Friday, 30 November 2012

Adams, Stepner Partners with the Kentucky Association of Counties ...

Adams, Stepner, Woltermann & Dusing, PLLC is a proud legal partner of the Kentucky Association of Counties (KACo) and is committed to its mission in the Commonwealth.? For more than 25 years, we have been a legal partner to KACo, and we will be participating in the 2012 KACo Conference & Exposition at the Galt House Hotel in Louisville, Kentucky on November 28 and 29, 2012.

Our Government Practice attorneys will be on-hand during the conference to answer any legal questions that you may have.? In addition, the conference offers Kentucky counties, government leaders and employees access to information, service-based companies and business tools to make their organizations run more efficiently.

Our Government Practice attorneys have countless hours of experience and a reputation for responsiveness. They are able to provide a strong focus on legal areas ranging from municipal representation, school law, business disputes and litigation, estate planning, corporate compliance issues, complex product liability and real estate.

After 100 years of service, we remain dedicated to being your ?go to? source for legal information and representation when you need it most.

Please join us and many others at the KACo Conference. For more information, please visit http://www.kaco.org.

Source: http://www.aswdlaw.com/adams-stepner-partners-with-the-kentucky-association-of-counties-kaco/

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Three contractors killed at Penoles mine in Mexico

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - Three contractors were killed on Friday while working on the construction of a ventilation duct at a zinc mine in central Mexico owned by Industrias Penoles, the company said in a release.

Miner and metals processor Penoles, which runs the world's largest primary silver producer, Fresnillo, operates the Tizapa mine in the central State of Mexico in the tiny municipality of Zacazonapan.

Three other contractors also employed by Mineria Castellana were injured and are being treated at a local hospital, Penoles added. The miner could not say if the incident was an explosion, as local media reported previously, but added that an investigation was underway.

Penoles said the Tizapa mine produces mostly zinc, although smaller quantities of lead, copper, silver and gold can also be found in the area.

Some 900 people, including contractors, work at the mine, situated about two hours from the state capital of Toluca, Christian Gomez, a spokesman at the mine, told Reuters earlier on Friday. It was not immediately clear how many of those workers were miners.

In August, the Mexican government suspended work at 32 small coal mines in the northern state of Coahuila due to safety concerns after 13 miners died in the space of three weeks.

A 2006 methane explosion at another mine in Coahuila owned by Grupo Mexico, killed 65 miners.

Penoles shares fell 2.91 percent to close at 646.13 pesos on Friday.

(Reporting by Cyntia Barrera Diaz. Editing by Andre Grenon)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/three-contractors-killed-penoles-mine-mexico-233823361--finance.html

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Can we implement a civility code that prohibits employees from ...

Q. I?d like to institute a civility code that goes beyond the basic racial and sexual slurs to include any name-calling that is demeaning, crude or rude. What do you suggest as punishment?

A. You can certainly prohibit racial and sexual slurs that are based on a protected category. However, your proposal is a little different.

You can implement a general civility code, but you must make sure it does not run afoul of the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA). The NLRA grants employees the right to engage in concerted activities for the purpose of collective bargaining or other mutual aid or protection. That can include criticism (of working conditions or co-workers) that you might consider rude or demeaning.

The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) is assertive in protecting employees? ability to engage in protected concerted activity. For example, it has found it a violation of the NLRA to prohibit employees from making disparaging comments and using inappropriate, offensive, rude or discourteous language.

If you implement a general civility code, consider narrowing the scope of prohibited conduct. Avoid vague or broad language, and add limiting language so employees understand you are not prohibiting activity protected under the NLRA.

Finally, as to your question about punishment, you should treat a violation of the civility code like a violation of any other policy.

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Thursday, 29 November 2012

Russian children find lion cub on the southern steppes, take it to school with them

MOSCOW - Most primary school classes get a goldfish to keep, a hamster or a turtle if they're lucky ? but children from one village in southern Russia got to play with a lion cub.

Children in the Rostov region found the 5-month old cub on the steppe Wednesday and brought it to their teacher, who kept it in the school gym, police said Thursday.

While waiting for police, children petted and played with the cub, named Barsik. One boy even tried to ride it like a horse while it mewled and swiped at the air.

The cub had escaped from a car on the way to a zoo in Dagestan in the North Caucasus. It has now been removed from the school and placed in a local zoo.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/russian-children-lion-cub-southern-steppes-school-them-125142521.html

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Nokia Wins Tribunal Ruling Against RIM In WLAN Patent Licensing Dispute

nokia-logoMore bad news for RIM: Nokia has won a tribunal ruling against the BlackBerry-maker regarding its WLAN-related patents. The ruling means RIM will have to pay royalties for handsets now considered to be in breach of a prior licensing agreement between the two. To enforce the tribunal's ruling, Nokia said it has now filed actions in the US, UK and Canada.

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Techcrunch/~3/Q_Kzs7gYw78/

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jerrie famish: Web Audio A New Level In Online Marketing - ocombs ...


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Web Audio A New Level In Online Marketing

The internet is truly one virtual place where change is ever constant. Internet geniuses would always come up with something new. Often, there are many modifications on what you see as well as in the system being used online. One thing may be the trend today; tomorrow something else would have superseded it. For individuals doing business over the internet, it has become their habit to constantly adjust with the trends on the net to cope with competition. One of the new innovations that received a lot of thumbs up from internet savvy people and online marketers as well is media streaming.
For online marketers in particular,Cheap iPad 2, specifically those that maintain their own web sites, they install web audio on their internet sites to further enhance their marketing techniques. Although this technology was not really designed for business purposes, innovative online marketers discovered it to be helpful in advertising actually. By employing the right methods, web audio can certainly spice up their web sites and gain more possible traffic to benefit their businesses. These online marketers have seen a great potential to profit from audio streaming. Aside from giving something new to see for their prospective customers, using web audio has also brought information dissemination thru the internet to a higher level.
If you are into media streaming, you need to take the most important steps towards a successful media streaming. You have to keep in mind that a good script, quality voice talent, and background music or effects are one of the basic elements of media streaming. With these elements in mind, you have to ensure that all these are included for a quality output. You can find easy to install web audio tools in the market. If you are in this for business,Cheap iPhone 5, then you need to invest some money on software tools so that it will be easier for you to insert sound on your web page.
Just think of the long term benefits you may get from this investment and the time that you will save in producing sound media,iPhone 5 For Sale. When you already have this technology installed on your web pages, you have to improve website sound media thru continuously research on new trends and techniques pertaining to web audio. Furthermore, it is equally important that you update your sound output regularly. There must always be something new for your visitors to hear. When you are just starting to learn this new technology, it is but apt to get a guide to media streaming. This information resource can definitely impart to you valuable tips and techniques on how to do create web audio and how to properly install it on your web page.
It is discouraged to hastily go into streaming audio without reading a primer about it. This will spare you from making mistakes that may cause you some money, too. Participating in forums relevant to web audio may also be able to help you get some more tricks on audio streaming. Another relevant advice that you have to give importance is to make sure that you don do sound streaming during peak hours. Doing so might cause your site to lag when being downloaded. Get more people to visit your site using this sound streaming technology by doing it the right way.
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Source: http://jerrie-famish.blogspot.com/2012/11/web-audio-new-level-in-online-marketing.html

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Wednesday, 28 November 2012

China Changes Leaders, Oppression of Muslims Continues

10:27 pm, Tue 27 Nov 2012

Chinese Muslims

Britain sees parliamentary changes every four to five years, but there exists a monarch that has?reigned?as sovereign for over sixty years. In the USA,?presidential elections?take place every four years and in France it?s five. Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan and Sudan have seen their leaders surpass 20 years at the top? whilst some African states have seen their leaders exceed?thirty years?in power. In China, leadership changes take place every ten years.

Whilst leadership changes in China take place every ten years, the oppression of some of its citizens is continuous - just ask the Uighurs and the Tibetans if the Chinese will allow them to speak to you.?

Those ten years are now up and the Chinese Communist Party?s 18th Party Congress took place almost the same time as the recent US elections - the world?s attention set firmly on the two biggest economies - as it decided to install?Xi Jinping and six others?to lead the Politburo Standing Committee. The BBC?reported?that ?Xi is also expected to take over as China's president in March 2013.?

The leadership change may have overshadowed the plight of those that China oppresses, but a timely reminder was given by none other than the Dalai Lama and the Japanese. Western mainstream media also wasted no time in highlighting corruption in the upper echelons of China?s ruling elite. The New York Times?published?a report outlining outgoing-Premier Wen Jiabao?s $2.7 billion wealth and?Bloomberg?highlighted the wealth accrued by the members of China?s legislature and related it to the poverty suffered by most Chinese citizens: ?income[s] reflects the imbalances in economic growth in China, where per capita annual income in 2010 was $2,425, less than in Belarus and a fraction of the $37,527 in the US.?

With impeccable timing the Dalai Lama?appeared?in Japan urging Japanese politicians to visit Tibet to see the suffering that China inflicts on Tibetans. Two Tibetans died in self-immolations that week. Japanese MPs then put out a statement ?strongly urging China to improve its unlawful suppression of human rights against Tibetans and Uighurs".

The Financial Times also?reported?back in March 2010 of the Dalai Lama stating ?Let us also remember the people of East Turkestan [China?s Xinjiang Uighur autonomous region] who have experienced great difficulties and increased oppression, and the Chinese intellectuals campaigning for greater freedom who have received severe sentences. I would like to express my solidarity and stand firmly with them?. And a recent academic?paper?published in an Australian Journal,?The Journal of Sociology,?claimed?that inequality between Uighurs and ethnic Chinese Hans fuelled tension in the region.

Are the concerns expressed by the Dalai Lama, and similarly the Japanese, about the Uighurs genuine or is he using their situation in an attempt to undermine China and promote his Tibetan cause?

Who knows? What is important is that the Uighurs? plight is getting some media coverage ? the only shame is that their plight seems to be conveniently forgotten by most Muslims who should be the most vocal in highlighting the oppression aimed at Muslims and promoting the struggle of Uighur political activists like?Rebiya Kadeer?? Muslims are, after all, part of an?Ummah.

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/mpacuk/~3/vKI_cirKEHo/china-changes-leaders-muslim-oppression-continues.html

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The Advantages of Payday Loaning - Finance Successfully

There has been a lot of talk over the practice of payday loaning. The understanding that payday loans often come with extortionately high interest rates, plus the lack of sufficient financial background screening for borrowers has put the institution under much scrutiny.

Allegations made to payday loans company Wonga about loaning money out to children has further fuelled anger towards the practice, with feelings against payday loaning being so strong that protests have been made against the advertisement of payday loan companies. However, there is much to suggest that payday loaning may be doing a lot more good than harm in this current economic climate. Here are the advantages of payday loaning, which we tend not to be reminded of.

Protests against Payday

The numbers of cases in which protests have been levelled against payday loaning are numerous. In effect, any company, business or institution that advertises the services of a payday loan company is in essence tarnished by this and prone to face scrutiny. Thus when Newcastle United Football Club announced a sponsorship deal with Wonga, they expectedly found themselves the subject of intense anger and disappointment.

Furthermore, football fans across the country protested against the association and advertisement of the English Football League with Wonga. This anger was so strong that the Football League had to eventually cut all direct ties with Wonga.

In addition, TV show presenters Ant and Dec were criticised heavily for their association with the ITV show Red and Black which advertised Wonga.

Understandable but NOT Justifiable

Taking into consideration the high interest rates involved in the practice, plus the fact that some payday loan companies (namely Wonga) tend to serve almost anyone, anti-payday loaning sentiment is understandable. In fact, considering the practices of Wonga, some payday loan companies should be heavily criticised.

However, not all payday loan companies are like Wonga and most act within the limits of the law and common morality.
Furthermore, from an economic perspective, there is much to suggest that we actually need payday loaning as a society. In such harsh economic times, many Brits are suffering to make ends meet. Bank lending has been somewhat limited in this period of mild austerity and therefore, and thus poor Brits have little option of debt or financial stress alleviation. Payday loans provide a solution that isn?t loan sharking or even drugs or prostitution.

Extortionately high interest rates aren?t ideal, but they?re a lot more ideal than the alternatives for many Brits in financial distress.

Payday LoaningLoans

Source: http://www.efollia.com/the-advantages-of-payday-loaning

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3D-Printing a Low-Cost Satellite

Seeking a low-cost way to launch their experiments into space, a team of scientists has designed a space-ready, 3-D printed CubeSat.

CubeSats are standardized, tiny satellites, often only 10 centimeters (3.9 inches) on each side and weighing less than 1.33 kilograms (just under 3 lbs). They are so small that they have room for only a few sensors, and burn up in the Earth's atmosphere after just a few months. Kits cost under $10,000, which is considered cheap for the space industry. But Jacopo Piattoni of the University of Bologna and his team aim to drive the satellites' price down even further, while making the devices easier to customize.

In 3D printing, a computer-directed nozzle "prints" a three-dimensional object in plastic. Often, engineers use this method to design a prototype for a product that will then be built out of metal or another, sturdier medium. But Piattoni?s team hopes their plastic CubeSat could survive launch and low-Earth orbit.

Using 3-D printers, researchers can automate the CubeSat production process. ?We don?t need a technician,? Piattoni said, adding that this also makes the process faster.

[NASA Turns to 3D Printing for Self-Building Spacecraft]

The CubeSat?s sensors and computer chips, of course, weren't printed in the lab, and the team had to add a small, metal heat sink to disperse the electronic components' heat. The method holds promise, though. When the researchers tested the chassis in near-space conditions, "it did really well," Piattoni said.

Piattoni chose ABS plastic, the same type of plastic used in Lego bricks, to construct his CubeSat because of that material's resilience to extreme temperatures, vibrations, radiation and more. A satellite will absorb a lot of solar radiation during its spaceflight, and its temperature will swing from -4 degrees F (-20 degrees C) to 176 degrees F (80 degrees C) each orbit. "It's not so easy for plastics in that environment," Piattoni said.

In fact, ABS plastic was famously indicted in a massive seat-belt buckle recall in the mid-90s because UV radiation weakened buckles made from the material. But such radiation, even at elevated levels, won't pose a problem for the CubeSat, due to its short lifetime.

With one successful satellite constructed, the team can now use the 3-D printer to crank out another copy each night. They can also test new designs or build support for other sensors or modules, just by clicking a few buttons on a computer.

The final product passed its tests with flying colors. Now, like most other CubeSats, it will hitch a ride into space as secondary cargo on a rocket already headed to its preferred orbit. Piattoni's team is working with QB50, which will put 50 CubeSats into orbit at once on a Russian Shtil-2.1 scheduled to launch in 2014.

The satellite was designed and tested by Piattoni and researchers in the University of Rome's Department of Astronautical, Electrical and Energy Engineering and the Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering.

This story was provided by TechNewsDaily, sister site to LiveScience.

Copyright 2012 LiveScience, a TechMediaNetwork company. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/3d-printing-low-cost-satellite-234108323.html

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Tuesday, 27 November 2012

Publishers brace for authors to reclaim book rights in 2013 ...

The book publishing industry, already facing disruption from Amazon and ?e-books, will confront a new form of turbulence in 2013. Starting in January, publishers face the loss of their back lists as authors begin using the Copyright Act to reclaim works they assigned years ago.

These so-called ?termination rights,? which let authors break contracts after 35 years, have already made the media thanks to a court squabble between the Village People and music studios.?On the book front, publishers ?and agents are staying mostly mum even though the bestseller lists from 1978 reveal some very big names eligible to reclaim their work ?? Stephen King, Judy Blume, John LeCarre and so on. Here?s a plain english overview of how the law works and why (for now at least) we?re likely to see literary types negotiate rather than litigate.

A Second Bite of the Apple

The law in question is Section 203 of the 1978 Copyright Act which allows authors to cut away any contract after 35 years. Congress put it in place to protect young artists who signed away future best sellers for a pittance.

?People have had 2013 circled on their calendar for a while,? said Andrew Bart, a copyright lawyer at Jenner & Block, in a phone interview.

Termination rights are not a new idea and have been the subject of famous court cases involving John Steinbeck, Lassie and Superman. The difference is that these older cases are based on a pre-1978 law that often required an author to exercise renewal rights which, in many cases, the author had signed away.

The new law has fewer such loopholes and will also mean that what has been a drip-drip of old copyright cases could turn into a flood as nearly every book published after 1978 becomes eligible for termination.

The 1978 law also means a threat to the back list of titles that are a cash cow for many publishers. The threat is amplified as a result of new digital distribution options for authors that were never conceived when the law was passed ? these new options mean authors have more leverage to walk away from their publishers altogether.

Publishers contacted for this story were reluctant to discuss termination rights and several sources said they want to deflect attention from it. That may not be possible for much longer.

?Grist for the Litigation Mill?

Even by the standards of copyright law, the author reclamation rules are a messy cat?s cradle of ambiguous rules and technicalities. The math makes your head spin.

For instance, authors have a five-year window to exercise the right but must also provide advance notice at least two years but no more than 10 years beforehand. For 1978 authors ? who are eligible to reclaim in 2013 ? the window is already closing.

It?s unclear how many understand the rules. Several literary agents contacted for this story appeared to be unaware of how they worked or even of their existence. This is not true of copyright lawyers, some of whom are rubbing their hands at the prospect of a legal trainwreck.

?This will provide grist for the litigation mill,? said Bart, comparing the law to the 1999 safe harbor rules that tied courts in knots for a decade.

For musicians, the reversion rights issue has spilled into court already. Since last year, studios have been claiming that the lead singer of the Village People is ineligible to reclaim copyright. The studios argued the music is an ineligible ??work for hire? and that the whole band ? as joint authors ? must together trigger the termination. The arguments have failed so far as the first judge to hear them sided with the singer in May.

While the ?right to hire? issue may not affect most book authors (who are typically not employees), it may affect some of the country?s most famous writers.

Copyright lawyer Lloyd Jassin?says that some publishers may try to pull a legal ace from their sleeve by pointing to the personal corporations that prominent authors use to license their work. These corporations mean that ? technically at least ? the author may be ineligible since they are employees of the corporation not authors.

Another potential flashpoint for famous authors is what happens to film and merchandise rights if they reclaim copyright. While the law lets studios keep rights to films that are already made, it?s less clear who controls sequels and individual characters.

A Bomb or a Bargaining Chip?

The long awaited (and dreaded) new termination regime kicks in for real in just over a month. For now, though, it?s still too soon to say if the rules will denude backlists in a big way. A?cursory search of the copyright registry suggests that termination notices have yet to flood in (copyrights are public records and a termination and transfer would have to be recorded).

This quiet may mean that many authors are simply unaware of their option to have a second bite at the apple.?Or it may mean that quiet negotiations are taking place behind the scenes. While authors have the option to bolt their publisher, many may prefer to simply seek a sweeter deal rather than fly solo or risk triggering a lawsuit. And, as Law360 notes (sub req?d), there may be only a relative handful of works that are valuable enough to justify expending millions in legal fees.

Details about the rulers are still scarce but, for now, the Authors Guild and Jassin, the copyright lawyer, have very good plain english good primers.

Finally, via Hawes.com, here is a list of the New York Times bestsellers from November 1978:

1 WAR AND REMEMBRANCE, by Herman Wouk

2 CHESAPEAKE, by James A. Michener

3 FOOLS DIE, by Mario Puzo.

4 THE FAR PAVILIONS

5 SECOND GENERATION, by Howard Fast.

6 PRELUDE TO TERROR, by Helen MacInnes

7 THE EMPTY COPPER SEA

8 EVERGREEN, by Belva Plain.

9 ILLUSIONS, by Richard Bach.

10 EYE OF THE NEEDLE, by Ken Follett.

11 BRIGHT FLOWS THE RIVER, by Taylor Caldwell.

12 THURSDAY THE RABBI WALKED OUT, by Harry Kemelman.

13 THE SILMARILLION, by J.R.R. Tolkien.

14 WIFEY, by Judy Blume. (Putnam?s, $8.95.)

15 SCRUPLES, by Judith Krantz.

NON-FICTION

1 IF LIFE IS A BOWL OF CHERRIES ? WHAT AM I DOING IN THE PITS?
by Erma Bombeck.

2 A DISTANT MIRROR, by Barbara W. Tuchman.

3 IN SEARCH OF HISTORY, by Theodore H. White.

4 THE COMPLETE BOOK OF RUNNING, by James F. Fixx.

5 AMERICAN CAESAR, by William Manchester.

6 THE SNOW LEOPARD, by Peter Matiniessen.

7 THE WOMAN DOCTOR?S DIET FOR WOMEN, by Barbara Edelstein, M.D.

8 GNOMES, text by Wil Huygen, illustrated by Rien Poortvliet.

9 A TIME FOR TRUTH, by William E. Simon.

10 ROBERT KENNEDY AND HIS TIMES, by Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr.

11 PULLING YOUR OWN STRINGS, by Wayne W. Dyer.

12 THE COUNTRY DIARY OF AN EDWARDIAN LADY, by Edith Holden.

13 THE ONLY INVESTMENT GUIDE YOU?LL EVER NEED, by Andrew Tobias.

14 JACKIE OH! by Kitty Kelley.

15 PURE AND SIMPLE, by Marian Burros.

Source: http://paidcontent.org/2012/11/27/publishers-brace-for-authors-to-reclaim-book-rights-in-2013/

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We Have To Change College Algebra | Reference and Education ...

To finish a degree, you must have college algebra, that's exactly what most majors think. Every single year a half of million university students take college algebra. This number a good reason for brand new studies with algebra courses - more interest from students can be made, higher success rates can be achieved and students could have better retention rates.Adequate college algebra help is given to the university students nowadays.

Survey Results All kinds of students have a problem with algebra and they need to devote lots of time to complete this class. This can be noticed in popular schools too, the gifted folks are hindered by algebra, not to mention trigonometry and calculus. There are students taking these courses 3 or 4 and even higher number of times to be able to complete the algebra exams. Some of them are seen taking additional college algebra help. The statistics say that 60 percent of students end up getting a bachelor's degree. When we compare algebra grades with the grades in different subjects, we find that we now have much more F's and D's.

Popular Reasons For Choosing Algebra

The fundamental reason why students go for algebra would be to fulfill a college or state requirement. The majority of students take up a standard College Algebra, based upon 1950's curriculum with the aim to prepare them for Calculus. Yet, it is seen that 90% of individuals won't ever take Calculus. Hence the traditional College Algebra along with its content are thought to be irrelevant and are just looked upon as a dreary obstacle to get a college education.

Why Choose A New Approach

If we did not have mathematics, the society would not succeed. We have to study ratios, decimals, rates and build numerical skills. Only a decent grounding in mathematics can hone these abilities. Investment opportunities, animated movies, airfare ticket costs are strengthened by Algebraic algorithms. Young people need to understand how those things work. There's a certain ideology behind the numbers, and algebra allows us to recognize and understand that ideology. The modern day times that we live in are statistical and that requires more informed citizenship. What is essentially needed is a greater comprehension of different numbers. College algebra assistance goes a long distance to fully grasp those book formulas and what they actually convey.

Once we figure out the idea behind these formulations, we are more intellectually proficient and more mindful of our surroundings. Hence, it's easy to understand why MIT or Caltech want each one of us to be proficient in mathematics. Math, applied or pure, is quite essential for the progress of our civilization. In an effort to decrease the ordeal and make algebra more attractive, exciting courses and college algebra help familiarize students with kinds of statistics that summarize our private and public life, whether the sphere is electronic or visual.

The Final Thoughts On College Algebra

The first year of geometry is a requirement for all higher-level math, trigonometry, calculus and algebra II. Students having high-level math course are more prone to do well in college math. Latest survey has found that reading along with math skills are required to work as plumber, electrician and even upholsterer. Algebra is, the portal to success these days. The college students, with a little college algebra help can make successful changeover from solid arithmetic to the symbolic language of algebra.

Source: http://thebesteducationreference.blogspot.com/2012/11/we-have-to-change-college-algebra.html

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Norquist's Tax Pledge: What It Is and How It Started

As Congress wrangles over the fiscal cliff, one tiny document will loom large over the negotiations.

Known in Republican circles simply as "The Pledge," the Americans for Tax Reform (ATR) Taxpayer Protection Pledge has steered GOP tax policy for decades, applying pressure to any candidate, lawmaker, or president who would raise taxes. If tax rates aren't at stake, the pledge is equally unforgiving to those who would limit deductions, even as a tradeoff, as Republicans are now being asked to do by Democrats and President Obama.

It reads:

I, ______, pledge to the taxpayers of the ______ district of the state of ______ and to the American people that I will: One, oppose any and all efforts to increase the marginal income tax rates for individuals and/or businesses; and Two, to oppose any net reduction or elimination of deductions and credits, unless matched dollar for dollar by further reducing tax rates

Much has been made lately of the pledge's allegedly diminishing influence, after House Speaker John Boehner indicated revenue increases would be on the table in fiscal-cliff talks. But Republicans who hint at pledge violations have a way of revising their statements with vague language about filling government coffers without going against the vow.

In the current Congress, 238 representatives and 41 senators have signed the Pledge. In the next Congress, ATR claims 219 representatives and 39 senators as adherents-although a small handful have already backed away from their commitments.

The pledge began in 1986 under the aegis of president Ronald Reagan.

Grover Norquist, a Republican and former staffer at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, had launched Americans for Tax Reform in 1985 to advocate for tax reforms Reagan was pushing in his second term. The group was financed largely by corporate sponsors such as Kraft, the Associated Press reported at the time.

In the midterm campaign year of 1986, Norquist rolled out the Taxpayer Protection Pledge as a way to pressure candidates to support Reagan's tax agenda, and as a cudgel for Republicans to wield against Democrats on the campaign trail.

"We intend to make tax reform permanent," Norquist explained that year. Reagan had already passed tax reforms in 1981-drawing the same Democratic criticism of GOP tax policies as today, namely that they favor the wealthy-and the second-term president eyed the 1986 bill as part two of his tax agenda.

Reagan and congressional Republicans signed onto it. ATR pushed the pledge through the Republican Information Network, a newfangled proto-Web tool for GOP campaigns, along with sample press releases offered up as blueprints for GOP candidates to attack their Democratic foes.

Reagan promoted the pledge, and Republican candidates ran on the pledge, and while the GOP lost House and Senate seats in the election year, Reagan's tax-reform bill passed: ATR and the pledge had succeeded.

Since then, Norquist's pledge has helped enforce near-uniformity in Republican ranks, enshrining as dogma a policy of never raising tax rates. George H.W. Bush, who did not sign the pledge, lost re-election after raising taxes, breaking his own "read my lips: no new taxes" vow, as Norquist is usually quick to point out. Raising taxes "ruined" Bush's presidency and "cut it in half," Norquist told ABC in a phone interview in June.

The pledge has worked for 26 years because it's simple.

'If you want a politician to make a commitment and you want it to matter, it can't be four paragraphs long, I can't have moving parts - you can't remember what's in it," Norquist told The Atlantic in 2011.

And as Norquist puts it, signers are beholden to voters, not to him or his group.

The pledge may be facing its biggest test yet. Norquist has his enemies and frenemies on both sides of the aisle, including Republican Sens. Lindsey Graham and Tom Coburn, both of whom have stood cleanly against any obligation to the pledge. About a dozen incoming House Republicans haven't signed it, and a few more have distanced themselves from it, The Hill's Russell Berman reported after the 2012 election.

Throughout 2012, with fiscal-cliff negotiations approaching, Norquist has been adamant that Republicans will not vote to raise taxes or limit deductions without finding new tax cuts elsewhere. Even as some Republicans have backed away from his anti-tax line, the pledge has history on its side.

Also Read

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/norquists-tax-pledge-started-231514035--abc-news-politics.html

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Monday, 26 November 2012

Successful private investor might be ready to approach a - DT Fine Art

Heres my situation: Many banks and credit unions are instantly turned off because I have so many properties financed as it is. Ive had problems getting banks and credit unions to do loans for smaller dollar amounts (say, $20,000 to $50,000).

My wife and I have been fortunate enough to save a substantial amount in our 401(k) and IRA accounts, and wouldnt mind using that cash for investments. But were turned off and worried about the multitude of the IRS rules regarding the use of those funds. Ive also considered buying properties in cash, with hopes to refinance and pull equity out, but I keep running into the problem of lenders being turned off by the number of properties I own and the prices I want to pay.

What is someone in my situation to do? Am I just working with the wrong banks?

A: Congratulations on your real estate investing success. The problems youre running into stem from the fact that youve outgrown the regular residential financing system. Residential mortgage lenders are not equipped to finance your 10th, 20th, or 100th property purchase.

Youve grown your way into the ranks of commercial lending, but because most lenders have lost money in the real estate world, theyre extra careful about financing large scale residential deals these days. The fact that youve made money in the past is irrelevant to most of them. Now, its all about how the numbers work.

You have two choices: You can start shopping around for a new lender, or you can finance your next round of purchases in cash, using your savings and converting your IRA to a self-directed IRA, which allows you to purchase investment properties as long as you use a third party to make sure youre on the up and up.

If you start to investigate commercial banks in your area, youll want to look at big national banks, regional banks and local banks. You may even find that theres a credit union or two willing to do business with you. If you look a bit harder, and talk to your accountant and real estate attorney, you might find that they know of investors whod want to back you in this venture, and loan you the cash you need to cover these investments. They might want some equity, or not, but that would be subject to negotiation.

Youll find that commercial lenders charge more, and require more in equity, but can create loans that are more flexible. For example, you might be able to combine all of the loans on the 8 properties you own into one big loan ? and there are plusses and minuses to doing that, by the way. You might purchase your next 10 properties on your own, then refinance them to take out 50 percent of the equity to use to finance additional purchases.

What you may want to do is find a commercial loan broker who, along with your real estate attorney, can discuss how the financing might work for these purchases, what your options are and how much itll cost. Dont forget to check in with your accountant, as all of these options are linked to tax consequences.

By engaging in a broader discussion, at least youll have some sort of context in which to measure the financing opportunities as you uncover them.

Good luck.

(Ilyce R. Glinks latest book is Buy, Close, Move In! If you have questions, you can call her radio show toll-free (800-972-8255) any Sunday, from 11a-1p EST. Contact Ilyce through her Web site, http://www.thinkglink.com.)

Tags: Commercial

Source: http://www.dtfineart.com/2012/11/successful-private-investor-might-be-ready-to-approach-a-commercial-lender/

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A Few Secrets Of Attracting Customers Through Online Advertising ...

Internet has become the fastest means of communication among individuals across the world. It has also become the most effective means of connecting brand/business owners with their prospective customers. Online advertising also known as internet advertising or web advertising is one of the fast growing means of brand or business communication. This blog highlights a few secrets of attracting customers through online advertising.

Publishing unique articles or blogs about your business

It may surprise many brand or business owners, but it is true that publishing unique articles or blogs about your business helps in attractive various customers to your website thereby acquainting them about what your business offers. Ezine is one of the online publishing sites where you can publish your articles or blogs. A major advantage of publishing online articles or blogs is that it is usually free of cost and you can elaborately talk about your brand or business in detail. Customers who are directed to the publishing sites read the informative content. If the content sounds pretty interesting, they would be encouraged to adopt or buy the business or brand. Search Engine Marketing is one of the main tools of Internet Advertising. Writing articles and blogs and publishing them on various sites is also one of the main strategies of search engine marketing. Search engine optimizers make the most of this very strategy to promote their business among customers.

Making the most of Email marketing

Another secret of Web Advertising is to interact with customers through emails. Most of us do not forget to check our mail boxes. By presenting the brand message right through the inboxes of customers, advertisers can easily persuade them to go through the same. Email marketing is also a cost effective means of web advertising. Advertisers can sort out the mailing list of a particular email campaign and can target only those customers who will probably reach to the advertisement. A thorough demographic survey is however one of the assets of promoting a brand or business through email marketing.

Online advertising in any of its forms provides rich content and attractive graphic. Any visitor gets glued to the brand message because of such features. Most of the online ad campaigns convey interesting brand messages to customers which is why recall value is also pretty good through an online ad display. Banner advertising, virals, email and sms campaigns, PPC, pop ups etc. are some forms of online advertising adopted by brand owners to promote their products on web world.

Internet is a global platform for many products and services. Internet advertising is therefore the smartest means of brand communication. A brand or business advertised through online media can be accessed by customers from anywhere across the globe and also without any restraint of time factor. The message or information is available for 24 hours, 7 days a week, months and even for years. A website for a brand or business for example is one of the reliable means for anyone to access valuable information on the product or service. One can visit the website as many times as one prefers and also go through the information again and again. Repetitive readership is yet another advantage of creating an online presence of a brand or business.

About the Author:
MAD offers exclusive advertising solutions through Mobile and Internet media. Internet Advertising with MAD,Join the largest Web advertising Agency.MAD is a largest Banner advertising agency.

Source: http://www.articlesnatch.com/Article/A-Few-Secrets-Of-Attracting-Customers-Through-Online-Advertising/4274131

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Source: http://nathandaniels.typepad.com/blog/2012/11/a-few-secrets-of-attracting-customers-through-online-advertising.html

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Source: http://davidsonnormand.typepad.com/blog/2012/11/a-few-secrets-of-attracting-customers-through-online-advertising.html

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Source: http://dion290.typepad.com/blog/2012/11/a-few-secrets-of-attracting-customers-through-online-advertising.html

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Sorry, Readability was unable to parse this page for content.

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Gearbox's Randy Pitchford on Aliens and the future of game consoles

Digital Trends sits down with Randy Pitchford to talk about developing a proprietary engine to bring the world of Aliens: Colonial Marines to life. Plus: Gearbox's president on the future of video game consoles.

Randy Pitchford had a good year. In the thirteen years since founding his studio, Gearbox Software has never had a hit quite like Borderlands 2, one of the best selling and widely praised video games to come out in a very crowded year. What?s more his studio?s long labor of love, Aliens: Colonial Marines, is just three months away from release after a nearly six year development. Where some game makers are itching for the next console generation to start so it can ramp up the declining console market, Pitchford and his team of creators are sitting pretty.

Digital Trends caught up with Pitchford at a recent event to talk about the prolonged development of Aliens, the unique technology powering that game, and the future of how we play video games.

Aliens: Colonial Marines uses a new engine. Why? Why not use something simple like Unreal Engine 3 to speed up development?

We haven?t really talked about it much, but we made a proprietary lighting engine for this game. Even though we?re at the end of this console generation, because this is a deferred rendering engine it?s going to give us a good sense of what next gen games are going. Deferred rendering is the future. We do leverage Unreal for the architecture and the data sets, for a lot of the under the hood stuff, but in terms of graphics, that?s the stuff we created just for this.

The Aliens films, to do that authentically, we needed deferred rendering. We needed dynamic lights and shadows. In the current generation, for games without a non-deferred renderer, all of the lighting is sort of baked into the environment which means it?s static. Things can?t move. Now take the scene in the Sulaco: There are so many things shifting around, with crates sliding across the room, ship rocking and lolling. If things move, the lights all need to work. When stuff?s blowing up, when you?re on the surface of LV-426, the atmosphere is alive. We needed that to feel natural, so we needed the lighting to be rendered in real time with the game. If you think about some of the other stuff we?re doing like Borderlands, it has a totally different look and feel. Our Brothers in Arms franchise, it?s a totally different environment and feel. Aliens has a very unique art direction, so it demanded custom technology.

You said the team met with Ridley Scott to discuss doing the game before it went into production. When did that meeting happen?

I think that was May of 2006. Maybe 2005.

At what point in the past seven years then did you decide to build this unique technology?

The meeting was 2005 or 2006, but the deal didn?t happen for another year or so after that.

gearbox software presidentThat?s when Sega announced it had the Alien franchise license.

We hadn?t even written the first line of code and Sega was so excited that they and Fox had to turn around and put out a press release! (laughs) It was a business statement, but if you?re an Aliens fan like me and you hear, ?There?s going to be a sequel to the movies as a video game and Gearbox is making it!?? suddenly there?s this expectation. I want that now! Usually when we make a game, we?ll be all the way through pre-production and into production before an announcement is made.

It was after our prototype, after our pre-production, that John Cavanagh, one of our programmers, took on the task of building the new renderer for this game. I believe we?ll be using this technology for a while. It?s going to be very useful in the future.

So that was the end of 2008 when we started making that technology and it was probably finished by the end of 2010.

Speaking of 2008, that was when you announced that Battlestar Galactica writers David Weddle and Bradley Thompson would be working on Aliens: Colonial Marines. What role did they play?

Those guys are awesome! We had a framework and sketches of characters when we started the game. Those guys came in and wrote all of this material that brought the characters to life for us. So now we don?t have to think about what we want the characters to be, we think, ?Okay, in this situation, how would Bella react to this? What would Winter say?? We know the answer because those guys helped us flesh everything out. Amazing, amazing work. They wrote enough material that we could have an entire series of television, honestly. I loved working with them. [Gearbox writer] Mikey Neumann was able to work very closely with them, and he was able to adapt what they did and write it to a video game, which is very different than writing for a passive movie. The quality that we?ve gotten in the narrative was the result of that iterative process and David and Bradley were instrumental in that. It was so cool to work with them.

I?m not sure if you?re office is still like this, but I saw a picture of it once and the game console collection on display in there is impressive to say the least. You clearly love this old, devoted technology. Aliens, Borderlands, all of Gearbox?s games really are clearly built as multiplatform games, both PC and console. My question for you: What?s the future of the console? Do we need them anymore?

How far in the future are we talking about?

Say fifteen years.

Obviously power is great. There are two components to this. One is energy drawn from whatever source you get it from. In fifteen years, wireless power still won?t be ubiquitous. We?ll be experimenting with it in fifteen years and some people will probably have appliances in their garages that allow their cars to charge wirelessly, but we won?t have ubiquitous wireless power for all devices. So in fifteen years, we?ll still see an advantage in things that can plug into a wall, a devoted power source, and draw a tremendous amount of energy.

The more energy we can draw, the more fuel we have for computing power. Computing power takes energy. Computing power will always allow us to simulate things, whether it?s visuals or gameplay or logic or physics. The more computing power we have, the more robust that simulation will be. Within fifteen years, we?ll still be using our senses?touch, sight, sound?to consume that simulation. So the processing power we?ll be using will still be simulating something that reaches us through our normal senses. We won?t be at a point where our senses can be tricked into something that?s like the holodeck or when something?s plugged right into our brain, where there?s no interpretive layer between the simulation and perception, that?s not going to happen yet.

Within that construct, power will still be a factor and power will let us do all kinds of things. We?re going to see some new fronts in the next fifteen years that are kind of difficult to imagine when you just think, ?Okay, I?ve got a dedicated machine, I?ve got a portable thing that uses a battery like a phone or handheld, I?ve got large format stuff like in a movie theater.? You?re going to see that whole spectrum, and it will largely be the same. It will be an iteration of how we understand entertainment, but it?ll be a massive iteration. You?ll see between twelve and twenty-four times the complexity possible on today?s machines.

Today, though, what does having your game on a console give you? What?s the benefit of the technology?

One of the advantages that consoles have for a customer is that you can trust it. It?s a simple price, an entry point that?s accessible, and you can plug it in and it all works. It rides this balance where one step up is a PC that draws a lot more power and a big step up in visuals, but a lot more complexity since it?s a moving platform. That makes it not so comfortable. The dedicated platform is fixed, though, which lets us developers make tremendous assumptions about what the customer is using. Because of those assumptions, we can commit ourselves, we can be very efficient in what we make.

Consoles let you make those assumptions. Look at the iPhone. Because there are now several generations of iPhone, in creating software we can either choose to eliminate a percentage of the potential user base by making our game only compatible with the iPhone 4 or 5 or we can hold ourselves back and cover the whole spectrum. Even that fragmentation changes our efficiency and quality from what it would be if we had a single, unchanging platform.

Because the phone cycle is ramping up so quickly, our only choices are abandon our software, iterrating it, or making new software. With a long console cycle, we can really commit ourselves to that single fixed platform and be super optimal. You can feel it in the results. We?re doing things on these platforms that are a lot more incredible than what we saw at the beginning of the generation.

It really doesn?t matter, though. At the end of the day in the entertainment business, what you care about is how many people can I reach and to what extent can I satisfy them. Our mission is to make people happy. We want to entertain people wherever they are.

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Source: http://www.digitaltrends.com/gaming/gearbox-software-president-randy-pitchford-on-aliens-colonial-marines-and-the-future-of-game-consoles/

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Sunday, 25 November 2012

Homemade Salad Dressing So Good You Will Want To Drink It ...

Now that Thanksgiving is over, I am ready for some food on the lighter side! ?Enter this amazing Homemade Salad Dressing. ?It really IS SO GOOD that you will want to drink it, or at least eat more greens than usual, just so you can have it. ?I made this a week ago, and I have wanted a salad every day since.?

?I make it a priority to eat leafy greens everyday no matter what, whether in the form of a smoothie or a salad. ?The amount of nutrients you can get in leafy greens just can't be beat, & this dressing makes it super easy to actually want and look forward to a daily salad.

?This dressing is a breeze to throw together. ?It uses ingredients that most people have on hand. ?The recipe calls for dijon mustard, ?which I didn't have, so I used plain yellow mustard. ?It was still drinkable & delicious!

?{it starts with a base of olive oil & red wine vinegar}

At our local farmers market, there is a booth that I always look forward to. ?She has tiny sample cups of ?salad dressing, and a chunk of bread to soak it up with. ?We love her salad dressing, and I buy a bottle every time we go. ?I have been missing her dressing now that it is fall, but I must tell you, this recipe tastes JUST LIKE hers. ?Even my daughter noticed this when she tasted it. ?Looks like we will be saving some money come Farmer's Market season--or not--now that I have this recipe I will probably need to buy more greens!

?{add seasonings & stir}

This would make a great dipping oil for bread when entertaining, and also a great marinade for chicken or fish. ?It is so much better for you than the salad dressings on the market, most of those are full of preservatives and high fructose corn syrup. ?Blech!

{pour into bottle & shake before using}

?This recipe will be one I use often. ?It has been a week and I'm already out. ?Time to make more! ?Good thing it is an easy recipe.

Homemade Salad Dressing

{so good you will want to drink it straight}

1 cup olive oil

1 cup red wine vinegar

2 1/2 tsps. garlic powder

2 1/2 tsps. dried oregano

2 1/2 tsps. dried basil

2 tsps. pepper

2 tsps. salt

2 tsps. onion powder

2 tsps. Dijon-style mustard (I used regular mustard)

Mix together and shake well. Store at room temperature tightly covered.

//

Have you ever made your own salad dressing? ?Do you have a favorite recipe to share?



Source: http://amy-newnostalgia.blogspot.com/2012/11/homemade-salad-dressing-so-good-you.html

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Interview with Dr. Victor Henning, Mendeley

This time (no, I haven?t gone interview-only. One more after this one and we?re back to regular posting)?I?m interviewing Dr. Victor Henning. Dr Henning has a PhD in Psychology from?the Bauhaus-University of Weimar, Germany, and is co-founder and CEO of Mendeley, a program which allows managing and sharing of research articles. Founded in late 2007, Mendeley has now reached 2 million users (and published an interesting?global research report , with graphs showing activity by discipline, average number of articles collected per researchers, etc.)

Dr. Victor Henning

You co-founded (with? Jan Reichelt and Paul F?ckler) Mendeley in 2007. What was your vision for Mendeley then, and has it changed since?

When we started Mendeley, we primarily wanted to solve our own problems: We were Ph.D. students and each had hundreds of research papers in PDF format that we needed to manage. We wondered why there wasn?t an easier way to manage those PDFs and keep them linked to bibliographic references, to enable you to create citations in the papers you?re writing. That was the first key idea behind Mendeley: Let?s develop a desktop app that can automatically turn my loose collection of PDFs into a structured research paper database that I can read, annotate, cite, and share with others.

The second key idea was: If we can get hundreds of thousands of researchers to use this desktop app to automatically extract information from research papers, why not crowdsource all of this data into an anonymized, open database? We realized that if the data was streaming in from researchers all over the globe in real time, we?d be able to analyze research trends across academic disciplines, connect researchers with similar interests, show readerships statistics for individual research papers, and generate collaborative filtering recommendations similar to Amazon?s, i.e. ?people who have read research paper A have also read research paper B?.

That has been our vision from the start, and it hasn?t changed significantly since then. The biggest change was probably that we were initially quite focused on creating visualizations of research connections ? e.g., you could visualize the citation network contained in your research paper collection as a 3D map within the Mendeley Desktop app. Later on, we dropped this because it was a magnificent task in itself, and we realized that we could let our community build visualization tools themselves if they wanted to. So our vision shifted to enabling third-party developers to tap into our crowdsourced data ? for free, under a Creative Commons ?CC-by? license ? to build their own apps. Since the release of our Open API (http://dev.mendeley.com), more than 260 third-party research apps have been built ?visualization tools, collaboration apps, semantic annotation tools, raw genome data mashups, expert finder services, Kindle and Android Apps, search interfaces, you name it. Our vision is now focused on turning Mendeley into a platform to let this ecosystem flourish.

The new Mendeley report shows that the biggest group of Mendeley users (31%) comes from the biology and medicine disciplines. Is it because you targeted those disciplines, because of their dominance in the global market of science in general, or are there other reasons?

We discussed whether to target specific disciplines in the beginning, but decided against it because we felt that Mendeley Desktop would be useful for anyone trying to manage academic knowledge ? in the sciences as well as the humanities. I believe that the demographics of the Mendeley user base are possibly quite representative of the overall demographics of research: There are simply a lot more biologists and doctors than there are linguists and philosophers.

We did, however, target specific geographic regions first. Because all three of us Mendeley founders are German, our personal academic network was predominantly German, too. We wanted to avoid giving the impression to US and UK academics that Mendeley was German network, so we treaded carefully with inviting our friends first. Instead, when we launched, I did a speaking tour along the US East Coast and presented Mendeley at places like Princeton, NYU, Yale, Brown, MIT, Harvard, and Dartmouth ? and it really took off from there.

Mendeley now has an institutional edition. What are its main functions, and what is its value for academic institutes?

In a bit more detail: Institutions that subscribe to the Mendeley Institutional Edition (MIE) can upgrade all of their students and faculty to a Mendeley premium account, meaning they receive more cloud storage/sync space, personalized research recommendations, enhanced group functionality, and premium support. The data dashboard tracks which journals are being read the most by the institution?s faculty and students, allowing their library to optimize their subscriptions ? meaning, they can cancel journals that are not getting used, and subscribe to journals which are popular, but not yet provided by the library. This enables librarians squeeze more value out of ever-scarcer resources and provide a better service to their researchers.

Moreover, the MIE data dashboard tracks the faculty?s publications: In which journals are they publishing, and how much impact ? measured in global readership ? do these publications have? This helps institutions gather information for research excellence assessments and other reports, as well as highlighting to them who their current and future star researchers are.

Lastly, MIE contains a ?social? tab which shows the librarian the public groups? in which their faculty are most active. Subject librarians can then potentially join in the discussion, re-establish connections with their constituency, and help them discover relevant research content. They can also set the OpenURL library resolver for all researchers at their institution to ensure that, once they discover interesting citations on Mendeley, receive full-text access to the content their library has paid for.

Your impact index (in the institutional edition) is a new way of measuring articles? influence. Have you heard of any cases where it has been used in institutional decision-making? What do you think the index reflects?

MIE is still young ? we only started rolling it out across campuses this fall semester ? so I?ve only heard anecdotal evidence of it influencing institutional decision-making. All of our customers are excited about the prospect of making better subscription decisions while cutting subscription costs, and one librarian at a North American institution has told me specifically that he plans to use the data as negotiation leverage when discussing journal subscription renewals. It?ll be interesting how this plays out over the next few months, as we?re gradually expanding coverage to more campuses.

As for the meaning of Mendeley?s real-time readership index: I believe it is simply a very good measure of research impact, and a leading indicator of citation metrics. Logically, you should have read a piece of research before you cite it ? though there are studies which suggest that, far too often, research gets cited without having been read[1]. Yet, we?ve never seen it as our job at Mendeley to interpret the data: We want to be a neutral data provider, and leave it up to each field of research to determine which metrics are important to them and how to interpret them.

Interestingly, there have been four bibliometric studies in the past year alone which have found a significant correlation of Mendeley?s readership data with Thomson Reuters? Impact Factor, the Scopus Citation Index, and Google Scholar citations [2],[3],[4], [5]?as well pointing out the remarkable Mendeley?s breadth of coverage.

Have there been any attempts to manipulate Mendeley?s numbers?

Not to our knowledge, and it would be very difficult to do so. Because of the scale of Mendeley ? we now track the data of more than two million users ? and its distributed nature, you would have to create thousands of fake ?puppet? accounts from different computers, and have all of those puppet accounts read papers by specific authors. We do have measures in place to prevent bots from creating accounts, and we?d certainly notice odd usage patterns like the one I just described. So, it?s much harder to manipulate our data than it is to manipulate citations, which ? as I?m sure you know ? is a fairly common problem. Earlier this year, Thomson Reuters kicked a few journals out of their citation index because their editors had gamed their citations metrics.

The Mendeley Team

The Mendeley Team

I?d like to thank Dr. Henning for the interview. Photos courtesy of Mendeley.

Disclaimer: even though most of the articles cited were written by my thesis advisors, they were cited by Dr. Henning ? we?re simply working a lot about alt-metrics at the moment.


[1] Simkin, M.V. & Roychowdhury, V.P. (2003). Read before you cite. Complex Systems. 14:269-74.

[2] Li, X., Thelwall, M., & Giustini, D. (2011). Validating online reference managers for scholarly impact measurement. Scientometrics.

[3] Li, X., & Thelwall, M. (2012). F1000, Mendeley and Traditional Bibliometric Indicators. 17th International Conference on Science and Technology Indicators.

[4] Priem, J., Piwowar, H.A., & Hemminger, B.M. (2012). Altmetrics in the wild: Using social media to explore scholarly impact. http://arxiv.org/abs/1203.4745

[5] Bar-Ilan, J. (2012). JASIST@mendeley. ACM Web Science Conference 2012 Workshop. Evanston, IL.

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Source: http://rss.sciam.com/click.phdo?i=c94f97f85be945cc1c3ef7b6be41e967

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It's Not Just Indians and Taiwanese Anymore

Bling Nation Co-Founder Wences Casares. Wenceslao Casares, an Argentine native who is the unofficial leader of the Latin American diaspora in Silicon Valley

Photograph courtesy Stanford Ecorner/YouTube.

While Silicon Valley is an immigrant-friendly place?witness Russian-born Sergey Brin?s triumph at Google or Hungarian-born Andy Grove?s success at Intel?there are signs that immigrants? influence in the tech mecca may be plateauing. A study released last month by AnnaLee Saxenian of Berkeley and Vivek Wadhwa of Duke found that 43.9 percent of Silicon Valley startups launched in the past seven years had at least one key founder who was an immigrant. That?s a big number, but it?s a drop from 2005, when 52.4 percent of startups were immigrant-founded.

The composition of immigrants in the Valley has shifted a bit, too. In Saxenian and Wadhwa?s ranking of countries that produced the most U.S.-based techies, Taiwan fell from fourth to 23rd. (The reasons for that drop?and the decline of immigrant-founders across the board?can be attributed in part to U.S. visa issues and burgeoning opportunities abroad.) At the same time, though, some tech insiders have seen Latin American-born entrepreneurs, a previously invisible cohort, begin to make their presence known in Silicon Valley.

Their numbers don?t come close to the Indian, Chinese, or even U.K. diaspora, and as of yet, our southern neighbors haven?t produced a nerdy-household name like India native Vinod Khosla of SunMicrosystems or Jerry Yang, the Taiwanese-born founder of Yahoo. There is, however, a nucleus of innovators from places like Argentina, Chile, and Colombia who have started companies aiming to create customized travel advice, digital wallets, and more. Like the Chinese and Indian entrepreneurs who came before, they are fostering interconnectedness between the United States and their native countries. And that?s going to have an impact on the tech scene in both places.

Globalization?where work is ?outsourced? abroad and companies target audiences far from their shores?is often portrayed as a faceless, malevolent, and inevitable, economic trend. But those connections are largely driven by individuals, particularly by men and women with roots in both the United States and a foreign country. The feet-in-two-worlds crowd can end up serving as a bridge, bringing together communities that otherwise would exist in separate spheres.

Consider the role Wenceslao Casares, an Argentine native who is the unofficial leader of the Latin American diaspora in Silicon Valley, has played in putting his home continent on Silicon Valley?s radar. In particular, two years ago, Casares persuaded Dave McClure, the former Paypal executive and founder of the accelerator 500 Startups, to take dozens of Silicon Valley types through Latin America. (McClure has been doing ?Geeks on a Plane? trips for years, leading engineers, entrepreneurs, and venture capitalists through Asia and Europe for 10-day stints.) Casares achieved renown for selling 75 percent of his company Patagon.com, an online bank for Latin American markets, to Banco Santander for $585 million in 2000, which meant his recommendation carried weight. He?s now the CEO of Lemon.com, which produces an app?currently the most downloaded financial one on iTunes?that allows you to capture both your paper receipts and your credit cards on your mobile phone. It?s well positioned to be a player in the move toward digital wallets, which means consumers will eventually pay for purchases with phones, rather than cash and physical plastic.

The 2011 and 2012 Geeks on a Plane trips to Mexico, Brazil, and Argentina didn't just result in U.S.-based angel investors putting money in Latin American companies. An introduction facilitated by last year's trip led the Buenos Aires-based venture capital firm Compan?a Argentina de Participaciones to invest $800,000 in AwayFind, a Silicon Valley startup that offers a Web application that identifies and sends important emails to mobile devices.

Source: http://feeds.slate.com/click.phdo?i=23be776fc097321e43fd4b2eb7045f88

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Saturday, 24 November 2012

Clashes in Egypt after president expands powers

Protesters storm an office of Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi's Muslim Brotherhood Freedom and Justice party and set fires in the Mediterranean port city of Alexandria, Egypt, Friday, Nov. 23, 2012. State TV says Morsi opponents also set fire to his party's offices in the Suez Canal cities of Suez, Port Said and Ismailia. Opponents and supporters of Morsi clashed across Egypt on Friday, the day after the president granted himself sweeping new powers that critics fear can allow him to be a virtual dictator. (AP Photo/Amira Mortada, El Shorouk Newspaper) EGYPT OUT

Protesters storm an office of Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi's Muslim Brotherhood Freedom and Justice party and set fires in the Mediterranean port city of Alexandria, Egypt, Friday, Nov. 23, 2012. State TV says Morsi opponents also set fire to his party's offices in the Suez Canal cities of Suez, Port Said and Ismailia. Opponents and supporters of Morsi clashed across Egypt on Friday, the day after the president granted himself sweeping new powers that critics fear can allow him to be a virtual dictator. (AP Photo/Amira Mortada, El Shorouk Newspaper) EGYPT OUT

Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi speaks to supporters outside the Presidential palace in Cairo, Egypt, Friday, Nov. 23, 2012. Opponents and supporters of Mohammed Morsi clashed across Egypt on Friday, the day after the president granted himself sweeping new powers that critics fear can allow him to be a virtual dictator. (AP Photo/Aly Hazaza, El Shorouk)

Protesters hurl stones during clashes between supporters and opponents of President Mohammed Morsi in Alexandria, Egypt, Friday, Nov. 23, 2012. Opponents and supporters of Mohammed Morsi clashed across Egypt on Friday, the day after the president granted himself sweeping new powers that critics fear can allow him to be a virtual dictator. Thousands from the two camps threw stones and chunks of marble at each other outside a mosque in the Mediterranean city of Alexandria after Friday Muslim prayers. (AP Photo/Tarek Fawzy)

Egyptian protesters opposed to president Mohammed Morsi take cover during clashes with Morsi supporters near Tahrir Square in Cairo, Friday, Nov. 23, 2012. Opponents and supporters of Morsi clashed across Egypt on Friday, the day after the president granted himself sweeping new powers that critics fear can allow him to be a virtual dictator. (AP Photo/Mohammed Asad)

Egyptian protesters opposed to president Mohammed Morsi chant slogans in Tahrir Square in Cairo, Egypt, Friday, Nov. 23, 2012. Opponents and supporters of Mohammed Morsi clashed across Egypt on Friday, the day after the president granted himself sweeping new powers that critics fear can allow him to be a virtual dictator.(AP Photo/Mohammed Asad)

(AP) ? Supporters and opponents of President Mohammed Morsi clashed Friday in the worst violence since he took office, while he defended a decision to give himself near-absolute power to root out what he called "weevils eating away at the nation of Egypt."

The edicts by Morsi, which were issued Thursday, have turned months of growing polarization into an open battle between his Muslim Brotherhood and liberals who fear a new dictatorship. Some in the opposition, which has been divided and weakened, were now speaking of a sustained street campaign against the man who nearly five months ago became Egypt's first freely elected president.

The unrest also underscored the struggle over the direction of Egypt's turbulent passage nearly two years after a popular uprising toppled Hosni Mubarak's authoritarian regime. Liberals and secular Egyptians accuse the Brotherhood of monopolizing power, dominating the writing of a new constitution and failing to tackle the country's chronic economic and security problems.

"I don't like, want or need to resort to exceptional measures, but I will if I see that my people, nation and the revolution of Egypt are in danger," Morsi told thousands of his chanting supporters outside the presidential palace in Cairo.

But even before he spoke, thousands from each camp demonstrated in major cities, and violence broke out in several places, leaving at least 100 wounded, according to security officials.

Security forces pumped volleys of tear gas at thousands of pro-democracy protesters clashing with riot police on streets several blocks from Cairo's Tahrir Square, birthplace of the Arab Spring, and in front of the nearby parliament building. Young protesters set fire to tree branches to counter the gas, and a residential building and a police vehicle also were burned.

Tens of thousands of activists massed in Tahrir itself, denouncing Morsi. In a throwback to last year's 18-day anti-Mubarak uprising, they chanted the iconic slogan first heard in Tunisia in late 2010: "The people want to overthrow the regime." They also yelled "erhal, erhal," ? Arabic for "leave, leave."

Outside a mosque in the Mediterranean city of Alexandria, anti-Morsi crowds threw stones and firecrackers on Brotherhood backers who used prayer rugs to protect themselves, injuring at least 15. The protesters then stormed a nearby Brotherhood office.

State TV reported that offices of the Brotherhood's political arm were burned in the Suez Canal cities of Suez, Ismailia and Port Said, east of Cairo.

In the southern city of Assiut, ultraconservative Islamists and former jihadists outnumbered liberal and leftists in rival demonstrations. The two sides exchanged insults and scuffled briefly.

Morsi and the Brotherhood contend that supporters of the old regime are holding up progress toward democracy. They have focused on the judiciary, which many Egyptians see as too much under the sway of Mubarak-era judges and prosecutors and which has shaken up the political process several times with its rulings, including by dissolving the lower house of parliament, which the Brotherhood led.

His edicts effectively shut down the judiciary's ability to do so again. At the same time, the courts were the only civilian branch of government with a degree of independence: Morsi already holds not only executive power but also legislative authority, since there is no parliament.

His move came at a time when he was enjoying lavish praise from U.S. President Barack Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton for brokering a cease-fire between Israel and Gaza's Hamas rulers on Wednesday. Clinton had been in Cairo for extensive talks with Morsi before the truce was announced.

U.S. State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland, said in a statement that the edicts raise "concerns" for many Egyptians and for the international community, adding that the country's revolution had aimed in part to prevent too much power from being concentrated in one person's hands.

The U.S. urged "all Egyptians to resolve their differences over these important issues peacefully and through democratic dialogue," she said.

Amnesty International, the London-based rights group, said Morsi's new powers "trample the rule of law and herald a new era of repression."

Morsi aide Samer Marqous, a Coptic Christian, resigned to protest the "undemocratic" decree.

"Morsi's decision means dictatorship. He creates the law, passes the law, and oversees the law," said Manal Tibe, an activist who was a member of the assembly writing the new constitution until she withdrew earlier this year to protest the Islamists' domination of it. "He is the state and the state is him."

Mohamed ElBaradei, Egypt's most prominent reformer and a Nobel Peace laureate, warned that Morsi was making himself a "pharaoh" and appealed to him to withdraw the decrees "before the polarization and aggravation of the situation increases."

In his decrees, Morsi ruled that any decisions and laws he has declared or will declare are immune to appeal in the courts and cannot be overturned or halted. He also barred the judiciary from dissolving the upper house of parliament or the assembly writing the new constitution, both of which are dominated by the Brotherhood and other Islamists.

The edicts would be in effect until a new constitution is approved and parliamentary elections are held, which are not expected until the spring.

Morsi also declared his power to take any steps necessary to prevent "threats to the revolution," public safety or the workings of state institutions. Rights activists warned that the vague ? and unexplained ? wording could give him even greater authority than Mubarak had under emergency laws throughout his rule.

In his speech, Morsi warned of "weevils eating away at the nation of Egypt," and pointed to old regime loyalists he accused of using money to fuel instability and to members of the judiciary who work under the "umbrella" of the courts to "harm the country."

His supporters and other Islamists chanted, "The people support the president's decree!" and pumped their fists in the air.

"God will humiliate those who are attacking our president, Mohammed Morsi," said ultraconservative cleric Mohammed Abdel-Maksoud.

"Whoever insults the sultan, God humiliates him," he added.

The state media described Morsi's decrees as a "corrective revolution," and supporters cast them as the only way to break through the political deadlock over drafting the constitution.

Mustafa Kamel el-Sayyed, a Cairo University political science professor, said Morsi may be confident that the U.S. won't pressure him on his domestic moves.

"The U.S. administration is happy to work with an Islamist government (that acts) in accordance with U.S. interests in the region," including preserving the Egyptian-Israel peace deal, he said.

With his decrees, Morsi was playing to widespread discontent with the judiciary. Many ? even Brotherhood opponents ? contend Mubarak-era judges and officials failed to prosecute the old regime's top officials and security forces strongly enough for crimes, including the killing of protesters.

Morsi fired the controversial prosecutor general and created "revolutionary" judicial bodies to put Mubarak and some of his top aides on trial a second time for the killings. Mubarak was sentenced to life in prison for failing to stop police from shooting at protesters, but many were angry he was not found guilty of actually ordering the crackdown during the uprising.

Some among Egypt's liberal, leftist and secular forces saw the edicts as an opportunity to galvanize an opposition that has been chronically fragmented.

Sameh Makram Obeid, a leader in the liberal Dustour Party, said Morsi's declarations are a "blessing" because they energized his opponents.

"The solution is civil disobedience," he said, echoing other activist leaders. "The separation of powers is gone completely."

"We are in a state of revolution. He is crazy if he thinks he can go back to one-man rule," said one protester in Tahrir, Sara Khalili.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/3d281c11a96b4ad082fe88aa0db04305/Article_2012-11-23-Egypt/id-cc61fa3ecf934795956932fe05c59518

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