T-Mobile USA eyes growth from iPhone, marketing changes

By Sinead Carew

NEW YORK (Reuters) - T-Mobile USA said on Tuesday that it will start selling Apple Inc's iPhone on April 12, making it the last of the big national U.S. operators to sell the popular smartphone.

The No. 4 U.S. mobile provider, which is seeking to merge with smaller rival MetroPCS Communications, is hoping the device can help stem customer losses. The launch follows a marketing overhaul that eliminates device subsidies and two-year service contracts favored by its bigger rivals.

T-Mobile, a unit of Deutsche Telekom AG, hopes its new approach will differentiate it from bigger rivals that already sell the iPhone: Sprint Nextel, AT&T Inc and Verizon Wireless, a venture of Verizon Communications and Vodafone Group Plc.

The company, which struggles with customer defections, hopes to attract cost-conscious consumers through an aggressive marketing campaign that focuses on its lack of service contracts and clearly outlines the monthly cost to consumers to own devices such as the iPhone.

U.S. operators have traditionally subsidized phones in exchange for tying customers into contracts but do not disclose how much of their monthly charges covers the device, a practice that T-Mobile USA criticized as lacking transparency.

"The industry's broken," T-Mobile Chief Executive John Legere said at a press event to announce the iPhone launch and discuss the service plans, which he promised late last year.

In particular, T-Mobile USA is taking aim at No. 2 U.S. operator AT&T because the two companies use the same network technology, making it easier for consumers to bring their AT&T phones to T-Mobile's network.

Legere estimated that T-Mobile customers would pay about $1,000 less over two years than they would for roughly comparable services at AT&T. T-Mobile's website also directly compares its pricing to AT&T's service fees.

However, AT&T appeared unfazed by the campaign. Spokesman Mark Siegel's response was: "Whatever."

Legere said that the iPhone and the new marketing plans will help the company stem its losses of bill-paying customers this year and create growth in this segment in 2014. The company, which ended 2012 with 33.4 million customers, lost 515,000 contract customers in the fourth quarter.

"You'll see discernable progress each quarter," the executive told Reuters, promising significant improvement in first quarter from the fourth quarter and second quarter numbers that are significantly better than the first quarter.

T-Mobile will offer the iPhone 5, Apple's latest model, for an upfront payment of $99.99 followed by 24 monthly payments of $20, adding up to $580 over two years. Its rivals charge $200 upfront to customers who sign a two-year contract, but customers who do not sign a contract pay about $650.

Slight differences in operators' service plans make comparison of total costs for consumers difficult, but analysts said that T-Mobile's offer does appear to be cheaper than those of its bigger rivals.

Reticle Research analyst Ross Rubin said it was still unclear whether consumers have as much disdain for contracts as T-Mobile hopes. But he said consumers will likely find the lower upfront cost for phones attractive and that the addition of the iPhone should help T-Mobile retain customers.

"Not having the iPhone 5 was certainly a big hole in its portfolio," Rubin said.

T-Mobile said it will sell the older iPhone 4 for a $69 up-front payment and a commitment to pay $20 a month for two years. It also promised smaller upfront fees for the latest smartphones from BlackBerry and HTC Corp.

Bigger rivals AT&T and Verizon have said they would closely watch T-Mobile's new service model and that they could follow suit if it proves popular with consumers.

Andrew Sherrard, T-Mobile's senior vice president of marketing, said the company would significantly increase its marketing spending, but he declined to give details.

T-Mobile also said on Tuesday that it had upgraded its network with faster data services in seven markets using the Long Term Evolution (LTE) technology that its bigger rivals have a head start in delivering.

T-Mobile promised to offer LTE in markets with a population of 100 million by mid-year and expects to broaden coverage to 200 million by year end.

One key element of Legere's strategy involves the proposed merger with MetroPCS, which needs shareholder approval at a special meeting on April 12, the date of T-Mobile's iPhone launch.

Two large activist shareholders, Paulson & Co Inc and P. Schoenfeld Asset Management, are campaigning to block the deal due to the level of debt that the combined company will have on its books. But Legere insisted the merger would go through.

"It will be approved despite ... several greedy hedge funds that are trying to take a double-dip out of that process," Legere said.

(Reporting by Sinead Carew; Editing by David Gregorio, Leslie Adler, Richard Chang and Steve Orlofsky)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/t-mobile-usa-sell-iphone-starting-april-12-174032771--finance.html

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Insect pests more plentiful in hotter parts of city than in cooler areas

Mar. 27, 2013 ? Higher temperatures in cities can be a key driver of insect pest outbreaks on trees in urban areas, according to research published March 27 in the open access journal PLOS ONE by Emily Meineke from North Carolina State University and colleagues from other institutions.

The researchers found that a scale insect that exclusively feeds on oak trees was 13 times more abundant on willow oaks in the hottest parts of the city of Raleigh, North Carolina than in cooler areas of the same city, even when other factors, like natural enemies that would kill the insects, were similar in both areas. In a second experiment, they found scale insects collected from trees in hot areas had higher survival rates in hot greenhouses than in cool ones. However, insects originally from cooler urban areas remained low in number in both hot and cool greenhouses. The researchers found no differences in the rates of reproduction of insects in any of these groups. Thus, they suggest that the differences in abundance may be a result of differences in survival rather than a higher reproductive capacity.

Urbanization of an area changes the species that dwell in it. Previous studies have analyzed these effects in terms of loss of resources or changes to habitat, but this is the first research to focus on the effects of "heat islands" created in cities. Meineke explains that, "Urban warming can lead to higher insect pest abundance, a result of pest acclimation or adaptation to higher temperatures."

The study concludes that since current urban warming is similar in magnitude to the higher temperatures predicted by global warming in the next fifty years, their results may indicate potential changes in pest abundance as natural forests also grow warmer.

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1. Emily K. Meineke, Robert R. Dunn, Joseph O. Sexton, Steven D. Frank. Urban Warming Drives Insect Pest Abundance on Street Trees. PLoS ONE, 2013; 8 (3): e59687 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0059687

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Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/most_popular/~3/-xa0IYLVu9Y/130327190544.htm

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Happy Birthday, SJP! A Look Through the Years

As the actress celebrates her 48th birthday on March 25, take a look back at SJP's road to supreme stardom

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What goes on in Japan Starbucks and Subway?

By Ken Y-N ( March 25, 2013 at 00:24) ? Filed under Polls, Rankings

goo Ranking seems to have started an interesting series looking at what typical behaviour one has experienced in food chains, with the first two being looked at being Starbucks and Subway.

Demographics

Over the 6th and 7th of March 2013 over 1,000 members of the goo Research monitor group completed a private internet-based questionnaire. However, the link to the full demographics is not operating right now? Note that the score in the results refers to the relative number of votes for each option, not a percentage of the total sample.

I actually prefer Tully?s to Starbucks ? Tully?s is usually not quite so packed, and their menu actually looks like a coffee shop menu. There?s probably also an element of me not wanting to be seen in place with so many foreigners?

I haven?t been to Subway for a while, although I will agree with number 15, their fried potato is excellent.

Ranking result

Q1: What typical behaviour have you experienced in Starbucks? (Sample size=over 1,000)

Rank	?	Score
1	Feeling healed by the smell of coffee throughout the shop	100
2	Lots of people studying, so nowhere to sit	90.2
3	Not knowing much about the kinds of coffee, so choosing based on the impression of the product names	85.8
4	When ordering with a lid to carry out, drinking through the small hole and burning the tip of my tongue	79.1
5	Feeling happy when staff offer me a sample of cake	47.1
6	Good taste in background music, giving the place a feeling of elegance	44.3
7	When hungry, ordering too many side dishes then later feeling regret when I realise the price I paid	43.4
8	Sitting in a too comfy sofa and spending too long there	41.5
9	As city centre shops are usually packed, feeling downhearted when I cannot sit	40.0
10	Feeling admiration for foreigners looking cool while drinking on the pavement seats	37.2
11	Feeling angry when someone who ordered after me gets their drink made first	33.2
12	When the cup is hot, not knowing the word ?Sleeve? and instead gesturing and asking for ?That thingie please?	27.4
13	Disregarding the high calories, ordering from the side menu	25.8
14	Feeling a frisson of excitement when the staff draw a cute picture on my paper cup	24.0
15=	Feeling envious of the high percentage of Mac-using customers	23.4
15=	When the staff calls out the order ?Tall coco!?, etc, I repeat the refrain in my heart	23.4
17	Being joyous when the staff gently catch my attention as I hum and haw over what to order	21.5
18	Overdoing it on the condiment bar and masking out the original taste	20.6
19	Since a refill of drip coffee is 100 yen, overdosing on coffee	18.8
20	Lots of cool/cute staff make my heart beat faster	17.2
21	Since there are more foreigner customers than other chains, heart beats a little faster	13.5
22	Having a violent end to a fight over a mains socket	12.6
23	Getting into poverty from visiting Starbucks too often	12.0
24	Buying the new tumblers every season, and ending up with my home overflowing with tumblers	11.1
25	Forgetting to return the ?Soy milk? card when they pass me my drink	5.5

Q2: What typical behaviour have you experienced in Subway? (Sample size=over 1,000)

Rank	?	Score
1	Being nervous about not knowing how to order	100
2	My eyes get drawn to the seasonal menu	83.6
3	Always getting my bread toasted	63.6
4	Tending to order the ?Special Sub?	55.2
5	When I have an empty stomach, tending to order a large chicken-related sub	44.8
6	Ending up saying ?All veggies are fine?	44.2
7	Ending up usually adding avocado topping	37.6
8	Usually carrying a discount coupon from their web site with me	30.9
9	Tending to order as much extra tomato as I can	28.5
10	Getting them to remove the veggies I don?t like ends up with a plain old sandwich	26.7
11	Feeling joy from the bottom of my heart when the egg sandwich reappears on the menu	26.1
12=	Wishing that they would serve their winter soups all year round	23.6
12=	Tending to get addicted to having sliced cheese toasted with the bread	23.6
14	Seeing a dream of me ordering a Giant Sub one day	23.0
15	Ending up thinking Subway make the tastiest fried potato	21.8
16=	Ending up trying all six dressings on a single sub	16.4
16=	Tending to always order a cookie from the side menu	16.4
18	Ordering without bread when dieting and ending up with just a salad	12.1
19	Ending up ordering a wrap	9.7
20	Secretly desiring to try out the Subway Diet	8.5

Read more on: goo ranking,starbucks,subway

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Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/WhatJapanThinks/~3/v7LIs1hJt_4/

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New analysis sheds light on ancient Egyptian mummification

A detailed study of 150 mummies embalmed over thousands of years in ancient Egypt indicated that what we think we know about ancient mummification practices might be wrong.

By Tia Ghose,?LiveScience / March 22, 2013

CT slices and 3D reconstruction showing the empty body cavity of the Royal Ontario Museum's ROM910.5.3 mummy.

Andrew Wade

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Contrary to reports by famous Greek historian Herodotus, the ancient Egyptians probably didn't remove mummy guts using cedar oil enemas, new research on the reality of mummification suggests.

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The ancient embalmers also didn't always leave the mummy's heart in place, the researchers added.

The findings, published in the February issue of HOMO ? Journal of Comparative Human Biology, come from analyzing 150 mummies from the ancient world.

Mummy history

In the fifth century B.C., Herodotus, the "father of history," got an inside peek at the Egyptian mummification process. Embalming was a competitive business, and the tricks of the trade were closely guarded secrets, said study co-author Andrew Wade, an anthropologist at the University of Western Ontario.

Herodotus described multiple levels of embalming: The elites, he said, got a slit through the belly, through which organs were removed. For the lower class, mummies had organs eaten away with an enema of cedar oil, which was thought to be similar to turpentine, Herodotus reported. [See Images of Egyptian Mummification Process]

In addition, Herodotus claimed the brain was removed during embalming and other accounts suggested the heart was always left in place.

"A lot of his accounts sound more like tourist stories, so we're reticent to take everything he said at face value," Wade told LiveScience.

Mummy tales

To see how eviscerations really took place, Wade and his colleague Andrew Nelson looked through the literature, finding details on how 150 mummies were embalmed over thousands of years in ancient Egypt. They also conducted CT scans and 3D reconstructions on seven mummies.

The team found that rich and poor alike most commonly had the transabdominal slit performed, although for the elites?evisceration was sometimes performed through a slit through the anus.

In addition, there wasn't much indication that cedar oil enemas were used.

Only a quarter of mummies had their hearts left in place. The removal of the heart seems to coincide with the transition period when the middle class gained access to mummification, so getting to keep the heart may have become a status symbol after that point, Wade said.

"The elites need some way to distinguish themselves from the people that they're ruling," he said.

And whereas Herodotus had suggested mummies had their brains removed and discarded, Wade and his colleagues found about a fifth of the brains were left inside the mummies' skulls. Almost all the others were pulled out through the nose, Wade's team described in another study detailed in the August 2011 issue of the same journal

After the evisceration, the bodies were rubbed down with a mild antiseptic such as palm wine. They were also covered with packets of natron, a naturally occurring salt, left to dry out for many days, packed with linen or wood shavings, and sometimes perfumed with scented items, Wade said.

Varied traditions

The findings show just how varied embalming techniques were in the ancient world, said David Hunt, a physical anthropologist at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C.

"A lot of people have taken the idea that it was all done the same way, but over the course of 3,000 years? Heck no," Hunt told LiveScience. "We know that folks in the Sudan didn't follow the exact same methodology as people that were in Alexandria."

Follow Tia Ghose on Twitter @tiaghose.?Follow?LiveScience @livescience, Facebook?& Google+. Original article on?LiveScience.com

Copyright 2013 LiveScience, a TechMediaNetwork company. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Source: http://rss.csmonitor.com/~r/feeds/science/~3/z_m0luTowpI/New-analysis-sheds-light-on-ancient-Egyptian-mummification

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'Olympus Has Fallen' gritty despite generic script

By Todd McCarthy, The Hollywood Reporter

Phil Caruso / FilmDistrict

REVIEW -- In a week when North Korea posted a homemade video showing the U.S. Capitol building being destroyed by a missile, what more logical response could Hollywood offer than a macho thriller about a Secret Service agent who takes on North Korean terrorists who attack the White House? The first of two similarly themed action dramas set for this year ("White House Down" arrives in June), "Olympus Has Fallen" will put to the test the question of whether American audiences are ready, 12 years after 9/11, to watch, strictly as disposable popcorn entertainment, a film in which the United States and some of its most prominent landmarks are devastated by foreign terrorists.

More from THR: 'Olympus Has Fallen' Premiere Celebrates Antoine Fuqua's Action Thriller

The answer almost undoubtedly will be yes, as the tough-guy former agent played by Gerard Butler gets to kick a whole lot of badass butt while trying to rescue the president. Although this is the sort of film in which the fate of the world hinges, when all is said and done, on the outcome of a one-on-one martial arts contest, director Antoine Fuqua's notably bloody child of "Die Hard" still generates a fair amount of tension and produces the kind of nationalistic outrage that rock-ribbed Americans will feel in their guts. Foreign revenue should be hefty as well, especially in countries where many viewers will get a thrill watching Washington get the sort of treatment usually reserved for places like Baghdad and Kabul.

More from THR: Gerard Butler on Sacrificing His Life, Declining the '300' Sequel and His ... Bar Mitzvah

Either due to incredible clairvoyance on the parts of first-time screenwriters Creighton Rothenberger and Katrin Benedikt or just through one of those twists of fate, the film arrives just as North Korea has anti-U.S. saber-rattling an almost daily exercise. So it seems uncannily timely that the brilliant bad guy here is a (supposedly) rogue North Korean who leads a bunch of skilled commandos on a raid of the White House that nets them the president and several key members of his staff as hostages. No doubt bootleg copies of the film will make their way to Kim Jong-un, who might be simultaneously offended and delighted at the opportunity to further rouse his subjects by showing them how much the enemy hates them.

At its core, however, "Olympus" is like an '80s or '90s genre item in which Clint Eastwood, Bruce Willis or Mel Gibson outwitted and outmuscled shrewd, more formidably armed opponents. Like Eastwood in "In the Line of Fire," Butler (who also produced) plays a disgraced presidential agent sidelined and haunted by a fluky failure (detailed in a 10-minute prologue) who suddenly and inadvertently finds himself back in the thick of a crisis.

If seemingly far-fetched, the attack by the North Korean paramilitary team is nonetheless ingenious and pulled off with somewhat disturbing ease, given that the White House is described as the best-fortified location on Earth. It's also quite violently staged. While President Asher (Aaron Eckhart) receives the South Korean premier and his entourage, a C-130 comes roaring in very low over Virginia and D.C. Knocking out two Air Force fighter jets, the terrorist-piloted plane heads down the mall and over toward the White House, strafing civilians while a second wave of gunmen launch a ground attack on the presidential mansion.

More from THR: Antoine Fuqua on Dennis Rodman's North Korea Trip, Violence in Movies and His Eminem Film

Inside, the premier's alleged head of security shows his true colors as the plot's mastermind. Kang (Rick Yune) quickly displays the diabolical genius worthy of any Bond villain (which Yune once played, as another North Korean in "Die Another Day"). He rounds up the president, Secretary of Defense (Melissa Leo, in an enjoyably fierce performance) and a bunch of other top officials and takes them down to the White House's massively secured emergency underground bunker, where he tortures and kills some of his hostages and dictates terms, the keys being the immediate withdrawal of U.S. troops from near the Korean demilitarized zone and the removal of the Navy's 7th Fleet from the area.

Enter Mike Banning (Butler), who knows the White House inside and out due to his years serving not only the president but entertaining his young son Connor (Finley Jacobsen), who's somewhere in the building and whom Kang wants as the ultimate bargaining chip. The bulk of the film thus becomes an elaborate cat-and-mouse game between Banning, who, against great odds, taunts Kang and gradually reduces his minions' numbers in several ambushes and one-on-one struggles, and the North Korean megalomaniac, who begins extracting the secret codes that will allow him to control the American nuclear arsenal.

Meanwhile, stuck with sedentary roles as officials sweating it out at the Pentagon heavily linked by video, phones and computers are, among many others, Speaker of the House (and acting President) Trumbull (Morgan Freeman); Secret Service director Jacobs (Angela Bassett); and Gen. Clegg (Robert Forster) the gung-ho head of the Joint Chiefs.

More from THR: Melissa Leo: 'I'm Not the Prettiest Actor Around, but I Protect My Characters'

The ordeal is an all-night affair, and unfortunately much of the White House action plays out in a murky, muddy darkness that has a very washed-out look; cinematographer Conrad W. Hall could have taken a tip or two from the incredible nocturnal, low-light-level work his father Conrad L. Hall did two decades ago in "Jennifer Eight." Quite a bit of the action is obscured as a result.

To his credit, though, Fuqua sustains the suspense until near the end of two hours; only in the final confrontation between Banning and Kang does the face-off seem over-extended and borderline risible. Willing to go for an R rating when a more inclusive one might have increased box office, the filmmakers deliver some pretty tough and brutal scenes, not the least of which has Kang mercilessly kicking and beating Leo's defiant Secretary of Defense.

After a string of increasingly lame and embarrassing projects, Butler took charge on this one as a producer here in a role carefully crafted in a time-honored action-hero mold. He comes off pretty well, as a sort of junior-league Mel Gibson with a bit less of the fiery-eyed craziness and wacky humor but plenty of grit and no shortage of appeal. In one-dimensional generic roles, most of the other performers deliver as expected, though Yune's exceptional looks and air of piercing intelligence pretty much maxes out what anyone could do with this sort of laser-focused villain figure.

The extensive CGI work is variable -- pretty good where it counts most but sketchy around the edges. Trevor Morris wallpapers the action with a constantly churning score.

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Source: http://entertainment.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/03/22/17418664-olympus-has-fallen-brings-grit-and-suspense-despite-generic-script?lite

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An update on Iran?s nuclear program (Powerlineblog)

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Most pre-packaged meals, snacks for toddlers contain too much salt

Mar. 21, 2013 ? Nearly 75 percent of commercial pre-packaged meals and savory snacks for toddlers are high in sodium, according to research presented at the American Heart Association's Epidemiology and Prevention/Nutrition, Physical Activity and Metabolism 2013 Scientific Sessions.

In the first study to look at the sodium content in U.S. baby and toddler foods, researchers compared the sodium content per serving of 1,115 products for babies and toddlers using data on major and private label brands compiled by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control (CDC). Baby food was categorized as intended for children less than one year old, and toddler food was categorized as intended for children between the ages of one and three.

A product was defined as high in sodium if it had more than 210 mg of sodium per serving. Toddler meals had significantly higher amounts of sodium than baby meals, and the amount of sodium in some of the toddler meals was as high as 630 mg per serving -- about 40 percent of the 1,500 mg daily limit recommended by the American Heart Association. The foods with the most sodium were savory snacks and meals for toddlers.

"Our concern is the possible long-term health risks of introducing high levels of sodium in a child's diet, because high blood pressure, as well as a preference for salty foods may develop early in life. The less sodium in an infant's or toddler's diet, the less he or she may want it when older," said Joyce Maalouf, M.S., M.P.H., ORISE, lead author and Fellow at the National Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta, Georgia. Consuming excessive amounts of sodium has been linked to the development of high blood pressure in scientific studies.

"Parents and other caregivers can read the nutrition facts labels on baby and toddler foods, to choose the healthiest options for their child," Maalouf said.

The American Heart Association recommends limiting sodium consumption to less than 1500 mg a day. Sodium is in regular table salt and many foods, including most prepared meals and snacks for toddlers.

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16th Time of the Writer Festival Opening Evening: Writers Explore ...

by Sharlene on Mar 20th, 2013

?
?Writers Writing a New World,? the theme for the 16th annual Time of the Writer International Writers Festival, was mulled over by University of KwaZulu Natal Dean, Cheryl Potgieter, at the festival?s Opening Evening at the Elizabeth Sneddon Theatre on Monday night. After a mellow musical interlude by Thungi, a Zimbabwean group, Potgieter took to the tage, noting that writers can form an activist constituency, playing a moral role in shaping our society. She mentioned that writers need to tackle gender-based violence, quoting the old adage ?to know and not to do is not to know?. She also touched on the importance of writers being able to choose to write in their own language.

After Potgieter had left the stage, six well-known Durban activists brought candles up to the podium and read excerpts from Footprints beyond Grey Street, paying tribute to the late Phyllis Naidoo, a ?giant of a writer and social activist? who died in Durban earlier this year.

Then it was the turn of the writers to introduce themselves and their thoughts around the theme of ?Writing a New World?. First up was Susan Abulhawa, a Palestinian author living in the US, who has just finished attending Israeli Apartheid Week in Johannesburg. She read from her majorly successful novel Mornings in Jenin, describing herself as one of a handful of novelists who present the Palestinian story in an authentic voice (in the past Palestine has been misrepresented by authors from other cultures).

Next was a feisty Jackee Batanda, from Uganda, who also emphasised the importance of Ugandans speaking for themselves. She will be participating in a panel entitled ?The Writer as Reporter?, later on in the week.

Elana Bregin, a Durban novelist, spoke of her most recent novel, Survival Training for Lonely Hearts, which she said uses romance as a lens to examine a troubled South Africa. She believes the role of the writer is to craft well-told stories, and engage in a ?sensual dance with the greater existence?. She commended the explosion of the ?online world? as creating a sense of ?fun and play?, but warned that ?few online things have lasting value,? stressing that the writer?s role is ?not to go viral, but vertical, to leave a lasting record of the complex, astonishing and difficult world that we once were part of?.

Another Durbanite, Ashwin Desai followed on from Bregin, saying that a ?brave new world? cannot be written by ?propagandists or cowards?. He called for writers to deliver honest ?post-apartheid commentary?.

Then, Nigerian Jude Dibia took the microphone, focussing on his particular interest, which is ?Queer Africa?. He explained his most popular novel is Walking the Shadows, a book about homosexuality, which sold 300% more copies than any of his other books, even in Nigeria, where according to the government, ?there are no gay people?.

Damon Galgut tried to describe the ?mysterious process of becoming a writer,? by narrating the story of how, at 12, his teacher read him and his classmates a Roald Dahl story called ?Pig?. After complaints from parents that the subject matter was too disturbing, the teacher was banned from sharing any more Dahl stories. He said this piqued his interest in writing, that text could make a familiar world unfamiliar.

Shafinaaz Hassim, who writes about gender-based violence, called on writers to ?constantly review the effect of violence?. She said that as a writer she ?tries to give violence a voice?. She explained that her most recent book, Sophia, a book about domestic violence, is written to encourage children to speak about hidden abuse. She ended on an optimistic note, saying that with the telling of our stories, ?the poison will seep out and we will find our human light again?.

Duncan Kgatea, an ex-mineworker from Rustenburg, who writes youth novels, described writers as prophets, who must be a nation?s conscience. He referred to the title of one of his books, Look into the mirror, encouraging young people to carry a metaphoric mirror with them that enhances their sense of self-acceptance.

Bhekisigcino Khawula, a Zulu author from umZinto, used a translator to address the audience. There was a lovely rapport between the two, sparking a lot of laughter in the auditorium. He said he wished more people would learn to speak isiZulu.

Zinaid Meeran delivered a very wacky address, saying that he ?conceived of human nature as sparks flow, bringing freedom?, and that his writing reflected this.

Andile Mngxitama slated SA?s democracy, saying it ?meant electing the next set of fascists?. He decried the fact that ongoing violence has become normalised, asking writers to ?show rulers for what they are?. He asked ?how do we love, and write poetry, under such circumstances,? inviting the audience to the launch of his novella at Ike?s Books on Saturday.

Kagiso Molope explained that mothering a boy had triggered the writing of her novel This book betrays my brother, as she had to think carefully about her role in addressing violence against women and children in SA.

Nnedi Okorafor, a Nigerian author living in the US, said she felt comfortable with the theme of ?Writing a New World?. She explained that Nigeria is her muse.

Graham Reid, a South African academic, who wrote a book called How to be a real gay, spoke of a positive global shift in attitude towards homosexuals, emphasising that many cultural traditions are ?hybrid, fluid and changing?.

Jo-Anne Richards, who will be launching her next novel The Imagined Child at this festival said she believes politically troubled SA is a ?gift for writers?. She said of her own role as writer that she ?doesn?t write parables, explores rather than exposes, writing not didactically or to create invisible signposts ? but to rummage through the parts of our strange new society?. She said she believes ?love and redemption come from facing our own flaws?.

Aman Sethi, an Indian author, whose book A Free Man documents the lives of daily wage-labourers sleeping on Delhi?s streets, said he believes the role of the writer is ?to listen to those who are building the new world with their own hands?.

Lastly, Jonny Steinberg read an extract from his soon-to-be-published book about a Somali refugee who walked from his homeland to reach SA.

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Source: http://cca.bookslive.co.za/blog/2013/03/20/16th-time-of-the-writer-festival-opening-evening-writers-explore-writing-a-new-world/

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FBI focusing on recovery in '90 Mass. art heist

BOSTON (AP) ? The FBI says it has solved the decades-old mystery of who stole $500 million in artwork from Boston's Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, but it is withholding the identities of the thieves, adding another twist to the largest property heist in U.S. history.

On Monday, the 23rd anniversary of the theft, authorities announced a new publicity campaign aimed at generating tips on what they still don't know: Where is the missing artwork? Their focus has shifted from catching the thieves to bringing home the precious artwork, including paintings by Rembrandt, Manet, Degas and Vermeer.

"The key goal here is to recover those paintings and bring them back," U.S. Attorney Carmen Ortiz said at a news conference at the FBI's Boston headquarters.

Just after midnight on March 18, 1990, two men posing as police officers pulled off the heist, stealing 13 pieces of artwork in 81 minutes.

For more than two decades, the FBI has chased leads around the globe, finally making progress over the last few years so that they now believe they know the identity of the thieves.

The FBI's Richard DesLauriers says the agency believes the thieves belonged to a criminal organization based in New England and the mid-Atlantic states. He said authorities believe the art was taken to Connecticut and the Philadelphia region in the years after the theft, and offered for sale in Philadelphia about a decade ago.

After the attempted sale, the FBI does not know what happened to the artwork, DesLauriers said.

DesLauriers repeatedly rebuffed questions from reporters on the identities of the thieves, saying releasing their identities could hamper the continuing investigation. He refused to say whether the thieves are now in prison on other charges, and would not say whether they are dead or alive.

Last year, a federal prosecutor in Connecticut revealed that the FBI believed a reputed Connecticut mobster, Robert Gentile, had some involvement with stolen property related to the art heist.

Gentile, 76, of Manchester, Conn., was not charged in the heist, but pleaded guilty in November in a weapons and prescription drugs case. Gentile's lawyer, A. Ryan McGuigan, said at the time that Gentile testified before a grand jury investigating the heist. He said Gentile knows nothing about the heist, but was acquainted with people federal authorities believe may have been involved.

The FBI also searched the Worcester home of an ex-convict who has a history of art theft.

Ortiz said the investigation was "active and at times fast-moving" over the past few years.

In the meantime, empty frames hang on the walls of the museum, a reminder of the "enormous loss" and a symbol of hope that they will be recovered, said Ortiz. The stolen paintings include: "The Concert" by Johannes Vermeer; and three Rembrandts, "A Lady and Gentleman in Black," Self-Portrait," and "Storm on the Sea of Galilee," his only seascape.

Ortiz said the statute of limitations has expired on crimes associated with the actual theft. She said anyone who knowingly possesses or conceals the stolen art could still face charges, but said prosecutors are willing to discuss potential immunity deals to get the artwork back.

The new publicity campaign will include a dedicated FBI website on the theft, www.FBI.gov/gardner , video postings on FBI social media sites and digital billboards in Connecticut and Philadelphia.

DesLauriers said authorities believe someone not involved in the theft has seen the artwork without realizing it is stolen.

"It's likely over the years that someone ? a friend, neighbor or relative ? has seen the art hanging on a wall, placed above a mantle or stored in an attic. We want that person to call us," DesLauriers said.

The FBI said it is re-emphasizing a $5 million reward being offered by the museum for information that leads directly to the recovery of the art.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/fbi-focusing-recovery-90-mass-art-heist-182043308.html

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Calm Yourself by Labeling Negative Feelings

Few things can put a damper on your productivity like a lousy mood. If you ever find yourself feeling down with a full day's work ahead of you, Gretchen Rubin of The Happiness Project passes on a tip for getting that anxiety out of the way.

So how do you quickly deal with those bad vibes? Label them and move on:

If you're feeling a negative emotion, you can work to reduce it by labeling it in one or two words. Note, however, that thinking or talking at length about the emotional state tends to intensify it?while simply observing and labeling it helps to quell it.

I do this myself, instinctively. I find myself thinking, "I'm overwhelmed" or "I'm frazzled" or "I'm feeling defensive" - and it's odd how calming it is. Just putting a label on a feeling helps me to master it.

If you take a moment to acknowledge how you're feeling instead of just trying to push through it, you may find it easier to focus and reorient yourself. Give it a try.

Click the link to read more.

Want a Simple Way To Calm Yourself? | Psychology Today

Photo by JD Hancock.

Source: http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/lifehacker/full/~3/d_C1IuIiZFs/calm-yourself-by-labeling-negative-feelings

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Girls charged for threats against rape victim

By Andrew Rafferty, Staff Writer, NBC News

?

A day after a juvenile court judge found two Steubenville High School football players guilty of raping a 16-year-old girl, Ohio?s attorney general announced two more teens have been arrested ? for allegedly using social media to threaten the victim.

A 16-year-old girl will face a charge of aggravated menacing for threatening the life of the victim on Twitter, according to a statement from State Attorney Mike DeWine.

A 15-year-old girl is charged with menacing after being accused of ?threatening bodily harm? to the victim on Facebook, DeWine said.

On Sunday, Trent Mays, 17, and Ma'lik Richmond, 16, were found guilty of raping the teenage girl during a night of heavy drinking and partying in a high-profile case that drew national attention to the small Ohio town.

Shortly after the trial concluded, DeWine announced a new, wide-ranging investigation that could yield more charges. ?

"Let me be clear. Threatening a teenage rape victim will not be tolerated. ?If anyone makes a threat verbally or via the internet, we will take it seriously, we will find you, and we will arrest you," DeWine said in a statement.

Social media played a unique role throughout the investigation as investigators used photos, messages and videos posted online to piece together what happened the night of Aug. 11, 2012. A now infamous 12-minute video shocked many in the town of 18,000 for the callous and profane way they discussed raping the young female.

"You were your own accuser, through the social media that you chose to publish your criminal conduct on,"? the mother of the victim told the boys after the verdict was read.

And more charges are likely to come down the line, perhaps for the football coaches and parents where the parties were held. Next month a grand jury will meet to consider evidence gathered during dozens of interviews, including the coaching staff of the Steubenville football team.

"I've reached the conclusion that this investigation cannot be completed, simply cannot be completed, that we cannot bring finality to this matter without the convening of a grand jury," DeWine said on Sunday, barley an hour after the judge handed down the guilty verdicts.

The two teens charged Monday are being held in a local detention center. WTRF of Steubenville reports the two will appear in front of a judge on Tuesday.

The Associated Press contributed to this report

Source: http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/03/18/17363530-two-teen-girls-charged-for-online-threats-against-steubenville-rape-victim?lite

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Sheriff says missing Mo. mom staged disappearance

In this undated photo released by Chariton County Sheriff's office, Rachel Koechner and her 4-year-old daughter Zoee Sandner are shown. The central Missouri woman who has been missing with her daughter for four days called her boyfriend from a suburban Kansas City motel but was gone when police arrived to check on her. Authorities say they're believed to be with Koechner's former husband and are considered endangered because of previous domestic violence incidents. (AP Photo/Chariton County Sheriff's Office)

In this undated photo released by Chariton County Sheriff's office, Rachel Koechner and her 4-year-old daughter Zoee Sandner are shown. The central Missouri woman who has been missing with her daughter for four days called her boyfriend from a suburban Kansas City motel but was gone when police arrived to check on her. Authorities say they're believed to be with Koechner's former husband and are considered endangered because of previous domestic violence incidents. (AP Photo/Chariton County Sheriff's Office)

KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) ? To law enforcement agencies, the disappearance of a Missouri woman and her young daughter for four days had all the markings of an abduction: a cryptic text message asking for help, a phone call that sounded like it was being read from a script, an ex-husband with a history of domestic violence.

Instead, Rachel Koechner told investigators Monday night that she slipped away with Davon Sandner, the ex-husband who's the father of her 4-year-old daughter, last week as part of a plan she devised a day before they took off. Koechner, Sandner and their child were found Monday in a home in Linn County about 100 miles northeast of Kansas City after someone saw them getting gas in nearby Brookfield and called police.

"Her family has such a strong hatred for her ex-husband, and his family has a strong hatred for her. They just wanted to be together," said Chariton County Sheriff Chris Hughes, whose department is leading the case.

Koechner was staying at her mother's house in Rothville in northern Chariton County when she disappeared.

Hughes said she left Thursday with Sandner and their daughter. They spent most of the time they were missing at a low-rate suburban Kansas City motel, where Koechner, 28, and Sandner, 37, smoked synthetic marijuana and laid low while law enforcement agencies frantically searched for them. Empty wrappers that had contained the artificial pot were found in Sandner's vehicle, and it appeared the couple had smoked the substance with their daughter nearby, the sheriff said.

Koechner's sister, Brandi Koechner, said family members are relieved that the mother and daughter have been found safe, but they're stunned by Rachel Koechner's actions ? especially after a nasty divorce that was finalized in November.

"The whole family is pretty much confused, hurt, upset, but glad we got the little girl back," Brandi Koechner said. "We don't understand any of it."

She said 4-year-old Zoee Sandner is now staying with Koechner's mother and other relatives in Rothville, and that the family is planning to seek custody of the girl.

The family doesn't necessarily hate Sandner, she said, but there was a great deal of animosity because of what Rachel Koechner went through during her relationship with him. She also said the family felt that Sandner had the ability to manipulate his ex-wife.

"They've had such an on-and-off again, bad relationship," Brandi Koechner said. "He knew how to get into her head. All of us were really scared because we've seen what he can do."

Sandner, of Brookfield, was charged in January in Livingston County with third-degree domestic assault after his new girlfriend told police he had struck her in the face at a Chillicothe motel. He pleaded guilty in 2007 to third-degree domestic assault involving a different woman and was given a 60-day suspended sentence.

Hughes said Sandner isn't expected to be charged in connection with Koechner's disappearance, but was being held Tuesday in Chariton County Jail on five forgery charges from a Linn County case. Prosecutors allege he wrote five bad checks on the account of another man last August.

Koechner hadn't been charged by midday Tuesday, but was being held without bond in the Chariton County Jail pending charges. Hughes expected her to at least be charged with making a false report.

Neither Sandner nor Koechner had acquired an attorney, and Hughes declined an Associated Press reporter's request to interview either of them at the jail.

Media coverage Monday of what was then being described as a possible abduction forced Koechner, Sandner and their daughter to leave the motel in the Kansas City suburb of Blue Springs early, even though they had paid for another night in advance, the sheriff said.

"He said, 'I saw my picture on the news yesterday morning and I started freaking out,'" Hughes said of Sandner.

Rachel Koechner called her boyfriend around 9 a.m. Monday to tell him she was OK and to have the search called off. The boyfriend, whose name has not been released, told Hughes the conversation sounded scripted.

Hughes tracked the phone number to the Blue Springs motel, which he called just as Koechner, Sandner and their daughter were checking out. The motel worker who answered the phone handed it to Koechner.

"She said she couldn't talk now," Hughes said. "I asked if she was OK, and she said, 'No.'"

The sheriff contacted Blue Springs police, but the three were gone by the time officers arrived at the motel.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/386c25518f464186bf7a2ac026580ce7/Article_2013-03-19-US-Missouri-Missing-Mom/id-0dccf5c40ef34623a3d3b4cfbb46e80b

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Eye on '16, Wisconsin governor rouses CPAC crowd

By Michael O'Brien, Political Reporter, NBC News

?

Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker sketched out a vision of conservative leadership during a Saturday morning speech to CPAC that could serve as the underpinnings of a future run for the White House.?

As Walker told Politico on Saturday that he could not rule out a bid for the GOP presidential nomination in 2016, he brought conservative activists to their feet with a speech outlining his own achievements in Wisconsin.

"In the states, to be successful, we have to be optimistic. We have to be relevant. And most importantly, we have to be courageous," he said.?

Walker forced a contentious law eliminating public employees' collective bargaining rights through his state legislature in 2011, a brash initiative in a state that helped birth the labor movement. When unions launched an effort to recall Walker, Wisconsin voters retained him over a Democratic challenger.?

The Wisconsin governor's victory in the recall has helped transform him into a potential contender ??although not a high-profile one ? for the Republican nomination in 2016.?

"Would I ever be [interested]? Possibly. I guess the only thing I?d say is I?m not ruling it out," Walker told Politico about his potential future endeavors.?

To that end, Walker weighed in on the question about the GOP's future trajectory. And he said that conservatives should look to the states, rather than Washington, for future solutions. He told CPAC attendees that "real reform does not happen in our nation's capital, it happens in our nation's statehouses across this nation."

And Walker echoed Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal, another prospective contender for the Republican nomination in 2016 who's argued for the GOP to avoid being defined by its legislative fights in Washington.?

"All too often in politics, we talk in terms of 'sequesters' and 'debt limits' and 'fiscal cliffs,'" Walker said.

Source: http://firstread.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/03/16/17338211-with-eye-on-16-wisconsin-governor-rouses-cpac-crowd?lite

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Researcher describes new 5-million-year-old saber-toothed cat from Florida

Friday, March 15, 2013

A University of Florida researcher has described a new genus and species of extinct saber-toothed cat from Polk County, Fla., based on additional fossil acquisitions of the animal over the last 25 years.

The 5-million-year-old fossils belong to the same lineage as the famous Smilodon fatalis from the La Brea Tar Pits in Los Angeles, a large, carnivorous apex predator with elongated upper canine teeth. Previous research suggested the group of saber-toothed cats known as Smilodontini originated in the Old World and then migrated to North America, but the age of the new species indicates the group likely originated in North America. The study appeared online in the journal PLOS One Wednesday.

"Smilodon first shows up on the fossil record around 2.5 million years ago, but there haven't been a lot of good intermediate forms for understanding where it came from," said study co-author Richard Hulbert Jr., vertebrate paleontology collections manager at the Florida Museum of Natural History on the UF campus. "The new species shows that the most famous saber-toothed cat, Smilodon, had a New World origin and it and its ancestors lived in the southeastern U.S. for at least 5 million years before their extinction about 11,000 years ago. Compared to what we knew about these earlier saber-toothed cats 20 or 30 years ago, we now have a much better understanding of this group."

Hulbert helped uncover fossils of the new genus and species, Rhizosmilodon fiteae, from a phosphate mine during excavations in 1990. The species was named after Barbara Fite of Lutz, Fla., who in 2011 donated one of the critical specimens used for the new description and allowed UF scientists to make casts of two other partial jaws in her collection.

The donation was a major contribution to the research because the remarkably well-preserved lower jaw contains almost pristine examples of all three chewing teeth, Hulbert said. The genus name Rhizosmilodon, meaning "root of Smilodon," implies the animal could be a missing link and direct ancestor of Smilodon, which became extinct about 11,000 years ago.

The study's lead author, Steven Wallace, an associate professor in the department of geosciences and member of the Don Sundquist Center of Excellence in Paleontology at East Tennessee State University, used comparative analysis of saber-toothed cat anatomy to help determine the animal's taxonomy. The analysis was primarily based on structure of the animal's lower jaw and teeth, smaller than the Smilodon and about the size of a modern Florida panther.

"The taxonomy of this animal was controversial because when it was first published 20 years ago, they only had one partial, somewhat-decent lower jaw, and it was missing some of the critical features," Hulbert said. "We now have more complete specimens showing it has a mixture of primitive and advanced characters, and does not match any previously named saber-toothed cat genus or species."

Originally misidentified as a member of the genus Megantereon in the early 1980s, Rhizosmilodon is instead the sister taxon to Megantereon and Smilodon, and the oldest of the group. These three cats are in the same tribe -- meaning they are more closely related than a family or subfamily -- and are often called as saber-toothed cats because of their long canine teeth, Hulbert said.

"When people think of saber-toothed cats, they think of it as just one thing, as if the famous tar pit saber-toothed cat was the only species, when in fact, it was an almost worldwide radiation of cats that lasted over 10 million years and probably had a total of about 20 valid species," Hulbert said. "Counting the newly described animal, there are now six different species of saber-toothed cats known just from Florida."

Saber-toothed cat expert Julie Meachen, an instructor at Marshall University School of Medicine in Huntington, W. Va., said the study helps settle the debate about whether the tribe arose from the Eurasia before coming to North America.

"I think that this revision was well-needed," Meachen said. "The fact that it's one of the oldest lineages is really interesting because that means that this exciting group of saber-toothed cats really is a North American tribe -- it evolved and persisted in North America."

Since 1915, more than 60 new species of reptiles, birds and mammals have been named from Central Florida phosphate mines, located southeast of Tampa and south of Lakeland. Rhizosmilodon lived in a forested coastal habitat that was also home to rhinos, tapirs, three-toed horses, peccaries, llamas and deer. Its relatively small size probably allowed it to climb trees and safely hide captured prey from large carnivores, such as packs of wolf-sized hyena-dogs and an extinct type of bear larger than the modern grizzly.

###

University of Florida: http://www.ufl.edu

Thanks to University of Florida for this article.

This press release was posted to serve as a topic for discussion. Please comment below. We try our best to only post press releases that are associated with peer reviewed scientific literature. Critical discussions of the research are appreciated. If you need help finding a link to the original article, please contact us on twitter or via e-mail.

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Source: http://www.labspaces.net/127320/Researcher_describes_new___million_year_old_saber_toothed_cat_from_Florida

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Health News and Fitness ? The Fundamentals Of Cosmetic Surgery

Mar 16 2013

It is not unusual for an individual to have anything they would like to change about their human anatomy. Some people have abnormally large noses. Some women would like to see their breast size enlarged or reduced. Many people want to decrease the fatty deposits in their stomachs, hips and thighs! That is where plastic surgery will come in. You are having a healthier, normal part of your body reshaped and changed for aesthetic reasons, when you have cosmetic surgery done. These areas of you?

Source: http://www.firstborn.us/the-fundamentals-of-cosmetic-surgery/

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Happy 28th Birthday, Kellan Lutz!

Source: http://www.thehollywoodgossip.com/2013/03/happy-28th-birthday-kellan-lutz/

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We're live at SXSW's Virtual Reality: The Holy Grail of Gaming panel with Oculus and more

What? You didn't think we'd make it out of the first day of SXSW without some gaming coverage, did you? We're here at the show's Gaming Expo, a room full of the latest and greatest offerings from companies big and small. We couldn't help but do a doubletake when we saw the lineup for the rather verbose Virtual Reality: The Holy Grail of Gaming. The panel's got Cliff Bleszinski (Epic), Palmer Luckey (Oculus Rift), and Chris Roberts (Wing Commander) -- an impressive offering moderated by Oculus' Nate Mitchell. Strap on those goggles and come talk VR with us after the jump.

Filed under: Gaming

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Source: http://www.engadget.com/2013/03/08/were-live-at-sxsws-virtual-reality-the-holy-grail-of-gaming/

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'Switch' critical to wound healing identified

Mar. 8, 2013 ? .Scientists from A*STAR's Institute of Medical Biology (IMB) have identified a molecular "switch" that controls the migration of skin cells necessary for wounds to close and heal. This is especially significant for diabetics and other patients who suffer from chronic wounds, wounds that do not heal or take years to do so, which are vulnerable to infections and could lead to amputations. This switch mechanism may hold the key to developing therapeutics that will reduce or prevent chronic wounds.

The scientists discovered that a tiny "micro-RNA" molecule, called miR-198, controls several different processes that help wound healing, by keeping them switched off in healthy skin. When skin is wounded, the manufacture of miR-198 quickly stops and the levels of miR-198 drop, switching on many wound healing processes.

In the non-healing wounds of diabetics, miR-198 does not disappear and wound healing remains blocked. This therefore identifies miR-198 as a potential diagnostic biomarker for non-healing wounds.

These findings were recently published in the journal Nature. The research leading to this discovery was carried out in collaboration with A*STAR's Bioinformatics Institute (BII), National University Hospital (NUH), Singapore and Jnana Sanjeevini Diabetes Center, Bangalore, India.

Importance of this discovery

Chronic wounds in patients with diabetes are a major global health burden and the most common cause of lower extremity amputations. In Singapore, diabetes is the fifth most common medical condition diagnosed and one in nine people aged 18 to 69 has diabetes. Unfortunately, chronic wounds are currently poorly understood and insufficiently treated. Chronic wounds also tend to affect the elderly and disabled patients, especially those confined to a wheelchair or bed-bound.

Dr. Prabha Sampath said, "Moving forward, we hope to translate this research into improved patient outcomes. We can now build on this research, to see how we can modulate the defective switch in chronic wounds by targeting miR-198 and its interacting molecules, to develop new strategies for treating chronic wounds."

Professor Birgitte Lane, Executive Director of IMB, said, "This switch appears to be an entirely new regulatory component in wound healing, and probably a very important one. Poor wound healing is a major healthcare burden, and this discovery is particularly timely in the face of aging populations and the sharp global rise in diabetes. The finding gives us a platform from which to develop therapies that could significantly reduce chronic wounds and improve healthcare."

An FSTL1-miR-198 molecular 'see-saw' switch

The information necessary to expressmicroRNA-198 (miR-198) and follistatin-like 1 (FSTL1) protein are found in a single "message" produced by the cell. However, miR-198 and FSTL1 protein cannot be produced at the same time -- it can only be one or the other. These two molecules also have opposite roles: miR-198 (found in unwounded skin) inhibits skin cell migration and wound healing, whereas FSTL1 protein (expressed after injury) promotes skin cell migration and wound healing. A regulatory switch dictates their expression, and hence controls the "see-saw" between inactive resting skin cells and the cell migration necessary for wound healing.

Dr. Sampath and her team showed that healthy unwounded skin contained high levels of miR-198 but no FSTL1 protein. They demonstrated that these high levels of miR-198 prevent skin cell migration by suppressing several genes, such as PLAU, LAMC2 and DIAPH1, which are needed for different aspects of the wound healing process. However upon injury, miR-198 is switched off in the wound by a signal from transforming growth factor ?1 (TGF-?1). This allows FSTL1 to now be made instead, and the skin migration genes to be unblocked, promoting migration of skin cells into the wound area to drive skin wound healing.

The scientists further examined skin samples of chronic non-healing ulcer wounds from patients with diabetes mellitus. They observed that, unlike healthy skin that had been injured, there remained high levels of miR-198 (inhibiting skin cell migration and wound healing) and an absence of FSTL1 protein (promoting skin cell migration upon wounding), indicating that this "switch" is defective in chronic wounds.

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The above story is reprinted from materials provided by Agency for Science, Technology and Research (A*STAR), Singapore.

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. Gopinath M. Sundaram, John E. A. Common, Felicia E. Gopal, Satyanarayana Srikanta, Krishnaswamy Lakshman, Declan P. Lunny, Thiam C. Lim, Vivek Tanavde, E. Birgitte Lane, Prabha Sampath. ?See-saw? expression of microRNA-198 and FSTL1 from a single transcript in wound healing. Nature, 2013; 495 (7439): 103 DOI: 10.1038/nature11890

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/top_health/~3/kakCBhSuJCA/130308111307.htm

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Marketing that brings customers year after year after year - The Eight

Inbound Marketing = contend and lead nurturing. Make this content valuable, relevant and evergreen and have a ?lead nurturing program and you will be ahead of your competition immediately.

Getting new customers is the name of the game for any business. ?Developing marketing strategies that will continue to bring customers to the door year after year is the key to driving a business forward. ?Traditional marketing strategies, such as advertising and direct mail, will bring a short burst of new customers, but the leads dry up as soon as campaigns stop. ?They are not building up assets for your company.

What a business needs is evergreen content that is going to continue to drive traffic to a website and bring in new customers day in, day out.

Blog ideas

For web content writers struggling with ideas, over a year or two, you will have built a library of resources for your keywords ? so do not waste any opportunity to leverage more customers from previously popular blogs and articles by repurposing the content.

Pull together how-to?s on similar topics in to mini guides, rewrite articles as FAQs, step-by-steps and revisit anniversaries to update and review ? like looking at a new feature or product one year on and looking back with a review of the year.

Repurposing can also mean redefining content as video, audio or infographics.

Every repurpose gives another chance of catching the attention of a customer.

Creating timeless blogs/articles is a great way of doing this.

Timeless content

Write about topics that readers will enjoy, while offering relevant information to customers looking for solutions to a problem.

Timeless writing means making clear some dates and times to readers ?

• Publication date ? That date at the top or bottom of the article clearly pegs when the article was written

• Spell out dates in the content ? If quoting a survey or writing about a future even, spell out when the event happened ? like the ?figures from the 2010 census say??

• If you have no timeline and quote from ??the latest official statistics?, readers are frustrated because they have nothing to work out when the statistics were actually published

Some content remains timeless ? like how to?s, but product articles will change every year or so as new models with extra features are released.

What the numbers say

Inbound marketing firm HubSpot publish some statistics on blogging:

• 57% of marketers picked up new customers from blogging
• 52% of companies say blogging is the cheapest way to acquire new leads
• Businesses that blog 20 times of more a month enjoy four times more traffic than those that blog four times or less a month
• Businesses with 400 or more content pages generate six times more leads than those with less than 100 pages

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With statistics like that, it?s difficult to build an argument about evergreen web content ? putting up those repurposed pages for web visitors that builds a repository of ripe information is just what everyone is looking for ? so give them what they want.

IMPROVE YOU

If you want to learn more then join our book club today for invaluable insight from some of the best business books on the market. ??http://www.the-eight.co.uk/the-eight-book-club

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About the Author

My name is Eve Whitaker, along with being a loving mother of two karate kids, doting wife, occasional (disastrous) pastry cook and a kindle obsessive?. I provide strategic advice to clients, helping them to find the right path towards successful business development, marketing, promotional and creative strategy. I will try to bring you links to resources, articles & opinions that I think you will find interesting & thought provoking. I will also share my thoughts, opinions & comments on the latest marketing theories & projects. Hope you will find it useful. Any great recommendations for books or cake tips welcomed!

Source: http://www.the-eight.co.uk/blog/marketing-that-brings-customers-year-after-year-after-year/

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Facebook brings a more personal touch to News Feed

MENLO PARK, Calif. (AP) ? Facebook has redesigned the main attraction of its social network to address complaints that its website has turned into a jumble of monotonous musings and random photos.

In an attempt to breathe new life into Facebook's News Feed, the company will introduce new controls that allow people to sort streams of photos and other material into organized sections.

With the makeover unveiled Thursday, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg hopes to turn the News Feed into something more like a newspaper tailored to the particular interests of each of the social network's more than 1 billion worldwide users.

Although Zuckerberg didn't say it, the overhaul also appears to be aimed at carving out more space to show larger and more dynamic ads within the News Feed as Facebook seeks to boost its revenue and stock price.

Previous tweaks to the News Feed have triggered howls of protest among Facebook's users. Hoping to minimize the grousing this time around, Facebook intends to roll out the changes in phases. It will probably be six months to a year before everyone who accesses Facebook on a personal computer sees the revamped News Feed, the company said. The facelift is likely to be more jarring for those who only visit Facebook on a PC because it incorporates some features already deployed in the social network's mobile applications for smartphones and tablet computers.

"They needed to freshen things up," said Brian Blau, research director of consumer technologies for Gartner Inc. "This should bring a lot of cooler things" into the News Feed.

The new features will enable users to choose to see streams of content that may feature nothing but photos or posts from their closest friends, family members or favorite businesses. Or they can just peruse content about music, or sports, as if they were grabbing a section of a newspaper. Other newspaper-like changes will include lists of events that users' social circles have flagged for the upcoming weekend and other summaries meant to resemble a table of contents.

By adding more personal touches, Facebook is acknowledging that the computer-generated formulas that it has been using to determine the content shown to each user have become less effective as the social circles within its network have widened to include a more diverse array of information.

"This gives people more power to dig deeper into the topics they care about," Zuckerberg said while discussing the makeover at Facebook's Menlo Park, Calif. headquarters.

Facebook still intends to rely on algorithms to select some material to feature on the main part of the News Feed, much like newspaper editors determine what goes on the front page.

More space on the News Feed's front page and other sections space will be devoted to pictures and video in recognition of how dominant those visual elements have become on Facebook as smartphones and tablet computers equipped with high-quality cameras have made it easier to share snapshots and clips.

About 50 percent of the posts on News Feed include a photo or video now, up from 25 percent in late 2011, Zuckerberg said.

Bigger pictures also will give advertisers a larger canvass to make their marketing pitches. Facebook is hoping marketers will seize the opportunity to develop more creative ways to entice and intrigue customers so advertising can become a more acceptable fixture on the social network.

More than anything else, the changes are meant to make Facebook a more fun place to hang out. If it doesn't keep evolving, the site risks becoming an Internet has-been like other once trendy social networks such as Friendster and MySpace.

"This is all about keeping people engaged," Blau said.

Although Facebook's website remains one of the Internet's top destinations, there have been early signs that the social network is losing some of its pizazz, particularly among younger Web surfers who are starting to spend more time on other fraternizing hubs such as Tumblr, Pinterest and Instagram, a photo-sharing site that Facebook bought for $521 million last summer.

A phenomenon, known as "Facebook Fatigue," was recently documented in a report from Pew Research Center's Internet and American Life Project. The study found that about 61 percent of Facebook users had taken a hiatus for reasons that range from boredom to too much irrelevant information to Lent.

That's a worrisome trend for Facebook because the company needs to ensure that its audience keeps coming back so it can learn more about their interests and, ultimately, sell more of the advertising that brings in most of the company's revenue.

"I don't think it had turned into a crisis, but Facebook was probably seeing some internal data that was telling them they needed to do something," said Greg Sterling, a senior analyst for Opus Research.

Facebook has been struggling to find the right balance between keeping its fun-loving audience happy and selling enough ads to please investors who want the company to accelerate its revenue growth.

Wall Street seems to think the redesigned News Feed might be a step in the right direction. Facebook's stock gained $1.13, or 4.1 percent, to close Thursday at $28.58. The shares remain 25 percent below the $38 that they fetched in Facebook's initial public offering last May.

The mobile-friendly redesign of News Feed underscores the company's intensifying focus on smartphones and tablet computers as more of its users rely on those devices to interact on the social network.

About 23 percent, or $306 million, of Facebook's advertising revenue came from the mobile market during the final three months of last year.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/facebook-brings-more-personal-touch-news-feed-212758611.html

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