collecta Data.gov DBpedia Echo (JS-Kit) Evernote Evri Facebook Facebook iPhone app Fedex SenseAware Feedly Fever Foursquare Freebase FreshBooks Glue Google App Engine Google Apps Google Chrome Google Maps Google Search Options and Rich Snippets Google Voice Hootsuite HP CeNSE Hulu IBM's sensor solutions ioBridge iPhone platform Jimdo Jive Software SBS 4.0 Jolicloud Layar Microsoft Windows Azure MindTouch Mint Mir:ror MOG Moshi Monsters Mozilla

Raindrop New York Times APIs OneForty Open Calais OrSiSo Outside.in Pachube Posterous Postrank present.ly PubSubHubbub Rackspace Cloud Drive Regator Ribbit RSSCloud Salesforce.com Seesmic Shazam SocialCast Socialtext Spotify StockTwits Superfeedr Tornado (FriendFeed framework) Tumblr TweetDeck Tweetie Tweetmeme Twidroid Twingly Twitter Vuze Wetoku WideNoise Wikitude Wolfram Alpha Woopra WordPress Yahoo Query Language (YQL) Yelp Zemanta Zoho CRM Discuss

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BlueKai: Intent Data or Black Box? By Richard MacManus (ReadWriteWeb)

airport or city, and activity on price comparison sites. The report analyzed "more than Submitted at 12/17/2009 6:00:00 AM 10 million online shopping intent BlueKai is an online marketing actions" for PCs and video game firm that provides data to consoles through the week marketers, ad networks and ending November 28, 2009. publishers. The main purpose of Here's a chart showing that this data, held in a repository netbooks, rather than the recently c a l l e d t h e B l u e K a i D a t a released Windows 7, had the Exchange, is to target ads to biggest increase in shopping consumers. BlueKai claims to intent actions in the PC category have now aggregated "intent over the Black Friday holiday data" from over 160 million period. unique users on e-commerce, BlueKai explained: online travel agency and auto "Online intent actions by those comparison sites. shopping for Netbooks surged What is "intent data"? Broadly 81% during the week of Black speaking, it's data that purports to Friday versus the prior week, show the intent of Web users with Netbooks reaching 7.1% when they browse a website. For share of total PC online intent example, a recent report from actions for the week ending BlueKai collected and analyzed November 28. Just a month prior, online shopping data over Black Netbooks comprised only 2.7% Friday week. In this post we look of PC-related online intent at that report's findings and then a c t i o n s o n t h e B l u e K a i ask some questions about the E x c h a n g e . " validity of the data. Here's another chart, this time Sponsor showing that Nintendo game Black Friday Online Shopping: devices, and in particular the Wii, Netbooks & Nintendo Popular held the most interest amongst BlueKai defined the resulting online shoppers during Black "shopping intent" data as "search Friday week. and shopping related activities by How it Works consumers on retail and price A New York Times article comparison sites." Specifically earlier this year profiled both these "intents" included price BlueKai and a similar data house search by auto make and model, called eXelate. The Times travel destination search by explained how they work:

"They both track who is interested in what through a cookie, an invisible bit of code on a Web page. When someone does a search, for example, on Kayak.com for first-class flights to Paris in September, that information can be captured by a cookie, and Kayak.com can sell that cookie using eXelate or BlueKai." As well as intent data, BlueKai recently announced a new service that gives advertisers access to shopper profiles. BlueKai CEO Omar Tawakol claimed that this gives advertisers insight into "actual shopping patterns," as opposed to merely surveying a user base. The problem is, BlueKai is inferring things about a consumer that may not be true. Claire Herminjard of the now defunct Lookery, which tried (and failed) to make a business of capturing explicit user data via a piece of javascript in partner sites, put it well: "[we] make no assumptions about users. If we don't have data on a consumer, we don't pretend that we do (or assume what we think it may be)." Although Herminjard was primarily trying to position

January 2010 Issue Now Online By John Mahoney (Popular Science - New Technology, Science News, The Future

And here you thought it was still 2009: We've published everything from the January

2010 issue. See it all here.

Lookery as a better data source, her other point was that BlueKai is essentially a "black box" and its data can't be substantiated when it comes to users - or their intents. Questions Over Data Reliability, But There's a Big Market For It What BlueKai is doing is similar to the methods used by the raft of recommendation engines we've profiled this year. We found in that series that each recommendation engine had its own methods and algorithms; and that it was difficult to judge the accuracy of the data and which company's method worked best. Likewise I'm somewhat skeptical of BlueKai's data claims, especially given how unreliable web data usually is (Alexa anyone?). Nevertheless, BlueKai is attempting to mine a large store of data that up till now has been very difficult to gather and analyze on a large scale online: user patterns on commerce sites. Whether or not the data is reliable is an open question for now, but there is a large market for it - and that will continue as long as online advertising is the main business model on the Web. Discuss

New Pics: Meet Jake Pavelka's New Bachelorettes (ETonline - Breaking News) Submitted at 12/17/2009 9:25:00 AM

What do an NBA dancer, a corporate flight attendant, a mortgage loan officer and a captain in the Air National Guard have in common? They all have their sights set on moving to Dallas with the new "Bachelor" Jake Pavelka, when "The Bachelor: On the Wings of Love," the 14th edition of ABC's popular romance reality series, premieres Monday, January 4 at 8 p.m. ET has a first look at the 25 women who hope to win Jake's heart and hand in marriage.

Facebook Becomes More Racially Diverse, Ought To Release Data for Outside Analysis By Marshall Kirkpatrick (ReadWriteWeb) Submitted at 12/16/2009 11:02:56 PM

FACEBOOK page 39

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FACEBOOK continued from page 38

Facebook used to be dominated by White and Asian users, but tonight the company announced results of a demographic study of its users concluding that the percentages of Black and Hispanic users of the site are now approaching their percentages of the population in the general US public. Hear that? Facebook scientists have looked at the data and everything is ok now. For months, we've been calling on Facebook to open up user data in an appropriate way for the public at large to study. Sponsor It's an invaluable bird's eye view of the interactions between 350 million people around the world. There are probably a lot of social patterns of interaction between people that could be discovered in that data - some not pretty at all. For now, though, Facebook has analyzed the data in-house and given itself a cheery report card. More analysis appears to be forthcoming, so we'll see what we're told about what really goes on on Facebook - but that data ought to be made available for outside analysis. In this case the data wasn't

anonymized, it was analyzed by two in-house staff members and two grad students from Cornell and Princeton. The group compared users' last names on Facebook to US Census data about the percentage of people with those last names who reported particular racial backgrounds. Once a larger number of Facebook users have public profiles, something that's probably happening very rapidly thanks to the radical new privacy settings the company began recommending to users last week, then analyzing things like names, friend lists and associations won't constitute a violation of user privacy anymore. That might not sound like something many users are comfortable with, but one way or another there is a lot of potential for social good (not just advertising) made possible by aggregate user data. Perhaps coincidentally, perhaps not - the new privacy regime will remove the primary objections to bulk analysis of user data. Presumably something will need

to be done to make the data available in bulk and in an appropriate format for outside analysis, though. The example we've offered most commonly in calling for this data to be released is the history of what's called Real Estate Redlining. When in the 1960's both US Census information and real estate mortgage loan information were made available for bulk analysis, it was proven that banks around the US were discriminating against home loan applicants in traditionally African American neighborhoods. That was a big deal and we suspect that there are patterns of comparable importance, both positive and negative, hiding in Facebook's huge store of data. For contrast and illustration, consider the conclusions drawn by popular dating site OK Cupid in an analysis of dating inquiry response rates between its users of different races. In heterosexual pairs, male inquirers on OK Cupid were far more likely to get a response when they were white. Black, Hispanic and Asian men saw terrible response rates from women on

the site. White men were least likely to respond to inquiries from Black women and they were by far the most likely to say that they preferred to date people of their same race. Both white men and women were quite unusual in the likelihood of their saying they preferred to date people of their own race. Take that, people who commented on the Facebook study tonight saying that people don't see race any more! It certainly appears that we do. It will be interesting to see if Facebook is willing to publish data that shines a less positive light on its own user base. Most likely, outside parties would be more apt to expose data like that. The world could use some more self-awareness, Facebook, but it's important that such selfawareness not be hand-delivered by scientists on your own staff, with your financial interests as their bottom line. Discuss

Gay Pride Came Early This Year [Open Caption] By Brian Moylan (Gawker) Submitted at 12/17/2009 9:52:14 AM

[ Straight allies Robert De Niro and Bruce Springsteen show

President Obama their support for gay rights at a reception for the Kennedy Center Honors recipients at the White House on December 5. Image freshly

uploaded to the White House's Flickr]

Ivan Reitman â&#x20AC;&#x201D; [Pullquote] By Gabriel Snyder (Gawker) Submitted at 12/17/2009 8:40:58 AM

comedy producer ( Animal House, Stripes and, er, Kindergarten Cop, as well as Ghostbusters) after being asked if The Hangover deserves a Academy Award nomination for Best Picture this year, to the New York Times' Carpetbagger blog.

SoundHound: A Music App That Could Change Mobile Search By Dana Oshiro (ReadWriteWeb) Submitted at 12/16/2009 5:55:00 PM

Larry Marcus is one investor with the ability to turn good core technology into consumer success. Five years ago he helped change the mathematical SOUNDHOUND: page 40

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SOUNDHOUND: continued from page 39

algorithm of the Music Genome Project into music sensation Pandora. Today, Marcus' work with Melodis' Sound2Sound Search Science is already celebrating market success with music identifying application SoundHound. ReadWriteWeb caught up with Marcus to hear about his latest project. Sponsor At first glance, Melodis' SoundHound is a Shazam Encore competitor with faster search functionality. Both services are among the top paid iPhone applications, both cost $5 dollars and both allow users to find songs, scan lyrics and read artist bios. Nevertheless, in addition to allowing users to identify songs from ambient background music, sung lyrics, spoken word and text -based search, SoundHound also lets you listen to music through your own iTunes library or Pandora account. With SoundHound you can capture FM radio, identify a song and create a Pandora internet radio station within seconds. And

while each of these features are impressive, what we're really excited about is SoundHound's plans for the future. The Underlying Technology Explains Marcus, "Most sound recognition technology converts speech to text in order to identify similarities. Sound2Sound (SoundHound's core technology) converts text and speech to phonic representations and cross references those. " The same underlying sound recognition technology that powers SoundHound also makes Melodis' Voice Dialer application possible. What's more, Marcus suggests that the technology can have even broader applications. "Music is just one way we're bringing this core technology to a mass market. It's a passion project that brings joy to users, but we can expand even further. To start, we believe that the best user interface ever is search." Meanwhile, Shazam's core technology is no longer its own. The company sold its search assets to BMI more than 4 years

ago to track audio files and enforce royalties for rights owners. While both Shazam and Melodis' SoundHound remain some of the App Store's most downloaded products, Shazam's product expansion is limited by BMI's control. Marcus believes that SoundHound may just be the tip of the iceberg for Melodis. From bird call recognition, to driver assistance, to voice-activated emergency response, Sound2Sound can expand as far as its engineers can carry it. Given the attention to voice recognition in yesterday's Bing iPhone application release and the fact that mobile search has become increasingly competitive, we may find Sound2Sound integrated in some unlikely places. To check out SoundHound, download it here. Discuss

Puck Talk: Minnesota's Uprising By Bruce Ciskie (Fanhouse Main)

Conference. Since a 3-9 start left everyone in Minnesota wondering about the Submitted at 12/17/2009 4:00:00 AM ability of this team to be Filed under: Wild It was a competitive without longtime hideous start to the season for the coach Jacques Lemaire, the Wild Minnesota Wild. At one point, have quietly put together an the Wild were comfortably sitting impressive 13-5-3 mark, and in the basement of the Western they're climbing up the Western

Conference ladder. With that in mind, we reached out to Nathan Eide, a writer with Wild blog Hockey Wilderness, to talk about this improved team. Listen to the podcast above, or click here to download the file.

Google Announces Map Contest: $50K for Adding Schools, Hospitals & More By Jolie O'Dell (ReadWriteWeb) Submitted at 12/16/2009 7:00:22 PM

Google is announcing a new contest for local would-be heroes. The Map Maker Global Competition, which challenges users to add high-quality data on universities, schools, hospitals and medical clinics in Google Map Maker, will run from December 15, 2009 to January 31, 2010. The grand prize for the user who adds the greatest quantity of data is a $50,000 UNICEF donation to the winner's home country. Sponsor The winning team or user will moreover receive a VIP tour from UNICEF officials of the local projects that will benefit from the donation as well as an all-expenses-paid trip to the Google Super Mappers 2010 conference. Top mapping contributors will appear on Google Map Maker and ultimately on Google Maps. Google's Map Maker shows users satellite images and asks them to add data to make actually useful maps. These "citizen

cartographers" can add directions, streets, schools and more; data is subject to peer moderation. The app is available in English, Spanish, French, Russian, Romanian, and Vietnamese and in more than 170 countries. UNICEF rep Gerrit Beger told Google, "We know that mapping is a proven method to enhance community development. Google Map Maker is a powerful tool to create better situational awareness for both young people and communities at large. It will enable organizations like ours to better deliver services, respond to crises and adapt to change." Google has also just wrapped up a similar competition focusing on Latin America. In that event, more than 50 teams from all over the world participated, which led to a 500 percent increase in mapping activity for several Latin American countries. Discuss

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Facebook in the Factory: Manufacturers Want Social Software, Too By Alex Williams (ReadWriteWeb)

The survey of manufacturing managers was done on behalf of IFS North America, one of the Submitted at 12/17/2009 9:10:29 AM largest software providers to Factories may not be the first manufacturing markets. IFS is place you'd expect to see demand developing its open-source for social technologies. But applications to fit the changing social networks are changing manufacturing landscape. For how manufacturers view their example, it is migrating away operations. from static documentation In a recent survey of 268 technologies in favor of more manufacturers, 63% of collaborative applications such as respondents said that enterprise wikis. Many manufacturing resources planning (ERP) companies face an aging software will provide its highest workforce. A new breed of value when integrated with social socially oriented technologies computing technologies. Users will be considered part of doing want ERP software to perform business for a younger the functions of collaborative generation. technologies and social networks. It's evident that real-time manufacturers with more than $1 contextual information from technologies, social networks and Sponsor But why do manufacturers want billion in revenue, 72% said they similar users at other companies, cloud-based services are having and troubleshooting. s o c i a l t e c h n o l o g i e s i n t h e wanted this capability. real impacts across our economy. M a n u f a c t u r e r s a r e m o s t Manufacturers are turning out to In 2010, we expect to see clear enterprise? According to Manufacturing interested in using data from be the surprise adopters of examples of how these new BusinessTechnology, a trade social networks to capture leads, Enterprise 2.0 technology. In a messaging and communications publication, they want to develop research competitors and perform recent survey done by the 2.0 services affect supply chains ways to share the knowledge of business intelligence functions, Adoption Council, manufacturers a c r o s s m u l t i p l e i n d u s t r i e s . s e n i o r e n g i n e e r s a n d such as product training. They were some of the most eager D i s c u s s p r o f e s s i o n a l s . A m o n g are also interested in receiving adopters of social technologies.

Backchecking With ... Ryan Suter By Adam Gretz (Fanhouse Main) Submitted at 12/17/2009 2:00:00 AM

Filed under: Predators We get to know NHL players with some quick questions. Today's subject: Nashville Predators defenseman Ryan Suter.

Bengals' Chris Henry in Dire Condition, Source Says By Dan Graziano (Fanhouse Main)

N.C. and was being treated for life-threatening injuries, according to a source with direct Submitted at 12/16/2009 11:38:00 AM knowledge of the situation. Filed under: Bengals Cincinnati "We don't think he's going to Bengals receiver Chris Henry m a k e i t , " t h e s o u r c e t o l d was seriously injured in a car F a n H o u s e o n W e d n e s d a y FoxSports.com's Alex Marvez reports that Henry is on life accident Wednesday in Charlotte, e v e n i n g .

support. thoughts and prayers [are] with "We ask everyone to pray for h i m d u r i n g t h i s e x t r e m e l y Chris," agent Andy Simms of d i f f i c u l t t i m e . " PlayersRep Sports said in a statement. "We also ask that you respect the privacy of Chris' family. Chris is indeed battling for his life tonight, and our

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OpenID Ends 2009 With 1 Billion Accounts Enabled By Jolie O'Dell (ReadWriteWeb) Submitted at 12/16/2009 6:00:35 PM

At the close of a whiz-bang year, OpenID has a lot to be proud of. With a community of 9 million sites that use OpenID logins and 1 billion enabled accounts, OpenID has effectively revolutionized the way we are able to create and maintain portable identities. Best of all, it's not just bloggers and geeks who sang OpenID's praises: The U.S. federal government got on board this year, too. Sponsor OpenID accounts are enabled by such providers as AOL, Blogger, Flickr, Google, LiveJournal, MySpace, Verisign, WordPress and Yahoo with announcements of upcoming OpenIDs from Microsoft and PayPal. Sites that allow users to login with OpenID range from major retailers and music labels to news

organizations and social sites. As for the government, at the Gov 2.0 Summit in Washington, DC, earlier this year, the General Services Administration and several government agencies announced they would adopt OpenID as part of the White House's Open Government Initiative. Participating companies included Yahoo!, PayPal, Google, Equifax, AOL, VeriSign, Acxiom, Citi, Privo and Wave Systems. On the government side is the Center for Information Technology (CIT), National Institutes of Health (NIH), U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), and related agencies. Not only is the government's involvement a vote of confidence for OpenID's innovation; it also speaks to the product's security

progress, which was spearheaded by security committee head and PayPal exec Andrew Nash. In addition to developing and spreading the OpenID product, there's also the OpenID Foundation, which appointed its first executive committee, including Chris Messina and Don Thibeau, in 2009. Portable identity is one of our favorite themes from this year, and we applaud what OpenID has been able to accomplish. What do you look forward to seeing from the product, the foundation and OpenID partner sites in the year to come? Let us know your thoughts in the comments. Update: The title of this post was changed to reflect the discrepency between the number of OpenID enabled accounts now online vs. the number of probable OpenID users. Discuss

Local Stations Still Pushing For Local Commercial Measurement (but won’t wanna pay for it) By Robert Seidman (TVbytheNumbers)

national commercials (I believe it is called audio watermarking) being usable at the local level, I Submitted at 12/17/2009 9:04:39 AM just don’t see it happening. L e d b y G r o u p M a n d h e One of the reasons they can T e l e v i s i o n B u r e a u o f solve the problem with Advertising, Nielsen is again technology more easily at a being pressured to provide local national level is there aren’t that ratings for commercial viewing many different ads. At the local like they do at a national level. level it expands to many more. I Previously, Nielsen had only think Nielsen could figure it out, measured live program viewing but it sure seems like it would be at the local level, but it is rolling extremely labor intensive and out Live+SD program viewing cost a lot of money. Money the a n d p u s h i n g t h a t a s a n local stations aren’t going to enhancement at the local level. want to pay. I can understand the local It will be interesting to see how stations and advertisers wanting this resolves, but my guess is that t h e s a m e c o m m e r c i a l in the short-term it will resolve measurement as Nielsen does with Nielsen’s plans to roll-out nationally, where it measures l i v e + S D p r o g r a m v i e w i n g commercial (rather than program m e a s u r e m e n t l o c a l l y . viewing) live and up to 3 days Much, much more from Claire after on DVR. But because Atkinson on Broadcasting & national commercials are national Cable. Nielsen can use technology to fivefilters.org featured article: measure the viewing, plus at the Normalising the crime of the local level viewing is much century by John Pilger. Available smaller. Without any kind of tools: PDF Newspaper, Full Text technology that can easily detect RSS, Term Extraction.

Bosh Unhappy With Toronto's Strategy By Tim Povtak (Fanhouse Main)

And that's not good for the Raptors. Bosh, their franchise player who Submitted at 12/16/2009 5:15:00 PM can leave as an unrestricted free F i l e d u n d e r : R a p t o r s agent this summer, was secondORLANDO -- Chris Bosh is not guessing the Raptors' strategy happy with the Toronto Raptors. after getting drilled in back-to-

back games by the Miami Heat

and Orlando Magic. "We make adjustments with teams before we play the game. That sends the wrong message to ourselves,'' Bosh said after losing to the Magic, 118-99, Wednesday night. "We practice

all the time so we should trust our system. We need to go out there and play hard. If they beat us for one quarter doing the things we normally do, then okay. Now we can change it up.''

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Apple Making Mobile Safari Web Apps Better, Faster, Stronger By Darrell Etherington (TheAppleBlog) Submitted at 12/16/2009 9:39:27 AM

iPhone web apps aren’t being left behind by Apple, despite the fact that the App Store has gone onto become such a huge success following its introduction in 2008. In fact, according to John Gruber at Daring Fireball, recent efforts on the Mac maker’s part show a real dedication to improving the platform’s web application experience. In a lengthy post comparing developing using Cocoa Touch for the App Store vs. developing web applications, Gruber goes over the strengths and limitations of both. In the end, he reveals that a new web app framework would bring the experience of using web apps much closer to that of apps which reside natively on the iPhone. The new framework is apparently called PastryKit, and it’s an official Apple endeavor. PastryKit brings three really important things to the table for web developers: • Hides the address bar, without the need to create a home screen shortcut first, which currently

since these are known to have trouble with JavaScript in mobile Safari. There’s little doubt that Apple is keeping its eye on the mobile web space, which is poised to explode thanks to recent developments in web tech like HTML5, CSS and others. There are some things that the App Store is no doubt better for, including advanced 3-D games like the kind released by allows that. • Allows for static, fixed position Gameloft, ngmoco and EA, but toolbars that don’t scroll along for other apps, an improved web interface could be just what the with the rest of the page. • A l l o w s f o r s c r o l l i n g doctor ordered. If Apple can get smaller momentum, which allows users to “fling” lengthy lists without developers who are creating apps causing scroll friction, the way with limited or light functionality to take their business to the web web apps generally do now. instead of routing through the PastryKit has already been App Store, it’ll be able to deployed in its iPhone User eliminate a lot of the static and Guide web page, though you can chatter that currently gums up the only see the effects if you’re review process and no doubt visiting the site on an iPhone. c o s t s C u p e r t i n o a n o t T h e y a r e a l l J a v a S c r i p t insignificant amount of overhead. implementations, and so should It may lose revenue, too, but the be usable by any web developer. more lucrative titles will likely MacRumors points out that remain as dedicated apps, being performance issues attached to the aforementioned games from the new features could arise on major publishers I mentioned older-generation iPhone models, above.

CBS’s “Late Show” and “The Late Late Show” Continue Their Winning Ways By Bill Gorman (TVbytheNumbers)

25-54 and 1.0/04 in adults 1849. LATE SHOW beat “The Tonight Show” broadcasts in Submitted at 12/17/2009 10:02:50 AM households by +63% (vs. 1.9/05), via press release: viewers by +66% (vs. 2.65m) and CBS’s “LATE SHOW” AND +17% in adults 25-54 (vs. “THE LATE LATE SHOW” 1.2/05). CONTINUE THEIR WINNING THE LATE LATE SHOW WAYS posted a 1.4/05 in households “Late Show” Tops “The Tonight with 1.95m viewers, 0.6/03 in Show” in Viewers and Adults 25- adults 18-49 and 0.7/04 in adults 54 25-54. LATE LATE SHOW “The Late Late Show” Places beat “Late Night With Jimmy First in Viewers, Adult 18-49 and Fallon” in households (vs. 1.1/04, Adults 25-54 +27%), viewers (vs. 1.50m, CBS’s LATE SHOW with +30%) and tied in both adults 25DAVID LETTERMAN topped 54 and adults 18-49. LATE “The Tonight Show” in viewers LATE SHOW also beat “Jimmy and adults 25-54 while THE Kimmel Live” in households (vs. L A T E L A T E S H O W w i t h 1.3/04, +8%), viewers (vs. CRAIG FERGUSON placed first 1.70m, +15%) and tied in adults in viewers and key demos (tied), 25-54 and adults 18-49. according to Nielsen live plus fivefilters.org featured article: same day ratings for the week Normalising the crime of the ending Dec. 1. century by John Pilger. Available LATE SHOW posted a 3.1/08 in tools: PDF Newspaper, Full Text households with an average of RSS, Term Extraction. 4.40m viewers, 1.4/06 in adults

Sony e-readers get exclusive Dow Jones, New York Post content (Engadget) (Yahoo! News Search Results for e-readers) Submitted at 12/17/2009 8:55:11 AM

Boss of the Year Entry Form Now that we've thrown 'em off the trail, use the form below to get in touch with the people at

Engadget. Please fill in all of the required fields because they're required. fivefilters.org featured article:

Normalising the crime of the century by John Pilger. Available tools: PDF Newspaper, Full Text RSS, Term Extraction.

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iPhone Passes Windows Mobile in Smartphone OS Market Share By Darrell Etherington (TheAppleBlog)

By Kona Gallagher (TV Squad)

Submitted at 12/17/2009 8:20:43 AM

Windows Mobile, Microsoft’s increasingly embarrassing single entrant in the smartphone OS field, can’t seem to hold onto the attention of the world’s consumers. A new survey by market research firm comScore sees Windows Mobile dropping one place in the overall rankings, and Apple’s iPhone gaining one, which puts it ahead of Microsoft. The iPhone climbs to No. 2 in terms of general smartphone OS market share in the U.S., while Windows Mobile drops to third. Research In Motion’s BlackBerry OS still tops the list, and in fact does so with an impressive gain in customers over the course of 2009, according to a breakdown of the report by DailyTech. comScore compiles its results for the smartphone survey every three months, collecting data from thousands of U.S. consumers. The latest threemonth period, the one which is detailed in this latest report, ended in October of this year. RIM, as mentioned, saw pretty significant growth throughout the year. At the beginning of 2009, it had just under 10 million customers, and according to the comScore report, it now boasts 14.96 million in the U.S. RIM

The Twelve Days of Festivus: Seven shows a -thrivin' Submitted at 12/17/2009 11:03:00 AM

has been employing aggressive pricing strategies to compete with the iPhone’s success, including handset giveaways and deep discounts, and it looks like the BlackBerry maker’s efforts have paid off nicely. Windows Mobile actually showed negative growth — it’s the only smartphone company that can make this unfortunate claim, and now has around 7.13 million users. Buyers could be shy of committing to a device that runs Windows Mobile 6.5 when version 7 is set to launch sometime early in 2010. Everyone else, including Palm’s WebOS, Google’s Android, and Symbian all experienced modest gains. Android still tails all others, but during the most recent period it broke the 1 million mark, and I’d expect to see it surge even further on the strength of the Droid in upcoming surveys.

As for the iPhone, it grew to 8.97 million users over the period ending in October. That’s a pretty impressive lead over Windows Mobile, though it means Apple still has a lot of ground to make up before it can snatch the crown from powerhouse RIM. It’s even more impressive when you consider that at the beginning of the year, the iPhone only had around 5 million users, meaning it experienced about 70 percent growth over the course of 2009, a performance that likely has a lot to do with the release of the 3GS and the significant price drop and continued sales of the 3G model. Overall, the smartphone market continues to do well. Roughly 11.8 percent of the American population claims to now own one, according to this most recent poll.

On the seventh day of Festivus, TV gave to me... Seven shows athrivin'. The 2009-2010 season is a great one to be on TV-- especially for returning dramas and new comedies. If we had 20 days of Christmas, I probably could have filled the list with shows that were either thriving right out of the gate or making a resurgence after being on the air for several years. As it is, we just have seven slots, so here are some noteworthy series that are thriving this year. Dexter I've always liked Dexter, but it's never been appointment TV for me. I've generally been content to wait until the season came out on DVD and knock all of the episodes out in a weekend. However, after a creative dip in season 3, I've found myself positively glued to my television every Sunday night that season 4 has aired. John Lithgow absolutely made the season as the creepy Arthur Mitchell. Plus the

finale? I know some of you saw the big twist coming at the end, but I certainly did not. Who doesn't like to end a season with their jaw on the floor? Continue reading The Twelve Days of Festivus: Seven shows athrivin' Filed under: Supernatural, Watercooler Talk, Festivus, Dexter, NCIS, TV Squad Lists, Reality-Free, Mad Men, The Big Bang Theory, Community, Modern Family Permalink| Email this| | Comments

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“This Week” Is #2 Among Total Viewers And Adults 25-54 By Bill Gorman (TVbytheNumbers)

25-54, “This Week” cut into the NBC show’ s demo lead by 63%(240,000 vs. 640,000) Submitted at 12/17/2009 9:17:26 AM compared to the same week last via press release: year. “THIS WEEK” IS #2 AMONG January 1, 2009 to present T O T A L V I E W E R S A N D versus the same period in 2008, ADULTS 25-54 “This Week” has cut into “Meet’ “THIS WEEK” CLOSES s” total viewing lead by TOTAL VIEWING GAP WITH 6 3 % ( 4 9 0 , 0 0 0 i n 2 0 0 9 v s . “MEET THE PRESS” 1,330,000 in 2008). Among FOR THE 40 TH TIME THIS Adults 25-54, the gap has YEAR narrowed by 57%(200,000 in ABC News“This Week with 2009 vs. 460,000 in 2008). George Stephanopoulos” was Please note that last Sunday the#2 Sunday morning discussion “This Week” was pre-empted in program among both Total Vi two of the top 25 markets: ewers and Adults 25-54 on Dallas due to coverage of a local Sunday, December 13, according marathon and Pittsburgh due to to Nielsen Media Research. In local news coverage. addition, “This Week” continues George Stephanopoulos’ guests to close the gaps with NBC’ s last Sunday were NEC Director “Meet the Press.” For the 40 th Lawrence Summers and Rep. time this year “This Week” E r i c C a n t o r ( R - V A ) . T h e narrowed the total viewing year roundtable featured George Will, to year gap with“Meet” by E d G i l l e s p i e , A r i a n n a 5 2 % ( 7 4 0 , 0 0 0 i n 2 0 0 9 v s . Huffington, John Podesta, and 1,530.000 in 2008), which does April Ryan. not include the shows when ABC George Stephanopoulos is the was number one. Among Adults anchor of “This Week” and Ian

Bank capital rules face overhaul (Financial Times - US homepage)

invasive international regulatory regime unveiled on Thursday. The Basel Committee on Submitted at 12/17/2009 8:01:56 AM Banking Supervision, which is Banks will be blocked from reviewing the rules governing paying bonuses or dividends to banks’ strength, said the ban shareholders if their capital levels would apply if a bank failed to fall below a minimum threshold, maintain a buffer of perhaps 25 under the terms of a more per cent above a new regulated

Cameron is the executive producer. The program airs Sundays on the ABC Televis ion Network. (Sunday, December 13, 2009) TOTAL VIEWERS A25-54 MM/Rtg ABC “THIS WEEK” 2,770,000 860,000/.7 NBC “MEET THE PRESS” 3,510,000 1,100,000/.9 CBS “FACE THE NATION” 2,760,000 760,000/.6 FOX “FOX NEWS SUNDAY” 1,130,000 450,000/.4 Source: NTI – A25-54 & Total Viewers – Wks. of 12/7/09, 11/30/09 & 12/8/08 Live +SD. 1/1/09 to present: Live +7 (where available) & Live +SD for 1/1/09-12/13/09 & 1/1/0812/14/08. fivefilters.org featured article: Normalising the crime of the century by John Pilger. Available tools: PDF Newspaper, Full Text RSS, Term Extraction.

Screen Actors Guild award nominations for TV By Allison Waldman (TV Squad) Submitted at 12/17/2009 11:33:00 AM

Every day it seems that we have nominations to announce. Yes, we are in award season and today it's the Screen Actors Guild's turn. On Saturday, January 23, 2010, at 8 p.m. on TNT and TBS, the winners of the 16th Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards will air live from Los Angeles. Here's the nominees in the main categories and some thoughts on each: Drama Ensemble: The Closer; Dexter; The Good Wife; Mad Men; True Blood Interesting that CBS's The Good Wife made the cut, especially over Lost or House or Breaking Bad or Sons of Anarchy or Damages or Friday Night Lights. And I love The Closer, but the inclusion here is a surprise. I guess NCIS would be too big a surprise to get recognized. Comedy Ensemble: 30 Rock; Curb Your Enthusiasm; Glee; Modern Family; The Office minimum. fivefilters.org featured article: Glee and Modern Family are Normalising the crime of the freshmen, but clearly excellent century by John Pilger. Available ensemble comedies. And for tools: PDF Newspaper, Full Text Curb Your Enthusiasm, are they RSS, Term Extraction.

honoring the Seinfeld team all over again? Also, where's The Big Bang Theory? Continue reading Screen Actors Guild award nominations for TV Filed under: OpEd, House, Curb Your Enthusiasm, The Office, Celebrities, The Closer, 30 Rock, Dexter, Awards, Breaking Bad, Reality-Free, Mad Men, Glee, Modern Family Permalink| Email this| | Comments

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What's On Tonight: Attack of the Show, SNL Christmas, Mentalist By Bob Sassone (TV Squad) Submitted at 12/17/2009 12:10:00 PM

• At 7, G4 has a new Attack of the Show, then a new X-Play. • At 8, CBS has a new Survivor, followed by new episodes of CSI and The Mentalist. • NBC has Saturday Night Live Presents: A Very Gilly Christmas at 8, then a new Jay Leno Show. • TCM has Christmas in Connecticut at 8, followed by Holiday Affair. • TLC has a new American Chopper at 9. • Spike has a new TNA Wrestling at 9. • Current has a new SuperNews at 9. • At 10, Bravo has a new Real Housewives of Orange County. • MTV has a new Jersey Shore at 10. • At 10:30, Current has a new Rotten Tomatoes Show. Check your local TV listings for

more. After the jump, the late night talk shows. Continue reading What's On Tonight: Attack of the Show, SNL Christmas, Mentalist Filed under: Late Night, Programming, Celebrities, Talk Show, What To Watch Tonight, Reality-Free Permalink| Email this| | Comments

Review: Nip/Tuck Wesley Clovis (season finale) By Jonathan Toomey (TV Squad)

(Sean, especially). Within the final moments of last night's superb finale (I mean it -Submitted at 12/17/2009 11:55:00 AM best episode of the season), it's ( S06E10)"Besides, we've seen easy to make the argument that people die before. I mean, hell, all has been forgiven, but with we've thrown them in a swamp." nine episodes remaining (the - Christian seventh and final season This deep into Nip/Tuck, it's premieres in just a few weeks on hard sometimes to remember the January 6th), it's probably a safe original sin that took place in the bet that we just witnessed the pilot episode all those years ago - calm before the storm. - Sean and Christian wrapping a Continue reading Review: body in spiral hams and dumping Nip/Tuck - Wesley Clovis it deep in the Everglades. The (season finale) two of them, they're not innocent Filed under: OpEd, Nip/Tuck, -- not by a longshot -- and it Episode Reviews, Reality-Free always creates an interesting Permalink| Email this| | dichotomy when they try to C o m m e n t s elevate themselves ethically

Curses! Tortorella Swears He'll Find Answers for Woeful Rangers By Christopher Botta (Fanhouse Main) Submitted at 12/16/2009 1:58:00 PM

Filed under: Rangers NEW YORK -- Good thing MSG Network is wise enough to record John Tortorella's post-game press conferences instead of broadcasting them live. Pressed, albeit not too intensely, by the New York media corps for his answers to the Rangers' dispassionate showing Wednesday night at home in a 21 loss to the rival Islanders, Tortorella went into David Mamet mode.

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Donald Trump gets another TV show

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By Brad Trechak (TV Squad) Submitted at 12/17/2009 10:30:00 AM

Not only does the man keep getting rehired, he's now got yet another job. Donald Trump will be hosting Donald J. Trump's Fabulous World of Golf on April 26 on the Golf Channel. The premise of the program is that golf stars and celebrities will play Trump one-on-one in a golf game for charity (presumably if Trump loses, the show donates to the charity of the celebrity's choice). Will anybody attack Trump with a golf club? I would tune in for that. Wouldn't it be great if he had the rematch with Vince McMahon in a game of golf? Perhaps, much like his WWE appearance, the loser can also have their head shaven. I'll wait to hear who Trump is actually playing before I consider

By ELLE.com (ELLE News Blog) Submitted at 12/16/2009 2:09:33 PM

tuning in. Of course, I hear Tiger Woods suddenly has a lot of free time available and could use the positive publicity. That would be an interesting episode. Filed under: Programming, OpEd, Celebrities, Pickups and Renewals, Reality-Free Permalink| Email this| | By Bill Gorman Comments (TVbytheNumbers)

Submitted at 12/17/2009 4:10:11 AM

The estimated percentage of cellphones that were recycled in 2007. The EPA estimated that of the 126.3 million cellphones disposed of in 2007, only 14

Charlie Horse and United Bamboo present: “Gift Horse,” a silent auction in support of emerging New York photographers including Joe DeNardo, Cassie McQuater, Paul Salveson, Phillip Birch, Jack Jeffries, and many more. Benefits Charlie Horse Reach, a new outreach program to sponsor talented South African artists, and a portion of the proceeds go to KittyKind, a New York, nonthat isn’t an immediate give profit, cat rescue and adoption group. away. I will return later today to When to go: Tonight, December confirm the correct answer 16, from 7-10pm assuming someone has gotten it, Where to go: Charlie Horse, 28 but because of my schedule there Marcy Avenue, Brooklyn may be quite a lag between a Follow ELLE on Twitter. c o r r e c t g u e s s a n d m y Become our Facebook fan! confirmation. Depending on how well this works, I might do it again. Or not! fivefilters.org featured article: Normalising the crime of the century by John Pilger. Available tools: PDF Newspaper, Full Text RSS, Term Extraction.

Ratings Detective: Can You Name The Show From The Ratings Alone? Submitted at 12/17/2009 9:55:42 AM

Mag+ digital magazine concept makes e-readers cower with envy (video!) (Engadget) (Yahoo! News Search Results for e-readers)

How much of a TV ratings detective are you? Think you can name a show looking only at its ratings trend? Here’s the 2009-2010 adults 1849 ratings trend for a broadcast million -- about 10 percent -- primetime scripted show (its new were recycled. The rest? Landfill episodes only, repeats have been heaven. (source: EPA, July 2008) removed, and the episode ratings fivefilters.org featured article: are show in order without any Normalising the crime of the date gaps). century by John Pilger. Available Guesses? tools: PDF Newspaper, Full Text If no one guesses correctly, I RSS, Term Extraction. will return with hints, but that will require me to think up a hint

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More on Meg Whitman's Fratty Princeton Son [Rumormonger] By Ryan Tate (Gawker) Submitted at 12/17/2009 9:46:50 AM

A defacto bodyguard lived at Princeton with Griff Harsh to assuage the kidnapping fears of his mom, California gubernatorial candidate Meg Whitman, according to a longtime Gawker commenter close to the university. And the rich kid's suspension? Probably academic. As we reported last night, Harsh â&#x20AC;&#x201D; full name Griff Harsh V â&#x20AC;&#x201D; was forced to withdraw from the university for a year, moving from the class of 2008 to the 2009 (thus presumably graduating last May. (The Daily Princetonian's seems to confirm some far off land, finds any the timing; the campus paper last reason to raise my rates, and is as year said ID'd him as a member electrically reliable as a used of the class of 2008 but in Pontiac Sunfire. But the guy they January this year ran a correction hired to write their TV listings saying he's really in the class of amuses me to no end. Check out 2009.) this recent listing for a rerun of Our tipster, who lives in America's favorite old show Princeton, NJ and says he knows (with an emphasis on "old"), the university well, says that the Matlock, infused with a tasty bit suspension appears academic, of TV trivia. Who says TV is no given Harsh's reputation as a notlonger the great educator? so-bright legacy. Filed under: Programming, The Whitman kid does sound Cable/Satellite, Reality-Free more like a boor than a bright Permalink| Email this| | Comments

The guy who writes my TV listings is the greatest TV listing writer ever By Danny Gallagher (TV Squad) Submitted at 12/17/2009 1:02:00 PM

I know that the odds of this statement being repeated are about as good as finding the lost director's cut of The Magnificent Ambersons at my local Blockbuster (let alone an actual cut of The Magnificent Ambersons until it's remade with Ben Stiller and Jack Black), but here goes: I love my cable provider. Oh, sure, they're a faceless media corporation that forwards all of my tech support calls to

light, given the party antics described in a campus magazine, which had the heir bragging that his wealth protected him from obnoxious behavior. But the heir may have another reason for his brashness: According to our tipster, the university assigned one of the toughest guys on campus to be his roommate, the lacrosseplaying son of a New Jersey real estate developer. The bodyguard roomie was probably the doing of Momma Whitman, who is very concerned Griff might be kidnapped, our tipster claims. Having donated at least $30 million to the university, she wouldn't have much trouble wielding influence

with the housing office. Her fears would also help explain why we haven't been able to find any pics of her son on the internet, save for the tiny thumbnail above. Genuine or not, Whitman's protectiveness over her son provides a ready-made excuse to avoid all discussion of and appearances with him on the campaign trail. Whitman can hardly be expected to answer questions about hearings and suspensions when she's trying to prevent an honest-to-God kidnapping, right? If only the Republican had some similar excuse to avoid answering questions about gay marriage rights.

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How a Fake Twitter Death Report Tragically Became True [Shut Up, Twitter] By Ryan Tate (Gawker) Submitted at 12/17/2009 9:24:38 AM

Last night on Twitter, someone impersonating a newspaper writer falsely reported the death of football player Chris Henry. Henry died about 12 hours later, according to news reports, finally making one of Twitter's many fake stories come true. The real news is horrible enough without the added layer of internet deception. During what police described as a domestic dispute with his wife, Henry tried to jump into the bed of a pickup truck in which his wife was driving away. He fell and was later found lying on the road and rushed to the hospital. He died at 6:36 am ET this morning. But Henry was reported dead approximately 12 hours earlier on Twitter. Real and fake deaths were bound to bump up against one another on the

microblogging service sooner or later, by sheer chance. Twitter supplies a steady stream of misinformation, including most prominently the prematurely reported death of actor Patrick Swayze, outrage over an Amazon gay book ban that never existed, and the false news that California

courts had overturned a gay marriage ban. The Henry death scam was, as these things go, relatively sophisticated, perpetrated by a scammer who went to the trouble of changing his screen name to "Gerry," calling himself a "Sports Reporter for Dallas Morning

News," and attaching a picture of real-life Morning News columnist Gerry Fraley, plus a link to Fraley's page on the newspaper's website. With Cincinnati Bengals receiver Henry known to be in the hospital following a car accident, it would be easier to pass off fake news: These reports were flatly denied by one of the supposed "sources," and the fakester was even outed by the real Gerry Fraley as fake. An enraged Twitter turned ferociously against the scammer (except for a few people who later insisted he'd been proven his correct, despite the 12 hour gap between his false tweets and the actual death): The Dallas Morning News must be thrilled with all the people who still think the scammer worked for the paper. Welcome to microblogging, printies!

Ohio School to Drop 'Belief in God' From Mission Values (FOXNews.com) Submitted at 12/17/2009 8:45:04 AM

UNIONTOWN, Ohio An Ohio school district facing a possible lawsuit from an atheist group plans to drop belief in God from its mission statement of values. The Lake Local school board near Canton has voted to delete the reference to belief in God. A final vote is planned next month. Board members say they're acting out of concern about a possible lawsuit over the issue. The Freedom From Religion Foundation says the values statement violates the separation of church and state. fivefilters.org featured article: Normalising the crime of the century by John Pilger. Available tools: PDF Newspaper, Full Text RSS, Term Extraction.

America Refuses to Work Out Without Gizmos [Fitness] By Hamilton Nolan (Gawker) Submitted at 12/17/2009 9:42:19 AM

If there's one thing America needs more of to solve its obesity crisis, it is flashing electronic doo -dads. And pricey customized gizmos. Combine these with exercise video games, and brother, you are the fitness

person of the future!

electronic drill sergeant hearts. "I'm betting that you'd stick with • Sure, you play a lot of Wii Fit. these wearable plastic bits longer But do you play enough Wii Fit? than you would with a gym Another plastic computer membership - and pay a lot less," thingamajig knows! David Pogue says David Pogue, Mr. Universe, introduces us to two little 1993. whatsits that you clip on your • If you wear a custom-made body, like a fool, and they will moving sufficiently, in the course mouthpiece (price: "$595 to tell you whether or not you are of the day, to satisfy their cold, $2,250, not counting the dentist's

fee"), it will maybe do something for your athletic performance, or not. If you don't wear one, just sit on the couch with some pie, you fat fuck. • [Pic via]

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Snooki Puncher Is Sorry, Also a Blackout Drunk [Free Snooki]

Notre Dame Fighting Irish on potential Big Ten membership: We prefer independence

By Brian Moylan (Gawker)

By ESPN.com news services (ESPN.com)

Submitted at 12/17/2009 8:46:52 AM

Queens gym teacher Brad Ferro is so sorry sorry he punched Jersey Shore's Nicole "Snooki" Polizzi in the face on camera and we should forgive him. Why? Because he was so drunk he doesn't remember doing it! Classy. Ferro's apologia for the incident (which became a hit viral clip but won't be shown on tonight's episode) comes by way of the New York Post, the official instrument of repentant attackers and recovering prostitutes: "When I saw the video I was sick to my stomach. I couldn't believe that I'd ever do anything like that. I was raised to act in a respectful manner to women. I remember very little from the time of the incident. It's all fuzzy. I remember a punch â&#x20AC;&#x201D; I don't remember who or why and I remember being arrested." That's just...Wow. Still, the article paints Ferro in a positive light, talking about his love of teaching and how he tells his students that violence is bad. Yet, in the same edition of the paper,

Submitted at 12/17/2009 9:58:45 AM

The Big Ten's decision to study expansion brings back an oftasked question -- would Notre Dame consider joining the conference, which includes a number of its regional football rivals? The answer is no, athletic director Jack Swarbrick told the Chicago Tribune. "Our strong preference is to remain the way we are," Swarbrick said, according to the report. "Independence is a big TV critic Linda Stasi goes on an part of the tradition of the anti- Jersey Shore polemic. So, program and our identity. We'd which is it, Post? You hate the sure like to try to maintain it." show but will benefit from it's College football nation blog notoriety? We shouldn't watch Get all the coverage of Notre trashy reality shows, but we Dame in the college football should forgive the monsters on nation blog. Brian Bennett them who beat up women in provides the latest Irish updates bars? Make up your mind, or else as part of ESPN.com's blog we're sending a black-out-drunk network. Ferro to your news room in the Notre Dame, which declined Big middle of the night to say "Sorry" Ten membership in 1999, is one of three remaining major college all over your face. football independents, along with Navy and Army. The Fighting Irish play in the Big East in other sports, including men's and women's basketball, and in the CCHA in ice hockey. Swarbrick acknowledged that

the major football conferences make even more money from their own media contracts than the $9 million Notre Dame is paid annually by NBC for the football rights. In the Big Ten, TV and radio rights fees generate $20 million a year for the schools. But Swarbrick said the football program considers factors other than revenue, according to the Tribune. "All of this has a lot more to do with our priorities than it does with business issues," Swarbrick said, according to the Tribune. "Our independence is tied up in a lot of the rivalries we have. We play Navy every year and have the tradition of USC weekends. Frankly, it works pretty well to play USC in October at home and in November at their place." Notre Dame is not the only school that could be courted by the Big Ten. Missouri also previously has been mentioned as a potential expansion choice for the conference, due to geographic and academic factors. In a statement released Tuesday, Missouri, a Big 12 member, said it had not yet been approached about Big Ten membership -- and didn't rule out the possibility. "Should there be an official inquiry or invitation, we would

evaluate it based upon what would be in the best interest of MU athletically and academically," the university said. Other schools cited as potential candidates for Big Ten expansion have included Pittsburgh and Rutgers, both members of the Big East. If a team other than Notre Dame joined the Big Ten, it could set off a chain reaction across other conferences, similar to what took place when Virginia Tech, Miami and Boston College bolted the Big East for the Atlantic Coast Conference. With that in mind, Notre Dame will keep an eye on the situation, Swarbrick said, according to the Tribune. "The question that any school faces, not just Notre Dame, is: Does this start the dominoes falling again, like the last round of reconfiguration?" Swarbrick said, according to the report. "It's less about our willingness to enter into discussions than what happens to the industry. What are the implications?" fivefilters.org featured article: Normalising the crime of the century by John Pilger. Available tools: PDF Newspaper, Full Text RSS, Term Extraction.

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Cincinnati Bengals receiver Chris Henry dies after fall from truck By ESPN.com news services (ESPN.com)

painful to us. We feel it in our hearts, and we will miss him." Police spokeswoman Rosalyn Submitted at 12/17/2009 10:07:19 AM Harrington said homicide Bengals React To Henry's Death detectives have been assigned to Bengals React To Henry's Death the case but had no further VIDEO PLAYLIST information. • Bengals React To Henry's Henry was rushed to the hospital Death Bengals React To Henry's Wednesday after being found on Death a residential road "apparently • NFL Fraternity Grieving Loss s u f f e r i n g l i f e - t h r e a t e n i n g O f H e n r y N F L F r a t e r n i t y injuries," according to police. Grieving Loss Of Henry Police said a dispute began at a • Impact Of Henry's Death On home about a half-mile away, Bengals Impact Of Henry's Death and Henry jumped into the bed of On Bengals the pickup truck as his fiancee • League Stunned By Henry was driving away from the News League Stunned By Henry residence. News Police said at some point when she was driving, Henry "came C H A R L O T T E , N . C . - - out of the back of the vehicle." Cincinnati Bengals receiver Chris They wouldn't identify the Henry has died, one day after woman, and no charges were falling out of the back of a immediately filed. pickup truck in what authorities Shock, Sadness Over Henry's described as a domestic dispute Death with his fiancee. " We are greatly saddened by Charlotte-Mecklenburg police today's tragic news about the loss said Henry died at 6:36 a.m. of Chris Henry. Our thoughts and Thursday. Henry was 26. prayers go out to Chris' family, "We knew him in a different way including his Bengals family. I than his public persona," Bengals ask you to keep Chris Henry and owner Mike Brown said of the his family in your thoughts player who was suspended five today." times during his career. "He had -- NFL commissioner Roger worked through the troubles in Goodell his life and had finally seemingly " We talked before every game r e a c h e d t h e p o i n t w h e r e and he would just say go out everything was going to blossom. there and handle your business. I And he was going to have the don't know what else to say. He future we all wanted for him. It's had been doing everything right."

-- Bengals WR Chad Ochocinco " We knew him in a way that [was not consistent] with his public persona. We liked him. He had worked through troubles in his life ... to a point where he was going to have the future we all wanted for him and that he wanted for himself. At the time of his tragedy he was running to daylight." -- Bengals president Mike Brown " For those who knew Chris, he was nothing like his public perception. A loving and caring individual, he was thankful for what he had in life, and proud of what he had overcome." -- Andy Simms, Henry's agent " I enjoyed our time together at West Virginia and we shared a lot of great moments. I have many fond memories of our three years together and will remember those forever." -- Michigan coach Rich Rodriguez " The entire Mountaineer football family is deeply saddened by the tragic passing of Chris Henry. We say 'Once a Mountaineer, always a Mountaineer,' and Chris was a big part of our success during his time here. For me, he was a real joy to be around on a daily basis. He always came to work and loved to play football." -- WVU coach Bill Stewart " I remember recruiting Chris to West Virginia like it was yesterday. He came from a

humble background and was a wonderful young man and football player. Chris was like a son to me and I will cherish all the great memories that I have of him." -- Michigan offensive coordinator Calvin Magee Henry is engaged to Loleini Tonga, and the couple has been raising three children. Tonga's MySpace page identifies herself as "Mrs. C. Henry" and has a picture of her next to a person who appears to be Henry. She also has a post from Tuesday talking about buying wedding rings. A neighbor said Wednesday that the Tonga family owns the home where police say the incident began. Charlotte is home to his fiancee's parents. "We ask that you keep Chris' family -- especially the young children he leaves behind -- in your prayers," Henry's agent, Andy Simms of PlayersRep Sports said in a statement. "It is tragic when a life is taken so young. He was a man just realizing his potential, not just in football, but in life." Authorities have not announced the cause of death. Mecklenburg County medical examiner investigator Carol Cormier said they were expecting to receive the body later Thursday. The Bengals (9-4), in the midst of their best season since winning 11 games in 2005, lead the AFC

North. They visit the San Diego Chargers on Sunday and will wear a helmet sticker to remember Henry. When the players received word Henry had died, quarterback Carson Palmer called them together in the locker room and said they should dedicate the game and rest of the season to Henry and the wife of defensive coordinator Mike Zimmer, who died unexpectedly during the season. Henry was away from the Bengals after breaking his left forearm during a win over Baltimore on Nov. 8. He had surgery and was placed on season -ending injured reserve following the game. "We are greatly saddened by today's tragic news about the loss of Chris Henry," NFL commissioner Roger Goodell said. "Our thoughts and prayers go out to Chris' family, including his Bengals family. We have been in contact with the Bengals to offer our support through this difficult time. "I ask you to keep Chris Henry and his family in your thoughts today." Throughout his career, his temper and poor decisions got him in trouble. He was ejected from a game and suspended for another while at CINCINNATI page 53

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Cincinnati Shocked by Chris Henry’s Death (WSJ.com: The Daily Fix)

hard time maintaining journalistic detachment this morning. “Ive never come across To describe the life of former an athlete as talented or as Cincinnati Bengals wide receiver t r o u b l e d a s C h r i s H e n r y , ” Chris Henry as turbulent is to L u d w i g w r i t e s . e n g a g e i n u n d e r s t a t e m e n t . Garey will have more on this H e n r y ’ s b r i e f N F L c a r e e r topic tomorrow.* * * featured five arrests, three NFL Only the most ardent and suspensions and a host of second blinkered of college-football chances. At age 26, Henry loyalists are under the illusion seemed finally to be straightening that their coaches of choice are things out off the field while particularly admirable people. contributing steadily on the field There are exceptions to the before suffering a season-ending general rule, of course, but for i n j u r y i n W e e k 9 . O n the most part football coaches — Wednesday, news broke that a leaders of men and master domestic dispute with his fiancee strategists though they might be somehow led to Henry falling or — are as flawed as any/everyone being thrown from the back of a else. While it’s not necessarily pickup truck and suffering surprising to hear about collegeserious injuries. Henry died of football coaches being brutish or those injuries on Thursday churlish, the scandal currently morning, leaving Bengals fans surrounding University of South and teammates to puzzle over the Florida coach Jim Leavitt stands confusing legacy of his short, out. That’s partially because of troubled life. Reuters Chris the allegations against Leavitt — Henry, seen during a playoff that he throttled and twice struck game against Pittsburgh in this in the face a sophomore walk-on 2006 file photo. named Joel Miller at halftime of There surely will be more to a Nov. 21 game — but more read about Henry and his strange notably for the way the story has story in days to come, but for the changed shape in recent days. time being we have to substitute Former Tampa Tribune reporter emotional response for context. Brett McMurphy based the “I saw a tall, lean, quiet, kid who FanHouse story that broke the wanted to get better as a football whole thing on quotes from five player and was doing all the right eyewitnesses as well as Miller’s things to make it happen,” the father and Miller’s high-school Cincinnati Enquirer’s John Erardi coach. The story raised some writes. “A kid.” eyebrows because of Leavitt’s Longtime Bengals beat writer alleged bad behavior and what C h i c k L u d w i g w r i t e s a t McMurphy described as the Cincinnati.com that he’s having a coach’s subsequent attempt to Submitted at 12/17/2009 8:45:46 AM

snuff the story out. Getty Images Jim Leavitt The confusing part came later, as Miller and his father — who, remember, was a quoted source in the original story — disavowed the whole thing. (Leavitt has always denied any wrongdoing.) On Wednesday, McMurphy reported that Miller’s brother was not entirely willing to toe the family’s new line on the incident, and stuck to a version of the incident in which Leavitt was decidedly the villain. So, what actually happened? We may never know, in large part since Miller’s football life depends on him continuing to stick to his latest story. In the Tampa Tribune, Martin Fennelly hopes that the truth in this strange tale will out. “There needs to be a real investigation here,” Fennelly writes. “There are coaches, bigger names, longer legends, who have been fired for doing what Leavitt is accused of doing. It’s hard to imagine something more serious than a coach bullying his players. It’s hard to imagine why any university would want such a coach, or why any parent would send their son to such a university.” Elsewhere in the Tribune, Joe

Henderson decries South Florida’s stonewalling on the story. “The longer everyone waits for a resolution, the more likely that positions will be hardened,” Henderson writes. “The damage to the football program and university, while already substantial, will get worse. Then when USF finally does have something to say, you wonder if anyone will be listening anymore.” In the St. Petersburg Times, Gary Shelton argues that only a thorough inquiry into the charges can repair the damage to Leavitt’s reputation. “At this point, only a vigorous, determined investigation will convince everyone that Leavitt’s side of the story is the truth,” Shelton writes. “And at this point, only such a truth can clear Leavitt’s name.”* * * The Fix picks the NFLs Thursday game, ahead of its Friday picks for the weekend: It’s a nice debate to face: Should you turn your perfect regular season over to the scout-teamers and headset-wearers while resting the stars for the postseason, or gun for the win? The New Orleans Saints could be mired in their own Cajuninflected version of this debate if they keep winning and clinch home-field advantage in the playoffs over the Minnesota Vikings. In Indy, the debate has arrived early, because the rest of the AFC didn’t put up much of a fight for the No. 1 seed.

Indianapolis (-3) at Jacksonville: Indianapolis hasn’t lost yet this season, as you might’ve heard. But Jacksonville might be the more admirable team in this game. The Jaguars’ roster is loaded with rookies, their home stadium is regularly half-empty and their fate seemingly was sealed before the season’s first coin flip. But the Jags have worked their way into the playoff picture by beating teams worse than them while losing to more talented teams with such predictability that it’s hard not to admire the extent to which they have fulfilled — if never really surpassed — their potential. The bad news for Jacksonville is that the Colts are also playing up to their potential, and are by far the better club — and one seemingly inclined to follow the pundits’ decree and play their stars down the stretch, record be damned. The good news? The Jags are officially this year’s NFL working-class heroes. That counts for something, right? Pick: David: Indianapolis, Garey: Indianapolis, Al Toonie: Jacksonville* * * That the NFL has a head-injury problem is news only to those who went out of their way not to know it over the last decade or so. But while the NFL has acknowledged and addressed that problem recently — breaking from a years-long “more research needed” slow-walk that was CINCINNATI page 55

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CINCINNATI continued from page 51

West Virginia, where former coach Rich Rodriguez told Henry that he was an embarrassment to himself and the program. His reputation was already costing him -- the Bengals were the only NFL team to bring him in for a pre-draft visit in 2005. They found that his demeanor didn't match his reputation. Henry was shy and spoke in a quiet voice. They warned him that he had to stay in control if he was going to stay in the NFL. Then, they picked him in the third round. In a sense, it was already a second chance. "I'm worth the chance," Henry said, when he showed up the following weekend for a rookie minicamp. "I'm just happy they took me." Henry become a vital part of the offense as a rookie, helping the Bengals reach the playoffs in 2005 with his ability to run past defenders to grab long passes. In the final month of the season, he also showed his other side, getting arrested for marijuana possession. After a playoff loss to Pittsburgh, he was arrested on a gun charge in Florida. Henry and former Tennessee cornerback Adam "Pacman" Jones became the league's two

most trouble-bound players. Commissioner Roger Goodell suspended both in 2007 -- Jones for a full season, Henry for half of it -- as part of a toughening of the league's conduct policy. When Henry was arrested for a fifth time following that season on an assault charge, the Bengals decided they'd had enough. At his arraignment on April 3, 2008, Municipal Court Judge Bernie Bouchard called Henry "a oneman crime wave." He was released by the Bengals the same day. It was a jolt to Henry, who had dreamed of an NFL career since high school, when he got the NFL logo tattooed on the back of his right hand. No team showed an interest in bringing him back. His career seemed finished. Then, Brown -- who refers to himself as "a redeemer" -changed his mind and gave him another chance. "If you only knew him by hearsay, you'd think he's some kind of ogre," Brown said, during the Bengals' appearance on HBO's "Hard Knocks" series this summer. "It's not true. He's a good person. When you see him up close, you'll find that you'll like him. He'll be a soft-spoken, pleasant person."

This time, Henry seemed determined to stay out of trouble. After only 19 catches and two touchdowns in 12 games in the 2008 season, he set about making himself a topflight receiver again. He got into top shape and worked out with teammates in the offseason, showing more resolve than at any point in his career. Henry also changed his personal life, spending more time with his fiancee and the three children they are raising. Teammates noticed a pronounced change in his demeanor. "He's a great kid with a great heart," Palmer said as training camp started. "He's changed his life around. He ran into some trouble, made some bad decisions, and realized that. He's sorry for them, apologized for them, and has done everything he can to make himself a better person. I'm just proud of him." Before the 2009 season, Henry got a new tattoo that matched his new outlook. Below his left ear, in flowing one-inch script, was the world "Blessed." "I kind of felt like I dug myself out of the hole and started doing the right things," Henry said in an interview with The Associated Press as training camp opened. "People say, 'How you feeling

now Chris? You doing all right?' I just tell them I'm blessed. That's why I got it." He caught a touchdown pass in each of Cincinnati's four preseason games. A thigh injury slowed him early in the season, and he had 12 catches for 236 yards -- his 19.7-yard average per catch leads the team -- when he broke his left arm during a win over Baltimore on Nov. 22, ending his season. "He was doing everything right," receiver Chad Ochocinco said. "My grandma always says you never question the man upstairs on decisions he makes. Everyone makes mistakes, but I don't see how Chris was supposed to go already, especially when he was on the right path. Other than that, he's going to be missed." Information from The Associated Press was used in this report. fivefilters.org featured article: Normalising the crime of the century by John Pilger. Available tools: PDF Newspaper, Full Text RSS, Term Extraction.

FKIA's Daily Double: School Daze By ELLE.com (ELLE News Blog) Submitted at 12/16/2009 1:58:16 PM

Attitude dressing is fine but why not lighten things up with a tongue-in-chic take on the triedand-sometimes-tacky leopard print. Alex Wang's faux lippi cat open-toe wedges instantly add just the right amount of bougie zhush to Nicolas Ghesquière’s safari pants and schoolboy blazer. — Anne Slowey Let me know what you love—and if you have any questions, e-mail me at AnneSloweyFashionKnowItAll @elle.com. Follow ELLE on Twitter. Become our Facebook fan!

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Washington Redskins hire Bruce Allen after Vinny Cerrato, VP of football operations, resigns By ESPN.com news services (ESPN.com)

needs someone different in this position," Cerrato said in a statement released by the team. Submitted at 12/17/2009 8:52:48 AM "I'm thankful to Dan Snyder and The Washington Redskins hired other members of his ownership former Tampa Bay Buccaneers team for the opportunities I've general manager Bruce Allen on been given over the years." Thursday, shortly after executive The resignation was first vice president of football reported by ESPN 980 in operations Vinny Cerrato Washington. resigned. Allen's father, the late George Allen becomes the first person Allen, coached the Redskins in hired by owner Daniel Snyder to the 1970s and led the team to hold the title of general manager. Super Bowl VII. The Redskins already have Cerrato, who was highly complied with the league's criticized for his player personnel R o o n e y R u l e a n d h a v e moves, had been Snyder's rightinterviewed at least two minority hand man for nearly all of candidates, an NFL source told Snyder's 10 years as owner of the E S P N N F L I n s i d e r A d a m Redskins. Schefter, who first reported the NFC East blog hiring of Allen. ESPN.com's Matt Mosley writes A news conference was expected about all things NFC East in his to be held Thursday afternoon to division blog. announce the hiring of Allen, â&#x20AC;˘ Blog network: NFL Nation who also worked in the Oakland For the past two seasons, Cerrato Raiders front office. has held the post of executive Cerrato vice president of football In a statement released by the operations. This year's Redskins team Thursday morning, Cerrato are 4-9 and have struggled in part said he has had numerous because of a lack of depth along conversations with Snyder the the offensive line. past few weeks about the team's "Of course, I am disappointed future. with this year's results, but I "We agreed that the franchise s t r o n g l y b e l i e v e t h a t w i t h

outstanding draft picks and encouraging performance by our younger players, we have laid a strong foundation for the franchise," Cerrato said in the statement. Cerrato added that he has "had the pleasure of working with some great coaches such as Joe Gibbs, Greg Blache and Sherman Lewis" -- notably leaving out the current coach, Jim Zorn, whose job status is also tenuous. Cerrato has been a favorite punching bag for fans in recent years, receiving criticism often in tandem with Snyder. One fan infamously used a pair of signs to refer to the two as "Dumb" and "Dumber" at a game this season. Cerrato was one of the first major hires after Snyder bought the Redskins in 1999. Cerrato was fired in 2001 by coach Marty Schottenheimer after Schottenheimer was given control of football operations. A year later, Snyder fired Schottenheimer and rehired Cerrato. Although Cerrato's title changed during the years, he remained a significant front-office voice in player decisions. The results have been far from encouraging: The

Redskins have won only one playoff game since 2000. Cerrato's power within the organization increased after coach Joe Gibbs' resignation two years ago, and there have been plenty of hits and misses among his player choices. This year, Cerrato gave Zorn an offensive line without a single reserve who played in the NFL last year -- even though two starters were coming off significant injuries. Both of those starters soon were out for the season, and the resulting scramble for a starting five hampered the development of the offense. Cerrato was previously was a scouting and player personnel director for the San Francisco 49ers, and recruiting coordinator at Notre Dame under Lou Holtz. Information from The Associated Press was used in this report. fivefilters.org featured article: Normalising the crime of the century by John Pilger. Available tools: PDF Newspaper, Full Text RSS, Term Extraction.

Street Chic: New York By ELLE.com (ELLE News Blog) Submitted at 12/17/2009 4:00:00 AM

Fur accents add a cozy-chic touch to a versatile black ensemble. Photo: Kelly Stuart Think you are Street Chic? Email us your photo and you could appear in ELLE.com's Street Chic Daily. Follow ELLE on Twitter. Become our Facebook fan!

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The Count: Sabermetricians Take on the Big Pitcher Moves

CINCINNATI continued from page 52

impressive even by congressional standards — the National Hockey League has generally ducked its (WSJ.com: The Daily Fix) Lee has been twice or three own concussion issue. In the San times, depending on how you Francisco Chronicle, Ray Ratto Submitted at 12/16/2009 11:16:05 AM count, in the last six years. The suggests that the NHL address its Sabermetrically minded baseball secret to Halladay’s success? A serious and seriously underanalysts are puzzling over the big part of it is his uncanny addressed brain-trauma problem three-way deal between the ability to locate his fastball on the as soon as possible. “People are in just that sort of Seattle Mariners, Toronto Blue corners. Jays and Philadelphia Phillies. In Still, even if Lee falls off mood on skull shots — even particular, they can’t figure out want to make decisions on large slightly, getting him for a year at football fans, who grew up why Cliff Lee seems to be valued samples, Lee’s thrown 450 a bargain price makes the trade a worshiping them as the highest s o m u c h l o w e r t h a n R o y innings over the last two years h e i s t f o r t h e M a r i n e r s , a s form of entertainment, are getting Halladay. Both aces have been and racked up +13.8 wins in that C a m e r o n w r i t e s a t U . S . S . the message,” Ratto writes. “The stellar over the last two seasons, time. You can’t fluke your way Mariner (ESPN’s Rob Neyer NHL needs not to get the and Lee is coming off a better- into that kind of performance.” agrees). Though acquiring Lee message, it needs to give it, and it than-stellar postseason for the Money is a factor here — in and Chone Figgins isn’t enough needs to give it with a knee right Phillies. Yet Philadelphia got terms of the salaries both pitchers to make the Mariners favorites in to the nethers, so that no owner, little in return for Lee, while are due in 2010, and the contracts the AL West, the Angels’ loss of general manager, coach, player or unloading valuable prospects to they sought afterwards. But there Figgins and John Lackey may at fan can mistake it for anything get Halladay, whom they signed are also subtle statistical reasons least mark a power shift. On other than what it should be.”* * to a three-year extension. Getty to prefer Halladay. Over the last FanGraphs, though, Matthew * Images John Lackey hopes to two years, Halladay has been Carruth points out reasons to So much sports journalism is channel his few fond Fenway worth about a win more above a worry about Lackey’s future and about reaction and overreaction: memories, such as this near no- replacement pitcher than Lee, in suggests the Red Sox may have trashing players, calling for the hitter in 2008. part because he delivered roughly overpaid for their new starter. heads of coaches or GMs, over “The only thing that makes sense equal quality while going for ( H e a l s o h a s s t r u g g l e d a t and over and over. While that to me is that teams are still a bit nearly 30 more innings. Also, Fenway, though that may say s t u f f c a n b e e n t e r t a i n i n g skeptical of Lee’s rapid rise to Halladay has been far more more about the bats of his new sometimes, none of us would be greatness,” Dave Cameron writes consistent; he hasn’t been below t e a m m a t e s t h a n a b o u t h i s following sports — or reading the Fix, most likely — if the on FanGraphs. “And while we’re league average since 2000, while p i t c h i n g . ) bigger narratives of sports didn’t the first ones to point out that you matter to us at least a little bit. While ESPN’s 24-hour news

cycle does much to keep the more unsatisfying elements of the sports discourse front and center with its ginned-up debates and facile controversies, it’s worth taking a moment to credit ESPN.com’s E-Ticket, a unique Web feature that allows ESPN’s stable of writers to stretch out and write long features on stories that don’t fit within the instantaneousness that defines ESPN. Wright Thompson’s fascinating story on Jimmy Robinson, a boxer who fought Muhammad Ali before facing some much scarier demons later in life, is a fine example of just how good E-Ticket can be. It’s a great, sobering read. — Tip of the Fix cap to Fixer emeritus Carl Bialik and fellow Fixer Garey Ris. Found a good column from the world of sports? Don’t keep it to yourself — write to us at dailyfix@wsj.com and we’ll consider your find for inclusion in the Daily Fix. You can email David at droth11@gmail.com.

US to back $100bn climate financing (Financial Times - US homepage) Submitted at 12/17/2009 4:54:15 AM

The US attempted to break the deadlock at the United Nations’

climate conference in Copenhagen on Thursday by publicly backing a proposal that developed countries should provide poorer nations with $100bn per year by 2020 to fight

climate change. The proposal came with less than two days left to secure a deal to curb global greenhouse gas emissions, after the talks had become bogged down on

Wednesday in disputes over century by John Pilger. Available p r o c e d u r e i n a d d i t i o n t o tools: PDF Newspaper, Full Text significant differences over RSS, Term Extraction. substantive issues. fivefilters.org featured article: Normalising the crime of the

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The Count: Chris Henry’s Stats Suggest He Was Underrated (WSJ.com: The Daily Fix) Submitted at 12/17/2009 10:22:10 AM

When the news broke that Cincinnati Bengals wide receiver Chris Henry died Thursday at age 26, many who knew him — including a former teammate and a Bengals beat writer— recalled how very talented he was. Getty Images Chris Henry’s stats, and this photo, demonstrate how supremely talented he was. This wasn’t immediately obvious from his stats. In five seasons with the Bengals, he caught just 119 passes for 1,826 yards — which amounts to solid production for two seasons, not five. Part of that reflects games he missed to suspension and injury, but Henry still appeared in 55 NFL games, equivalent to three and a half seasons. During the time they overlapped with

More advanced stats also testify to Henry’s abilities. Football Outsiders ranks all receivers by their Defense-adjusted Value Over Average, or DVOA. This takes into account the defense, game situation and passes thrown to a receiver that are incomplete Henry in Cincinnati, receivers or intercepted. Because it’s a stat T.J. Houshmandzadeh and Chad compared to average, a value Ochocinco each had more than over zero makes a player better twice the productivity in catches than league average. And in four out of Henry’s five seasons, he and yards than Henry did. However, Henry was better than had a positive DVOA. This both of them at extending his season was shaping up to be his catches for long gains, and at best yet, with a DVOA of 26.7%, scoring once he caught the ball. ranking him the top dozen or so He averaged 15.3 yards per receivers — though he had only reception and scored on 18% of 23 balls thrown his way. those, compared to equivalent The stats can only go so far, but n u m b e r s f o r t e a m m a t e s they paint a portrait of an Houshmandzadeh and Ochocinco e x c e e d i n g l y t a l e n t e d a n d of 11 yards and 9%, and 14.5 valuable wide receiver — when his off-field problems didn’t keep yards and 9%, respectively. him from playing.

BofA names Moynihan as new chief (Financial Times - US homepage)

in leadership at the Charlotte, North Carolina, bank. The appointment of Mr Submitted at 12/16/2009 9:48:51 PM Moynihan, who is 50 years old Bank of America named Brian and currently heads BofA’s Moynihan to be its next chief substantial consumer banking executive late on Wednesday, u n i t , b r i n g s a n e n d t o a keeping the job within the tumultuous 11-week search that company and disappointing involved several high-profile institutional shareholders who c a n d i d a t e s a n d u l t i m a t e l y have been agitating for a change exposed a rift between board

members who wanted to promote an insider and directors who wanted an outsider to take control at the bank. fivefilters.org featured article: Normalising the crime of the century by John Pilger. Available tools: PDF Newspaper, Full Text RSS, Term Extraction.

Report: Wife to seek divorce from Tiger Woods By ESPN.com news services (ESPN.com)

course. One woman who said she had a 31-month affair with Woods shared a voice mail that Submitted at 12/17/2009 8:46:45 AM she said Woods left her two Elin Nordegren, the wife of n i g h t s b e f o r e h i s N o v . 2 7 Tiger Woods, will seek a a c c i d e n t . divorce, ABC News.com is "I am deeply aware of the reporting. disappointment and hurt that my A source close to Nordegren told infidelity has caused to so many the Web site on Wednesday that people, most of all my wife and a "divorce is 100 percent on." children," Woods said in a N o r d e g r e n w a s r e c e n t l y statement released last week. "I photographed pumping gas want to say again to everyone without her wedding ring. that I am profoundly sorry and Woods and his wife have been that I ask forgiveness. It may not married for five years and have a be possible to repair the damage 2-year-old daughter and a 10- I've done, but I want to do my month-old son. best to try." Woods announced late last week Woods has not been seen in he was taking an indefinite leave public since the accident. from public life and golf while he Information from The works to fix his marriage after Associated Press was used in this multiple allegations of infidelity. report. The announcement came two fivefilters.org featured article: weeks after Woods crashed his Normalising the crime of the SUV into a tree outside his century by John Pilger. Available Florida home, setting in motion a tools: PDF Newspaper, Full Text stunning downfall for the world's RSS, Term Extraction. No. 1 player who for 13 years rarely made news off the golf

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Mike Holmgren, Cleveland Browns haven't discussed money yet By Associated Press (ESPN.com) Submitted at 12/17/2009 9:44:31 AM

No Guts, No Glory: 19-0 Is Way to Go By Jay Mariotti (Fanhouse Main)

attained by no other human being. So why wouldn't the Submitted at 12/16/2009 12:35:00 PM Indianapolis Colts and New Filed under: NFL Orleans Saints, both armed with JACKSONVILLE, Fla. -- Any the opportunity of an all-time team can win a Super Bowl ... sports achievement, embrace the check that, any team not based in i d e a o f p u r s u i n g t h e Cleveland, Detroit, Buffalo or, unprecedented? I don't grasp why well, Jacksonville. But no team t h i s m u s t b e a n e i t h e r / o r has won the Super Bowl with the proposition, why climbing the flawless sheen of a 19-0 record. Rockies would suffice when Mt. From the moment an athlete Everest beckons. At 13-0, both emerges from the womb and teams have favorable schedules hears a doctor's first words -- and should win their final three probably, "You da man!!!" -- he regular-season games, assuming is mandated to seek plateaus the Colts pounce on the erratic

Jaguars Thursday evening and the Saints beat up the Decemberdoomed Cowboys on Saturday night. At 13-0, both teams are bound for home-field advantage in the playoffs. Before you can say "Mercury Morris" -- and it should be a matter of hours before we hear the most arrogant of 1972 Dolphins self-promoting the NFL's only perfect team ever and denouncing the current challengers -- both could be 18-0 and playing each other in the ultimate championship game in Miami.

BEREA, Ohio -- Mike Holmgren and the Cleveland Browns will talk again, and money has yet to come up in the discussions. AFC North blog ESPN.com's James Walker writes about all things AFC North in his division blog. â&#x20AC;˘ Blog network: NFL Nation Browns spokesman Bill Bonsiewicz says the second conversation will occur in the coming days, but offered no specifics. He did say the team and Holmgren have not talked salary, despite reports that Holmgren could command upwards of $10 million a year to

run the Browns' football operations. Before Holmgren can be hired, the Browns would have to interview a minority candidate to comply with the NFL's "Rooney Rule." Bonsiewicz said the Browns have been in contact with the league to be certain the team is clear on the rule. He would not say if the Browns already have interviewed a minority candidate -- or any other, besides Holmgren. Copyright 2009 by The Associated Press fivefilters.org featured article: Normalising the crime of the century by John Pilger. Available tools: PDF Newspaper, Full Text RSS, Term Extraction.

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Grading the Prospects in the Halladay-Lee Blockbuster By Frankie Piliere (Fanhouse Main) Submitted at 12/16/2009 12:30:00 PM

Filed under: Athletics, Blue Jays, Mariners, Phillies, MLB Transactions, Prospects, MLB Hot Stove, Advanced Scouting Following any blockbuster trade, questions about the lesser known names involved in the deal are inevitable. There were several talented prospects swapped between the Mariners, Phillies, Blue Jays and Athletics in the Roy Halladay- Cliff Lee megadeal, but just how do these players profile as future bigleaguers? That's a question the pro scouting departments of these teams have been working hard to try and answer from start to finish of this deal. The prospects on the move profile from anywhere between solid regulars to dominant

players at their positions. In other words, Lee and Halladay might not be the only star-level talents involved in this trade when it's all said and done. Below, the guys involved in this deal who don't have Cy Young Awards in their trophy case (at least not yet) are grouped based on the 2-8 scouting scale, with 8 representing a truly elite talent.

Resident Evil 5's 'Desperate Escape' episode detailed By Griffin McElroy (Joystiq)

collapsed after that one fight. Together, they have to escape from the Tricell facility, pushing Yesterday, we learned about the through wave after wave of fauxcast swap that would take place zombies in the middle of the in Resident Evil 5 Alternative night. They'll need to do so Edition's second downloadable quickly, as they need to fulfill episode, Desperate Escape. their important, life-saving duties However, we had no context in to Chris and Sheva, who are which to put Jill Valentine and simultaneously locked in battle Josh Stone in cahoots, nor did we with that one guy. know what they'd be doing while Additionally, Capcom has cahooted. Now, thanks to an released some screens of the new announcement from Capcom, we episode, which we've posted in know: They'll be escaping. the gallery below. Also, the Desperately. developer revealed two new We'll try to share these details costumes for Chris and Sheva in without dropping any spoilers: the game's Mercenaries Reunion Josh encounters Jill, who has mode: Chris gets " Heavy Metal" Submitted at 12/17/2009 1:30:00 PM

duds, while Sheva gets somewhat classier " Business" attire. Check them out in the videos after the jump! Gallery: Resident Evil 5 Desperate Escape Continue reading Resident Evil 5's 'Desperate Escape' episode detailed Resident Evil 5's 'Desperate Escape' episode detailed originally appeared on Joystiq on Thu, 17 Dec 2009 13:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds. Read| Permalink| Email this| Comments

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Joyswag: Xbox 360 Holiday Games Bundle By Joystiq Staff (Joystiq)

we'll say about the first prize is: rogue[rohg]-adjective 1. Operating outside desirable Welcome to Joystiq's " Naughty controls. or Nice" holiday giveaway What is Joyswag? Since we extravaganza! It's simple: Just don't keep the games and follow the instructions below to merchandise we receive for enter for your chance to win. Ah, review or promotional purposes, but to win what? There's always it becomes"Joyswag," which is a catch, isn't there? Each passed along to our readers. "Naughty or Nice" giveaway Please note that Joyswag may be features two prizes: a totally in "used" condition. For more sweet bundle of holiday cheer info on our policy, click here. and, um, a lump of coal. Winners Joyswag: Xbox 360 Holiday are selected randomly, we assure Games Bundle originally you. Of course, who's to say luck appeared on Joystiq on Thu, 17 isn't dependent on virtue ... Have • You must be 18 years or older F I F A S o c c e r 1 0 , F o r z a your emails! Dec 2009 11:15:00 EST. Please you been naughty? Or nice? and a resident of the US or Motorsport 3, Halo 3: ODST, • For a list of complete rules, see our terms for use of feeds. To enter this giveaway: Permalink| Email this| Canada (excluding Quebec). Left 4 Dead 2, and DJ Hero click here. Comments • Limit 1 entry per person per Bundle with Turntable, plus • Leave a comment on this post calendar day. additional Turntable controller, For the grand prize we've t e l l i n g u s i f y o u ' v e b e e n • This entry period ends at 12:00 all for Xbox 360, and a "Live rounded up an eclectic mix of "naughty" or "nice" this year. pm ET on Tuesday, December Turns Five" wireless Xbox 360 many of the best Xbox 360 (Note: Your response will not 22. We'll randomly select one controller (Total ARV: $568); games from 2009's fall and affect your chance of winning grand prize winner at that time to and one first prize winner to holiday seasons and tossed in a a n y o f t h e p r i z e s i n t h i s receive one copy of Assassin's receive Rogue Warrior for Xbox limited edition orange controller giveaway.) Creed II, Dragon Age: Origins, 360 (ARV: $60) -- please check (from 2007 -- it's vintage!). All Submitted at 12/17/2009 11:15:00 AM

3D Blu-ray specs finalized, PlayStation 3 support confirmed By Ben Gilbert (Joystiq) Submitted at 12/17/2009 1:00:00 PM

The Blu-ray Disc Association this morning confirmed the finalization of "the Blu-ray 3D specification." What we're trying to tell you is this: 3D films are heading to your PlayStation 3 next year and there's nothing you can do to stop it. Sure, you probably don't own a 3D-ready

television just yet, but that's okay, because we've been assured that nearly everyone will have one by 2014. If you're like us and aren't quite ready to make the 3D jump just yet, the BDA thankfully notes that our quaint old "2D" films will still be supported. But don't let that lull you into a false sense of safety -- embedded within today's announcement is the fact

that 3D technology "allows every Blu-ray 3D player and movie to deliver Full HD 1080p resolution

to each eye[our emphasis]." That's right, folks -- they're targeting each eye individually!

Sounds like a great time to invest in the burgeoning eye patch market. 3D Blu-ray specs finalized, PlayStation 3 support confirmed originally appeared on Joystiq on Thu, 17 Dec 2009 13:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds. Read| Permalink| Email this| Comments

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Joyswag: PS3 Holiday Games Bundle By Joystiq Staff (Joystiq) Submitted at 12/17/2009 1:15:00 PM

Welcome to Joystiq's " Naughty or Nice" holiday giveaway extravaganza! It's simple: Just follow the instructions below to enter for your chance to win. Ah, but to win what? There's always a catch, isn't there? Each "Naughty or Nice" giveaway features two prizes: a totally sweet bundle of holiday cheer and, um, a lump of coal. Winners are selected randomly, we assure you. Of course, who's to say luck isn't dependent on virtue ... Have you been naughty? Or nice? To enter this giveaway:

affect your chance of winning any of the prizes in this giveaway.) • You must be 18 years or older and a resident of the US or • Leave a comment on this post Canada (excluding Quebec). t e l l i n g u s i f y o u ' v e b e e n • Limit 1 entry per person per "naughty" or "nice" this year. calendar day. (Note: Your response will not • This entry period ends at 12:00

Here's a good question: What's more functional? The Tony Hawk: Ride board or the replica Phurba Dagger Artifact included in the extremely rare Uncharted 2: Among Thieves: Fortune Hunter Edition? What is Joyswag? Since we don't keep the games and merchandise we receive for review or promotional purposes, it becomes"Joyswag," which is passed along to our readers. Please note that Joyswag may be in "used" condition. For more pm ET on Tuesday, December Crack In Time for PlayStation 3 info on our policy, click here. 22. We'll randomly select one (Total ARV: $590); and one first Joyswag: PS3 Holiday Games grand prize winner at that time to prize winner to receive Tony Bundle originally appeared on receive one Uncharted 2: Among Hawk: Ride Skateboard Bundle Joystiq on Thu, 17 Dec 2009 Thieves: Fortune Hunter Edition, (ARV: $90) -- please check your 13:15:00 EST. Please see our Assassin's Creed II, Demon's emails! terms for use of feeds. Souls: Deluxe Edition, God of • For a list of complete rules, Permalink| Email this| War Collection, Modern Warfare click here. Comments 2, and Ratchet & Clank Future: A

Hands-on: Mass Effect 2, the first 90 minutes By Randy Nelson (Joystiq)

the first 20 minutes. We know that because -- save Submitted at 12/17/2009 12:00:00 PM for some optimizations here and click to enlarge there -- we played the first hourWith the game set to ship out on and-a-half of a finished Mass January 26, EA held one last Effect 2, from the title screen hands-on sneak preview of Mass until being politely informed that Effect 2 on Wednesday night in we were about to enter forbidden San Francisco. We were there, of p l o t t e r r i t o r y . W h i c h i s course, intrigued by an invitation surprising, considering that the that promised we'd learn what opening of the game, apart from s o m e t h i n g c a l l e d " P r o j e c t being one of the most dramatic Lazarus" was -- as it turned out, w e ' v e w i t n e s s e d i n r e c e n t it's a crucial part of the game's memory, is also chockablock plot that makes an appearance in with pretty huge plot twists.

That said, we must warn you that the preview after the break contains what some may consider MAJOR SPOILERS-- so if you want the beginning of the game

and the surprises it holds to remain unrevealed until launch day, seriously ... don't read any further. Gallery: Mass Effect 2 (12-17-

09) Continue reading Hands-on: Mass Effect 2, the first 90 minutes Hands-on: Mass Effect 2, the first 90 minutes originally appeared on Joystiq on Thu, 17 Dec 2009 12:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds. Permalink| Email this| Comments

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Spec Ops: The Line may face censorship; Dubai taking the 'wait and see' approach By Christopher Grant (Joystiq)

struck a nerve. "We will have to review the game first before issuing any " I t t a k e s p l a c e a f t e r a n decision on whether to ban it or unimaginable natural disaster has allow it," Mohammed al Mutawa, struck the region," says former a video games censor at the GameSpot editor-in-chief and United Arab Emirate's National current video game producer M e d i a C o u n c i l , t o l d T h e Greg Kasavin, discussing 2K National. Juma Obaid Alleem, Games' recently revealed shooter, the director of media content at S p e c O p s : T h e L i n e . T h e the NMC, told the newspaper that unimaginable natural disaster he's 'before a video game is released referring to is a catastrophic in the UAE, the NMC assesses sandstorm and the region is the whether it conforms with local financially precarious Dubai. laws and notifies authorities if it With the one-time booming city- does not.' From there, we see state finding itself in something references to "international of a bust, following the global matter" and "Ministry of Foreign economic downturn, scenes of Affairs" and we figure it best to D u b a i ' s w o r l d - f a m o u s take the 'wait and see' approach skyscrapers buried in sand surely Mr. al Mutawa referred to. Submitted at 12/17/2009 12:30:00 PM

For his part, Kasavin is playing up the setting as a "fantastic location from an architectural standpoint" but is quick to point out that "the game uses the location purely as a location." He

explained to The National that 'the enemies ... in the fictional Dubai would not have any clear religious or political beliefs associated with them' and that 'none of the shoot-outs took place

in mosques.' With myriad games having angered religious or national groups before everything from Resistance and the Church of England to LittleBigPlanet and the Qur'anthe Spec Ops team has plenty to learn from. We'll know more closer to the game's expected 2011 release. [Thanks, mister_jOBe; via LA Times] Spec Ops: The Line may face censorship; Dubai taking the 'wait and see' approach originally appeared on Joystiq on Thu, 17 Dec 2009 12:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds. Read| Permalink| Email this| Comments

Bonfire Studios hires former Halo Wars lead David Pottinger By David Hinkle (Joystiq) Submitted at 12/17/2009 11:30:00 AM

Bonfire Studios, the development house that emerged in the wake of the Ensemble Studios closure, has picked up another ex-colleague: Dave Pottinger, lead designer of Halo Wars. He rejoins his peers as the director of technology, assuming

the same responsibilities he held before Ensemble was shut down. Bonfire Studios is currently working on several unannounced projects for 2010. Pottinger has been with the company since its formative days back in 1996, and contributed to the development of Ensemble's the former studio's last game, friends that I am looking forward to working with again," Pottinger key real-time strategy titles, from Halo Wars. "Bonfire is a team full of old said. "I think we're going to blow Age of Empires all the way up to

people away once they see what we're doing." Bonfire Studios hires former Halo Wars lead David Pottinger originally appeared on Joystiq on Thu, 17 Dec 2009 11:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds. Read| Permalink| Email this| Comments

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Backstage With Lissy Trullie By ELLE.com (ELLE News Blog)

great teacher, and really warm and friendly. You toured with the Virgins Submitted at 12/16/2009 12:06:11 PM earlier this year. How was that? As Lissy Trullie’s debut EP, Self I’ve known Donald [Cumming] Taught Learner, proves, the for about ten years, so it was like stylish singer-songwriter— see touring with my buddies. On the her 2008 ELLE shoot—has bus we did art projects—I plenty of substance (in fact, she’s embroidered a vest that he wears been honing her guitar hooks on stage. We watched a ton of since age 11). Trullie, set to movies—there was never a good release her first full-length album selection wherever we went, so in 2010, spoke with us before we actually watched Conan the Monday night’s show at New Barbarian and its sequel. York’s Mercury Lounge. —Erin What’s the biggest Clements misconception about you? You music has gotten a lot of That I had a big career as a buzz this year. What have been model and I’m some model the high points and low points? turned rocker. I did it for a short Touring was great—just getting time while I was in school. But more fans has been pretty I’ve been doing music since I awesome. The low point was was a child. when our bassist Ian got swine How did you get into modeling? flu in Hamburg—he was in the I was scouted on the street. I was hospital for a long time and we very reluctant and suspicious were quarantined. about what this person wanted How did you meet Adam Green from me and then she ended up (of the Moldy Peaches), with booking me for something that whom you duet on a cover of Biz paid really well. And from there Markie’s “Just a Friend”? she took me to an agency. At the We played at the same ASPCA time, I was a struggling student, event and started hanging out. so the idea of making money was We knew we were going to do a like, “Yeah! I don’t have to duet at one of my shows and waitress?” I was actually a janitor someone else had suggested to at the time, so that sounded him “Just a Friend.” enticing. But then after three Who else would you like to years I really just wasn’t happy collaborate with? doing it. The producer for my upcoming You also DJ occasionally. record was kind of a guitar hero What’s always on your playlist? of mine—Bernard Butler. I was a “Uptown Top Ranking,” by little intimidated at first, but he’s Althea & Donna, this reggae duo such an amazing musician, a of girls who were 17 at the time.

It was released in the ‘70s. That’s an amazing jam. I DJ a lot of Motown, soul, and hip-hop—Wu -Tang and Tupac. As far as newer bands go, the Virgins, LCD Soundsystem, Hot Chip. How did you get into Hot Chip? I love your “Ready for the Floor” cover. I had to change up my DJ set and was looking for current, poppier stuff to play. I checked out Hot Chip and thought that song had an amazing melody, and it got stuck in my head. When we were playing earlier on, and nobody knew who we were, I thought it would be a good idea to throw in a cover so people had something to relate to. And when we did that one, people kind of freaked out over it. My manager was like, “Why don’t you record that?” Who are your musical icons?

When I was younger I liked a lot of Motown and soul music. And as I grew into a preteen, I became obsessed with Freddie Mercury. Then I discovered indie music. I was growing up in DC and there’s a band there that started out as Nation of Ulysses then turned into The Make-Up and I was obsessed with them. There are great DC bands—Slant 6, Tuscadero, Bratmobile. What can we expect from your forthcoming full-length album? It’s more reflective of how I wanted my music and songwriting to be. The EP was recorded in a very short amount of time with little money—it was rushed and I didn’t get all the ideas that I wanted to get in there done. I like it—I feel blessed that we got to put that together because it’s gotten us so many great shows and fans. But this one is not as sophomoric. What’s your songwriting process like? It all comes together in a mess. I don’t sit down with a melody in mind; it’s all just this chaotic thing. I listen to a lot of music, I read a lot of books, and I write a lot, and I think that helps. I try not to sing too personally because I don’t want to exclude anyone, like “you won’t understand this because it’s so deep.” Photo: Getty Images

Dollar’s revival damps demand for stocks (Financial Times - US homepage) Submitted at 12/17/2009 8:46:12 AM

16:45 GMT. The dollar shot to its highest level in three months on Thursday after traders perceived the Federal Reserve had adopted a more upbeat tone regarding the US economy following its decision to leave interest rates at historic lows. However, in a sign that the the carry trade mantra of “strong dollar equals weak stocks” is still afforded some heft, global stock markets turned lower on the greenback’s advance. fivefilters.org featured article: Normalising the crime of the century by John Pilger. Available tools: PDF Newspaper, Full Text RSS, Term Extraction.

As wage theft rises, states and cities crack down (AP) (Yahoo! News: U.S. News) Submitted at 12/17/2009 9:38:07 AM

CHICAGO – Fabian Gutierrez logged more than 60 hours a week slicing meat and stocking shelves with cheeses and milk at a neighborhood grocery for less than minimum wage and no WAGE page 63

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overtime. The 32-year-old Mexican immigrant said he put up with the situation for months because he was desperate to support his wife and young daughter. And like many co-workers, he was afraid to challenge his boss. "All of us took abuse. We were disrespected," said Gutierrez, who found help at a workers' rights center, joined with other workers to sue the owner of La Fruteria and now works at another grocery store that he says treats him better. Across the nation, the longsimmering problem of employers who don't pay their workers appears to be getting worse, especially for immigrant laborers. In the absence of aggressive federal action, some states and local governments have begun to tackle the issue on their own. They say employers who don't pay overtime or minimum wage are unlikely to pay into state workers' compensation or unemployment insurance fundsâ&#x20AC;&#x201D; bilking taxpayers even as they're cheating workers. Workers rights centers say wage theft has become the No. 1 complaint they've heard in recent months. In Chicago, Working Hands Legal Clinic, which is helping Gutierrez, received 161 complaints of wage theft from January through June 2008. That jumped by more than 60 percent to 252 complaints during the same period this year. The Los Angeles-based National

Day Laborer Organizing Network says at least 50 percent of day laborersâ&#x20AC;&#x201D; there are 120,000 on a given day in the U.S. â&#x20AC;&#x201D; experience some form of wage theft. About 68 percent of low-wage workers reported wage theft in 2008, regardless of citizenship status, according to a study released earlier this year that surveyed 4,400 low-wage workers in major U.S. cities, the first such extensive review in years. "It's not confined to the margins, or a few rogue employers. Employers realize that workers are desperate," said Nik Theodore, a professor at the University of Illinois at Chicago and lead author of the study conducted with the University of California, Los Angeles and the City University of New York. "It looks like standard business practice in many industries." Wage theft has even emerged in industries where there haven't previously been many complaints, like fairs and carnivals, according to the Workers' Rights Law Center of New York. Earlier this year, Dreamland Amusements Inc. agreed to pay $325,000 in back wages to Mexican workers in New York after the company was accused of forcing them to work 70 hours a week at less than minimum wage. Low-wage immigrant workers are particularly vulnerable because most are paid in cash, making record-keeping difficult.

Many fear a call to immigration authorities, even if they have legal status to work in the U.S. Gutierrez, a soft-spoken, husky man who declined to discuss his immigration status, said he and other workers were scared to bring up the problems with their employer because they feared they might be deported. Eventually, Gutierrez said, he overcame his fear because he wanted to make sure others weren't wronged. Gutierrez's former boss, Tony Macias, owns several grocery stores throughout Chicago. His attorney, William J. Raleigh, said Macias didn't know he had to pay overtime. Until recently, such lawsuits have been the main way for workers to fight back. But lawyers often won't take the cases since they take months to resolve, the payoff is low and collection is difficult. "Even if we win, that's usually just the beginning," said Milan Bhatt of The Workers' Rights Law Center. "By the time the litigation is resolved, they've closed shop and moved elsewhere." Some states are looking for creative solutions. California and New York created multi-agency task forces that raid problem industries, such as car washes and grocery stores, and focus on regions where workers repeatedly report violations. "Having everyone go out together shows a very powerful message that you can't just pay

the piper and keep going," said Terri Gerstein, New York's deputy labor commissioner for wage and immigrant services. Advocates say enforcing wage and hour laws even for laborers in the country illegally keeps wages for all workers from being driven down and ensures that employers who follow the rules can compete. California has also required some businesses to pay a state registration fee, which pays workers if violations are later found and funds a collections department, making fines enforceable. Some worker advocates say combining efforts for massive raids is good publicity but nets little for workers because the focus is on recovering unemployment or Social Security taxes for the state rather than overtime wages for the employee. In response, New York Labor Commissioner M. Patricia Smith has worked with communitybased groups and even unions, which are often the first to receive labor complaints, in a nationally recognized effort to identify employers violating labor laws. "Unlike with a state agency, people don't feel nervous coming to us and sharing their stories, even undocumented folks," said Andrew Friedman, co-executive director of Make the Road New York. Washington, Oregon and Massachusetts are beginning to

adopt some similar approaches and adding their own twists, such as hefty fines and online complaint filing. In Miami-Dade County, a nongovernmental wage theft task force is pushing to create a lowcost, streamlined complaint process. San Francisco already has a similar ordinance, and Los Angeles and New Orleans are considering such proposals. Still, advocates say the federal government needs to step up enforcement. Despite reports from the ground that wage theft is on the rise, the U.S. Department of Labor reported a 25 percent drop in registered complaints from low-wage workers from the start of the Bush administration through 2008, the most recent data available. A recent Congressional report slammed the Labor Department for frequently failing to investigate or even register some complaints; a bill in the House would extend the federal statute of limitations on some violations to give the department more time to investigate them. Labor Secretary Hilda Solis has added about 250 wage and hour inspectors, and last week, the department signed an agreement with the New York labor department, Mexican Consulate and several other groups to create a call center that will provide Hispanic workers in the New York area information about their WAGE page 66

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Police: Bengals' Henry dies day after dispute (AP) (Yahoo! News: U.S. News)

say if the woman, whom police would not identify, was present at the scene when police arrived. C H A R L O T T E , N . C . – Henry is engaged to Loleini Cincinnati Bengals receiver Chris Tonga, and the couple has been Henry died Thursday, a day after raising three children. Tonga's falling out of the back of a MySpace page identifies herself pickup truck during what police as "Mrs. C. Henry" and has a said was a domestic dispute with picture of her next to a person his fiancee. who appears to be Henry. She Charlotte-Mecklenburg police also has a post from Tuesday said Henry died at 6:36 a.m. talking about buying wedding Henry was 26. rings. A neighbor said "We knew him in a different way Wednesday that the Tonga family than his public persona," Bengals owns the home where police say owner Mike Brown said of the the incident began. Charlotte is player who was suspended five home to his fiancee's parents. times during his career. "He had "We ask that you keep Chris' worked through the troubles in family — especially the young his life and had finally seemingly children he leaves behind — in r e a c h e d t h e p o i n t w h e r e your prayers," Henry's agent, everything was going to blossom. Andy Simms of PlayersRep And he was going to have the Sports said in a statement. "It is future we all wanted for him. It's tragic when a life is taken so painful to us. We feel it in our young. He was a man just hearts, and we will miss him." realizing his potential, not just in Police spokeswoman Rosalyn football, but in life." H a r r i n g t o n s a i d h o m i c i d e Authorities have not announced detectives have been assigned to the cause of death. Mecklenburg the case but had no further C o u n t y m e d i c a l e x a m i n e r information. investigator Carol Cormier said Henry was rushed to the hospital they were expecting to receive Wednesday after being found on the body later Thursday. a residential road. Police said the The Bengals will wear a helmet dispute began at a home about a sticker Sunday against San Diego half-mile away, and Henry to remember Henry. jumped into the bed of the pickup When the players received word truck as his fiancee was driving Henry had died, quarterback away from the residence. Carson Palmer called them Police said at some point when together in the locker room and she was driving, Henry "came said they should dedicate the out of the back of the vehicle." game and rest of the season to Police have not released the 911 Henry and the wife of defensive tapes, and Harrington wouldn't coordinator Mike Zimmer, who Submitted at 12/17/2009 10:15:55 AM

died unexpectedly during the season. Henry was away from the Bengals after breaking his left forearm during a win over Baltimore on Nov. 8. He had surgery and was placed on season -ending injured reserve following the game. "We are greatly saddened by today's tragic news about the loss of Chris Henry," NFL commissioner Roger Goodell said. "Our thoughts and prayers go out to Chris' family, including his Bengals family. We have been in contact with the Bengals to offer our support through this difficult time. "I ask you to keep Chris Henry and his family in your thoughts today." Throughout his career, his temper and poor decisions got him in trouble. He was ejected from a game and suspended for another while at West Virginia, where former coach Rich Rodriguez told Henry that he was an embarrassment to himself and the program. His reputation was already costing him — the Bengals were the only NFL team to bring him in for a pre-draft visit in 2005. They found that his demeanor didn't match his reputation. Henry was shy and spoke in a quiet voice. They warned him that he had to stay in control if he was going to stay in the NFL. Then, they picked him in the third round. In a sense, it was already a

second chance. "I'm worth the chance," Henry said, when he showed up the following weekend for a rookie minicamp. "I'm just happy they took me." Henry become a vital part of the offense as a rookie, helping the Bengals reach the playoffs in 2005 with his ability to run past defenders to grab long passes. In the final month of the season, he also showed his other side, getting arrested for marijuana possession. After a playoff loss to Pittsburgh, he was arrested on a gun charge in Florida. Henry and former Tennessee cornerback Adam "Pacman" Jones became the league's two most trouble-bound players. Commissioner Roger Goodell suspended both in 2007 — Jones for a full season, Henry for half of it — as part of a toughening of the league's conduct policy. When Henry was arrested for a fifth time following that season on an assault charge, the Bengals decided they'd had enough. At his arraignment on April 3, 2008, Municipal Court Judge Bernie Bouchard called Henry "a oneman crime wave." He was released by the Bengals the same day. It was a jolt to Henry, who had dreamed of an NFL career since high school, when he got the NFL logo tattooed on the back of his right hand. No team showed an interest in bringing him back. His career seemed finished. Then, Brown — who refers to

himself as "a redeemer" — changed his mind and gave him another chance. "If you only knew him by hearsay, you'd think he's some kind of ogre," Brown said, during the Bengals' appearance on HBO's "Hard Knocks" series this summer. "It's not true. He's a good person. When you see him up close, you'll find that you'll like him. He'll be a soft-spoken, pleasant person." This time, Henry seemed determined to stay out of trouble. After only 19 catches and two touchdowns in 12 games in the 2008 season, he set about making himself a topflight receiver again. He got into top shape and worked out with teammates in the offseason, showing more resolve than at any point in his career. Henry also changed his personal life, spending more time with his fiancee and the three children they are raising. Teammates noticed a pronounced change in his demeanor. "He's a great kid with a great heart," quarterback Carson Palmer said as training camp started. "He's changed his life around. He ran into some trouble, made some bad decisions, and realized that. He's sorry for them, apologized for them, and has done everything he can to make himself a better person. I'm just proud of him." Before the 2009 season, Henry got a new tattoo that matched his POLICE: page 72

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NFL Star Dies After Fall From Truck in Domestic Dispute (FOXNews.com)

Harrington wouldn't say if the woman was present at the scene when police arrived. Cincinnati Bengals receiver Authorities have not announced Chris Henry died Thursday, a the cause of death. Mecklenburg day after falling off a truck C o u n t y m e d i c a l e x a m i n e r during a domestic dispute with investigator Carol Cormier said his fiancee, a tragedy Bengals they were expecting to receive owner Mike Brown said "cut him the body later Thursday. down" just as he was "running to A controversial player at times, daylight." Henry had a history of getting in Charlotte-Mecklenburg police trouble. Coach Marvin Lewis said Henry died at 6:36 a.m. s a i d H e n r y h a d b e c o m e a Thursday. Henry was 26. different man. Henry was rushed to the hospital "He worked through adversity Wednesday after being found on and came out of it to be a beacon a residential road. Police said the of hope for other people," Lewis dispute began at a home about a said. "It's a very difficult thing half-mile away, and Henry with this loss of a young life that jumped into the bed of the pickup won't ever get to reach its full truck as his fiancee was driving potential." away from the residence. Henry is engaged to Loleini Police said at some point when Tonga, and the couple has been she was driving, Henry "came raising three children. Tonga's out of the back of the vehicle." MySpace page identifies herself They wouldn't identify the as "Mrs. C. Henry" and has a woman, and no charges were picture of her next to a person immediately filed. who appears to be Henry. She "It is with great sadness to learn also has a post from Tuesday Chris has passed away," Henry's talking about buying wedding agent, Andy Simms said in a r i n g s . A n e i g h b o r s a i d statement. "For those who knew Wednesday that the Tonga family Chris, he was nothing like his owns the home where police say public perception. A loving and the incident began. Charlotte is c a r i n g i n d i v i d u a l , h e w a s home to his fiancee's parents. thankful for what he had in life, "We ask that you keep Chris' and proud of what he had family — especially the young overcome." children he leaves behind — in Police spokeswoman Rosalyn your prayers," Simms said. "It is H a r r i n g t o n s a i d h o m i c i d e tragic when a life is taken so detectives have been assigned to young. He was a man just the case but had no further realizing his potential, not just in information. Police have not football, but in life" released the 911 tapes, and Henry was away from the team Submitted at 12/17/2009 8:33:26 AM

after breaking his left forearm during a win over Baltimore on Nov. 8. He had surgery and was placed on season-ending injured reserve following the game. Throughout his career, his temper and poor decisions got him in hot water. He was ejected from a game and suspended for another at West Virginia, where former coach Rich Rodriguez told Henry that he was an embarrassment to himself and the program. His reputation was already costing him — the Bengals were the only NFL team to bring him in for a pre-draft visit in 2005. They found that his demeanor didn't match his reputation. Henry was shy and spoke in a quiet voice. They warned him that he had to stay in control if he was going to stay in the NFL. Then, they picked him in the third round. In a sense, it was already a second chance. "I'm worth the chance," Henry said, when he showed up the following weekend for a rookie minicamp. "I'm just happy they took me." Henry become a vital part of the offense as a rookie, helping the Bengals reach the playoffs in 2005 with his ability to run past defenders to grab long passes. In the final month of the season, he also showed his other side, getting arrested for marijuana possession. After a playoff loss to Pittsburgh, he was arrested on a gun charge in Florida.

Henry and former Tennessee cornerback Adam "Pacman" Jones became the league's two most trouble-bound players. Commissioner Roger Goodell suspended both in 2007 — Jones for a full season, Henry for half of it — as part of a toughening of the league's conduct policy. When Henry was arrested for a fifth time following that season on an assault charge, the Bengals decided they'd had enough. At his arraignment on April 3, 2008, Municipal Court Judge Bernie Bouchard called Henry "a oneman crime wave." He was released by the Bengals the same day. It was a jolt to Henry, who had dreamed of an NFL career since high school, when he got the NFL logo tattooed on the back of his right hand. No team showed an interest in bringing him back. His career seemed finished. Then, Bengals owner Brown — who refers to himself as "a redeemer" — changed his mind and gave him another chance. "If you only knew him by hearsay, you'd think he's some kind of ogre," Brown said, during the Bengals' appearance on HBO's "Hard Knocks" series this summer. "It's not true. He's a good person. When you see him up close, you'll find that you'll like him. He'll be a soft-spoken, pleasant person." Brown said during a press conference on Thursday that Henry had restarted his life. "He has worked through troubles

in his life and seemed to reach the point where everything would blossom and he would have the future we all planned for him," Brown said. "And then this tragedy cut him down." Henry seemed determined to stay out of trouble. After only 19 catches and two touchdowns in 12 games in the 2008 season, he set about making himself a topflight receiver again. He got into top shape and worked out with teammates in the offseason, showing more resolve than at any point in his career. Henry also changed his personal life, spending more time with his fiancee and the three children they are raising. Teammates noticed a pronounced change in his demeanor. "He's a great kid with a great heart," quarterback Carson Palmer said as training camp started. "He's changed his life around. He ran into some trouble, made some bad decisions, and realized that. He's sorry for them, apologized for them, and has done everything he can to make himself a better person. I'm just proud of him." Before the 2009 season, Henry got a new tattoo that matched his new outlook. Below his left ear, in flowing one-inch script, was the world "Blessed." "I kind of felt like I dug myself out of the hole and started doing the right things," Henry said in an interview with The Associated NFL page 68

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Dude, they're putting pot in more than brownies (AP) (Yahoo! News: U.S. News) Submitted at 12/17/2009 9:03:55 AM

DENVER â&#x20AC;&#x201C; Any slacker living over his parents' garage can make pot brownies. Gourmet chefs are taking the art of cooking with marijuana to a higher level. In Denver, a new medicalmarijuana shop called Ganja Gourmet serves cannabis-infused specialties such as pizza, hummus and lasagna. Across town in the Mile-High City, a Caribbean restaurant plans to offer classes on how to make multi-course meals with pot in every dish. And in Southern California, a low-budget TV show called "Cannabis Planet" has won fans with a cooking segment showing viewers how to use weed in teriyaki chicken, shrimp capellini and steak sandwiches. The evolution of pot cooking was perhaps inevitable given the explosion of medical marijuana around the country in recent years. Many health-conscious patients would rather eat the drug than smoke it. And they would prefer to eat something other than sugary treats. "When I started using marijuana, I was eating a brownie every day. I gained a ton of weight," said Michael DeLao, a former hotel chef who hosts the "Cannabis Planet" cooking segments on Los

Angeles' KJLA. "Then I learned how to really cook with marijuana, and once more people learn about all the possibilities, we're going to see a lot more people wanting this in their food." Ganja Gourmet's menu includes lasagna ("LaGanja"), " Panama Red Pizza" and an olive tapenade called "ganjanade," along with sweets such as cheesecake, muffins and brownies. Employees wear tie-dyed T-shirts that proclaim, "Our food is so great, you need a license to eat it!!!" All patrons at the Ganja Gourmet must show a medical marijuana card that proves they have a doctor's permission to use pot for some kind of malady. The place opened last week, and so far, 90 percent of its business has been takeout. The food isn't cheap. A whole pizza sells for $89, and a dozen sweet treats called Almond Horns cost $120. "The food is really good," said Jamie Hillyer, a 41-year-old medical marijuana patient who paid $12 for a serving of vegetable LaGanja. Hillyer said that he can't taste the weed in the food and that it gives him a "more mellow" buzz than smoking pot. Chefs are able to use marijuana in cooking because its key

ingredient, the mind-altering drug THC, is fat-soluble, meaning it binds with oils or fats. Marijuana chefs put leaves or buds in a food processor and grind the marijuana into green flour. Then they add the flour to oil or butter, cook it slowly for up to a couple of days while the THC binds to the fat, and strain out the green flakes. The result is "cannabutter," or butter that makes a diner high. Chefs say 2 teaspoons of cannabutter typically contain the amount of THC in an ounce of weed. The pot-infused oils and butters have a greenish tint and an earthy taste, but chefs say the flavor can easily be masked with garlic or other herbs and spices. Denver's 8 Rivers Modern Caribbean restaurant does not serve pot-infused food, but its husband-and-wife owners, Scott Durran and Wanda James, plan to offer cooking-with-marijuana classes starting next month. They also own a medical marijuana dispensary, which they hope will eventually offer take-home soups and roasted chicken. Marijuana chefs say it takes 20 minutes to two hours for the potlaced food to produce a high. The biggest problem, they say, is that users often eat too much, thinking the food isn't working. While you can't exactly overdose

on marijuana food, people who eat too much may feel more sluggish or disoriented than they would like. So at Ganja Gourmet, customers are allowed to eat only one menu item every 45 minutes. (The drug takes so long to start working that there's little chance of a customer developing a case of the munchies and getting hungrier the more he ate.) Ganja Gourmet owner Scott Horowitz tried to get liability insurance of the sort bars take out to protect themselves against damage caused by intoxicated patrons. But he said he couldn't any insurers selling similar coverage for pot shops. Ganja Gourmet does offer customers a ride home if they need one. "If someone leaves my place wasted, I'm liable," Horowitz said. Horowitz's liability worry may be shortlived. Denver's City Council is considering an ordinance banning dispensaries from allowing marijuana to be smoked or eaten on site. ___ On the Net: Cannabis Planet: http://cannabisplanet.tv fivefilters.org featured article: Normalising the crime of the century by John Pilger. Available tools: PDF Newspaper, Full Text RSS, Term Extraction.

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labor rights. For now, Gutierrez and his former employer are trying to work things out in court, but he's unsure if he'll get all the back pay he says he's owed. "I want my voice to be heard," he said. "We don't do the work for free." ___ Laura Wides-Munoz reported from Miami. ___ On the Net: Make the Road New York: http://www.maketheroad.org/ Working Hands Legal Clinic: http://www.workers-law.org Workers' Rights Law Center of N e w Y o r k : http://www.workersrightsny.org National Day Laborer Organizing Network: http://www.ndlon.org (This version corrects Friedman's title to co-executive director instead of co-director and adds the full name of his group, Make the Road New York.) fivefilters.org featured article: Normalising the crime of the century by John Pilger. Available tools: PDF Newspaper, Full Text RSS, Term Extraction.

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Police Highly Suspicious of Missing Utah Mom's Husband (FOXNews.com)

certainly causes us to ask questions as to why would he do things to exclude the resources SALT LAKE CITY that we can bring to the table to Authorities have upgraded their find Susan," Black said. investigation into the Josh Powell said he went disappearance of a Utah mother camping with their boys, ages 2 to a criminal probe and say her a n d 4 , i n s u b f r e e z i n g husband's "lack of cooperation" temperatures about 12:30 a.m. on has made them increasingly Dec. 7 and returned in the suspicious of him. evening. Susan Powell, a 28-year-old But Josh Powell has been mother of two young children, uncooperative in providing any was reported missing Dec. 7, details that might explain what when she didn't show up for happened to his wife, Black said. work. She was last seen a day Among other things, Josh earlier. Powell hasn't specified where he "Every lead we've been offered went camping or where he was so far would leave us to believe all day on Dec. 7, he said. this is out of character (for "That would be awesome if he Susan) and thus suspect foul play would be willing to cooperate on is involved," West Valley City that level and take us to his camp Asst. Police Chief Craig Black site," Black said. said Wednesday. Powell has told police he went He said that her husband, Josh camping in Simpson Springs on Powell, has not been named a the historic Pony Express Trail in suspect but investigators are Utah's west desert — an area of highly interested in him. thousands of square miles — that " J o s h ' s u n u s u a l l a c k o f is now covered in snow. cooperation for a husband Josh Powell on Tuesday did looking for his wife with the provide a DNA sample to police, police department, you know, it as did several other family Submitted at 12/17/2009 5:38:56 AM

members. Josh Powell's attorney, Scott Williams, a defense attorney who often defends high-profile clients, described the DNA testing as routine in such cases. Williams disputed allegations made by police that his client had been uncooperative. "Despite our continued invitation to be contacted with questions we received no contact from the police today (Wednesday) and as to the nature of prior information, we have answered all questions posed to us since Monday morning," he said. "Josh continues to favor attention on finding Susan and has been cooperating and providing information to that end." Black reiterated that Josh Powell has given them little information of value. "Any reason as to why she would've disappeared either of her own accord or because of some type of other foul play, he has not been cooperative with that," he said. The Powell home was locked when officers initially arrived

and they broke in, fearing the family had suffered from carbon monoxide poisoning. Susan Powell's father, Charles Cox of Puyallup, Wash., said police found a wet spot in the home being dried by two fans, but police have declined to comment on that. Investigators said there were no signs of forced entry at the home and they found Susan Powell's purse and cell phone there. Susan Powell was last seen by someone other than her husband on Dec. 6 — a family friend who ate dinner with her at the couple's home following church. The family has planned a news conference in the Seattle area on Thursday, according to a posting on the Friends and Family of Susan Powell Facebook page. Click here for more from Fox13Now.com. fivefilters.org featured article: Normalising the crime of the century by John Pilger. Available tools: PDF Newspaper, Full Text RSS, Term Extraction.

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Judge: Gangs more deadly than some Family Enraged After Gitmo detainees (AP) Driver Who Killed Cop Gets 3rd DUI (Yahoo! News: U.S. News)

gang's crimes. It was one of the city's longest and most tightly guarded trials. The judge and jury WASHINGTON â&#x20AC;&#x201C; The chief were protected by bulletproof judge of the federal court in glass. W a s h i n g t o n t o l d l a w y e r s President Barack Obama has Thursday that domestic street ordered the federal government gangs are more deadly than some to acquire an underused state Guantanamo Bay detainees who prison in rural Illinois to be the could face trial in U.S. courts. new home for a limited number Judge Royce Lamberth was of terror suspects now held at speaking at an American Bar G u a n t a n a m o . T h e f e d e r a l Association breakfast about government will transform the Attorney General Eric Holder's site into a prison that exceeds recent decision to put the reputed supermax standards, officials said Sept. 11 mastermind and four this week. accused henchmen on trial in Lamberth said he does not want New York federal court. to get into a political debate L a m b e r t h d i d n ' t r e f e r about whether detainees should specifically to those five in his be tried in military commissions comments, but rejected the or civilian courts, but he insisted suggestion made by some critics the court system can handle of Holder's decision that U.S. whatever cases it gets. courts cannot secure defendants "Federal courts are very capable like terror suspects held at of doing this," Lamberth said. Guantanamo. Some critics of Holder's decision "The gangs are more murderous, argue that such trials will expose I think, than some of these people national security secrets to enemy at Guantanamo," Lamberth said. terrorists. But Lamberth argued a "They've certainly killed their trial judge can sort through the share of witnesses here." classified information in secret Lamberth presided over a 2004 before anything is aired in a trial in which six members of a public courtroom. gang called Murder Inc. were Stewart Baker, a former Bush accused of killing at least 31 administration homeland security people, including witnesses to the official who attended Lamberth's Submitted at 12/17/2009 8:45:42 AM

speech, said afterward he was not convinced on that point. Such a trial "creates this massive hydraulic pressure to declassify information," said Baker. "We can always do something. Whether you can really protect national security fully is really an open question." Lamberth said he "bristled" when he heard Holder predict that Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and the four others will be convicted, and bristled again when defense lawyers spoke publicly about the case becoming a " show trial." The judge suggested a gag order could be imposed on all the lawyers in any such case to keep the proceedings from getting out of hand. He also said that it is possible defendants will use the trial to launch anti-American invective, but said: "It's a free country. I don't think that that can be prevented and I think families have to understand that in a free country those things can happen." fivefilters.org featured article: Normalising the crime of the century by John Pilger. Available tools: PDF Newspaper, Full Text RSS, Term Extraction.

(FOXNews.com)

behind the wheel. "I think he should be locked up again, and all this crap about An Ohio man is due in court remorse and treatment while he Friday to face DUI charges for was in prison, that didn't do no the third time after serving 10 good, it didn't do no good ... it's years in prison and losing his 15 years later," Knaff's cousin license for life in the 1994 death Rosalyn told Fox 8. of a police officer, Fox 8 Officers applauded the efforts of reported. the convenience store customer Police say they received a call who followed Gordon home. Sunday night from a Green, Ohio "This was late at night, I'm sure convenience store customer they were tired, they could easily regarding a man who appeared have just said I hope they make it intoxicated. home and got in their car and "They went and attempted to gone home," Holland said. block this person in, the driver Gordon is charged with driving got in the car, maneuvered under the influence, driving around the citizen's car and took under suspension and refusing to off driving," Inspector William take a breathalyzer test. Holland of the Summit County "They should take a real long, Sheriff's Department told Fox 8. hard look at him cause he has The customer followed the served time, you would think that swerving car to a nearby home, 10 years would really absolutely where police deputies arrived and give him the courage to be found 47-year-old Gregory remorseful for real from the heart Gordon, who was convicted of for what he did," Rosalyn Knaff killing police officer George told Fox 8. Knaff in 1994 after running a Click here to read more on this stop sign and smashing into story from Fox8.com. Knaff's car. fivefilters.org featured article: This is also Gordon's second Normalising the crime of the arrest for DUI since his release century by John Pilger. Available from prison. He was arrested in tools: PDF Newspaper, Full Text 2006 as well. RSS, Term Extraction. Knaff's family is enraged that he is still able to drink and get Submitted at 12/17/2009 9:12:14 AM

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N.J. Dad in Brazil Wins Custody, Wants Son for Christmas

Colombia scam mastermind jailed

(FOXNews.com)

(BBC News | Americas | World Edition)

Joao Paulo Lins e Silva, the Brazilian stepfather with whom Sean lives, would appeal RIO DE JANEIRO A U.S. Wednesday's federal court ruling father who won another round in to surrender the boy. Zamariola his legal fight to regain custody said he didn't expect a final of his 9-year-old son living in resolution until at least the first Brazil is expected to land in Rio half of 2010. on Thursday, hoping to bring the The stepfather's attorney, Sergio boy to New Jersey in time for Tostes, declined to comment. Christmas. The boy's maternal grandmother But David Goldman's own has said her grandson wants to attorney warned that additional stay in Rio. She has filed a appeals could block the hand- s e p a r a t e p e t i t i o n w i t h t h e over of his son, Sean â&#x20AC;&#x201D; which a Supreme Court asking that Sean's federal court set for Friday at the desires be considered. A similar U.S. Consulate in Rio de Janeiro. request from the Brazilian family "The hand-over can be halted," was denied earlier this year. said Ricardo Zamariola, The child, who has dual Goldman's attorney, referring to a citizenship, has been shielded possible Supreme Court appeal from speaking directly to the by the family that now has news media. custody of the boy. President Barack Obama, the Goldman said he is cautious U.S. Congress and Secretary of after such a long fight. State Hillary Rodham Clinton "I've been down this road for 5 have all urged the child's return. 1/2 years," he told CNN in Goldman, who lives in Tinton comments aired Thursday. "Until Falls, New Jersey, was not I'm on the plane with Sean and present for the ruling and didn't the wheels are up, I can only be return a request for comment hopeful." made to his U.S. attorney, Previous rulings favorable to Patricia Apy. Zamariola said he Goldman have been scuttled by had spoken with Goldman and other Brazilian courts. Zamariola expected him to arrive in Rio de said he was certain lawyers for Janeiro on Thursday. Submitted at 12/17/2009 6:31:26 AM

The case began in 2004 when Goldman's wife, Bruna Bianchi, took the 4-year-old Sean to her native Brazil. Goldman says it was to be a two -week vacation. But she stayed and so did the boy. She eventually obtained a Brazilian divorce from Goldman and remarried. Goldman was already seeking his son's return under an international treaty that covers cross-border child abductions when his former wife died last year giving birth to a daughter. Her death generated more interest in the case, which has been discussed this year by toplevel diplomats in Washington and the Brazilian capital, Brasilia. It also has been the subject of congressional hearings in the U.S. and has prompted protests in both countries. Goldman and Sean were reunited in February for the first time since his son was taken to Brazil. They have not seen each other since June. fivefilters.org featured article: Normalising the crime of the century by John Pilger. Available tools: PDF Newspaper, Full Text RSS, Term Extraction.

where he faces money-laundering charges. Murcia was extradited from Submitted at 12/17/2009 7:40:52 AM Panama to Colombia a year ago A Colombian man who ran a to face accusations that his pyramid scheme that defrauded business was a pyramid scheme thousands of people of their life that amassed millions of dollars savings has received a 30-year and duped at least 200,000 jail term. Colombians out of their life David Murcia Guzman was savings. sentenced after being found The demise of DMG provoked guilty in August of money- protests both by those angry at laundering and illicit enrichment. the loss of their money and also Murcia, who insists his business by investors who insisted that the was legal, led the DMG Group, company was legitimate and that which promised returns of well the government had forced its over 100%. collapse. Its collapse in November 2008 Print Sponsor led to widespread street protests fivefilters.org featured article: across Colombia by investors. Normalising the crime of the Sentencing Murcia to 30 years in century by John Pilger. Available prison, the judge also ordered tools: PDF Newspaper, Full Text that he be fined $12.5m (ÂŁ7.7m). RSS, Term Extraction. It is expected that Murcia will soon face extradition to the US