Ten Questions: A B2B Online Community Readiness Checklist

A wide range of B2B firms are considering the need for creating and operating their own online customer communities. In the B2B information technology sector, customer support, knowledge-sharing and product enhancement communities are common. For example, nearly two-thirds (65%) of 207 firms surveyed in 2010 by the research firm ITSMA  said they participated in private online communities hosted by the companies which sell them computer hardware, software and related services.  However, a broader 2011 study by B2BMagazine found that only 22% of surveyed B2B firms had online customer care communities.

While the prospect of launching and running an online community for customers or partners makes good business sense, B2B firms are often daunted by the disparity between the attention garnered by popular consumer sites and the less-exciting reality that a B2B online community will never generate the traffic volume of a B2C community. But that???s as it should be. B2B customer communities are not destinations for chit-chat, sharing cat video links or collecting ???likes??? for a dancing competition contestant. They???re not that kind of place.

Online communities amp; customer satisfaction B2B online communities serve their host organizations by offering key business constituencies ??? customers, partners, suppliers ??? even other firms in the same industry ? a private, gated virtual space where business information can be safely shared with other decision-makers. Most business-to-business companies depend on building relationships with their customers to create sustainable returns and a foundation for long-term growth. Customer satisfaction is essential to generating repeat business, and online communities help B2B companies learn about and respond to current and future customer needs ??? the key to customer satisfaction.

How does a B2B online community do this? Consider these examples:

?       Distributed customer support. Customers get more value from their product and service purchases through collaborative problem-solving, shared insights and expertise from outside experts ??? other customers ??? as well as from inside sources.

?       Thought leadership and guidance. Listening to and discussing shared concerns with customers engages them in the ongoing process of building trust and sustaining the firm???s reputation. Online communities do this on a 7#215;24 basis across the globe ??? no need to wait until the next trade show or customer summit.

?       Customer-influenced product and service development. Many a B2B company has identified a promising market opportunity by listening carefully and understanding what customers are saying among themselves about what???s missing from existing products or services. Communities offer an excellent source of data to inform new product concepts and speed the research and development phase for in-house innovations and product development. Beta testing, preliminary market responses ??? the list goes on.

For all these reasons and more, B2B companies often start to explore if an online community is right for them. But the truth is, despite their value, not every firm is ready to start, build and maintain a successful B2B online community.
Here???s a ten-question checklist any B2B firm should consider before embarking on an online customer community initiative.

About your customers or partners:

• Are they willing to share information with other customers because they do not compete directly with each other?
•  Are you and your customers in a fast-moving industry, where access to up-to-date information is a burden or challenge?
• Do they use a ???platform??? or enabling product or service, and need to communicate with other users about how best to capitalize on it?
•   Are they willing to participate in off-line user groups or in-person customer summits?

About your customer???s business problem and how your product or service helps solve it:

•  Are the customer???s business issues critical, ongoing and ever-changing?
•   Does the knowledge for solving the business problems become obsolete quickly?
•  Do they gain major value by learning from the experiences of other customers and/or have an urgent need to share their experiences?

About your products amp; services

• Do customers use your firm???s offering as a platform or a key part of a solution to bigger problems?
•   Do your customers need suppliers to make continual enhancements to your product?
• Are product or service upgrades a key revenue generator for your organization?

If you said ???Yes!??? to nine or all ten ??? what are you waiting for? Get that B2B online community launched, pronto.  Four to eight positive responses suggests there???s some ???there??? there. Under four positives may mean your current customer types and product mix does not require much ??? if any ??? customer relationship management. Perhaps you should ask them about this?

Source: http://www.allennelsonrealtor.com/?p=2844

fidel castro rick santorum ozzie guillen castro comments phish gluten free diet barry zito mac virus

Investing in infrastructure ? Your Money - CNN.com Blogs

About this Show

They are the biggest issues in your life: Your job, your savings, your home, and your debt."Your Money" breaks down the business news of the week and shows you how it impacts your bottom line. Saturdays at 1 p.m. ET and Sundays at 3 p.m. ET

About Ali Velshi | Send Feedback | Subscribe

Source: http://yourmoney.blogs.cnn.com/2012/09/28/investing-in-infrastructure/

jason whitlock beach boys tony bennett joe walsh the civil wars paul mccartney duggar miscarriage

Requesting scholars for a Dark Souls rp

So, basically I really want to create a Dark Souls roleplay because I feel it is something many people who are fans of the title will be attracted to and I think some really intense rp can come from it, the thing is I've been giving this some though for a couple of days now and I just can't come up with a cohesive story that will do a popular title such as Dark Souls justice. That's where you come in if you think you can help, I need someone that I can collaborate with to create an epic story for a Dark Souls rp I'm dying to create. PM me if you wish to engage in close collaboration with me, or just post your ideas here and we can weed out ones that simply will not work, and put finishing touches on any ideas with real potential.

If I do get a really awesome idea that I can roll with rest assured that the person will receive his or her due credit, and if they choose to be apart of the rp if it does happen they will get priority over all others, meaning they get first picks at whatever characters are needed for the rp, now matter how great or how small their roles.

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/RolePlayGateway/~3/0zZrt_1jjBY/viewtopic.php

rock salt david letterman march of dimes james randi wargames blake griffin dunk florida primary

Swimmer Ryan Lochte picks training over Tinseltown

FILE - In this Sunday, Sept. 16, 2012 file photo, Ryan Lochte arrives at the ALMA Awards in Pasadena, Calif. With his camera-ready good looks, quirky catchphrases and funky fashion choices, swimmer Ryan Lochte parlayed the five medals he won at the 2012 Olympic Games into a bourgeoning media career. (Photo by Jordan Strauss/Invision/AP, File)

FILE - In this Sunday, Sept. 16, 2012 file photo, Ryan Lochte arrives at the ALMA Awards in Pasadena, Calif. With his camera-ready good looks, quirky catchphrases and funky fashion choices, swimmer Ryan Lochte parlayed the five medals he won at the 2012 Olympic Games into a bourgeoning media career. (Photo by Jordan Strauss/Invision/AP, File)

FILE - In this Sunday, Sept. 16, 2012 file photo, Ryan Lochte arrives at the ALMA Awards in Pasadena, Calif. With his camera-ready good looks, quirky catchphrases and funky fashion choices, swimmer Ryan Lochte parlayed the five medals he won at the 2012 Olympic Games into a bourgeoning media career. (Photo by Jordan Strauss/Invision/AP, File)

FILE - In this Sunday, Sept. 16, 2012 file photo, Ryan Lochte arrives at the ALMA Awards in Pasadena, Calif. With his camera-ready good looks, quirky catchphrases and funky fashion choices, swimmer Ryan Lochte parlayed the five medals he won at the 2012 Olympic Games into a bourgeoning media career. (Photo by Jordan Strauss/Invision/AP, File)

LOS ANGELES (AP) ? With his camera-ready good looks, quirky catchphrases and funky fashion choices, swimmer Ryan Lochte parlayed the five medals he won at the 2012 Olympic Games into a burgeoning media career.

But the 28-year-old athlete says he's back in the pool training for future competitions and only embraced Hollywood to raise his sport's profile.

"My main goal is to make swimming bigger than what it is, or what it was back in 2008, and the only way I can do that is by going and doing cameos, being on talk shows, doing all those little things to help bring people aware that like, just bring them into swimming more," Lochte told The Associated Press in an interview Wednesday. "Honestly, the only time you ever hear about swimming is during the Olympics. I say to myself and to other people: Why can't swimming be like the NBA or the NFL or something like that, because we do have those big championship meets once a year, so why can't we have that (attention)?"

Lochte has been among the most visible Olympians to emerge from the summer games in London.

He's worked as a fashion correspondent for TV's "Extra" during New York Fashion Week, filmed cameos for "30 Rock" and "90210," served as a presenter at the Alma Awards, introduced Lil Wayne on stage at last week's I Heart Radio concert in Las Vegas and was spoofed by Seth MacFarlane on the season opener of "Saturday Night Live."

He's also using his heightened profile to help raise funds for Water for People, which provides clean drinking water sources to developing nations that lack them. Lochte and fellow gold-medal swimmer Conor Dwyer co-star in a new public-service announcement for the nonprofit group.

Lochte said he was "honored" to lend his famous face to the cause because "water is practically part of my life."

Still, on-camera work isn't easy.

"I can go up on the blocks and swim in front of millions and millions of people, no problem, and perform at my best. Like, that's easy. But getting in front of a camera and doing a little acting? That is nerve-racking," he said. "I did a first cameo for '90210' and I was completely nervous... A lot of stuff comes into play when you're acting. There's like different places where you have to be, different facial expressions, hand gestures, just everything comes into play, just for like one little scene. It's crazy."

He felt a little better on "30 Rock."

"I was working with Alec Baldwin, who's a tremendous actor, and he helped me out," Lochte said. "He was just like, 'Be yourself.' And he kind of made it on set a little more easy to work with because he was just goofing off the whole time."

And what about MacFarlane's "SNL" swipe? The "Family Guy" creator hosted last week's episode and played Lochte as a dimwit who couldn't put a sentence together.

Lochte says he's heard from "Saturday Night Live" but plans to let the whole thing go.

"I'm going to let whatever Seth MacFarlane did, I'm just going to let it be and just move forward," he said. "But anytime Seth wants to race me in a pool, I'll be more than happy to."

And though Lochte is focused on preparing for his next competition in December, if Hollywood calls, he'd answer.

"Oh yeah, of course," he said. "I had a blast doing it. If it fits into my training, I'll do it."

___

AP Entertainment Writer Sandy Cohen is on Twitter: www.twitter.com/APSandy.

___

Online:

http://ryanlochte.com/

www.waterforpeople.org

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/4e67281c3f754d0696fbfdee0f3f1469/Article_2012-09-27-People-Ryan%20Lochte/id-fc2e8e26a59041178ed25117bbe26b02

mary louise parker cher morgellons nhl all star draft touch nitrous oxide rihanna thug life tattoo

Deadline latest weapon in EADS-BAE merger talks

PARIS (Reuters) - Europe's EADS rejected calls on Thursday to allow extra time for negotiations over a $45 billion merger with BAE Systems , as brinkmanship looked set to play a key role in politically complex plans to create a new defense giant.

Fabrice Bregier, head of the Airbus planemaker unit and part of the inner circle running Franco-German-Spanish EADS, was quoted as saying it was crucial to stick to the date set by UK regulators under rules designed to protect investors.

"The importance is that opinions converge. The October 10 deadline may seem soon but it is absolutely necessary given the environment," Bregier told the French daily Les Echos in an interview to be published on Friday.

EADS and BAE are in talks to create what would be the world's largest defense company. But their efforts have become snagged on differences over control between France and Germany while there are also political concerns about jobs.

German Defence Minister Thomas de Maiziere joined France in pressing the companies to seek an extension of the UK deadline in order to give politicians more room to bridge differences.

"Perhaps we need more time. It depends on the answers for our questions and so I think we need more time," de Maiziere told reporters at a meeting in Cyprus.

France and Germany want to safeguard their influence over EADS while special arrangements will be needed to ringfence sensitive operations, including work BAE does in the United States and on Britain's nuclear submarines.

In the past two weeks, investors uncertain about the deal have stripped 4 billion euros from the value of EADS, illustrating the risk Chief Executive Tom Enders could face if he agrees to expose the stock to a further month of negotiation.

BAE shares have also shed their initial gains and analysts warn they may struggle to carry investors with them beyond October 10 if the talks show no signs of progress.

Yet with two weeks left, EADS and BAE have little incentive to seek an extension to the deadline.

Softening the deadline would ease pressure on Europe's politicians to come to an agreement acceptable to the companies while placating U.S. and UK fears of political interference.

For these reasons, experts say a bid for an immediate extension is unlikely unless there is progress. But if there is stalemate running up to the deadline, leaders of both companies could play hardball and decide to abandon the plan.

"It's normal that different points of view are expressed. Especially in an operation where states have strategic interests to preserve," Bregier told Les Echos.

"This kind of operation requires rapid decisions and it's not EADS or BAE management pushing, it's the markets and the clients, who want to know what the future of the group will be," he said adding that the current merger plan included guarantees to the United States covering its security concerns.

INFLUENCE AND TRADE-OFFS

The merger to create the world's biggest defense and aerospace company would dilute the influence of the French, German and Spanish governments in the company, prompting negotiations over their roles in the future.

German reservations include how to safeguard jobs and protect the merged firm from any future hostile takeover, a government document obtained by Reuters on Monday showed.

On Wednesday, a French government source said France would want to retain certain rights, as well.

EADS is standing firm, reiterating its "intention and current expectation" to provide further clarity by that date.

Technically, extensions to the UK stock market deadline are relatively simple and are usually granted, lawyers say.

Yet in classic European negotiating style, as seen on issues from farm subsidies to national bailouts, talks generally go down to the wire.

Raising the threat of a missed deadline, or demanding it be kept, is a tried and tested tactic in the brinkmanship so often seen among the 27 nations of the European Union.

De Maiziere called talks with his British and French counterparts on Wednesday evening "constructive".

"This is a complex situation, there are a lot of questions and conditions, nothing has (been) decided yet ... We will keep in contact," he said.

European governments all face severe spending pressures, but a stand-off between France and Germany over control of EADS is seen as the bigger roadblock, rekindling a climate of mistrust which set in during management rows from 2005 onwards.

France holds a 15 percent stake in EADS and wants to retain its right to influence group strategy. Spain owns 5 percent.

Germany is not a direct shareholder but sees the transaction as a chance to enlarge its influence. At the same time, EADS and BAE are pressing for less political influence.

Airbus's Bregier said he did not see the issue of German state participation being an issue in the talks and did not see any reason why measures could not be taken to ensure a balance with France, whose government would end up with a 9 percent share in the new group as plans stand today.

Signs of discord first emerged at the weekend when Reuters reported that France appeared to rebuff German proposals for a common position [ID:nL5E8KLN1G].

EADS and BAE have said they will offer the governments of France, Germany and Britain a "special share" in the new company, allowing them to block any future hostile takeover, but are determined to prevent any meddling in management decisions.

(Additional reporting by Michele Kambas, Adrian Croft, Rhys Jones, Gernot Heller, Mark John, Catherine Bremer; editing by Jason Neely, Bernard Orr)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/deadline-latest-weapon-eads-bae-merger-talks-170436198--finance.html

safety not guaranteed lifehouse al gore la dodgers lawrence o donnell magic johnson jetblue pilot

Short Sale Relocation Assistance ? HAFA, Chase Bank, Bank of ...

A call came in the other day from a gentleman with a really great question.

?I have a Notice of Default on my property and my mortgage is with Chase Bank. I really need relocation expenses paid in order to be able to afford to move, and I want to know if I qualify for the additional Chase Bank relocation assistance. How can I find out now??

This is such a great question, and it seems to be one of the great mysteries in short sale processing and negotiation. In fact, you hear so many horror stories about short sale sellers who think they are getting relocation assistance and then learn at the last minute that they get nothing?often because the agent or short sale processor did not correctly do what was necessary.

The answer to the question about Chase relocation assistance is this: With the help of a qualified Realtor? who knows his or her way around a short sale, you can find out very quickly whether you qualify for the HAFA program, which offers $3000 in relocation assistance to qualified borrowers. The additional money (the big bucks sometimes offered by Chase and even Bank of America)?learning about that takes a little bit longer. Often times, you do now know until you are able to speak directly with the short sale negotiator in the midst of the short sale process after the package has been submitted to the bank.

The reason that obtaining the information often takes awhile is because the amount of relocation assistance varies depending upon the investor that owns your note. Remember that often times the lender where you pay your mortgage does not own your note (your loan). This company could just be servicing it for someone else or some other entity. And, in this case, the negotiator?s work is based upon the guidelines of the owner of the note, and not the guidelines of the servicer.

Sounds a little confusing? It can be! That?s why you need to make sure that you are working with a qualified Realtor? that knows how to get the job done. And, if you need assistance, feel free to contact the agents at Broadpoint Properties.

?

?

Source: http://servingsandiegocounty.com/relocation-assistance-and-short-sales/

zooey deschanel yvette prieto hypertrophic cardiomyopathy kaye stevens michael jordan engaged kid cudi breedlove

RIM to report 2Q amid wait for new BlackBerry

'},"otherParams":{"t_e":1,".intl":"US"},"events":{"fetch":{lv:2,"sp":"2145480762","ps":"LREC,MON","npv":true,"bg":"#FFFFFF","em":escape('{"site-attribute":"_id=\'c5352fa6-a9ae-357e-8f6c-8eee875dab89\' sensitivity=\'0\' rs=\'lmsid:a097000000MqtFvAAJ\' ctype=\'fn_news;News\' ctopid=\'2299500;1542500;1577000;9174489\' can_suppress_ugc=\'1\' content=\'no_expandable;ajax_cert_expandable;\' ADSSA"}'),"em_orig":escape('{"site-attribute":"_id=\'c5352fa6-a9ae-357e-8f6c-8eee875dab89\' sensitivity=\'0\' rs=\'lmsid:a097000000MqtFvAAJ\' ctype=\'fn_news;News\' ctopid=\'2299500;1542500;1577000;9174489\' can_suppress_ugc=\'1\' content=\'no_expandable;ajax_cert_expandable;\' ADSSA"}')}}};var _createNodes=function(){var nIds=_conf.nodeIds;for(var i in nIds){var nId=nIds[i];var dId=_conf.destinationMap[nIds[i].replace("yom-","")];n=Y.one("#"+nId);if(n)var center=n.one("center");var node=Y.one("#"+dId);var nodeHTML;if(center && !node){nodeHTML=_conf.nodes[nId];center.insert(nodeHTML);};};};var _prepareNodes=function(){var nIds=_conf.nodeIds;for(var i in nIds){var nId=nIds[i];var dId=_conf.destinationMap[nIds[i].replace("yom-ad-","")];n=Y.one("#"+nId);if(n)var center=n.one("center");var node=Y.one("#"+dId);if(center && node){center.set("innerHTML","");center.insert(node);node.setStyle("display","block");};};};var _darla;var _config=function(){if(YAHOO.ads.darla){_darla = YAHOO.ads.darla;_createNodes();};};var _fetch=function(spaceid,adssa,ps){ if (typeof(ps)!='undefined') _conf.events.fetch.ps = ps;if(typeof spaceid != "undefined") _conf.events.fetch.sp=spaceid;adssa = (typeof adssa != "undefined" && adssa != null) ? escape(adssa.replace(/\"/g, "'")) : "";_conf.events.fetch.em=_conf.events.fetch.em_orig.replace("ADSSA", adssa);if(_darla){_prepareNodes();_darla.setConfig(_conf);_darla.event("fetch");};};Y.on("domready", function(){_config();});;var that={"fetch":_fetch,"getNodes":_conf.nodes,"getConf":_conf};return that;}();/* Backwards compatibility - Assigning the latest instance to the main fetch function */YUI.PhotoAdsDarla.fetch=YUI.PhotoAdsDarla.photoslightboxdarla.fetch; }); Y.later(10, this, function() {YAHOO.namespace('Media.Social').Lightbox = {}; }); Y.later(10, this, function() {Y.Media.Article.init(); }); Y.later(10, this, function() {new Y.Media.AuthorBadge(); }); Y.later(10, this, function() {new Y.Media.Branding(); }); Y.later(10, this, function() {Y.on("load", function () { YUI.namespace("Media.SocialButtons"); var instances = YUI.Media.SocialButtons.instances || [], globalConf = YAHOO.Media.SocialButtons.conf || {}, vplContainers = []; Y.all(".ymsb").each(function (node) { var id = node.get("id"), conf = YAHOO.Media.SocialButtons.configs[id], instance; if (conf) { instance = new Y.SocialButtons({ srcNode: node, config: Y.merge(globalConf, conf.config || {}), contentMetadata: conf.content || {}, tracking: conf.tracking || {} }); vplContainers.push( { selector: "#" + id, callback: function(node) { instance.render(); instance = conf = id = null; } }); if (conf.config && conf.config.dynamic) { instances.push(instance); } } }); Y.Global.Media.ViewportLoader.addContainers(vplContainers); YUI.Media.SocialButtons.instances = instances; }); }); Y.later(10, this, function() {if(Y.Photos && Y.Photos.LightboxModule) { var lightboxdecebac879fe4fc8c042c9761992f2f3 = new Y.Photos.LightboxModule('{"spaceid":"2145480762","ult_pt":"story-lightbox","darla_id":"","images_total":0,"xhr_url":"/_xhr/related-article/lightbox/?id=c5352fa6-a9ae-357e-8f6c-8eee875dab89","xhr_count":20,"autoplay_if_first_item_is_video":true}',[],[]); } }); Y.later(10, this, function() {YUI.namespace("Media.Article.Lead"); YUI.Media.Article.Lead.config = { playerUrl : 'http://d.yimg.com/nl/ynews/site/player.swf', autoPlay : 0 }; }); Y.later(10, this, function() {new Y.Media.RelatedArticle({count:"2",start:"1", mod_total:"10", total:"0", content_id:"c5352fa6-a9ae-357e-8f6c-8eee875dab89", spaceid:"2145480762", related_count:"-1" }); }); Y.later(10, this, function() {(function(d){ d.getElementsByTagName('head')[0].appendChild(d.createElement('script')).src='http://d.yimg.com/oq/js/csc_news-en-US-core.js'; })(document); }); Y.later(10, this, function() { if(!("Media" in YAHOO)){YAHOO.Media = {};} if(!("ugcrate" in YAHOO.Media)){YAHOO.Media.ugcrate = {};} if(!("Media" in Y)){Y.namespace("Media");} YAHOO.Media.ugcrate.ratings_b104917a6db5b72f752c20350b56a9b9 = new Y.Media.UgcRate({"context_id":"0b9243e1-31dc-47b6-8465-59893ae147c6","sCrumb":"","containerId":"yom-sentimentrate-b104917a6db5b72f752c20350b56a9b9","rateDimensions":"d1","appLang":"en-US","sUltSId":"2145480762","sUltProperty":"news-en-US","sUltCampaign":"","sUltPlatform":"ugcwidgets","sUltIntl":"US","sUltLang":"en-US","selfPageUrl":"http:\/\/news.yahoo.com\/rim-report-2q-amid-wait-blackberry-205721754--finance.html?_esi=0","artContentId":"c5352fa6-a9ae-357e-8f6c-8eee875dab89","sUltQstnTxt":"Are you considering purchasing the Windows 8 phone?","artContentTitle":"RIM to report 2Q amid wait for new BlackBerry","artContentDesc":" Struggling BlackBerry maker Research In Motion Ltd. will release its fiscal second-quarter results after markets close Thursday, coming as the company tries to hang on to its subscriber base while preparing to release its much-delayed new phones next year.","sUltBucketId":"test1","sUltSection":"sentirating","sUltBeaconUrl":"","sUltRecordPageviews":"1","sUltBeaconEnable":"1","serviceUrl":"\/_xhr","publisherContextId":"","propertyId":"2fcd79b5-b3a3-333e-b98e-722536a6698f","configurationId":"435db9ee-c55e-3766-b20d-c8ad3ff889d1","graphId":"","labelLeft":"No way!","labelRight":"I can\\'t wait!","labelMiddle":"","itemimg":"http:\/\/l.yimg.com\/a\/i\/ww\/met\/yahoo_logo_us_061509.png","selfURI":"","aggregateRatingCount":"39398","aggregateReviewCount":"0","leftBlocksNum":"34020","rightBlocksNum":"5378","leftBlocksPerCent":"86","rightBlocksPerCent":"14","ugcrate_apihost":"api01-us.ugcl.yahoo.com:4080","publisher_id":"news-en-US","yca_cert":"yahoo.ugccloud.app.trusted_proxies","timeout_write":"5000","through_proxy":"false","optionStats":"{\"s1\":26562,\"s2\":1881,\"s3\":1640,\"s4\":2065,\"s5\":1872,\"s6\":5378,\"s7\":0,\"s8\":0,\"s9\":0,\"s10\":0}","l10N":"{\"FIRST_TO_READ\":\"You are first to read this. Share your feelings and start a conversation.\",\"SHARE_YOUR_FEELINGS\":\"You too can share your feelings and start a conversation!\",\"HOW_YOUR_FRIENDS_THINK\":\"Thank you for sharing your feeling on this article!\",\"PRE_SHARE_MSG\":\"Your Facebook friends on Yahoo! can see how you responded to this question. To share your response on Facebook, click on the Facebook share option.\",\"START_THE_CONVERSATION\":\"Start the Conversation\",\"THANKS_FOR_SHARING\":\"Sure, that's how you feel... But what do your friends think?\",\"POLL_HEADER\":\"SOCIAL SENTIMENT\",\"SERVER_ERROR\":\"Oops there seems to be some error, please try again later\",\"LOADING\":\"Loading...\",\"SHARE_AFTER_COMMENT\":\"Your response has been shared on Facebook.\",\"UNDO\":\"Undo\",\"UNIT_PEOPLE\":\"People\",\"NUM_PEOPLE_DISAGREE\":\"disagree with your opinion.\",\"READ_MORE_TEXT\":\"Read what they have to say.\",\"SLIDER_THUMB_WORDING_BEFORE_VOTING\":\"WHAT DO YOU THINK?\",\"SLIDER_THUMB_WORDING_VERB_BEFORE_VOTING\":\"DRAG\",\"SLIDER_THUMB_WORDING_THANKS_VOTING\":\"Thanks for voting\",\"NUM_PEOPLE_ANSWERED\":\" 39,398 people have answered this question\",\"ONE_PERSON_ANSWERED\":\" 1 person has answered this question\",\"TWO_PEOPLE_ANSWERED\":\" 2 people have answered this question\",\"NUM_PEOPLE_RATED__s1\":26562,\"NUM_PEOPLE_RATED__s2\":1881,\"NUM_PEOPLE_RATED__s3\":1640,\"NUM_PEOPLE_RATED__s4\":2065,\"NUM_PEOPLE_RATED__s5\":1872,\"NUM_PEOPLE_RATED__s6\":5378,\"NUM_PEOPLE_RATED__s7\":0,\"NUM_PEOPLE_RATED__s8\":0,\"NUM_PEOPLE_RATED__s9\":0,\"NUM_PEOPLE_RATED__s10\":0}","fbconfig":"{\"message\":\"undefined\",\"name\":\"undefined\",\"link\":\"\",\"source\":\"\",\"picture\":\"http:\\\/\\\/l.yimg.com\\\/a\\\/i\\\/ww\\\/news\\\/2011\\\/09\\\/27\\\/yahoo-tc.jpg\",\"description\":\"\",\"captionLeft\":\"undefined\",\"captionRight\":\"undefined\",\"app_id\":\"196660913708276\",\"redirect_uri\":\"\\\/_xhr\\\/ugcratefbredirect\\\/\"}","template_id":"LONG_SLIDER_SOUTH","obj_id":"ratings_b104917a6db5b72f752c20350b56a9b9","opt_count":"6","opt_color1":"","opt_color2":"","template_html":"

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/rim-report-2q-amid-wait-blackberry-205721754--finance.html

chuck elisabeth hasselbeck fran drescher scarlett o hara pat sajak vanna white michael robinson

Uruguay lawmakers vote to legalize abortion

MONTEVIDEO, Uruguay (AP) ? Legislators have voted in Uruguay by a razor-thin margin to legalize abortion.

In Latin America, where the majority of people are Catholic, no country except Cuba has made abortions accessible to all women during the first trimester of pregnancy.

The vote in Uruguay's Chamber of Deputies was 50-49 just before midnight Tuesday after several lawmakers on each side of the debate said they could not in good conscience go along with their parties, and allowed substitutes to vote in their stead.

President Jose Mujica says he will allow it to become law, if the Senate approves the changes. The Senate already has approved an even more liberal version of the abortion measure.

The Chamber of Deputies' legislation would give women the right to a legal abortion during the first 12 weeks of pregnancy, and decriminalize later-term abortions when the mother's life is at risk or when the fetus is so deformed that it wouldn't survive after birth. In cases of rape, abortions would be legal during the first 14 weeks.

Deputy Pablo Abdala of the opposition National Party vowed Wednesday to promote a popular referendum to overturn the law, if Mujica doesn't veto it, calling the measure a violation of human rights.

However, polls suggest many more Uruguayans favor abortion rights than oppose them.

A survey this month showed 52 percent of Uruguayans would vote to legalize abortion if the question were put to the people, while 34 percent would vote against it. The survey of 802 people nationwide by the CIFRA consulting firm had a 3.4 percentage point margin of error.

Abortion rights advocates were disappointed by compromises made to secure the votes, including a requirement that women seeking abortions justify their request before a panel of at least three professionals ? a gynecologist, psychologist and social worker ? and listen to advice about alternatives including adoption and support services if she should decide to keep the baby. Then she must wait five more days "to reflect" on the consequences before the procedure.

Such bureaucratic barriers will only delay the procedures and force more women to seek illegal and dangerous abortions elsewhere, they said. Abortion rights advocates also were upset by a clause preventing any woman who hasn't lived in the country for at least a year from obtaining abortions in Uruguay.

"This is not the law for which we fought for more than 25 years," complained Marta Agunin, who directs Women and Health, a non-governmental organization in Uruguay.

Her group staged a colorful protest outside Congress during the debate and more than a dozen women posed in the nude in extremely cold weather, their bodies painted orange with purple flowers.

Deputy Alvaro Vega with the ruling Broad Front coalition said it would be better to simply eliminate criminal penalties for first-term abortions, and leave such decisions up to individual women alone. But in the end, every member of the lower house who supports abortion rights voted in favor of the measure.

The goal is to reduce the number of illegal abortions in Uruguay, said Deputy Ivan Posada of the small center-left Independent Party, who authored the measure and provided the key tie-breaking vote.

"They talk of 30,000 a year, a hypothetical number, but whatever the number is, it's quite dramatic for a country where 47,000 children are born each year," Posada explained in an Associated Press interview.

The review panel should obtain the father's point of view, but only if the woman agrees. Women under 18 must show parental consent, but they can seek approval from a judge instead if they're unwilling or unable to involve their parents in the decision.

The measure also allows entire private health care institutions, as well as individual health care providers, to decline to perform abortions.

Opponents include Uruguay's Catholic and evangelical institutions, which along with public hospitals provide much of the available health care in Uruguay.

Cuba, which decriminalizes abortions in the first 10 weeks of pregnancy, is the only country in Latin America where legal abortion is common. Argentina and Colombia allow it only in cases of rape or when the mother's life is endangered. Colombia also allows it when there is proof of fetal malformation. Mexico City has legalized first-trimester abortions, but there are restrictions in most other parts of the country.

Many countries ban abortions under any conditions.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/uruguay-lawmakers-vote-legalize-abortion-110525810.html

pennsylvania primary jerome simpson hand sanitizer obama on jimmy fallon google drive apple stock pilar sanders

Kendra Wilkinson Bikini Photos: THG Hot Bodies Countdown #76!

Source: http://www.thehollywoodgossip.com/2012/09/kendra-wilkinson-bikini-photos-thg-hot-bodies-countdown-number-7/

sons of anarchy how i met your mother avengers yom kippur yom kippur andy williams andy williams

How is a Kindle like a cuttlefish? Parallels between e-Paper technology and biological organisms that change color

ScienceDaily (Sep. 26, 2012) ? Over millions of years, biological organisms -- from the chameleon and cuttlefish to the octopus and squid -- have developed color-changing abilities for adaptive concealment (e.g., camouflage) and communication signaling (e.g., warning or mating cues).

Over the past two decades, humans have begun to develop sophisticated e-Paper technology in electronic devices that reflect and draw upon the ambient light around you to create multiple colors, contrast and diffusion to communicate text and images.

And given the more than 100 million years head start that evolution has provided to these animals and their cellular systems, it's not surprising that e-Paper devices lag behind in optical performance, especially color generation.

In an effort to close that gap, a multidisciplinary team led by University of Cincinnati researchers came out Sept. 26 with a paper that aims to help biologists who work with these color-changing creatures and engineers who work with e-Paper technology.

Authors are Eric Kreit, a recent doctoral graduate in UC's College of Engineering and Applied Science (CEAS); Lydia M. M?thger and Roger T. Hanlon, research scientists at the Marine Biological Laboratory in Woods Hole, Mass.; Patrick B. Dennis and Rajesh R. Naik, scientists at the Materials and Manufacturing Directorate, Air Force Research Laboratory, Wright Patterson Air Force Base; Eric Forsythe, scientist at the Army Research Laboratory; and Jason Heikenfeld, associate professor of electronic and computing systems, also in the University of Cincinnati's College of Engineering and Applied Science (CEAS).

According to UC's Kreit, "Our main goals were threefold: To allow display engineers to learn from millions of years of natural selection and evolution. To teach biologists the most advanced mechanisms and performance measurements used in human-made reflective e-Paper and to give all scientists a clearer picture of the long-term prospects for capabilities such as adaptive concealment and what can be learned from now you see me, now you don't mechanisms."

Ways in Which Animals and Electronics Are Alike

One of the researchers' key findings is that there are numerous approaches to change the reflective color of a surface and that the highest-performance approaches developed by both humans and nature share some powerful common features. Both use pigment, and both change or achieve color expression by either spreading or compacting that pigment. Animals use muscle fiber to spread or compact pigment, and electronics make use of an electric field to do so.

However, even if the basic approach for color change is similar, humanity has never developed anything as complex or sophisticated as the biology and physics of cephalopod skin. (Cephalopods are a diverse ocean group and include 700 species of cuttlefish, squid and octopus -- and are the acknowledged masters of color change on the planet).

According to Heikenfeld, "The highest performance human-made approaches have been only recently developed, well after numerous other approaches were tried. Perhaps in the past, if we had more closely trusted nature's ability to find the best solution, we would be further along today in creating better display technology."

Animals Are Efficient Users of Available Light

Biological organisms that change color are very efficient at using available light. The animal's skin either reflects light to achieve a bright-color effect or absorbs light to achieve stunning, multi-colored effects.

In their use of available light, the biological organisms are more efficient than electronic devices, which generally require large amounts of electric power to generate an internal/emissive light to generate bright color.

Said Roger Hanlon, "Cephalopod skin is exquisitely beautiful and radiant, and can be changed in milliseconds, all without generating any intrinsic light from within the skin; there are elegant solutions from biology waiting to be translated to our consumer and industrial world."

In fact, overall, animals "outscore" synthetic devices when it comes to sophistication and integrated systems; required energy use for color change; size scalability (cephalopods' adaptive coloration works over a wide range of sizes in the organisms' class -- from small-size cuttlefish to large-size octopus and squid); and surface texture (cephalopods can selectively adapt or "crinkle" their skins to match a variety of three-dimensional textures, which provides additional light scattering and shadowing).

Electronic Devices Achieve Colors Faster and Achieve More Colors

Human-developed technology is far superior to cephalopods or other color-adapting animals when it comes to speed. In other words, human-made electronics can achieve color and a color change faster than the response time of a biological organism.

In addition, synthetic devices can provide a greater range of colors and more efficient dark or black state. In other words, a device can achieve a black screen, but most biological organisms cannot achieve such darkened coloring. This is, in part, due to the fact that an organism like a marine animal generally has no reason, in terms of survival adaptation or signaling, to go to a dark or black state. Such an adaptation would actually make them more visible, not less, to predators.

This research was funded by the Air Force Research Laboratory, National Science Foundation, Air Force Office of Scientific Research, Army Research Laboratory, Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency and the Office of Naval Research.

Share this story on Facebook, Twitter, and Google:

Other social bookmarking and sharing tools:

---

Story Source:

The above story is reprinted from materials provided by University of Cincinnati. The original article was written by M.B. Reilly.

Note: Materials may be edited for content and length. For further information, please contact the source cited above.

---

Journal Reference:

1. Eric Kreit, Lydia M. M?thger, Roger T. Hanlon, Patrick B. Dennis, Rajesh R. Naik, Eric Forsythe And Jason Heikenfeld. Biological vs. Electronic Adaptive Coloration: How Can One Inform the Other? The Journal of The Royal Society Interface, 2012 DOI: 10.1098/rsif.2012.0601

Note: If no author is given, the source is cited instead.

Disclaimer: Views expressed in this article do not necessarily reflect those of ScienceDaily or its staff.

Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/top_news/top_technology/~3/2F6jqihqhnc/120926110114.htm

dad shoots daughters laptop brandon jennings channing tatum the vow review luol deng culkin wooly mammoth

Age is no bar for Mann Kaur, 96, to run half marathon

New Delhi, Sep 24

The Airtel Delhi Half Marathon will see a 96-year-old participant Mann Kaur, who will be the oldest runner in the event.

As someone who truly defies age, Mann Kaur is getting set to demonstrate to Delhiites that age is no bar and that barriers exist only in the mind.

Mann Kaur, who hails from Chandigarh, has raced her way to glory in many championships with training from son Gurdev Singh, who lives in Canada and is also a runner. She took to running on encouragement of her son, who is 75 years old himself.

Recently Kaur won a gold medal each in the 100 and 200 metres in the World Masters Athletic Championship in Sacramento, US.

"In 2008, I went to Canada for the World Masters Championship where I saw a participant named Olga, who was 90 years old. It was then that I convinced my mother to take up athletics as I knew her fitness levels," said Gurdev.

Together with her son, Mann Kaur is gearing up to participate in this year's Delhi Half Marathon. For both of them, it's the first time at the event in Delhi, and Mann Kaur is all excited to run that extra mile with her son.

Talking about her participation in the event, she said, "I feel privileged to have represented India at the World Masters Athletic Championship. This year, my son and I are participating in the Delhi Half Marathon and I am really excited."

The Delhi Half Marathon among the country?s top running events and one of the few half marathons from around the world which enjoy IAAF Gold Label Status is scheduled to be held Sep 30.

Source: http://www.prokerala.com/news/articles/a329767.html

eli manning kelly clarkson national anthem halftime show super bowl halftime show 2012 ahmad bradshaw tom brady halftime super bowl 2012

Photos: A roundup of the day's best images

An illegal settler cries next to her husband as they are being detained by a member of the SWAT police team during a demolition in Manila's Makati financial district September 24, 2012. Dozens of slum residents of an abandoned government compound clashed with the police on Monday in an attempt to block a demolition order issued by the local government. REUTERS/Erik De Castro (PHILIPPINES - Tags: CRIME LAW CIVIL UNREST POLITICS SOCIETY TPX IMAGES ... more?An illegal settler cries next to her husband as they are being detained by a member of the SWAT police team during a demolition in Manila's Makati financial district September 24, 2012. Dozens of slum residents of an abandoned government compound clashed with the police on Monday in an attempt to block a demolition order issued by the local government. REUTERS/Erik De Castro (PHILIPPINES - Tags: CRIME LAW CIVIL UNREST POLITICS SOCIETY TPX IMAGES OF THE DAY) less?

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/photos/photos-of-the-day-1340925511-slideshow/

Fred Willard Emmy nominations 2012 Ramadan 2012 Michelle Jenneke News batman joe paterno

Apple Most Valuable Brand, OS X 10.8.2 Update, Launchpad Manager, and More, Mac News Review

Mac notebook and other portable computing is covered in The 'Book Review. iPad, iPod, iPhone, and Apple TV news is covered in iOS News Review. Older Macs are covered in Vintage Mac News. All prices are in US dollars unless otherwise noted.

Purchases made through links to Amazon.com and Apple's iTunes/iBook/App/Mac App Store support Low End Mac.

News & Opinion

Apple Updates

Products & Services

Software

Desktop Mac Deals

News & Opinion

Apple Now World's Most Valuable Brand

PR: The global brand value ranking eurobrand global 100 by eurobrand, the European independent experts for brand, patent & IP valuation & strategy, examining more than 3,000 brand corporations and their brands in 16 industries, with comparisons of Europe, America, and Asia.

The most valuable global brand is Apple with a brand value of ?100,239 bn, followed by the brand portfolio of the Coca Cola Company representing a value of ?59,978 bn, and Microsoft with a brand value of ?53,973 bn. The Global Top 10 are all US-based.

The further Global TOP 10 are represented by IBM (?52,637 bn), Google (?50603 bn), Philip Morris International incl. Marlboro (?48,309 bn), Procter & Gamble incl. Olay, Gillette, Pampers etc. (?47,144 bn), McDonald's (?45,847 bn), Johnson & Johnson (?44,662 bn) and AT&T with a brand value of ?44,494 bn

The global brand value ranking eurobrand global 100 by eurobrand the European independent experts for brand, patent and IP valuation and strategy - examining more than 3,000 brand corporations and their brands in 16 industries, with comparisons of Europe, America and Asia.

Europe's most valuable brand corporation remains LVMH, whose brands include Luis Vuitton, Moet, Hennessy, etc., and represent a value of ?34,306 bn (global rank 14), followed by, Vodafone with a value of ?28,578 bn (global rank 17) and the brands of ABInBev representing a value of ?28,021 bn (global rank 19).

Gerhard Hrebicek, CEO of eurobrand and President of the European Brand Institute summarizes the major findings:

1. Top 100 brand corporations grow on average +5% in brand value - strong brands grow much faster than the average.

Apple shows the highest increase by +43.9% whereas HP depreciates -28,3%. Highest growth in Europe show Germany's most valuable brand corporation Volkswagen Group gaining +26.7% and the Swiss No. 2 brand corporation Novartis growing by +20.2%. Samsung (+39%) shows the highest growth in Asia.

2. Europe leading in old brands, North America is strong in new brands. Europe is the continent of consumer goods representing the old brand business, North America is strong in IT&technology representing the new brand business, Asia takes the best of both other continents and grows the fastest.

Europe shows double the quantity of brands, whereas North America shows double the value performance compared to Europe.

3. Small European countries worldwide leading in brand contribution to the economy. Contributing to the actual discussion in Europe: brand corporations of small countries like Austria, Denmark, Finland, Luxembourg, Sweden and Switzerland create the highest contribution to their economy and are therefore global leaders concerning the brand value to GDP ratio.

4. Europe is built on SMEs with strong brands. Brand and IP valuation, analysis and reporting, IP value oriented management and company structures evolve as key tasks also for small and medium-sized enterprises, which are important for the development of Europe and globally.

eurobrandforum 2012

Upcoming eurobrandforum on October 17, 2012 in Vienna gathers international brand decision makers, discussing the future of brands, their development, management and organization for value generation.

Link: eurobrand Global Top 100

Google Drive Is the New Home for Google Docs

PR: Google has announced that Google Docs has been merged into its Google Drive Cloud service, and you can access your Google Docs files anytime at drive.google.com. You can still do everything you could before, like create, share, and collaborate with Google documents, spreadsheets, and presentations. Now you can access your stuff anywhere, making it much easier to upload and sync your files across all your devices, to find files faster, and to work with more web apps.

YouTube video: http://bit.ly/PkzTuL

Drive is available for Mac, PC, Android, iPhone & iPad devices.

Features

• Find files faster. Look for files by keyword and Drive searches everything even text within scanned documents or images without any text at all. Drive also comes with a simplified navigation to help you better organize your files, and there's a new grid view to help you see thumbnails at a glance. Learn more about the new look and how to find your files.
• Beyond Google Docs, Drive now works with other web apps. Google Docs are now stored in Google Drive, so you can continue to work with others in real time on documents, spreadsheets and presentations. Plus, Drive is integrated with a growing number of third-party apps, so you can do things like send faxes, edit videos and create website mockups all in one place. With Google Drive, you can quickly view many file types online, including PDFs, Microsoft Office files, and many image file types.

Any file that you upload or sync to Google Drive and don't convert to a Google Docs format can be accessed through the Google Drive viewer. To do so, click on the file's title in Google Drive on the web or by following a link shared with you.

Here are some things you can do from the Google Drive viewer:

• Show revision history of the file (if you have owner or edit rights)
• Change the sharing settings (if you have owner or edit rights)
• Download and print by going to the File menu and selecting Download as...
• Search text on the page using the search box in the upper right.
• Add your comments in all types of files.
• Only files under 25 MB can be previewed with the Google Drive viewer.

Supported File Types

Google Drive viewer helps you preview over 16 different file types:

• Image files (.JPEG, .PNG, .GIF, .TIFF, .BMP)
• Video files (WebM, .MPEG4, .3GPP, .MOV, .AVI, .MPEGPS, .WMV, .FLV)
• Text files (.TXT)
• Markup/Code (.CSS, .HTML, .PHP, .C, .CPP, .H, .HPP, .JS)
• Microsoft Word (.DOC and .DOCX)
• Microsoft Excel (.XLS and .XLSX)
• Microsoft PowerPoint (.PPT and .PPTX)
• Adobe Portable Document Format (.PDF)
• Apple Pages (.PAGES)
• Adobe Illustrator (.AI)
• Adobe Photoshop (.PSD)
• Tagged Image File Format (.TIFF)
• Autodesk AutoCad (.DXF)
• Scalable Vector Graphics (.SVG)
• PostScript (.EPS, .PS)
• TrueType (.TTF)
• XML Paper Specification (.XPS)
• Archive file types (.ZIP and .RAR)
• Google Drive is also connected directly to Gmail. If you receive an attachment in Gmail, you can click the View link, which will display that file attachment through the Google Drive viewer.

Search Your Uploaded Files

You can search for text in PDF and image files by:

• Typing a query in the search box in Google Drive on the web.
• Opening the Google Drive viewer and using the search box in the upper right.
• You'll be able to search the first 100 pages of any text documents or text-based PDFs that you've uploaded. You'll also be able to search for text found on the first ten pages of any image PDFs on your Drive.

Offline Access

• Access Google Drive even when you're not connected to the Internet. - Internet outages and long plane rides shouldn't prevent you from working in Google Drive. Set up offline access so that the next time you're offline you'll still be able to view Google documents and spreadsheets, shuffle folders around, and edit non-Google Docs files stored in your Google Drive folder.
• You can view Google documents and spreadsheets without an Internet connection. You can also edit Google documents while offline. View access isn't available for Google presentations, forms, or drawings. Learn more about using Google Docs offline.

Non-Google Docs Files That You've Stored in Google Drive

• You can both view and edit files such as PDFs, Microsoft Office files, and images, from your Google Drive folder even when you're disconnected from the Internet. Any changes you've made to synced files while offline will sync to all devices with a time stamp when you reconnect to the Internet.

Google Drive offers 5 GB of free cloud storage - and 25 GB for less than $2.50 per month.

Google Drive clients support Windows XP and later, Mac OS X 10.7 Lion and later, Android 5.1 and later, and iOS 5 and later. It can also be accessed with most modern web browsers, although Google specifically recommends Chrome.

Link: Google Drive

Apple Updates

Apple Releases OS X Mountain Lion 10.8.2 Update

The OS X Mountain Lion v10.8.2 update is Ready to install via Software Update, is recommended for all OS X Mountain Lion users and includes new features and fixes.

You can also download the manual update installer, your editor's preferred method and also a useful option when you need to update multiple computers but only want to download the update once. These versions of the standalone installers are available from Apple Support Downloads.

Link to OS X 10.8.2 download page for the 665.39 MB standalone Combo installer: http://support.apple.com/kb/DL1581

OS X Mountain Lion 10.8.2 includes the following new features and fixes:

Facebook

• Single sign on for Facebook
• Adds Facebook as an option when sharing links and photos
• See Facebook friends' contact information and profile pictures in Contacts
• Facebook notifications now appear in Notification Center

Game Center

• Share scores to Facebook, Twitter, Mail, or Messages
• Facebook friends are included in Game Center friend recommendations
• Added Facebook "Like" button for games
• Challenge friends to beat your score or achievement

Other New Features

• Adds Power Nap support for MacBook Air (Late 2010)
• iMessages sent to your phone number now appear in Messages on your Mac*
• You can now add passes to Passbook (on your iPhone or iPod touch) from Safari and Mail on your Mac*
• FaceTime can now receive calls sent to your phone number*
• New shared Reminders lists
• New sort options allow you to sort notes by title, the date you edited them, and when you created them
• Dictation now supports additional languages: Mandarin, Cantonese, Spanish, Korean, Canadian English, Canadian French, and Italian
• Dictionary app now includes a French definition dictionary
• Sina Weibo profile photos can now be added to Contacts

General Fixes

The OS X Mountain Lion v10.8.2 update also includes general operating system fixes that improve the stability, compatibility and security of your Mac, including the following fixes:

• Adds an option to discard the changes in the original document when choosing Save As
• Unsent drafts are now opened automatically when launching Mail
• Receive Twitter notifications for mentions and replies from anyone
• URLs are shortened when sending tweets from Notification Center
• Notifications are disabled when AirPlay Mirroring is being used
• Adds SSL support for Google searches from the Smart Search Field in Safari
• Adds a new preference to have Safari launch with previously open webpages
• Resolves an issue that may cause the "Enable Autodiscover" checkbox to always remain checked
• Enables access to the Mac App Store when Parental Controls are enabled
• Support for @icloud.com email addresses
• Resolves a video issue with some VGA projectors when connected to certain Mac notebooks
• Addresses an issue that may prevent Active Directory accounts from being locked out
• Resolves an issue that may cause the policy banner to reappear prior to logging in
• Improvements to SMB
• Addresses an issue with NIS users when auto-login is enabled
• Addresses an issue in which the Keychain may not be accessible
• Ability to pre-authenticate a FileVault protected system
• Addresses an issue that may cause Xsan to not automatically start after migrating from Mac OS X Snow Leopard

For information about the security content of this update, visit http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1222

Link: About the OS X Mountain Lion v10.8.2 Update

Apple Releases OS X Update 10.7.5, Adds Gatekeeper

The OS X Lion 10.7.5 update is recommended for all OS X Lion users and includes general operating system fixes that improve the stability, compatibility, and security of your Mac. It also includes the Gatekeeper security feature that was introduced with OS X 10.8 Mountain Lion that helps you keep your Mac safe from malicious software by giving you more user control over what apps are installed on your Mac.

The OS X 10.7.5 Lion update also includes fixes that:

• Resolve an issue where icons in Launchpad may get rearranged after a restart
• Improve WiFi reliability for iMac (Late 2009 and newer)
• Resolve an issue using Spotlight to search an SMB server
• Improve compatibility connecting to Active Directory servers

For information about the security content of this update, visit http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1222

System Requirements: OS X Lion 10.7

OS X Lion Update 10.7.5 (Client Combo) updater download: http://support.apple.com/kb/DL1582

Link: About the OS X Lion v10.7.5 Update

Apple Releases OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard Security Update 2012-004

Security Update 2012-004 is recommended for all users and improves the security of Mac OS X.

For information about the security content of this update, visit http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1222

System Requirements: Mac OS X 10.6.8

Link: Security Update 2012-004 (Snow Leopard)

Products & Services

Switching to the Mac: The Missing Manual, Mountain Lion Edition

PR: Ready to move to the Mac? This guide helps you make a smooth transition. New York Times columnist and Missing Manuals creator David Pogue gets you past three challenges: transferring your stuff, assembling Mac programs so you can do what you did with Windows, and learning your way around OS X.

Learning to use a Mac is not a piece of cake, but once you do, the rewards are oh-so-much better. You won't find questionable firewalls or inefficient permissions. Just a beautiful machine with a thoroughly reliable system. Whether you're using Windows XP or Windows 7, Switching to the Mac: The Missing Manual, Mountain Lion Edition (O'Reilly Media, $29.99) has you covered.

• Transfer your stuff. Moving files from a PC to a Mac is the easy part. This guide gets you through the tricky things: extracting your email, address book, calendar, Web bookmarks, buddy list, desktop pictures, and MP3 files.
• Re-create your software suite. Big-name programs from Microsoft, Adobe, and others are available in both Mac and Windows versions, but hundreds of other programs are Windows-only. Learn the Macintosh equivalents and how to move data to them.
• Learn OS X Mountain Lion. Once you've moved into the Macintosh mansion, it's time to learn your way around. You're in good hands with the author of Mac OS X: The Missing Manual, the #1 best-selling guide to OS X.

The author, David Pogue, Yale '85, is the weekly personal-technology columnist for the New York Times and an Emmy award-winning tech correspondent for CBS News. His amusing tech videos appear weekly on CNBC. And with 3 million books in print, he is also one of the world's best-selling how-to authors. In 1999, Mr. Pogue launched his own series of amusing, practical, and user-friendly computer books called Missing Manuals, which now includes 100 titles.

Link: Switching to the Mac: The Missing Manual, Mountain Lion Edition

Free Ebook: Hard Drive Troubleshooting

PR: Software and Computer Systems Company, LLC (SCSC) has just released a new, free ebook in PDF format title "Hard Drive Troubleshooting." The book, which is 141 pages in length is available for free download to any interested users from SCSC's web site

"This book is provided to complement our hard drive scanning and analysis tool, Scannerz for Mac OS X," says an SCSC spokesman. "If someone thinks they have a hard drive problem, we thought it would be a good idea to release a book explaining how they can test and evaluate their problems without possibly buying an unneeded hard drive, or for that matter, software. Although the book references our product, Scannerz for Mac OS X, the fact is Scannerz, or for that matter any other analysis tool on the market cannot and will not be able to identify a problem that appears to be a drive problem, when in fact it may be traced to something else, like a failing power supply. This book traces the data flow all the way from the I/O controller on the logic board to the read and write heads actually exchanging data with the drive platters. We hope this book will become the de facto standard reference manual for hard drive and system problems on Mac OS X based systems."

"Through years of analysis and experience, we've determined that hard drive related problems can range from the obvious to the obscure. Examples of obvious failures would include a logic board with a bad I/O controller or CPU, a failed controller on a hard drive, or a severe head crash rendering a drive useless. Obscure problems, which are every bit as, if not more common as obvious problems, can include such things as cracks in traces on the logic board, a weak solder joint, or connectors that are marginally functional. Obscure problems typically yield extremely erratic system performance, often with intermittent errors, leading users to believe they have a severe, unrepairable problem, when in fact it it might be easily fixed. The purpose of this document is to provide owners with a set of procedures that will allow them to at least understand what's going wrong, and in many cases, fix it."

Topics covered by the book include the following:

• Definitions of failure and problem types
• Descriptions of how particular failures and problems effect systems
• Identification of problems and failures on internal and external drive systems
• Software problems that can appear as drive or system problems
• Remapping bad sectors to good sectors on a drive with platter damage
• Dealing with drives that aren't visible to a system
• Dealing with drives or systems behaving erratically
• Dealing with drives or systems suffering from intermittent lockup or shutdown
• Dealing with drives or systems suffering periodic crashes

The book is intended for users using systems that typically fall into the following categories:

• They're using systems running Mac OS X Version 10.5 (Leopard) or higher
• Either a PowerPC G4 or Intel based system

Although the book is clearly targeted at users using Apple Macintosh based systems, the general theory is applicable to almost any Mac or PC based system. SCSC invites anyone interested to download the book from their website.

Link: Hard Drive Troubleshooting

HGST Announces Radically New, Helium-filled 3.5" Hard Disk Drive Platform

PR: Western Digital's HGST subsidiary (formerly Hitachi Global Storage Technologies) has announced a new helium-filled hard disk drive platform, which the company says is in the vanguard of advanced hard drive technology for increasing capacity and significantly reducing total cost of ownership (TCO) for enterprise and cloud customers especially.

With products expected to ship in 2013, the new platform enables HGST to go beyond its award-winning five-platter design, providing a path for higher capacity storage and lower customer TCO for years to come. With industrywide challenges in scaling current areal density technologies, this new platform allows HGST to design seven-platter drives in a standard 3.5" form factor that it claims will cost-effectively extend the capacity and cost-per-gigabyte curve for many product generations to come. In addition, the inherent benefits of the platform, including the helium fill, allow HGST to significantly improve datacenter TCO on virtually every level: capacity, power, cooling and storage density.

New Platform for Reducing TCO

With the explosion of data resulting from mobile devices, Internet services, social media and business applications, corporate, cloud and big data customers are constantly looking for ways and means to improve their storage infrastructure costs and their bottom line. Also, HGST says that new storage models, such as cold storage, are evolving in ways that require enormous amounts of data to be stored and available within a moment's notice. These hyperscale datacenters must deploy massive amounts of storage with the best TCO to help them manage their costs and growing storage needs. And when it comes to TCO, numbers matter most cost-per-terabyte, watt-per-TB, TB-per-system weight and TB-per-square foot.

The density of helium is one-seventh that of air, delivering significant advantages to HGSTs sealed-drive platform. The lower density means dramatically less drag force acting on the spinning disk stack so that mechanical power into the motor is substantially reduced. The lower helium density also means that the fluid flow forces buffeting the disks and the arms, which position the heads over the data tracks, are substantially reduced allowing for disks to be placed closer together (i.e., seven disks in the same enclosure) and to place data tracks closer together (i.e., allowing continued scaling in data density). The lower shear forces and more efficient thermal conduction of helium also mean the drive will run cooler and will emit less acoustic noise.

"The benefits of operating a hard drive with helium fill have been known for a long time. The breakthrough is in the product and process design, which seals the helium inside the hard drive enclosure cost effectively in high-volume manufacturing," says Steve Campbell, chief technology officer at HGST. "We are excited about the introduction of this platform, which demonstrates HGST technology leadership and is the result of more than six years of development in materials science, mechanical engineering and process technology. Thanks to the hard work of our research and engineering teams, our initial pilot lines are up and operational, putting HGST in position to introduce this technology first into the market."

"As a technology innovator, HGST continues to invest in multiple R&D efforts that will help us win new customers, gain deeper market penetration and deliver a significant return on investment for our customers," comments Mike Cordano, president of HGST. "Our new breakthrough platform delivers unprecedented innovation with new features optimized to meet the performance, scalability, efficiency and TCO demands of both corporate and cloud datacenters, which could not be achieved using conventional techniques. With these improvements, customer interest has been positive and we look forward to qualifying our new drives in 2013."

The new, helium-filled sealed-drive platform was demonstrated this week at the Western Digital Investor event in Irvine, California. At the event, HGST compared the power consumption between a helium-filled drive and an equivalent air-filled drive side-by-side, demonstrating a reduction in power consumption for the helium-filled drive of 23 percent. Taking into account the extra capacity coming from two additional disks, the improvement in watts-per-TB is 45 percent. In addition to consuming less power, the drive operates four degrees Celsius cooler, requiring less cooling in the system rack and data center. This reduction in power and associated cooling cost significantly contributes to the lower TCO of the helium-filled platform. The critical watt-per-TB metric will further improve over time as the helium-filled drive platform enables significantly higher drive capacities in future product generations.

HGST will release specific capacities points and product specifications when the platform launches in 2013.

Software

Launchpad Manager for Lion and Mountain Lion

PR: Launchpad Manager lets you delete any icons from Launchpad.

Launchpad Manager for Lion and Mountain Lion

Note: This will not uninstall your app, it only remove the icon! Available in free and pro versions.

Features

• Available in Free (partially crippled demo) and Pro Versions
• Delete any Icons or Groups in Launchpad
• Rename any of your Icons or Groups
• With the Quick Select buttons can tidy up your Launchpad with a couple of clicks!
• Cut and Paste for moving things around quickly
• Organise Groups - Select icons and move them into a new group with a single click
• Add missing applications to Launchpad
• Simple Drag'n'Drop Reordering
• Save Layout
• Load Layout - restore a previously saved layout
• Alphabetical Ordering of icons
• Move Icons to another page
• Move icons to a new page

System requirements: Mac OS X Lion 10.7 or Mountain Lion 10.8

In order to unlock all the Pro features you must purchase a license for $7.99. A single license can be used on up to five computers.

Link: Launchpad Manager

GIMP Robust Freeware Image Editor Reviewed

AppStorm's Drew DuPont notes that when it comes to image editors, Adobe Photoshop remains the gold standard for professionals. But for students, amateurs, or anyone starting their career, the $700 price tag (or even ~$200 with a student discount) is likely prohibitive. There are cheaper apps available, such as Acorn and Pixelmator, but they offer far fewer features.

Luckily, says DuPont, there's the GIMP (GNU Image Manipulation Program), a completely free and open source image editor that nearly matches Photoshop's versatility. It's long been available on the Mac if you had X11 installed, but it never looked the part of a high quality Mac app.

However, DuPont says that's all changed with the latest 2.8.2 release of GIMP, which shipped as a fully native Mac app, which prompted him to take a closer look at the most popular Photoshop alternate.

A graphic designer, DuPont knows his way in and out of Photoshop, but says that the moment he loaded up the GIMP, he was astonished at the similarities between this free program and Adobe's expensive giant, noting that the interface in GIMP Version 28.2 bears a striking resemblance to Photoshop CS6 - down to the coal-gray color scheme and the palette dock on the right.

GIMP for Mac requires OS X 10.6 or later.

Link: GIMP: A Robust Freeware Image Editor

Desktop Mac Deals

Low End Mac updates the following price trackers monthly:

For deals on current and discontinued 'Books, see our 13" MacBook and MacBook Pro, MacBook Air, 13" MacBook Pro, 15" MacBook Pro, 17" MacBook Pro, 12" PowerBook G4, 15" PowerBook G4, 17" PowerBook G4, titanium PowerBook G4, iBook G4, PowerBook G3, and iBook G3 deals.

We also track iPad, iPhone, iPod touch, iPod classic, iPod nano, and iPod shuffle deals.

Source: http://lowendmac.com/newsrev/12mnr/0921.html

maryland lottery grand jury ozzie guillen fidel castro darvish george zimmerman website edmund fitzgerald uss enterprise

Social Media Offers the Best Form of Exposure for Small Businesses

These days a lot of small business owners are looking out for perfect ways and means to enhance and grow their businesses both online as well as offline. Currently, it is very important to keep the ever-growing competition in mind and use the right marketing tools. Social media has come a long way to help small businesses to grow and explore the markets further. If social media as a marketing tool is processed well and in the right manner, most certainly small businesses are in for experiencing huge success.

Social media is influencing people all over the world. It plays a very important part of most people?s lives. There are people who have to get themselves on social media sites, it has become like a mandatory thing. Therefore, keeping such a fact in mind, it is but obvious to see that the human behaviour is influenced by these social media sites.

For larger companies and businesses, it is not very difficult to pool in big investments and funds. But, for small businesses, it is often a task and the only way to come under the lime light is by using a desirable, foolproof formula, which strongly comes in the form of social media. Of course, this does not mean that social media is not helping the big companies; it is most definitely helping them too. But, the kind of exposure it is giving to the small business, nothing like it.

All you need to do is work on a potential campaign for the social media websites. The campaign should suggest what the business is all about, the highlights etc. as long as the business is existing on the social media, that?s all that matters. The whole concept of using social media by small businesses is generating huge success is because there is no requirement of heavy investment. Gone are those days when the small businesses had to either settle with the clich?d marketing tools or go out of their comfort to make heavy investments for marketing. Thanks to the social media, everything is so much easier and less expensive.

Many small businesses exhaust a lot of their finances on marketing. However, with social media, there is no need to invest a huge sum. The one rule associated with social media is to create a good fan base or communities. As long as there are people on the business page, then there is a lot of scope for better business prospects. A lot of businesses are using social media, but not all of them are finding success. One of the significant reasons is because they do not operate in the right manner. It is very important to make sure that the marketing strategy is used in a way that it suffices the purpose of using social media for business marketing.

While marketing via social media, small business concerns need to understand the channel of communication between them and their target audience. Therefore, just by signing up with social media you cannot expect the business to grow in popularity overnight. You need to keep up with the momentum. The page assigned for your business on the social media sites needs to be updated with latest information and updates about your business. Be it posts, tweets or updates, all you need to do is keep the communication channel open all throughout. As long as you please your target audience, it gets easier to determine the fate of your business, or rather the fate of using social media to popularize your business.

Be it a small business or a big business concern, it is very important to have people on board who can come up with creative ideas and also handle it at the same time. It cannot be a one-man show all the time, and one person cannot handle everything. So as a business, it is very important to have someone look at marketing the business using online tools like social media. This helps in better organizing and of course better handling of marketing strategies. As you know, it is never too easy to survive the competition on the market and for this, it is equally important to come up with new strategies at regular intervals. A lot depends on what kind of business it is and how it is being handled on the social media.

Even the best marketers and entrepreneurs across the globe vouch for social media. The buzz around social media is so much, if the businesses do not make the most of this opportunity; they are literally letting a golden chance slip away. Especially for the small businesses, it is extremely helpful because it is effective and doesn?t not cost you much as well. Keeping all this benefits in mind, you must explore the social media; it is a perfect formula for small business success.

Social Media for Small Business ? Simple Yet Effective

The best way to promote your small business is by using the perfect marketing tool. Out of the umpteen options, social media is one of the most effective tools available today. By making use of social media, you can expect your business to reach new heights. Regardless of why a business fails, if you use social media in the right manner, you are bound to reap the benefits of using a good and reliable marketing tool. As long as you are using social media in the right manner, you are bound to see enormous difference in the way your business is listed online. A very effective approach like this ensures sustainability of most small businesses. As compared to the large businesses, often the small sized companies find it threatening to sustain or establish a strong hold over the market. The fact that they are unable to invest as much as the large organizations and companies, it is always a risk associated with small businesses. There are always on the lookout for sustainability. This is where social media plays an important and effective role.

Going by the statistics, it has been stated that social media, be it of any form has been dominating the biggest markets across the globe. It accounts for a huge percentage of buyers and sellers. Given the time most people spend on the internet, there is no surprise that the sellers can easily target the buyers. Of course, it gets a whole lot easier and simpler when you go with social media. Majority of adult population is listed on the most popular social media sites. Therefore, it is easier to target the customers via such networks. With so much in the offering, small businesses across the globe are definitely finding the social media as one of the best and worthwhile option for boosting and promoting their business.

Most small business owners are already using social media. So, if you are thinking about associating with such a medium to promote your business, it is high time you already go with social media because the marketers and experts are favouring this online tool. The amount of money, time and effort invested in social media all across the globe is massive. This in turn allows the small businesses to gain the exposure for a mere small investment. Therefore, it is a win-win situation for all the business owners.

Opting for the right social media will help your business get the much-needed visibility online. The best social media also has a greater number of people connected with it as members. Moreover, these days some social media attracts people of all age groups and this is definitely a boon to business promoters.

However, what needs to be understood is the fact that gaining visibility is just the first step. The concerned business owners need to work on increasing visibility because leaving things where it started is not going to help the business. In order to target the ideal group of audience, there should be a channel of communication. By means of sharing and spreading content about the company, it can open a freeway of opportunity for the business. It could lead to more sales, and of course a scope to improvise and become better, which in turn will impress and satisfy the customers? requirements.

By using social media, you will also get yourself exposed to the on-going competition. This is one of the most important aspects of promoting business. Unless you know what kind of competition or threat exists on the market, it is very difficult for you to make changes in your marketing and business approach in general. Social media offers the easier way to keenly watch the competition around and at the same time advocate better means and ways to go ahead of the competition. After all, when it comes to marketing and branding, you have to be better than the rest.

At the same time, the other greatest benefit is that you will enhance your ability to communicate with your customers. Initially everything is a tried and tested means. It is over the course of time that you will get better at it. Just when you are connecting with your target audience, it allows you to grow and perform better. To have loyal customers, you have to be the loyal seller, and to prove this you can make use of social media.

It is very interactive approach and the business owner can quite comfortably understand the needs and requirements of the customers. Imagine spending on indirect marketing like television advertisements, you would never understand or know what your target audience thinks of your product and service. At least, with social media, the feedback is healthy and quick, and it lets the business owner?s progress in the right direction. There is a sense of freedom, no restrictions at all. This is the magic social media does to the business world. The markets are experience early successes because of social media. By all means, this is one of the best options available.

Source: http://www.howtoee.com/social-media-offers-the-best-form-of-exposure-for-small-businesses/

argentina train crash nancy pelosi nancy pelosi gop debate republican debate lewis black kirkwood