Stories I Found Of Interest (weekly)

• Move To Another Country To Escape The Collapse Of America? | Market Daily News

  • According to the U.S. State Department, an all-time record of more than 6 million Americans are now working or studying overseas.  Of course many of those that have left the country do not believe that the U.S. economy is going to collapse, but without a doubt there are an increasing number of preppers that believe that now is the time to “escape from America” while they still can.  And certainly there are a lot of reasons why the U.S. is becoming less appealing with each passing day.  In addition to our economic problems, crime is on the rise in our cities, our liberties and freedoms are being eroded at a frightening pace, political correctness is wildly out of control, and our corrupt politicians continue to make things even worse.

• Online-Only TV Shows Join Fight for Attention - NYTimes.com

  • The companies are, in effect, creating new networks for television through broadband pipes and also giving rise to new rivalries — among one another, as between Amazon and Netflix
  • But the trend may inflame cable companies’ concerns about cord-cutting by subscribers who decide there’s enough to watch online.

• Revolution in Resale of Digital Books and Music - NYTimes.com

  • a New York court is poised to rule on whether a start-up that created a way for people to buy and sell iTunes songs is breaking copyright law. A victory for the company would mean that consumers would not need either Apple’s or Amazon’s exchange to resell their digital items. Electronic bazaars would spring up instantly
  • The technology to allow the resale of digital goods is now in place, and it will cause a dramatic upheaval,
  • The resale of e-books would send the price of new books crashing
  • Amazon’s patent envisions a book or movie or song being kept in a customer’s personalized “data store.” When an item is no longer wanted, the user could sell or trade it to another user, an action that would automatically delete the item from the first user’s store
  • The patent describes what is essentially a gigantic swap meet

• Marijuana legal in Florida? Bill proposed in Florida Senate to legalize medical marijuana use

  • BOCA RATON, Fla. -- Florida could be the next state to legalize marijuana for medicinal use.

    It's estimated seven out of 10 people polled would support a recent bill proposed in the State Senate

• The Scary Reality Of The Student Loan Bubble In 5 Charts | Market Daily News

  • The explosion of the student loan bubble could lead to the next financial crisis in the United States, says a new federal report -which highlights the growing problem in these alarming new charts.
  • As of 2012, about $1 trillion was tied up in student loans – more than the total amount of credit card debt in the nation,
  • No longer does a bachelor’s degree guarantee a secure job, enough income to buy a house or the opportunity to advance in a career
  • We’re in the midst of the greatest investing boom in almost 60 years. And rest assured – this boom is not about to end anytime soon. You see, the flattening of the world continues to spawn new markets worth trillions of dollars; new customers that measure in the billions; an insatiable global demand for basic resources that’s growing exponentially ; and a technological revolution even in the most distant markets on the planet

• BBC News - TED 2013: 4D printed objects 'make themselves'

  • The process uses a specialised 3D printer made by Stratasys that can create multi-layered materials.

     

    It combines a strand of standard plastic with a layer made from a "smart" material that can absorb water.

     

    The water acts as an energy source for the material to expand once it is printed.

     

    "The rigid material becomes a structure and the other layer is the force that can start bending and twisting it," said Mr Tibbits.

     

    "Essentially the printing is nothing new, it is about what happens after," he added.

     

    Such a process could in future be used to build furniture, bikes, cars and even buildings, he thinks.

     

    For the time being he is seeking a manufacturing partner to explore the innovation.

  • Engineering software developer Autodesk, which collaborated on the project, is looking even further into the future.

     

    "Imagine a scenario where you go to Ikea and buy a chair, put it in your room and it self-assembles," said Carlo Olguin, principal research scientist at the software firm.

     

    The 4D printing concept draws inspiration from nature which already has the ability to self-replicate.

• Citi: Demand For Apple Products Is Soft - Business Insider

  • "Citi basically thinks demand for Apple products has reached a peak. Incremental products will be a snooze. No new product categories.

• Mobile data spending outpaces voice for first time - The Washington Post

  • U.S. consumers spent more on mobile data than on voice for the first time in 2012
  • Wireless carriers must improve network efficiency to accommodate the growing demand for data services

• ABC Unified: Disney's new advertising platform could finally put TV anywhere you want it | The Verge

  • ABC is making the biggest leap: its "ABC Unified" campaign sells programs to advertisers across all platforms, from TVs to computers, tablets, and smartphones.
  • If a show's audience is measured and ads are sold in a single buy across all platforms, that creates a tremendous incentive for a network to maximize the number of platforms where its shows are available. It also makes it more likely that networks will push toward parity across those platforms

• YouTube to launch music streaming service, take on Spotify - Fortune Tech

  • Google is planning to roll out a music streaming service to capitalize on the power of YouTube
  • YouTube is already one of the most heavily used music services in the world, but it hasn't yet charged users. Instead, it sells ads against its music videos; a cut goes back to the record companies. Of the ways music is consumed today, spending on subscription-based streaming ("renting" music rather than "owning" it) is a fraction of what spending on digital purchases on stores like Amazon (AMZN) or Apple's (AAPL) iTunes store can reach. Fewer people subscribe, and of those, the spending per month is generally lower
  • major music labels have found that there is money to be made via streaming music services. The Warner Music Group, which, sources say, has partnered with YouTube and Google on the new ventures,
  • Content ID is another notable partnership: a bit of backend software YouTube runs to match videos with their "audio fingerprints," then tags uploaded videos and ensures royalties go to the copyright holders.

• With gesture, voice or eye control, tech gets more human-centered | JWT Intelligence

  • The theme behind a crop of new products is technology becoming more intuitive rather than requiring people to adapt to it. Gesture control, for instance, feels more natural than operating a mouse.
  • Apple and others are pursuing intuitive 3D interfaces using Famo.us, a new Java-based framework
  • claims it will “bring about the next big change in the way we interact with computers and other devices and systems

• YouTube Programmers Complain About Video Advertising Dollars - Peter Kafka - Media - AllThingsD

  • Things are fuzzier for some of YouTube’s biggest programming partners. Their views are also increasing. But the ad revenue YouTube generates for their stuff isn’t keeping pace
  • that’s pushing many big YouTube networks and partners to look hard for new sources of revenue.
  • “Every single person in the entertainment group complained to [YouTube content executive] Alex Carloss: ‘We’re not making enough money,’”
  • Maker Studios, another big “multichannel network,” is looking to boost revenue via alternate streams like iTunes soundtrack sales, among other strategies.
  • Many big programmers are also concentrating on selling their own “integrations” with advertisers
  • Others are working to direct traffic from YouTube to their own sites.
  • Video makers who control their own sites say they are often able to generate much bigger payouts than YouTube provides

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Stories I Found Of Interest (weekly)

• Lack of sleep 'switches off' genes - Telegraph

  • Getting fewer than six hours' sleep per night deactivates genes which play a   key role in the body's constant process of self-repair and replenishment,   according to a new study.

• Net providers begin warning of illegal downloads - New York News | NYC Breaking News

  • The Copyright Alert System, organized by the recording and film industry, is being activated this week to target consumers using peer-to-peer software.
  • Internet users who illegally share music, movies or television shows online could soon receive warning notices from the nation's five major Internet service providers.
  • The Copyright Alert System, organized by the recording and film industry, is being activated this week to target consumers using peer-to-peer software.

• Bill unveiled to legalize medical pot - Kevin Robillard - POLITICO.com

  • Flanked by more than 150 advocates from around the country, Oregon Democrat Earl Blumenauer on Monday put forward his legislation allowing states to legalize medical marijuana in an effort to end the confusion surrounding federal pot policy.

    Blumeanuer’s legislation, which has 13 co-sponsors — including GOP Rep. Dana Rohrabacher of California — would create a framework for the FDA to eventually legalize medicinal marijuana. It would also block the feds from interfering in any of the 19 states where medical marijuana is legal.

  • On the heels of successful referendums legalizing marijuana in both Colorado and Washington state, Blumenauer and Rep. Jared Polis (D-Colo.) introduced legislation to end federal marijuana prohibition and set up a scheme to tax the drug

• Logic E-Cigarettes - Business Insider

  • Some other Business Insider folks tried out the Logic too and here is what they had to say:

     

    Money Game Editor, Sam Ro said, "You get a nice thick cloud of smoke, which is great if you like blowing smoke rings. But it doesn't taste like tobacco, and you really don't get the nicotine fix."

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Stories I Found Of Interest (weekly)

• Skype calls now equivalent to one-third of global phone traffic | Ars Technica

  • New research (PDF) from TeleGeography, a telecom market analysis firm, shows that worldwide Skype usage is now equivalent to over one-third of all international phone traffic—a record level.
  • While that doesn’t mean that telcos are going to go out of business anytime soon, it does mean that they are certainly continuing to feel the heat.

• Visualant Retains Howard Nellor to Accelerate Revenue Generation

  • Mr. Nellor commented, “Visualant has the most promising, disruptive technologies and keen strategy that I have seen in many years. It’s a fortunate opportunity to be able to support their transition to significant market penetration and profits

• Rackspace revenue misses as web hosting growth slows | Reuters

  • Web hosting companies like Rackspace and competitors Equinix (EQIX.O) and Internap Network Services Corp (INAP.O) own or lease space on a server, typically housed in data centers, warehouses lined wall-to-wall with powerful storage servers.

    Many companies have migrated to hosting their applications in "the cloud" - using the Internet to provide software, computing power and data storage - as a cheaper alternative to in-house resources in a slow-growth economy.

• AT LEAST two-thirds mobile traffic will be video by 2017 - Cisco report * The Register

  • According to the Cisco Visual Networking Index (VNI) report, with its quarterly update out this week, video accounted for over 50 per cent of all mobile traffic for the first time in 2012 and this will rise to 66.5 per cent by 2017
  • Overall global mobile data traffic will increase 13-fold between 2012 and 2017

• Visualant ChromaID™ Wins Photonics Award

  • One sector of interest for Visualant is the cosmetic industry since consumer demand for natural, bio-friendly products has increased by 13.9 percent last year, Kline research reports. That means that chemical companies are being asked by cosmetic companies to develop relevant products that satisfy this market demand. Visualant’s ChromaID technology could then be used in the manufacturing process to ensure that all cosmetic products created meet a certain sustainable, green standard
  • The Visualant Spectral Pattern Matching™ technology directs structured light onto a substance, through a liquid/gas, or off a surface, to capture a unique ChromaID™. When matched against existing databases, a ChromaID can be used to identify, detect, or diagnosis markers invisible to the human eye. ChromaID scanner modules can be integrated into a variety of mobile or fixed-mount form factors. The patented technology is disruptive, making it possible to effectively conduct analyses in the field that could only previously be performed by large and expensive lab–based tests

• Video ads growing at fastest rate on Web as TV-viewing habits change - SiliconValley.com

  • Internet video ads, long a sideshow in the online advertising market, are gaining in importance to marketers and Web publishers as they look to capitalize on consumers' changing viewing habits and tap a $70 billion television market.
  • There have been media reports that Facebook is developing a video ad service, and analysts will likely be looking for answers on that avenue when the social networking giant delivers its quarterly results on Wednesday.
  • "We're are at a point where television ad budgets are likely to come online."
  • The number of people watching TV seems to be stagnating or declining, and the number of people turning to the Internet for entertainment is surging," said RBC's Mahaney. "It almost inevitably drives these TV budgets online"

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Stories I Found Of Interest (weekly)

• Tech, telecom giants take sides as FCC proposes large public WiFi networks - The Washington Post

  • The federal government wants to create super WiFi networks across the nation, so powerful and broad in reach that consumers could use them to make calls or surf the Internet without paying a cellphone bill every month
  • a free-for-all WiFi service
  • The airwaves that FCC officials want to hand over to the public would be much more powerful than existing WiFi networks that have become common in households. They could penetrate thick concrete walls and travel over hills and around trees. If all goes as planned, free access to the Web would be available in just about every metropolitan area and in many rural areas
  • public WiFi could allow many consumers to make free calls from their mobile phones via the Internet

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Stories I Found Of Interest (weekly)

• 22nd Century Group (XXII): Just recieved a phone call from Century 22

  • If you ever thought of riding a stock out to see how far it could go , this is the one.

• Nearly Half Of Americans Would Support Reducing Nicotine In Cigarettes If And When The FDA Exerts Its Authority To Act On It - PR Newswire - The Sacramento Bee

  • Nearly Half Of Americans Would Support Reducing Nicotine In Cigarettes If And When The FDA Exerts Its Authority To Act On It
  • shows strong public support – nearly 50 percent  -- for a potential federal mandate to reduce nicotine content in cigarettes.
  • Nicotine reduction could be a promising tool to protect the population from the harm and death caused by tobacco products
  • the courts have found that Big Tobacco intentionally manipulated its products' nicotine levels in order to create and sustain addiction

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Stories I Found Of Interest (weekly)

• SPECTROPHOTOMETRY: ChromaID scanner challenges traditional spectrophotometry - Laser Focus World

  • eliminates the need for delicate optical components and expensive detectors by using a “virtual” light-emitting diode (LED) source and inexpensive photodiode detectors
  • the current supplied to the LEDs is varied through a sequence of steps to vary the frequency of the light produced by the emitter
  • one prototype source incorporates 34 emitters that are fired through 25 current steps in a sequence that is repeated four times; in effect, a single less-than-one-second scan paints 34 × 25 × 4 = 3400 flashes of light onto the sample
  • Recent testing on plastic sample bags containing a variety of similar-looking white powders demonstrated that the SPM ChromaID method was able to distinguish between flea powder, household cleaner, ground Tums, Splenda, baby powder, and cornstarch, to name a few

• CES 2013: The Four-Sentence Summary - Forbes

  • The Internet of Things is really an Internet of Sensors. It was Kevin Ashton of RFID fame who first popularized the phrase Internet of Things. But the way he and others explored the idea made it clear that the key element of this Internet of Things was that things were going to be individually addressable on the network.
  • With enough of the right sensors in my life, the sensors can flexibly identify the things in my environment and provide a very efficient means of addressing them

• Intellicig-maker CN Creative acquired by Footsie giant British American Tobacco | Manchester Evening News - menmedia.co.uk

  • the acquisition was a natural extension of its approach to tobacco harm reduction
  • our goal is to provide those adult smokers who are seeking safer alternatives to cigarettes with a range of reduced-risk products
  • added that the takeover by BAT was a 'game-changer' for the company

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Stories I Found Of Interest (weekly)

• Ten Companies (Including Logitech) Team Up To Create The Internet Of Things Consortium | TechCrunch

  • The “Internet of Things,” for those of you who aren’t too familiar with it, basically refers to the growing trend of uniquely identifiable, Internet-connected electronic devices.

• The new guard: Look at who is buying technology companies now — Tech News and Analysis

  • I wouldn’t be surprised if we see more of this in coming months. Why? The reasons are not that complex actually. Typically the tech giants buy startups (loosely speaking) in order to acquire talent and in very rare cases, technology (like Apple buying Siri). But for the most part, the motive behind Internet giants’ buying frenzy is mostly about finding the right people to keep competing with their rivals.
  • Today it might not seem obvious, but a year or two from now, companies big and small are going to realize that emergence of mobile and other newer technologies are going to redefine the a business experience.

• Fast-Food Worker Hours Cut, New Health Care Law Blamed

  • The company has announced that all non-management positions will have their hours reduced to 28 a week. Gary Burdette, Vice President of Operations for the local franchise, says the cuts are coming because the new Affordable Health Care Act requires employers to offer health insurance to employees working 32-38 hours a week

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Stories I Found Of Interest (weekly)

• US Electricity Use Falls as Economy Greens | Via Meadia

  • Historically, economists saw electricity use as an accurate measure of growth, but now that everyday products are increasingly energy efficient and the manufacturing economy is streamlined, growth and electricity use have become decoupled. This is another sign that in our new information age growth is green. Declinists and pessimists, take note; growth in the American economy is less and less about producing widgets and more about style, design, services and ideas. It’s likely that the faster we grow the more rapidly the transition to a cleaner and greener economy will go.
  • In response to falling profits, electricity companies are balancing the books by cutting investment in low-emission options like nuclear power plants (which many greens will not mourn) and especially in renewable energy projects. Falling demand for electricity plus rising supplies of cheap and reliable domestic fuels like natural gas makes subsidies for green generation more expensive and less likely to succeed.

• 22nd Century Group Announces Allowance of U.S. Patent for MPO Nicotine Biosynthesis Gene - Yahoo! Finance

  • The allowed claims of Patent Application No. 12/305,483, entitled, NUCLEIC   ACID ENCODING N-METHYLPUTRESCINE OXIDASE AND USES THEREOF, cover   nucleic acids encoding MPO, methods for producing tobacco plants with   either reduced or increased nicotine levels, and tobacco cells and   tobacco plants produced by the foregoing.
  • Scientists have attempted to clone the MPO gene for   decades
  • The MPO gene technology is one of several 22nd Century patent   families representing our second-generation gene technology for   modifying the content of nicotine and other nicotinic alkaloids in the   tobacco plant. Our second-generation technology has significant   advantages over our first generation technology
  • mainly   related to all of the key nicotine biosynthesis genes and potential   modified risk tobacco products produced therefrom

• Rubio promises proposals to bolster middle class - South Florida Sun-Sentinel.com

  • As a party and as conservatives we need to do a better job explaining to people why free enterprise and limited government is better for them than big government is," he added. "That's true for all Americans, including Cuban-Americans.

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Stories I Found Of Interest (weekly)

• Feds Requiring 'Black Boxes' in All Motor Vehicles | Threat Level | Wired.com

  • Federal regulators are proposing that new automobiles sold in the United States after September 2014 come equipped with black boxes, so-called “event data recorders” that chronicle everything from how fast a vehicle was traveling, the number of passengers and even a car’s location.

• Venture Capital to Suppress Its Appetite for Risk in 2013 - WSJ.com

  • Internet entrepreneurs have had the upper hand over venture capitalists in recent years but that balance of power is now showing some signs of shifting, a trend that could accelerate in 2013.

• The Baby Boom and Financial Doom - TIME

  • In 1900, 1 in 25 Americans was over the age of 65. In 2030, just 18 years from now, 1 in 5 Americans will be over 65. We will be a nation that looks like Florida. Because we have a large array of programs that provide guaranteed benefits to the elderly, this has huge budgetary implications. In 1960 there were about five working Americans for every retiree. By 2025, there will be just over two workers per retiree.

• Web Stocks Sink on State Rules as E-House Jumps: China Overnight - Bloomberg

  • he Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress, China’s lawmaking body, will decide this week on proposed legislation that would require Web users to register their real names to gain Internet access, the Xinhua news agency reported yesterday. The People’s Daily newspaper, published by the ruling Communist Party, has featured during the past week front-page editorials calling for more regulation of the Web, saying the “chaotic Internet” needs to be controlled

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Stories I Found Of Interest (weekly)

• Windows Firefox stiffs Adobe Flash, plays H.264 YouTube vids • The Register

  • Mozilla is averse to proprietary codecs because they're typically buried under patents and require a licensing fee. By using the video support built into the operating system, the open-source browser maker can sidestep these constraints.
  • The organisation had hoped patent-free codecs, such as Google’s VP8, would succeed at the expense of H.264 on the web, but that hasn’t happened. Google bought VP8 in 2009 as WebM from On2 Technologies for $124.6m and released it under a royalty-free licence in May 2010.
  • As Firefox on Android gained support for the codec, Mozilla chief technology officer Brendan Eich wrote at the time: “H.264 is absolutely required right now to compete on mobile. I do not believe that we can reject H.264 content in Firefox on Android or in B2G and survive the shift to mobile.

• Kleiner Partners' View of the Future of Tech - WSJ.com

  • The biggest single trend is urbanization, people moving from rural to urban areas. And if they urbanize the way we did—they can't, the planet can't afford it. Our green investing doesn't depend on government policies. It's about basic supply and demand.

• Facebook Preps to Bring Video Ads to News Feed | Digital - Advertising Age

  • Facebook is set to unveil a new video-ad product in the first half of next year in its largest attempt to date to attract big swaths of ad dollars from TV advertisers, according to several industry executives who have been briefed on the company's plans over the past few weeks
  • In what's sure to be a controversial move, the visual component of the Facebook video ads will start playing automatically -- a dynamic known as "autoplay" -- according to two of the executives.

• Star Scientific to stop making tobacco products - Yahoo! Finance

  • Dissolvable tobacco is finely milled tobacco pressed into shapes like tablets that slowly dissolve in a user's mouth. They are gaining the attention of tobacco companies looking to offset a decline in cigarette use as smokers face tax hikes, growing health concerns, smoking bans and social stigma

• What Instagram's New Terms of Service Mean for You - NYTimes.com

  • Instagram released an updated version of its privacy policy and terms of service on Monday, and they include lengthy stipulations on how photographs uploaded by users may be used by Instagram and its parent company, Facebook
  • The potentially lucrative move will let advertisers in Facebook’s ad network use data and information that users have shared on Instagram, like details about favorite places, bands, restaurants or hobbies, to better target ads at those users
  • Instagram will also be able to use your photographs and identity in advertisements. “You agree that a business or other entity may pay us to display your username, likeness, photos (along with any associated metadata), and/or actions you take, in connection with paid or sponsored content or promotions, without any compensation to you,” the new terms say. This means that photographs uploaded to Instagram could end up in an advertisement on the service or on Facebook. In addition, someone who doesn’t use Instagram could end up in an advertisement if they have their photograph snapped and shared on the service by a friend.
  • the company says ads will not necessarily be labeled as ads.

• IT News Online > - - Frost & Sullivan: Life Sciences Organizations Cannot Afford to Miss the "Next Big Thing"

  • New analysis from Frost & Sullivan's (http://www.healthcare.frost.com) Global Life Sciences Trends and Opportunities research finds that the industry consists of several billion dollar markets totaling $1.35 trillion in 2012, which is anticipated to reach $5.01 trillion in 2015.  This global life sciences analysis discusses three technologies with "bench to bedside" potential, including next-generation sequencing, microRNA and digital polymerase chain reaction (PCR).

• Below the Surface | asymco

  • Early data shows that the PC market has not experienced a “pop” from Windows 8. Market watchers have been anticipating this pop since every previous version of Windows has led to a surge in shipments. PC vendors have also been hoping for this to lift their volumes. Volumes have been stagnant for a while, as the following chart shows:

     

  • The question is whether Microsoft will be successful in shifting to this new computing model? Microsoft’s problem is not that it has difficulty offering an operating system for tablets. The problem is that the economics of both systems and application software on tablets is destructive to its margins.
  • The problem for Microsoft is that pricing systems software at $50 and a suite of apps at $67 for a tablet that costs $200 to the end-user is prohibitive.

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Stories I Found Of Interest (weekly)

• Disruptive Energy Technology: GTL Promises Gas Revolution

  • But the disruptive technology is not LNG. The disruptive technology converts natural gas to gasoline, diesel and jet fuel. Yes, it is possible to make gasoline from natural gas.
  • GTL may also work in the United States. Indiana-based Calumet Specialty Products Partners recently announced plans to build a 1,000 barrel per day GTL plant in Karnes City, PA
  • Natural gas has the potential to transform North America. If supplies of natural gas are as plentiful as experts suggest, energy independence is achievable. Not only can the nation become energy independent, it can export surplus natural gas and distillate products to other nations

• Press Release: Boeing - Neah Power Systems Collaboration

  • Neah Power Systems, Inc. (OTCBB:NPWZ) announced today that The Boeing Company is exploring areas of collaboration to deploy our patented, award winning PowerChip^TM technology to various distributed power sources on Boeing’s current and future airplane and ground systems
  • he current trend in the aircraft industry is the “More Electric Aircraft” (MEA), which focuses on replacing mechanical and hydraulic systems with electrical systems to accommodate ever increasing power requirements. In a letter to our company, a representative of Boeing Commercial Airplanes states “One of the key technologies that Boeing is evaluating for future airplanes are fuel cell systems used for the generation of airplane electrical power
  • We believe that Neah’s technology will help Boeing achieve the objective of greener airplanes in the future. The development of a fuel cell system meeting Boeing’s requirements is a crucial step toward proving the potential for successful deployment of this technology. Boeing would work with Neah on the prototypes for internal validation, developing and engineering the air-worthiness of the system, various certifications needed, and system integration with airplane and ground applications.”

• Stockwatch

  • Destiny Media Technologies Inc., in response to a lawsuit it faces from Richard Angus Bruce McDonald's Noramco Capital Corp., blames Noramco for an 11-year campaign to aggressively manipulate its stock downward. According to Destiny, Mr. McDonald took a naked short position in 2000 as he was negotiating a private placement with Destiny, and in the ensuing 11 years has continued to exert downward pressure on the stock
  • It then began an "aggressive and secret campaign" to push down the stock through naked shorting and other unspecified methods. It continued to short the company as a means of keeping the price down so it could defer or avoid having to cover its naked short positions at a loss, the response states.
  • While Destiny provides no details of the 11-year campaign (it says that information is well known to Noramco and Mr. McDonald) it claims that the campaign continues "to this day."

• Reader

  • "In a survey of 3,000 pentamillionaires ($5 million net worth) the Harrison Group
     (HarrisonGroupInc.com) reported that almost all pentamillionaires made their fortunes in a
     big lump sum after a period of years. Worth repeating: a big lump sum, not “by saving 10% of
     his paycheck for 40 years.”
     “A big lump sum” is just another phrase for *“asset value.”* Furthermore, 80% either started their
  • So, to sum it up, asset appreciation and liquidation is the key to massive, rapid wealth creation - not passive income.
  • 
     It virtually always takes more timeto BUILD vs. BUY.
     
     This is the secret behind why large corporations buy pre-existing companies.....

• Why disc drives are an endangered species - CNN.com

  • the ability to stream music or movies on demand has made CDs and DVDs less essential.

  • CDs? There's music streaming or digital downloads. DVDs? Netflix, Amazon or a host of other online movie sites. Video games? There's digital distribution like Steam and, increasingly, downloads from the major console and game makers.

     

    "As personal cloud services become ubiquitous and broadband speeds increase, there's very little reason for many consumers to use an optical drive on their computer going forward

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Stories I Found Of Interest (weekly)

• Book Report: What I Wish I Knew When I Was 20

  • One way to find opportunities is to take an item and list all your assumptions about it, then write all the opposites.  This is how Cirque de Soleil was created- expensive tickets, one act, small tent, no animals, etc
  • • Always act like you’re in a foreign country.  Be acutely aware of your surroundings.  Meet people everywhere you go, take interest in all people and things.

• Mass Megawatts Offers Cost Competitive Green Energy to Retail Customers - Yahoo! Finance

  • Mass Megawatts plans to leverage their knowledge of the wind power industry in their offering of competitive green power to electrical users across the Northeast. The expansion into the retail electrical market is a logical, strategic progression that diversifies their business model while improving future earnings potential. 

• Metabolix Now Shipping MveraTM B5008 Compostable Film Grade Resin - Yahoo! Finance

  • Metabolix,   Inc. (MBLX), an innovation-driven bioscience company focused on   delivering sustainable solutions for plastics, chemicals and energy,   today announced that Mvera^TM B5008, a new   certified-compostable film grade resin, is now available for shipment to   customers. Compounded in Europe for local markets and widely available   for global customers, Mvera B5008 is designed for applications including   compost bags, can liners used for organic waste, as well as shopping and   retail bags that can be reused as compostable organic waste bags.

• Headline Story | equities.com

  • Destiny Media Technologies (TSXV: DSY)  (OTCQX: DSNY) is pleased to announce that it has successfully expanded  the prototype announced August 22nd to include functionality and  features required for full commercialization.  Demo videos at http://www.clipstream.com showcase support for full screen HD on broadband, feature length  movies, instant access to any point chosen from thumbnail scenes  displayed above the seek bar and automatic adjustment of quality to  support a wide variety of environments. 

     

     The solution is much simpler than alternatives which require proprietary  streaming servers and plug-ins.  Once run through Destiny's encoder  software, the video is just dropped into any web page server and it  will play back natively on 100% of HTML 5 compliant browsers

  • The H.265 format, due out in January 2013, won't be  compatible with any existing web browser and is intended to phase out  old videos encoded in H.264. 

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Stories I Found Of Interest (weekly)

• New York City replaces 250 public pay phones with iPad-like screens — Tech News and Analysis

  • “you have to give people content before you give them advertising.”

• Google wants to take on Apple with an open AirPlay alternative — Online Video News

  • Google is working on an open alternative to Apple’s AirPlay, and it’s hoping to bring a number of device and software vendors on board to provide the industry with an open technology to exchange data between second screens and TV-connected devices
  • And it’s not just about remote control functionality and beaming a video from your mobile phone to the TV we are talking about. The new protocol makes it possible for data to flow in both directions, Drayson explained, which would enable developers to build second-screen experiences that correspond to what’s happening on live TV as well. Also on the roadmap: beaming content from your laptop to your TV screen.

• How to Get Startup Ideas

  • Why is it so important to work on a problem you have? Among other things, it ensures the problem really exists. It sounds obvious to say you should only work on problems that exist. And yet by far the most common mistake startups make is to solve problems no one has.
  • The verb you want to be using with respect to startup ideas is not "think up" but "notice."
  • coming up with startup ideas is a question of seeing the obvious. That suggests how weird this process is: you're trying to see things that are obvious, and yet that you hadn't seen.
  • The next best thing to an unmet need of your own is an unmet need of someone else.
  • Make something unsexy that people will pay you for.

• Energy: The economics of global climate leadership | The Economist

  • Somewhat surprisingly, new exploration and technology—mostly the technique for obtaining unconventional oil and gas known as hydraulic fracturing, or "fracking"—will make America a net exporter of energy within a few decades.

• Report: China 'Affluent' Population to Hit 280 Million by 2020 - China Real Time Report - WSJ

  • the total number of affluent consumers China is expected to have by 2020 – more than doubling the current total of 120 million — according to a new study by consultancy Boston Consulting Group

• Made in USA label popular in China, too: study | Reuters

  • Consumers in China are willing to pay a premium for certain products labeled "Made in USA" because they see them as more durable and of higher quality, a new study found

• Now That Nielsen Tracks Tweets, How Will That Change TV? - Forbes

  • They just said Twitter is the best place to go and buy second screen, because that’s where we’re going to measure
  • We as a network have no idea exactly how many people are talking about our programs on Facebook,
  • Real-time, or linear, viewing has been under siege since the VCR. But nothing has the potential to disrupt watching at the same time quite like on-demand viewing and streaming
  • Tablet viewing, for instance, could not only hasten time-shifting trends, but also completely change the whole condition for “second screen” watching

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Stories I Found Of Interest (weekly)

• New WiFi protocol boosts congested wireless network throughput by 700% | ExtremeTech

  • Engineers at NC State University (NCSU) have discovered a way of boosting the throughput of busy WiFi networks by up to 700%. Perhaps most importantly, the breakthrough is purely software-based, meaning it could be rolled out to existing WiFi networks relatively easily — instantly improving the throughput and latency of the network
  • To solve this problem, NC State University has devised a scheme called WiFox. In essence, WiFox is some software that runs on a WiFi access point (i.e. it’s part of the firmware) and keeps track of the congestion level. If WiFox detects a backlog of data due to congestion, it kicks in and enables high-priority mode. In this mode, the access point gains complete control of the wireless network channel, allowing it to clear its backlog of data. Then, with the backlog clear, the network returns to normal.

• A Venture Capitalist Weighs on the Next Phase of Tech Innovation - Forbes

  • We see significant changes in a number of enterprise technologies such as cloud infrastructure, mobile, storage, software-defined networking and security.

• Republicans lost the culture war - CNN.com

  • According to a Pew Research poll taken last year, 49% of Americans age 18-29 have a positive view of socialism while just 46% have a positive view of capitalism. Such a view has roots.

• Pepsi Special Sold In Japan Claims To Block Fat « CBS Pittsburgh

  • It contains an additive called Dextrin, a fat-blocking fiber that is supposed to keep the body from absorbing fat and lower cholesterol levels. That’s a claim that the Food & Drug Administration has not yet bought.

     

    But if it does, as a marketing tool, a Pepsi drink that blocks fat could be a winner

  • “If you read some of the product claims, there’s one thing I saw that says you’ll be able to eat a piece of chocolate cake and it won’t be absorbed,
  • But a Pepsi ad in Japan suggests you can eat both pizza and hamburger – as long as you drink Pepsi Special.

• visualant_10k-15341.htm

  • Visualant’s SPM technology resides in the general marketplace for spectroscopy (measurement of light according to its spectrum) and spectrometry (the measurement of the chemical or atomic components as a function of light reflected or absorbed by them).  These analytic tools are typically fragile and expensive often costing tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars.

• Welcome to The Future: BlueBubbleLab and The Market Research of Tomorrow - Forbes

  • One of BluebubbleLab’ key product is a software that can read people’s face and describe their emotions.
  • Bluebubblelab allows companies to measure consumer reaction by analyzing their facial expressions while they test the product at their own homes or anywhere else.
  • According to Ben Van Dongen,CEO, “Our software allows us to understand people not by listening to what they tell us. It captures the reptile brain information by looking at 128 micro muscles in anyone’s face which are managed by their cortex. Our software tell us if the person likes something or not and if he is happy or sad or angry. We not only analyze the muscles but also measure heart rate, emotions, eye tracking, breathing, behavior, facial recognition, attention time, head pose, and more

• Online viewers start leaving if video doesn’t play in 2 seconds, says study — Tech News and Analysis

  • A new study reports that faster internet connections have made viewers more impatient, and that people begin abandoning videos if they don’t load within two seconds
  • the “four second rule” — the amount of time people will wait for a webpage to download.

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Stories I Found Of Interest (weekly)

• Dear Matt Drudge: Stop the race stories - The Hill's Pundits Blog

  • "When the people find that they can vote themselves money, that will herald the end of the republic".  Benjamin Franklin.

• The Social Network Quotes (Page 3)

  • Harvard undergraduates believe that inventing a job is better than finding a job

• Web radio growing faster than on-demand services (study) | Internet & Media - CNET News

  • Pandora is supporting legislation that would lower the royalty rates that Web radio services pay labels and artists to play music. The music industry, which had scheduled a pow wow last night to discuss how to battle Pandora's legislation, says that the sector has been shrinking for more than a decade while Pandora's executives are banking millions. They say creators can't take any more hits.

• Mexico to reconsider joint policies with U.S. amid new state marijuana laws - Washington Times

  • A top aide to Mexico’s President-elect Enrique Pena Nieto says votes to legalize the recreational use of marijuana in Colorado and Washington state will force the Mexican government to rethink its efforts at trying to halt marijuana smuggling across the Southwest border.

• The Case of the Missing White Voters | RealClearPolitics

  • In other words, if our underlying assumption -- that there are 7 million votes outstanding -- is correct, then the African-American vote only increased by about 300,000 votes, or 0.2 percent, from 2008 to 2012. The Latino vote increased by a healthier 1.7 million votes, while the “other” category increased by about 470,000 votes.

     

    This is nothing to sneeze at, but in terms of the effect on the electorate, it is dwarfed by the decline in the number of whites. Again, if our assumption about the total number of votes cast is correct, almost 7 million fewer whites voted in 2012 than in 2008.

• Judge denies Fox’s request to stop Dish’s commercial-skipping service | Ars Technica

  • Of course, Fox has the opposite view. "Dish is marketing and benefitting from an unauthorized VOD service that illegally copies Fox’s valuable programming," Fox said. The company has vowed to appeal the decision

• MasterCard rolls out credit card with display and keypad | Crave - CNET

  • Next time you get a new card from your bank, don't be surprised if it has a keypad and an LCD on it. 

    Meet MasterCard's new "Display Card," which basically combines the usual credit/debit or ATM card with an authentication token. The authentication portion features a touch-sensitive keypad and LCD display -- hence the name "Display Card" -- for reflecting a one-time password (OTP). 

• Ink of the Week Merriam

  • I think one of the pros said this year, "If you have to ask why, you'll never understand." I think that's so true about IRONMAN. You will never understand the draw, the feeling of accomplishment, the pain and the true reasons each athlete strives for this until you've been through it. 

• Will Obama Harsh Colorado's Historic Marijuana Legalization? - Forbes

  • The implications for Colorado are serious. Economically, it could both bolster the already legal medical marijuana industry and do damage to the illicit dealer. It could also lead to a tourist boon, the likes of which Colorado has not known since the chairlift.

• Machine-To-Machine 'Internet Of Things' Gaining Steam - Investors.com

  • M2M in buildings, for example, could integrate security, maintenance, electrical and water systems for better management. In the home, M2M technology could help consumers efficiently control and optimize usage of appliances, electrical and water systems. In health care, the technology could monitor patients wearing implantable monitoring devices no matter where they may be

• October, 2012: The Month That Your Smartphone and Four Other Technologies Officially Started To Die - Forbes

  • In record numbers, people are doing their work on laptops and devices that have never been touched by an employee at Microsoft or Intel.  We all knew this was going to happen.  And now we have proof.  So much for the good old days of the Microsoft-Intel alliance.
  • Urban Outfitters, a major retailer, announced that it will no longer have cash registers in its stores, instead equipping salespeople with iPod Touches and self-service iPads for their customers.

• http://xml.10kwizard.com/filing_raw.php?repo=tenk&ipage=8544715

  • Future devices embedded with ChromaID technology can read and record natural chromatic markers by structuring light onto a substance, through a liquid or gas, or off a surface. Once scanned, the technology captures the reflected light in a simple Photodiode and provides a unique ChromaID profile. The ChromaID profile can be matched against existing databases to identify, detect, or diagnosis markers invisible to the human eye

• Measuring your metabolism - Health - Fitness - Smart Fitness | NBC News

  • But now there are other options for determining how fast or slow your engine's running. Two high-tech gadgets available at many health clubs and weight-loss centers promise to give you a more accurate assessment. One is called BodyGem and the other is New Leaf. With both, you breathe into a mouthpiece or face mask that determines your body’s exchange of oxygen and carbon dioxide while at rest. The devices then spit out your individualized RMR, which Bryant and other experts say is more accurate than the mathematical formulas.

     

    The RMR figure can then be used, along with estimates of how much energy you burn each day through physical activity and how many calories you ingest, to tailor-make a fitness and diet plan — how much more you need to exercise and how much less you need to eat —to help you achieve your weight-loss and fitness goals.

• How to Measure Your Metabolic Rate - For Dummies

  • Many methods exist for calculating your metabolic rate, but one of the best ways to get an accurate measurement of it is to use equipment that measures your resting metabolic rate (similar to your BMR) by examining your oxygen input and carbon dioxide output. Several hand-held devices are available today for the public, but these can be cost prohibitive and not completely accurate.

• WELCH: US Energy Bigger Than Internet - Business Insider

  • Talking about shale gas, Welch said:

     

    We have a chance in this country to make this the American century. This gas thing is huge. The gas and oil that we have found is in the first inning. It's like the internet in 1990. We're in the first inning of a great American century

• CLYW Message Board | CALYPSO WIRELESS Stock - Yahoo! Finance

  • My wag is that after we win the trial (remember, the jury has to find just one of 30 patent features have been infringed), is a pps of $1.50, after Daic's 28% and receiver's percent (15%?). Then, we sell the patent. Estimated sale value: $1.5 billion. Final pps after expenses and creditors paid, $3.50 - $8.00

• CLYW Message Board | CALYPSO WIRELESS Stock - Yahoo! Finance

  • CLYW shareholders are thus in the unique position of all or nothing. If TM wins the 2013 case, shareholders get nothing for their years of investing and waiting. If CLYW wins and then sells the patent, CLYW shareholders will have their lives completely changed by an insane return of dollars on pennies spent on the shares. The stock cannot be traded on the market anymore but can, of course, be bought and sold privately.

• Romney offers a real alternative to Obama, Bush and the whole New Deal sexy state circus – Telegraph Blogs

  • The creation of a warfare/welfare state consensus under both Republicans and Democrats lumbered the federal government with crippling levels of debt. Using the tax code to buy off segments of the population shrivelled income, while liberalism’s language of class war made it hard to build a consensus for reform.
  • In 2012, Obama is the candidate of the warfare/welfare establishment that has dominated American politics for eighty years.
  • Romney offers an alternative not only to Obama but also to Bush. He offers an alternative to whole New Deal, big spending, debt hiking, contraception distributing, sexy state circus
  • The Romney/Paul ticket seems to have grasped that America simply cannot continue the way it is going. In a globalised world, smaller government is more competitive and more competitive is more beautiful.

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Stories I Found Of Interest (weekly)

• Visualant Wins Fourth Patent on ChromaID Technology Using Exclusive Spectral Pattern Matching Technique - Yahoo! Finance

  • Future devices embedded with ChromaID technology can read and record natural chromatic markers by structuring light onto a substance, through a liquid or gas, or off a surface. Once scanned, the technology captures the reflected light in a simple Photodiode and provides a unique ChromaID profile. The ChromaID profile can be matched against existing databases to identify, detect, or diagnosis markers invisible to the human eye.
  • Visualant Founder and CEO Ron Erickson believes ChromaID technology will usher in new angles to protect consumer products, currencies, pharmaceuticals, and a wide variety of products by bringing the power of spectral analysis from the lab and into the field. Erickson states, "Our technology adds another authentication layer to tools used by government and industrial entities who grapple with the identification and security challenges that impact our society at large.
  • The patented technology is disruptive, making it possible to effectively conduct analyses in the field that could only previously be performed by large and expensive lab--based tests.

• Why I’m voting for Romney - NYPOST.com

  • Reader Harold Theurer reports a new disease, writing: “Obama is talking about the ‘big things’ like ‘Romnesia.’ Well, every time I think of four more years of him, I get Obamitosis, which is a really bad taste in my mouth.”

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.