(Reuters) ? Some 8 million people received emails from the New York Times on Thursday offering a special discount if they would reconsider their decision to cancel their subscriptions.
The trouble is, the offer was supposed to go to only about 300 people who had decided to stop taking home delivery of the newspaper -- it was erroneously sent by a New York Times employee to more than 8 million people on an email marketing list.
The debacle lit up social media sites such as Twitter and Facebook, sparking concerns that hackers might have broken into the newspaper's computer network to send out spam.
A spokeswoman for the newspaper blamed human error, saying hackers were not involved and security was not at fault.
"An email was sent earlier today from The New York Times in error. This email should have been sent to a very small number of subscribers, but instead was sent to a vast distribution list made up of people who had previously provided their email address to The New York Times," the paper said in a statement.
The email offered a 50 percent reduced rate for 16 weeks on home delivery.
The New York Times is owned by New York Times Co.
(Reporting By Paul Thomasch in New York and Jim Finkle in Boston; Editing by Steve Orlofsky, Phil Berlowitz)
ABUJA (Reuters) ? The death toll from a bomb attack on a church just outside Nigeria's capital Abuja on Christmas Day has risen to 37, with 57 people wounded, a source at the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) said on Friday.
The bombing at St. Theresa's Catholic church in Madalla on Abuja's outskirts during a packed Christmas mass, was the deadliest of a series of Christmas attacks on Nigerian churches and other targets by the militant Islamist sect Boko Haram.
"As of just now, the latest death toll from the bombing of St. Theresa's church is at 37. Wounded, we have 57," a senior NEMA official said. The initial death toll had been 27.
The official asked not to be identified because the victims were now in the hands of hospitals and morgues.
President Goodluck Jonathan summoned his security chiefs for an emergency meeting on Thursday to discuss the growing Islamist militant threat and how to deal with it.
This year was the second in a row that Boko Haram has attacked churches at Christmas. Its strikes are becoming deadlier and more sophisticated, and have raised fears that the militants are trying to ignite sectarian strife in country historically prone to conflicts between a largely Muslim north and Christian south.
Boko Haram, whose name means "Western education is sinful" in the northern Hausa language, has been blamed for a campaign of shootings and bombings against security forces and authorities in the north.
Attacks in and around the capital - including one on the U.N. headquarters in August that killed at least 24 people - suggest the group is trying to raise its profile and radiate out from its heartland in the northeast.
On Tuesday night, unidentified attackers threw a homemade bomb into an Islamic school in Nigeria's southern Delta state, in an apparent sectarian reprisal that wounded seven people, six of them young children.
On Wednesday night, an explosion in a local bar in the northern city of Gombe wounded one person, police said.
LANSING ? A state audit cites what it called ?significant deficiencies? related to internal control over some past financial reporting from the Michigan Department of Military and Veterans Affairs.
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Overstating the dangers of methamphetamine may impede treatment of drug abusers, asserts a review by Columbia University researchers
By Gary Stix
?|
December 27, 2011?|
Crystal methamphetamineImage:
The 1936 film Reefer Madness developed a cult following because of its over-the-top depiction of the evils of marijuana. Getting stoned and going to a midnight showing became a ritual for many college students.
The recognition that pot is not a direct route to an asylum for the criminally insane, as it was for one character in the film, fueled the hilarity for late-night moviegoers. The divergence between perception and reality has become an issue in recent years for other recreational drugs.
Last month four scientists from Columbia University published an analysis of previous studies on methamphetamine use that called into question some of the purported damaging effects of the drug on brain functioning. The review in Neuropsychopharmacology found that short-term effects of the drug actually improve attention, as well as visual and spatial perception, among other things.
Moreover, chronic users?the ones who would be expected to suffer most?remain largely unimpaired. The researchers found that they experience brain and cognitive changes ?on a minority of measures? in brain imaging and psychological tests. ?Cognitive functioning overwhelmingly falls within the normal range,? the report states, while adding that researchers? pre-existing assumptions about meth's detrimental effects "should be reevaluated to document the actual pattern of cognitive effects caused by the drug."
While recognizing the potential for abuse, the researchers emphasize that misinterpretations of the scientific evidence can wrongly stigmatize drug abusers and lead to misguided policymaking. One study, for instance, asserted that meth abusers might be too cognitively damaged to benefit from rehabilitative treatments, such as cognitive behavioral therapies. ?Findings from this review argue that such concerns are unwarranted,? the researchers state.
In Thailand, efforts to stem meth use have gone as far as banning all amphetamines, a class of drug that is used medically for treatment of ADHD and other conditions. ?My main goal really was to make sure that we are rigorous in the science before we are political,? says Carl Hart, a substance abuse researcher at Columbia who was the lead author on the Neuropsychopharmacology paper. ?I think, with meth, we have been political.? (Neuropsychopharmacology is part of Nature Publishing Group, which also includes Scientific American.)
The article asserts that some of the misconceptions surrounding meth go beyond findings on mental functioning. Drug education campaigns often publish photographs of ?meth mouth,? severe tooth decay among users because of the lack of saliva. But dry mouth is a condition common to other drugs, such as the prescription antidepressant Cymbalta and the ADHD medication Adderall.
Hart says he was impelled to do the research because of distortions of the evidence for harm from crack cocaine. During the crack cocaine epidemic in the 1980s and 1990s, pronouncements about lasting prenatal harm to children whose mothers used the drug turned out to be overblown: long-term effects on brain development and behavior were fairly small, and children were sometimes ostracized or received medical diagnoses that were mistakenly attributed to effects from the drug.
The review by Hart and colleagues elicited a firm counterpoint from National Institute on Drug Abuse director Nora Volkow, some of whose research is critiqued in the Neuropsychopharmacology paper. ?Because of the far-reaching public health implications of this issue, it is essential not to forget what we do know about meth-induced neuropathology, which is plenty troubling,? she says. Volkow points out that the vascular effects of meth can lead to strokes and hemorrhages. The drug, she notes, has also been shown to produce inflammation, atrophy and structural changes in brain tissue. ?Similarly worrisome is a recent report of increased incidence of Parkinson?s diseases among individuals with a past history of methamphetamine abuse [compared with] the general population,? she says, adding that meth abuse can be ?neurotoxic to the human brain.?
In a bid to streamline its unprofitable television business, Sony (NYSE:SNE) said Monday it would sell nearly 50% stake in an LCD Joint Venture with Samsung (PK:SSNLF) to the South Korean company for US$940-M, according to media reports on Tuesday.
Sony?s exit from the joint venture, which was set up in Tangjeong, South Korea, in April 2004, will let it switch to less-expensive outsourcing options.
Analysts have long blamed high production costs for Sony?s squeezing profit margins in a cutthroat competition. Besides, a strong yen has also weighed on Sony?s profit by eroding the value of its overseas earnings when they are repatriated into yen.
In November, Sony, the World?s 3rd largest flat panel TV maker, warned of a 4th straight year of net losses for the financial year to next March, with its TV unit alone set to lose US$2.2-B on tumbling demand and a rising Yen.
Sony said it expected to cut costs in its LCD business by 50-B Yen a year as a result of the departure.
Sony ?aims to secure a flexible and steady supply of LCD panels from Samsung, based on market prices and without the responsibility and costs of operating a manufacturing facility,? it said in the statement.
Meanwhile, Samsung Electronics, the World leader in flat-panel televisions, would gain freer rein in producing its next-generation displays by taking control of S-LCD.
Paul A. Ebeling, Jnr.
Paul A. Ebeling, Jnr
Paul A. Ebeling, Jnr. writes and publishes The Red Roadmaster?s Technical Report on the US Major Market Indices, a weekly, highly-regarded financial market letter, read by opinion makers, business leaders and organizations around the world.
Paul A. Ebeling, Jnr has studied the global financial and stock markets since 1984, following a successful business career that included investment banking, and market and business analysis. He is a specialist in equities/commodities, and an accomplished chart reader who advises technicians with regard to Major Indices Resistance/Support Levels.
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Nigeria's Christmas from hell began around 7:30 a.m. at St. Theresa's Church in Madalla, a suburb of the capital Abuja, just as worshippers spilled outside from the popular service. "A man with a motorbike dropped a bag just outside the church," a church member told TIME. "One of our officials went to check what was in the bag and at the same time he reached it -- that was when there was an explosion. Everybody started running. You can imagine how many people were running around. We thought the explosion was from one car that was parked outside, but we now discover it was actually the bag that my colleague went to check." The blast partially destroyed the church roof and shattered glass in nearby buildings. It turned out to be part of a wave of bomb blasts striking packed churches and towns across Nigeria as Islamist militants launched a Christmas Day bombing spree that left at least 39 dead and scores more wounded in Africa's most populous nation.
"With my own two eyes, I saw a whole family, five of them, perish in their car which was next to the explosion," Idriss, a 43-year-old truck driver, told TIME over the phone. "I counted 27 bodies. Not only in the church, outside there were two drivers dead on top of their okadas [the local motorcycles used to navigate the area's choked streets]." Among the dead were three policemen stationed to guard the church, the police area commander told TIME. Security has been beefed up in churches nationwide amid repeated threats from the Islamist militant group Boko Haram. (See photos of Boko Haram's August bombing in Nigeria.)
Angry Christian youths, furious over the attack, initially refused to let the dead bodies be cleared away from the smoldering rubble, demanding that President Goodluck Jonathan personally see what had taken place. Officials from the National Emergency Management Agency struggled with a shortage of ambulances. Policemen eventually cordoned off the area and dispersed the mob by reportedly firing live rounds into the air.
It was not the first bombing in the capital region. Boko Haram members allegedly detonated Nigeria's first ever suicide bombing in August at the U.N. compound, killing 24. The group, which draws inspiration from Afghanistan's Taliban movement, is fighting for a strict interpretation of Shari'a across Nigeria's 160 million-strong population, which is roughly split between Muslim and Christian. Boko Haram (which -- in Hausa, a language in northern Nigeria -- roughly means Western Education Is Sacrilege) is believed to have been behind four subsequent explosions.
On Christmas Day, a person claiming to speak on behalf of Boko Haram claimed responsibility for the Madalla church attack and another attempted explosion that struck the central city of Jos -- an ethnic and religious melting pot that has borne the brunt of Nigeria's sectarian violence. "A police patrol car sighted three men on a motorbike. There was exchange of gunfire and the men threw the bomb into the church compound," a Jos state official said, speaking on condition of anonymity. He said the policeman died on the way to hospital, but no other casualties were reported. In Jos, traditional celebrations and planned family reunions had already been scrapped in the run-up to Christmas amid painful memories of a Christmas Eve bomb that killed some 32 people last year, residents said. "The streets are so empty it's like it's not even Christmas. Nobody wants to go out even to buy cigarettes because of all this fear," said Chidi Emweku, 31, a university student.
Meanwhile explosions struck two other towns in Yobe, one of the impoverished northeastern states where Boko Haram traditionally operates. One was in a church in Damaturu, according to residents. The police commissioner said details were not immediately available. (See why Boko Haram is al-Qaeda's new friend in Africa.)
Earlier in the week, the Nigerian chief of army staff, Azubuike Ihejirika, said three soldiers were killed when police raided a suspected Boko Haram bombmaking factory in Damaturu. "There was a major encounter with the Boko Haram in Damaturu," Ihejirika said. "In the encounter, we lost three of our soldiers, seven were wounded. But we killed over 50 of their members." Hospital and morgue workers who spoke to TIME said almost all the 50 bodies they saw were civilians. Critics say the army's frequent incursions into areas where Boko Haram has popular support has fueled the cycle of violence. The group's fierce antigovernment rhetoric has also earned support in the arid, predominantly Muslim northeastern states of Yobe and Borno, where unemployment and poverty far exceed that in the oil-rich south, where Christians abound.
Experts are anxiously monitoring Boko Haram's ability to strike regularly beyond Yobe and Borno, amid claims from the group that its members have traveled to neighboring Chad and as far east as Somalia for training and financing. A December 2011 report from the U.S. Congress said the organization -- along with al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, which operates just north of Nigeria's Sahel desert -- posed a growing threat to American interests.
Activist Shehu Sani, president of Civil Rights Congress of Nigeria, said several attempts to broker a cease-fire between the group and the government collapsed amid mutual mistrust. "The only option is dialogue. For as long as the group has foot soldiers willing to use their bodies, using force will not work against them," he said. The violence prompted condemnations from around the world, including a statement from the White House, which called the attacks "senseless" and pledged to work with Nigerian officials to bring those responsible to justice.
President Jonathan said there was "no reason" for what he called "an ugly incident." "This is one of the challenges of this Administration. This will not be forever, it will end one day," he said in a statement. But many Nigerians wonder when it will end. Idriss, standing amid the wreckage in Madalla, said he had fled Jos earlier in the week after news of gun battles day after day in the north of the country filtered through. "I just wanted to be somewhere safe, but look what happened," he said as sirens wailed in the background.
NBA champions Dallas looked nothing like the team that lifted the trophy last June as they stumbled to a second defeat in as many nights, this time to the Denver Nuggets.
Tyreke Evans (L) of the Sacramento Kings drives on Derek Fisher of the Los Angeles Lakers at Power Balance Pavilion in Sacramento, California. The Kings won 100-91.
Denver on Monday hammered the hapless Mavericks 115-93, a day after the Miami Heat routed them in their Christmas Day season-opener in a rematch of last season's championship series.
Dallas trailed Denver 97-68 after three quarters and were down by as many as 33 points in the final period.
"Obviously, we look old and slow and out of shape," said Dirk Nowitzki, the Most Valuable Player of the NBA finals. "That's a bad combination. I still think this team has a lot of potential. We just need to work."
Coach Rick Carlisle shouldered much of the blame.
"It's on all of us, but it's on me more than anybody, not having these guys ready to play," Carlisle said. "I've got to look at this very closely and then come Wednesday we've got to go back at it."
The extended lockout that delayed the start of the season until December has every team struggling to hit their stride with little pre-season preparation.
But Carlisle said that was no excuse for a performance that had fans booing their title-holding team.
"I'm the head coach and it's my job to make sure that these guys are ready to play, and it's clear that they're not," Carlisle said.
"Coach always tries to take the blame if some stuff doesn't go right," Nowitzki said. "But we got a lot of veteran guys. We got to keep on working and eventually turn the corner."
The compressed 66-game schedule means each team faces a more demanding fixture list than normal.
Kobe Bryant and the Los Angeles Lakers are getting an early taste of that intensity with three games in as many days to open the season.
They lost the first by one-point to Chicago, and the second a day later in a 100-91 defeat to the Kings in Sacramento.
Now they must try to regroup for their home game on Tuesday against Utah.
The Orlando Magic, beaten at Oklahoma City on Sunday, bounced back with a 104-95 home win over Houston.
The Thunder notched their second win in as many nights, defeating Minnesota 104-100 to deny the Timberwolves' Spanish sensation Ricky Rubio a victory in his long-anticipated NBA debut.
The 20-year-old Rubio, who made his Spanish league debut at the age of 14, was drafted by the Timberwolves in the 2009 NBA draft but had spent the last two years at Barcelona.
Having finally arrived, Rubio looked confident and came off the bench to hand out six assists with five points and five rebounds in 26 minutes without a turnover.
Minnesota edged ahead by a point three times in the fourth quarter, but couldn't hold off the Thunder's All-Star duo of Kevin Durant and Russell Westbrook.
Even so, the Timberwolves were pleased with the energy on the court and among the standing-room-only crowd of 19,406 fans.
"We didn't play our best game and we still had them down to the last minute," Minnesota's All-Star forward Kevin Love said.
"We're happy with how things went. Obviously, we would have felt better with a win, but we just had a good feeling in the locker room after the game. We just said if we can play like that and give a good effort like that night in and night out, we can win a lot of ball-games."
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JERUSALEM?(JTA) -- A radical Islamist party in Egypt that said it would respect the country's peace treaty with Israel has amended its statement to say it is against "normalization" between the two countries.
The Salafi Al-Nour party, which won up to 30 percent of the vote in the first two rounds of parliamentary elections in Egypt, reportedly said Sunday in a statement that the party will "stand firmly against normalization between the two countries in all forms, and are against ties with any entity that wants to harm the Egyptian identity."
Last week, a spokesman for the party announced in an interview with Israel's Army Radio that the party would respect all treaties signed by Egypt, including the 1979 peace treaty with Israel, though party leaders later clarified that the party is looking into the matter. The spokesman later told the Associated Press that he was not aware that he was talking to Army Radio.
He told the AP that the party supports changes to the peace agreement, including increasing the number of troops in the Sinai Peninsula, a number regulated by the treaty.
"We call for full Sinai rights for Egypt and for our brothers in Palestine and occupied lands, and we see this as directly related to the agreement," he told the AP.
The Salafi Al-Nour party finished second behind the Muslim Brotherhood's Freedom and Justice Party; the Muslim Brotherhood refuses to negotiate with Israel. ?
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It may be Christmas Eve Eve and the fourth day of Hannukah, but so far, this has felt like just another week in the consumer electronics biz. Another loco crazy, pre-CES, sink-or-swim, walk-a-dozen-miles-to-charge-your-cell kind of week. But that doesn't mean we don't have a couple of nice presents for you...including, of course, your very own Engadget Podcast.
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NEW YORK ? CNN's Piers Morgan was in the position few television interviewers like to be this week: on the other side of the microphone.
He testified by video link about his past life as a London tabloid editor before a British panel looking into media ethics. It was big news back home, but his appearance made little splash in the country where he's known as a celebrity interviewer and former host of a prime-time talent show.
Experts suggested on Thursday that this week's testimony won't have much effect on his standing in the United States, while cautioning things could change if future evidence emerges to tie him directly to hacking by journalists into private cell phone accounts.
"I didn't see anything that would make them turn him or the television off," said Frank Sesno, director of the School of Media and Public Affairs at George Washington University and a former CNN Washington bureau chief.
Morgan was behind his desk at CNN shortly after his testimony. It has been nearly a year since he replaced veteran interviewer Larry King, and his guests Tuesday included former GOP presidential candidate Tim Pawlenty and football analyst Tony Dungy. Rocker Lenny Kravitz was on Wednesday's show.
Television news networks in Britain carried Morgan's testimony live. Not so in the United States. CNN did a handful of reports summing up the appearance, with some video footage. Market leader Fox News Channel's Shepard Smith mentioned it during a newscast, with no video. MSNBC also did brief reports, and it was a topic on the "Morning Joe" political talk show the next day.
While Morgan didn't win raves for his performance ? The Associated Press called him "tense and sometimes hostile" ? the headlines were primarily about what he didn't say. The stories focused on Morgan's refusal to illuminate how he heard a phone message left by Paul McCartney for then-wife Heather Mills.
That failure to advance the incident, coupled with limited exposure at a time when many news consumers are preoccupied with the holidays, contributed to the sense that the event didn't mean much for Morgan in the United States.
"I don't think it's going to have any effect on his career," said Paul Levinson, professor of communications and media studies at Fordham University in New York, "but you shouldn't make the mistake of thinking that it's a good thing."
CNN has largely kept quiet about this week's events. "Piers' testimony speaks for itself and does not impact his CNN program," spokeswoman Meghan McPartland said.
There's a certain irony that, in the United States, CNN seems more directly tied to the British phone hacking scandal than competitor Fox News Channel ? even though Fox's parent company also owned the News of the World tabloid that has been at the center of the story. That's because Morgan is a familiar face and none of the Fox News personalities that viewers know have been tied to the scandal.
Morgan's performance at CNN has given ammunition to both his supporters and detractors.
His average viewership of 735,000 viewers each night is up 9 percent over King's audience in 2010, Nielsen said. Viewership is up by 26 percent in the 25-to-54-year-old demographic, which advertisers consider more valuable.
That doesn't make it a hit, however.
"CNN hoped Morgan would be the sort of feisty and combative host who could attract a loyal following," said Sid Bedingfield, a former CNN executive and now a journalism professor at the University of South Carolina. "It hasn't really happened. The cable news audience doesn't seem that interested. Barring new revelations, I doubt his testimony will change that one way or another."
They're tougher on Morgan in England, where the Guardian's Richard Adams called Morgan's testimony "bumbling" and suggested CNN's outlook on Morgan will be less positive next month when it can no longer compare his ratings performance to King's poor final year. Steve Hewlett, a British media analyst and consultant, said Morgan's performance turned him "from the man who knows everything to the man who knows nothing."
Hewlett said Morgan would not survive if investigators find evidence that he lied during testimony or to his bosses at CNN.
"He's given everybody enough rope to hang him with," said Hewlett, presenter for BBC Radio's "The Media Show."
"If anything turns up to show that what he was saying wasn't true, then he's toast," Hewlett said.
George Washington's Sesno, however, said the hacking case was still amorphous as it concerned Morgan. Viewers in the U.S. also probably don't hold Morgan, as a celebrity interviewer, to the same standards as they do most journalists, he said.
"He's got half a foot in the entertainment world," he said. "Is anybody expecting him to perform by the traditional rules? I don't think so."
___
Associated Press writer Raphael G. Satter in London contributed to this report.
BUCHAREST, Romania ? Romania's government survived a no-confidence vote Thursday in Parliament over election law changes.
The government wanted to hold local and parliamentary elections simultaneously. Prime Minister Emil Boc says that would save at least euro20 million ($26 million) and would generate more interest in the elections.
Critics said the new law would make it easier to commit election fraud.
The government had planned to pass the bill through a speedy procedure without a parliamentary debate, but opposition had criticized that move as undemocratic.
Just 199 lawmakers voted against the government, short of the 233 votes needed.
Before the vote, Boc was booed by members of non-governmental organizations, some of whom yelled: "Shame on you!"
"This is an attempt to strike at the heart of the democratic system ... the government has decided what is good and we have to stand in line," said Crin Antonescu, leader of the opposition Liberal Party.
Having survived the vote, the law will be adopted and next year's elections will be held on the same day instead of months apart.
WEDNESDAY, Dec. 21 (HealthDay News) -- Approval for the HIV drug Isentress (raltegravir) has been expanded to include children and adolescents ages 2-18, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration said Wednesday.
The drug is an integrase strand transfer inhibitor that helps slow the spread of the AIDS-causing virus throughout the body, the agency said in a news release. It was first approved for adults in October 2007.
The twice-daily pill is available in a chewable form for people aged 2 to 11, and in non-chewable form. Clinical testing of the drug among 96 children and teens with HIV-1 infection showed 53 percent of patients had undetectable blood HIV levels after 24 weeks, the FDA said.
The most common reported side effects of Isentress included trouble sleeping and headache.
The drug does not cure HIV infection, and patients must take Isentress continually to ensure ongoing reduction in HIV-related illness, the FDA stressed.
The drug is produced by Merck & Co., based in Whitehouse Station, N.J.
More information
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services has more about HIV/AIDS.
Occupying the site of a former farm in New Hampshire's Green Hills, Bedford's 14-suite luxury inn looks like it came straight out of a holiday print by Currier and Ives.
By Laura Kiniry , Travel+Leisure
After sipping wine by the fireplace and tree, you sit down to a seven-course Christmas Eve dinner. It all sounds just about perfect ? and it gets better. There are no dishes to clean and no unexpected relatives dropping in. Why? You?re celebrating at Seattle?s chic Hotel Vintage Park.
Slideshow: See the best hotels for the holidays
Getting away for the holidays can be the best gift of all. And while it?s not always easy ? you?ve got to contend with potential foul weather and crowds ? once you arrive, there?s nothing to do but soak up the festive atmosphere and experience how another place celebrates. From Charleston to Yosemite National Park, we?ve found appealing lodges, hotels and historic inns with holiday goings-on to suit any personality.
If you love the cool bite of frost, head to New Hampshire?s quaint Bedford Village Inn, where local designers work their magic annually to deck the halls, and chefs concoct the prix fixe menu and mom-daughter teas. But if what your family really wants for Christmas is sand and sun, check in to Honolulu?s Outrigger Reef on the Beach, where kids can dine with Santa himself (even Kris Kringle needs to defrost a little) and pose for photos. Root for staff as they compete in a gingerbread-house-making contest.
Christmas gets a more grown-up, southwestern treatment at the landmark Taos Inn, decorated with old-world furnishings and farolitos, lovely paper lanterns traditional to the area. Guests can belly up to the Adobe Bar for killer margaritas and Yuletide Salsa nights with live music.
For others, Christmas is merriest at its most traditional, with the trappings of gingerbread, candles in the window, and the kind of Victorian-era traditions associated with Charles Dickens?s "A Christmas Carol." Madrona Manor in California wine country brings those visions to life with its annual Dickens Dinners, hearty feasts complete with carolers dressed in 19th-century garb.
Like it or not, Dickens?s classic helped popularize the holiday as a secular time to enjoy with loved ones, let the wine flow, and seek inspiration and new beginnings in the dark days of winter.
Here?s hoping that even the Scrooges among us find the perfect place to spend the holidays.
(Reuters) ? Softbank Corp will quit its domestic social networking site business after just five years, liquidating a joint venture with Rupert Murdoch's News Corp for the Japanese-language version of Myspace, the Nikkei business daily reported.
The 50-50 joint venture with U.S. media group News Corp will shut down at the end of January and be liquidated, the Nikkei reported. The Japanese-language service will be taken over by U.S. firm Myspace LLC, the newspaper added.
News Corp acquired Myspace for $580 million in 2005, when it was among the world's most popular websites, and the company's success in beating out rival Viacom Inc in a bidding war was viewed as a major victory for Murdoch.
However, since then Facebook eclipsed Myspace in popularity and in June, News Corp sold the website to advertising company Specific Media LLC and singer Justin Timberlake at a fraction of what it had paid.
News Corp continues to own its stake in the Japanese unit, the Nikkei said.
Launched in November 2006, Myspace's Japanese service tied up with record labels and sought to tout itself as a way for artists to reach fans. But it failed to offer attractive content, and had only signed up about 1.08 million users as of August, not even a 10th of Facebook's tally, the paper said.
(Reporting by Ritika Rai in Bangalore; Editing by Viraj Nair)
Speaker of the House John Boehner speaks to the decision for a formal conference to resolve the differences for the payroll tax cut bill between the Senate and the House.
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You wouldn't think that the Nikon AW100 ($379.95 direct) is the company's first try at a rugged point-and-shoot camera. The 16-megapixel shooter manages to do just about everything right?capturing sharp images, surviving drops, geotagging your photos, shooting underwater, and grabbing 1080p30 video. And it does it all quickly, with faster performance than any other rugged model we've tested. All of this means that the AW100 ousts the Panasonic Lumix DMC-TS3 ($399.95, 4 stars) as our Editors' Choice rugged camera.
Design and Features Similar in design to other rugged compacts, the AW100 sports a sealed lens with an internal zoom mechanism, located on the top corner of the camera. It measures 2.6 by 4.4 by 0.9 inches and weighs 6.3 ounces, slightly larger than the 2.5-by-3.8-by-0.9-inch, 5.5-ounce Olympus Tough TG-310 ($199.99, 3.5 stars). The camera is available in three colors?orange, black, and blue. Its 5x optical zoom lens covers a 28-140mm (35mm equivalent) field of view and has a nice macro capability for capturing smaller objects.
A 3-inch, 460k-dot LCD dominates the rear of the camera. It's very bright and sharp, making it easy to frame and review images in a variety of lighting conditions, putting the 2.7-inch, 230k-dot display on the Lumix TS3 to shame. Control buttons are rubberized and sealed, but are quite responsive to the touch. The camera has all the standard control buttons?including a zoom rocker, dedicated movie button, self timer, flash control, and exposure compensation?and adds a special control button on the left side of the camera, called the Action button.
This button can be configured to bring up the GPS world map or to adjust shooting settings. Pressing it brings up a menu from which you can adjust the shooting mode, start recording a movie, play back photos, or view the world map. Lightly tapping the Action button scrolls through the options, while pressing it locks in a selection. This makes it possible to adjust settings on the fly, which can be helpful if you're into the outdoors or extreme sports and need to concentrate on things other than delving through camera menus.
The menu system is not as robust as on other Nikon point-and-shoots. There are fewer shooting options, the camera doesn't have Program, Aperture Priority, Shutter Priority, or Manual modes. Instead you are limited to Easy Auto, Auto, and various scene modes. You'll have limited control over camera settings in all of these modes, but will always be able to control flash output, exposure compensation, and the ISO setting. It's not always easy to find what you're looking for in the menu, however. The GPS setting is available only if you hit the menu button while viewing the camera's internal world map?which can be a bit confusing if you don't know to look for it there.
The camera is rated to survive drops of up to 5 feet and can be used underwater to depths of 33 feet. I was able to drop the camera over and over again without it missing a beat. I also let out my inner Jacques Costeau, submerged the camera in water, and grabbed some photos. Our previous Editors' Choice, the Panasonic Lumix TS3, is a little more rugged?it's rated to 40 feet underwater and can survive a 6.6-foot drop, but isn't as well rounded a performer as the AW100. The TS3 also includes an altimeter and barometer, and is rated for use in 14?F temperatures, which might make it a better option for mountaineers.
Performance and Conclusions The AW100 is the speediest rugged camera that we've tested. It can start up and grab a shot in 1.4 seconds, only requires 0.8 second of recycle time between photos, and records a 0.1-second shutter lag. Other rugged cameras we've tested, like the Pentax Optio WG-1 were much slower. The Pentax requires 2.3 seconds to start and shoot, makes you wait a full 3.7 seconds between shots, and records a lengthy shutter lag of 1.2 seconds.
I used Imatest to measure the camera's performance in terms of image sharpness and noise. The software analyzes a test chart as shot by the camera to deliver a center-weighted sharpness score, measured in lines per picture height. A score of 1,800 lines is considered to be very sharp, and the AW100 came in well above that metric?it recorded 2,166 lines. The Panasonic Lumix TS3 didn't do nearly as well, recording only 1,347 lines. It isn't the sharpest rugged that we've tested, that honor goes to the 2,461 lines recorded by the Olympus Stylus Tough-8010 ($399.99, 3.5 stars), but the AW100 does come close.?
The camera does a pretty good job in terms of image noise, but it's not the best in class. Images become noisier as the camera's sensitivity to light, measured as ISO, is increased. When a photo is composed of more than 1.5 percent noise, it is noticeably grainy. The AW100 keeps image noise below 1.5 percent through ISO 800, which lets you shoot with freedom in dimmer light. This matches the performance of the Olympus Tough TG-310, but falls a bit shy of the Panasonic Lumix TS3 and Pentax Optio WG-1?both of those cameras are capable of clean images through ISO 1600.
The AW100 has a built-in GPS that adds geographic coordinates to photos automatically. This lets you view the location at which they were taken when you use the camera with compatible software, like Picasa and iPhoto. The GPS works quite well, acquiring a signal in only a few minutes in my tests, but using it does cut into the camera's battery life. The camera also supports A-GPS, which is often used by cell phones to help speed position acquisition. You'll need to install A-GPS files manually?they are available for download from Nikon's website?as the camera doesn't have any sort of Wi-Fi or 3G connectivity.
Video is recorded in QuickTime format at 1080p30 resolution. The quality is quite good, and the camera can zoom in and out while recording. The noise of the lens moving is audible on the soundtrack of the video, however, and the camera sometimes has difficulty reacquiring focus after zooming. When in focus, details are sharp and colors are accurate. The camera supports standard SD, SDHC, and SDXC memory cards. It can connect to an HDTV via mini HDMI or to a computer via a proprietary USB port.
Overall, the AW100 is an excellent first attempt from Nikon at a rugged camera. The compact point-and-shoot feels polished and refined, and performs admirably on all fronts, delivering snappier performance and sharper images than our previous Editors' Choice rugged compact, the Panasonic Lumix DMC-TS3. That camera is a bit tougher, and is rated for use in cold temperatures where the AW100 is not, which still makes it a good choice for cold weather shooters. Like most rugged cameras, the AW100 is quite pricey. If you're on a budget and don't plan on taking your camera deeper than 10 feet underwater, you may want to consider the Olympus Tough TG-310, which is a full $180 less expensive than the AW100.
More Digital Camera reviews: ??? Leica D-Lux 5 ??? Nikon Coolpix AW100 ??? Samsung MV800 ??? Nikon Coolpix P7100 ??? Panasonic Lumix DMC-GF3 ?? more
BEIJING (Reuters) ? Actor Christian Bale was roughed up by Chinese security guards as he attempted to visit a blind legal activist whose detention has sparked a domestic and international outcry, CNN reported on Friday.
Bale, who plays crime-fighting superhero Batman, and a camera crew from CNN were jostled by men in plainclothes in Dongshigu village in eastern Shandong province, where activist Chen Guangcheng has been under house arrest for 15 months, according to a video released by CNN on its website.
"Why can I not visit this man?" Bale asked several security officers, while they were pushing him.
"You know, I'm not being brave doing this," Bale told CNN. "The local people who are standing up to the authorities and insisting on going to visit Chen and his family and getting beaten up for it, and my understanding, getting detained for it and everything. I want to support what they are doing."
CNN said the guards shadowed its van for more than half an hour.
The fate of Chen, a self-schooled advocate who has campaigned against forced abortions, has become a test of wills, pitting the Communist Party's crackdown on dissent against activists championing his cause and that of artist Ai Weiwei.
In recent months, dozens of supporters have been blocked from visiting Chen. Many were beaten by men in plain clothes.
CNN said that Bale, in China for the premiere of his latest film "The Flowers of War" made by Chinese director Zhang Yimou, approached the news network to try to meet Chen.
They took an eight-hour car journey to Chen's village from Beijing.
"This doesn't come naturally to me," Bale said to CNN. "But this was just a situation, I said, I can't look the other way."
China's Foreign Ministry did not respond to a faxed inquiry about Bale's visit.
It was not clear if the incident would have any impact on "The Flowers of War," which is China's Oscar entry for next year, or the release of Bale's new Batman film in the country.
China's film regulator, the State Administration of Radio, Film and Television, did not answer telephone calls seeking comment.
"INTRINSIC WEAKNESS"
In a later interview with CNN, Bale said: "It's amazing that a superpower like China is actually terrified of this man and shows such an intrinsic weakness within the fabric of the country."
"This kind of treatment ... represents the power structure and their attitudes towards their own citizens, which is disgusting," he said.
Internet users took to the Twitter-like microblogging service Weibo to applaud Bale's visit to see the "blind man." Authorities have blocked searches for "Chen Guangcheng."
"Mr Bale, I admire your courage and heart," said a microblogger called "Chen Xiaoying wants to support."
"But next time if you want to save a person, remember to wear your Batman suit. The Chinese official media will not report this, it's up to CNN to broadcast it."
Chen angered Shandong officials in 2005 by exposing a program of forced abortions as part of China's one-child policy. He was formally released in September 2010 after four years in jail on a charge of "blocking traffic."
"What I really wanted to do is to shake the man's hand and say 'thank you', and tell him what an inspiration he is," Bale told CNN.
Other Hollywood stars have also been active in criticizing Chinese policies. Actor Richard Gere is a strong supporter of Tibet, for example.
China does not take kindly to foreign criticism of its rights record. In 2008, Icelandic singer Bjork shouted "Tibet! Tibet!" at a Shanghai concert after performing her song "Declare Independence," angering the government and local fans alike.
As a young boy, Bale starred in "Empire of the Sun," a film set in World War Two about a British family in Shanghai.
(Reporting by Sui-Lee Wee, Additional reporting by Beijing Newsroom; Editing by Robert Birsel)
WASHINGTON (Reuters) ? President Barack Obama welcomed a deal on Saturday worked out by divided lawmakers to extend a payroll tax cut for U.S. workers by two months and to continue emergency jobless aid.
"This is spending money that also benefits families and businesses and the entire economy, and (the jobless aid is) a lifeline that would have been lost for more than 2.5 million people in the first two months of next year if Congress had not acted," Obama said in brief remarks at the White House.
He urged Congress to move quickly when it returns from its winter recess to extend the tax cut for a full year, saying it would be "inexcusable" to allow the reduction to lapse.
"It should be a formality and hopefully it's done with as little drama as possible when they get back in January," Obama said.
(Reporting By Caren Bohan, Laura MacInnis and Dave Clarke; Editing by Philip Barbara)
Chart shows selected results of a poll on Barack Obama and the economy
Chart shows selected results of a poll on Barack Obama and the economy
WASHINGTON (AP) ? Entering 2012, President Barack Obama's re-election prospects are essentially a 50-50 proposition, with a majority saying the president deserves to be voted out of office despite concerns about the Republican alternatives, according to a new Associated Press-GfK poll.
Obama's overall poll numbers suggest he could be in jeopardy of losing re-election even as the public's outlook on the economy appears to be improving, the AP-GfK poll found. For the first time since spring, more said the economy got better in the past month than said it got worse. The president's approval rating on unemployment shifted upward ? from 40 percent in October to 45 percent in the latest poll ? as the jobless rate fell to 8.6 percent last month, its lowest level since March 2009.
But Obama's approval rating on his handling of the economy overall remains stagnant: 39 percent approve and 60 percent disapprove.
Heading into his re-election campaign, the president faces a conflicted public that does not support his steering of the economy, the most dominant issue for Americans, or his reforms to health care, one of his signature accomplishments, yet are grappling with whether to replace him with Republican contenders Mitt Romney or Newt Gingrich.
The poll found an even divide on whether Americans expect Obama to be re-elected next year.
For the first time, the poll found that a majority of adults, 52 percent, said Obama should be voted out of office while 43 percent said he deserves another term. The numbers mark a reversal since last May, when 53 percent said Obama should be re-elected while 43 percent said he didn't deserve four more years.
Obama's overall job approval stands at a new low: 44 percent approve while 54 percent disapprove. The president's standing among independents is worse: 38 percent approve while 59 percent disapprove. Among Democrats, the president holds steady with an approval rating of 78 percent while only 12 percent of Republicans approve of the job he's doing.
"I think he's doing the best he can. The problem is the Congress won't help at all," said Rosario Navarro, a Democrat and a 44-year-old truck driver from Fresno, Calif., who voted for Obama in 2008 and intends to support him again.
Robin Dein, a 54-year-old homemaker from Villanova, Pa., who is an independent, said she supported Republican John McCain in 2008 and has not been impressed with Obama's economic policies. She intends to support Romney if he wins the GOP nomination.
"(Obama) spent the first part of his presidency blaming Bush for everything, not that he was innocent, and now his way of solving anything is by spending more money," she said.
Despite the soft level of support, many are uncertain whether a Republican president would be a better choice. Asked whom they would support next November, 47 percent of adults favored Obama compared with 46 percent for Romney, a former Massachusetts governor. Against Gingrich, the president holds a solid advantage, receiving 51 percent compared with 42 percent for the former House speaker.
The potential matchups paint a better picture for the president among independents. Obama receives 45 percent of non-aligned adults compared with 41 percent for Romney. Against Gingrich, Obama holds a wide lead among independents, with 54 percent supporting the president and 31 percent backing the former Georgia congressman.
Another piece of good news for Obama: people generally like him personally. Obama's personal favorability rating held steady at 53 percent, with 46 percent viewing him unfavorably. About three-quarters called him likeable.
The economy remains a source of pessimism, though the poll suggests the first positive movement in public opinion on the economy in months. One in five said the economy improved in the last month, double the share saying so in October. Still most expect it to stay the same or get worse.
"I suppose you could make some sort of argument that it's getting better, but I'm not sure I even see that," said independent voter John Bailey, a 61-year-old education consultant from East Jordan, Mich. "I think it's bad and it's gotten worse under (Obama's) policies. At best, it's going to stay bad."
Despite the high rate of joblessness, the poll found some optimism on the economy. Although 80 percent described the economy as "poor," respondents describing it "very poor" fell from 43 percent in October to 34 percent in the latest poll, the lowest since May. Twenty percent said the economy got better in the past month while 37 percent said they expected the economy to improve next year.
Yet plenty of warning signs remain for Obama. Only 26 percent said the United States is headed in the right direction while 70 percent said the country was moving in the wrong direction.
The president won a substantial number of women voters in 2008 yet there does not appear to be a significant tilt toward Obama among women now. The poll found 44 percent of women say Obama deserves a second term, down from 51 percent in October, while 43 percent of men say the president should be re-elected.
About two-thirds of white voters without college degrees say Obama should be a one-term president, while 33 percent of those voters say he should get another four years. Among white voters with a college degree, 57 percent said Obama should be voted out of office.
The poll found unpopularity for last year's health care reform bill, one of Obama's major accomplishments. About half of the respondents oppose the health care law and support for it dipped to 29 percent from 36 percent in June. Just 15 percent said the federal government should have the power to require all Americans to buy health insurance.
Even among Democrats, the health care law has tepid support. Fifty percent of Democrats supported the health care law, compared with 59 percent of Democrats last June. Only about a quarter of independents back the law.
The president has taken a more populist tone in his handling of the economy, arguing that the wealthy should pay more in taxes to help pay for the extension of a payroll tax cut that would provide about $1,000 in tax cuts to a family earning about $50,000 a year. Among those with annual household incomes of $50,000 or less, Obama's approval rating on unemployment climbed to 53 percent, from 43 percent in October.
The Associated Press-GfK Poll was conducted December 8-12 2011 by GfK Roper Public Affairs and Corporate Communications. It involved landline and cell phone interviews with 1,000 adults nationwide and has a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 4 percentage points.
___
Associated Press writer Stacy A. Anderson and News Survey Specialist Dennis Junius contributed to this report.
Now that you've got your Galaxy Nexus, it's time to tinker. And tinker we shall. We've already showed you how to unlock the bootloader, which you really should do first thing if you have any thoughts at all about one day rooting the phone or using a custom ROM. So if you haven't done that already, go do it. We'll wait.
Back? OK. Now this being a Nexus phone, it's way more "open" than anything else you might have owned (other than another Nexus phone, of course). And to that end, Google has just released the factory images for the Verizon Nexus. (Google previously released the GSM images.) That means pretty much no matter what you've done to the phone, so long as you can get to the bootloader (which has that bad-ass image you see above) you can return your phone to full stock. Nice. And we would love to see every manufacturer do this. (We know, we can dream.)
Anyhoo, hit the download link below for the factory image for the Verizon Galaxy Nexus.
