Which Obama E-mail Subject Line Raised Him the Most Money in 2012?

NEW YORK (Reuters) - A young model was either insane, or a calculating, quick-thinking murderer who feigned mental illness when he killed and castrated his lover, a prominent Portuguese journalist, in their New York hotel room last year, a jury heard on Wednesday. No one disputes that Renato Seabra, 22, killed Carlos Castro, 65, in January 2011. Seabra pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity to a charge of second degree murder, and his trial reached closing arguments at Manhattan criminal court. ...

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/obama-e-mail-subject-line-raised-him-most-150302929.html

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2012 White House Holiday Craft: Pomegranate Tree Ornaments

Joy to All, from the White House to your house...

First Lady Michelle Obama invited children from military families for a craft-making session in the State Dining Room when she unveiled this year's 'Joy to All' Christmas decor.? Led by Executive Pastry Chef Bill Yosses, Mrs. Obama and the kids used whole pomegranates, ribbon, glitter glue and plastic doves to create sparkling ornaments.? The kids had a lot of fun making their keepsakes, and it's an easy and fun craft that can be recreated at home.? (Above:? Mrs. Obama at the craft table; Yosses is at left)

The pomegranates are briefly baked to dry out, to ensure that the ornaments last through the holiday season.? The First Lady and her junior guests drew designs on the pomegranates with the glitter glue--Mrs. Obama penned? a sparkly heart--and then wound green, red and gold ribbons around their fruit. The doves were pinned into the top, but any holiday decoration can be used, such as stars, snowmen, or tiny reindeer. White House Pomegranate Tree Ornaments
Supplies
*Large pomegranates

*Glitter glue in holiday colors:? Sliver, blue, red, green, gold

*Holiday ribbon

Method
1.? Preheat over to 190 degrees F.

2.? Place pomegranates on a baking sheet and dry in the oven for at least fifteen minutes.

3.? Decorate pomegranates with glitter glue, with polka dots, hearts, stars.? Let dry.

4.? Tie a ribbon around the pomegranate and leave some long ends to tie a loop to hang on the tree.

5.? Pin a holiday decoration on top of the pomegranate, such as a snowman, star or dove.

Above, Yosses displays a completed ornament.
______________________
Check the side bar for all White House recipes.? Click here for links to all posts about the 2012 holidays.

Download:? The 2012 Official White House Holiday Tour Booklet [PDF].?
?
*Photos by Eddie Gehman Kohan/Obama Foodorama

Source: http://obamafoodorama.blogspot.com/2012/11/2012-white-house-holiday-craft.html

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Why Health Care Is Reshaping Itself - Hospitals & Health Networks

By Joe Flower	November 27, 2012
There's a new math on the balance sheet: Revenue and cost are transforming beyond recognition.

Costs and revenue: This is the oxygen of any business, any organization. What are your revenue streams? How much does it cost you to produce them? Life is not just about breathing, but, if you don't get that in-out equation right, there is nothing else life can be about.

Right now this enormous sector is turning itself inside out. It has turned the "transmogrification" setting to "warp." Why? It's all about the in-out. It's all about increasingly desperate attempts to get that right ? and the clear fact that we cannot know if we are getting it right.

Let's do some school on the two sides of this equation. Let's just go over the new weirdness, and the implications for you and your organization. Revenue first.

Hunting for True Revenue

In traditional health care (the way we did business until about five minutes ago) the revenue side was complicated in detail, but simple in concept: You do various procedures and tests and services, and you bill for them. You bill each item according to a code. You bill different payers; each has its own schedule of payments that you negotiate (or just get handed) every year. There are complications, such as people on Medicare with supplemental insurance, dual eligibles on Medicare and Medicaid, and self-pay patients who may or may not pay.

That's the basic job: aggregating enough services that reimburse more than their real cost so that you can cover the costs of services that don't reimburse well. This is cost-shifted, fee-for-service management. Cut back on those low-reimbursement services; pump up the high-reimbursement ones. Corral the docs you need to provide the services, provide the infrastructure and allocate costs across the system.

The incentives all point in the same direction. The revenue streams are all additive. The more you do of the moneymaking items on the list, the more money you make.

Hybrid revenue streams in the Next Health Care. Fast forward to five minutes in the future, and the picture becomes not only complicated, but complex, in some ways irremediably so. Now you're not just thinking about the revenue structure of a hospital; more often you are thinking about a system, with not just multiple revenue streams but multiple types of revenue streams. You may already have had clinics, labs, ambulance services, imaging services, primary care physician groups ? in fact, a whole array of different businesses. What's different now is how you get paid for things.

You may still mostly be working fee-for-service, but maybe now you have an insurance arm, and maybe some percentage of your patients are capitated through it: You have an incentive to provide excellent care, but any unnecessary emergency department visits or surgeries, any preventable heart attacks or diabetic shock episodes are now simple costs, while before they were revenue opportunities as well.

You may have developed a new set of revenue streams in per-patient, per-month prospective payments for "medical home" services but, the more you do that and the better you are at it, the more you keep people out of your ED and your surgical suites. That's what those payments are for ? to lower the overall costs by taking better care of the patient up front. And the costs you are lowering are your revenues.

Similarly, your primary care arm may have an at-risk contract like the Alternative Quality Contract from Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts, which literally pays primary care providers to keep patients from needing to use EDs or needing surgery or other high-end services, while holding them to quality standards that assure they are getting excellent care. It's a revenue stream, but it's at the cost of other revenue streams. Or it may not be your revenue stream. It may be an independent primary care physician group in town that has the contract, paid extra to deprive you of fee-for-service patients.

Or you may have dedicated clinics servicing specific groups on a per-patient, per-month basis (like, say, a spine and pain clinic for a company's warehouse workers) in which working efficiently and well cuts into what otherwise may have been fee-for-service operations and imaging services.

Unknown factors. These scenarios lie against a background in which it is likely that actual fee-for-service reimbursement rates from Medicare and private payers will be held tightly in check. The future landscape has a number of new opportunities for revenue streams, but most of them make money by cutting into your (or someone else's) more conventional business. But we cannot know by how much, or how the interaction between different revenue streams will play out over time.

In planning for the new environment, this tells us three things:

• These systemic risks are not quantifiable, and so cannot be hedged. They are risks because we are entering new territory. We simply do not know how these different parts of the market will interact. Revenue estimates for most parts of the business have to be treated as "high-variance" projections, which were much harder to pin down in the past.

• If some types of risk contracts make money by cutting into other types of business, you want to own that contract. If some organization is going to make money by costing you money, you want to be that organization. It may be cutting into your ED, surgery and imaging business, but at least you get the revenue stream for doing that. If you don't, someone else will.

• For any business that includes a hospital, bigger is better. At greater size, you can absorb more high-variance risk from a greater variety of revenue streams, and from different contracts serving different populations. You can spread the revenue base and try more alternatives. You have the space and breadth to try, fail forward quickly and try again.

If the revenue side is so hard to pin down, you need to create some space to try different options. The cost side can give you some of that space.

Getting Our Arms around Cost

Compared with revenue, the cost side of things seems relatively straightforward. So why can't we get our arms around it?

When we are talking about the costs of health care, we are talking about two different types of costs. One is the cost of doing things, such as: How much does it cost to do a complex back fusion operation? Think of these as internal costs. The other is the cost of producing an effect, such as: How much does it cost to reduce back pain? Think of these as system costs.

If you are at risk for a population (as in, perhaps you have a spine and pain center with a per-patient, per-month risk contract), then both kinds of costs are true costs to you. If you can satisfy the patient and end his or her back pain through medical management instead of surgery, you have dropped a bunch of money to your bottom line.

On the other hand, if you are in a fee-for-service environment, the back operation is not just a cost, it's also an income opportunity, and only the internal costs are actual costs to you.

More unknowns. In any environment, then, reducing your internal costs improves your bottom line. The problem here is that we typically do not actually know what our internal costs are, or what we could do to reduce them.

Some things obviously reduce internal costs ? better coordination, reduced duplication, more efficiency in moving the patient through the system (not adding the cost of an extra inpatient day just because someone neglected to sign off on the discharge form, for instance), or fewer mistakes and infections.

But beyond these efforts, to truly reduce costs we need to drive our analysis to the individual patient and case level, differentiating between the general system costs imputed to the case, or the average costs that such cases are thought to generate, or the sunk costs of the facility and equipment, and the actual incremental costs that this case generated: How much did it cost us to replace Mr. Herndon's hip? Much of the costs attributed to particular types of operations are averages, or imputed costs representing the whole organization's overhead. These obscure the costs that are particular to Mr. Herndon's case.

Fine-grained cost analysis. Why do we need such fine-grained cost analysis? Because if the team who handled Mr. Herndon's workup, surgery, post-surgery and rehab did something different that actually cost less and worked better ? a different kind of wound dressing, say, or a more aggressive schedule of getting him up and walking afterward ? more general cost analysis would not let us pick up that difference, track it and replicate it.

Further, we need to track the costs by activity (how much did the post-surgical care actually cost, say) and across the entire care cycle.

Similarly, we need to drive the cost analysis to the team level: If a given hip-replacement team is able to find ways of doing things that are better and cheaper, we need cost analysis that can pick up that difference so we can find out what teams are doing differently, try the improvement with other teams, measure the improvement and propagate it.

Two things make this currently impossible in most of health care: Our cost aggregation software is mostly designed for billing purposes, not for discovering actual costs. It doesn't ask the questions to which we need answers. And typically in health care, we do not work in persistent, dedicated clinical teams. We rotate people through various assignments. When there are no persistent teams, it is not possible to notice which variations of practice actually cost less and get better results. Having no teams obliterates the possibility of learning.

Still, though tracking real costs to the patient, case and team levels is difficult, costs are ultimately more discoverable than future revenue streams. With the right strategies, one can drive down costs much more dependably than one can predict revenue.

Cost and Revenue as Change Drivers

The struggle to get the cost-revenue respiration right is the prime driver of the enormous structural changes that we are seeing in health care. Recently, the head of health care for a major Wall Street bank told me that up to just a few years ago, mergers and acquisitions amounted to 5 percent of his practice. Today it is 67 percent.

Big systems, including for-profit systems, are expanding rapidly, acquiring hospitals and other health care services by the bunch. They see these acquisitions not as "revenue plays" largely, but as "cost plays." The big systems believe they can create value and enhance their survival by mitigating the "high-variance" risks of the new environment through size and diversity, while wringing cost out of the services and hospitals they acquire through tighter coordination and more aggressive management.

These same factors make it increasingly difficult for small and rural hospitals to survive as independents. They need the scale, greater coordination, access to clinical excellence, ability to support experiments in driving cost and quality, and ability to rationalize high-variant risk across a larger system that only a partnership of some kind with larger organizations can provide.

The new era of costs and revenues likely spells the end of any notion of the hospital as a cottage industry. It is on the balance sheet and the cash flow sheet that the idea of "coordination across the full cycle of care" stops being a buzzword and becomes a structural reality.

Joe Flower is a health care futurist and CEO of The Change Project Inc., and its health care education arm, Imagine What If. He is also a regular contributor to H&HN Daily and a member of Speakers Express.

The opinions expressed by authors do not necessarily reflect the policy of Health Forum Inc. or the American Hospital Association.

in general. All comments will be reviewed by a moderator before being posted.

Please note: Your browser cookies must be enabled to leave comments and remember your login information. If you are having trouble posting a comment please enable your browser cookies or email us your comment at hhndaily@healthforum.com.

Source: http://www.hhnmag.com/hhnmag/HHNDaily/HHNDailyDisplay.dhtml?id=7180005042

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Improve Sleep & Health With Android Mobile Phone Technology

The following interview was conducted with the programmer of "Sleep as Android" -- an "app" or application (program) which runs on Android phones and helps you to get to sleep, have a better quality of sleep, and then helps you to wake up refreshed and at the right time.

Louis Szondy: First, I'd like to let you know how much the Sleep as Android app has helped me, and I've only had it a few weeks. Before this I have had trouble sleeping early, getting enough sleep, and I've been functioning badly as a result. I have to admit I did not know about the importance of waking up during "light sleep".

I am sure this application will be of help to most people, since I suspect very few people these days get either enough nor the right type of sleep. Already I've been getting more and better sleep since using your app: I am taken to sleep gently by nice sounds that slowly decrease in volume and woken up during light sleep phase close to alarm time by music of my choice slowly increasing in volume.

What I find really amazing too is that I can see a graph of my light and deep sleep, as well as listen to recordings of any talk, snoring or other sounds that took place while sleeping. So I have many questions and I'm sure that most of our readers will benefit from better sleep if they have an Android or iPhone. This app is available for iPhone users too, is that correct?

Petr Nalevka: Currently we only have an Android version "Sleep as Android", although there are alternatives for IPhone from other parties such as "Sleep cycle tracker".

Q: Please tell me, how is it that a mobile phone on the mattress can know when we are in deep sleep and light sleep with such accuracy, and give us the times and graphs of our sleep cycles as they occurred?

A: In medicine there are different applications where accelerometers are very useful to deduce various conditions of a patient based on his movement patterns. This method is called actigraphy and has proven to be useful also for measuring sleep cycles. It is not as precise as EEG for example, but it delivers comprehensive results and it is much simpler to use in home conditions.

Contemporary smartphones have accelerometers built-in mostly for screen orientation changes, gaming or augmented reality. But they are quite precise ? on par with some medical devices ? and may also be used for actigraphy and sleep cycle tracking.

During your sleep your body is going through various phases. To simplify, light sleep and deep sleep phases are taking turns. Deep sleep phases are followed with limited muscle activity up to fully relaxed muscles toward the end of each deep sleep phase. This allows us to assume your sleep cycles from your movement based on accelerometric data delivered to your phone through the mattress.

Q: This is something many people may not realize, thinking that the phone is relying on *sound* not movement. So it relies exclusive upon movement, and can even notice the slightest movement?

A: Yes, sleep cycles are estimated based on movement exclusively. You may start Sleep as Android in the "test sensors" mode and see the accelerometer is really precise so that even the slightest movement gets captured. The curve in the graph is never flat, even when you leave the phone on the table.

There may be some relation between sound and sleep cycles but it is probably very much individual and not as straightforward as movement. Still capturing sound during your sleep may be another good idea to do. It may reveal some other characteristics of your sleep such as snoring or sleep talking. Also different serious sleep disorders may be detected using the audio information. For some people even common snoring may have serious consequences and may for example lead to further development of sleep apnea if not treated.

LS: Yes, and this is a part of the app that many may find useful or interesting: that the app records any noises during the night, so if you sleep talk or snore, this can be played back later.

We spend perhaps a third of our lives asleep. Assuming that when we are awake we are really awake :-) And that time is really important. It determines much of our health and productivity as well as state of mind during the following day(s). Waking refreshed, and not groggy from a deep sleep phase, is so important, and yet, your app which helps us to do exactly that, costs only $2?!

Q: Why is the price so low, how do you manage to constantly develop and bring in new features, and also answer questions and support mail? You do a really great job of customer service, how many of you work on this project?

A: Exactly as you say, Sleep as Android is not only measuring sleep cycles, but it is trying to make maximum use of this information to help you improve your sleep experience. This includes: finding an optimal moment for your wake up to feel better in the morning, advice on your sleep habits (SleepStats) ? e.g. what is a good time for you to go to bed, measuring sleep quality (deep sleep %) etc.

The price may be so favorable (just ~$2) for two main reasons. First, the incredible progress in mobile technology and devices we achieved recently - basically all you need to track and improve your sleep is already in your pocket and its called the smartphone.

Second, the great idea of app markets and the progress in micro payments which allow to offer the app to a great amount of people and divide your development costs among them.

Those two factors allow us to offer the app at minimal cost and still keep improving it. We do release a new version roughly each 2 weeks and beside bug fixes and more device compatibility we try to introduce new features in each release. For example the most recent improvements include: nature sound lullabies, experimental lucid dreaming support, backup alarm or ringtone playlists.

We take our support task very seriously and we try to answer vast majority of the requests, even we are getting around 30-50 requests a day. We are two guys doing the job mostly in free time.

Q: You mentioned "lucid dreaming support", can you say something more about that?

A: Regarding lucid dreaming, currently this feature is not well documented and it is really for the enthusiasts to play with and give us feedback. In general it plays some audio hint which you train yourself for during your deep sleep phase to allow you to realize you are dreaming. The idea is you can than control your dreams and have a lot of fun :).

That's why I say it's really for enthusiasts as people mostly want to have a calm sleep rather than having some audio triggers during the night.

Q: What actually made you start this project to make this "app" (application/program)?

A: Several years ago I got interested in the use of actigraphy to enhance a telemedical project which became the base of my dissertation thesis. I did want to test actigraphy myself and was looking at some single-purpose sleep cycle alarm clock devices which appeared on the market. But those devices were quite expensive and I was thinking, why should I buy such a device when I already have an Android smartphone with accelerometer (it was an Android 1.6 at that time). And that's how we started to code "Sleep as Android".

LS: Looking at the reviews by other users, I see mostly either five stars or one star. I see five stars from those who are clearly using the application correctly, and one from those who seem to be making mistakes such as putting the phone under the pillow, or not having it plugged into a charger, or unable to dim the screen and leaving it face up. Yet others who write in for help are happy though as they then get the answers how to use it correctly.

Q: What are the reasons or limitations of use?

A: I agree the app is not yet as user-friendly as it could be. On our website we have a quick start guide, explanation of sleep tracking principles, a FAQ and a forum with over 500 topics all answered. We are working to improve this aspect and we are preparing a tutorial and help within the app itself.

Also the app is accessing all soft of hardware functions of the phone (mic, accelerometr, flash light, audio playback...) which makes it hard to keep all aspects functional on the huge zoo of Android devices out there. According to the Play store, our app may run on more than 2600 devices (and there are unofficial devices not listed). We are supporting up (down) to Android 1.5 and 1.6 where we still have thousands of users.

To make it even more complicated we are suffering from a bug in the Android system introduced in Android 1.6. It was partially fixed in 2.3.5 but it is still present on several >4.0 devices. The bug causes the accelerometer to stop providing data when the screen turns off. For the affected devices we need to keep the screen on all night (at minimal level) and we need a sophisticated detection system to recognize whether it is an affected device or not.

Those issues may be the source of some negative ratings, but we are trying hard to deliver a functional app on most devices out there and our average rating is now 4.53 stars out of 5.

LS: I am not one of those who normally has to be up at a certain time, my main worry is falling asleep, and waking up after enough sleep, not before. But I found Sleep as Android makes me go to bed earlier by alerting me when it is time to sleep, gently and persistently even if my wife often tells me the same thing. It helps me get to sleep faster by playing the right sounds. It then gently wakes me in the morning at optimal time during a light sleep phase with nice music of my choice slowly rising in volume. But others set it to make sure they have really woken up in the morning, those heavy sleepers who have to wake up by a certain time, no matter what, or they'll miss the train to work, for example.

Q: Can you tell us about those features that make sure that someone is really awake and does not either keep hitting the snooze button, or even switch off the alarm and fall back asleep?

A: We call this feature CAPTCHA. Even though we are not using it for telling apart spam bots from people but we are recognizing people who are fully woken up and ready to go to work from sleepy "zombies" whose only concern is to dismiss the alarm as quickly as possible and continue sleeping even they will miss their work and get into a lot of troubles later!

Apparently there is a numerous group of people with real difficulties to get out of bed in the morning and Sleep as Android may help here.

The basic concept of all our CAPTCHA's is: the alarm won't stop ringing before you solve a little task which proves you are fully awake. Simple Math CAPTCHA was the first we introduced. To dismiss the alarm you had to solve a very simple mathematical equation. But some people did not like math in the morning so we introduced "Sleeping sheep" where you have to find an open-eyed sheep in a herd of sleeping ones.

Than we also have CAPTCHAs where you need to do some physical activity to stop the alarm. For example shake your phone for a while.

For the heaviest sleepers we have a QR code CAPTCHA. You print out any QR code you like and put it on your bathroom mirror for example or on your fridge. Later when the alarm rings the only way to stop it is to get out of the bed and scan the QR code in your bathroom or kitchen.

Q: As your price is so low, as soon as the 2 week trial expired, I purchased the license. I also bought the extended stats ($2 also?). What happens if someone does not buy the license and opts to continue to use it for free, I saw some advertising on the app, and I think it would only work every two days?

A: By the way thank you very much for purchasing our app and to all our other users who did that too. We use your contribution to bring you new features and to make the app available on as many devices as we can.

Anyway, if you decide to not purchase the unlock you are free to continue using the app but as you said sleep tracking will only work every second day. Still the alarm clock will wake you up in the morning with all the other features (CAPTCHA, gradual volume, time to bed etc.) but will not use smart wake up at that particular day. Also some lullabies and nature sound ringtones are available in the full version only.

Q: And what of the extended stats? I've only had those for a day, so can you tell us what they do and how they can help us improve our sleeping habits or patterns, or what purpose they serve?

A: SleepStats provide you with more inside into your sleep data. It provides several visually rich and informative charts. You can see how does you average sleep length and average deep sleep develop over time. You can see your actual and cumulative sleep deficit visualized. Sleep patterns show your wake up and fall asleep hours in a range-bar chart.

The highlight of SleepStats is definitely sleep advice. We apply a polynomial regression model to your sleep data history to see which sleep characteristics lead to best sleep results. Based on that we can advise you on the best sleep length and fall asleep hour.

Q: Can I ask, how old are you, and what is your background and where are you located?

A: I'm 32 years old, I have a PhD in computer science, I'm working as an IT consultant but most of all I'm a technology geek. I really enjoy all the new possibilities technology has brought to our lives. I'm located in Czech republic, Prague.

Q: How do you use the App yourself, if that is not too private to ask... do you listen to recordings, use the go to sleep sounds, if so which one, do you use the "time to sleep" alarm, and which of the waking methods do you use? And how has the App helped you?

A: I'm a big fan of the app myself :). I use it every day and so does my girlfriend. She likes especially to accuse me of snoring using the recording feature as evidence.

During the work week I use a 30 minutes smart wake up period. On the weekend I use 2 hours. I use a playlist of nature sounds to wake me up and recently I really enjoy lullabies as I fall asleep very fast when I listen to "diving with whales". This lullaby is really calming me down although I also like "thunderstom" or "fireplace".

As I'm a bit of a workaholic the app especially helps me to keep my sleep deficits low. I use an insistent "time to bed" notification with an ideal sleep duration of 8 hours (although 7 and 7.5 may be more preferable for others).

During the work week I use the math CAPTCHA which not only gets me out of bed, but also it is a small exercise to get my brain started in the morning.

Q: What else do you do of interest, or is this a full-time job? It sure sounds like it!

A: I'm working in business IT on short-term projects. Beside Sleep as Android we have a small but interesting portfolio of other Android apps such as Dock4Droid, AppReactor or Apps Watchdog. In Czech republic we are running probably the biggest public fuel price database (www.pumpdroid.com) allowing our users to save money on gas using their smartphones. Recently I had a lot of fun presenting our app's at various local tech conferences.

Q: When did you start making this App, and what is now in the works? I see some people complain about the look of the interface, but personally I love the existing look.

A: We started 2.5 years ago.

One of the things in front of us is the migration to the Android new Holo-look where we face backward compatibility issues, but we already have a holo-styled version which is now available to anyone who is willing to test it on our website.

In addition we have many other plans on our task list. For example we would like to introduce sleep graph tagging and do a data mining analysis to provide you with more detailed advice on your sleep, improve snoring detection and noise recording quality, implement proper REM sleep phase detection, more cloud synchronization possibilities and many more. Also we are starting to cooperate with a few sleep researches where Sleep as Android may help collect sleep data.

Q: I notice that sometimes the "lullaby" to help me to sleep, goes back to louder volume when I've been a bit restless. Does it respond to me not falling asleep by restarting so that I get more time?

A: Yes, currently the lullaby feature uses accelerometric data to adjust volume and the idea is to turn the volume down as you land in the first deep sleep phase. If we recognize you are still in light sleep we get the volume back.

Q: How can we find out what our optimum sleeping length is? I thought mine was 8 hours, but now realize I never seem to get that, perhaps 7 is closer. Is it possible I became accustomed to too little sleep, and can increase my sleeping duration over time, and that this App can help me to do that?

A: There are several studies on this topic. For a long time 8 hours was suggested but more recently it gets more toward 7 hours. We thing that this figure is individual and Sleep as Android is a tool to get advice on that. For example you can rate your sleeps in the morning and than use advice in the stats add-on which tells you what sleep length maximizes your sleep rating.

Q: What happens if two people are in the bed, and go to sleep and get up at different times?

A: In some cases the other person in the bed may cause interference with your sleep tracking. This depends on the mattress, on the position of the phone. From our own experiments I can say that interference may be eliminated if you have a separate mattress or if you keep the phone on your side of the bed. Also using a smartphone armband will solve this issue. You may need to do a few experiments and find proper settings in your home conditions to eliminate this issue.

Thank you very much. I highly recommend our readers, if they have either an iPhone or an Android phone, to download and try this App. Also, the information on your web site is very much worth reading, it is not to long, and very informative. Here is a link to it.
#

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/mathaba/latina/~3/GrSOE4jfeCM/

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I'm Chris Anderson, and This Is How I Work

After more than a decade as editor-in-chief at Wired magazine, Chris Anderson is making some big changes. Earlier this month, Chris announced that he's stepping down to focus on his robotics manufacturing startup, 3D Robotics. While manning the helm at Wired, Chris authored three books that turned him into a leading voice across schools of economics, technology, and DIY design: The Long Tail, Free, and his latest, Makers: The New Industrial Revolution. (He also lead the magazine in nearly doubling its readership, racked up too many awards to count, and landed on the Time 100.) In Makers, Chris champions open source design, low cost material, and 3D printing as drivers of manufacturing's next generation?all things his company uses as its foundation. We chatted with Chris about his seriously awesome workshop, the best advice he's ever received, and the apps and gadgets that keep him running (like a machine).

Name: Chris Anderson
Occupation: Incoming CEO, 3D Robotics; Exiting Editor in Chief, Wired
Location: Berkeley, CA
Current computer: An old beater Dell laptop, covered in stickers and scratches
Current mobile device: Samsung Galaxy II
I work: Obsessively

What apps/software/tools can't you live without?

I live nearly 100% in the Google universe: Gmail, Google Calendar, Docs, Chrome, Code, Groups, G+, Reader, Android, etc. The only big exceptions are Skype for team calls (although I'm starting to switch to Google Hangouts more and more) and Keynote on the iPad for presentations, which is the only software I use that actually makes me happy. I don't think it's possible to make an ugly presentation in Keynote (God knows I've tried).

What's your best time-saving shortcut/life hack?

I've got a Samsung Chromebook next to the bed, and when I wake up I try to clear out the overnight email before I get up. I know I've got a deadline (I need to take the kids to school) so that forces some pretty efficient and telegraphic responses. I pretty much type as fast as I can for half an hour?it gets the brain going and primes me for the day.

When I've got to get some writing done, I turn on my Strict Pomodoro plug-in in Chrome. It shuts off all internet distractions, such as email, for 20 minutes, then sounds a bell and lets me back at them for 5 minutes. I can spend a whole day like this: 20-5, 20-5... When I really need to concentrate, it's the only thing that works for me.

The only automation I've ever had success with is delegation: great assistants, deputies, project managers, etc. Division of labor is mankind's greatest invention!

What's your favorite to-do list manager?

Sadly, plain old Sticky Notes in Windows. Fugly, but it works for me.

Besides your phone and computer, what gadget can't you live without?

I'm not much of a gadget geek, but I do love my iPad 2 and Nike Fuelband. And our Withings wifi scale.

What's your workspace like?

These days, I'm in-between offices, so for typing work it's a coffee shop with laptop. Or, more commonly, an airport and laptop. In my new 3D Robotics North office, I'm going to try a standing desk.

For "making" work, my home workshop is my pride and joy. It's part of a new level we added to the house, but due to seismic issues and a relatively massive foundation (we live a few blocks from the Hayward Fault), it's a pretty small room that I've had to be creative in laying out. It's got a built-in workbench with power outlets top and bottom every foot, lots of drawers, and a wheeled stainless steel worktable. There are robots of every kind on deeply inset shelves and hanging on the walls.

The main workstation is for electronics, and the Weller soldering iron gets used every day. My electronic measurement tools, such as the oscilloscope and logic analyzer, are USB devices, so they usually hide away in a drawer. Lots of little storage racks have tons of electronic components, all neatly (and uncharacteristically) ordered and labeled. You won't get far in electronics without an organization system of some sort!

For non-electronics work, the go-to machines include a second-generation MakerBot Thing-a-matic 3D printer, a Hitachi benchtop bandsaw, and a Dremel workstation. The hot glue gun gets a lot of work, as does a full complement of Xacto knives, saws, and other tools. We've got a desktop CNC machine coming, but it will probably live in the garage.

Pictured above: Chris's workbench.

What do you listen to while you work?

If I really have to write, I'll take one album and just put it on repeat for days at a time. I wrote most of The Long Tail to Ladytron's Witching Hour.

What's your sleep routine like?

Sleep is a problem for me. I'm a really active dreamer and they tend to wake me up throughout the night. So when I'm at home, I try to stick to this routine:

• Bed by 11:00pm
• No email for an hour before bed
• 3mg of Melatonin
• No more than two glasses of wine, and not after 10:00

I've got a Zeo sleep monitor on my bedside table. I don't wear it often enough, but when I do it shows that I get very little deep sleep (usually just 10-12%). Part of my decision to focus on just one job, rather than the 2-3 I've been trying to maintain for the past few years, is to cut down on the stress and distractions that are causing me such interrupted sleep.

What everyday thing are you better at than anyone else? What's your secret?

I am the lightbulb king. Whatever the latest, most energy-saving lightbulb technology with the brightest, warmest light might be, I am ON IT. After a few false starts (okay, a lot), we're now in full LED migration mode. My wife mutters a bit about how ugly they are, but our electric bills are thanking us.

What's the best advice you've ever received?

"Success is not a destination. It's the trail you leave behind you."

Anything else you want to add for readers/fans?

My #1 productivity secret: Don't watch TV. Ever.

Note: Connect with Chris on Twitter @chr1sa and with 3D Robotics @3DRobotics.

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The How I Work series asks heroes, experts, brilliant, and flat-out productive people to share their shortcuts, workspaces, routines, and more. Every Wednesday we'll feature a new guest and the gadgets, apps, tips, and tricks that keep them going. Have someone you'd kill to see featured, or questions you think we should ask? Email Tessa.

Source: http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/lifehacker/full/~3/sEImLk7PWsA/im-chris-anderson-and-this-is-how-i-work

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Risk of childhood obesity can be predicted at birth

ScienceDaily (Nov. 27, 2012) ? A simple formula can predict at birth a baby's likelihood of becoming obese in childhood, according to a study published today in the open access journal PLOS ONE.

The formula, which is available as an online calculator, estimates the child's obesity risk based on its birth weight, the body mass index of the parents, the number of people in the household, the mother's professional status and whether she smoked during pregnancy.

The researchers behind the study hope their prediction method will be used to identify infants at high risk and help families take steps to prevent their children from putting on too much weight.

Childhood obesity is a leading cause of early type 2 diabetes and heart and circulatory disease, and is becoming more common in developed countries. According to NHS figures, 17 per cent of boys and 15 per cent of girls aged two to 15 in England are classified as obese.

The researchers developed the formula using data from a study set up in 1986 following 4000 children born in Finland. They initially investigated whether obesity risk could be assessed using genetic profiles, but the test they developed based on common genetic variations failed to make accurate predictions. Instead, they discovered that non-genetic information readily available at the time of birth was enough to predict which children would become obese. The formula proved accurate not just in the Finnish cohort, but in further tests using data from studies in Italy and the US.

"This test takes very little time, it doesn't require any lab tests and it doesn't cost anything," said Professor Philippe Froguel, from the School of Public Health at Imperial College London, who led the study.

"All the data we use are well-known risk factors for childhood obesity, but this is the first time they have been used together to predict from the time of birth the likelihood of a child becoming obese."

The 20 per cent of children predicted to have the highest risk at birth make up 80 per cent of obese children. The researchers suggest that services such as dieticians and psychologists could be offered to families with high-risk infants to help them prevent excessive weight gain.

"Once a young child becomes obese, it's difficult for them to lose weight, so prevention is the best strategy, and it has to begin as early as possible," said Professor Froguel. "Unfortunately, public prevention campaigns have been rather ineffective at preventing obesity in school-age children. Teaching parents about the dangers of over-feeding and bad nutritional habits at a young age would be much more effective."

Although common genetic variants did not prove to be helpful for predicting childhood obesity, the researchers say about one in 10 cases of obesity are caused by rare mutations that seriously affect appetite regulation. Tests for these mutations could become available to doctors in the next few years as the cost of DNA sequencing technology falls.

The Imperial researchers conducted the study in collaboration with colleagues at the University of Oulu, Finland; Harvard University in the US and the University of Verona, Italy. The work was funded by the Medical Research Council, Imperial College London, the University of Oulu and Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique.

The obesity risk calculator is available online at http://files-good.ibl.fr/childhood-obesity/

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Story Source:

The above story is reprinted from materials provided by Imperial College London.

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

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Journal Reference:

1. Anita Morandi, David Meyre, St?phane Lobbens, Ken Kleinman, Marika Kaakinen, Sheryl L. Rifas-Shiman, Vincent Vatin, Stefan Gaget, Anneli Pouta, Anna-Liisa Hartikainen, Jaana Laitinen, Aimo Ruokonen, Shikta Das, Anokhi Ali Khan, Paul Elliott, Claudio Maffeis, Matthew W. Gillman, Marjo-Riitta J?rvelin, Philippe Froguel. Estimation of Newborn Risk for Child or Adolescent Obesity: Lessons from Longitudinal Birth Cohorts. PLoS ONE, 2012; 7 (11): e49919 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0049919

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

Disclaimer: This article is not intended to provide medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. Views expressed here do not necessarily reflect those of ScienceDaily or its staff.

Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/top_news/~3/3L_guxH0ow4/121128182739.htm

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Stay in shape during the holidays with these iPhone apps

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Hitting the gym can be hard to do during the holidays. There is less light in your day and more parties to attend, so it?s easy to put on unhealthy weight. However, making time to flex your muscles and get a good workout can keep the pounds down during the holiday season. Here are some fabulous iPhone apps to fit in a little exercise now so you are not paying the price later.

Pilates is a fabulous way to tighten up your abs, butt, and inner thigh muscles. With the Learn Pilates app for iPhone, you can find new exercises to target your trouble zones without hitting the gym. This fitness app takes you through 30 days of Pilate?s exercises until you master all the moves. Learn Pilates is a great way to fit a little exercise into your day no matter how busy you are!

Looking for an easy way to spice up your gym routine? Grab the Tone It Up app for iPhone and get a new workout routine every day for free. Check out the ?Love? section of the app each day to see what the trainers, Karena and Katrina, have planned for you. Join the community in order to log your workouts and daily diet. Don?t forget to set the ?Booty Call? alarm so you don?t oversleep and miss your workout.

Have you been spending months on the treadmill only to see your butt shrink? Or do you sit all day at work and want to tighten your tush before it sags all the way to the floor? Set up a butt workout plan with the free Butt Workout app for iPhone. Personalize the workout plan and repetitions that work for you and coordinate the perfect butt bumping workout playlist. Do so and you should have the tightest tushie on the block before spring break.

Okay, okay, so Pilates and butt workouts aren?t for everyone. If you are looking for a little bit of a more challenging fitness program, check out the Ray Lewis Workouts app for iPhone. You can train like a Super Bowl MVP when you get this fitness app. You will be training like a superstar athlete in no time with the 24 stellar work outs in this app concentrating on strength, power, endurance, and flexibility.

There are a ton of exercises you can do without the assistance of a gym, a personal trainer, or even weights. You can use your own body weight to get in shape. It?s easy and it?s free. If you have no idea where to start, check out the Bodyweight Training app for iPhone that is filled with ways to use your own body weight during your next workout. Choose a premade workout or build your own with this savvy fitness app.

Download the Appolicious Android app

Source: http://www.appolicious.com/shine/articles/12995-stay-in-shape-during-the-holidays-with-these-iphone-apps

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Locate on the internet auto loan for your automobile | Voooz.com

Before buying any auto, you should certainly consider shopping for your auto loan on the internet. On-line auto lenders are rapidly becoming 1 of the very best sources of fianc for new and employed automobile.

You can want visit on-line lenders internet site as much as you want. Obtaining online leader helps you to save beneficial time looking around town. Find out the greatest where the lender is genuinely willing to give you finance or who can supply you with low interest rate. On the web auto loan in the greatest way to find out the most affordable loan.

Just before applying for an on the internet auto loan, choose ahead time and funds you are prepared to invest on your auto and length of loan. It usually excellent to apply for what you are actually searching for, it will assist to add in sales tax and other charges.

You can evaluate on the web lenders quote with auto loan quotes from bank and from the dealership and confirm online auto loan is the least expensive loan you can get in market.

On the web application for auto loan is a brief type, requesting personal details, employment and any earlier mortgage. After you have completed the form submit it, you can anticipate response with in handful of operating hours. The on-line auto lenders approve your loan inside few minutes, but at the most they will get back to you next day.

Now you can keep away from dealers financing frustration with on-line auto loan. On the internet auto loan will send you verify right away. There are no any hidden fees or any additional changers.

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Source: http://voooz.com/2012/11/27/locate-on-the-internet-auto-loan-for-your-automobile/

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The iPad Is Drastically Transforming Retail - Business Insider

This post is part of the "Future of Business" series, which examines how cutting-edge technologies are rapidly reshaping our world, from how businesses run to how we live. "The Future of Business" is sponsored by SAP.

In just a few short years, iPads have changed how many retailers do business.

Some companies are replacing cash registers with the Apple devices, while others are using apps to track employee productivity and merchandise. The portable iPad is a "powerful selling device," said Sandeep Bhanote, a vice president at VeriFone, which provides companies with mobile payment software.

Michael Relich, president of IT at Guess?, said that he gave iPads to his store managers, with amazing results. "The iPad app we had allowed us to see what styles and sizes were selling in different regions," Relich said. "For instance, we needed to stock more small sizes in San Francisco, where people exercise a lot."

Guess? is just one of a growing list of retailers who are harnessing technology to their benefit. VeriFone told us a few ways that retailers are using iPads to change how they do business.

• Retailers can use apps that give associates and customers access to inventory and availability. E-commerce expands availability beyond inventory on hand to ensure that retailers never lose a sale. If a product is not available in-store, they can use the iPad to complete the purchase and have it delivered directly to the customer?s doorstep.
• Businesses can use iPads to show the customer more merchandise. Customer interaction tools, such as look books and product finders, drive sales by offering a more personalized customer experience through assisted selling, according to VeriFone. For instance, an apparel retailer could show the customer an entire outfit incorporating one item they were interested in.
• Retailers don't have to pay for printing and distribution costs for corporate materials. iPads eliminate the need to pay for paper, CDs, and other corporate materials such as training manuals or in-store promotions. One-touch delivery of corporate materials sent directly to the iPad makes it possible to update more frequently to ensure stores "are constantly leveraging the latest and greatest materials," according to VeriFone.
• iPads make associates more effective. Retailers can now deliver the most current customer insight, preferences, and selling tools to their staffs to support enhanced customer relationships. This allows retailers to "bring new associates up to speed more quickly and ensure that veteran associates are constantly refreshing their skills to effectively drive sales," Bhanote said.
• iPads make it easier for all retail employees to be on the same page. Managers can ensure that new layouts and trends are in-store before the competition. This could also bring in new customers.

Soon, iPads will be an essential tool for any retailer looking to keep up.

See more Future Of Business >>

Source: http://www.businessinsider.com/the-ipad-is-drastically-transforming-retail-2012-11

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GOP senators more troubled after Rice meeting

AAA??Nov. 27, 2012?11:16 AM ET
GOP senators more troubled after Rice meeting
By BRADLEY KLAPPER and DONNA CASSATABy BRADLEY KLAPPER and DONNA CASSATA, Associated Press??

FILE - This April 14, 2012 file photo shows U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Susan Rice speaking at U.N. headquarters. With congressional opposition softening, U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice could find her name in contention as early as this week to succeed Hillary Rodham Clinton as secretary of state. Her nomination to the top Cabinet job could signal the potential for a more robust intervention in world crises in President Barack Obama?s second term. (AP Photo/Craig Ruttle, File)

FILE - This April 14, 2012 file photo shows U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Susan Rice speaking at U.N. headquarters. With congressional opposition softening, U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice could find her name in contention as early as this week to succeed Hillary Rodham Clinton as secretary of state. Her nomination to the top Cabinet job could signal the potential for a more robust intervention in world crises in President Barack Obama?s second term. (AP Photo/Craig Ruttle, File)

Acting CIA Director Michael Morell, center, arrives for a closed-door meeting on Capitol Hill in Washington, Tuesday, Nov. 27, 2012, with U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice, who could find her name in contention as early as this week to succeed Hillary Rodham Clinton as secretary of state. Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., the ranking member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, and other prominent senators, have said they would block the nomination of Rice. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)

Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., the ranking member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, left, followed by Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., right, arrives on Capitol Hill in Washington, Tuesday, Nov. 27, 2012, for a closed-door meeting with U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice who could find her name in contention as early as this week to succeed Hillary Rodham Clinton as secretary of state. McCain and Graham have been vocal opponents of Rice based on her comments following the deadly Sept. 11 attack on a U.S. consulate in Libya. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)

FILE - This Nov. 14, 2012 file photo shows Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., the ranking member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, gesturing during a news conference on Capitol Hill in Washington. With congressional opposition softening, U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice could find her name in contention as early as this week to succeed Hillary Rodham Clinton as secretary of state. Her nomination to the top Cabinet job could signal the potential for a more robust intervention in world crises in President Barack Obama?s second term. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite, File)

WASHINGTON (AP) ? Three Republican senators who met Tuesday with U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice say they are more troubled now over her initial explanations about the deadly Sept. 11 raid in Libya.

Rice met behind closed doors Tuesday with Sens. John McCain, Lindsey Graham and Kelly Ayotte ? three of her harshest critics.

Ayotte said Rice told them that her national television description that a spontaneous demonstration triggered the attack on the U.S. consulate was wrong. She had made the comments five days after the raid based on intelligence information.

The lawmakers said the Obama administration still must answer questions about the attack.

Obama is considering Rice as a successor to Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/386c25518f464186bf7a2ac026580ce7/Article_2012-11-27-Cabinet-Rice/id-86107318b78c45f0a7de3c9ecf98db2e

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Raining Cats And Blogs: Who is Buying and Selling in 2012 ...

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?This is a great infographic on buyers and sellers. I found some surprising info and some that was not so surprising. It is great to see that the percentage of buyers that use an agent is up so much..I think the most surprising to me was the percentage of buyers and sellers that are first timers. ?Especially the buyers, since it is so hard to get a loan right now.. I thought that number may be way down.

What do you think? Any surprises in the info? Do you find it helpful at all? ?

Source: http://rainingcatsandblogs-snt.com/post/3532150/who-is-buying-and-selling-in-2012-infographic

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A Dress For The Holidays! - The Gerber Babies Blog Product ...

The holidays are upon us and many are already planning menus and ordering gifts. I've been busy?but luckily,?I've already finished my shopping. Now, I'm cleaning house, planning holiday activities and getting ready to spend the day with my family?to go and pick out a Christmas tree. We?make a plan to get one every?December 1! I'm also busy?trying to keep the kids from discovering their unwrapped presents. That's harder than it sounds!?While I don't have my hands completely full because I'm not hosting a large party this year, I am entertaining a few nights before Christmas. I like things to be perfect and I work hard to make sure my parties are memorable.?A few years ago, ?I would get so wrapped up in all the little details, I'd forget to find a new dress or outfit to dazzle my guests. When that happens, I usually just pull something from my closet. The next time?I host a holiday bash, I am going to WOW everyone with my party and my?party?dress! While there are some fashions?I really wish I could wear, I'll stick with classic and slightly conservative choices. But just wait. One day I'm going to buy a dress that wows, even if I don't have anywhere to wear it!
I've been tempted to get something extraordinary to wear. Maybe next year, I'll have the chance to host?the first of many, lavish parties and wear an elegant and memorable?dress. I think?I can pull it off. I'll invite my favorite people and we can sip champagne and spread a little holiday cheer. Wouldn't that be fun! This year, I'm keeping it simple. A dinner party with friends and family. We'll drink eggnog and listen to Christmas music by the fire, and maybe roast a few chestnuts. Next year, I'm going all out, and my dress will be the first item I check off my list of things to buy!

Source: http://2gerberbabies.blogspot.com/2012/11/a-dress-for-holidays.html

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Add Cultured Whey to DIY Condiments to Make Them Last Longer in Your Fridge

We've showed you how to make homemade versions of ketchup, mustard, mayonnaise, and Sriracha, all of which are awesome but normally only last for a few days up to a couple of weeks in the fridge before becoming unsafe. Lengthen that timeline by adding cultured whey.

Culinary weblog Eating Rules notes that making DIY condiments is great, but it's frustrating that they have such a limited shelf life; who wants to make a batch of mayo every time you have a sandwich? Instead they hope to reintroduce readers to the art of culturing foods aka fermentation. You basically introduce naturally occurring bacterias, such as those found in yogurt, to a food and those bacterias convert sugars in the food to lactic acid or alcohol. A simple way to culture most DIY condiments is to add a bit of whey from plain yogurt. You know when you open a cup of yogurt that's been sitting in your fridge for a while and it has a clear yellow-ish liquid on top? That's whey. Any organic non-Greek yogurt will have all the positive bacteria you need to culture your condiments.

Line a colander with a dish towel, place that over a bowl, and pour the jar of yogurt on the dish towel to sit for eight hours. The whey will strain through the towel into the bowl and the leftover yogurt will have a consistency more like Greek yogurt. You can store this whey in a glass jar with a towel cover for months in your fridge. When you make a condiment and want it to last longer add four tablespoons of whey to the condiment, mix, and place in a glass jar. Let it sit on your counter at room temperature for two to four days which will allow time for the bacteria to do its work. When done, place the condiment back in your fridge and use as needed for up to three months. Best of all, this process adds nutritional value to your food?the bacteria helps with digestion and increases some vitamin and enzyme levels.

The Superfood Secret to Making Homemade Condiments Last for Weeks | Eating Rules

Source: http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/lifehacker/full/~3/db0nF-N3wQA/add-cultured-why-to-diy-condiments-to-make-them-last-longer-in-your-fridge

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Free Legal Question: Criminal Law | Maryland | I have a failure to ...

Keywords State Country Area of Law Search Any keyword ?? All keywords ?

Source: http://www.lawguru.com/legal-questions/-/failure-case-md-wanted-lawyer-504608509/

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Microsoft Type Cover (for Surface)

With the introduction of the Microsoft Surface RT tablet ($699.00 direct), Microsoft also unveiled the latest in PC peripherals, the Surface cover and keyboard. While there will likely be third-party accessories coming soon, right now, Microsoft's own accessories are the only game in town. Like its sibling, the Microsoft Touch Cover, the Microsoft Type Cover is both tablet cover and keyboard, but it places far more emphasis upon the keyboard, with tactile keys, firm construction, and a look and feel that is far more like a traditional laptop than Microsoft's Surface ads have shown.

Design
Microsoft's Type Cover is both tablet cover and keyboard. In many respects, it's similar to the Logitech Ultrathin Keyboard Cover (for New iPad, iPad 2) , which both protects the tablet screen and offers a full keyboard for more productive use than the tablet alone could offer.

The Type Cover attaches to the Surface with a magnetic docking connection. The dock connects along the bottom edge of the Surface, attaching like the spine of a book, securely held in place by the magnetic connection. It's secure enough to pick up the tablet and let the cover hang loose without fear of the cover coming loose. When you don't need a keyboard, the cover folds back behind the tablet, which is sensed by an accelerometer in the cover, disabling the keyboard so that it can be gripped like a paper notebook with the cover folded back.

Unlike the Microsoft Touch Cover , which has no tactile feedback, the Type Cover offers a much more familiar feel, with scissor-switch keys, and a firm backing that makes typing on uneven surfaces a bit more feasible. The key-travel, though minimal, provides a much more comfortable typing experience. However, the introduction of key movement and mild key resistance means that typing is just a tad slower that on the Touch Cover, where you need only touch the key instead of depressing the key. The result is a keyboard that is more comfortable, but not quite as responsive. Whether or not that is an issue is entirely subjective, so head to a Microsoft Store if you want to try before you buy.

The Touch Cover is also slightly thicker, to provide the extra millimeter or so of key movement offered by the scissor-switch keys. As a result, the Type Cover is 6 millimeters thick, while the Touch Cover is only 3. The weight is also similar, coming in at 0.47 pound, just a whisper heavier than the 0.45 pound Touch Cover. Compared to Microsoft's other mobile Windows 8 keyboard, the Microsoft Wedge Mobile Keyboard , the Type Cover is much closer to full-size, making the experience much less cramped.

Compared to the touchpad on the Touch Cover, the Type Cover's touchpad is also a bit better, with a smoother surface. Like the Touch Cover, however, it still the miniscule proportions, measuring a tiny 2.6 by 1.4 inches. The mouse buttons are integrated into the touchpad and, like the Type Cover's keys, the right- and left-buttons actually click when pressed, providing a much more traditional mousing experience.

Features and Performance
Given that the Type Cover is made exclusively for Microsoft's Surface tablets, it should be no surprise that Windows 8 (and Windows RT) functionality is built in, with functions from the Charms Bar found in the F1-F12 buttons. These include volume controls, and Charms for Search, Connect, Devices, and Settings. You've also got function keys for Home, End, PgUp, PgDn, and the usual Esc and Del keys.

In actual use, the Type Cover certainly feels better than the Touch Cover, thanks to the moving keys and clickable mouse buttons, but compared to the Touch Cover, it's just not as sensitive, or as fast. On the other hand, it is more comfortable, and the typing fatigue experienced with the Touch Cover is alleviated by the cushioning springiness of the keys. For a Windows 8 keyboard with more sensible ergonomics, the Microsoft Sculpt Mobile Keyboard offers a curved surface with better typing feel. It's also going to be an easier transition for touch typists, as the keys are separate and distinct, with the usual nubs on the F and J keys to keep you anchored to the home row.

If you expect to do a lot of typing on the Surface RT, this is the keyboard to get. It's more comfortable and familiar than the Touch Cover, and is far more friendly to touch typists and users who may be away from a desk or table. It's not as cramped as the Microsoft Wedge, and it's more compatible with touch-typing than the Touch Cover. However, it's a little thicker, a little heavier, and it's not as responsive as the Touch Cover. The differences are minimal, but shoppers will want to get some actual hands on time with each before deciding which to buy.

COMPARISON TABLE
Compare the Microsoft Type Cover (for Surface) with several other keyboards side by side.

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/ziffdavis/pcmag/~3/vOdee-8sxcM/0,2817,2412309,00.asp

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Bajaj Finance seeks Sebi approval for Rs 750 cr rights issue | Firstpost

Mumbai: Non-banking finance company Bajaj Finance has sought market regulator Sebi?s approval to raise up to Rs 750 crore through a rights issue.

Issue of equity shares on a rights basis to its existing equity shareholders would aggregate up to Rs 750 crore, draft prospectus filed by Bajaj Finance with Sebi showed. In rights issue, shares are issued to existing investors as per their holding at pre-determined price and ratio.

Rahul Bajaj and Rajiv Bajaj. Reuters

The company plans to use the proceeds of the issue for strengthening its capital base. ?We intend to invest the funds in high quality interest bearing liquid instruments including investment in money market mutual funds, deposits with banks and other interest/premium bearing securities for the necessary duration,? Bajaj Finance said.

JM Financial Institutional Securities is acting as lead mangers to the issue, while Karvy Computershare is the registrar.

Bajaj Finance, a subsidiary of Bajaj Finserv, is engaged in the buiness of consumer finance, SME finance and commercial lending.

Earlier in August, Sebi had given its go-ahead to Bajaj Finserv to raise up to Rs 1,000 crore through rights issue. Shares of Bajaj Finance today surged by 2.62 percent to settle at Rs 1,362.05 apiece on the NSE.

PTI

Firstpost encourages open discussion and debate, but please adhere to the rules below, before posting. Comments that are found to be in violation of any one or more of the guidelines will be automatically deleted:

Personal attacks/name calling will not be tolerated. This applies to comments directed at the author, other commenters and other politicians/public figures

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While you do not have to use your real name, any commenters using any Firstpost writer's name will be deleted, and the commenter banned from participating in any future discussions.

Comments will be moderated for abusive and offensive language.

Source: http://www.firstpost.com/fwire/investing-fwire/bajaj-finance-seeks-sebi-approval-for-rs-750-cr-rights-issue-533707.html

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Guest lineups for the Sunday news shows

WASHINGTON (AP) ? Guest lineups for the Sunday TV news shows:

ABC's "This Week" ? Sens. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., and Lindsey Graham, R-S.C.; Rep. Adam Smith, D-Wash.; actor/director Ben Affleck.

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NBC's "Meet the Press" ? Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich.; Reps. Peter King, R-N.Y., and Gregory Meeks, D-N.Y.; Dave Cote, chairman and CEO of Honeywell International Inc.

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CBS' "Face the Nation" ? Annual books and authors show.

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CNN's "State of the Union" ? Sens. Jon Kyl, R-Ariz., Kay Bailey Hutchison, R-Texas, and Joe Lieberman, I-Conn.; Rep. Barney Frank, D-Mass.

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"Fox News Sunday" ? Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/guest-lineups-sunday-news-shows-183815643.html

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Political suicide, anyone? (Powerlineblog)

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London sale features Elvis Presley's Rolex

LONDON (AP) ? A watch which was one of Elvis Presley's last Christmas presents and a corset worn by Madonna on her 1990 "Blond Ambition" tour will be featured at a London auction.

The watch, estimated to sell for 6,000 pounds ($9,500) or more, is a diamond-set Rolex given to Presley by his longtime manager, Tom Parker. It is engraved, "Elvis merry Christmas your pal Col. Tom Parker." It was the last Christmas for Presley, who died the following year.

Madonna's corset by Jean-Paul Gaultier is of green silk with conical cups and beaded fringe, embroidered with candy stripes of opalescent sequins and peppermint bugle beads.

Christie's estimates that the corset will sell for at least 10,000 pounds.

Christie's previewed the sale on Friday. The auction will be on Thursday.

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Online: http://www.christies.com

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/london-sale-features-elvis-presleys-rolex-113715278.html

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Obama Thanksgiving address: Calls to unite behind WH, doesn?t thank God

During his fourth Thanksgiving presidential address, President Barack Obama referenced the recent, long and bruising campaign season, urged the country to unite behind his administration and, for the fourth year running, neglected to offer verbal thanks to God.

?As a nation, we?ve just emerged from a campaign season that was passionate, noisy, and vital to our democracy,? Obama said. ?But it also required us to make choices ?? and sometimes those choices led us to focus on what sets us apart instead of what ties us together; on what candidate we support instead of what country we belong to.?

?Thanksgiving,? he continued, ?is a chance to put it all in perspective ?? to remember that, despite our differences, we are, and always will be, Americans first and foremost.?

The president?s call to unite behind his administration follows a bitter election, in which his opponent, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, won independents 50 to 45 percent, and whites 59 to 39 percent.

At the same time, while Democrats made gains in both the House and the Senate, the GOP held control of Congress. Speaker of the House John Boehner has since indicated that he is willing to work with the president, especially regarding the Jan. 1, 2013 fiscal cliff, when a combination of draconian spending cuts and massive tax hikes will hit the sluggish U.S. economy.

Additionally, for the fourth year in a row, the president did not explicitly thank God, raising the ire of conservatives.?

?Today we give thanks for blessings that are all too rare in this world,? Obama said. ?The ability to spend time with the ones we love; to say what we want; to worship as we please; to know that there are brave men and women defending our freedom around the globe; and to look our children in the eye and tell them that, here in America, no dream is too big if they?re willing to work for it.?

The president?s mention of the freedom ?to worship as we please? could be seen as a challenge to conservatives and the Catholic Church, both of which have accused his administration of waging a war on religious freedom. The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops ? an organization that has often angered conservative Catholics for its left-wing rhetoric ? held a week of Masses, culminating in a Wednesday afternoon, July 4 Mass at the National Basilica, where 5,000 Catholics overflowed the 3,500-seat basilica.

American schools teach that the Pilgrims, who held the first Thanksgiving, fled to America from England to flee religious persecution.

Catholics, however, do not vote as a coherent bloc.

God did make an appearance, however, in the president?s 2012 Thanksgiving proclamation.

?Let us spend this day by lifting up those we love, mindful of the grace bestowed upon us by God and by all who have made our lives richer with their presence,? the proclamation reads.

In his address, the president also made mention of God when speaking of the victims and first responders in the wake of Hurricane Sandy.

?When our brothers and sisters are in need, we roll up our sleeves and get to work ?? not for the recognition or the reward, but because it?s the right thing to do,? Obama said, repeating an oft-cited campaign trail line, often used to promote a tax hike. ?Because there but for the grace of God go I. And because here in America, we rise or fall together, as one nation and one people.?

The mention of God comes just over two months after the Democratic National Convention narrowly voted to not strike God?s name from the party?s platform.

The official proclamation is lower-profile than the address, and the neglect to verbally thank God ? as the original celebrators of Thanksgiving convened to do ? angered some conservatives.

?Yet again, President Obama?s Thanksgiving message eschewed any direct reference to thanking God, making this the fourth straight year in which the president of the United States has ignored the central message of the holiday in favor of political grandstanding,? the conservative Big Government reported. ?This year, Obama?s central message was that now that he?s been re-elected, Americans should agree with all of his policies. His unity routine sounds strangely empty after a campaign in which he focused on dividing Americans.?

?Obama?s lack of overt religiosity has been a source of controversy,? the pro-life LifeSiteNews reported, ?with polls consistently showing that a large number of Americans are unaware that Obama is a Christian, or doubt the claim.?

The president has a long history of upsetting the religious right, and even some in his own party. Incidents include having a cross removed from the allegedly Catholic Georgetown University while he delivered a speech there; infrequent church attendance; an overtly pro-abortion presidential campaign and open support for gay marriage.

But conservatives aren?t the only people the president upset on Thanksgiving. Soon, he may hear from animal rights activists.??(RELATED:?Butterball no longer halal)

?Peace, one of two turkeys pardoned by President Obama last year, was euthanized Monday, according to an official who insisted the timing of the death ? days before the Thanksgiving holiday ? was not suspicious,? CNN reports.

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Source: http://news.yahoo.com/obama-thanksgiving-address-calls-unite-behind-wh-doesn-080136187.html

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