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Tuesday, October 29, 2013
You Can Now Get HBO GO Without Paying for Other Channels
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HP EliteOne 800
Slowly, but surely, Windows 8 and touch screens are making it to business desktops. The HP EliteOne 800 ($2,173 direct) is one of the latest, and it's definitely a move in the right direction. It solves many of the problems that IT managers had with all-in-one desktops, and its speed will wow your workers. It's got the stuff to claw its way in as our next Editors' Choice for all-in-one business desktops, and here's why.
Design and Features
The EliteOne 800 is a high-end business all-in-one desktop, and the system certainly looks the part. It is corporate black, not consumer silver, so it will fit in among your firm's corporate-style monitors and desktop PCs. The 23-inch 1,920-by-1,080 resolution IPS display dominates the design, and the edge-to-edge glass shows that the system has a 10-point touch screen built in. The system can be equipped with a $99 articulated arm and stand can be adjusted for tilt, height, and pivot into portrait mode. That way you can adjust the system to be comfortable for virtually any sitting or standing position, plus it works well if you work on vertically oriented data (like Websites and news page layout). This is an improvement over the stand on our current Editors' Choice for business systems, the Dell Optiplex 9010 AIO ($2,592), which tilts and has a height adjustment, but doesn't pivot.
Above the screen there is a 2-megapixel webcam, which is optimized for Microsoft's Lync video conferencing system. You can order the EliteOne 800 without one, but if your business has specific privacy concerns then your user can close a manual shutter over the camera for privacy. There is also a manual shutoff for the system's built-in microphone in the row of touch sensitive buttons below the screen. The EliteOne 800 we reviewed came with a top-end Intel Core i7-4770S processor, 8GB of memory, 2GB AMD Radeon HD 7650A discrete graphics, DVD burner, and a 256GB solid-state drive (SSD). This review system is configured with faster components than the base EliteOne 800 with touch screen that goes for $1,299. The EliteOne 800 we reviewed comes with a Windows 8 Pro license, which allows you or your IT folks to downgrade to Windows 7 Professional instead. This is a good fit for the mixed office or development department, where you may be running both operating systems in the same location.
The EliteOne 800 is well connected, with Gigabit Ethernet and 802.11 a/b/g/n Wi-Fi networking. The system can be connected with plenty of peripherals like hard drives via the six USB 3.0 ports. Other I/O ports include a DisplayPort (for external multi-monitor support), a serial port (for older peripherals like cash register drawers), audio, and a pair of PS/2 ports in case your business still uses PS/2 mice and keyboards. The system we reviewed came with a HP wireless keyboard and mouse set with a USB dongle.
The front panel has a NFC (near-field communications) sensor, in case your business is starting to roll out NFC-enabled devices like smartphones or access cards. The back panel of the system is particularly IT friendly, since it lifts off after pushing a pair of simple switches. The back panel can be locked with a Kensington-compatible lock, which also keeps the system from walking away from users' desks. Once inside, IT service personnel can swap out hard drives, memory, and the optical drive. The stand can be removed so the EliteOne 800 can be mounted with a VESA mount on a wall or on an arm. Particularly determined techs can also install mini PCIe cards in the free slot. Upgrades to the processor or AMD Radeon MXM graphics card are best left to a service depot. The system comes with a standard three-year warranty.
Performance
The EliteOne 800's SSD and Intel Core i7-4770S processor combine to give the system excellent performance at the day-to-day PCMark 7 test. It beat out systems with the previous high end Core i7-3770S like the Lenovo ThinkCentre M92z and was in a dead heat with the Dell XPS 27 all-in-one Touch (2720), which has the same processor as the EliteOne 800. The Dell XPS 27 had better 3D performance on account of its consumer/enthusiast graphics card, but the rest of the benchmark tests were comparable. The EliteOne 800 edged out the Dell Optiplex 9010 AIO, and was also competitive with the Apple iMac 27-inch (Intel Core i5-4670) on the multimedia benchmark tests.
The HP EliteOne 800 bests the previous Editors' Choice Dell Optiplex 9010 AIO in terms of features (IT friendliness, SSD capacity, discrete graphics, NFC) and in speed. It fits in to the corporate look, rather than standing out like a consumer-grade system would. It's fast, serviceable, and works as a Windows 8 touch system or as a Windows 7 Pro system if your organization isn't ready for Win8 yet. That's the recipe for our latest Editors' Choice for business all-in-one desktops.
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16,000-Brick Lego Hack Reveals Yoda or Darth Vader Based on Light Angle
Google Switzerland spent 10 hours and used 16,000 bricks to create this light installation for the Google Zurich office. Depending on the angle of the light, the pattern of the Lego bricks either reveals Yoda or Darth Vader. It's called "The Force", and it's a pretty amazing Lego hack. [John Mueller]
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Email
PrintApple's earnings fall despite rising iPhone sales
SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — Apple's quarterly earnings are still sagging even as sales of its iPhones are rising, a vexing phenomenon feeding investor worries about whether stiffer competition in the mobile device market will continue to undercut the company's prosperity.
The fiscal fourth-quarter results announced Monday closed the books on a sobering year that saw Apple's market value plunge by about 25 percent, or about $160 billion. Apple Inc. remains the world's most valuable company, despite the downturn.
The company's earnings have been shrinking along with its share of the smartphone and tablet computer market that Apple reshaped with the 2007 release of the first iPhone and the 2010 introduction of the iPad. Apple hasn't come up with another breakthrough product in a new category since then, raising questions about the company's ability to innovate following the death of co-founder and chief visionary Steve Jobs two years ago.
Apple's earnings have now fallen from the previous year in three consecutive quarters after a decade of steady growth.
The Cupertino, Calif., earned $7.5 billion, or $8.26 per share, during the three months ending Sept. 28. That compared to income of $8.2 billion, or $8.67 per share, last year.
The latest quarterly earnings topped the average estimate of $7.92 per share among analysts polled by FactSet.
Revenue rose 4 percent to $37.5 billion — about $600 million above analyst predictions.
Investors were evidently hoping for a better showing and, perhaps, a more optimistic forecast for the current quarter, which covers the crucial holiday shopping season. Management predicted Apple's revenue will range from $55 billion to $58 billion in the quarter ending in late December. Analysts had projected revenue of $55.6 billion. Apple also indicated that its profit margins would be in the same range as the past quarter.
Apple's stock dipped $6.45, or about 1.2 percent, to $523.43 in extended trading after the numbers came out.
Activist investor Carl Icahn, who holds a 0.5 percent stake in Apple, is pressuring the company to spend $150 billion buying back its own stock in an effort to boost the price. His idea would more than double the $60 billion that Apple's board has budgeted for buying back stock during the next three years.
Apple apparently doesn't have any immediate plans to placate Icahn. CEO Tim Cook told analysts on a Monday conference call that the board won't announce any potential changes to its current program for buying back stock until early next year.
The latest quarter included early sales of the latest iPhones released last month.
The models consist of a 5S, a high-end version featuring a faster chip and a fingerprint reader, and the 5C, a slightly cheaper version that comes in a variety of brightly colored plastic cases. Apple didn't specify how many of each of the new models sold during the final week of the quarter.
The company sold 33.8 million iPhones in the past quarter, a 26 percent increase from the same time last year. But the prices for those iPhones averaged $577, a 7 percent decrease from an average price of $618 a year ago.
Apple's iPad sales edged slightly upward, with 14.1 million of the devices sold versus 14 million a year ago. The average price for an iPad slipped 14 percent to $439, a shift reflecting the growing popularity of a smaller version featuring an 8-inch display screen.
An update to the iPad Mini with a higher definition display screen and a higher price is scheduled to go on sale at a still-to-be determined date next month. At the same time, Apple is cutting the price of the original iPad Mini by $30 to $299. A thinner and lighter version of the full-sized iPad, called Air, will go on sale Friday.
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Lou Reed’s Palm Pilot
Photo by Bertrand Guay/AFP/Getty Images
I first met Lou Reed about 10 years ago, at a benefit in New York. Reed was sitting next to his partner, Laurie Anderson, and fiddling with a Palm Pilot. He was wearing a grey blazer covered with black furry patches, in a sort of random pattern, and tight blue jeans stuffed into black cowboy boots. I couldn’t help but peer over Reed’s furry shoulder—and his rather imposing mullet—watching him paging through menu screens on the PDA at an impressive clip. I thought of the black-and-white Velvet Underground poster that hung in my kitchen for years, and the image of Reed as a champion of down and dirty minimalism, of raw three-chord rock, and New York cool. And there he was, Mr. Rock ’n’ Roll Animal, fiddling with a Palm Pilot.
Reed was always a tech boffin, a part of his history that often gets glossed over. Read old interviews and he talks at excruciating length about the technical aspects of recording. “I spend a lot of time researching,” he told Simon Reynolds in 1992. “You could call it studying. I ask, ‘Why does digital do that? What's the analog-to-digital conversion process? Are the filters better now?’ It goes back to the wood in the guitar, which pickups to use.”
When I heard that Lou Reed died, I was in London, fiddling with a mobile phone as the streets filled with rain. I couldn’t believe that Reed was dead; he was an ur-text for rock ’n’ roll, for New York, for my childhood. By the time I was 17, my teenage friends and I had memorized every Velvets song; we knew all the outtakes, live versions, and B-sides. We covered our house in aluminum foil to get it to look like the Factory; we put a strobe light in the bathroom, where “Venus in Furs” played on loop. My friend Blake donned a handmade Andy Warhol wig and I practiced a Nico accent. Reed was like a family friend to us; we yelled at him through the stereo. We chuckled at songs like “Lady Godiva’s Operation,” relishing the moment when Reed’s voice cut in, complementing John Cale’s elegant Welsh lilt with the grace of a thousand heavy rocks. When we burned out on the VU, we tuned into David Bowie, and to Reed’s solo output—from Transformer to Berlin to The Blue Mask. My personal favorite was Reed’s critically panned 1975 opus Metal Machine Music.
The album—once denounced by Rolling Stone as the “tubular groaning of a galactic refrigerator”—was Reed’s masterpiece. It was Reed at his most aggressive—four sides of earsplitting feedback, spread over two LPs—and Reed at his nerdiest. Cale had turned Reed on to the power of the drone and to experimental electronic music, and Metal Machine Music was Reed’s ultimate synthesis of the two. “No Synthesizers,” Reed proudly proclaimed on the back of the LP, writing that the album displayed “drone cognizance and harmonic possibilities vis a vis Lamont [sic] Young’s Dream Music.” He told Lester Bangs that bits of Vivaldi, Beethoven, and other classical composers were embedded in its chaos. “This record is not for parties/dancing/background romance,” Reed wrote in the Metal Machine Music liner notes. “This is what I meant by "real" rock, about "real" things. No one I know has listened to it all the way through including myself. It is not meant to be.”
Metal Machine Music was Reed at his conceptual extreme. I still laugh at the last line of his snarling, obnoxious liner notes: “My week beats your year.”
I fell asleep to Metal Machine Music every night for years when I lived in New York City, harnessing the album’s punishing waves of feedback to drown out the cacophony of the streets below. After a while, I found the album soothing, even nourishing; there was something cosmic about it, something timeless. I somehow knew that Lou felt the same way. The only thing heavier than the feedback was the hubris—Metal Machine Music was Reed at his most ridiculous and conceptual extreme. I still laugh when I think of the last line of Reed’s snarling, obnoxious liner notes: “My week beats your year.”
Reed packed more life into those weeks than most of us ever will. I remember staring at his face in awe, studying those deep character lines and ridges, a face as tough as a piece of old leather.
“I really disliked school, disliked groups, disliked authority,” Reed once said. “I was made for rock ‘n’ roll.” It wasn’t an entirely true statement; as Slate’s Carl Wilson notes in his appreciation, Reed’s classes with the poet Delmore Schwartz at Syracuse University were central to his aesthetic, and he was most famous as part of a group. But part of Reed’s brilliance was in disliking almost everything—in cutting through the “glop”, as he would say, in distilling music down to its essence. He had little tolerance for bullshit. “Repetition is so fantastic, anti-glop,” Reed wrote in the pages of Aspen in 1966.
“Listening to a dial tone in Bb, until American Tel & Tel messed and turned it into a mediocre whistle, was fine. Short waves minus an antenna give off various noises, band wave pops and drones, hums, that can be tuned at will and which are very beautiful. Eastern music is allowed to have repetition…Andy Warhol's movies are so repetitious sometimes, so so beautiful. Probably the only interesting films made in the U.S. Rock-and-roll films. Over and over and over. Reducing things to their final joke. Which is so pretty.”
It wasn’t often that Reed called his own music pretty, but most of his music was pretty in spite of itself. The stark, brutal lyrics heightened the beauty; it made the moments of light feel lighter. “Just the verbal and musical zeitgeist that Lou created—the nature of his lyric writing had been hitherto unknown in rock, I think,” Bowie once said. “He gave us the environment in which to put a more theatrical vision. He supplied us with the street and the landscape, and we peopled it.”
By carving out all the negative space, Reed created the environment for thousands of bands to bloom. He stood for many things: New York City, minimalism, repetition, feedback, poetry, darkness. But most of all, he defined what rock ’n’ roll could be: not just for himself, but for all of us.
For more on Lou Reed, read Mark Joseph Stern on whether the singer was the first out rock star and Rob Wile on how Reed helped bring down communism in Eastern Europe. Also, check out this great PBS documentary on Reed.
Source: http://www.slate.com/articles/arts/culturebox/2013/10/lou_reed_s_metal_machine_music_the_artist_was_a_rock_god_he_was_also_a_big.html
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'Gate' Opens To Bloody And Raucous 17th Century England
Alan Cheuse reviews Jeanette Winterson's latest book, The Daylight Gate, set in 17th Century England. The novel is set seven years after the undoing of the infamous Gunpowder Plot, in which Catholic terrorists attempted to blow up the House of Parliament of the anti-Papist King James I.
Copyright © 2013 NPR. For personal, noncommercial use only. See Terms of Use. For other uses, prior permission required.
AUDIE CORNISH, HOST:
With Halloween just around the corner, we have a review now of a ghoulish new novel from writer Jeanette Winterson. It's a dark thriller with a cast of characters that includes witches, an unforgettable spider and the devil himself.
Alan Cheuse has our review.
ALAN CHEUSE, BYLINE: The absolute forefront of British writing, that's where Jeanette Winterson, now in her mid-50's, has stood for me ever since I read her early fiction. She's a writer in the vanguard still, and moving against the traditional decorous nature of the British novel. Her latest work of fiction, a daring book called "The Daylight Gate," takes us back to the bloody raucous early English 17th century, where some seven years after the undoing of the infamous Gunpowder Plot, in which Catholic terrorists attempted to blow up the House of Parliament of the anti-Papist King James 1.
"The Daylight Gate" of the title is, like the novel itself, a membrane of time. On the other side of this gate, supposedly hell and the dark gentleman, otherwise known as the devil await. But in fact the ordinary English side of this gate is a hellish enough realm for Catholics. In the wake of the Gunpowder Plot many of them, accused of dabbling in magic and outre sexual liaisons, have already suffered hunger, prison, and physical torture in advance of being tried as witches and hanged.
Winterson's bold sentences and pithy but authentic scenes quickly build sympathy in the reader for the naysayers, the mad violated children, the same-sex lovers, and even one of the gunpowder plotters who has been emasculated by the king's torturers. This last fellow has taken refuge on the estate of a wealthy high-born Catholic woman named Alice Nutter, a master of falconry who doesn't appear to age. Weird, but she has some potion that keeps her looking young.
Roger Nowell, the local magistrate, likes that. He finds himself caught between his desire for the beautiful Alice and his devotion to his legal and political duties. Will Nowell's desire for Alice keep him from rounding her up with the other suspected witches? Will she give up the fugitive gunpowder plotter hiding in her house? Such are the matters at hand in this passion-charged work of fiction that - I really have to say it - flirts with greatness, a book that gives you the sensation that the novelist is trying to pull you over to the other side, or at least to help you peer across into the darkness
CORNISH: The book is "Daylight Gate" by Jeanette Winterson. Our reviewer Alan Cheuse teaches writing at George Mason University.
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This is NPR News.
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Chemical weapons inspectors in Syria miss deadline
U.N.-Arab League envoy Lakhdar Brahimi, center right, and Deputy Syrian Foreign Minister Faisal Mekdad arrive to a hotel surrounded by security Monday, Oct. 28, 2013 in Damascus, Syria. Brahimi is on his first trip to the country in almost a year. (AP Photo/Dusan Vranic)
U.N.-Arab League envoy Lakhdar Brahimi, center right, and Deputy Syrian Foreign Minister Faisal Mekdad arrive to a hotel surrounded by security Monday, Oct. 28, 2013 in Damascus, Syria. Brahimi is on his first trip to the country in almost a year. (AP Photo/Dusan Vranic)
This image made from citizen journalist video posted by the Shaam News Network, which is consistent with other AP reporting, Syrian rebels fire at government forces at a military airport in Deir el-Zour, Syria, Monday, Oct. 28, 2013. The fighting coincided with the first visit to Syria by the U.N.-Arab League envoy Lakhdar Brahimi in almost a year. (AP Photo/Shaam News Network via AP video)
This image made from citizen journalist video posted by the Shaam News Network, which is consistent with other AP reporting, a Syrian rebel fires an automatic weapon in the Daraya district of Damascus, Syria, Monday, Oct. 28, 2013. The fighting coincided with the first visit to Syria by the U.N.-Arab League envoy Lakhdar Brahimi in almost a year. (AP Photo/Shaam News Network via AP video)
BEIRUT (AP) — International inspectors overseeing the destruction of Syria's chemical weapons stockpile have missed an early deadline in a brutally tight schedule after security concerns prevented them from visiting two sites linked to Damascus' chemical program.
Experts from the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons were to have checked all 23 of Syria's declared chemical sites by Sunday, but the organization said Monday that inspectors have visited only 21 because of security issues. While there are no consequences for missing the deadline, the group's failure to meet it underscores the ambitious timeline as well as the risks its inspectors face in carrying out their mission in the middle of Syria's civil war.
The OPCW did not say who was responsible for the security problems, but the organizations' director-general has said in the past that temporary cease-fires may have to be negotiated between rebels and forces loyal to President Bashar Assad to reach some sites. The chemical weapons watchdog said it has not given up hope of gaining access to the two locations.
"Negotiations continue to try to get security guarantees so our inspectors can go in," OPCW spokesman Michael Luhan said.
The joint OPCW-U.N. mission faces a string of target dates for specific tasks as it aims to achieve the overall goal of ridding Syria of its chemical stockpile by mid-2014. Luhan said the next deadline is Nov. 1, by which time Syria has to complete "functional destruction of the critical equipment for all its chemical weapons production facilities and mixing-filing plants."
That step will ensure that Syria can no longer make new chemical weapons. After that, the international community and Syria have to agree to a plan to destroy the country's chemical stockpile.
Syria is believed to possess around 1,000 metric tons of chemical weapons, including mustard gas and the nerve agent sarin. It has sent the OPCW a plan for full destruction of the stockpile that has to be discussed by the group's executive council next month.
The OPCW, based in The Hague, said such declarations by member states "provide the basis on which plans are devised for a systematic, total and verified destruction of declared chemical weapons and production facilities."
State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said Monday that Washington was reviewing the declaration, which ran to more than 700 pages. "We are, in accordance with OPCW regulations, not going to publicly discuss or analyze our assessment of the report," she said.
The two sites the inspectors still need to check appear to be in rebel-held or contested areas. At least one of the locations is believed to be the town of al-Safira, which experts say is home to a production facility as well as storage sites. The area has been engulfed by fighting for months, and many of the rebels in the area are from al-Qaida-linked groups.
The OPCW-U.N. mission stems from a deadly chemical attack on rebel-held suburbs of Damascus in August that killed hundreds. Assad denied any role in the attack, while the U.S. and its allies blamed his government and threatened to carry out punitive missile strikes.
The U.S. and Russia then brokered an agreement for Syria to relinquish its chemical arsenal. Assad quickly agreed, and the deal was enshrined in a U.N. Security Council resolution.
That resolution also endorsed a roadmap for a political transition in Syria, and called for a peace conference to be held in Geneva as soon as possible. Diplomatic efforts to convene the meeting have sputtered, however, amid disagreements over the agenda and participants.
U.N.-Arab League envoy Lakhdar Brahimi traveled to Damascus Monday as part of his regional trip to try to drum up support for the conference. Brahimi is expected to meet Syrian officials as well as members of local opposition groups. It is not clear whether he will meet Assad, who was furious with the envoy after Brahimi said in December that the Assad family's 40-year rule of Syria was "too long."
Also Monday, Syrian government forces retook a Christian town north of Damascus, expelling al-Qaida-linked rebels after a week of heavy fighting, state media and opposition activists said.
The state-run SANA news agency said the army "restored security and stability" to the town of Sadad, 120 kilometers (75 miles) north of Damascus, and that "a large number of terrorists" were killed.
The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the government had retaken the town but that rebels had successfully withdrawn.
SANA also said that rebel fighters captured a member of parliament, Sheik Mahna el-Fayadh, on Sunday near the eastern city of Deir el-Zour. The Observatory said el-Fayadh was being held by rebels from the Ahrar al-Sham brigade as well as the al-Qaida-linked Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant.
___
Corder reported from The Hague, Netherlands. Associated Press writers Bassem Mroue in Beirut, Albert Aji in Damascus, Syria, and John Heilprin in Geneva contributed to this report.
Associated PressSource: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/cae69a7523db45408eeb2b3a98c0c9c5/Article_2013-10-28-Syria/id-f85b6c8db5b24141a977d729b4029381Similar Articles: lunar eclipse USA VS Mexico djokovic lindsay lohan mumford and sons
Monday, October 28, 2013
Welcome to the Oldest Known Galaxy in the Universe
Tornado Kills at Least Five in Oklahoma
Obama Gets Firsthand Look at a Tornado Damage
Tornado Kills at Least Five in Oklahoma. Very long title. Long long long. Tornado Kills at Least Five in Oklahoma. Very long title. Long long long.
Tornado Kills at Least Five in Oklahoma. Very long title. Long long long. Tornado Kills at Least Five in Oklahoma. Very long title. Long long long.
Source: http://www.slate.com/articles/video/video/2013/10/welcome_to_the_oldest_known_galaxy_in_the_universewelcome_to_the_oldest.html
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Who You Gonna Call? The Littlest Ghostbuster and His Adorable Ecto-1
Do you recognize Cooper? Probably not, because he's a year older than the last time you saw him driving a tiny time-traveling DeLorean and wearing an adorable Marty McFly costume
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S&P 500 makes small gain to log another record
NEW YORK (AP) — The Standard & Poor's 500 index notched another record close on Monday by a tiny margin as good news from J.C. Penney helped offset disappointing earnings from several U.S. companies.
J.C. Penney was the biggest gainer in the S&P 500 after the retailer's CEO said sales were improving. Merck fell after the drugmaker sharply lowered its earnings forecast for the year and reported a plunge in third-quarter earnings. Roper Industries, a medical and industrial equipment manufacturer, dropped after lowering its full-year earnings estimate.
The S&P 500 has closed at an all-time high six times in October. The index was boosted earlier in the month by a deal in Washington that ended a partial government shutdown and prevented a potential default on the U.S. government's debt. Stocks have also climbed because companies have been able to keep increasing their earnings even as the economy failed to escape stall speed.
Earnings are expected to rise by about 4.5 percent at S&P 500 companies, according to data from S&P Capital IQ. While that is the slowest rate of growth in a year, companies are still beating the estimates of Wall Street analysts. About two-thirds of the companies that have published third-quarter earnings so far have exceeded analysts' expectations.
"Earnings are beating a low bar," said Russ Koesterich, chief investment strategist at BlackRock. "You have an economy that's not producing a lot of top-line growth, but it's allowing margins to remain elevated for longer than people thought."
The S&P 500 rose 2.34 points, or 0.1 percent, to 1,762.11. The Dow Jones industrial average edged down 1.35 points, or less than 0.1 percent, to 15,568.93. The Nasdaq composite closed down 3.23 points, or 0.1 percent, at 3,940.13.
J.C. Penney, which is trying to recover from a botched corporate makeover led by its former CEO, rose 60 cents, or 8.8 percent, to $7.39. The stock, which is still down 63 percent this year.
Merck fell $1.19, or 2.6 percent, to $45.35 after reporting that its third-quarter profit plunged 35 percent. Roper Industries fell $8.78, or 2.6 percent, to $124.26 after the company's earnings fell short of estimates. Roper also cut its earnings forecast.
Homebuilders fell after the number of Americans who signed contracts to buy previously occupied homes fell in September to the lowest level in nine months, reflecting higher mortgage rates and home prices. D.R. Horton dropped 11 cents, or 0.6 percent, to $19.66. KB Home fell 22 cents, or 1.2 percent, to $17.68.
Stocks have been supported this year by ongoing economic stimulus from the Federal Reserve. This week investors will get more insight into the central bank's thinking.
Analysts don't expect to see any big changes come out of a meeting of Fed policymakers this week. The Fed is currently buying $85 billion in bonds every month to help keep down long-term interest rates and to encourage borrowing, spending and hiring.
"The Fed is not likely to surprise the markets at this week's meeting, by any means," said Michael Sheldon, the Chief Market Strategist at RDM Financial. "For now, it's steady as she goes."
The 16-day government shutdown that ended earlier this month likely curtailed economic growth in the fourth quarter. Also, many government agencies stopped publishing economic reports during the shutdown, making it harder for policy makers to get a clear picture of the economy.
The yield on the 10-year Treasury note rose to 2.52 percent from 2.51 percent.
In commodities trading, the price of gold edged down 30 cents to close at $1,352.20 an ounce. Oil rose 83 cents, or 0.8 percent, to $98.68 a barrel.
Among other stocks making big moves:
— Burger King rose $1.14, or 5.8 percent, to $20.90 after the hamburger chain said its third-quarter net income surged as it sharply reduced its expenses.
— CF Industries gained $8.74, or 4.2 percent, to $218.36 after the company agreed to sell its phosphate business to the fertilizer producer Mosaic.
— Bristol-Myers Squibb rose $3.25, or 6.7 percent, to $52.02 after the company reported positive results from an early-stage study of its cancer drug nivolumab.
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New Venezuelan Ministry Focuses On 'Supreme Social Happiness'
Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro has not had a great year. After a winning a disputed election, he faces inflation near 50 percent. Supplies of basic goods like toilet paper have run low. Now Maduro is acting. He created a new Vice Ministry of Supreme Social Happiness. It's supposed to coordinate services for the poor.
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STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:
Good morning, I'm Steve Inskeep.
Venezuela's President Nicolas Maduro has not had a great year. After a winning a disputed election, he faces inflation near 50 percent. Supplies of basic goods like toilet paper have run low. But now Maduro is acting. He created a new Vice Ministry of Supreme Social Happiness. It's supposed to coordinate services for the poor. We do not know of the Happiness Ministry will work but it has given a practical benefit, causing people to laugh.
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Concordia professor wins Prix du Quebec
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PUBLIC RELEASE DATE: 28-Oct-2013
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ShareContact: Clea Desjardins
clea.desjardins@concordia.ca
514-848-242 x45068
Concordia University
Marguerite Mendell to receive highest distinction awarded by the Government of Quebec
This news release is available in French.
The Government of Qubec has announced that Marguerite Mendell economist, professor and interim principal of Concordia's School of Community and Public Affairs (SCPA) will receive the Prix du Qubec for her three decades of scholarship and engagement in the field of social economy.
The Prix du Qubec is the highest distinction awarded by the Government of Quebec. It recognizes individuals whose innovative spirit and work has contributed to the development of Qubec society.
"On behalf of the entire Concordia community, I congratulate Marguerite Mendell on winning the Prix du Qubec," says Alan Shepard, president of the university. "Her dedication to her field and ground-breaking academic achievements exemplify the commitment Concordia faculty have to innovative research and teaching."
Since joining the university in 1984 as a postdoctoral fellow in the PhD Humanities program, Mendell has carved out an illustrious career in which she has been a significant contributor to the SCPA and the Karl Polanyi Institute of Political Economy, where she has served as director since 1987.
Her collaborations with practitioners in community economic development, social economy and the social finance sector have resulted in innovations in public policy at the municipal, provincial and federal levels.
"I am delighted, honoured and humbled to be receiving this award," says Mendell. "My research has been based on the dynamic nature of Quebec society a place I love. To be recognized by the government at this stage in my career is very rewarding, but also overwhelming!"
Her record as both a researcher and teacher is significant. She has published widely on the social economy in Quebec, local development, social finance and economic democracy. She also played a central role in establishing the SCPA's Graduate Diploma in Community Economic Development, which trains students to strengthen local communities in an era of globalization and participate in the process of progressive social change.
"Margie's impressive career as an engaged scholar epitomizes her dedication to enhancing social well-being in Qubec and beyond," says Graham Carr, vice-president of Research and Graduate Studies. "Her long record of community engagement both locally and internationally illustrates how academic research can have a positive impact on society."
Mendell's expertise on public policy continues to be sought worldwide. Earlier this year, her presentation at the United Nations Research Institute for Social Development in Geneva shed new light on the theme of social and solidarity economy. In November, she will be the keynote speaker at the 2013 Social Economy Global Forum, co-hosted by the mayor of Seoul and the Government of Quebec.
The Prix du Qubec is given annually to 13 recipients in the fields of culture and science. Mendell will specifically receive the Marie-Andre-Bertrand Award, which is given to individuals whose research leads to important social innovations that improve collective well-being. It will be presented on November 12 at a special ceremony being held at the Assemble nationale du Qubec.
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Watch a video interview with Mendell on the Prix du Qubec website: http://www.prixduquebec.gouv.qc.ca/ehtml/video.php?noLaureat=473
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AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
PUBLIC RELEASE DATE: 28-Oct-2013
[
]
ShareContact: Clea Desjardins
clea.desjardins@concordia.ca
514-848-242 x45068
Concordia University
Marguerite Mendell to receive highest distinction awarded by the Government of Quebec
This news release is available in French.
The Government of Qubec has announced that Marguerite Mendell economist, professor and interim principal of Concordia's School of Community and Public Affairs (SCPA) will receive the Prix du Qubec for her three decades of scholarship and engagement in the field of social economy.
The Prix du Qubec is the highest distinction awarded by the Government of Quebec. It recognizes individuals whose innovative spirit and work has contributed to the development of Qubec society.
"On behalf of the entire Concordia community, I congratulate Marguerite Mendell on winning the Prix du Qubec," says Alan Shepard, president of the university. "Her dedication to her field and ground-breaking academic achievements exemplify the commitment Concordia faculty have to innovative research and teaching."
Since joining the university in 1984 as a postdoctoral fellow in the PhD Humanities program, Mendell has carved out an illustrious career in which she has been a significant contributor to the SCPA and the Karl Polanyi Institute of Political Economy, where she has served as director since 1987.
Her collaborations with practitioners in community economic development, social economy and the social finance sector have resulted in innovations in public policy at the municipal, provincial and federal levels.
"I am delighted, honoured and humbled to be receiving this award," says Mendell. "My research has been based on the dynamic nature of Quebec society a place I love. To be recognized by the government at this stage in my career is very rewarding, but also overwhelming!"
Her record as both a researcher and teacher is significant. She has published widely on the social economy in Quebec, local development, social finance and economic democracy. She also played a central role in establishing the SCPA's Graduate Diploma in Community Economic Development, which trains students to strengthen local communities in an era of globalization and participate in the process of progressive social change.
"Margie's impressive career as an engaged scholar epitomizes her dedication to enhancing social well-being in Qubec and beyond," says Graham Carr, vice-president of Research and Graduate Studies. "Her long record of community engagement both locally and internationally illustrates how academic research can have a positive impact on society."
Mendell's expertise on public policy continues to be sought worldwide. Earlier this year, her presentation at the United Nations Research Institute for Social Development in Geneva shed new light on the theme of social and solidarity economy. In November, she will be the keynote speaker at the 2013 Social Economy Global Forum, co-hosted by the mayor of Seoul and the Government of Quebec.
The Prix du Qubec is given annually to 13 recipients in the fields of culture and science. Mendell will specifically receive the Marie-Andre-Bertrand Award, which is given to individuals whose research leads to important social innovations that improve collective well-being. It will be presented on November 12 at a special ceremony being held at the Assemble nationale du Qubec.
###
Watch a video interview with Mendell on the Prix du Qubec website: http://www.prixduquebec.gouv.qc.ca/ehtml/video.php?noLaureat=473
[
Share]
AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
Source: http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2013-10/cu-cpw102813.php
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Career Counseling With Saul Berenson
Photo courtesy Kent Smith/Showtime
Well, that is one way to capitalize on finally bringing some narrative tension back into your television show—completely deflating it. After four weeks of crying in place, last week’s Homeland ended on a promising twist: Turns out Carrie and Saul are working together to hook the Iranians. But instead of diving into that story, this week’s episode featured yet more of the wheel-spinning, mood-establishing, waiting game. In one stretch, we were privy to the scintillating sight of five people in three different cars looking at stuff. At this rate, next week’s episode, will be a 50-minute staring contest between Carrie and Majid Javadi.
As for what did happen in “The Yoga Play”: The show clarified that, yes, every single thing we have seen this season— Saul betraying Carrie at the Senate hearing, Carrie’s hospitalization—was part of a scheme. (And so is everything we’re still seeing: Was Carrie really terrified that those men were going to rape her? Or was she just playing up the fact that she’s fragile and isolated?) As Quinn says when Saul breaks the news, “Fuck me.” The critical conversation around TV these days is so devoted to the auteur theory—the idea that great TV shows are the product of a singular visionary and his band of brilliant writers—that we don’t really ask questions about whether or not the author’s intent is actually worth a damn. In high-school English, you might have been prodded by your teacher to wonder, does what the author meant to do here matter more than what he or she actually did here? Does how the author wanted you to feel trump how his or her work actually made you feel? When talking about TV these days, the answer is definitively yes. (See: If only David Chase would tell us what really happened at the end of The Sopranos we could all know for sure!) But when Homeland’s Alex Gansa says Carrie and Saul were working together all along, it makes me want to plug my ears and go “nah-nah-nah, I can’t hear you,” and go back to believing Saul and Carrie’s plan was concocted much more recently, by far a more sensible interpretation of everything we’ve seen thus far.
In this episode, Quinn continues to be a really good guy (who accidentally murdered a small child). He tells Carrie, “What you put yourself through, it was fucking incredible,” and generally does everything he can to protect her, whether asking for directions or ignoring Saul’s orders not to get a closer look at her house. Saul, on the other hand, continues to evince his new streak of callousness toward Carrie. He may be frustrated with her for potentially blowing the operation by trying to help Dana, but he is really short with her on the phone, shorter than he should be with a woman he just abandoned in a mental hospital. “She was always on her own,” he tells Quinn at the end of the episode, which sounds like a compliment (and the cue to the Carrie Mathison theme song), but is in reality pretty twisted: Carrie, anyway, thought she was at least a little bit with Saul.
This episode also, perhaps inadvertently, impugns Saul’s spy skills: How is he fit to be the director of the CIA if he doesn’t even know some other guy is about to be made director of the CIA? Being head of the CIA is about politics, maintaining and stoking personal and social relationships, things which Saul has never made much of an effort at. Saul wanted the job so badly, he couldn’t see how unlikely it was that he would get it: Does Saul have the president’s ear? Does Saul give the CIA a fresh start? Do lots of CIA directors have huge beards? The answer to all these questions is no, but Saul still gets blindsided by the news that Sen. Lockhart is going to be his new boss. (Imagine how Carrie is going to feel when she learns that the person most convinced she is a crazy liability to the CIA is now in charge of the agency.)
Homeland goes out of its way to set up a contrast between Lockhart and Saul: One is a man who is really comfortable with guns, one is not; one believes in drones, one believes in “human beings”; one is inexperienced, one is beyond experienced; one is expedient, one is righteous. Saul’s nasty toast to Lockhart, questioning his suitability given his long history of criticizing the CIA, plays like a mic-drop—Saul will not be tamed by threats from Lockhart; he would rather be out of a job than run an intelligence operation the wrong way. But it’s also sour grapes. The CIA catastrophically failed. A man who has been critical of its efforts seems like a great choice to head it up, even if Lockhart has been given a Cheney-V.P. Walden sheen.* Saul’s argument that only someone who knows how the CIA has done things can command respect is also an argument for bureaucratic sclerosis.
And while sitting in the blind with Lockhart, Saul basically pooh-poohs the fact that Brody played the CIA. Given Saul and Carrie’s alliance, I am no longer sure what Saul thinks about Brody: Does he know Carrie helped him escape? Does he share Carrie’s belief in his innocence? (If everything Carrie did was part of the scheme, are we sure Carrie still totally believes in Brody’s innocence? Or did she say so just to make herself seem crazy?) The disdain with which Saul spits out “Brody’s daughter” to Carrie on the phone suggests he still thinks Brody is bad news. But if so, he shouldn’t be treating Brody’s betrayal so lightly when talking to Lockhart.
As for Brody’s daughter: I liked the scene when Jessica came to Carrie’s house looking for help. The more the Brodys can be integrated into the pulsing heart of Homeland—Carrie—the better. And the dynamic between Carrie and Jessica is so messed up, I’d be happy if both actresses got future opportunities to try to navigate it. But here’s hoping that next time, whatever plot they kick off won’t be totally unnecessary: Most of Carrie’s storyline this week, trying to find Dana, didn’t matter at all. Carrie didn’t help find Dana. Dana got herself found after learning that Leo had lied to her about his brother’s death. Upon arriving back home, Dana wandered alone into her bedroom and started to sob.
Look, I know Dana wants her space and is a surly, laconic teen, but guess what time it is, Jessica Brody? Time to get all up in your daughter’s face with questions and concern and maybe even—I know this sounds radical!—some hugs. Since when is Jessica Brody a reserved, bloodless WASP? Hug your daughter when she arrives home, obviously emotionally wrecked, from a scary and ill-advised trip with her dangerous boyfriend. You can even give her one from me, as thanks that this particular storyline is over.
Correction, Oct. 28, 2013: This article originally misidentified the vice president in Homeland. He is Vice President Walden, not Walker. (Return to the corrected sentence.)
Source: http://www.slate.com/articles/arts/television/2013/10/homeland_recap_the_yoga_play_saul_loses_out_to_lockhart.html
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Is Google's Mysterious Barge Actually a Floating Glass Store?
After an odd but engrossing CNET story last week, everybody's wondering what the strange barge with ties to Google is doing docked near San Francisco
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