boutonniere tuesday: June 2012

Wednesday, June 27, 2012

T3 POS Solutions Named RSPA Certified Retail Technology Provider

Richardson, TX/US ? (June 20, 2012) ? T3 POS Solutions, a point of sale hardware, software and service provider for the hospitality and restaurant industry, announced that it has been named an RSPA Certified Retail Technology Provider. According to RSPA?s industry standards, T3 received the certified technology provider status by demonstrating a commitment to excellence and an exceptional level of professionalism. As a RSPA Certified Retail Technology Provider, T3 is recognized as ethical and fair and stands behind the products and services they sell and support.

The Retail Solutions Providers Association, the only association dedicated to the retail technology industry, launched its industry Certification Program on July 13, 2009. The Certification Program is a new way to identify professionals in the retail technology industry and was developed to set and maintain the bar of professionalism for retail technology vendors and resellers.

Certification offers assurances to the public, including those who use the products and professional services that they are working with a company that is a distinguished solution provider. Recently the National Restaurant Association released the ?8 Essential Elements of Owning POS? which encourages end-users to work only with RSPA Certified solution providers. To learn more about RSPA?s Certification program, visit GoRSPA.org/Certification.

?RSPA is very pleased to bring an industry association supported certification program to the Retail Technology marketplace,? said Joe Finizio, RSPA President & CEO. ?This program was developed to set and maintain the bar of professionalism for retail technology vendors and resellers. T3 POS Solutions has proved it?s worthy of this certification by demonstrating superior products and customer service.?

?We provide complete turnkey programming, training, installation and ?best in class? on-site support of the most recent state-of-the-art point of sale solutions on the market today,? states Steve Odom, T3 CEO. ?Our expert service technicians support all of our products and services 24?7, 365 days a year so you never have to go somewhere else to get the service levels you require. With T3, you get one-stop point of sale solutions, saving you valuable time and money.?

Call T3 today at 866-472-7556 to learn what they can do for your business. Or visit their website at www.t3pos.com.

About RSPA (www.GoRSPA.org)

The Retail Solutions Providers Association (RSPA) is the only association dedicated to the retail technology industry. RSPA members include resellers, hardware manufacturers, software developers, consultants, finance companies, and distributors bringing retail technology products and/or services to the marketplace. The RSPA provides education, industry advocacy, standards, services and benefits to assist member companies in expanding their businesses.

About T3 POS Solutions

T3 POS Solutions is a nationally recognized point of sale hardware, software and service provider for the hospitality and restaurant industry. In business since 2007, T3 offers24/7 customer service, sophisticated on-the-go reporting and fully integrated payment processing platforms.Whether a multi-faceted enterprise system or a single mom & pop location, T3 provides exceptional point of sale solutions for your business.

Media Contacts:

Karen Gallo, Director of Marketing

214-343-4242 ext 1210

http://www.t3pos.com

RSPA ? Retail Solutions Providers Association

Nicole Taylor, Director of Marketing & Communications

704.940.4274

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Monday, June 25, 2012

Video: For-Profit Ed: No Good News

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Disney's "Brave" rides to box office win

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African American History in Washington DC Part II

This?is a program on African American work and life in Washington, D.C., especially in the area around the White House known as President's Park. Speakers include?Alexandra Lane, Rights and Reproductions Coordinator for the White House Historical Association, and Elizabeth Dowling Taylor, author of A Slave in the White House: Paul Jennings and the Madisons. This event took place at St. John's Church on the edge of President's Park.

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Chinese tech giant calls for cyber cooperation

ST. PETERSBURG, Russia?? The founder of Chinese telecom equipment giant Huawei, which has faced security concerns in the U.S. and Australia, is calling for global cooperation to improve data protection.

Ren Zhengfei, in a rare public appearance at an economic forum on Friday, did not mention the controversy surrounding Huawei. But he warned data would be "vulnerable to attack again and again" because technology will develop faster than security. He gave no details of possible joint measures.

"Cyber security is a common issue that the whole industry has to face," Ren said at the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum. "We must join hands to proactively address this issue."

Huawei Technologies Ltd., which Ren founded in 1987, has faced suspicions it is controlled by China's ruling Communist Party or is a front for the military. The company has denied it is a security threat and says it is owned by its employees.

Huawei was barred from bidding to work on a planned Australian high-speed Internet network due to concerns about cyber attacks traced to China. The company had to unwind its purchase of a U.S. computer company, 3Leaf Systems, last year after it failed to win approval from a government security panel.

The Australian ban highlighted concern about Beijing's cyber warfare efforts, a spate of hacking attempts aimed at Western companies and the role of Chinese equipment providers, which are expanding abroad. A U.S. congressional panel has said it will investigate whether allowing Huawei and other Chinese makers of telecoms gear to expand in the United States might aid spying by Beijing.

Huawei works with 45 of the 50 biggest global phone companies and says it has won the industry's trust. It publicly invited the U.S. government last year to investigate it in order to allay security concerns.

Ren, a former military engineer, said the industry must rapidly develop reliable cyberspace technology to support development of education and social skills.

"It is unfeasible to establish an absolutely impenetrable security assurance system that can keep data flowing securely within the networks (pipes) at all times," Ren said, comparing the flood of data to the global inundation in the Hollywood disaster movie "2012."

"Data floods will never go away," he said. "No matter how well we design and reinforce security assurance systems, they will be vulnerable to attacks again and again."

Ren is one of China's most enigmatic business figures, rarely appearing in public and never talking to reporters. Forbes magazine has estimated his net worth at more than $1 billion.

Huawei reported profit of 11.6 billion yuan ($1.8 billion) last year on sales of 209.9 billion yuan ($32.4 billion). Profit fell 53 percent from 2010, which Huawei blamed on weak global demand and the strength of China's yuan against foreign currencies.

After building its business on making switching equipment that forms the backbone of phone and computer networks, Huawei is trying to become a business and consumer brand. It launched a campaign this year to sell smartphones under its own brand in the United States.

Ren said Huawei plans to expand investment in Russia to take advantage of the country's background in technology. Huawei already has a development lab in Moscow, one of 23 around the world, including in Silicon Valley.

"Russia has a very solid foundation in the military industry, rich assets of wisdom and plenty of talent," Ren said. "This foundation endows Russia with unique advantages in developing the information industry."

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AJStream: Sudan: Protests Trigger Arrest of Twitter Activists http://t.co/RixFfbhZ

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Sunday, June 24, 2012

Sudan students at forefront of rising social unrest

Khartoum has seen an outburst of social unrest in the past week, driven by rampant inflation and simmering discontent, with the regime determined to crush a movement led by Sudanese students that has strong historical resonance.

The widening anti-government protests, which persist despite the security forces' policy of violently dispersing them, began as a student demonstration outside the University of Khartoum on June 16 against the sharp rise in food and fuel prices and quickly spread to other universities in the capital.

The University of Khartoum was the cradle of Sudan's first post-independence revolution, as protests there in 1964 led to a mass uprising that toppled the military dictatorship then in power, in what became known as the October revolution.

Opposition youth group Girifna published a story on its website on Monday entitled: "Khartoum University: heartbeat of the Sudanese revolution."

But the students now pushing for change face daunting challenges, particularly the repressive tactics of the ubiquitous security forces and the systematic infiltration of the universities by the regime, according to Nagi Musa, a medical student and member of Girifna (Arabic for 'We're fed up').

"It is extremely difficult to have any public activity... The government is trying to take the space inside the universities, because they think it's a danger to them," he told AFP, describing how a group of pro-regime students had visited one of the main campuses earlier that day carrying metal bars and knives.

"The (ruling) National Congress Party have resources. They have money, and through this they employ a lot of security people," said the student activist, who was detained for two weeks in January.

The riot police and agents working for Sudan's feared National Intelligence and Security Service (NISS) have, as in the past, demonstrated a zero tolerance policy towards the protesters, firing tear gas, beating them with batons and making sweeping arrests.

Amnesty International said on Friday that scores of activists had been detained since the demonstrations began.

AFP saw pictures of one, arrested while protesting at Sudan University on Tuesday, who had scars on his back, allegedly from being beaten while in custody, where he also had both his eyebrows shaved off.

A senior member of the NISS told an AFP correspondent, following his arrest at the University of Khartoum for taking photos, that the situation around the universities was "very sensitive."

The government actually closed the Khartoum university for more than two months earlier this year after students clashed with riot police in December, following a sit-in over a dispute over university fees that spilled into the surrounding streets.

Sudanese academics say that despite the recent student demonstrations, the universities are not the hotbeds of political activism that they used to be, which partly explains why they have failed to bring large numbers onto the streets so far.

Omar al-Bashir's regime, which celebrates 23 years in power next week, has successfully depoliticised the universities, says mathematics professor, Mohamed El-Tom, who was expelled from the University of Khartoum in 1992.

El-Tom, who has published research on the decline in higher education under Bashir, says NCP supporters now dominate the student union and the administrative staff at the universities are government appointees.

The policy of dramatically expanding and Islamising higher education in the 1990s has also relentlessly undermined standards, helping to explain why students do not command the respect that they used to, says El-Tom.

Another challenge for the activists is the fear among many Sudanese of the chaos that a revolution might usher in, given the existing conflicts in Sudan's peripheral regions such as Darfur and South Kordofan.

But Hisham Bilal, a teaching assistant at the University of Khartoum, argues that the economic crisis has now enabled student protesters to forge a link with the street.

"Put simply, hunger creates anger. So this could lead to more widespread social unrest," he said.

The protests remain small compared with the mass demonstrations that swept neighbouring Egypt last year and toppled long-time strong man, Hosni Mubarak.

But they come amid a rapidly deteriorating economic situation that has forced the government to announce drastic austerity measures and driven up the cost of living, especially for the burgeoning poor who are already struggling to cope with high food prices.

Musa, the activist with Girifna, believes that if any student gets killed this time, it could have a similar effect, recalling the death of student activist Ahmed al-Qureshi in 1964 which sparked the October Revolution.

"It will move a lot of people. I think it will have a big influence, and the government knows this and it is afraid," he said.

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Tuesday, June 19, 2012

The Mysterious Brain of the Fat-Tailed Dwarf Lemur, the World's Only Hibernating Primate

A fat-tailed dwarf lemur (Image courtesy of Kathrin Dausmann)

In the 18th century Carl Linnaeus named them lemurs, after the Latin lemures?spirits of the dead, wandering ghosts. He knew the primates roamed Madagascar?s forests at night, their large eyes brimming with moonlight, their shrill cries crashing through the treetops. One of the smallest lemurs on the island, the fat-tailed dwarf lemur, resembled a phantom in another way: it completely vanished for seven months each year.

For a long time, no one understood where the fat-tailed dwarf lemur went?a remote part of the island? the spirit world??or what it was doing all that time, but scientists had a hunch. Perhaps the lemur was hibernating. If so, it would be the only primate in the world?and one of the only tropical mammals?to do so. Given Madagascar?s climate, however, it made sense that a lemur might hibernate to survive annual periods of drought.

In general, Madagascar has two seasons: the hot, wet season from November to April, and the cooler, dry season from April through October. The deciduous forests on the west coast, where many fat-tailed dwarf lemurs live, offer no open sources of water during the dry season and only fibrous fruits bereft of sugar. Perhaps, scientists reasoned, the fat-tailed dwarf lemur hunkered down and waited for the rains to return, slowing its metabolism and dropping its body temperature. It could survive off of nutrients stored in its tail, which always grew plumper as the dry season drew closer.

In 1993 Kathrin Dausmann of the University of Hamburg and her colleagues finally put the hibernation hypothesis to the test. Between 1993 and 2003, the researchers regularly traveled to the forest of Kirindy on the west coast of Madagascar, where they captured 53 fat-tailed dwarf lemurs (Cheirogaleus medius). They tagged all the lemurs with radio transmitters to track their location and implanted six of the primates with small temperature sensors.

Around April, the lemurs disappeared as usual, but they were not really gone?just out of sight. The radio transmitters revealed their hiding spots?nests within tree hollows?and the temperature sensors confirmed that the primates were in fact hibernating during the dry season. The lemurs? approach to hibernation, however, was unusual.

A fat-tailed dwarf lemur on the west coast of Madagascar (Credit: Frank Vassen, via Wikimedia Commons)

Many small hibernating mammals?including arctic ground squirrels and European hedgehogs?regularly emerge from deep hibernation every few weeks and enter brief periods of biological activity during which their body temperatures rise, their metabolism speeds up and their brain activity increases. The animals do not necessarily get up and move around, but they might urinate and defecate. When they emerge from hibernation, they also sleep. That may seem paradoxical at first; isn?t hibernation a form of deep sleep? No, it?s not. During hibernation the mammalian brain is too cold and too idle to generate the electrical activity that regulates the kind of sleep we look forward to each night. Some scientists think that the need for sleep entirely explains why mammals periodically wake up from hibernation, while others think it is just one reason. What scientists know for certain is that any mammal deprived of sleep for too long will die.

In Dausmann?s study, lemurs hibernating in well-insulated hollows maintained a constant body temperature of about 25 degrees Celsius (77 degrees Fahrenheit), rousing themselves once every 10 to 14 days, somewhat like ground squirrels and hedgehogs. But the body temperatures of lemurs inside poorly insulated hollows fluctuated by 20 degrees Celsius or more every day with the ambient temperature, which increased from 10 degrees Celsius (50 degrees Fahrenheit) or colder at night to 30 degrees Celsius (86 degrees Fahrenheit) or warmer during the day. No one had ever observed such passive hibernation in a mammal. Dausmann thinks the primates essentially return to a reptilian form of temperature regulation, relinquishing control of their body?s thermostat to the environment and sparing themselves the energetic cost of waking up periodically during hibernation. The sun does most of the work for them.

In recent years, Peter Klopfer of Duke University and his colleagues have been visiting the forest of Kirindy on Madagascar to learn more about fat-tailed dwarf lemurs. Klopfer is particularly interested in studying how the dwarf lemur?s brain copes with hibernation. As a primate brain, the lemur?s brain is larger relative to body size, more complex and more demanding of energy than a squirrel?s brain. Klopfer and his teammates observe lemurs at the Duke Lemur Center and set up nesting boxes on Madagascar. They measure how much oxygen the lemurs use while inside their boxes as a proxy for changes in body temperature, as well as implanting temperature sensors just below the skin. The researchers also slip small, slender electrode needles below the lemurs? scalps to measure electrical activity in their brains.

A fat-tailed dwarf lemur with a plump tail (Image courtesy of Kathrin Dausmann)

So far, their data suggests that the hibernating fat-tailed dwarf lemur brain is unique among all hibernators, orchestrating sleep patterns that look nothing like those of ground squirrels or other hibernating mammals.

In people and most other mammals, rapid eye movement (REM) sleep?the phase most strongly associated with dreams?occupies about 25 percent of a night?s sleep. This is true for fat-tailed dwarf lemurs that are not hibernating. Klopfer and his team discovered that when hibernating dwarf lemurs sleep, however, they exclusively enter REM-sleep and they stay in REM sleep for an unusually long time. Arctic ground squirrels, in contrast, rarely or never enter REM sleep during hibernation. It?s almost as though the primate brain builds up a desperate need for REM-sleep during hibernation, Klopfer speculates, and satisfies the need with long REM sessions. As part of a recent study, scientists discovered that hibernating black bears maintain typical cycling between REM and non-REM sleep, but unlike many smaller hibernators their body temperatures do not drop all that much.

To Klopfer, the discrepancy between the sleeping patterns of hibernating ground squirrels and dwarf lemurs suggests that hibernation is not a conserved trait passed down from one evolutionary generation to the next. Rather, hibernation might be a convergent trait that evolved independently several times in different groups of animals. But studies on how fat-tailed dwarf lemurs hibernate are preliminary, Klopfer stresses, and?as with much hibernation research?there are still more questions than definitive answers.

Klopfer also thinks that, as a primate, the fat-tailed dwarf lemur is a better animal model than the arctic ground squirrel, hamster or hedgehog for studies on inducing hibernation in people. Some scientists have framed the possibility of deliberately reducing a person?s body temperature and metabolism in a controlled manner as a medical breakthrough that could permit otherwise impossible surgeries, as well as deep space travel. Although researchers have made some progress in artificially inducing hibernation in rodents, we are nowhere near ready to send human popsicles to Mars.

In about a week, Klopfer is returning to Madagascar to continue studying the fat-tailed dwarf lemur and to begin investigating the brain activity of the tenrec, which looks somewhat like a shrew and is the only other tropical mammal that hibernates. If the tenrec also enters REM sleep during hibernation, then this style of hibernation might be explained by a tropical environment, rather than a behavior unique to hibernating primates. Perhaps, Dausmann proposes, only the brains of tropical hibernators have the opportunity to get warm enough for REM sleep in an energetically efficient manner. An arctic ground squirrel hibernating in a burrow deep underground is not exposed to much fluctuation in ambient temperature, so it has to actively warm its brain in order to sleep, which requires a lot of energy?perhaps too much energy to fully enter REM sleep. A tropical hibernator, in contrast, could rely in part on high ambient temperatures to warm its brain enough for REM sleep.

Regardless of the exact details, the fact remains: fat-tailed dwarf lemurs are remarkable.? These tiny lemurs show that is is possible for a primate and its brain to survive off of nothing but a tail?s worth of fat for seven months?enduring large fluctuations in body temperature every day during that period?and to emerge from the whole experience, a little groggy perhaps, but as healthy as ever. Scientists now know where dwarf lemurs go when they disappear and what they are doing. Now they just have to figure out how they do it.

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Monday, June 18, 2012

Songza soars in challenging online music field

LOS ANGELES (AP) ? Songza, a new online radio service, leapfrogged Pandora as the most popular free music app for Apple devices last week. But it immediately faces a struggle to survive in a business saddled with high royalty rates for artists.

The New York-based startup aims to re-write the songbook on how an online radio service ought to run. One key difference: it has no mood-killing audio ads.

"We have playlists for getting lucky," says CEO and co-founder Elias Roman, 28. "If you're getting lucky and you're hearing a toothbrush ad in it, that's not a lifestyle enhancement. That's embarrassing for everybody."

Audio ad-free Songza, at no charge, compares with a $36 annual fee to avoid audio ads on Pandora Media Inc., or $4 a month on Slacker Inc., another online radio service. It also limits Songza Media Inc.'s revenue flow, although the company still runs display ads.

The lack of interruptions helped Songza get downloaded 1.15 million times in the 10 days since June 7, when it updated its iPhone app and offered an iPad-optimized version.

The company now enters a race to become the biggest, or at least among the biggest, online radio services, before an inevitable shake-out decimates those unable to turn a profit.

Even Pandora, by far the market leader in online radio, tripled its losses in the first quarter through April to $20.2 million, mainly because listening hours jumped 92 percent from a year ago to 3.1 billion in the quarter. Royalties amount to a fraction of a penny per song play, and rapid growth has outstripped Pandora's ability to sell ads.

"You can't build a business with these per-track rates," says Pandora co-founder Tim Westergren. He says that an eventual slowdown in growth will allow ad sales to catch up. He's pinned hopes for cutting costs on a government royalty-setting process that starts in 2014.

He says Songza might not survive the rigors of the free music business, like Imeem before it. "People were excited about them for a while. They hit the reality of the business ultimately."

The uneven economics of the online radio business were highlighted by a deal announced two weeks ago between traditional radio station giant Clear Channel and Taylor Swift's record label, Big Machine.

The deal gave Swift and other artists an unprecedented slice of royalties based on traditional radio station airplay. In exchange, they agreed to cap their share of revenue made on Internet-delivered radio songs from Clear Channel's iHeart Radio service. The deal "creates a structure that makes sense," Clear Channel CEO Bob Pittman said in a statement. The existing structure clearly didn't.

Slacker Inc., which launched in 2007, uses its free online radio service as a loss-leader to draw in potential customers. It convinces about 10 to 15 percent of them to pay up to $10 a month to choose songs and artists instead of hearing them more or less at random.

"There's no question it's a difficult business," says Jonathan Sasse, Slacker's senior vice president of marketing. The cost of marketing means the company is losing money, but that won't stop it from advertising to try to get bigger. "We'll continue to do that to invest in the growth of the company."

Songza is hoping that it can make money by learning what people say they're doing at certain moments of the day. Songza's "Music Concierge" service offers up playlists around themes like "unwinding after a long day," ''working out," and "eating dinner." Those lifestyle clues could appeal to advertisers.

CEO Roman didn't specify how Songza will use the information to create a business. "It's the type of thing you can do if you package your product as a lifestyle enhancer," he said.

Songza clearly needs to attract more users. According to comScore Inc., Pandora's website alone racked up 1.2 billion listener hours in May, compared to 2 million for Songza.

"Scale solves a lot of problems," says Tim Komada, founder of the Menlo Park, Calif.-based venture capital firm, Deep Fork Capital, which is an early Songza investor. "Our No. 1 priority now is scale ? gaining and retaining users."

Associated Press

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Sunday, June 17, 2012

Doo.net Lands Series A Funding To Organise Documents, Automatically For The People

Paper continues to be a problem inside organisations. we just can't seem to get rid it despite all these computers. And organising it is annoying. Doo.net hopes to solve the problem by organising documents with a cloud-based service. It's now launched its public beta on OS X and announced a Series A round which takes the companies total funding to $10m. Plus, an app for the Windows 8 Store is close to final approval and mobile apps for iOS and Android. A Google Docs integration, will come in the next few weeks.

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Monday, June 11, 2012

Top risk of stroke for normal-weight adults: Getting under 6 hours of sleep

Public release date: 11-Jun-2012
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Contact: Doug Dusik
ddusik@aasmnet.org
630-737-9700
American Academy of Sleep Medicine

Stroke risk greatest for employed middle to older ages, normal weight and no sleep apnea, habitually sleeping less than 6 hours each day

DARIEN, IL Habitually sleeping less than six hours a night significantly increases the risk of stroke symptoms among middle-age to older adults who are of normal weight and at low risk for obstructive sleep apnea (OSA), according to a study of 5,666 people followed for up to three years.

The participants had no history of stroke, transient ischemic attack, stroke symptoms or high risk for OSA at the start of the study, being presented today at SLEEP 2012. Researchers from the University of Alabama at Birmingham recorded the first stroke symptoms, along with demographic information, stroke risk factors, depression symptoms and various health behaviors.

After adjusting for body-mass index (BMI), they found a strong association with daily sleep periods of less than six hours and a greater incidence of stroke symptoms for middle-age to older adults, even beyond other risk factors. The study found no association between short sleep periods and stroke symptoms among overweight and obese participants.

"In employed middle-aged to older adults, relatively free of major risk factors for stroke such as obesity and sleep-disordered breathing, short sleep duration may exact its own negative influence on stroke development," said lead author Megan Ruiter, PhD. "We speculate that short sleep duration is a precursor to other traditional stroke risk factors, and once these traditional stroke risk factors are present, then perhaps they become stronger risk factors than sleep duration alone."

Further research may support the results, providing a strong argument for increasing physician and public awareness of the impact of sleep as a risk factor for stroke symptoms, especially among persons who appear to have few or no traditional risk factors for stroke, she said.

"Sleep and sleep-related behaviors are highly modifiable with cognitive-behavioral therapy approaches and/or pharmaceutical interventions," Ruiter said. "These results may serve as a preliminary basis for using sleep treatments to prevent the development of stroke."

Ruiter and colleagues collected their data as part of the Reasons for Geographic and Racial Differences in Stroke (REGARDS) study, led by George Howard, PhD, of the University of Alabama at Birmingham School of Public Health. REGARDS enrolled 30,239 people ages 45 and older between January 2003 and October 2007, and is continuing to follow them for health changes. The study is funded by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke.

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The abstract "Short sleep predicts stroke symptoms in persons of normal weight" is being presented today at SLEEP 2012, the 26th annual meeting of the Associated Professional Sleep Societies (APSS) in Boston. To be placed on the mailing list for SLEEP 2012 press releases or to register for SLEEP 2012 press credentials, contact AASM PR Coordinator Doug Dusik at 630-737-9700 ext. 9364, or at ddusik@aasmnet.org.

A joint venture of the American Academy of Sleep Medicine and the Sleep Research Society, the annual SLEEP meeting brings together an international body of more than 5,500 leading clinicians and scientists in the fields of sleep medicine and sleep research. At SLEEP 2012, more than 1,300 research abstract presentations will showcase new findings that contribute to the understanding of sleep and the effective diagnosis and treatment of sleep disorders such as insomnia, narcolepsy and sleep apnea.

Follow @aasmorg on Twitter for live updates and use the official hashtag #SLEEP2012 to see what attendees are saying. "Like" the American Academy of Sleep Medicine on Facebook at Facebook.com/sleepmedicine for photos, videos and more.

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Top risk of stroke for normal-weight adults: Getting under 6 hours of sleep

Public release date: 11-Jun-2012
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Contact: Doug Dusik
ddusik@aasmnet.org
630-737-9700
American Academy of Sleep Medicine

Stroke risk greatest for employed middle to older ages, normal weight and no sleep apnea, habitually sleeping less than 6 hours each day

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Thursday, June 7, 2012

Top music lobbyist urges corporations to voluntarily censor the Internet

By Stephen C. Webster
Wednesday, June 6, 2012 12:54 EDT

In prepared remarks delivered to Congress (PDF) on Wednesday, Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) CEO Cary Sherman said that the movie and music industries are working behind the scenes to encourage major Internet companies to voluntarily censor the Internet in an effort to better protect intellectual property rights.

Sherman?s testimony came amid a House Energy and Commerce Committee hearing on ?The Future of Audio,? during which members of Congress were considering allowing FM receivers be inserted into next generation smartphones, which would see radio stations paying more in performance rights.?Sherman, however, decided to talk about piracy, saying that despite the growing popularity of legitimate online music streaming services, illegal downloading is still essentially killing the industry and more must be done to fight it.

?We hope other intermediaries like search engines will? [negotiate] voluntary marketplace best practices to prevent directing users to sites that are dedicated to violating property rights,? he told the committee.

Despite Sherman?s hopes, that?s not likely to happen.

Search giant Google has been an ardent defender of the same cloud-based storage websites the RIAA calls ?rogue,? and even filed an amicus brief on behalf of one so-called ?cyber locker? website earlier this year in a prosecution brought by the movie and music industries, accusing the site of a copyright infringement conspiracy. Their attorneys argued that the movie and music industries fundamentally misunderstand the law and are trying to use it in an abusive manner, to the point where they are actually threatening the very existence of the social Internet.

The same groups were behind an enforcement action carried out against user-upload site MegaUpload.com, which Sherman hailed as a landmark achievement for the industry. ?The indictment of MegaUpload has had a tremendous impact on other such rogue cyberlocker sites,? he said. ?The government?s action sends a signal that the UnitedStates will not tolerate the use of the Internet for criminal activity that violates our laws.?

But where they cannot achieve their goals through government action, the RIAA and counterparts at the Motion Picture Association of American (MPAA) have sought to achieve voluntary compliance. One of their most recent successes in this arena will see America?s largest Internet service providers launching a copyright spying scheme on July 1 of this year that will monitor Internet users? traffic and interrupt them with messages of possible legal sanctions if infringing activities are detected.

?Just last year, we announced a voluntary program with ISPs that will be implemented later this year to address illegal downloads on P2P networks,? Sherman told members of Congress. ?We also helped craft an agreement with major credit card companies and payment processors on voluntary best practices to reduce sales of counterfeit and pirated goods. And just last month, major advertisers and ad agencies announced a series of voluntary best practices so that their valuable brands are not associated with rogue Internet sites that offerillegal goods, and advertisers don?t inadvertently enrich rogue website operators.?

One example of a voluntary industry ?best practice? formulated in recent years are the shared blacklists used by Google, Facebook, Microsoft and other major Internet corporations to track sites that are known to host malicious software. While these companies usually just insert a warning page cautioning users that a given site may be harmful, they do not completely block users from accessing them.

Microsoft, however, inadvertently demonstrated earlier this year what a more advanced ?best practice? might look like, when it began censoring links to The Promo Bay, a legal media sharing website spun off by the creators of The Pirate Bay, one of the Internet?s leading hubs for illegal downloaders.

Despite that site?s purported legitimacy, it landed on the ?SmartScreen? blacklist used by Microsoft, likely due to a report by a copyright holder, and the company suddenly began actively preventing users of its Windows Live Messenger program from sharing links to it. Other sites that were offering identical content could be shared through the service, but Microsoft?s chat client simply explained to users that The Promo Bay ?was blocked because it was reported as unsafe,? with users on the other end left unaware the communication ever took place.

?These voluntary programs are not a panacea. No program ever will be,? Sherman told Congress. ?And sometimes, the Congress must step in to assure that our property rights, and U.S. economic interests, are being protected. Especially against sites overseas whose business model is the theft of U.S. works. But collectively, we think these collaborative efforts will make a difference. They are the product of outreach, and a lot of conversation over several years ? not only with these intermediaries, but also with public interest groups who want to figure out how to address online problems while ensuring the reasonable preservation of a free and open Internet.

?We need to engage in the same sort of outreach directly with the tech and Internet communities, and I am committed to doing that ? because, in the end, we all have an interest in an Internet that is open and accessible, but not lawless.?
??

(H/T: Torrent Freak)

Stephen C. Webster

Stephen C. Webster is the senior editor of Raw Story, and is based out of Austin, Texas. He previously worked as the associate editor of The Lone Star Iconoclast in Crawford, Texas, where he covered state politics and the peace movement?s resurgence at the start of the Iraq war. Webster has also contributed to publications such as True/Slant, Austin Monthly, The Dallas Business Journal, The Dallas Morning News, Fort Worth Weekly, The News Connection and others. Follow him on Twitter at @StephenCWebster.

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Tuesday, June 5, 2012

Senior al-Qaida leader targeted in US drone strike that killed 15 in Pakistan

- / AFP/Getty Images file

Al-Qaida official Abu Yahya al-Libi, who escaped from U.S. custody in Afghanistan in 2005, is shown in a screen grab from an al-Qaida propaganda videotape released in July 2008.

By Robert WindremNBC News

A Predator attack over the weekend targeted Abu Yahya al-Libi, a leading al-Qaida operative who was viewed as one of five candidates to succeed Osama bin Laden as leader of the terrorist group when he was killed last year.? U.S. officials confirm that he was the target of the Sunday attacks and say they are awaiting word on his status.

In one of three strikes over the weekend, a U.S. drone struck a militant compound early Monday morning in North Waziristan, part of? Pakistan?s northwestern tribal area. Pakistan security reports indicated the pre-dawn strike killed 15 insurgents, but. U.S. officials said the number of dead was ?exaggerated.?

The Agence France Presse news agency reported that two missiles were fired on the compound in Mir Ali, 15 miles east of Miramshah, the capital of North Waziristan, near the Afghan border, in an area considered a hive of Taliban and al-Qaida activity.

A Pakistani official, ?who spoke with NBC News on condition of anonymity, said the victims were mostly foreigners and Urdu-speaking Punjabi Taliban who had gathered with the intention of crossing into Afghanistan to fight with Afghan Taliban fighters against NATO forces.

Reuters, citing reports from the region, said nearly 30 people were killed during the sequence of strikes, including four suspected militants on Saturday, 10 suspected militants on Sunday, and 15 people in the strike in which Abu Yahya was targeted.

Pakistan's Foreign Ministry said Monday it "strongly condemns" the US drone strikes, which it described as "illegal attacks" on Pakistani sovereignty.

The most-recent attack of the weekend was the eighth drone strike in Pakistan since a NATO conference on Afghanistan in Chicago last month. Since taking office in 2009, the Obama administration has carried out nearly 300 drone strikes in Pakistan, Yemen and Somalia, the majority of them in Pakistan?s tribal areas, according to the New America Foundation, which keeps an unofficial count.

If Abu Yahya was indeed killed, it would be another blow to al-Qaida in Pakistan, the so-called al-Qaida Central.? The Libyan, believed to be 39 years old, is one of the most influential propagandists in al-Qaida and one of its best known leaders.

Abu Yahya draws much of his credibility from having escaped a U.S. military prison at Bagram Air Base in Afghanistan on the night of July 10, 2005. He subsequently appeared in more than 30 videos produced by al Shahab, the al-Qaida media wing, and other militant sites. In December 2009, Pakistani officials erroneously reported he had been killed in a Predator strike, further enhancing his image.

U.S. officials say unlike many al-Qaida propagandists, Abu Yahya also is a seasoned fighter.

In May 2011, shortly after bin Laden was killed, U.S. officials identified Abu Yahya as one of five potential successors to the slain al-Qaida leaders.? The leading candidate, Ayman al Zawahiri, ultimately did succeed bin Laden.? If Abu Yahya was killed, he would be the fourth of the five to have been killed in drone strikes.

Ilyas Kashmiri, al-Qaida?s director of external operations, was killed on June 3. Abdul Rahman Atiya, bin Laden?s chief of staff, was killed Aug. 22. Both of those attacks took place in northwestern Pakistan.? Anwar al Awlaki, a leader of al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula and an American citizen, was killed in Yemen, also in a drone strike, on Sept. 30.?

Robert Windrem is a senior investigative producer for NBC News; NBC News' Mushtaq Yusufzai contributed reporting from?Pakistan.

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Scranton Chinese School celebrates end of semester at picnic

Photo: N/A, License: N/A, Created: 2012:06:03 00:06:05

Jason Farmer / Staff Photographer Eight-year-old Alice Zhang fills up her plate during the Scranton Chinese School's spring picnic at the University of Scranton on Sunday.

A game of Twister with directions in Chinese and some Chinese dishes were on the menu at the University of Scranton on Sunday.

After a semester of academic interaction, students of the Scranton Chinese School and their families enjoyed a potluck picnic on campus.

"It's good to get to know the other Chinese families and share some tips," Joyce Cheng, whose two children take classes, said. "It's more like a community."

The students and families enjoyed homemade Chinese dishes, as well as a few catered dishes from the dining service at the university.

The Scranton Chinese School, which began in 2010, is an educational nonprofit organization that promotes language and cultural awareness. Although the university donates the space where the school meets, it is a separate organization.

"This (the picnic) is more for the kids to have fun, learn about classmates and gain more than just the class interactions," Ms. Cheng said.

Students were invited to perform songs or share what they had learned throughout the semester. Several shared their knowledge by playing Twister, while their teacher gave directions in Chinese.

Many of the students were either part of Chinese families or adopted from China. Bringing the two groups together has been rewarding for Sarah Balmer, 37, and her daughter, whom she adopted more than two years ago.

"We can try to do cultural things with her, but we're not Chinese," she said. "That's an experience she never would have been a part of."

It was the first semester of the program for Patrick Zippittelli, 31, Jessup. After practicing Chinese martial arts for 20 years, he decided to immerse himself deeper in the culture.

"It was something I always wanted to learn," he said. "Learning language makes it easier to learn about the culture."

The next beginner class will begin in the fall.

For more information, visit www.scrantonchinese school.org.

Contact the writer: rbrown@timesshamrock.com

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Defense: George Zimmerman in police custody

After his bond was revoked, George Zimmerman, right, returns to the John E. Polk Correctional Facility in Sanford, Fla., Sunday, June 3, 2012. Zimmerman is charged with second-degree murder in the shooting of Trayvon Martin.(AP Photo/Orlando Sentinel, Joshua C. Cruey, Pool)

Mark O'Mara, attorney for George Zimmerman, makes comments after Zimmerman returned to the John E. Polk Correctional Facility, Sunday, June 3, 2012, in Sanford, Fla. Zimmerman is charged with second-degree murder in the shooting of Trayvon Martin. (AP Photo/John Raoux)

After his bond was revoked, George Zimmerma, right, returns to the John E. Polk Correctional Facility in Sanford, Fla., Sunday, June 3, 2012. Zimmerman is charged with second-degree murder in the shooting of Trayvon Martin. (AP Photo/Orlando Sentinel, Joshua C. Cruey, Pool)

MIAMI (AP) ? George Zimmerman, the neighborhood watch volunteer charged with murder in the killing of Trayvon Martin, surrendered to police Sunday and was booked into jail after having his bail revoked two days earlier.

Zimmerman's legal team said in a tweet that he was in police custody. Zimmerman's bail was revoked because the judge said he and his wife lied to the court about their finances so he could obtain a lower bond.

On Sunday afternoon, about 40 minutes before the 2:30 p.m. deadline to surrender, Zimmerman was listed as an inmate on the jail website. He was listed as being held without bail and having $500 in his jail account.

Seminole County Sheriff Donald Eslinger said Zimmerman turned himself in to two sheriff's office employees around 1:25 p.m. near the jail, and was then driven to the jail. Zimmerman arrived in a white minivan and did not respond to questions from reporters as he walked inside, handcuffed and wearing blue jeans, sneakers and a button-down shirt.

"He is quiet and cooperative," Eslinger said at a news conference after Zimmerman's surrender.

The Seminole County Sheriff's Office said Zimmerman would be in a cell by himself, separated from the general population, because the case is so high-profile. The 67-square-foot cell is equipped with a toilet, two beds, a mattress, pillow, blanket and bed sheets. Zimmerman will not have access to a TV.

Prosecutors had said Zimmerman and his wife told the judge at a bond hearing in April that they had limited money, even though he had raised about $135,000 through a website. Defense attorneys said the matter was a misunderstanding.

Attorney Mark O'Mara announced earlier Sunday on his website that Zimmerman had arrived in Florida late Saturday evening ahead of his surrender. Zimmerman, who is charged with second-degree murder in the fatal shooting of the 17-year-old Martin, was ordered by a judge Friday to return to jail.

During a bond hearing in April, the couple had indicated they had limited funds. But prosecutors say Zimmerman had raised thousands through a website he had set up for his legal defense.

Zimmerman's legal team said Sunday that they will ask for a new bond hearing to address those concerns, and that they hope Zimmerman's voluntary surrender will show he is not a flight risk. Furthermore, the money Zimmerman has raised is in an independent trust and cannot be directly accessed by Zimmerman or his attorneys, according to the press release.

Zimmerman has pleaded not guilty to the second-degree murder charge. He maintains he shot Martin in self-defense under Florida's so-called "stand your ground" law because the teen, who was unarmed, was beating him up after confronting Zimmerman about following him in a gated community outside Orlando.

Zimmerman's credibility could become an issue at trial, legal experts said, noting the case hinges on jurors believing Zimmerman's account of what happened the night in February that Martin was killed.

Zimmerman wasn't charged in the case until more than a month after the shooting. Protests were held across the nation, and the case spurred debate about whether race was a factor in Zimmerman's actions and in the initial police handling of the case. Martin was black; Zimmerman's father is white and his mother is from Peru.

Police in Sanford did not immediately arrest Zimmerman, citing the Florida law that gives wide latitude to use deadly force rather than retreat in a fight if people believe they are in danger of being killed or seriously injured.

Zimmerman was arrested 44 days after the killing.

Prosecutors pointed out in their motion that Zimmerman had $135,000 available when the bond hearing was held in April. It had been raised from donations through a website he had set up. They suggested more has been collected since and deposited in a bank account.

Shellie Zimmerman was asked about the website at the hearing, but she said she didn't know how much money had been raised. Circuit Judge Kenneth Lester set bail at $150,000. The 28-year-old was freed a few days later after posting $15,000 in cash ? which is typical.

Prosecutor Bernie De la Rionda complained Friday, "This court was led to believe they didn't have a single penny. It was misleading and I don't know what words to use other than it was a blatant lie." The judge agreed and ordered Zimmerman returned to jail by Sunday afternoon.

The defense countered that Zimmerman and his wife never used the money for anything, which indicated "there was no deceit."

The judge said he would schedule a hearing after Zimmerman is back in custody so he could explain himself.

Benjamin Crump, an attorney for Trayvon Martin's parents, Tracy Martin and Sybrina Fulton, said his clients have always said Zimmerman should remain in jail until trial.

Associated Press

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