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Monday, November 28, 2011
Sunday, November 27, 2011
Horrible Bosses 2011 HD 720p blu ray 1 link
Horrible Bosses 2011 HD 720p blu ray 1 link
IMDB Rating: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1499658
Genre: Comedy
Director: Seth Gordon
Cast: Jason Bateman, Charlie Day and Jason Sudeikis
File size: 1.39 GB
Run time: 105 min
File Name: HorribleBosses.2011.HD.720p.mp4
Language: English
subtitles: English/Spanish/German
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Video: What to expect from Cyber Monday
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Source: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21134540/vp/45452274#45452274
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Saturday, November 26, 2011
Talks resume with Christmas Day schedule in jeopardy (Reuters)
(Reuters) ? NBA owners and players met on Friday to try to reach an agreement that would salvage the league's Christmas Day marquee schedule.
The two sides met on Monday and reconvened on Friday afternoon in New York for a settlement conference that continued into the night.
The negotiations are the first since the players rejected the owners' last proposal on November 14, which included a 72-game schedule beginning on December 15.
Since then, the players union has been disbanded and the players filed an anti-trust lawsuit against the league in Minnesota. The league filed a suit in New York seeking to prove the lockout is legal.
Local media has reported that if the two sides reached an agreement over the weekend the NBA would open a 66-game schedule on Christmas Day, featuring an NBA Finals rematch between the defending champion Dallas Mavericks and Miami Heat.
However, if they are unable to come to a resolution the entire season is likely to be wiped out.
Any agreement would require 50 percent approval from the owners and players. Complicating the matter is that the players would have to drop their lawsuit, reform the union, and then vote to accept the deal.
Participating in the latest talks on behalf of the owners are Commissioner David Stern, deputy commissioner Adam Silver, San Antonio Spurs owner Peter Holt.
The players are represented by the leaders of the disbanded union including Billy Hunter, Derek Fisher and Mo Evans.
(Reporting by Mike Mouat in Windsor, Ontario; Editing by Peter Rutherford)
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Qualcomm challenges LCDs through new e-reader
SEOUL, South Korea (AP) ? A new electronic display is poised to challenge power-hungry LCDs after U.S. mobile chip maker Qualcomm Inc. teamed up with a South Korean bookseller to introduce a new e-reader.
The "Kyobo eReader" was unveiled this week in Seoul and will reach South Korean consumers as early as Dec. 1, Kyobo Book Centre officials said Thursday.
The e-reader features Qualcomm's 1.0 GHz "Snapdragon" processor, a custom Kyobo application based on Android and a 5.7 inch "XGA" mirasol display.
The mirasol display uses ambient light instead of its own in much the same way that a peacock's plumage gets its scintillating hues. Qualcomm's mirasols have already been used in a few Chinese and South Korean phones, and in an MP3 player on the U.S. market. The display contains tiny mirrors that consume power only when they're moving, easing battery drain. Mirasol displays also quickly change from one image to the next and show video.
The global market for e-readers is dominated by bright LCDs and grayscale "e-ink" screens. LCDs consume relatively more battery power while e-ink screens are slow to refresh.
The introduction of the e-reader jointly developed by Qualcomm and Kyobo signals increasing competition in the global market for tablets.
U.S. online retailer Amazon.com Inc. and bookseller Barnes & Noble Inc. have recently released tablets of their own, Kindle Fire and Nook Tablet, and are challenging Apple's iPad in pricing.
Qualcomm CEO Paul Jacobs noted South Koreans' near-100 percent literacy rate and digital reading skills during a launching ceremony in Seoul on Tuesday, according to the San Diego-based company. Fifteen-year-old South Koreans scored highest in their ability to absorb information from digital devices, according to a 2009 study by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. Over 80 percent of households in South Korea have broadband Internet access.
The e-reader featuring the mirasol display will be priced at 349,000 won, or $302, said Seoul-based Kyobo, South Korea's largest bookseller.
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The Change Up 2011 UNRATED.1080p.mkv HQ BluRay
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IMDB Rating: The Change-Up (2011) - IMDb
Genre: Comedy
Language: English
Director: David Dobkin
Writers: Jon Lucas, Scott Moore
Stars: Jason Bateman, Ryan Reynolds and Olivia Wilde
File size: 1.1 GB
Run time: 118 min
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Russia's Mars probe starts making regular contact
The European Space Agency reported Wednesday that a ground station in Australia has made repeated contacts with Russia's Phobos-Grunt probe, two weeks after a mysterious post-launch glitch.
The reports sparked a growing glimmer of hope for a mission that seemed as good as dead a day earlier.
The $170 million Phobos-Grunt ("Phobos-Soil") mission was designed to land on Phobos, the larger of Mars' two moons, scoop up a soil sample and return it to Earth. The spacecraft is also carrying China's first interplanetary probe, Yinghuo 1, which is supposed to be dropped off in Martian orbit.
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More space news from msnbc.com
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Astronomers?rate the habitability of alien worlds
Science editor Alan Boyle's Weblog: Which worlds beyond our own are the most habitable? Astronomers come up with two new indexes to rate alien planets and moons.
- Life and death in the galaxy next door
- Updated 103 minutes ago 11/23/2011 11:38:00 PM +00:00 Russia's Mars probe starts making regular contact
- NASA rover to look deep into Mars' past
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Astronomers?rate the habitability of alien worlds
Before its Nov. 9 launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, the Phobos-Grunt mission was heralded as a sign of Russia's resurgence in interplanetary exploration. The 13-ton spacecraft reached Earth orbit, but it did not fire its engines as scheduled to start its months-long cruise toward the Red Planet.
Since then, Russian controllers have been struggling to contact the probe, aided by ESA as well as NASA. On Tuesday, the Interfax news agency quoted Russia's deputy space chief, Vitaly Davydov, as saying that "chances to accomplish the mission are very slim."
Then ESA said its tracking station in Perth, Australia, made contact with the probe late Tuesday (around 20:25 GMT, or 3:25 p.m. ET).
ESA explained on its website that the job was particularly challenging because it was hard to get a precise fix on the spacecraft for a narrow-beam transmission, and because Phobos-Grunt's antenna was optimized to receive low-power transmissions in deep space.
"In the past few days, ESA's Perth dish was modified by the addition of a 'feedhorn' antenna at the side of the main dish so as to transmit very low-power signals over a wide angle in the hopes of triggering a response from the satellite," the space agency said.
The response came in the form of a simple confirmation from the probe that it had executed commands to switch on its transmitter.
Second contact
Later Wednesday, ESA spokesman Rene Pischel reported that the Perth station received useful telemetry from Phobos-Grunt during a subsequent pass.
"We have again established contact with the Phobos-Grunt spacecraft, we obtained telemetry reports, they are being analyzed by our colleagues from the Lavochkin Research and Production Association," the RIA Novosti news service quoted Pischel as saying.
RIA Novosti said the contact lasted only six minutes, and more data would probably be required to diagnose Phobos-Grunt's problem. NPO Lavochkin, the probe's prime developer, has been in charge of making the diagnosis.
If the probe can be revived, NBC News space analyst James Oberg said it could rank as "the biggest 'space rescue' since Apollo 13, Skylab and the iceberg space station Salyut 7."
Now what?
It's not clear what options are still available for continuing Phobos-Grunt's mission. Some reports from Russia have suggested that the opportunity for a round trip to Phobos and back has already been lost. Davydov, however, said Russian engineers had until the end of the month to fix the probe's engines and send it on a path to Phobos.
Russian scientists could fix the problem if the probe failed because of a software flaw, but some experts think that the failure was rooted in hardware that's difficult to fix.
Even if Phobos-Grunt could no longer execute its sample return mission, it could still conceivably take on a one-way trip to Mars and its moon, or head for a different destination, such as Earth's moon or an asteroid. That assumes, of course, that Phobos-Grunt's onboard systems can be fully revived.
If the mission fails, that could affect Russia's priorities for space research. The Russian space agency would more likely focus on moon research instead of studying Mars, Davydov said.
Davydov said that if engineers can't take control of the spacecraft, it could crash to Earth sometime between late December and late February. The site of the crash cannot be established more than a day in advance, he said.
"If you calculate the probability of it hitting somebody on the head, it is close to zero," he said.
More about Mars:
This report includes information from msnbc.com and The Associated Press.
? 2011 msnbc.com
Source: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/45413483/ns/technology_and_science-space/
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Friday, November 25, 2011
Bing hitches holiday hopes to Rudolph the reindeer (AP)
SAN FRANCISCO ? Like Santa Claus on that one foggy Christmas Eve, Microsoft has summoned Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer to guide some precious cargo ? a holiday marketing campaign for its Bing search engine.
The advertisements, debuting online and on TV this week, star Rudolph and other characters from the animated story about the most famous reindeer of all. The campaign is part of Microsoft's attempt to trip up Google Inc., an Internet search rival as imposing as the Abominable Snowman was before Yukon Cornelius tamed the monster.
Google has been countering with its own emotional ads throughout the year. Most of Google's ads show snippets of its dominant search engine and other products at work before swirling into the logo of the company's Chrome Web browser.
The dueling ads underscore the lucrative nature of search engines. Although visitors pay nothing to use them, search engines generate billions of dollars a year in revenue from ads posted alongside the search results.
The holiday season is a particularly opportune time for search companies because that's when people do more searches ? to find gifts online, look for party supplies and plan nights out on the town. That means more people to show ads to. Advertisers also tend to be willing to pay more per ad because they know people are in a buying mode.
To capture that audience, Microsoft and Google are both thinking outside the search box to promote their brands.
Although the text ads running alongside search results do a fine job of reeling in some customers, they still lack the broader, more visceral impact of a well-done television commercial, said Peter Daboll, chief executive of Ace Metrix, a firm that rates the effectiveness of ads.
"It's instructive that these companies who are all about the Internet and doing things in real time are actually doing these emotive ads on TV," Daboll said.
Search engines are particularly difficult to sell because the sophisticated technology required to make them work isn't something "you can touch or feel in a store, so you need to bring some emotion to it," said Sean Carver, Bing's advertising director. "The storytelling is important."
Microsoft Corp. licensed the rights to the characters from Rudolph's 47-year-old holiday special after convincing their owners that the Bing commercials would add an endearing chapter to the reindeer's story. The rights to Rudolph and the rest of the cast are owned by the children of Robert L. May, who wrote the story in 1939 while working as a copywriter at the Montgomery Ward department store (May's brother-in-law, Johnny Marks, later wrote the famous song).
Microsoft is far more experienced at marketing than Google.
For one thing, it's 23 years older than Google, which was founded in 1998.
More important, Google co-founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin were so contemptuous of traditional marketing campaigns that the company never bothered to advertise its search engine on national TV until the 2010 Super Bowl. Spending millions to be a part of TV's annual advertising extravaganza was so out of character that Eric Schmidt, Google's CEO at the time, heralded the Super Bowl ad with a post on Twitter that concluded "hell has indeed frozen over."
Since that breakthrough, Google has caught the advertising bug. Without breaking down its total ad budget, Google disclosed that it has spent $583 million more on television and other advertising during the first nine months of this year than it did at the same time last year.
The investment has won Google some respect in the advertising industry.
Google took five of the 10 top spots for most effective national TV ads that promote websites, based on Ace Metrix's study of viewer reactions to the commercials. Topping the list is an ad showing how a father used Google services such as Gmail to create an electronic journal of his daughter Sophie's life.
Three Bing ads also ranked in the 10 most effective, but it also had two ads on the least effective list.
"There doesn't seem to be a very coherent creative pattern to the Bing ads," Daboll said. "It's kind of hit and miss."
There's no mistaking the common theme in the four Rudolph ads produced for the Bing promotion. The ads are all done in the same stop-motion puppet animation used in the original 1964 TV special. One features Bumble the Abominable Snowman using Bing to get ideas for a more fearsome roar. Another shows some of the characters turning to Bing for suggestions on a vacation that leads to a getaway on an island of misfit toys.
Microsoft has bought seven slots on national TV to run those four 30-second ads. The company is going for high impact rather than high frequency and is placing those ads during holiday-themed specials, starting with "The Simpsons" on the Fox network on Thanksgiving night and ending on Dec. 21 during "South Park" on the Comedy Channel. Microsoft isn't buying time during the Rudolph special, though, which CBS is broadcasting next Tuesday and Dec. 10.
The ads also will be shown in more than 200 movie theaters before holiday films and will be available online beginning Wednesday.
Microsoft declined to say how much it's spending on the Rudolph campaign.
Aaron Lilly, a Microsoft executive who helps conceive Bing's promotions, came up with the idea to build holiday ads around the Rudolph story two years ago. It didn't happen then because the Aflac insurance company had already bought licensing rights to the characters for that holiday season.
The ads will be a success for Microsoft if they help the company gain more ground and cut its losses in Internet search, an area that remains weak for Microsoft even after years of investing in better technology.
While the Xbox video game console and familiar software such as Windows and Office provide most of Microsoft's earnings, Bing remains a financial drain. The online division anchored by Bing has suffered operating losses totaling $7 billion since June 2008, when Microsoft introduced the latest overhaul of its search engine.
Google's share of the Internet search market has increased since Bing's debut, according to the research firm comScore. Google now processes about two out of three search requests in the U.S. and rakes in an even larger share of the revenue that rolls when people click on ads next to search results.
Bing's market share has climbed from about 9 percent in June 2008 to roughly 15 percent in October, but most of those gains have come at the expense of Yahoo Inc., which hired Microsoft to run most of its search technology two years ago.
For Google, the ads are aimed at not only maintaining its dominance in search but also driving adoption of other Google products, including its Chrome browser. Google says Chrome now has 200 million users worldwide, up from about 120 million at the end of last year. Despite those gains, Chrome still trails Microsoft's Internet Explorer and the Mozilla's Firefox.
But Chrome has been able to narrow the gap separating it from Internet Explorer more than Bing has been able to do in its pursuit of Google in search. Bing is still hoping to emulate Rudolph, a one-time laughingstock who overcame the skeptics to leap of the front of the pack.
___
Online:
http://www.bing.com/videos/watch/video/bing-originals-bumble-less/1vqjkdrpj
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90% The Descendants
All Critics (123) | Top Critics (40) | Fresh (111) | Rotten (12)
With so many balls in the air the temptation is to rush from one plot strand to another, but Payne takes the opposite approach. He also captures the complexity of emotional reactions that grief stirs.
It's a lovely, heartfelt character study of common, everyday people trapped on the horns of an uncommon but not unheard-of dilemma.
The latest exhibit in Payne's careful dissection of the beached male, which runs from Matthew Broderick's character in "Election" to Jack Nicholson's in "About Schmidt" and Paul Giamatti's in "Sideways."
This mature, well-acted dramatic comedy is deeply satisfying, maybe even cathartic.
A tough, tender, observant, exquisitely nuanced portrait of mixed emotions at their most confounding and profound -- all at play within a deliciously damp, un-touristy Hawaii that's at once lush and lovely to look at.
A splendid comedy-drama about a father coping with his comatose wife and difficult daughters represents high points for George Clooney and Alexander Payne.
In the hands of writer-director Alexander Payne, Clooney has rarely seemed so much at home.
There are ample opportunities for the film to soak in pathos, righteousness, farce, or pictorialism, and Payne manages to nod at those pitfalls without falling into them.
An emotionally ennobling film that wears its compassion on the sleeve of its ugly Hawaiian print shirts.
Payne displays a knack for both perfect casting and using his lead actor in sometimes unconventional, unexpected ways
Director Alexander Payne prefers to start a movie with one strike against him. He always picks a dislikable protagonist... Then, as he slowly gives characters self-awareness, he gives us reasons to watch and care about them.
In playing an everyman stranded between anger and duty, Clooney earns an emotional payoff that a lesser actor would simply demand.
An introspective and heartwarming film, unafraid to convey its story with pleasing simplicity.
It's Clooney and Woodley's movie, as they become a team before our eyes.
I kept expecting it to get better, but it just sort of did its thing and called it a day.
A family drama whose distinction comes primarily from its nuances and subtleties.
Director and co-writer Alexander Payne again shows the most acute and perceptive understanding of the American psyche of any current director.
Flawless in the still manner it approaches crippling encounters with grief and disgust, dryly expressing the necessary unraveling of a distracted man. The Descendents is simply terrific, profound yet understated.
Payne has a particular skill for making movie stars seem like normal people, and the resolute normalcy of the cast helps to show Hawaii not as a resort paradise, but as a place like any other where people live, work, love, and die.
Payne continues to live up to his name as a wry observer of modern American crises.
Even as Payne's weakest film, The Descendants is still worth seeing
I understand Clooney is playing a detached father and husband, but there's no explanation why a financially well-off man basically without a job has no clue about his wife and children.
More Critic ReviewsSource: http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/the_descendants_2011/
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Hot Wheels Video Racer Micro Camera Car
Film the world from the perspective of a race car with the Hot Wheels Video Racer Micro Camera Car ($59.99 list). The Video Racer is the only 1/64 scale Hot Wheels car that doubles as an action camera. Download the free Video Racer editing software to upload your videos and share them with your friends.
The Hot Wheels Video Racer Micro Camera Car allows you to race on any Hot Wheels track while filming from the "driver's" point of view. The built-in LCD screen on the undercarriage displays instant playback. The Video Racer's video camera can record 12 minutes of video at up to 30 frames per second. You can edit the copy with the included Hot Wheels Video Racer software.
Use the Video Racer as an action-cam by mounting it on bikes, skateboards, or helmets with the included clips and straps.
Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/ziffdavis/pcmag/~3/BKCGgeAmzQY/0,2817,2396677,00.asp
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Thursday, November 24, 2011
Adwatch: Misleading Romney ad suggests Obama doesn't want to talk about economy (Star Tribune)
Penguin Reverses Course For Now On Kindle Lending
SAN FRANCISCO ? One of the country's largest publishers, Penguin Group (USA), is temporarily restoring libraries' ability to loan their e-books for Amazon.com's Kindle ? but only through the end of the year.
The publisher backtracked Wednesday after saying it was informed by Amazon.com Inc. that the online retailer wasn't aware of Penguin's agreement with Overdrive, a leading supplier of e-books to libraries.
Penguin, which is based in New York, had suspended making new e-books available to libraries and said it won't allow libraries to loan any e-books for the Kindle due to unspecified security concerns.
Amazon, based in Seattle, allows Kindle users to borrow e-books from local libraries through a partnership with OverDrive. The partnership vastly increases the Kindle's presence in libraries and encourages patrons to visit Amazon's website and buy books.
Penguin asked OverDrive to disable its "Get for Kindle" function on Penguin books on Monday, and OverDrive said it and Penguin were "in the process of looking at new terms" for libraries.
Now, Penguin says the companies are all working together to "address Penguin's concerns" by the end of 2011.
Amazon declined to comment.
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Fed considers more clarity on interest rate policy (AP)
WASHINGTON ? Federal Reserve policymakers this month discussed how they could give businesses and investors more information about what might trigger an increase in interest rates. But the Fed held off making any changes, according to minutes of the Nov. 1-2 meeting.
A panel headed by Vice Chairman Janet Yellen is exploring ways to provide more information on future central bank moves. More clarity on interest rate policy could help reassure investors and businesses that rates will stay low.
At its August meeting, the Fed said it planned to keep short-term rates near zero until at least mid-2013, as long as economic growth remained weak.
The Fed has kept its key short-term interest at a record low since December 2008. That is the rate that banks charge on overnight loans and it serves as the benchmark for millions of business and consumer loans.
After its November meeting, the Fed sketched a bleaker outlook for the U.S. economy, which it predicted would grow much more slowly and face higher unemployment than it had estimated in June.
The Fed announced no new policy actions after the meeting. But the gloomier forecast increased the likelihood that it would take new steps soon.
Some economists think the Fed could announce after its Dec. 13 meeting a plan to buy mortgage-backed securities, which could directly support the depressed housing market by lowering loan rates. Another option would be launching a third round of Treasury bond purchases, similar to the $600 billion program that the Fed brought to a close in June.
The decision to leave policy unchanged in November was approved on a 9-1 vote. Charles Evans, the president of the Chicago Federal Reserve Bank, dissented after pushing for stronger efforts to try to boost the economy.
The vote was a shift from the previous two Fed meetings when three members had dissented for the opposite reason. They opposed the Fed's decisions to make changes in an effort to bolster growth. They argued those moves to increase the risks of future inflation.
After the September meeting, the central bank announced that it would shuffle its holdings of Treasury securities to try to further lower long-term interest rates.
In November, the Fed downgraded its outlook for the economy. It predicted growth of no more than 1.7 percent this year and 2.7 percent in 2012. Both are below what's needed to lower the unemployment rate, which has been stuck near 9 percent since the recession officially ended.
The Fed doesn't see that changing much. It predicts the unemployment rate will average 8.6 percent at the end of next year.
At a news conference after the meeting, Bernanke said the pace of economic growth is "frustratingly slow" and said that the central bank remained "prepared to take action as appropriate to make sure the recovery continues.
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Lyneborg bot carves models of magnetic fields, dares the future to have a look (video)
Lyneborg bot carves models of magnetic fields, dares the future to have a look (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 22 Nov 2011 19:26:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Wednesday, November 23, 2011
Google Search for iPad Receives an Interface Overhaul, Instant Search, and More [Video]
! Google's Search app just received a nice update for iPad, bringing some nice interface enhancements. This includes Google Instant, which is better late than never, but you'll probably find the other stuff more exciting. For example, you can load a web page in a side tab after you search and then swipe back to your search results to look for other pages while that side tab is loading. The app also features a pretty slick image viewer that's in a similar style to Apple's cover flow but a bit more practical. If you want to look up any of your past searches you can with a visual search history browser. You also get easier access to existing search tools and other Google Apps.
This update is available now, for free, in the iTunes App Store. Check out the video above for a demo.
Google for iPad | iTunes App Store
You can follow Adam Dachis, the author of this post, on Twitter, Google+, and Facebook. ?Twitter's the best way to contact him, too.
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Moody's: France's rating outlook at risk
PARIS?? Moody's warned France on Monday that a sustained rise in its debt yields coupled with weakening economic growth could harm its ratings outlook, fuelling concern the euro zone's second largest economy might lose its AAA status.
Worries about a high fiscal deficit and banks' exposure to other troubled European sovereign debt have drawn France into the firing line of the bloc's crisis, despite the government's insistence it would do everything necessary to protect its top rating.
Moody's announced in mid-October it could place France's AAA rating on negative outlook in three months if the costs for helping to bailout French banks and other euro zone members overstretched its budget.
Dow falls over 300 points amid debt load fearsOn Monday, the rating agency said that a worsening in the French bond market -- amid fears the sovereign debt crisis was spreading to the euro zone's core -- posed a threat to its credit outlook, though not at this stage to its actual rating.
"Elevated borrowing costs persisting for an extended period would amplify the fiscal challenges the French government faces amid a deteriorating growth outlook, with negative credit implications," Senior Credit Officer Alexander Kockerbeck said in Moody's Weekly Credit Outlook dated Nov. 21.
The premium investors charge on French 10-year debt compared to the German equivalent was up around 20 basis points at 163 bps following publication of Moody's report but remained well short of the 202 bps hit last week, a new euro-era high.
Moody's said that at last week's record level, France pays nearly twice as much as Germany for long-term funding, adding that a 100 basis point increase in yields roughly equates to an additional three billion euros in yearly funding costs.
Many investors have already discounted a downgrade to France's AAA rating, given expectations its economy will enter recession next year.
"In the current environment, people are expecting France to be downgraded," said Olivier Bizimana of Morgan Stanley, saying it appeared likely Moody's would revise down France's stable outlook if nothing changed. "The fiscal position is probably worse than other triple A countries and on top of that you don't have the back up of a central bank."
Trapped
France's AFT debt agency said on Monday that, despite a recent increase in the spread of French yields over benchmark German debt, its average medium- and long-term financing cost remained close to historically low levels.
"For the first 11 months of the year, it stood at 2.78 percent, its (second) lowest level since the creation of the euro, after 2.53 percent observed in 2010," AFT told Reuters in a statement.
Economists, however, said that France risked being sucked into a "fiscal trap" where slowing growth necessitated more austerity measures which in turn slowed growth even further.
"If on top of that you have interest rates which are increasing it means you have a vicious cycle where it's almost impossible to stabilise the trajectory of the debt and that could add pressure on the ratings," Bizimana said.
France's government recently cut its growth forecast for next year to 1 percent, from 1.75 percent, but most private economists still consider that far too optimistic.
Budget Minister Valerie Pecresse said the government would not take further austerity measures, after announcing a 65 billion euro package of cuts this month, saying a budgetary buffer of 6 billion euros next year would give it breathing room even if growth underperformed.
"We must above all avoid taking measures that plunge the country into recession," Pecresse said.
But Moody's said that slowing growth combined with rising interest rates would make it hard for France to hit its target of cutting the fiscal deficit from an estimated 5.7 percent at the end of this year to an EU ceiling of 3 percent by 2013.
"The French social model cannot be financed if the French economy's potential is not preserved. With further weakening GDP growth the political scope for the government to generate further savings in this case would be tested," Monday's note from Moody's said.
In a research report on Monday, JP Morgan's David Mackie said the stress in core euro zone bond markets increased the need for a dramatic response from policymakers.
"Not surprisingly all eyes are on the ECB, as the only institution able to step in quickly and decisively," he said, adding the ECB would start to intervene in the bond markets of even core countries.
Copyright 2011 Thomson Reuters. Click for restrictions.
Source: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/45385119/ns/business-world_business/
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Gates to testify in $1B lawsuit against Microsoft
SALT LAKE CITY (AP) ? Microsoft's Bill Gates is set to testify in a billion-dollar antitrust lawsuit accusing the software maker of duping a competitor in violation of federal law.
The case against Microsoft has been ongoing in federal court in Salt Lake City for about a month.
Utah-based Novell Inc. claims Microsoft duped the company into thinking its WordPerfect writing application would be included in the Windows '95 rollout.
Novell says it was later forced to sell WordPerfect for a $1.2 billion loss.
Microsoft lawyers will open their case Monday with testimony from Gates.
They say he will testify he dumped WordPerfect because it threatened to crash Windows '95 and wouldn't be compatible with future versions.
Novell claims it was tricked, but Microsoft lawyers say the claims are groundless. They have sought a dismissal.
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Tuesday, November 22, 2011
Three ways shopping apps save you money
Mary Altaffer / AP file
Whether you?re planning on shopping in stores or online, apps for iPhone, iPad and Android devices can give you peace of mind when it comes to making purchases. Find out when to buy, get alerts when prices drop, price comparison shop from within stores, even browse the Sunday circulars for coupons and deals. Here are my favorites.
Occipital LLC
Compare prices
I always question whether I?m getting the best deal when I?m shopping in a store. But with a price comparison app like ShopSavvy (free in iTunes and Android Market and iTunes), I can check the price at local stores and online retailers easily.
I simply input the product name or scan its barcode and the app will pull up pricing at local and online retailers (including Amazon, which is key for me since I get free 2-day shipping with my Amazon Prime membership).
For local retailers, I check to see if there?s a blue dot, which means the product is in stock. And if I?m just browsing, I can always go back to a list of the products I?ve looked up. Listings have the price and a photo.
RedLaser (free in Android Market and iTunes) is another great choice. I find its barcode scanning works better in challenging lighting conditions than ShopSavvy, but it doesn?t pull in regular Amazon pricing, just Amazon Marketplace. But you can always download Price Check by Amazon (free in iTunes and Android Market) to supplement.
Decide Inc.
Decide when to buy
I hate to see a product I?ve just bought go on sale. And with Black Friday and Cyber Monday right around the corner, it?s easy to second guess when the right time is to buy a product. The best protection is to use an app that helps you decide when it?s the right time to buy.
My favorite app for electronics is the Decide.com app (free in iTunes). It shows price history, lets you know when prices drop, alerts you when there?s a new model and predicts if the price will rise or drop. For other product categories, check out LetShop ($1.99 in iTunes), which provides price history, price comparison (including Amazon and eBay) and price drop alerts.
Find deals and coupons
dealnews.com, Inc.
This time of year, I don't like to buy anything without checking to see if there's a coupon or deal to be found. And Dealnews (free in iTunes ?and Android Market) makes it easy for online or offline retailers. Keep tabs on favorite product categories, like toys or electronics, and even narrow it by retailer. If I find a particular item I like, I can save it to ?my deals? for future reference or even buy it from within the app.
For Sunday circular browsers, I suggest GeoQcops (free in iTunes). It shows the scanned pages along with text describing the deals.
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Pre-gaming With Pat Is Legendary [VIDEO] : COED Magazine
November 21, 2011 ? ? Posted in Collegiate, football, Football - NCAA, Funny Stuff, homepage, Lifestyle, Party, Sports, Travel & Money, Video
I?m a huge football fan. I love the game so much that I wept like a little baby when I was asked to quit my college team. Part of me regrets going to Hopkins where the squad was D-3 and not some big time school like Michigan. It?s gotta be one of the greatest experiences in the world to be amongst 100k like-minded brethren. This video from 23-year-old up-and-coming comedian Pat Stansik confirms what I already assumed: that U of M knows how to pre-game like legends for a football game. I wouldn?t say I was a huge Wolverines fan, but after seeing this and after hearing the blue and maize crowd actually count down the play clock for Denard Robinson when it went down Saturday, I might just commit my first born right now.
For more of Pat, check out his:
SOURCE: YouTube
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Source: http://coedmagazine.com/2011/11/21/funny-pre-gaming-with-pat-legendary-video/
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Regular Sex May Be Key to Happy Marriage for Seniors (HealthDay)
MONDAY, Nov. 21 (HealthDay News) -- Among older married Americans, an active sex life is associated with greater happiness with their marriages and with life in general, according to a new study.
The finding is based on an analysis of the responses of 238 married people 65 and older who took part in the 2004 General Social Surveys.
Sexual-activity frequency significantly predicted both overall and marital happiness, and this association remained even after factors such as age, gender, health status and financial satisfaction were taken into account.
Nearly 60 percent of those who had sex more than once a month were very happy with life in general, compared with 40 percent of those who had no sex in the last year. Nearly 80 percent of those who had sex more than once a month were very happy with their marriage, compared with 59 percent of those who had no sex in the last year.
The findings were presented Sunday at the annual meeting of the Gerontological Society of America in Boston.
"This study will help open the lines of communication and spark interest in developing 'outside-the-box' approaches to dealing with resolvable issues that limit or prevent older adults from participating in sexual activity," study author Adrienne Jackson, an assistant professor at Florida Agricultural and Mechanical University, said in a society news release.
"Highlighting the relationship between sex and happiness will help us in developing and organizing specific sexual-health interventions for this growing segment of our population," Jackson added.
To assess frequency of sexual activity, survey participants were asked the following question: "About how many times did you have sex during the last 12 months? By 'sex' we mean vaginal, oral or anal sex."
Participants were also asked the following questions to assess general happiness, and marital happiness, respectively: "Taken all together, how would you say things are these days -- would you say that you are very happy, pretty happy, or not too happy?"; "Taking things all together, how would you describe your marriage? Would you say that your marriage is very happy, pretty happy, or not too happy?"
Because this study was presented at a medical meeting, the data and conclusions should be viewed as preliminary until published in a peer-reviewed journal.
More information
The U.S. National Institute on Aging has more about sexuality in later life.
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Cranbrook Art Museum Renovation Brings Old Favorites Back To The Public (PHOTOS)
BLOOMFIELD HILLS, MICH. -- On Nov. 11, the Cranbrook Art Museum opened its doors to the public after two years of renovations.
Every piece in Cranbrook's collection is now accessible to the public, and pieces are stored in such a way that they resonate with each other even sitting in orderly rows on shelves. But what really makes Cranbrook advanced in the "open storage movement" is that the collections wing is designed with several teaching areas, including a seminar room that was specifically designed to hold the maximum class size in Detroit Public Schools.
"I do not know if any other museum in the nation has designed their most sacred vault as a space you can teach in," said Greg Wittkopp, director of the museum.
An institution both for southeast Michigan and the Arts and Crafts movement, the Cranbrook Art Museum was founded by Henry Booth and designed by the Finnish midcentury modernist architect Eliel Saarinen, opening in its current building in 1942.
But its now 6,000-work collection outgrew the available exhibition space, which couldn't hold more than 100 pieces. Many pieces have only been on display once or twice in the last decade.
The museum raised $22 million for an innovative 20,000 sq. ft. Collection Wing designed to work in harmony with Saarinen's building. The Collection Wing is designed with space for the continuously expanding collection, with 25 to 30 percent growth anticipated in the next 25 years.
Wittkop was inspired by the Schaulager, an extensive private contemporary art collection in Basel, Switzerland where each room contains all the acquired works from a single year. Each piece is displayed exactly as it was intended to be seen by the artists, including individual screening rooms for video and film works.
Wittkop wanted to take the Schaulager's innovative combination of storage and museum and apply it to his public teaching institution.
With multiple classroom settings, the Collection Wing will be an invaluable resource for researchers, students at the Cranbrook Art Academy and Cranbrook students at lower levels.
The museum is currently searching for an Education Curator, so the full extent of educational programs has yet to be realized. "We haven?t added on the staff we need quickly enough," Wittkopp said.
But several educational ideas are in development. Wittkopp and the museum are working with Cranbrook Kingswood Upper School to develop lessons for a Memoir in 20th Century Literature class to be held every two weeks in the Collections Wing. A pilot version is being created for a class at Cranbrook, with plans to export it to other schools in the metro Detroit area.
The museum also received a Masco Corporation grant to develop a program that will use a collection of Detroit-based material with third graders from the city of Detroit. It is being designed to meet educational benchmarks and be integrated into their regional history lesson plans. The museum is in the process of raising money for buses to bring Detroit students to the museum, a program planned to start in the spring of 2012.
Cranbrook Art Museum kicked off its reopening with the exhibition "No Object is an Island: New Dialogues with the Cranbrook Collection," co-curated by Wittkopp and Sarah Margolis-Pineo, the museum?s Jeanne and Ralph Graham Collections Fellow.
"I can honestly say that I'm enthusiastic about each and every object in the show," Wittkop said. "Each piece in the show is a killer object."
"No Object is an Island" features 50 pieces from the collection paired with 50 contemporary art pieces, many created specifically for the show, and includes work from Cranbrook Academy of Art professors. The works are arranged to play off each other and grouped in six thematic categories: Craft, Site, Comfort, Resistance, Process, and Fiction.
"We wanted to do a show that demonstrated the exceptional quality of the collection by showing a selection of it," said Reed Kroloff, director of Cranbrook Academy of Art. "But more importantly for us, we wanted to be able to demonstrate how the collection becomes even more powerful when it's put in the context of continuing to make art and design, continuing to inspire new generations."
Check out some of Wittkopp's favorite pieces in the Cranbrook permanent collection below.
No Object is an Island runs through March 25, 2012. To celebrate the opening, Cranbrook has had ongoing events and tours of the Collection Wing for the first 11 days, ending on Monday, Nov. 21 with Closing Dialogue: Cranbrook Academy of Art's Ten Artists-in-Residence at 5 p.m.
'The Three Perfumes'
1?of?7
The Three Perfumes by Margaret Macdonald Mackintosh is watercolor on velum. "It has a very translucent quality to it, the watercolor itself. You really feel like you are seeing through it to the surface beyond," Wittkop said. "What's thrilling about this piece is to be able to document the career of this remarkable artist who is often lost in the shadows of her better known husband [Scottish architect Charles Rennie Mackintosh]." The Three Perfumes hasn't been on view at Cranbrook since 2004. It is now stored in the Stoner Print Study Room. Margaret Macdonald Mackintosh, English, 1864-1933 1912, Watercolor and pencil on vellum Collection of Cranbrook Art Museum, Bloomfield Hills, Michigan Gift of George Gough Booth and Helen Scripps Booth Photographer: R. H. Hensleigh
The Three Perfumes by Margaret Macdonald Mackintosh is watercolor on velum. "It has a very translucent quality to it, the watercolor itself. You really feel like you are seeing through it to the surface beyond," Wittkop said."What's thrilling about this piece is to be able to document the career of this remarkable artist who is often lost in the shadows of her better known husband [Scottish architect Charles Rennie Mackintosh]."
The Three Perfumes hasn't been on view at Cranbrook since 2004. It is now stored in the Stoner Print Study Room.
Margaret Macdonald Mackintosh, English, 1864-1933
1912, Watercolor and pencil on vellum
Collection of Cranbrook Art Museum, Bloomfield Hills, Michigan
Gift of George Gough Booth and Helen Scripps Booth
Photographer: R. H. Hensleigh
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'The Three Perfumes'
The Three Perfumes by Margaret Macdonald Mackintosh is watercolor on velum. "It has a very translucent quality to it, the watercolor itself. You really feel like you are seeing through it to the surface beyond," Wittkop said. "What's thrilling about this piece is to be able to document the career of this remarkable artist who is often lost in the shadows of her better known husband [Scottish architect Charles Rennie Mackintosh]." The Three Perfumes hasn't been on view at Cranbrook since 2004. It is now stored in the Stoner Print Study Room. Margaret Macdonald Mackintosh, English, 1864-1933 1912, Watercolor and pencil on vellum Collection of Cranbrook Art Museum, Bloomfield Hills, Michigan Gift of George Gough Booth and Helen Scripps Booth Photographer: R. H. Hensleigh
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Monday, November 21, 2011
Crystal Cathedral sees risky future without church (AP)
SANTA ANA, Calif. ? The sale of the Crystal Cathedral to the Catholic church could mark an end to the storied televangelist ministry broadcast around the world that came crashing down in hard times.
While the church's spiritual leaders vow to carry on in a new location, the cathedral's own financial expert says it is impossible to see the future once the congregation loses its famed, glass-spired home.
What began more than 50 years ago as a weekly prayer service atop a drive-in movie theater snack bar in Orange County evolved into a televangelist empire broadcasting from the striking sanctuary that became an icon of the Rev. Robert H. Schuller's ministry.
The church raked in millions in donations through its "Hour of Power" television program to pay for the elaborate building and 40-acre grounds in Garden Grove filled with Biblical messages and statues. But it saw revenue plummet in 2008, and despite massive budget cuts, sought bankruptcy protection last year.
Now, congregants question the future of the church without the building they have come to love ? and that has given the ministry its name. And many worry the "Hour of Power" broadcast ? the source of 70 percent of the church's revenue ? is doomed once the congregation moves to a new location that is unfamiliar to viewers and pales in comparison to the glimmering church that lets worshippers see the sky and swaying palm trees through its glass-paned walls.
"People think the ministry isn't about a building. Usually they're right. But that one represents Jesus Christ, positive thinking, and if you believe in yourself and believe in the Lord there isn't anything you can't do," Sherwood Oklejas, a congregant who opposed the diocese's bid, told a federal bankruptcy court judge at a hearing on the church's future. "If the ministry no longer has the Crystal Cathedral to operate from, in my opinion, it will not last at all."
The Crystal Cathedral is selling its property to help pay creditors more than $51 million and emerge from federal bankruptcy protection. After weeks of intense bidding, a federal bankruptcy judge on Thursday night approved the church's sale to the Roman Catholic Diocese of Orange. The diocese plans to use the building designed by renowned architect Philip Johnson as a long-sought countywide cathedral.
Oklejas is one of many congregants who rallied for the church to accept a competing bid on the property from Orange County's Chapman University that would have paid up to $59 million and let them continue using the church ? which they see as critical to their ability to survive.
But the ministry's board of directors flip-flopped at the last minute and instead backed a $57.5 million offer from the diocese, arguing the sale will preserve the campus as a religious, not an educational, institution ? as donors intended.
Under the plan, the Crystal Cathedral will be able to lease the building for up to three years, but then must move to a new location, possibly a smaller Catholic church up the street that the diocese will vacate.
Crystal Cathedral leaders insist the ministry founded by Schuller under the auspices of the Reformed Church in America will survive even without the landmark building, noting its educational programs and efforts to help the homeless will continue ? just at a new location.
"Crystal Cathedral church is not a building. A church is comprised of people who are dedicated to practicing through words and works," senior pastor Sheila Schuller Coleman ? the daughter of the founder ? said in a statement.
Church attorney Marc Winthrop said the congregation could even keep its name, though U.S. Bankruptcy Court Judge Robert N. Kwan said he didn't see how that would be possible.
Losing the church is an especially hard hit because the congregation's identity is so tied to the building, said William Dyrness, a professor of theology and culture at Fuller Theological Seminary.
But religion experts said the Crystal Cathedral's troubles run far deeper than the loss of the campus and stem from Schuller's retirement, an ill-fated attempt to hand over the ministry to his son and the church's failure to adapt to attract younger worshippers.
On the contrary, some said losing the building will force the ministry to do some much needed soul-searching on how it can remain relevant.
"If they stayed in place, they were doomed to slowly dissolve into nothing over time. And if there's any hope for them at all, it is a kind of rebirth out of these ashes," said Scott Thumma, a professor of sociology of religion at the Hartford Institute for Religious Research.
"That Crystal Cathedral has in fact encapsulated them and held them in a crystal prison," he said.
Moving forward, a key challenge will be shoring up the Crystal Cathedral's finances. The church should emerge with close to $7 million in surplus cash from the sale of the property, according to an attorney for the committee of unsecured creditors. But many congregants question whether the "Hour of Power" program can continue to draw viewers ? and donations ? without the iconic setting.
"It's virtually impossible to know what will happen to ministry revenue if the campus changes hands to a non-Protestant religious institution," Michael VanderLey, the church's financial adviser, told the bankruptcy court. "It's just a very uncertain set of potential revenues."
In 2008, the church's revenues plummeted amid a decline in donations and ticket sales for holiday pageants. Church officials blamed the recession, but some experts said the church's leadership struggles alienated members.
VanderLey said the decline in revenue appears to be slowing and the church is poised to reel in $3.5 million in December ? a key month for revenue ? down from $4 million in the same month last year.
But some churchgoers say their ranks are dwindling and will only get smaller once the ministry leaves its beloved building.
Dante Gebel, pastor of the church's Hispanic ministry, wrote on his Facebook page that his growing Spanish-speaking congregation will likely need a larger venue in three years' time such as a nearby stadium or convention center, and he stressed the group's independence from the English-language church.
These days, the Crystal Cathedral's parking lot is empty when worshippers pull up to attend Sunday services, though it was packed just a few years ago, said congregant Rob Ekno, who questioned whether the ministry can survive.
"Anything is possible," he said. "Obviously, we're dealing with a church here, so it's all in God's hands."
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