Italians Take Up The Torch To Ignite Their Own Tech Startup Scene

Last year, Italy?s official statistics bureau, ISTAT, produced a report on the state of the Internet in Italy. It found that in world terms, Italy was below average in terms of Internet usage. The European average is 73 percent usage by population, and Italians were hovering around the 63 percent mark. But official statistics can be cruel and out of date - and it's clear now to any observer on the ground that whatever is happening in the home market, Italian tech startups aren't just shooting for their own country but for yours, as well.

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Techcrunch/~3/6iwxtB18iMg/

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Iran swipe at Web brings angry reply

FILE- In this Monday, Feb. 13, 2012 file photo, Iranian women use computers at an Internet cafe in central Tehran. Iran?s cyber monitors often tout their efforts to fight the West?s 'soft war' of influence through the web, but trying to ban Google?s popular Gmail may have gone too far with complaints coming even from email-starved parliament members. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi, File)

FILE- In this Monday, Feb. 13, 2012 file photo, Iranian women use computers at an Internet cafe in central Tehran. Iran?s cyber monitors often tout their efforts to fight the West?s 'soft war' of influence through the web, but trying to ban Google?s popular Gmail may have gone too far with complaints coming even from email-starved parliament members. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi, File)

FILE - In this Monday, Feb. 13, 2012 file photo, Iranian women use computers at an Internet cafe in central Tehran. Iran?s cyber monitors often tout their efforts to fight the West?s 'soft war' of influence through the web, but trying to ban Google?s popular Gmail may have gone too far with complaints coming even from email-starved parliament members. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi, File)

TEHRAN (AP) ? Iran's cyber monitors often tout their fight against the West's "soft war" of influence through the Web, but trying to block Google's popular Gmail appeared to be a swipe too far.

Complaints piled up ? even from email-starved parliament members ? and forced authorities Sunday to double down on their promises to create a parallel Web universe with Tehran as its center.

The strong backlash and the unspecific pledges for an Iran-centric Internet alternative to the Silicon Valley powers and others highlight the two sides of the Islamic Republic's ongoing battles with the Web. It's spurred another technological mobilization that fits neatly into Iran's self-crafted image as the Muslim world's showcase for science, including sending satellites into orbit, claiming advances in cloning and stem cell research and facing down the West over its nuclear program.

But there also are the hard realities of trying to reinvent the Web. Iran's highly educated and widely tech-savvy population is unlikely to warm quickly to potential clunky homegrown browsers or email services. And then there's the potential political and economic fallout of trying to close the tap on familiar sites such as Gmail.

"Some problems have emerged through the blocking of Gmail," Hussein Garrousi, a member of a parliamentary committee on industry, was quoted Sunday by the independent Aftab-e Yazd daily. What he apparently meant was that many lawmakers were angry and missing their emails.

He said that parliament would summon the minister of telecommunications for questioning if the ministry did not lift the Gmail ban, which was imposed last week in respond to clips on Google-owned YouTube of a film mocking the Prophet Muhammad that set off deadly protests across the Islamic world.

Even many newspapers close to the government complained over the email disruptions. On Saturday, the Asr-e Ertebat weekly reported that Iranians had paid a total of $4.5 million to purchase proxy services to reach blocked sites, including Facebook and YouTube, over the past month.

Iranian authorities ? perhaps recognizing the risks at hand ? decided against taking a symbolic twin shot at Google and cut access to the Web browser in a country with 32 million Internet users among a population of 75 million, according to official statistics.

That would rank online Iran among the world's top 20 in terms of sheer numbers of users, and equivalent to some European countries in per capita Web use at more than 40 percent, according to the private monitoring group Internet World Stats. The World Bank, however, puts Iran's Internet link rate at just 21 percent last year.

The U.S. is among the world's highest at more than 75 percent.

Iran's deputy telecoms minister, Ali Hakim Javadi, told reporters that Iranian authorities were considering lifting the Gmail ban. But he also used the opportunity to again promise development of Iran's domestic alternatives: the Fakhr ("Pride") search engine and the Fajr ("Dawn") email, Aftab-e Yazd reported.

When reporters noted the quality of Gmail services, Javadi quipped: "If there is Mercedes Benz on the street, that doesn't mean everyone drives a Mercedes."

Iran's clerical establishment has long signaled its intent to get citizens off of the international Internet ? which they say promotes Western values ? and onto a "national" and "clean" domestic network. Earlier this year, Iran's police chief, Esmail Ahmadi Moghadam, called Google an "instrument of espionage" rather than a search engine.

But it is unclear whether Iran has the technical capacity to follow through on its ambitious plans, or is willing to risk the economic damage and the social shock waves.

The Internet has steadily become part of Iran's fabric since the first Farsi-language sites developed a decade ago by Canadian-Iranian blogger Hossein Derakshan, who is considered one of the founders of Iran's social media community. Derakshan, however, was detained in 2008 and sentenced to nearly 20 years in prison two years later as the battles heated up between liberals seeking open access to the Web and authorities trying to erect their own version of China's "Great Firewall," the name given to Beijing's extensive filtering and censorship of the Internet.

Sites such as Twitter and Facebook were pillars of the street revolts after the disputed 2009 re-election of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. The powerful Revolutionary Guard responded by recruiting and training its own cyber force to patrol the Web and, later, try to defend against virus attacks on nuclear and other sites that Iran has blamed on the West and its allies.

Some Web security experts also have raised the possibility of Iranian hackers being behind some recent high-profile computer attacks, such as disruptions at Saudi Arabia's state oil giant Saudi Aramco and Qatari natural gas producer RasGas earlier this month. Iran has denied any links.

In a video message for Iranian new year in March, President Barack Obama denounced what he called the "electronic curtain" that keeps ordinary Iranians from reaching out to Americans and the West.

A few weeks later, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei ordered the creation of an Internet oversight agency that included top military, security and political figures in the country's boldest attempt yet to control the Internet. The panel is headed by Ahmadinejad and includes powerful figures in the security establishment such as the intelligence chief and the commander of the Revolutionary Guard.

It's not Iran's first attempt to hold off what hardliners call a Western "cultural invasion." The so-called Barbie wars have gone on for more than a decade with periodic raids to confiscate the iconic American dolls from toy stores. Iran also introduced its own dolls ? twins Dara and Sara ? designed to promote traditional values with modest clothing and pro-family values, but it hasn't significantly dented the demand for Barbie dolls.

___

Murphy reported from Dubai, United Arab Emirates.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/cae69a7523db45408eeb2b3a98c0c9c5/Article_2012-09-30-Iran/id-576494b520a94668b12d7493e7567ffe

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How physicists can tilt the odds in roulette

If you want to beat the house at roulette, it helps to think like a physicist.

A simple model of the motion of a roulette wheel and ball, based on physics principles and confirmed by experiments on an actual wheel, has revealed two ways of overcoming the usual odds against roulette players.

The key, the modelers found, is knowing the precise location of the ball and the relative speeds of the ball and wheel when the croupier ? the casino worker in charge of the game ? sets the wheel in motion and releases the ball.

"Knowing the initial conditions allows you to beat the odds," said Michael Small, a statistician at the University of Western Australia in Perth, who carried out the study with Chi Kong Tse of Hong Kong Polytechnic University. "In some cases you can beat them quite significantly."

The simpler method the pair tested involves careful observation and recording of the initial conditions by an individual or team of players. In experiments on a roulette wheel in a laboratory, the method produced predicted earnings of almost 20 percent instead of the expected loss of about 2.7 percent for a European-style wheel. In U.S. casinos, the odds tilt further in the house's favor because the wheel contains one extra space.

The other approach, using a digital camera mounted above the wheel to obtain the same data, provided better predictions. But for gamblers it presents the obvious problem of how to conceal the equipment in a security-conscious casino.

Look for a slant
And yet another factor increased the chances of beating the house even further.

"A very slight slant in the roulette table, could ... substantially enhance returns," the two researchers reported in the journal Chaos.

Small and Tse used high-school calculus and physics ? specifically, the branch known as classical mechanics ? to develop their model. They wrote down equations to predict the path the ball would take once the croupier releases it.

"We extrapolate that prediction to the point where the ball hits one of the deflectors ? the raised bumps in the wheel's rim that are added to increase the random bouncing of the ball," Small explained. "Then we make a guess as to what portion of the wheel the ball is likely to land in."

The pair tested their model on a standard casino roulette wheel installed in Tse's laboratory. Small recorded on a computer the times at which the ball and a specific part of the roulette wheel passed a fixed point on the frame supporting the wheel.

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"You basically press a button when the ball passes a certain point and then use that timing to make a prediction," Small said.

Predicting the half of the wheel in which the ball would settle would allow a gambler to bet on a combination of numbers with some confidence.

In 22 trials, Small and Tse predicted the correct half 13 times. Overall that would have earned them 18 percent profit on a theoretical stake, they report.

"It is clear that in principle one should be able to make some predictions, given sufficient information," said Holger Dullin of the University of Sydney in Australia. "The paper by Small and Tse did a good analysis."

History of scientific roulette
The concept of using scientific understanding to beat the house isn?t new. In the late 1970s the "Eudaemons," a group of physics postgraduates, used theoretical insights and a rudimentary computer concealed in a shoe to win at roulette in Nevada in the 1970s. But since they didn?t publish their research, nobody outside their team knows the details of how they did it.

On the heels of this new research, however, J. Doyne Farmer, a group member who is now a professor of mathematics at Oxford, has written a report on the exploit that he plans to submit for publication.

"Small and Tse get some aspects of roulette prediction right," Farmer said. ?"I can?t say whether their system would work, but I'm sure it is not as good as ours."

Small and Tse extended their research by taking advantage of modern technology. They mounted a digital camera directly above their roulette wheel to obtain better measurements of the physical parameters. In 700 trials, they confirmed the validity of their model and identified certain numbers on the wheel in which the ball settled preferentially.

Strategies for both sides
The study suggests strategies for both sides of the roulette wheel.

"If you wish to beat the house, look for a wheel for which the ball drops only from one side of the rim ? that is, a crooked table," Small said. "Prediction becomes substantially simpler and more reliable."

However, Small warned that roulette "is a game of chance. Even if the odds are in your favor, there is still a probability of losing, and losing big. In the long run you would come out ahead but you may first need very deep pockets."

And Small also has some advice for casino owners.

"Train the croupiers to spin the ball when they release it, and make sure that the tables are level and the air conditioning is working," Small said, to allow for any influence of air resistance.

Small insists that his interest in gambling is purely theoretical. He has broken even in casinos by refusing to gamble there.

"On one occasion I lost $20 on cocktails," Small recalled. "And on another I gained $20, which I found on the floor."

More about scientific gambling:

A former science editor of Newsweek, Peter Gwynne is a freelance science writer based on Cape Cod, Mass.

Source: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/49220189/ns/technology_and_science-science/

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Military death toll in Afghanistan reaches 2,000

While the US prepares to withdraw most of its troops from Afghanistan by 2014, the number of military deaths in the country continues to rise. The toll is now at 2,000.

By Patrick Quinn,?Associated Press / September 30, 2012

US soldiers attend a ceremony marking the seventh anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks, at the US Camp Phoenix in Kabul, Afghanistan in 2008. US military deaths in Afghanistan have surpassed 2,000, a grim reminder that a war which began nearly 11 years ago shows no signs of slowing down despite an American decision to begin the withdrawal of most of its combat forces.

Musadeq Sadeq/AP/File

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US military deaths in the Afghan war have reached 2,000, a cold reminder of the human cost of an 11-year-old conflict that now garners little public interest at home as the United States prepares to withdraw most of its combat forces by the end of 2014.

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The toll has climbed steadily in recent months with a spate of attacks by Afghan army and police ? supposed allies ? against American and NATO troops. That has raised troubling questions about whether countries in the U.S.-led coalition in?Afghanistan?will achieve their aim of helping the government in Kabul and its forces stand on their own after most foreign troops depart in little more than two years.

On Sunday, a US official confirmed the latest death, saying that an international service member killed in an apparent insider attack by Afghan forces in the east of the country late Saturday was American. A civilian contractor with NATO and at least two Afghan soldiers also died in the attack, according to a coalition statement and Afghan provincial officials. The U.S. official spoke on condition of anonymity because the nationality of those killed had not been formally released. Names of the dead are usually released after their families or next-of-kin are notified, a process that can take several days. The nationality of the civilian was also not disclosed.

In addition to the 2,000 Americans killed since the Afghan war began on Oct. 7, 2001, at least 1,190 more coalition troops from other countries have also died, according to iCasualties.org, an independent organization that tracks the deaths.

According to the?Afghanistan?index kept by the Washington-based research center Brookings Institution, about 40 percent of the American deaths were caused by improvised explosive devices. The majority of those were after 2009, when President Barack Obama ordered a surge that sent in 33,000 additional troops to combat heightened Taliban activity. The surge brought the total number of American troops to 101,000, the peak for the entire war.

According to Brookings, hostile fire was the second most common cause of death, accounting for nearly 31 percent of Americans killed.

Tracking deaths of Afghan civilians is much more difficult. According to the U.N., 13,431 civilians were killed in the Afghan conflict between 2007, when the U.N. began keeping statistics, and the end of August. Going back to the U.S.-led invasion in 2001, most estimates put the number of Afghan civilian deaths in the war at more than 20,000.

Source: http://rss.csmonitor.com/~r/feeds/csm/~3/NPNREXTw6AM/Military-death-toll-in-Afghanistan-reaches-2-000

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Israel already passed own nuclear red line: Iran

TEHRAN: Israel has already breached its own red line set by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu by acquiring "dozens of nuclear warheads," Iranian Defence Minister Ahmad Vahidi said on Saturday.

"If having the atomic bomb is passing the red line, the Zionist regime, that possesses dozens of nuclear warheads and weapons of mass destruction, has passed the red line years ago, and it has to be stopped," he said, according to the ISNA news agency.

Vahidi was responding to a speech by Netanyahu to the UN General Assembly this week in which -- using a cartoon bomb diagramme -- the Israeli leader called for a "clear red line" to be applied to Iran's nuclear activities, which he charged are aimed at developing atomic weapons.

"Is the occupying and aggressor Zionist regime that possesses nuclear weapons more dangerous? Or an Iran that doesn't have nuclear weapons and which insists more than anybody on nuclear disarmament, and seeks only to have peaceful nuclear energy abiding by international rules," Vahidi asked.

Israel is the Middle East's sole, though undeclared, nuclear weapons state. Analysts estimate it has more than 200 nuclear warheads.

It is a member of the International Atomic Energy Agency but has never signed the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.

Iran insists its nuclear programme is entirely peaceful and rejects Israel's accusations of military intent.

Israel has had serious differences with Washington over how to respond to what it regards an "existential" threat from Tehran.

US intelligence agencies estimate that Iran has taken no decision to acquire a nuclear weapon but is merely seeking a so-called breakout capability to develop one in the future if it so decides.

It says there is more time for diplomacy and sanctions to work out.

Source: http://www.dailystar.com.lb/News/Middle-East/2012/Sep-29/189635-israel-already-passed-own-nuclear-red-line-iran.ashx

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AP Exclusive: Brown did service at his old daycare

LOS ANGELES (AP) ? Chris Brown has logged more than 1,400 hours of community service for the 2009 beating of former girlfriend Rihanna, basically completing his sentence. The Associated Press has learned one-third of those hours were recorded at a rural Virginia daycare center where the singer spent time as a child and his mother once served as director.

And in the last seven months, an AP analysis of the work records indicates Brown's labor credits increased by four times from what they had been during the previous two years. Yet through it all, Brown hasn't stopped being an R&B superstar, performing worldwide, releasing an album and even getting injured in a nightclub brawl.

Brown's service records have come under scrutiny by a prosecutor and a judge, who are trying to ascertain their accuracy. At a Monday hearing, Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Patricia Schnegg called the accounting of Brown's community service by Richmond, Va., Police Chief Bryan T. Norwood "somewhat cryptic."

No specific concerns were detailed by the court, yet the AP analysis of Brown's service shows that in the past seven months, the artist has been credited for working 701 hours ? a feat that previously took him 28 months to achieve, clocking sporadic, shorter shifts mostly at Richmond police and fire stations.

In recent months, the logs show Brown has essentially been working three jobs ? performing cleanup duty in Richmond police precincts by day, janitorial chores at the daycare 45 miles east by night, and hit songs for global audiences in between.

Ida Minter, the administrator of the Tappahannock Children's Center, said Brown attended the nonprofit facility "off and on" for more than 12 years and his mother was employed there for 24 years, including as director.

Brown's community service at the center began in January 2010, but work entries dramatically increased in March of this year. Most of his shifts were logged between 6 p.m. and 2 a.m. and were typically listed as "general cleaning," with some entries describing him painting or stripping and waxing floors. It is unclear who supervised him.

Brown's attorney Mark Geragos said Monday that he welcomed inquiries from Los Angeles probation officials and said he urged Brown to work double shifts so the lawyer wouldn't have to keep coming back to court.

Minter described Brown's work at the daycare center favorably.

"I think Chris always goes beyond because he always wants to give back to where he grew up," she told the AP. "And this was a part of his home because his mom worked here full-time."

"If you've ever been involved in stripping and waxing, it's hard," she said. "It's a lot of work."

Minter said Brown was always accompanied by someone while working at the center, but she said she couldn't discuss who it was.

The singer, who pleaded guilty to felony assault in June 2009, only worked at night and on weekends when no children were present, Minter said. That is supported by the logs, which also showed that Brown only worked one other weekend shift that wasn't at the daycare center.

Brown has been undeniably busy in recent months, releasing his new album "Fortune," traveling to France for a video shoot, winning a Grammy Award, performing at other award shows and resuming his friendship and music collaboration with Rihanna.

He has also drawn negative attention for being present at a bottle-throwing brawl at a New York City nightclub that left him with a cut chin. And in February, a woman in Miami accused him of taking her cellphone to prevent her from snapping pictures of him.

It was after that incident that Brown, 23, accelerated his work schedule, completing the 701 hours in seven months, according to the records filed Monday.

Meanwhile, the singer has remained an active promoter of his work on Twitter, where he sends out almost daily links to his music and clothing line, and also interacts with fans.

His international travel, which must be approved by Schnegg, has somehow been squeezed around his marathon community service sessions.

In July, for instance, Brown is listed as working 42 hours in four days before leaving for France. Upon his return, he worked 12 consecutive days, logging 164 hours, 100 of which were at the daycare described in Norwood's log as "Tappa Day Care."

March was similarly busy, with Brown being credited for work on 20 of the month's 30 days; he was approved to travel to Cancun, Mexico, for five of the remaining days.

Before this week, Brown had received praise from Schnegg and had never been in danger of violating his probation. But that could change if the inquiry the judge ordered turns up irregularities with the singer's service.

Schnegg allowed Brown to perform his work in his home state of Virginia under the supervision of Norwood, but on Monday noted there are discrepancies in the chief's accounting.

For one, Brown's work log shows he has put in 1,402 hours, but a couple of errors in the data may push the total up to 1,404. And although Brown was sentenced to perform 1,440 hours of labor, the chief wrote in a letter dated Sept. 14 that Brown had completed all his service hours.

Norwood's spokesman declined to respond to questions from the AP on the discrepancies. "Chief Norwood has reported directly to the judge, providing periodic updates regarding the progress of Chris Brown's community service," spokesman Gene Lepley said.

Prosecutors "are not happy with the quality of the report," Schnegg said Monday. "They don't know if it's reliable, yes or no."

District Attorney's spokeswoman Sandi Gibbons said the office would make all its comments on the case in court.

The judge and prosecution aren't the only ones concerned about the administration of Brown's sentence. In August, Virginia probation authorities recommended that Richmond police stop supervising Brown after the singer tested positive for marijuana and what they believed was unapproved travel to France. However, they made no critical comments about his community service.

Geragos, Brown's attorney, declined comment for this story, but he said at Monday's court hearing that he believes his client has completed all his community service.

Brown's labors have left a lasting mark at the Tappahannock Children's Center: a colorful wall mural featuring a huge clown face and splashes of purple, orange, green and yellow. The words "Big Room" ? the informal name of the large space amid a warren of smaller classrooms ? is painted in fat letters along a wall where jackets are hung on hooks.

Brown approached Minter, who has known Brown since his birth, to ask if he could use his art skills on the walls of the big room, she said.

The singer is not the only celebrity to perform community service with an entity to which they have close ties. Mel Gibson and Sean Penn had similar arrangements.

Both actors had received permission in advance for the assignments in misdemeanor cases. Before Monday's filings, there had been no mention of Brown working at his boyhood daycare center in probation reports.

___

Steve Szkotak reported from Richmond, Va.

___

Anthony McCartney can be reached at http://twitter.com/mccartneyAP .

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/ap-exclusive-brown-did-old-daycare-151502349.html

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Green Blog: Leopard Poaching on the Rise, Group Warns

When it comes to the poaching of endangered species, elephants, tigers and rhinos tend to be in the limelight. But a new report sets out to plug the information gap on a different species that is imperiled by a tide of demand related to rising affluence in Asia: leopards.

In India alone, an average of at least four leopards have been poached each week over the last 10 years, according to Traffic, an organization that monitors the trade in endangered wildlife around the globe and issued the report. That?s more than 2,000 in one decade.

The estimate is based on a review of seizures of spotted leopard skins and other body parts. While most of the items seized were skins, other body parts, particularly bones, are prescribed as substitutes for tiger parts in traditional Asian medicine, Traffic said.

?Even though reports of illegal trade in leopard body parts are disturbingly frequent, the level of threat to leopards in the country has previously been unrecognized and has fallen into our collective ?blind spot?,? said Rashid Raza, the lead author of the report, which was released on Friday in New Delhi.

There are no reliable estimates of how many leopards exist in India. The animals are notoriously wary of humans and are spread out over large areas, so tracking their numbers is difficult.

Yet the International Union for the Conservation of Nature, which categorizes leopards as ?near threatened? on its so-called red list of species, says that leopard populations have become extinct in some parts of the world and dwindled to tiny numbers in others. Although they dwell widely in the forests of the Indian subcontinent, Southeast Asia and China, they are ?becoming increasingly rare outside protected areas,? the organization says.

Divyabhanusinh Chavda, president of the World Wildlife Fund?s India chapter, said that concerted national action was needed. ?Without an effective strategy to assess and tackle the threats posed by illegal trade, the danger is that leopard numbers may decline rapidly, as happened previously to the tiger,? he said.

Government estimates put the number of tigers in India at little more than 1,700.

Source: http://green.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/09/28/148691/?partner=rss&emc=rss

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Portuguese protest against austerity, await more measures

LISBON (Reuters) - Thousands of Portuguese protested on Saturday against austerity, stepping up their opposition to the country's 78-billion-euro bailout ahead of new spending cuts and tax hikes to be announced in the government's 2013 draft budget.

The peaceful protest organized by the CGTP union came after the center-right government ignited widespread anger this month with a hike in social security taxes that threatened to end Portugal's so far high social acceptance for austerity.

Facing criticism from unions, opposition politicians and businesses alike, the government reversed the tax hike. But it is now rushing to find alternative measures to adopt in its 2013 budget to ensure the country meets fiscal goals under its bailout from the European Union, European Central Bank and IMF, the so-called troika.

Protesters marched through downtown Lisbon, shouting "Let the fight continue" and carried banners reading "Go to hell Troika, we want our lives back."

"A year ago the prime minister told us the solution to the country's problems was the agreement with the troika," shouted CGTP head Armenio Carlos in a speech.

"But we have already seen this film in Greece, this is a road without an exit, pushing us toward the precipice," Carlos told the marchers that crowded into Lisbon's main Praca de Comercio square on the banks of the Tagus River.

The protest in Portugal came after a week of similar anti-austerity marches in Greece, Spain and Italy as southern Europeans face increasingly grim economic conditions under hardship sparked by the euro debt crisis.

Carlos said the protest was one of the largest organized by the CGTP, Portugal's biggest union, in recent years but he gave no figure of the number of people present. Praca de Comercio square has a capacity of about 100,000 people but it was not completely full on Saturday.

The protests were smaller than nationwide marches on September 15, immediately after the tax hike was announced, which prompted an estimated 500,000 people to take to the streets.

Portugal's unemployment rate has hit record levels above 15 percent as the country descended this year into its worst recession since the 1970s under the weight of spending cuts and tax hikes.

Anger by the Portuguese at austerity is likely to rise further as the government now expects the recession to extend into next year with few signs of economic growth emerging from the bailout plan.

The government has to present its 2013 budget by the middle of October.

(Reporting by Axel Bugge; editing by James Jukwey)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/portuguese-protest-against-austerity-await-more-measures-170338122.html

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Cisco Blog ? Blog Archive ? U.S. Broadband Deployment: Where ...

By Howard Baldwin, Contributing Columnist

At a time in the United States when political opinions seem to fly to the extremes, with no middle ground, it?s no surprise that the FCC?s recent report on broadband deployment evokes a similarly polarized reaction.

Of the five commissioners who authored the report, three (including chairman Julius Genachowski) seem to believe that 95% penetration of fixed broadband by any technology (see graphic) is cause for alarm, citing the lack of broadband in rural areas and tribal lands. Two of the three commissioners filed dissents to the conclusions of the report.

Larry Downes, an Internet consultant writing in Forbes, called this conclusion ?bizarre? and accused the FCC of an incipient power grab:

?Under section 706 of the 1996 Communications Act, the FCC must make an annual determination of whether broadband ?is being deployed to all Americans in a reasonable and timely fashion.? If not, the agency must take ?immediate action? to remove barriers that are keeping network operators from spending their investors? money even faster. Which translates, on the majority?s view, into a vast array of regulatory powers that otherwise aren?t available to the agency.?

According to Troy Wolverton, writing in the San Jose Mercury-News from the heart of Silicon Valley, industry lobbying group Broadband for America called the report ?inaccurate? and focused ?too much on those who lack broadband and not enough on the investments made by broadband providers to improve access and speeds.?

The FCC did acknowledge the private sector?s $1 trillion investment in broadband deployment. ?The private sector continues to do its part,? Wolverton quoted Broadband for America co-chairman John Sununu saying. ?Rather than misrepresent this record, our government should be working with us to identify the best approach to reach the small percentage of rural homes without broadband access.?

Or should it? Is there a third element missing from the FCC report, beyond rural vs. urban? I submit that there is, and that missing element is context. It?s arguably encouraging having government officials admit, ?We can do better,? rather than hollowly touting success. But pointing out the lack of rural broadband, especially when the percentage is in the single digits, misses the bigger picture: where does the U.S. sit in comparison with the rest of the world?

It?s not surprising that nobody wants to talk about that, because among the top 25 countries, the U.S. is 23^rd in broadband penetration ? and that?s down from 22^nd place, according to research firm Point Topic. Only Cyprus and the Isle of Man trail the U.S., according to the latest figures from Q3 of last year.

Look at the graphic again, and note that fiber deployment is way down at 19 percent. The industry has done great at deploying broadband, but as the FCC report rightly notes, technology tends to move forward rapidly. This is one of those situations.

Instead of worrying about the lower 5 percent of Americans who don?t have broadband, why aren?t we worrying about the upper 5 percent of Americans who want to create new start-up companies but don?t have access to the super-fast broadband to do so?

If the FCC wants to make a power grab, why doesn?t it mandate fiber deployment where it will do the most good, rather than insisting that telecommunications companies eliminate demographic data from their determinations of where to deploy fiber?

Why not let ?broadband service providers deploy high-speed fiber in urban downtown areas, where companies will be most likely to happily pay a premium for it, and then use that income to backfill in other areas? And do that in radiating circles, from urban areas to suburban areas, and finally to rural areas.

If I had one message for the FCC, it would be to stop pitting urban versus rural, and start figuring out how to move the U.S. up the international ranks of broadband penetration.

>>More? Connected Life Exchange

Tags: broadband, FCC, infrastructure, policy, social and economic development

Source: http://blogs.cisco.com/cle/u-s-broadband-deployment-where-the-fcc-should-focus/

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Reasons Why You Should See a Gynae Today

Doctors have defined obstetrics and gynaecology as the surgical medical specialties related to the female reproductive organs in the pregnant and non pregnant state. These problems generally start showing after the age of 18; this is the reason why most gynaes advise women to go for regular checkups after they complete 18. Most young women are susceptible to cervical cancer after the age of 18. The only way to know if you have this type of cancer is to be tested for it regularly.

Your gynaecologist is trained to answer any questions you have in regards to obstetrics and gynaecology. It is very essential for you to build a relationship with your gynae over the years so he understands your health and what matters to you.

You will come across plenty of gynaecologists in your city; but, not all of them are good, nor is it advisable to trust all of them. It is your health in question, so compromising on the quality of the gynea you choose is not at all a wise thing to do. With so many options to choose from, finding a good gynaecologist may seem difficult a difficult task. By following the few simple tips you will be able to find a good gynae for your needs:

Trust and comfort- These are two points that you should keep in mind. Pick a gynaecologist that you share a good comfort level with. This is your health in question; you need to ensure that the doctor you choose is someone you are comfortable with.

Create a list of gynaecologists in your area- You can begin your search by simply asking your mother or female friends if they know of any good gynaecologists that they can refer to you. You may have friends who are doctors. They will be able to recommend some good doctors to you.

Make use of the internet- Plenty of gynaecologists use the internet to advertise their services. Look up their web pages. With just a simple click of the mouse you are exposed to a number of doctors from which you can take your pick.

Distance- Do not opt for a gynae who is very far from your home. When you are pregnant and go into labor at odd hours, then commuting will be a problem. In case of an emergency the doctor may not be able to reach you on time.

Seeing a gynaecologist could benefit you in a number of ways. Some of the reasons why you need to see one are:

? Explain to you what is normal for you so you can notice any problem changes, like signs of a vaginal infection.

? Allow the doctor to find problems early so they can be treated or kept from getting worse.

? Help you understand your body and how to care for it.

? Teach you how to protect yourself if you have sex.

? Explain to you what exactly a normal vagina discharge should look like and the signs you should look out for to tell if you are sick.

If you are look for a good women clinic in Singapore you can contact Dr Law Wei Seng of the Pacific Healthcare Specialist Centre.

Source: http://www.selfgrowth.com/articles/reasons-why-you-should-see-a-gynae-today

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Bullish Penny Stocks To Watch Heading Into October: SANP, BONZ ...

Palm Beach Gardens, FL -- (SBWIRE) -- 09/28/2012 -- With over 1 million visitors, AimHighProfits knows penny stocks and knows that The RIGHT Penny Stock can offer the HIGHEST percentage gains of any stocks in the market.?For more information on SANP, NGNM and/or BONZ, visit AimHighProfits.

The bullish penny stocks heading into October are:

Santo Mining Corporation (OTC:SANP)
NeoGenomics, Inc. (OTC:NGNM)
Bonanza Goldfield Corp. (PINK:BONZ)

Santo Mining Corporation (SANP) is a development-stage junior minerals exploration and development company focused on gold production opportunities in the Dominican Republic.

SANP stock was initiated Friday by SMA and has risen to as high as $1.73.

NeoGenomics, Inc. (NGNM) operates a network of cancer-focused testing laboratories.

NGNM stock has nearly doubled since the start of July and was recently rated a "buy" and given a $5.00 target price by analyst Craig Hallum on August 22, 2012.

Bonanza Goldfield Corporation (BONZ) is an exploration-stage company. The Company is engaged in the acquisition and exploration of gold mineral properties in North America.

BONZ stock has closed green for 9 consecutive trading sessions heading into Friday.

Have you been doubling your money or better on penny stocks that have exploded higher?

Have you been losing money because you didn't know enough about the penny shares you purchased?

Recent winners include:

Cannabis Science (CBIS) - 1,100% maximum gains
Omni Ventures (OMVE) - 441% max,imum gains
Peregrine Pharmaceuticals (PPHM) - 1,281% maximum gains
Bebida Beverage (BBDA) 1,143% maximum gains

We know Penny Stocks and If you CAN'T make money with AimHighProfits' Newsletter, then you shouldn't be in the stock market. Readers of the AimHighProfits Penny Stock Newsletter have been cashing in handsomely all year and there is no reason you should be left out.

Make sure to Follow us on Twitter and Facebook. To get your FREE subscription, visit AimHighProfits.

And Remember to Always:

-?Do Your Own Research.
- Trade Responsibly.
- Verify Everything.
- Move Fast or Get Left Behind.
- Do not Use Market Orders to Enter a Position, Use Limit Orders.
- Have a System That fits You.
- If a Stock Gaps Open, Look for Pullbacks to Enter.
- Plan a Trade and Trade a Plan.
- Always Use Stop Loss Orders to Protect Yourself.
- Positive Attitude / Positive Self- Belief.
- Keep Penny Stock Trading as Part of a Balanced life.
- If a Stock Breaks Below Our Alert Price GET OUT. Do not wait.
- View Trading as a Score in Points and Not In Money:
- Always Take Your Profits Whenever You Can. Do Not Be Greedy.
- Work Hard at Learning How to Trade Properly and Keep Working.
- Do Something to make Someone Else's Life Better Today.

About AimHighProfits
AimHighProfits (www.AimHighProfits.com) is a penny stock watch website that provides free daily alerts on penny stocks. AimHighProfits' penny stock alerts include news releases or daily e-mails on Small-Cap and Micro-Cap stocks in all sectors of the market. These include stocks with high or low volume, penny stocks, stocks with technical indicators and much more. AimHighProfits tracks stocks that may be moving upwards or downwards. AimHighProfits also features companies on its website with company profiles, research reports, analysis, and newsletters.

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The information contained herein is based on sources which we believe to be reliable but is not guaranteed by us as being accurate and does not purport to be a complete statement or summary of the available data. The owner, publisher, editor and their associates are not responsible for errors and omissions. They may from time to time have a position in the securities mentioned herein and may increase or decrease such positions without notice. Any opinions expressed are subject to change without notice. AimHighProfits encourages readers and investors to supplement the information in these reports with independent research and other professional advice. All information on featured companies is provided by the companies profiled, or is available from public sources and AimHighProfits makes no representations, warranties or guarantees as to the accuracy or completeness of the disclosure by the profiled companies or the information contained herein. AimHighProfits has been advised that the investments in companies profiled are considered to be high risk and use of the information provided is at the investor's sole risk. AimHighProfits also advises that the purchase of such high risk securities may result in the loss of some or all of the investment. Investors should not rely solely on the information presented. Rather, investors should use the information provided by the profiled companies as a starting point for doing additional independent research on the profiled companies in order to allow the investor to form his or her own opinion regarding investing in the profiled companies. Factual statements made by the profiled companies are made as of the date stated and are subject to change without notice. Investing in any stock (large-cap, small-cap, or micro-cap security) is highly speculative and carries an extremely high degree of risk. It is possible that an investor's entire investment may be lost or impaired due to the speculative nature of the companies profiled. AimHighProfits makes no recommendation that the securities of the companies profiled should be purchased, sold or held by individuals or entities that learn of the profiled companies through AimHighProfits.com. AimHighProfits owners may or may not hold positions in any of the companies that are profiled.

SAFE HARBOR: The information contained herein contains forward-looking information within the meaning of Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1993 and Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 including statements regarding expected continual growth of the company and the value of its securities. In accordance with the safe harbor provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995 it is hereby noted that statements contained herein that look forward in time which include everything other than historical information, involve risk and uncertainties that may affect the company's actual results of operation. These statements are not guarantees of future performance and involve significant risks and uncertainties. Actual results may vary materially from those in the forward-looking statements. Factors that could cause actual results to differ include but are not limited to; the size and growth of the market for the company's products, the company's ability to fund its capital requirements in the near term and in the long term, pricing pressures, unforeseen and/or unexpected circumstances in happenings, the effectiveness of management's strategies and decisions, general economic and business conditions, new or modified statutory or regulatory requirements and changing price and market conditions. Investing in securities is speculative and carries risk. Past performance does not guarantee future results. No assurance can be given that these are all the factors that could cause actual results to vary materially from the forward-looking statements. The following report is neither an offer to buy or sell securities. Never invest in any stock featured on the AimHighProfits website unless you can afford to lose your entire investment. This disclaimer is to be read and fully understood before using our site, or joining our email list.

Source: http://www.sbwire.com/press-releases/bullish-penny-stocks-to-watch-heading-into-october-sanp-bonz-ngnm-168461.htm

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Sidelined

An all-male sideline

Photograph by Ezra Shaw/Getty Images.

Go see a special live performance of Slate?s sports podcast "Hang Up and Listen" in Washington, D.C., on Monday, Oct. 1. Click here for more information and to buy tickets.

Near the end of the trailer for Wildcats, a 1986 sports comedy with a 13 percent Rotten Tomatoes rating, a voice-over actor informs prospective moviegoers that during the film, ?Goldie Hawn tackles the impossible.? The movie is about a woman who coaches a men?s football team, and the implication is that such an endeavor equates to doing that which is undoable.

Sadly, that disembodied voice from the mid-?80s was on to something. Huge numbers of otherwise reasonable people, in 2012, simply take it as a given that women couldn?t possibly coach a men?s sports teams. And so, regardless of ability, talent, or potential outcomes, a woman who aspires to lead a high-level men?s team is actually reaching for the near impossible.

There are exactly zero women working as coaches for the 122 teams playing in the NBA, MLB, NHL, and NFL. Zero head coaches, zero assistant coaches, zero assistant to the assistant coaches. The average NFL team employs 18 coaches. Major League Baseball teams have six coaches and a manager. Most NHL teams carry at least four coaches, and a typical NBA squad has one head coach and four to six assistants. All together, that?s more than 1,000 jobs ... all held by men. To state it another way: 50.8 percent of the U.S. population has virtually no shot of becoming men?s football, baseball, basketball, or hockey coaches at any level that would involve payment for services due.

OK, fine, they have a tiny shot: At the college level, women coach fewer than 3 percent of men?s teams. And three people?Bernadette Maddox, Jennifer Johnston, and Stephanie Ready?represent the entire universe of women who have served as coaches for Division I men?s basketball teams. They were all assistants.

There are, to be sure, some women coaching men?s teams at the more than 36,000 high schools in the United States?in fact, more women than ever before. But if one of these individuals resides in your town, you are in the tiniest minority. Case in point: Natalie Randolph, a teacher at Washington, D.C.?s Calvin Coolidge Senior High School, appears to be one of only two women serving as head coach of a high school football team in the United States.

Women coach women?s teams at all levels. But so do men. In fact, the percentage of women?s college teams coached by women, for instance, has shrunk considerably since the passage and implementation of Title IX. (In 1972, 90 percent of women?s college teams were coached by women?that number is now down to 42.9 percent. And according to this ESPN story, men have been hired for 68.5 percent of the college women?s team coaching openings filled since 2000.) This is by no means meant to suggest that coaching men?s teams should be valued more highly than coaching women?s teams or represent the ultimate goal for a coach. The point here is simply that choosing a coach from an inherently flawed and unnecessarily narrow universe of candidates is probably not the best way to proceed. Not to mention that coaching women generally pays far less than coaching men.

There are all sorts of reasons why women almost never coach men?s teams, most of which fall under the category of Catch-22s: the lack of women actively seeking these jobs due to existing norms that are reinforced at every athletic level, the dearth of female candidates with the type of experience that is valued by those filling positions to coach men?s teams, the lack of female role models who have successfully coached men, the persistence of discrimination and stereotypes that die slowly, etc. Basically: Women never coach men?s teams because they?ve never coached men?s teams. Then there are these loopy justifications that you?ve surely heard, or maybe even uttered yourself: Women don?t play some men?s sports competitively, so they couldn?t possibly be good at coaching those sports; men won?t take orders from, or sufficiently respect, women; women have no place in men?s locker rooms; and, of course, women are way too [insert your stereotype of choice here regarding emotional fragility] to successfully coach men?s teams.

Here is the point in this article at which I would love to combat all of the above with numerous examples of women coaches killing it in men?s sports. Only there?s not much of a well from which to draw. So let?s look at the rationales when applied to men.

The claim that is perhaps trotted out most often is the one about how women couldn?t effectively coach sports such as football and baseball that they don?t play competitively, and how they wouldn?t be successful coaching men in the sports women do play, because they haven?t competed in them against men or at the highest of levels. (Remember: This is not about women playing against men, where, in some instances, strength and muscular advantages are unmistakable factors.)

Source: http://feeds.slate.com/click.phdo?i=bf2fa75be004776139487153dc97c1c2

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Ark. first Southern state to vote on medical pot

David Mcnew / Getty Images

In this Sept 7. photo, marijuana plants grow at the Perennial Holistic Wellness Center, a not-for-profit medical marijuana dispensary in Los Angeles, Calif. On the November ballot, Arkansas voters will be asked whether centers like these can be legal in its state.

By NBC News staff and wire services

Come November, Arkansas voters will be faced with a question unprecedented in the South: Should qualified patients be allowed to buy medical marijuana from nonprofit dispensaries with a doctor's recommendation?

The Arkansas Supreme Court upheld the proposed ballot measure on Thursday, making "The Natural State" the first in the South to ask its voters about medical marijuana, The Associated Press reported. Seventeen other states and the District of Columbia have already legalized medical marijuana to some degree.

---

The court's review of "The Arkansas Medical Marijuana Act" came after the Coalition to Preserve Arkansas Values filed a lawsuit in August that tried to get the proposal off the state's ballot, NBC station KARK 4 of Little Rock reported. The conservative coalition claimed that the 384-word ballot question doesn't properly explain the consequences of passing the 8,700-word law, according to the AP. Even if the act were passed,?approved patients could still be prosecuted under federal law.

"We hold that it is an adequate and fair representation without misleading tendencies or partisan coloring," the court wrote. "Therefore, the act is proper for inclusion on the ballot at the general election on Nov. 6, 2012, and the petition is therefore denied."

The conservative coalition, which includes leaders from the Arkansas Faith and Ethics Council, the Families First Foundation and the Family Council Action Committee, has five days to ask the court for a rehearing, according to KARK 4.

Related: Legalize pot vote coming up in 3 states - Colo., Ore. & Wash.

Danny Johnston / AP

Jerry Cox, the head of the Arkansas Family Council and a member of a coalition of groups opposed to the proposed medical marijuana ballot measure, holds a copy of the proposal as he speaks to reporters in Little Rock, Ark. on Thursday.

An attorney for Arkansas for Compassionate Care ? the group behind the measure ? said he is pleased with the ruling.

"Now that we've passed muster with the Supreme Court we'll begin our campaign to show the people of the state of Arkansas that this is truly a compassionate measure," attorney David Couch told the AP.

Following the decision, opponents soon?responded on Thursday.

"We've shifted into campaign mode," coalition spokesman Larry Page said, according to KARK 4. "We respect the court's decision, but we are very disappointed that this flawed measure will appear on the ballot."

According to the AP, the proposal lets qualified patients or designated caregivers grow marijuana if the patient lives more than five miles away from a dispensary. It also allows minors to use medical marijuana with parental consent. Cancer, Alzheimer's disease, glaucoma, HIV and AIDS would all be qualifying health conditions.

Arkansas Gov. Mike Beebe, a Democrat, is against the measure and told reporters Thursday that he's requested an estimate on how much it will cost to regulate the dispensaries if voters pass it.

"If I understand what I think I understand about it, if it passes, it's going to require a whole of administration from the health department," Beebe said, according to the AP. "I don't know where we're going to get it from."

Beebe also told reporters that he doesn't believe Arkansas voters would legalize medical marijuana.

While voters in Arkansas and Massachusetts are expected to have their say on this issue on the November ballot, voters in North Dakota won't, after its state Supreme Court ruled the?initiative?can't appear on its ballot, the AP reported.

The Associated Press contributed to this story.

More content from NBCNews.com:

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Source: http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2012/09/27/14124948-arkansas-first-southern-state-to-vote-on-medical-marijuana?lite

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GOP fires vendor after questionable registrations (The Arizona Republic)

Share With Friends: | | Politics - Top Stories News, RSS and RSS Feed via Feedzilla.

Source: http://news.feedzilla.com/en_us/stories/politics/top-stories/251563650?client_source=feed&format=rss

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Bye Bye, Bill: How Nguyen Doomed Color from the Start | PandoDaily

So CEO and co-founder Bill Nguyen has reportedly?checked out at Color.

Shocker.

The most common response I got when I Tweeted our post on the news earlier: Wait, Color is still around?

You can point to a lot of things that doomed Color. But the biggest one was Nguyen?s utter lack of understanding about what had changed about building a Silicon Valley company since? he started his more successful companies in 1999 and 2000.

It may seem obvious that things change in a place that?s predicated on startups and innovation. I mean, we?re not that old as an ecosystem and how many companies here are even doing anything remotely involving Silicon anymore?

But as much as we pay attention to the shifts in the people and the technology and the companies, not as much attention gets paid to how much the way of doing business in the Valley also changes from cycle to cycle. Fundraising amounts, valuations and the desire to go ?fat? or go ?lean? tend to come in and out of vogue along with the economic cycles.?But other things change permanently.

And when he set out to launch Color, Nguyen didn?t get that. Worse: According to sources he didn?t listen when more in-touch people tried to explain it to him.

Launches aren?t everything, but Color could not have had a worse one. Nguyen articulated a huge vision that swayed some journalists into a wait-and-see attitude but the vision wasn?t reflected anywhere in the actual product. What it put out there was one of a million photosharing sites with a horrible UI. And worse: The company came out trumpeting it?d raised $41 million before it had a single user. The factoid that made nearly every headline: ?Nguyen crowed that Sequoia found the idea so bold that they put in double the money they put into their initial investment in Google.

That was a bizarre comparison to make, and it clearly came from the company given the consistency of the message. Color was a completely different kind of company started in a different time and a different industry. Why on earth would that be relevant to compare its funding amount to Google?s?

There was only one reason to lead with that instead of the product: Because Nguyen had launched his previous companies in a very different time when the size of your series A was what mattered. The Internet was still relatively new and the number of people on it was comparatively small. Winning was seen as a race to get as many resources as possible, buy a pricey domain, do as splashy a launch as possible and do whatever marketing you needed to land-grab users.

That fundamentally changed in the Web 2.0 era, mostly because the entire economics of how you build a company had changed. The costs were far lower, so raising money for the sake of a gaudy press release had given way to the luxury of raising less and retaining control.

The marketing game changed too. First mover advantage was no longer valued. Commercials only worked once you have a successful product and a solid user base and are looking to grow well beyond it. The way you build a company is to raise a modest round, get a minimum viable product, push it out, and iterate like hell until people use it or pivot and try again.

People no longer get told what products to use in a Web 2.0 era, they use them and spread them to their friends if they?re good. Color wasn?t? as was evidenced by its two star rating. Money and grand articulations of a vision can?t shortcut that. The Web has become too crowded and users are too smart.

This is a lesson Web 1.0 veterans who started new companies this go-round learned early on. I remember when Max Levchin was launching Slide. At PayPal they?d concocted a clever method of paying users $20 to refer a friend, and the product spread rapidly ? and it was cheaper than how other companies were grabbing users back then. With Slide, he was struck by how his pedigree, his experience, his team, his cash ? none of this could force adoption. There was no trick the way there was in the late 1990s. ?You just can?t force users to get up off their asses and use your product,? he told me in exasperation at the time.

Nguyen?s launch plan made even less sense given he was launching a photosharing app ? an insanely crowded space, where the quality of the product and whether your friends were using it were the only two things that mattered to users. And Color had neither of those.

For contrast, look at the company who won this space: Instagram. Founder Kevin Systrom raised a small amount in the beginning, hired a tiny staff and had a straightforward and simple vision. It was the anti-Color in strategy, style, product, CEO and, ultimately, adoption and exit.

Nguyen couldn?t work the press the way he expected and didn?t get the late 1990s style headlines he craved. And when users tried the product out ? after reading nothing but how much money he?d raised and how Sequoia thought this would be bigger than Google? they laughed and used social media to one-up each other with the jokes. The company just got trounced.

And Nguyen didn?t know enough about how the media game worked anymore to ever take control of the narrative again. Quick high level defections of co-founder Peter Pham and DJ Patil only made the company look more doomed, and this bizarre pervy commercial only made the company look more out-of-touch. Color was mostly known by the users it courted as a meme about an epic flop, and when people got bored of it, they just moved on to more interesting memes.

Now that Nguyen is out? or at least never showing up and vacationing while he takes a paycheck? it doesn?t offer much hope the company will amount to much. Early spin that ?This team alone could be worth $41 million!? seem silly now that the founders and that early talent has mostly bailed. These companies are outgrowths of the founders for better or worse. Without a compelling product (still), a grand vision that has mostly proven to be vaporware, and scant users, Color is still just another Delaware corporation with a lot of cash in the bank.

I spoke with a close friend of Nguyen?s in the aftermath of that launch. I explained why I thought the strategy was so out of touch. This person just shook his head and went on an exhausted screed about how he tried to explain that to Nguyen before launch until he was blue in the face. But Nguyen had launched companies before, and he thought he knew better, this person said.

There?s a strange contradiction in the Valley where investors say they crave the experience of a serial entrepreneur but also want the fresh eyes of a young entrepreneur in touch with the users of today. There are plenty of examples of each being successful, but you can?t have both in a single founder. For either to work, a founder needs to realize those inherent limitations and listen to people around him to compensate for them. The best young founders do that by surrounding themselves with savvy investors and mentors. Sometimes the know-it-all serial entrepreneurs need to do the reverse.

Source: http://pandodaily.com/2012/09/28/bye-bye-bill-how-nguyen-doomed-color-from-the-start/

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'Looper' Props Came From eBay And A Smoke Shop?

Prop master James Kroning tells MTV News the secrets of seeking perfect time-travel objects for Rian Johnson-directed film.
By Kevin P. Sullivan

Joseph Gordon-Levitt in "Looper"
Photo: TriStar Pictures

Source: http://www.mtv.com/news/articles/1694591/looper-movie-props.jhtml

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Dickey gets 20th win, leads Mets over Pirates 6-5

New York Mets starting pitcher R.A. Dickey puts his hand to his heart as the thanks the fans as he celebrates his 20th victory of the season after the Mets 6-5 win against the Pittsburgh Pirates in a baseball game at Citi Field in New York, Thursday, Sept. 27, 2012. (AP Photo/Kathy Willens)

New York Mets starting pitcher R.A. Dickey puts his hand to his heart as the thanks the fans as he celebrates his 20th victory of the season after the Mets 6-5 win against the Pittsburgh Pirates in a baseball game at Citi Field in New York, Thursday, Sept. 27, 2012. (AP Photo/Kathy Willens)

New York Mets starting pitcher R.A. Dickey tips his cap to the crowd as he celebrates his 20th victory of the season after the Mets 6-5 win against the Pittsburgh Pirates in a baseball game at Citi Field in New York, Thursday, Sept. 27, 2012. (AP Photo/Kathy Willens)

New York Mets starting pitcher R.A. Dickey acknowledges fans as he celebrates his 20th victory of the season after the Mets 6-5 win against the Pittsburgh Pirates in a baseball game at Citi Field in New York, Thursday, Sept. 27, 2012. (AP Photo/Kathy Willens)

Fans pay tribute to New York Mets pitcher R.A Dickey, who is going for his 20th victory, during a baseball game against the Pittsburgh Pirates at Citi Field in New York, Thursday, Sept. 27, 2012. (AP Photo/Kathy Willens)

New York Mets starting pitcher R.A. Dickey acknowledges fans as he celebrates his 20th victory of the season after the Mets 6-5 win against the Pittsburgh Pirates in a baseball game at Citi Field in New York, Thursday, Sept. 27, 2012. (AP Photo/Kathy Willens)

NEW YORK (AP) ? R.A. Dickey was so close yet so far from 20 wins, faltering from fatigue and fuming he had failed to seize the moment.

"About the fourth or fifth inning I felt exasperated. I was not myself today for the most part," he said.

"And then I'd come out for an at-bat and I would hear this kind of growing surge, and it really was neat. I mean I don't know if I've ever experienced something like that before. Maybe I never will again. Although I wasn't distracted from the moment, how could you not be motivated to go out there and give the fans and, well, your teammates and yourself all that you have?" he said.

Absorbing the energy from 31,506 fans at the final home game of another sorry Mets season, Dickey summoned his strength and concentration. David Wright boosted him into the lead with a tiebreaking three-run homer, and Dickey led New York over Pittsburgh Pirates 6-5 Thursday to become the first knuckleballer in more than three decades to win 20 games.

"It's like a big exhale," Dickey said.

Throwing his hard knuckler at up to 78 mph, Dickey (20-6) allowed three runs and eight hits in 7 2-3 innings, tying his career high with 13 strikeouts and walking two.

With New York winding up its fourth straight losing season, he capped a trinity of highlights that began with the first Mets no-hitter by Johan Santana in June and continued with Wright setting the team career hits record on Wednesday.

"This was about R.A. today," Mets manager Terry Collins said. "It was about him. It was about his connection with the fans, the connection with the city. And so I said use that."

Quite a turnaround from 2010, when Dickey began the season at Triple-A Buffalo and had to prove he belonged in the majors. And from last year, when he was 8-13.

The 37-year-old had never won more than 11 games in any previous season is just 61-56 in his big league career.

"I was the picture of mediocrity by my own admission," he said.

But in the late stages of his career, he has mastered the knuckler ? a pitch that has flummoxed most of those who have tried and must survive on fastballs.

"I think everybody here today would have taken one swing where they thought they were going to crush one and they swung right throw it," Pirates outfielder Travis Snider said.

Dickey had never set a numerical goal for his pitching.

"It's just much more for me if I can really harness the moment and suck the marrow out of every second, then I've done what I want to do and I can be satisfied," he said.

Dickey became the first 20-game winner for the pitching-proud Mets since Frank Viola in 1990 and the first knuckleballer to accomplish the feat since Houston's Joe Niekro in 1980, according to STATS LLC. Viola also reached 20 with a win over the Pirates.

New York had altered its rotation, giving Dickey a chance to win 20 at home. The fans gave Dickey his first ovation when he walked to the bullpen to warm up. He waved his cap as they applauded when he walked off after his 128th and final pitch ? his most in eight years ? and got a final round of applause when he returned to the field for a postgame interview that was broadcast over the stadium sound system.

"Growing up, you just want to compete. And once you have the weaponry to compete, you want to be really good," he said. "And then when you're really good, you want to be supernaturally good. And I think for me there's been this steady kind of metamorphosis from just surviving to being a craftsman. Ultimately the hope is to be an artist with what you do."

The milestone following two life-changing events. He authored a book last spring, "Wherever I Wind Up," revealing he was a sexual abuse victim when he was 8. And he climbed Mount Kilimanjaro to raise awareness for the Bombay Teen Challenge.

"When you get to a comfort level about who you are and you don't have secrets and you feel the freedom to be who you feel like you're called to be, that's something," Dickey said. "Is this the result of the cathartic experience of writing the book, I don't know. I'm going to say this, it certainly hasn't hurt. And to be comfortable in your own skin, which I was not for so long in my life, there's something to that."

His memorable year began with a climb to the 19,341-foot Uhuru Peak of Mount Kilimanjaro in Tanzania.

"He was taking his career and putting it in jeopardy, putting it in harm's way," Collins said. "You don't know what's going to happen. But it wasn't about him. It has never been about him."

Dickey joined Washington's Gio Gonzalez (20-8) as the top winners in the majors. They figure to duel for the NL Cy Young Award.

Dickey fell behind 2-0 and 3-1 and overcame an outstanding, climbing catch by Snider more than 2 feet above the right-field wall that robbed Mike Baxter of a tying home run in the second inning.

Former Texas teammate Rod Barajas hit an opposite-field RBI double that hopped the right-field wall in the second, and Jordy Mercer following with a run-scoring infield single.

Ike Davis led off the bottom half with his 31st homer, but Barajas boosted the lead to 3-1 when he homered on an 0-2 pitch in the fourth, a drive over the old 16-foot wall in left. Kevin Correia (11-11) gave up Scott Hairston's RBI single in the fourth and Murphy's tying single in the fifth before Wright hit an opposite-field drive to right for his 21st home run this season and a 6-3 lead.

Dickey was watching on TV in the clubhouse at the time.

"There were times he picked us up and really carried us as a team on his back," said Wright, happy to provide the hit that made the difference.

Dickey said after the seventh inning he was "pooped," but Collins sent him out for the eighth.

"I said, look, this ballpark is filled with energy today. Use it to your advantage," the manager recalled. "These people deserve to see you walk off the mound."

Responded Dickey: "Don't leave me hanging."

Jon Rauch, pitching on his 34th birthday, came in after a two-out walk, finished the eighth and allowed Alex Presley's two-run homer in the nervy ninth. Bobby Parnell retired Josh Harrison on a groundout and Jose Tabata on a flyout for his fifth save.

Dickey came back on the field for handshakes and soaked in the fans' love.

"I feel it in my face. I don't know if that makes any sense," Dickey said. "I want to get emotional. It's hard because we've had the type of season that we've had."

His family stayed back in Nashville, Tenn. ? the kids are in school ? but planned to meet him in Atlanta on Thursday night for the start of the Mets' final trip. He had some close friends at the game.

Through all the tough times, Dickey pictured this type of success in his mind.

"I never abandoned hope. I always held that out," he said. "My hope always outweighed my doubt, and that's what kind of kept me going."

NOTES: Pittsburgh, which led the NL Central at the All-Star break, lost for the 20th time in 26 games and dropped to 76-80. ... Snider gave the Pirates a memory with one of the best defensive plays of the season. He dug his cleats into the chain-link fence, hooked his left arm on top of the wall in front of the Mo's Zone seats, hoisted himself up and grabbed Baxter's drive in the webbing of the glove on his right hand well about the 8-foot wall. ... Andrew McCutchen bruised his left knee on a failed attempt at a diving catch on a soft fly to center in the seventh inning. He went 0 for 4, dropping to .332 and giving up the NL batting lead to San Francisco's Buster Posey, who went 2 for 4 and is hitting .333. ... The Mets drew 2,242,803 to Citi Field this year, down from 3.15 million in 2009, 2.56 million in 2010 and 2.35 million last year. This is the team's lowest home attendance since 2.19 million at Shea Stadium in 2003. ... Mets broadcaster Keith Hernandez shaved off his mustache before the game in a charity fundraiser.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/347875155d53465d95cec892aeb06419/Article_2012-09-27-BBN-Pirates-Mets/id-0c06d79c47e441e5bfe9e7e0c2f4d416

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