রবিবার, ১০ ফেব্রুয়ারী, ২০১৩

Northeast trying to get back on track after storm

Tony Colon uses a snowblower to clear his driveway in Derby, Conn., as residents face massive snow removal, Saturday, Feb. 9, 2013, following a severe blizzard that dumped up to three feet of snow across the state. (AP Photo/The Connecticut Post, Autumn Driscoll) MANDATORY CREDIT

Tony Colon uses a snowblower to clear his driveway in Derby, Conn., as residents face massive snow removal, Saturday, Feb. 9, 2013, following a severe blizzard that dumped up to three feet of snow across the state. (AP Photo/The Connecticut Post, Autumn Driscoll) MANDATORY CREDIT

Brian Tinker, 14, walks to a friends house across East Main Street in West Brookfield, Mass., in the aftermath of an overnight storm on Saturday, Feb. 9, 2013. (AP Photo/Worcester Telegram & Gazette, Tom Rettig)

A.J. Cooper sleds on a hill in Cummings Park, Saturday, Feb. 9, 2013, in Stamford, Conn. (AP Photo/The Stamford Advocate, Lindsay Perry) MANDATORY CREDIT; MAGS OUT

Justin Bertollo, 10, is followed by his dogs Daisy and Nelson as he pushes the snowblower while clearing the sidewalk along Third Street in Berwick, Pa., Saturday morning, Feb. 9, 2013. (AP Photo/Press-Enterprise, Jimmy May)

Snow covers vehicles at the Wayne Ford car dealership, Saturday, Feb. 9, 2013, after a snow storm in Wayne, N.J. (AP Photo/The Record of Bergen County, Tariq Zehawi) ONLINE OUT; MAGS OUT; TV OUT; INTERNET OUT; NO ARCHIVING; MANDATORY CREDIT

(AP) ? Emergency crews and residents struggled to clear roadways and sidewalks from a storm that rampaged through the Northeast, dumping up to 3 feet of snow and bringing howling winds that knocked out power to hundreds of thousands.

Municipal workers from New York to Boston labored through the night Saturday in snow-bound communities, where some motorists had to be rescued after spending hours stuck in wet, heavy snow. Meanwhile, utilities in some hard-hit New England states predicted that Friday's storm could leave some customers in the dark at least until Monday.

"We've never seen anything like this," said Suffolk County Executive Steven Bellone of Long Island, which got more than 2? feet of snow.

About 400,000 homes and businesses remained without power early Sunday, down from a total of about 650,000. Some school districts announced they'd be closed on Monday, complicating parents' back to work schedules but giving kids another day for frolicking.

At least five deaths in the U.S. were blamed on the snowstorm, including an 11-year-old boy in Boston who was overcome by carbon monoxide as he sat in a running car to keep warm while his father shoveled Saturday morning. That death and the illnesses of several others exposed to carbon monoxide set off a flurry of safety warnings from public officials.

Roads across the Northeast were impassable and cars were entombed by snow drifts on Saturday. Some people found the snow packed so high against their homes they couldn't get their doors open.

"It's like lifting cement. They say it's 2 feet, but I think it's more like 3 feet," said Michael Levesque, who was shoveling snow in Quincy, Mass., for a landscaping company.

In Providence, where the drifts were 5 feet high and telephone lines encrusted with ice and snow drooped under the weight, Jason Harrison labored for nearly three hours to clear his blocked driveway and front walk and still had more work to do.

Rhode Island Gov. Lincoln Chafee cautioned that while the snow had stopped, the danger hadn't passed: "People need to take this storm seriously, even after it's over. If you have any kind of heart condition, be careful with the shoveling."

Blowing with hurricane-force winds of more than 80 mph in places, the storm hit hard along the heavily populated Interstate 95 corridor between New York City and Maine. Milford., Conn., got 38 inches of snow, and Portland, Maine, recorded 31.9, shattering a 1979 record. Several communities in New York and across New England got more than 2 feet.

Still, the storm was not as bad as some of the forecasts led many to fear, and not as dire as the Blizzard of '78, used by longtime New Englanders as the benchmark by which all other winter storms are measured.

By midday Saturday, the National Weather Service reported preliminary snowfall totals of 24.9 inches in Boston, or fifth on the city's all-time list. Bradley Airport near Hartford, Conn., got 22 inches, for the No. 2 spot in the record books there.

Concord, N.H., got 24 inches of snow, the second-highest amount on record and a few inches short of the reading from the great Blizzard of 1888.

In New York, where Central Park recorded 11 inches, not even enough to make the Top 10 list, Mayor Michael Bloomberg said the city "dodged a bullet" and its streets were "in great shape." The three major airports ? LaGuardia, Kennedy and Newark, N.J. ? were up and running by late morning after shutting down the evening before.

Most of the power outages were in Massachusetts, where at its peak more than 400,000 homes and businesses were left in the dark. In Rhode Island, a high of around 180,000 customers lost power, or about one-third of the state.

Connecticut crews had slowly whittled down the outage total from a high of about 38,000 to about 25,000 by early Sunday, and power was restored to nearly all of the more than 15,000 in Maine and New Hampshire who were left without lights after the storm hit.

Massachusetts, Connecticut and Rhode Island imposed travel bans until 4 p.m. to keep cars off the road and let plows do their work, and the National Guard helped clear highways in Connecticut, where more than 240 auto accidents were reported. The Guardsmen rescued about 90 motorists, including a few who had hypothermia and were taken to hospitals.

On Long Island, hundreds of drivers spent a cold and scary night stuck on the highways. Even snowplows got bogged down or were blocked by stuck cars, so emergency workers used snowmobiles to try to reach motorists, many of whom were still waiting to be rescued hours after the snow had stopped.

Richard Ebbrecht, a chiropractor, left his office in Brooklyn at 3 p.m. on Friday and headed for home in Middle Island, N.Y., but got stuck six or seven times on the Long Island Expressway and other roads.

"There was a bunch of us Long Islanders. We were all helping each other, shoveling, pushing," he said. He finally gave up and settled in for the night in his car just two miles from his destination. At 8 a.m., when it was light out, he walked home.

"I could run my car and keep the heat on and listen to the radio a little bit," he said. "It was very icy under my car. That's why my car is still there."

Around the New York metropolitan area, many victims of Superstorm Sandy were mercifully spared another round of flooding, property damage and power failures.

"I was very lucky and I never even lost power," said Susan Kelly of Bayville. "We were dry as anything. My new roof was fantastic. Other than digging out, this storm was a nice storm." As for the shoveling, "I got two hours of exercise."

At New York's Fashion Week, women tottered on 4-inch heels through the snow to get to the tents to see designers' newest collections.

Across much of New England, streets were empty of cars and dotted instead with children who had never seen so much snow and were jumping into snow banks and making forts. Snow was waist-high in the streets of Boston. Plows made some thoroughfares passable but piled even more snow on cars parked on the city's narrow streets.

Boston's Logan Airport resumed operations late Saturday night.

Life went on as usual for some. In Portland, Karen Willis Beal got her dream wedding on Saturday ? complete with a snowstorm just like the one that hit before her parents married in December 1970.

"I have always wanted a snowstorm for my wedding, and my wish has come true to the max," she said.

In Massachusetts, the National Guard and Worcester emergency workers teamed up to deliver a baby at the height of the storm at the family's home. Everyone was fine.

Some spots in Massachusetts had to be evacuated because of coastal flooding, including Salisbury Beach, where around 40 people were ordered out.

Among them were Ed and Nancy Bemis, who heard waves crashing and rolling underneath their home, which sits on stilts. At one point, Ed Bemis went outside to take pictures, and a wave came up, blew out their door and knocked down his wife.

"The objects were flying everywhere. If you went in there, it looks like ... two big guys got in a big, big fight. It tore the doors right off their hinges. It's a mess," he said.

___

Lindsay reported from Salisbury, Mass. Associated Press writers David Klepper in Providence, Ebony Reed in Quincy, Mass., Karen Matthews in New York, Frank Eltman in Farmingville N.Y., Charles Krupa in Boston, and John Christoffersen in Fairfield, Conn., contributed to this report.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/3d281c11a96b4ad082fe88aa0db04305/Article_2013-02-10-Northeast%20Snow/id-74245b31b18c43e1840f81fcde4e3c59

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Snowflakes are shape-shifters

Kenneth Libbrecht / Caltech

Kenneth Libbrecht, professor of physics at California Institute of Technology, photographs snowflakes in the field and in his lab. Studio-type lighting, even outdoors, brings out angles, texture and color that are otherwise hard to spot.

By Tia Ghose, LiveScience

Winter snowstorms, like the Nor'easter that just slammed New England, transform gray days into winter wonderlands.

So while you're stuck inside, or within snowshoe-walking distance, here are six fun facts about snow, from the idea that no two snowflakes are alike to the bizarre megadunes that blanket Antarctica.

Unique beauty
According to physicists, it's actually true that no two snowflakes are alike ? well, at least when it comes to complex snowflakes.

Snowflakes form when water droplets in the clouds freeze to form a six-sided crystal structure. As the temperature cools, more water vapor freezes and grows in branches from the six sides of the seed crystal. As the crystals form, they are randomly tossed about inside the clouds, which vary in temperature.

The temperature greatly affects how the snowflake forms, so while the simplest hexagonal crystals may look alike, more complicated beauties each have their own unique shapes. [See Stunning Photos of Snowflakes]

White triangles
Most snowflakes form dazzling crystal patterns with six sides. But occasionally, a triangular crystal forms, something that has puzzled physicists for years. A 2009 study in the open-access, pre-publish journal arXiv.org revealed that triangular snowflakes form when the six sides of the seed crystals are slightly asymmetric. This makes them wobble randomly as a snowflake falls, allowing the bigger sides to hit the fast-flowing air inside the cloud, and grow at the expense of the smaller sides.

Other snowflakes have even stranger shapes: Some look like hourglasses, others like spools of thread and still others like needles. And while the quintessential snowflake is the six-armed, symmetrical beauty, most versions are hardly so picturesque. In fact, since the arms of a snowflake all grow randomly, asymmetrical snowflakes are more common.

Snowy shapes
The types of snowflakes that form depend a lot on the temperature and moisture in the clouds, according to a 2005 review in the journal Reports on Progress in Physics. Right around freezing temperatures, hexagonal plates (the cross-section is a two-dimensional hexagon) and the iconic, six-sided snowflake (known as a dendrite) form.

As the temperature cools, snowflakes develop into needles, then hexagonal prisms and even hollow columns. Go colder still, and dendrites form at much larger sizes. And at truly frigid temperatures, the frigid air forms prisms and flat plates.

ESO

This photo of penitentes, ice formations formed in high-altitude regions, was taken in December 2005 along the Chajnantor plain in Chile.

Piles and piles
Because snow is so fluffy (meaning it's chock full of air), a relatively small amount of water can translate into a huge pile of snow. An inch of rain on average makes about 10 inches of snow. The biggest snowfalls on record are hard to compare, but the Great Snow of 1717 dropped about 3 to 4 feet (0.9 to 1.2 meters) on Boston inhabitants, with some drifts reaching 25 feet (7.6-m), according to the National Snow and Ice Data Center.

In 1959, a snowstorm in Mt. Shasta dropped as much as 15.75 feet (4.8 meters) on inhabitants of the California region, according to the College of the Siskiyous. In the 1998 to 1999 snow season, about 95 feet (28.9 m) of snow fell on Mt. Baker, Wash.

Graupel and hoar Frost?
An old saying claims the Eskimos have dozens of different words for describing snow. While that turned out to be a myth, there are many types of snow crystals and even more snow formations. Aside from the snowflake, there's also hoar frost and graupel, according to the National Snow and Ice Data Center.

Hoar frost forms on surfaces that are colder than the frost point in the air around them, so water goes straight from vapor to solid. This spiky, fluffy snow tends to form on tree branches, telephone wires and other skinny items exposed to the chilly air. Graupel, which consists of hard ice pellets, forms when snowflakes fall through a cloud that contains supercooled water droplets. The droplets freeze onto the snowflakes and form misshapen, lumpy balls.

Snow landscape
While the snow on the driveway may just be a pile, the fluffy white stuff creates beautiful formations in nature. Lovers of winter sports know to be wary of cornices, overhanging snow that juts from the edge of a cliff.

And in Antarctica, giant snow formations known as megadunes form from monstrous snow crystals that are up to 0.75 inches (2 cm) across, according to the National Snow and Ice Data Center. (There can be several?snow crystals in a single snowflake.) In arid locales like Death Valley, Calif., piles of snow can be transformed into penitents: bizarre, spiky formations that look like the stalagmites that form in caves.

Follow LiveScience on Twitter @livescience. We're also on Facebook?& Google+.

Source: http://science.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/02/09/16911301-snowflakes-are-shape-shifters-changing-with-temperature-moisture

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Ribbon Sells Your Stuff Anywhere on the Web With One Easy Button

Ribbon Sells Your Stuff Anywhere on the Web With One Easy ButtonRibbon Sells Your Stuff Anywhere on the Web With One Easy Button Unless you have an established merchant shop on major sites like eBay, selling things online can be a hassle. Ribbon aims to alleviate that stress with a simple, easy-to-set-up storefront that can be embedded across a variety of social networks.

For sellers, simply log in with Facebook or Twitter, or create a separate Ribbon account if you prefer. After that, you only need to enter a valid email address before you can start adding products. Each item you enter will get its own dedicated page that you can either link to directly, share on social networks, or embed directly on your own site.

Whenever customers encounter the "Buy Now" button, they only need to enter a credit card number and email address to purchase. The embedded widget lets them pay without even leaving the site they're on. No need to create a new account or stop what they're doing. Of course, Ribbon takes its own cut off the top: Five percent plus thirty cents for each transaction. But, there are no monthly fees or charges for listing an item, which makes this very attractive for casual sellers. Check out the video above to see more.

Ribbon | via Wired

Source: http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/lifehacker/full/~3/BPJBWo054pM/ribbon-sells-your-stuff-anywhere-on-the-web-with-one-easy-button

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Powerful blizzard takes aim at northeastern U.S.

BOSTON/NEW YORK (Reuters) - A blizzard blew into the northeastern United States on Friday, cutting short the workweek for millions who feared being stranded as state officials ordered roads closed ahead of what forecasters said could be record-setting snowfall.

Authorities scrambled to prepare for the storm, which had already resulted in a massive traffic pile-up in southern Maine and prompted organizers of the nation's sledding championship in Maine to postpone a race scheduled for Saturday, fearing too much snow for the competition.

From New York to Maine, the storm began gently, dropping a light dusting of snow, but officials urged residents to stay home, rather than risk getting stuck in deep drifts when the storm kicks up later Friday afternoon.

Even in its early stages, the storm created some panic. Drivers lined up at gas stations to top off their tanks, grocery stores were swamped as shoppers stocked up on bread and milk, and travelers were forced to confront flight delays and cancellations.

With the worst of the storm yet to come, the governors of Massachusetts, Rhode Island and Connecticut declared states of emergency and issued bans on driving by early Friday afternoon.

"The rate of snowfall and reduced visibility during the evening rush hour in particular will make safe travel nearly impossible," Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick told reporters.

The early edge of the storm led to a 19-vehicle pile-up in southern Maine, snarling traffic on a major interstate highway north of Portland. No major injuries were reported. A smaller accident briefly closed an interstate near Bolton, Vermont.

"It was close to whiteout conditions, it's sort of a precursor of what's coming later," said Stephen McCausland, a spokesman for the Maine State Police.

Officials across the region closed schools and more than 3,000 flights were canceled. Several thousand customers lost power in New Jersey and points south, though officials warned the number was likely to rise as the snowfall got heavier and winds picked up.

Governors and mayors ordered nonessential government workers to stay home, urged private employers to do the same, told people to prepare for power outages and encouraged them to check on elderly or disabled neighbors.

The light snow falling across much of New England on Friday morning was a taste of the weather to come, said Jerry Paul, senior meteorologist with Weather Insight, a unit of Thomson Reuters.

"That's going to be gradually building today as time goes on," Paul said.

A wide swath of New England, including northeastern Connecticut, Providence, Rhode Island, and the Boston area, will likely see 24 inches to 30 inches of snow, with some areas seeing more than three feet (one meter) by the time the storm ends on Saturday morning, Paul added.

At the storm's peak, winds could gust up to 65 miles per hour (105 kilometers per hour), he said.

Boston's record snowfall, 27.6 inches, came in 2003.

CHEERING ON STORM

Organizers of the country's championship sledding race, that had been scheduled to get underway in Camden, Maine, on Saturday, postponed the event by one day.

"As soon as the weather clears on Saturday and it is safe, the toboggan committee will be out at Tobagganville cleaning up the chute as quickly as they can," said Holly Edwards, chairman of the U.S. National Toboggan Championships. "It needs to be shoveled out by hand."

Some 400 teams were registered for the race, which features costumed sledders on a 400-foot (121 meter) chute.

After two years of very little snow across the region, people whose livelihoods depend on skiers and snowmobilers cheered on the storm.

"It affects restaurants, lodgings, everything if those people aren't up here to play," said Scott Senecal, manager of the VIP Discount Auto Center in Littleton, New Hampshire, in the White Mountains. "All those people that come up here they're going to have flat tires, batteries that die ... Cold weather causes people to have to spend money whether they wanted to or not."

FUEL WORRIES

In New York City, still not fully recovered from the effects of October's devastating Hurricane Sandy, officials said they had 1,800 Sanitation Department trucks equipped with snow plows ready to be deployed.

Motorists, mindful of the severe fuel disruptions after Sandy, rushed to buy gasoline, leading to shortages in New York City. A Reuters photographer reported at least three service stations had run out of gas in the borough of Queens on Friday morning, with long lines formed at others.

Sandy knocked out power to hundreds of thousands of homes, taking gasoline stations out of service, and damaged port facilities, exacerbating the shortages by preventing operable stations from refueling.

"We've seen some lines at stations in the southern part of the state, ahead of the storm, which may actually help prevent problems after the storm," said Ralph Bombardiere, executive director of the New York State Association of Service Stations and Repair Shops. "I'm not expecting anything like the vast power outages and problems we had with Sandy."

Travel will become more difficult through the day, with Massachusetts planning to close its public transportation system at 3:30 p.m. (2030 GMT) and ordering most drivers off roads by 4 p.m. (2100 GMT). Connecticut started closing roads at noon (1700 GMT).

The Amtrak railroad service warned it would suspend service between New York, Boston and points north on Friday afternoon.

Life was not any easier for those who planned to fly. More than 3,000 flights were canceled on Friday, with close to 1,000 planned cancellations for Saturday, according to the website FlightAware.com. The hardest-hit airports were in the New York City area, Boston and Toronto.

Major Boston financial companies, including State Street Corp and Fidelity Investments, said many employees worked from home on Friday rather than risk traveling.

(Additional reporting by Jason McClure in Littleton, New Hampshire, David Sheppard and Scott DiSavino in New York and Dave Warner in Philadelphia; Editing by Paul Thomasch)

Source: http://weather.yahoo.com/england-bear-brunt-powerful-blizzard-032605853.html

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শনিবার, ৯ ফেব্রুয়ারী, ২০১৩

First Person: Blizzard of '13 Lives Up to the Hype

Yahoo! News is gathering brief first-person accounts, photos and video from the severe winter weather in the northeastern United States. Here's one resident's story.

FIRST PERSON | It looks like all the warnings about Winter Storm Nemo have paid off. The blizzard plowed through Connecticut last night, delivering high winds and dumping more than two feet of snow.

This morning we are still experiencing heavy snowfall, though forecasters expect that to taper off around 10 a.m. Norwich has about 23 inches of snow at the moment. Snow banks in our front yard have easily reached waist-high. We had to shovel the snow outside our front door twice in the middle of the night just to prevent us from becoming trapped inside.

A blanket of about three inches of snow covers all the roads to our neighborhood; it's clear that the plows have not come through for some time. The storm became so bad last night that state and city plow trucks were pulled off the roads; they are now back in action. Not only is traveling impractical, but it's also impossible. Even so, Gov. Dan Malloy ordered that all roads be closed until further notice to prevent optimistic drivers from getting stuck in the snow.

Though Connecticut Light & Power reports about 36,000 of its customers without power, here in Norwich, the Norwich Public Utilities is only reporting sporadic outages, with about 160 customers out of power. We thankfully experienced no power outages during the storm.

It looks as though this weekend will be spent digging ourselves out of the massive amount of snow we have and drinking lots and lots of hot chocolate to stay warm.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/first-person-blizzard-13-lives-hype-145000515.html

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Video: ?Doomsday Preppers? demonstrate self-defense

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Source: http://video.today.msnbc.msn.com/today/50743258/

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Justice Department, states weigh action against Moody's

(Reuters) - The Justice Department and multiple states are discussing also suing Moody's Corp for defrauding investors, according to people familiar with the matter, but any such move will likely wait until a similar lawsuit against rival Standard and Poor's is tested in the courts.

Inquiries into Moody's are in the early stages, largely because state and federal authorities have dedicated more resources to the S&P lawsuit, said the sources, who were not authorized to speak publicly about enforcement discussions.

Moody's spokesman Michael Adler and Justice Department spokeswoman Adora Andy declined to comment for this story.

Moody's in the past has defended itself against similar allegations, including a 2011 congressional report that concluded the major ratings agencies manipulated ratings to drive business.

The firm previously said Moody's takes the quality of its ratings and the integrity of the ratings process very seriously. It also said the firm has protections in place to separate the commercial and analytical aspects of its business.

The U.S. Justice Department filed a $5 billion lawsuit against S&P late on Monday and accused it of an egregious scheme to defraud investors in the run-up to the financial crisis, fueled by a desire to gain more business.

Shares of McGraw Hill Cos Inc , which owns S&P, have fallen more than 25 percent since news of the lawsuits. Moody's shares have fallen about 15 percent, even though it was not named in any of this week's actions.

"Don't think Moody's is off the hook," said one law enforcement official.

Another rival, Fimalac SA's Fitch Ratings, is unlikely to face similar action, the sources said, since it is a much smaller player in the U.S. ratings industry. The firm also escaped the brunt of scrutiny from congressional investigators.

In a sign of just how high-stakes the battle is, S&P hired prominent defense attorney John Keker, who has represented everyone from cyclist Lance Armstrong to Enron's Andrew Fastow.

S&P said in a statement on Tuesday that the lawsuit is meritless and said it will vigorously defend itself.

A similar coordinated federal-state action against Moody's would follow lawsuits two states have already filed against the ratings firm. Connecticut, which led the states in this week's actions, sued Moody's and S&P in March 2010.

In January a state court in Hartford denied the last of the preliminary motions Moody's had filed to have the case thrown out. That case and the one against S&P are proceeding to trial in the second half of 2014.

Democratic Senator Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut, who as then-attorney general brought the cases against S&P and Moody's in 2010, said he found rampant abuse across the credit rating industry.

"The difference is one of degree and scale rather than essential modus operandi," Blumenthal said in an interview. "S&P is the largest and they did the most sizeable amount of ratings with the largest profits."

CASE THEORY

Those earlier cases and the more recent ones against S&P are based on a theory that the firms misled investors by stating that their ratings on mortgage products were objective and not influenced by conflicts of interest.

Instead, the lawsuits contend, the firms inflated ratings and understated risks as the housing bubble started to burst, driven by a desire to gain more business from the investment banks that issued mortgage securities.

Framing the cases in that manner steers clear of attacking individual ratings, which have largely been shielded under free speech protections. Instead, the focus is on proving false just one statement S&P made - that its ratings were objective.

The two state cases against Moody's present evidence that is similar to material in the complaints against S&P.

According to the Connecticut lawsuit, Moody's pledged in its code of conduct that its ratings are "not ... affected by the existence of, or potential for, a business relationship between (Moody's) ... and the Issuer ..."

"This representation by Moody's was false and Moody's knew it," the Connecticut complaint said.

In rating a collateralized debt obligation in 2006, for example, the issuer of the deal resisted a rating a Moody's analyst had determined by arguing that S&P had provided a more favorable rating. Following an exchange with managers, the analyst provided a recommendation that Moody's "reconsider the previously committed loss coverage levels," the lawsuit said.

The lawsuit does not say whether the levels were changed.

Moody's has said the Connecticut lawsuit is "without merit".

A 2011 Congressional report on the causes of the financial crisis singled out both Moody's and S&P for blame, because their ratings made the risky mortgage-backed securities that were central to the crisis seem like safe investments.

The report from the Senate's permanent subcommittee on investigations, led by Democratic Senator Carl Levin from Michigan, detailed specific pressures at Moody's to keep investment bank clients happy.

Managers were evaluated based on their ability to build market share, and former Moody's employees testified that employees were fired when they challenged senior management with a more conservative approach to rating the securities.

"The fear was real, not rare and not at all healthy. You began to hear of analysts, even whole groups of analysts, at Moody's who had lost their jobs because they were doing their jobs, identifying risks and describing them accurately," former Moody's senior vice president Mark Froeba testified to the subcommittee.

PAPER TRAIL

Despite similar evidence against both companies, people with knowledge of the rating agencies say authorities may have moved first against S&P because of a stronger paper trail against it.

Richard Greenfield of Greenfield & Goodman, who was part of a suit against Moody's with a settlement last year that included governance reforms and $4.95 million, said looking at the respective evidence, it does appear that there was more material against S&P.

"Here you've got a very, very good paper trail with S&P," he said. "If they are not totally smoking gun documents, they are collectively smoking gun documents."

The paper trail is important because the kinds of documents involved can help keep a judge from dismissing a case before it gets to trial, said Hillary Sale, a securities law and corporate governance expert and professor of law at Washington University in St. Louis.

The government's complaint against S&P includes numerous embarrassing emails, such as one in which an analyst parodies a Talking Heads song "Burning Down the House" to reflect the "boiling over" subprime market.

"When you have that kind of evidence that looks bad, you don't want to dismiss the case until you have more discovery," Sale said. That kind of a paper trail "helps you survive a motion to dismiss."

Legal experts say they expect the S&P case might simply be a prelude to more action.

"It may very well be that the government's testing their waters and they don't want to bite off more than they can chew," said Philip Hilder of Hilder & Associates in Houston, a former federal prosecutor. "Nobody should take these cases lightly."

(Reporting By Aruna Viswanatha in Washington and Karen Freifeld, Luciana Lopez and Peter Rudegeair in New York; Editing by Karey Wutkowski and Tim Dobbyn)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/justice-dept-states-weigh-action-against-moodys-002057450--sector.html

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Laikipia Plateau: First Scouting Session

After a few days spent settling in at the field station--getting oriented with the vehicle (read: learning to drive manual shift on the opposite side of the vehicle from what I'm used to, in a Land Rover on bouncy bush roads), gathering some supplies from town, and doing overall game planning, I finally made it out into the field yesterday.

I headed up to the northern part of Mpala with my field assistant, Simon (whose knowledge of this ecosystem is just astounding), to scout out places to set up my mesopredator trapping grid. We drove almost the entire length of the Mpala Research Conservancy (MRC), and it was wonderful to be out and about in the field at last. When Simon and I finally got to my first sampling site (a 25 kilometer drive takes close to an hour on these roads), we headed out on foot to determine the best way to orient and structure the grid. A key component of trapping mammals is to make sure that trapping stations are close enough to one other to keep animals from slipping between them without noticing any bait, but not so close that you limit yourself to the home range of just one or a few individuals, and to keep the traps a standard distance from on another--they are most often arranged in rectangular grids. The rules can change depending upon the social structure of the target species and the questions you seek to answer with the data, of course, but those are the general guidelines for the type of abundance/diversity sampling that I'm doing. Simon and I decided to set up a grid starting along a nearby luga--the local term for a small stream channel that often only actually has water during the wet season and to extend outwards across the savanna from that. In case you are wondering what the terrain here looks like, here is a shot of the incipient trapping grid (with Simon telling me about the luga just off in the distance). Unfortunately, our luga exploration was truncated when Simon noticed a large bull elephant (Loxodonta africana) lurking a few hundred meters away. Although many people think of carnivores as the main killers on the savannah, elephants and buffalo are actually the ones that people out here tend to be the most concerned about. Lone bulls are often thought to be especially dangerous. Elephants (presumably both the African and Asian species) actually kill upwards of 500 people each year, and the Cape buffalo (Syncerus caffer) is commonly said to kill more hunters than any other species in Africa. Both elephants and buffalo are enormous, travel in large groups, are unbelievably quiet as they move through the bush, and have the unfortunate pairing of short tempers and sharp weapons on their skulls. The rule around here is that if an elephant is occupying a spot at a given time, the elephant gets to keep that spot until he/she decides they're ready to move on. So Simon and I hiked east, away from the elephant but not in a direction that would let it easily get between us and our vehicle. We kept scouting the farther portion of our planned grid, and spotted an Eastern Chanting Goshawk (Melierax poliopterus) on our way. What makes a good trapping site for a mesopredator, anyway? As you can see in the picture, the acacia woodlands found in this area consist mostly of acacias or other small trees dispersed across relatively sparse ground, with bunches of vegetation crowded around the base. Those bunches of vegetation are ideal mesopredator trapping spots, because a trap can be wedged into the grasses to resemble a burrow. This also keeps the animal from stealing bait out of the back of the trap and generally makes it feel less exposed as it enters the doorway. The vegetation provides essential shade from the sun--we don't want any crispy mongoose on our hands. I will also be wrapping the traps in shade paper before setting them, but the vegetation itself does the best job of keeping things as cool as possible. (Just a note, the traps are opened in the evening and checked first thing in the morning, so no animals are ever left inside a trap in during heat of the day). The site we scouted yesterday is to the far north of the MRC, meaning that the site gets relatively little rainfall (will likely experience more frequent and intense droughts as global climate change progresses. Thus, the dry sampling areas in my study may be representative of what the environment will be like in the more southern--and historically wetter--portions of Laikipia in the near future. Another hugely rewarding part of this week was that I finally laid eyes on one of my study animals! This afternoon I spotted two dwarf mongoose (Helogale parvula) in the grass not far from the station. These small herpestids are extremely wary critters, and they rarely stick around long once they detect that they're being observed. Dwarf mongoose have a social structure that is actually very similar to that of the ever-popular meerkats (Suricata suricatta), and they also have a neat vigilance mutualism with hornbills. The hornbills hang around while mongoose are foraging and eat some of the insects that the little mammals grub up, and in "exchange" they emit alarm calls when they see predators, warning other hornbills and mongoose alike that danger is near. I'm interested to see whether hornbill sightings are a good indicator of finding dwarf mongoose at a given locality in this ecosystem. I will report back once we start getting the traps set--fingers crossed for lots of mesopredators in the traps and no elephants stepping on them! Images: copyright by author. Previously in this series: Laikipia Plateau: mesopredators in Kenya Laikipia Plateau: I have arrived Follow Scientific American on Twitter @SciAm and @SciamBlogs. Visit ScientificAmerican.com for the latest in science, health and technology news.
? 2013 ScientificAmerican.com. All rights reserved.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/laikipia-plateau-first-scouting-session-235600387.html

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Key to antidepressant response uncovered

Feb. 7, 2013 ? Through a series of investigations in mice and humans, Johns Hopkins researchers have identified a protein that appears to be the target of both antidepressant drugs and electroconvulsive therapy. Results of their experiments explain how these therapies likely work to relieve depression by stimulating stem cells in the brain to grow and mature. In addition, the researchers say, these experiments raise the possibility of predicting individual people's response to depression therapy, and fine-tuning treatment accordingly. Reports on separate aspects of the research were published in December on the Molecular Psychiatry website, and will also appear in the Feb. 7 issue of Cell Stem Cell.

"Previous studies have shown that antidepressants and electroconvulsive therapy both activate neural stem cells in the adult brain to divide and form new neurons," says Hongjun Song, Ph.D., a professor of neurology and director of the Stem Cell Program at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine's Institute for Cell Engineering. "What were missing were the specific molecules linking antidepressant treatment and stem cell activation."

To make that link, Song's team and its collaborators assembled a body of evidence from different types of experiments. In one, they compared gene activity in the brains of mice that had and had not been treated with electroconvulsive therapy, looking specifically at genes with protein products that are known to regulate neural stem cells. The comparison turned up differences in the activity of one inhibitor gene for a chemical chain reaction that had been previously implicated in stimulating neural stem cells. Specifically, the therapy reduced the amount of protein the inhibitor gene, sFRP3, produced, which would in turn have given the growth-stimulating chain reaction freer rein.

To learn more about sFRP3's effects, the team next compared normal mice with mice that had been engineered to lack the sFRP3 protein. They found that the modified mice behaved like normal mice on antidepressants; moreover, giving antidepressants to the modified mice did not further change their behavior. This strongly suggested that antidepressants work by blocking sFRP3; without sFRP3, the modified mice had nothing to block.

In order to tie their mouse work to what happens in the human brain, the researchers next analyzed genetic information from 541 depression patients and tracked their response to a course of antidepressant drugs. The team found three common variations in the human version of sFRP3 that were linked to a better response to therapy. Wondering what these variations actually did, the researchers searched a database that correlates gene sequences to gene activity in the human brain. All three variations caused less gene activity, they found, meaning that there likely would have been less inhibitor.

Song notes that sFRP3 is also regulated by other conditions, including exercise. "This gene's activity is very sensitive to the amount of activity in the brain, so sFRP3 seems to be a gatekeeper that links activity to new neuron growth," he says. The finding has two major near-term implications, he says: It could lead to genetic tests that enable doctors to predict a patient's response to antidepressants, and it provides a target for potential new therapies for the disease.

The studies were supported by the National Institute of Mental Health (grant numbers MH090115 and MH087874), the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (grant numbers NS048271, NS047344 and NS080913), the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (grant number HD069184), the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (grant number ES021957), the Brain & Behavior Research Foundation, the Maryland Stem Cell Research Fund, the International Mental Health Research Organization and the Max Planck Society.

Other authors on the Cell Stem Cell article are Mi-Hyeon Jang, Michael A. Bonaguidi, Yasuji Kitabatake, Jiaqi Sun, Juan Song, Eunchai Kang, Heechul Jun, Chun Zhong, Yijing Su, Junjie U. Guo, Marie Xun Wang, Kurt A. Sailor, Ju-Young Kim, Yuan Gao, Kimberly M. Christian and Guo-li Ming of the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. Other authors on the Molecular Psychiatry article are Mi-Hyeon Jang, Yasuji Kitabatake, Eunchai Kang, Heechul Jun, Mikhail V. Pletnikov, Kimberly M. Christian and Guo-li Ming of the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine; Ren? Hen of Columbia University; and Susanne Lucae and Elizabeth B. Binder of the Max Planck Institute of Psychiatry.

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The above story is reprinted from materials provided by Johns Hopkins Medicine.

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


Journal References:

  1. Mi-Hyeon Jang, Michael?A. Bonaguidi, Yasuji Kitabatake, Jiaqi Sun, Juan Song, Eunchai Kang, Heechul Jun, Chun Zhong, Yijing Su, Junjie?U. Guo, Marie?Xun Wang, Kurt?A. Sailor, Ju-Young Kim, Yuan Gao, Kimberly?M. Christian, Guo-li Ming, Hongjun Song. Secreted Frizzled-Related Protein 3 Regulates Activity-Dependent Adult Hippocampal Neurogenesis. Cell Stem Cell, 2013; 12 (2): 215 DOI: 10.1016/j.stem.2012.11.021
  2. M-H Jang, Y Kitabatake, E Kang, H Jun, M V Pletnikov, K M Christian, R Hen, S Lucae, E B Binder, H Song, G-I Ming. Secreted frizzled-related protein 3 (sFRP3) regulates antidepressant responses in mice and humans. Molecular Psychiatry, 2012; DOI: 10.1038/mp.2012.158

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/mind_brain/mental_health/~3/Fda69E4MJRs/130207131342.htm

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Republicans are Jumping the Shark With Consumer Finance ...

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The Republicans seem intent on jumping the shark, even if they have to do it one goldfish at a time. This time they are staking a lot of political capital on a battle to disable the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) and its director Richard Cordray.

On Friday, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell and 42 other Republicans sent a letter to President Barack Obama announcing they will block the appointment of Cordray to be permanent director of the Consumer Financial Protection Agency, a position he already holds through a recess appointment made by the President on January 4, 2012. This appointment will not be ratified, the letter said, ?Until key structural changes are made to ensure accountability and transparency? at the CFPB. The letter demands the director be replaced by a commission, CFPB?s independent funding be replaced by Congressional appropriation, and ?a safety-and-soundness check? for financial regulators who oversee those aspects of financial institutions be established.

CFPB was created by the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act and was the brainchild of Elizabeth Warren who was expected to head the agency. When the Republicans made it clear Warren stood a better chance of being deported than confirmed, the President nominated Cordray, former Attorney General of Ohio and Warren?s right-hand man. Of course it wasn?t just Warren, although they were particularly hostile toward her, but the Bureau itself to which the Republicans and their Wall Street buddies objected. In a 2011 letter much like the one last Friday, Republicans said no conceivable nominee would be acceptable so the President invoked his recess appointment powers.

That appointment and three others to the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) have been challenged in separate law suits and the NLRB appointments were invalidated by a federal appeals court last week, but more about that in a moment.

In attempting to defang CFPB Republicans of course are pandering to their Wall Street constituency. However Dodd-Frank is no longer the Wall Street bugaboo that it was two years ago and CFPB has earned some credibility, even if it is of the ?devil we know? variety.

The Agency has only slowly rolled out its mandate, taking on consumer financial domains one at a time. It now regulates credit cards, mortgages, student loans, and credit reporting agencies. Elizabeth Warren described CFPB as ?a new sheriff in town? and consumers are beginning to recognize it as such. In its first 15 months of operation it logged approximately 79,200 consumer complaints. Not a bad total for an agency just hitting the ground, especially since it did not have a director or launch its non-bank supervision until January 2012 or begin accepting student loan complaints until last March.

One of its responsibilities is formulating rules to carry out consumer laws and some critical ones for mortgage servicing, mortgage standards, and appraisals were released in final form in mid-January. While few of the stakeholders were happy about the idea of regulations they almost universally praised the process the Bureau had pursued in developing them. Lobbying groups representing mortgage bankers, credit unions, consumers, and home builders all issued statements thanking the Bureau for not just inviting their comments, but listening to and incorporating them. These rules are all due to go into effect in January 2014.

Small business owners ? those job creators we hear so much about from McConnell ? were recently surveyed by the Small Business Majority about Dodd-Frank generally and CFPB specifically. Eighty-four percent of the majority Republican sample supported the Bureau and 58 percent agreed its regulations are needed. Only one-third associated CFPB with bureaucracy that hurts small businesses and job creation.

Now back to the law suits. If the NLRB recess appointments are unconstitutional so too are any decisions those members made in the past year. If the Cordray appointment suffers the same fate so will some, but not all of CFPB?s rule making and even many personnel decisions. More worrisome is the potential for months of uncertainty about the new rules going into effect in 2014 at a time when major banks are gearing up and spending millions of dollars to meet their requirements.

There are a few ways to resolve this crisis should it emerge but the most immediate and cost neutral is Senate confirmation of a CFPB director who could then ratify the Bureau?s previous work. Instead the Republicans are preparing for a fight to rid the country of a regulator that no one but them seems heavily invested in destroying. Wall Street could spend millions to comply with rules that may be moot and that they aren?t all that opposed to anyway; small businesses actually like the Bureau, and consumers might notice that once again their financial welfare doesn?t count on one side of the Senate aisle.

Looks like the Republicans are about to be the stupid party again.

And particularly stupid when one realizes another little wrinkle in their plan. CFPB is Elizabeth Warren?s baby and she is now a senior U.S. Senator and a member of the Banking Committee. There will be vigorous defenses of the Bureau by consumer organizations and the President and Senate Democrats have said they will not consider the Republicans? demands. But it will be Warren who will lead the charge. She may be a freshman senator but she is the survivor of many congressional hearings and a master of media sound bites. She also has a broad and enthusiastic army of supporters both inside and outside her home state and will be able to command a lot of vocal support from every senator?s constituency.

This will, in the end, give the Democrats another opportunity to accuse Republicans of disregarding the middle class and being pawns of Wall Street, an opportunity which Warren will exploit to the max, while Wall Street frankly doesn?t give much of a damn.

Source: http://www.politicususa.com/republicans-jumping-shark-consumer-finance-protection-bureau-attack.html

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Tonik, dog with human face, up for adoption

Tonik, dog with human face: Tonik, a Shih Tzu/poodle who some say has a remarkably human-like face, is up for adoption at a shelter in Indiana. Why is it that Tonik appears so human to some people?

By Eoin O'Carroll,?Staff / February 6, 2013

Dog with human face: Tonik, a poodle/Shih Tzu mix, was rescued from a kill shelter in Kentucky. He is now available for adoption from the Homeward Bound Animal Welfare Group, Inc., Mishawaka, IN.

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Tonik, an 11-pound, 1-year old dog available for adoption from the Homeward Bound Animal Welfare Group in Mishawka, Indiana, is looking for a loving and responsible household, preferably without children. He is part poodle, part Shih Tzu, and, if his photo is any indication, part human.?

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Yes, it's true: Tonik's face, at least in this photo, looks very much that of a mildly peeved?H. sapiens. Indeed, the resemblance is striking enough to prompt a writer for the Huffington Post to lead their story with, "It's just one of those things that are like, 'Whoa, dude.'"?

But how, exactly, did Tonik's face get so . . . dude-like? Well, it's true that humans and dogs do share some genes: our two species likely have a common ancestor dating back to the Cretaceous era. And it's also true that Shih Tzus have been bred for their flat faces (many Shih Tzus have trouble breathing because of this). But Tonik's humanoid visage?has much less to do with canine physiology than it does with human psychology.

Anthropomorphism, the tendency to ascribe human traits to animals and objects, was first described by the traveling Greek poet Xenophanes of Colophon. Xenophanes, who lived in the 5th and 6th century BC, criticized the polytheism of his contemporaries, noting that?Ethiopians?described their gods as snub-nosed and black, while the Thracians described theirs as blue-eyed and red-haired. If horses and oxen could draw pictures, Xenophanes scoffed,?they would draw deities that resemble horses and oxen.?

Anthropomorphism is universal. Even the most hard-nosed rationalists among us cannot stop themselves from doing it. But in 2007, psychologists?Adam Waytz, Nicholas Epley and John T. Cacioppo?found that people who feel socially isolated are more likely to anthropomorphize. They write:

"From the elderly person who treats his or her cat as a bit too much like a spouse to cinematic depictions such as Cast Away in which the shipwrecked protagonist (Tom Hanks) anthropomorphizes a volleyball (named Wilson) after being marooned on an island, those who are lacking human connection appear to seek it out in nonhuman connections."

Perhaps even more universal than our tendency to ascribe human traits to nonhumans is our tendency to detect human faces in all manner of things. Anthropoid mugs constantly present themselves to us not just in all phyla of animals, but also in clouds, tree stumps, coffee stains, the moon, grilled cheese sandwiches, and anything else that can plausibly display a pair of ovals for eyes and a line for a mouth.

Psychologists use the term "pareidolia"?to describe our tendency to perceive random stimuli as significant, and when it comes to faces, pareidolia is deeply ingrained. In fact, our brains have a specific area ?(right near the bottom, in case you were wondering) specialized to recognize faces. Brain-mapping studies show that it is one of the first parts of the brain to get to work when presented with something that looks like a face, but not with other objects. Neurons in this area fire in well under a fifth of a second, well before the conscious mind can begin to process the information. We are also adept at very quickly determining the emotions of the face, and we tend to pick out faces with threatening expressions faster than those with benign ones.?

All of this is the result of eons of hard-won evolutionary programming, and it was in our ancestors' best reproductive interests not to be overly strict in excluding would-be faces.?The costs of missing a human face are far greater than the costs of seeing one where none exists. ?

Which brings us back to Tonik. Chances are, with all this media scrutiny, he's already got plenty of prospective?adopters. But, according to the ASPCA,?about 5 million to 7 million cats, dogs, and other pets enter animal shelters nationwide each year, and approximately 3 million to 4 million of them are euthanized.?If a little bit of evolutionarily ingrained cognitive misattribution will render these animals worthy of your compassion, and if you can responsibly take care of a pet, then feel free to?anthropomorphize away. ?

Source: http://rss.csmonitor.com/~r/feeds/science/~3/q8t6kaqoIRA/Tonik-dog-with-human-face-up-for-adoption

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Ally of Iran's Ahmadinejad freed from prison: official

DUBAI (Reuters) - A once-feared prosecutor at the center of a row between two of Iran's most powerful figures was freed from two days' detention on Wednesday, adding a new twist to a political drama Iran watchers expect to intensify before presidential polls in June.

Neither the arrest nor the release of the former judicial official, Saeed Mortazavi, have been accompanied by any public explanation from the authorities.

But Mortazavi was detained shortly after his political ally, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, publicly accused Parliament Speaker Ali Larijani's family of attempting to use their prominence for financial gain.

Its timing suggested it was linked to the accusations of corruption and it was seen as the most recent indication that Ahmadinejad has lost favour with Iran's most powerful authority, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

On Wednesday, state news agency IRNA reported that Mortazavi had been released from prison, citing an anonymous source. It was unclear whether Mortazavi had posted any bail, IRNA said.

The Iranian Students' News Agency, or ISNA, reported that Tehran prison official Sohrab Soleimani had confirmed the news of Mortazavi's release.

The squabbling between members of Iran's ruling elite appears to have intensified despite calls from Khamenei, the final arbiter on all matters in Iran, for officials to avoid airing their disagreements in public ahead of the vote.

The Fars news agency reported on Tuesday evening that judiciary chief Sadeq Larijani, the parliament speaker's brother, held a meeting with Khamenei after Mortazavi had been detained. It did not elaborate.

Khamenei has not commented on Mortazavi's arrest or Ahmadinejad's accusations against the Larijanis, and analysts say that by virtue of seniority he is unlikely to mention the specifics of the dispute in public. But he is likely to make a public speech in the coming days as Iran marks the 34th anniversary of the 1979 Islamic revolution this week.

Mortazavi was suspended from his judicial post in 2010 over the torture deaths of three protesters in custody after the 2009 presidential elections, which the opposition said were rigged in Ahmadinejad's favour, bringing huge crowds into the streets.

Human Rights Watch has previously described Mortazavi as a "serial human rights abuser" whose "unsavoury history goes back many years."

Labour Minister Abdolreza Sheikholeslami, who was dismissed by parliament on Sunday, appointed Mortazavi last year to head the social security office, against lawmakers' wishes.

(Reporting By Yeganeh Torbati, Editing by William Maclean and Jon Boyle)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/ally-irans-ahmadinejad-freed-prison-official-agency-064852064.html

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Upgrade the Caliber of Your Stories within Your Sales Presentations ...

Speeches and sales presentations are not memorable without fascinating stories. I want you to upgrade the caliber of your stories. Practice telling stories. Utilize what I call the ?Hollywood Model? ? character, dialogue, and dramatic lesson learned; which is, of course, that doing business with you is the best way to go.

Whenever you are telling a story to a prospect, make sure it is populated with flesh and blood characters, just like the people you are talking to. People do not remember the words you say; people remember the story, and the picture, created in their minds while they listen to you.

Robert McKee, the screenwriter said, ?Stories are the creative conversion of life itself into a more powerful, clearer, more meaningful experience.?

Given the choice of listening to a trivial story well told or a brilliant story badly told, an audience of one or 1,000 would rather hear a trivial story well told. Stories are the currency of human contact. Encourage your happy, satisfied clients not only to share positive stories with you that you can repeat, but also to tell all their friends. People can resist a sales presentation, but nobody can resist a good story well told.

My article, ?Story Development Ideas? can help you get started on developing successful stories for your presentations.? The audio CD, Inside Secrets of Superstar Sales Presentations: Increasing Results Through Persuasive Presentation Skills can help you learn how to connect intellectually and emotionally with your prospects.

Patricia Fripp & Darren LaCroix with Speakers' Conference Attendees

Patricia Fripp & Darren LaCroix with Lady & The Champs Speakers? Conference Attendees

Darren LaCroix and Patricia Fripp are partners in World Champions Edge coaching community with Ed Tate, Mark Brown, and Craig Valentine. You can hear them all at the Lady & The Champs 2013 Speakers? Conference in Las Vegas. Patricia and her friends are experts in public speaking, business presentations, sales presentations, marketing yourself and how to use social media to your advantage. These are all covered in Lady & The Champs.

You can listen, watch and learn for prior years as a value pack: Lady & The Champs 2011 & 2012 Combo Pack

No comments yet.

Source: http://www.fripp.com/blog/upgrade-the-caliber-of-your-stories-within-your-sales-presentations/

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How To Create a Board For Your Business (Part 2) | Vantage ...

In my last post, I discussed the questions a business needs to raise before it can decide whether the time is right to establish a board.

If?you?ve?decided the time is right, there are a couple of obvious options.

Some companies may first set up an advisory board to provide independent advice on issues including business development and strategy.

An advisory board is not a decision-making entity and is not regulated under the Corporations Act, although advisory boards need to be careful that they are not in fact a governing board (because in this case the legal duties and obligations of a director might be applied).

An advisory board is often part of a transition process to a more formal, governing board with functions regarding risk, strategy, compliance and monitoring company performance.

Other companies create a governing board from the outset, which means the directors have legal duties and liabilities under the Corporations Act.

If you choose this path, first carefully consider the following key questions that we at Directors Australia ask all clients in this position:

  1. Is your business ready for the transition ? both financially and emotionally?
  2. What will be the impact of loss of control and independence for the owner/s?
  3. Is the timing right given other things going on in the business?
  4. Are there family issues to be sorted through first?
  5. If it?s a family business, which family members will sit on the board?
  6. What is the ideal skill set to deliver on your company?s strategic plan and where are the gaps?

Selecting an independent director to suit your business

Many family and other SME businesses initially feel comfortable appointing known advisors or peers to an advisory board.

This can be a good mechanism to integrate ?outsiders? into the business.

As a business moves to a formal, governing board, it is important to draw in a wide pool of candidate directors who have experience in business, governance and strategic thinking.

It?s also important to not only look for people with the right skills and experience, but who are also a good cultural fit for the business.

In the family business context this means looking for someone who understands and can effectively work within the family?s culture, values and goals.

A good starting point to selecting the right directors is drafting a position description outlining what the board is ideally seeking.

This document should be at the core of the search and selection process.

It will need to cover:

  • Professional skills (e.g. financial, strategic marketing)
  • Personal attributes and behaviours (communication style, ability to collaborate)
  • Expectations (such as number of meetings, involvement in strategic planning and representing the company at industry events).

Kerryn Newton is a guest blogger and an experienced director and managing director of Directors Australia, a specialist board performance and board recruitment consultancy working with clients around Australia.

Source: http://www.businessstrategyblog.com.au/3396/how-to-create-a-board-for-your-business-part-2/

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Scientists turn toxic by-product into biofuel booster

Feb. 4, 2013 ? Scientists studying an enzyme that naturally produces alkanes -- long carbon-chain molecules that could be a direct replacement for the hydrocarbons in gasoline -- have figured out why the natural reaction typically stops after three to five cycles. Armed with that knowledge, they've devised a strategy to keep the reaction going. The biochemical details -- worked out at the U.S. Department of Energy's Brookhaven National Laboratory and described in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences the week of February 4, 2013 -- renew interest in using the enzyme in bacteria, algae, or plants to produce biofuels that need no further processing.

"Alkanes are very similar to the carbon-chain molecules in gasoline. They represent a potential renewable alternative to replace the petrochemical component of gasoline," said Brookhaven biochemist John Shanklin, who led the research, which was conducted in large part by former Brookhaven postdoc Carl Andre, now working at BASF Plant Science in North Carolina, and Xiaohong Yu of Brookhaven's Biosciences Department. "Unlike the process of breaking down plant biomass to sugars and fermenting them to ethanol," Shanklin said, "biologically produced alkanes could be extracted and used directly as fuel."

Recent discovery of an enzyme known as aldehyde-deformylating oxygenase (ADO), which naturally makes alkanes from precursors in certain bacteria, stimulated interest in harnessing this enzyme's action to make liquid biofuels. But early attempts to install ADO in laboratory-based alkane "factories" produced disappointing results.

Likewise, the Brookhaven team's experiments in test tubes -- using substrates synthesized with the help of Sunny Kim in Brookhaven's Radiotracer and Biological Imaging group -- yielded the same result others had observed: The enzyme mysteriously stopped working after three to five "turnovers" and alkane production would cease.

Biochemical curiosity and ADO's remarkable resemblance to a group of enzymes the Brookhaven scientists were familiar with drew them deeper into the mystery of why the enzyme stopped working.

"We set to work to try to understand the biochemistry of ADO because it is so similar to the desaturase enzymes that we study, but performs a very different and interesting reaction," Shanklin said.

The key discovery -- that the alkane-producing system creates a by-product that's toxic to the ADO enzyme -- was unexpected. It was also the key to solving the turnover problem.

To simplify the analysis of ADO, the scientists tested whether they could substitute hydrogen peroxide for the electron transfer proteins and oxygen normally required for the alkane-producing reaction -- an approach that had worked for a related enzyme. But instead of stimulating alkane production, no alkane at all was produced, and in control experiments containing all the components plus hydrogen peroxide, alkane production was also blocked.

"It turns out one of the electron transport proteins was interacting with oxygen to produce hydrogen peroxide, and the buildup of hydrogen peroxide was 'poisoning' the ADO enzyme, completely inhibiting its activity," Shanklin said.

To confirm that hydrogen peroxide buildup was the problem and to simultaneously test whether its depletion might enhance alkane production, Shanklin and his team tried adding another enzyme, catalase, which metabolizes hydrogen peroxide to oxygen and water.

"When we added both enzymes, instead of the reaction turning over three times before stopping, it ran for more than 225 cycles," Shanklin said.

So the scientists decided to make a "bi-functional" enzyme by linking the two together.

"We reasoned that with the ADO and catalase enzymes linked, as the hydrogen peroxide concentration near the enzyme increases, the catalase could convert it to oxygen, mitigating the inhibition and thereby keeping the reaction going," he said.

Living cells often contain levels of hydrogen peroxide sufficient to cause ADO inhibition. So there was a question about whether the dual enzyme would increase alkane production under these natural conditions.

Results to date have been encouraging: In experiments in test tubes and pilot studies in bacteria, the bi-functional enzyme resulted in at least a five-fold increase in alkane production compared with ADO alone. And, in addition to removing hydrogen peroxide as an inhibitor of ADO, the combo enzyme actually helps drive the alkane-producing reaction by producing oxygen, one of the key components required for activity.

"This bi-functional enzyme simultaneously decreases the concentration of the inhibitor and increases the concentration of a needed reaction component by converting an inhibitor into a substrate," Shanklin said.

Now the scientists are working to install the combo enzyme in algae or green plants.

"While ADO-containing bacteria convert sugar that we feed to them into alkanes, it would be much more efficient to produce alkanes in photosynthetic organisms using carbon dioxide and sunlight," Shanklin said.

The scientists also suggest that the general approach of strategically designing fusion enzymes to break down small molecule inhibitors could be used to improve the efficiency of a wide range of reactions. Defeating natural inhibition, a process they describe as "protection via inhibitor metabolism" (PIM), would allow such bifunctional enzymes to function more efficiently than their natural counterparts.

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Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/top_news/top_technology/~3/F9tQb89hEvM/130204153859.htm

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মঙ্গলবার, ৫ ফেব্রুয়ারী, ২০১৩

Stack Exchange Co-Founder Jeff Atwood Launches Forums Startup Discourse, With Funding From First Round, Greylock, And SV Angel

discourse logoJeff Atwood, co-founder of Q&A network Stack Exchange, announced today via blog post?that he's launching a new startup called Discourse, which offers an open source platform for running discussion forums. The full name of the company is actually Civilized Discourse Construction Kit, Inc., and its aim is indeed to improve the quality of online discussion. However, Atwood writes that he's following a very different strategy from Stack Exchange, which aims for "the absolute minimum amount of discussion necessary to produce great questions and great answers":

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Techcrunch/~3/zEKN4Bc-7jI/

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New 'retention model' explains enigmatic ribbon at edge of solar system

Feb. 5, 2013 ? Since its October 2008 launch, NASA's Interstellar Boundary Explorer (IBEX) has provided images of the invisible interactions between our home in the galaxy and interstellar space. Particles emanating from this boundary produce a striking, narrow ribbon, which had yet to be explained despite more than a dozen possible theories. In a new "retention model," researchers from the University of New Hampshire and Southwest Research Institute suggest that charged particles trapped in this region create the ribbon as they escape as neutral atoms.

The Sun continually sends out a solar wind of charged particles or ions traveling in all directions at supersonic speeds. IBEX cameras measure energetic neutral atoms (ENAs) that form when charged particles become neutralized.

As solar wind ENAs leave the solar system, the majority move out in various directions, never to re-enter. However, some ENAs leave the solar system and impact other neutral atoms, becoming charges particles again. These newly formed pickup ions begin to gyrate around the local interstellar magnetic field just outside the solar system. In the regions where the magnetic field is perpendicular to their initial motion, they scatter rapidly and pile up. From those regions, some of those particles return to the solar system as secondary ENAs -- ENAs that leave the solar system and become charged and then re-neutralized, only to travel back into the solar system as ENAs a second time.

"The syrup you pour on a pancake piles up before slowly oozing out to the sides," says Dr. David McComas, IBEX principal investigator and assistant vice president of the SwRI Space Science and Engineering Division. "The secondary ENAs coming into the solar system after having been temporarily trapped in a region just outside the solar system do the same thing. As they pile up and get trapped or retained, they produce higher fluxes of ENAs from this region and form the bright ribbon seen by IBEX."

ENA energies observed in the ribbon correlate to the speed of the solar wind, which is slower (around 1 million miles per hour) at low latitudes and faster (up to 2 million miles per hour) at high latitudes.

"This was the clue that made us think the ribbon was caused by a secondary ENA source, because it so directly reflects the latitudinal structure of the solar wind," says McComas.

Simulations using a realistic solar wind structure showed remarkably good association with the IBEX data, closely reproducing the observed ribbon structure, location, and latitudinal ordering by energy. Thus far, the retention model appears best able to reproduce the IBEX observations. However, more studies are needed to confirm if variations in the solar wind affect the ribbon, as theorized.

Using information provided by this new model, future studies of the ribbon could help determine the properties of the nearby galactic magnetic field, opening a window into the physics of the nearby galactic medium. In addition, the IBEX ribbon could provide researchers with a means for measuring the strength of the interstellar magnetic field, as well as its direction.

The paper, "Spatial Retention of Ions Producing the IBEX Ribbon," by N.A. Schwadron and D.J. McComas was published Feb. 4 in the Astrophysical Journal. The IBEX team's papers on the first six models about the ribbon's origin were published in Science (2009).

IBEX is the latest in NASA's series of low-cost, rapidly developed Small Explorer space missions. Southwest Research Institute in San Antonio leads the IBEX mission with a team of national and international partners. NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md., manages the Explorers Program for NASA's Science Mission Directorate in Washington.

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Journal Reference:

  1. N. A. Schwadron, D. J. McComas. Spatial Retention of Ions Producing The IBEX ribbon. The Astrophysical Journal, 2013; 764 (1): 92 DOI: 10.1088/0004-637X/764/1/92

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