text:
Times of Oman award winning pages
This is the award winning pages of Times of Oman in the 33rd edition of the SND best of news design competition
SND 33 AWARD-WINNING PAGES Gold Medal Editorial Staff Gold Medal Designer: Adonis Durado Designer: Sahir KM Silver Medal Designer: Adonis Durado Silver Medal Award of Excellence Designer: Adonis Durado C4 M O N DAY, O CTO B E R 3 1 , 2 0 1 1 FEATURE ny look behind the curtain of wall street is not going to be pretty. But there is not pretty and then there is plain ugly. James O'Shea, the former editor in chief of The Los Angeles Times, found a classic of the genre in the course of reporting out "The Deal From Hell: How Moguls and Wall Street Plundered Great American Newspapers," his deep dive into the two deals that tipped over the companies that owned, among many other newspapers, The Los Angeles Times and The Chicago Tribune. Here's the capsule version: In 2000, the Tribune, owner of the Tribune and many other papers, bought the TimesMirror, owner of The Los Angeles Times, for a then-record $8.3 billion. The merger never yielded much in the way of synergy, and the combined company put itself in play in 2007, when there were few buyers left. Enter Sam Zell, a real estate tycoon with a fondness for distressed assets, who took over the business with the help of an Employee Stock Purchase Plan that saddled Tribune with $13 billion in debt. The company is now mired in a two-year, hugely expensive bankruptcy. That's all known. What O'Shea focused on was how the bankers -- who he said should have known the deal would render the company insolvent -- seemed to be too busy counting their fees to care. Here's a note he found buried deep in court records from Jieun Choi, an analyst at JPMorgan Chase, that demonstrated a breathtaking level of cynicism and self-dealing: "There is wide speculation that (Tribune) might have so much debt that all of its assets aren't gonna cover the debt in case of (knock-knock) you know what," she wrote to a colleague, in a not very veiled reference to bankruptcy. "Well that's what we are saying, too. But we're doing this `cause it's enough to cover our bank debt. So, lesson learned from this deal: our (here I mean JPM's) business strategy for TRB but probably not A only limited to TRB is `hit and run."' She then went on to explain just how far a bank will go to "suck $$$ out of the (dying or dead?) client's pocket" in terms that are too graphic to be repeated here or most anywhere else. The court-appointed bankruptcy examiner, Kenneth Klee, was sceptical of her ability to make such a judgment, saying, "Choi's email reflects a misunderstanding by a junior analyst who failed to understand the nature and purpose of the analysis she was asked to perform." Klee sought to interview her, but she declined and has since returned to her native Korea. O'Shea said her email reflected an overall mentality that was pervasive among the banks. JPMorgan ran the deal, but other banks, including Citibank and Bank of America took part. There were two separate rounds of funding to raise the approximately $12 billion that Zell borrowed to take Tribune private. The banks received an eye-popping $161 million in fees for just the first round -- a number sufficient to run The Los Angeles Times newsroom for a year, as O'Shea points out -- and a total of $283 million in fees for both rounds. He also reports that Jamie Dimon, head of JPMorgan, expressed some doubts about the fundamentals of the deal based on his firm's analysis, but ultimately the bank decided to keep Zell's business. JP Morgan was a substantial lender in the deal as well, lending hundreds of millions of dollars, and will share in the pain of the bankruptcy. JPMorgan's lawyers declined to comment on the record, but said both the bank and Dimon were obligated by the contracts signed during Phase 1 of the lending and that they did so based on a solvency opinion that has since come into dispute. O'Shea said in a phone call that he "was stunned by how this small group of powerful bankers, all of whom seemed to know each other, lined up to get Zell's business. Like him, they didn't know much about the news business, but they BOOK REVIEW Author: James O'Shea Publisher: Public Affairs Pages: 395 were basically doing billion dollar loans with a wink and nod." O'Shea said that Jimmy Lee, a vicepresident and longtime deal guy at JPMorgan, laid out the blueprint after a conversation with Zell, including who would be on the board, who would run the divisions and who was out the door. "The bankers were calling all the shots," O'Shea said. Lawyers for the firm said he was simply doing what senior executives are expected to do in a deal of this magnitude and was not involved in any granular way in running the company. "The Deal From Hell" combines O'Shea's original reporting with his own experience as managing editor of The Chicago Tribune and later editor at The Los Angeles Times. He has since gone on to found the Chicago News Cooperative. (The New York Times has a partnership arrangement with the Chicago News Cooperative to buy local content for two pages a week in its Chicago edition.) In the book, O'Shea explains that the Chandlers, long stewards of The Los Angeles Times, were antsy about the dim prospects for the industry as a whole and like other newspaper families -- the Cowles and Ridders, and later, the Bancrofts -- began looking for an exit. In particular they were upset that Mark H. Willes, then the chief executive of Times Mirror, had named himself publisher of The Los Angeles Times. The Chandlers, he wrote, "didn't like the way he ran around acting like he owned The Los Angeles Times." And in a surprise in a book that has its share, it turns out that the so-called Staples scandal, was the event that convinced the Chandlers it was time to sell out. As part of a partnership with the brand new $400 million sports and convention complex, The Los Angeles Times had agreed to publish a huge Sunday magazine about the centre in October 1999. But a scandal mushroomed after it was learned that the newspaper has agreed to split the $2 million in advertising revenues with the Staples Centre. Sharing revenues with a subject was and is taboo, and the newspaper ended up with a huge black eye with readers. The Chandlers had had enough and after rebuffing earlier overtures from John Madigan at the company, renewed the discussions and eventually sold out to Tribune. And O'Shea admits that he was at first taken by Zell and the possibilities of the new ownership. "Like a lot of people at the time, I was willing to try something, anything, other than what we were doing, which was to just keep cutting costs as the products became less and less appealing to our readers," he said. "I thought at the time that maybe Zell could be the answer." Instead, Zell staffed the debt-ridden enterprise with radio executives from his past who knew very little about the newspaper business. Many of those same bankers now find themselves in Delaware bankruptcy court, fighting over who will get a haircut for the busted deal. To begin the book, O'Shea steps back and suggests that if newspapers had been able to collaborate, selling advertising nationally and charging consumers no matter how they accessed content, the myth of expensively produced "free" content would not have taken hold, Google would not have gained traction and the ensuing alliances with bankers, mergers and bankruptcies may not have taken place. "None of this had to happen," he said, pointing out that the newspapers involved now have just over half as many reporters as they did before the busted deals. "The stakes here are different. This isn't just a bunch of companies going under. We are headed into uncharted waters where the availability of reliable local news is under threat and there is a social consequence far beyond a deal going bad." -- DAVID CARR / The New York Times News Service Award of Excellence Designer: Adonis Durado Award of Excellence Designer: Adonis Durado Award of Excellence Designer: Adonis Durado Award of Excellence Designer: Adonis Durado Award of Excellence Designer: Adonis Durado Award of Excellence Designer: Adonis Durado Award of Excellence Designer: Adonis Durado Award of Excellence Designer: Adonis Durado Award of Excellence Designer: Adonis Durado Award of Excellence Designer: Sahir KM Award of Excellence Designer: Sahir KM Award of Excellence Designer: Sahir KM Award of Excellence Designer: Sahir KM EXTRA SATURDAY, JANUARY 29, 2011 C11 genetically modified mosquito carrying an artificial fragment of DNA designed to curb the insect's fertility has been released for the first time in south-east Asia as part of an ambitious attempt to combat deadly dengue fever that affects up to 100 million people worldwide. The GM mosquito has been developed by scientists at Oxford biotechnology company Oxitec to pass on a gene that kills the insect at the larval stage of its lifecycle. Officials in Malaysia said that the field experiment involved the release of about 6,000 male GM mosquitoes into an area of uninhabited forest to monitor their dispersal. If successful, scientists hope to conduct bigger trials to test the idea that the GM males will mate with wild female mosquitoes that will produce unviable larvae that die before adulthood. On a big enough scale this should significantly reduce mosquito numbers and limit the spread of the dengue virus, which is transmitted in the bite of females. Last year Oxitec carried out a A GM mosquitoes deployed to control Asia's dengue fever. The new formula could deter insects for upto three times longer than repellents much larger field trial in the Cayman Islands involving the release of about three million GM male mosquitoes -- the first release of a GM mosquito into the wild. The company said that the local population of the Aedes aegypti mosquito, the species that carries the Dengue virus, fell by 80 per cent. The researchers believe that releasing GM male mosquitoes into the wild should be safe because, unlike females that need to feed on blood to produce their eggs, males cannot spread dengue or other mosquito-borne diseases such as yellow fever and malaria as they lack the piercing mouth parts necessary to enable them to consume blood from a human victim. The self-destruct nature of the gene passed on by the GM male mosquitoes when they mate with wild females also ensures that the genetic modification is not passed on to other organisms in the wild, said Hayden Parry, chief executive of Oxitec, which developed the GM mosquito. "These mosquitoes are `sterile'. We only release the males and when they mate with females their offspring die. So there are only two options, either they mate and their offspring die, or the males don't find a female and they die anyway," Parry said. "This is a very limited trial in an uninhabited area near the town of Bentong (Malaysia). We are basically looking at how the GM mosquitoes disperse in the wild and how long they live for, but it is the first trial of a GM mosquito in this part of the world," he said. The Malaysian Institute for Medical Research, which is in charge of the latest release experiment, said that the field trial began on December 21 and was successfully completed on January 5. In addition to the 6,000 GM male mosquitoes, scientists also released 6,000 non-GM males for comparison. There is no vaccine or effective drug to treat dengue fever, which is a growing problem. Malaysia has reported a 52 per cent increase in dengue-related deaths over the past 20 years and total infections rose 11 per cent from 2009 to more than 46,000 cases last year, including 134 deaths. Controlling the insect that transmits the dengue virus is seen as critical in fighting the disease. Releasing GM males carrying a self-destruct gene comes out of the "sterile insect technique", when sterile males are released to compete with fertile wild males. Dengue Dengue causes a severe flu-like illness, and sometimes a potentially lethal complication called dengue haemorrhagic fever. Its incidence has grown dramatically in recent decades, probably linked with the spread of the aedes aegypti mosquito. About 2.5 billion people are now at risk of dengue, which is found in mostly urban and semi-urban areas in tropical and subtropical climates. The aedes mosquito is known to favour urban habitats. The WHO says that dengue haemorrhagic fever is a leading cause of serious illness and death among children in some Asian countries. Appropriate medical care frequently saves the lives of patients with dengue haemorrhagic fever. -Steve Connor/THE INDEPENDENT Award of Excellence Designer: Greg Fernandez EXTRA S AT U R DAY, A P R I L 2 , 2 0 1 1 C11 A report by experts says that many young girls are totally misinterpreting healthy eating advice HUNDREDS of children are copying "impossibly thin" celebrities and models � and therefore suffer from anorexia or associated illnesses. A report by experts says that many young girls are totally misinterpreting healthy eating advice being promoted by schools and surviving on little more than salad. Over 14 months, 208 children under 13 -- the vast majority of them girls -- were treated for eating disorders in Britain and Ireland. Some who received hospital treatment were as young as six. Eating disorders commonly affect adolescents and young adults. But increasing numbers are developing anorexia or bulimia before reaching puberty. Studies of children aged between five and 13 showed that around three in every 100,000 in this age group are treated for an eating disorders including anorexia, bulimia and binge eating. Of these, 82 per cent were girls. Half of those receiving hospital treatment had to be admitted to a paediatric ward according to findings published in the British Journal of Psychiatry. Mary George, spokeswoman for the eating disorder charity Beat, said: "Daily we are bombarded with so-called `ideal' images that apparently we should all aspire to. It is no surprise this permeates through to young children who are much more media savvy and exposed to these messages than ever before." Urgent action is needed to identify children suffering from eating disorders which have a death rate similar to childhood leukaemia, medical experts say. Anorexia and bulimia are traditionally seen as a problems of adolescence but evidence suggests they are starting earlier in childhood.Prompt treatment is essential to tackle what can develop into a long-term serious disorder, researchers from the Insititute of Child Health in London say. On average children wait eight months to see a specialist with up to half requiring hospital admission and one in seven feeding by tube into their stomach. About three in every 100,000 children under the age of 13 are affected, according to the first survey of early onset eating disorders published in the British Journal of Psychiatry. The most common symptom was a determined refusal of food. Parents described their children as "fussy eaters", refusing anything except milk or liquids, "intolerant of lumps" and "not aware of hunger". Charlotte Bevan's daughter Georgie, 12, developed anorexia two years ago while away at boarding school. After hospital treatment, her mother instituted a "re-feeding" scheme she learnt about on the web. "I fed her six times a day for a year. I didn't persuade her, I required her to eat. The mantra in this house was the food is your medicine". - AGENCIES WHEN YOUR DIET UPSETS THE APPLE CART Award of Excellence Designer: Greg Fernandez B8 THURSDAY, APRIL 7, 2011 ETCETERA MILLIONAIRESS AT 0 1 Willow Smith is no ordinary youngster. Daughter of acting superstars Will Smith and Jada Pinkett Smith, she has been singing and acting since she was seven and had her first chart-topper, `Whip My Hair', when she was nine Singin g wante and acting d is I get m to do my w what I've ho y my sin acting from le life. ging a bility dad and from m um er new single, 21st Century Girl, has gone straight to the top of the charts.She earns over $5 million a year, has her own production company and a personal staff of five. Her hair-style is copied by millions and her first collection of clothes is out soon. Not bad for a girl who is... ten years old! But then Willow Smith is no ordinary youngster. Daughter of acting superstars Will Smith and Jada Pinkett Smith, she has been singing and acting since she was seven and had her first chart-topper, Whip My Hair, when she was nine. Nor has Willow's success taken her by surprise. "Singing and acting is what I've wanted to do my whole life," she says. "I get my acting from dad and my singing ability from mum. That's just what happens when you hang out with the Smiths!" Willow made her acting debut in 2007 in I Am A Legend, playing her father's daughter ("it was a pretty easy thing to do!")followed by an award-winning performance in Kit Ketridge -- an American Girl. Whip My Hair, hailed as "one of the hottest songs of the year," sold over half a million in a week. When it reached number one it made Willow the youngest person to top the charts since Jimmy Osmond in 1972. Rapper and pop tycoon Jay-Z heard the record before it was released and immediately signed up Willow without knowing that she was only nine. "All I knew that the record would be a smash," he says. "I believe in superstars and I believe in big records and Willow has both. She has a child's innocence but she has a clear vision of who she is and who she wants to be." Talking about her new record deal with Jay-Z's label, Willow says: "It felt like all the hard work I'd done in recording the song had paid off. "We went to this big building -- I don't remember what it was-- but I got to meet Jay-Z and it was fun." Willow has known fame and fortune all her life. Her family's closest friends are the Cruises and her 12-year-old brother Jayden is the star of the remake of the Karate Kid. Will Smith, star of such mega-hits as The Independence Day and Men in Black, is taking a break from his own career to steer his children's move into showbusiness. In fact Will started his career as a rapper in the late 1980s, calling himself the Fresh Prince. Recently he announced that he plans to produce a remake of Little Orphan Annie starring his daughter. Jay-Z is in talks to provide Willow's songs for the movie. All this means that Willow's life is hardly that of an ordinary youngster. "I never really get to go to school because I either am eith recording or on tour," she says. "I have a personal tutor b because I am always working I find it hard to but the get to t lessons. All my friends are ahead of me in most subjects subject because they go to school regularly." There's not much chance that things will change for a The while -- Willow is about to go on yet another world tour, time this tim supporting teen idol Justin Bieber. Willow Will says she picks all her own songs and particuliked 21st Century Girl " which is about girls who larly li just can jus be themselves. They're walking towards their and goal an striving to be the best because you know that can you ca do it." Jay-Z Jay- says that Willow is "only at the start of an incredible credib journey" but parents Will and Jada know the dangers danger involved in being a pre-teen pop phenomenon. The pressure of early success had a disastrous effect on such child performers as Lena Zavaroni, Aaron Carter and of course Michael Jackson. But Will Smith says: "We know the dangers of too much attention for a ten-year-old and we know when shield to shie her from it. "Of course Willow's childhood erent from other kids, but she is happy and wellis diffe balanced balanc and Jada and I are careful to give her the sort guidance and discipline that ten-year-olds need. of guid "We have a happy family life and there are no stars in Smith the Sm household! If chores need doing we all chip in, regardless of how many Oscars or platinum discs we've regard On got!" O the advice of top show-business accountants Will is not only Willow's father but also her employer! This is because Willow's record contract is with Jay-Z Roc label R Nation which has made an agreement with Spooky Girl Inc, whose president is...Will Smith. Willow's mum is listed as her guardian so technically Will and Jada a Will could be on opposite sides if it came to a disagreement over Willow's singing career. disagre g -Judson B Bennett/TONY JAMES FEATURES H Award of Excellence Designer: Greg Fernandez C4 T U E S DAY, A P R I L 1 2 , 2 0 1 1 MARKET SOME REMEDIES FOR THE PAIN WHEN COUPLES TALK MONEY There is a 10 percentage point difference in how men and women responded when asked whether they were planning their portfolios more carefully, with women being more cautious. The gap pervaded all the responses said Susan Hirshman, president of SHE, a consulting firm focused on financial literacy for women and the author ne of the most difficult conversations of "Does This Make My Assets Look Fat?" (St. a couple can have is not about love or Martin's Press, 2010). "What I found, generally speakcommitment. It is about money -- how ing, was with men, even if they were going to be OK, they it is saved and invested and what it couldn't deal with the fact that the number was less. That still means for their lifestyle. applies very much today." According to a survey to be released this weekend by PNC Bridging that gap is the point of the talk. But, of course, it is Wealth Management, men and women are not any closer in their easier to give relationship advice than to apply it. One relatively views about their investments than they were before the recession painless way to enter the conversation is not to make it overtly about wreaked havoc on their portfolios. money. Pick a goal instead. There is a 10 percentage point difference in how men and women re"It has to be an issue that grabs them both," Altfest said. "I really want to sponded when asked whether they were planning their portfolios more visit our daughter who moved to the West Coast. Can we afford to stay three carefully, with women being more cautious. And asked how they viewed their days or for a week?" portfolio strategy, 51 per cent of men said "nothing has changed," while only 38 This is a step that helps people get to the bigger conversation of how much monper cent of women felt the same way. The gap pervaded all the responses. One ey they have and how it is invested. Visiting a child costs money, but the quesupside in the PNC survey, a follow-up to one it conducted five years ago, was that tion itself does not ask that. Instead, it hopefully opens the recession did not push the sexes further apart in their the way to a broader conversation. views about money. But even a seemingly benign question can be difficult for "There was not as much change with the way people think some people to ask. This is where Hirshman tries to scare her about their money through the recession as we thought," said R. clients into talking to their spouses. She tells them that if they Bruce Bickel, senior vice-president at PNC Wealth Management. do not get involved in their investments, they may end up in the "I think that is because there is better communication and they are "if only club." "If only I knew how aggressively we were invested, getting more of their family involved in their finances. It is just a if only I knew how leveraged we were, if only I knew we weren't small percentage increase but it was positive." saving," she said. Bickel attributed the continued differences to traditional gender She advocates involving both spouses in managing their money. roles in relationships. But he said that women had changed their views She does not offer a prescriptive solution on how to do it. on risk, becoming more comfortable with it since the 2006 survey. "If you decide not to save money for your child's education, that's "Women are taking more responsibility and getting involved in not good or bad, but you have to understand the choices you're the family financial matters, which is healthy," he said. "Commumaking," she said. "It's almost like smoking. If you smoke today, you nication is imperative." So, should people have a money talk? The know you're getting the instant gratification, but the trade-off is, are consensus among those who write and counsel about gender and you willing to risk a higher probability of lung cancer?" money is that couples need to discuss their finances, even if they do not want to or fear it is going to be painful. Keep on talking "Very often they're afraid to take that first step," said Karen CapIf these conversations were easy, all couples would know exactly lan Altfest, principal adviser and executive vice-president for cliwhat was happening with their money and there would not be ent relations at Altfest Personal Wealth Management. "You'd be any financial surprises. But that is not the case, which is why surprised by how many people don't know how much their spouse rifts often arise. is making." Knowing something so basic is a first step, but it gets The most common problem during a money conversation is more complicated from there. Here's a look at problems that obvious: People blame each other for their financial problems. discussions about money can cause and some suggestions on But it could be emblematic of wider relationship problems. making the conversation productive. Going over how money is invested may not solve those The divide over investing money and managing risk is per- Senior vice-president at PNC Wealth Management problems. Even if the money chat goes well, there are vasive, but the bigger problem is who is actually in charge of two more subtle areas that can become an issue. the process. The first is the desire for status, which can ruin even the most thoughtThe PNC survey found that 73 per cent of women thought they shared reful financial plan. Harvey J. Coleman, president of Coleman Managesponsibility for financial decisions equally, while only 45 per cent of men said ment Consultants in Atlanta, said he had seen too many couples stop that task was divided. (About 53 per cent of men said they were the sole detalking about money once they felt they had things set. "What people ciders, while only 17 per cent of women said that.) don't talk about is, `What is the lifestyle they want to move to?"' he The disconnect, in fact, has gotten worse since 2006, when 68 per said. "That's where problems come in. It's when you buy a house cent of women thought decisions were made equally and 48 per cent in a neighbourhood where you can't afford the house and of men agreed. In fact, the only real area of consensus was on the fishouldn't have bought it in the first place." nancial prospects of their children: 57 per cent of mothers and 55 Like Hirshman, Coleman sees nothing wrong with per cent of fathers said the recession had changed how their people wanting to be wealthier and have the trapchildren would manage their money. pings that go with it. But he questions whether "What I saw during the 2008 crisis was if I people are talking seriously about how that could show women that they were hurt but desire is going to affect their future, that they were still going to be able both in cost and savings terms. to maintain a lifestyle of their choice, they were OK," -- The New York Times News Service O PAUL SULLIVAN There was not as much change with the way people think about their money through the recession as we thought. I think that is because there is better communication and they are getting more of their family involved in their finances. R. Bruce Bickel, Award of Excellence Designer: Greg Fernandez C4 S U N DAY, N OV E M B E R 1 3, 2 0 1 1 FEATURE The in novati raises ve wo the bro rk at N arrati ader is of artifi ve Sc sue of cial in ience wheth or rep tellige er suc lace th nce w h app em. T ill ma licatio echno inly a ns logy is ssist h uman alread worke y und of trad rs ermin itiona ing th l journ e econ alism omics "Wisconsin appears to be in the driver's seat en route to a win, as it leads 51-10 after the third quarter. Wisconsin added to its lead when Russell Wilson found Jacob Pedersen for an eight-yard touchdown to make the score 44-3 ..." hose words began a news brief written within 60 seconds of the end of the third quarter of the Wisconsin-UNLV football game in September. They may not seem like much -- but they were written by a computer. The clever code is the handiwork of Narrative Science, a start-up in Evanston, Ill., that offers proof of the progress of artificial intelligence -- the ability of computers to mimic human reasoning. The company's software takes data, like that from sports statistics, company financial reports and housing starts and sales, and turns it into articles. For years, programmers have experimented with software that wrote such articles, typically for sports events, but these efforts had a formulaic, fill-in-the-blank style. They read as if a machine wrote them. But Narrative Science is based on more than a decade of research, led by two of the company's founders, Kris Hammond and Larry Birnbaum, co-directors of the Intelligent Information Laboratory at Northwestern University. And the articles produced by Narrative Science are different. "I thought it was magic," says Roger Lee, a general partner of Battery Ventures, which led a $6 million investment in the company earlier this year. "It's as if a human wrote it." Experts in artificial intelligence and language are also impressed, if less enthralled. Oren Etzioni, a computer scientist at the University of Washington, says, "The quality of the narrative produced was quite good," as if written by a human, if not an accomplished wordsmith. Narrative Science, Etzioni says, points to a larger trend in computing of "the increasing sophistication in automatic language understanding and, now, language generation." The innovative work at Narrative Science raises the broader issue of whether such applications of artificial intelligence will mainly assist human workers or replace them. Technology is already undermining the economics of traditional journalism. Online advertising, while on the rise, has not offset the decline in print advertising. But will "robot journalists" replace flesh-and-blood journalists in newsrooms? T The leaders of Narrative Science emphasized that their technology would be primarily a low-cost tool for publications to expand and enrich coverage when editorial budgets are under pressure. The company, founded last year, has 20 customers so far. Several are still experimenting with the technology, and Stuart Frankel, the chief executive of Narrative Science, wouldn't name them. They include newspaper chains seeking to offer automated summary articles for more extensive coverage of local youth sports and to generate articles about the quarterly financial results of local public companies. "Mostly, we're doing things that are not being done otherwise," Frankel says. The Narrative Science customers that are willing to talk do fit that model. The Big Ten Network, a joint venture of the Big Ten Conference and Fox Networks, began using the technology in the spring of 2010 for short recaps of baseball and softball games. They were posted on the network's website within a minute or two of the end of each game; box scores and play-by-play data were used to ... generate the brief articles. (Previously, the network relied on online summaries provided by university sports offices.) As the spring sports season progressed, the computer-generated articles improved, helped by suggestions from editors on the network's staff, says Michael Calderon, vice president for digital and interactive media at the Big Ten Network. The Narrative Science software can make Narrative Science, points to a larger trend in computing of the increasing sophistication in automatic language understanding and, now, language generation COMPUTER SCIENTIST, UNIVERSITY OF WASHINGTON OREN ETZIONI inferences based on the historical data it collects and the sequence and outcomes of past games. To generate story "angles," explains Hammond of Narrative Science, the software learns concepts for articles like "individual effort," "team effort," "come from behind," "back and forth," "season high," "player's streak" and "rankings for team." Then the software decides what element is most important for that game, and it becomes the lead of the article, he said. The data also determines vocabulary selection. A lopsided score may well be termed a "rout" rather than a "win." "Composition is the key concept," Hammond says. "This is not just taking data and spilling it over into text." Last fall, the Big Ten Network began using Narrative Science for updates of football and basketball games. Those reports helped drive a surge in referrals to the website from Google's search algorithm, which highly ranks new content on popular subjects, Calderon says. The network's Web traffic for football games last season was 40 per cent higher than in 2009. Hanley Wood, a trade publisher for the construction industry, began using the program in August to provide monthly reports on more than 350 local housing markets, posted on its site, builderonline.com. The company had long collected the data, but hiring people to write trend articles would have been too costly, says Andrew Reid, president of Hanley Wood's digital media and market intelligence unit. Reid says Hanley Wood worked with Narrative Science for months to fine-tune the software for construction. A former executive at Thomson Reuters, he says he was struck by the high quality of the articles. "They got over a big linguistic hurdle," he observes. "The stories are not duplicates by any means." He was also impressed by the cost. Hanley Wood pays Narrative Science less than $10 for each article of about 500 words -- and the price will very likely decline over time. Even at $10, the cost is far less, by industry estimates, than the average cost per article of local online news ventures like AOL's Patch or answer sites, like those run by Demand Media. Narrative Science's ambitions include moving further up the ladder of quality. Both Birnbaum and Hammond are professors of journalism as well as computer science. The company itself is an outgrowth of collaboration between the two schools. -- Steve Lohr /The New York Times News Service Award of Excellence Designer: Greg Fernandez C10 MONDAY, OCTOBER 3, 2011 EXTRA Processed food has its place in your diet. Although not all processed foods are of equal quality, the best of them can deliver lots of nutrition without doing you any harm The right process he dietary zeitgeist favours foods that are "whole" and "local" over those that are "processed" and "packaged." But omitting processed, packaged foods can make it hard to meet your body's dietary needs. "Food processing has been around for a long time," says Connie Weaver, head of the Department of Foods and Nutrition at Purdue University. Weaver says she grew up on a farm "where a childhood activity was picking food and processing it in the kitchen. You harvest food all at once, but you can't eat it all at once," she notes, adding that much of the harvest had to be preserved so her family could eat year-round. "It is not a good recommendation to think people can have `fresh' and `local' foods meet all their nutrient needs," says Weaver, who spoke about the value of processed foods at the annual Food and Nutri- T tion Conference and Expo of the American Dietetic Association in San Diego. In any case, she says, it's kind of a moot point: Issues of seasonality and transportation make it impossible for all of us to access fresh and local foods all the time. Like it or not, she says, "we depend on a lot of processed foods". Most people might think of processed food as something that comes wrapped in plastic from a factory across the country. But Cooking Light magazine editor Scott Mowbray points out that anything you do with food is "processing". So the question isn't whether your food has been cooked, baked, fermented, canned, frozen, mashed or ground but whether it's been processed in such a way that "what's left in the package is healthy" and retains its key nutrients. In its October issue, Cooking Light of- fers its second annual roundup of the best packaged and processed foods available at grocery stores nationwide. The list's 24 categories include items you might expect -- gluten-free pasta made with brown rice flour -- and some you might not, such as ranch dressing, frozen burritos and potato chips. Cooking Light also includes shredded wheat cereals, both frosted and unfrosted, among its choices. Indeed, Weaver notes that for many people, ready-to-eat cereals, which she describes as "very processed", are a key source of nutrients, many of which are added to the product through fortification. So avoiding all processed foods is "ridiculous", in Weaver's estimation. "You just have to be somewhat selective." In seeking the best examples of each packaged food, Cooking Light staff members "go through every label looking for ingredients" that signal a processed food might not be the best choice. Those include excess sodium, artificial colours, trans fats, artificial sweeteners and "too many stabilisers, which portend a product that's not going to taste as good", Mowbray says. Common stabilisers include xanthan gum, guar gum and gum arabic. Weaver suggests scanning nutrition labels "for disproportionate amounts of fat, salt and sugar". That can help you discern the nutritional difference between, say, a can of corn vs a bag of corn chips. Both are forms of processed corn, but the latter typically has more salt and fat than its nutritional value warrants, she says. The best way to assess a food's value is to decipher its nutrition facts panel. Besides the basics of paying attention to calories and serving size, here are tips to guide you from the Food and Drug Administration: Choose products with high daily value percentages (20 per cent or more per serving) of fibre and of vitamins and minerals, such as Vitamin A, Vitamin C, calcium and iron. Look for low daily value percentages (5 per cent or less) of total fat, saturated fat, cholesterol and sodium. The following terms signal added sugars, which contain lots of calories but little nutrition value: corn syrup, highfructose corn syrup, fruit juice concentrate, maltose, dextrose, sucrose, honey and maple syrup. "There is a huge continuum of processed foods," Weaver says. "It's not so easy to categorise processed foods as good or bad. We just have to be smart about it, a little more sophisticated." - By Jennifer LaRue Huget/The Washington Post ALL PROCESSED FOODS ARE NOT CREATED EQUAL Yoghurt: The process that makes yoghurt is probably also what makes it so good for you. In addition to the calcium and protein, vitamins and minerals yoghurt delivers, the active bacteria cultures that give it its tangy taste are probiotics that are thought to provide digestive health benefits. Canned beans: Beans are an excellent source of protein (especially for those who don't eat meat) and fibre. Sure, you can buy, dry and soak them (thereby processing them yourself ). But you can't beat the convenience of canned. Look for reduced-sodium brands, or drain and rinse your beans before eating. Jarred spaghetti sauce: The process of cooking actually improves the quality of the antioxidant carotenoids that give tomatoes their colour, making jarred sauce a healthful choice. Connie Weaver points out that such sauces usually are seasoned with herbs, which add vitamins and minerals such as potassium. Canned salmon: We're all supposed to be eating more fish -- at least two four-ounce servings a week, according to federal dietary guidelines -- and fatty, cold-water fish such as salmon and tuna are tops because of the omega-3 fatty acids they contain. But buying fresh fish can get expensive. Canned varieties provide the same nutrition. Oatmeal: Steel-cut or simply rolled, processed oats are excellent sources of dietary fibre and can help lower your cholesterol. Frozen vegetables: Vegetables harvested at their peak and immediately frozen retain all their nutritional value, allowing us to enjoy vegetables' benefits year round. They're often less expensive than fresh produce, too. Peanut butter: Another great source of protein and heart-healthy fats, this tasty, versatile spread is best when made simply with finely ground peanuts. Award of Excellence Designer: Greg Fernandez C10 S AT U R DAY, F E B RUA RY 1 9, 2 0 1 1 EXTRA HOW TO SPOT A SPINNING BLACK HOLE Astronomers have indirect evidence that the supermassive black holes believed to lie at the core of many galaxies rotate. The rotation of the Milky Way's black hole, for example, is suggested by the velocity distribution of stars within the galaxy n international group of astronomers and physicists has found that rotating black holes leave an imprint on passing radiation that should be detectable using today's most sensitive radio telescopes. Observing this signature, they say, could tell us more about how galaxies evolve and provide a test of Albert Einstein's general theory of relativity. General relativity says that very massive objects such as black holes warp space-time, bending the path of light that passes them -- an effect known as gravitational lensing. The theory also predicts that a rotating black hole will drag space-time around with it, creating a vortex that constrains all nearby objects, including photons, to follow that rotation. Astronomers already have indirect evidence that the supermassive black holes believed to lie at the core of many galaxies rotate. The rotation of the Milky Way's black hole, for example, is suggested by the velocity distribution of stars within A the galaxy, but this provides only an inexact measurement, because it is not known exactly how much matter the galaxy contains. Some astronomers believe that the black hole is rotating very quickly, whereas others maintain that its rotation is slow. In a paper published yesterday by Nature Physics, Fabrizio Tamburini, an astronomer at the University of Padua in Italy, and his colleagues show how the rotation can be detected more directly, by measuring changes to the light that passes close to a black hole. The team says that a wavefront of radiation travelling in a plane perpendicular to the black hole's axis of spin will get twisted as it passes close to the black hole, because half of the wavefront will be moving in the direction of advancing spacetime and the other half in the direction of receding space-time. This will give the phase of the radiation -- that is, the precise position of the waves' peaks and troughs -- a distinctive distribution in space. This will make it possible to determine the speed at which the black holes are spinning much more accurately. The researchers used a computer simulation to model the phase distribution resulting from the rotation of the Milky Way's black hole, and found that the pattern ought to be visible from the ground. They say it could be measured by pointing an array of radio telescopes at the centre of the galaxy, using different telescopes to observe different segments of the approaching wavefront, and then superimposing these segments on each other to calculate their relative phase. This procedure would be repeated many times, with the telescopes pointing to a different section of the sky surrounding the black hole each time. Galactic origins Tamburini describes his group's findings as "fundamentally important," given that most massive objects in the universe rotate. In particular, he says, studying the rotation of black holes in active galactic nuclei will improve astronomers' understanding of these active galax- Researchers say black hole can be measured by pointing an array of radio telescopes at the centre of the galaxy, using different telescopes to observe different segments of the approaching wavefront, and then superimposing these segments on each other to calculate their relative phase ies, given that the rotation of these black holes would heat the galaxies considerably and so potentially alter their evolution . The researchers say that, assuming they receive funding, they could carry out measurements of the phase distribution of photons around black holes within the next two years using an existing array of radio telescopes, such as the Very Long Baseline Array of ten radio telescopes in Socorro, N.M. The planned Square Kilometer Array, an international project consisting of thousands of antennae set to be 50 times as powerful as any radio instrument in use today and scheduled to be in operation from 2024, would be even more useful for the task. Richard Matzner, an astrophysicist at the University of Texas at Austin, agrees that the proposed measurements would give us a much better idea of what is happening near black holes. He also points out that observation of the phase-distribution pattern found by Tamburini and his colleagues would provide extra experimental proof of the theory of general relativity. Conversely, if the pattern isn't found, it might indicate that an alternative theory of gravity should be sought, or at least that previously unknown astrophysical processes are in play. But Matzner does not believe that current radio telescopes are sensitive enough to make such demanding observations. The measurements involve not only imaging an extremely small portion of the sky, but also measuring the phase variation across it, which will tax the capabilities of the Very Long Baseline Array. Matzner says that because the radiation emitted from the vicinity of a black hole tends to be brightest at high frequencies, such as those of X-rays or gamma-rays rather than light or radio waves, it would make more sense to use instruments operating at these frequencies. Matzner points out, that would mean launching new space-based observatories, given that X-rays and gamma-rays are absorbed by the atmosphere. - THE NEW YORK TIMES NEWS SERVICE Award of Excellence Designer: Waleed Rabin C4 w e d n e s day, j u ly 6, 2 0 1 1 feature THE gaps around air-condiTionErs arE mElTing your dollars COOLING CO TS ide emissions. While the report covers only New York City buildings, the problem extends across the nation, said Russell Unger, executive director of the Urban Green Council, the New York affiliate of the US Green Building Council. (The national council is best known for bestowing the LEED seal of approval on environmentally friendly buildings.) And while the heat loss matters more in areas with long winters like the Northeast, Unger said, cool air also leaks out when the units are in use in hot weather, resulting in higher electricity costs. "This is something under everyone's noses, and it's totally overlooked," he said. "It's an issue in every building that doesn't have central air." The report is based on tests by Steven Winters Associates, a building-design consulting firm, on three types of units commonly used in the city: the windowmounted air-conditioner that is a fixture of pre-war buildings; the air-conditioner that sits in a metal sleeve in the wall; and a packaged-terminal air-conditioner that protrudes into the room and is usually permanently installed at the time of construction. In all 11 buildings tested in the city, building engineers found that each poorly fitted and poorly sealed unit left a gap equivalent to a hole roughly 2 inches by 3 inches � "about the size of your fist if you punched a hole in the wall," as Unger put it. In some buildings, the report said, the cost of fuel lost to such energy waste is equal to the total cost of cooling the building alone. The report recommends both immediate and long-term steps to deal with the problem, including building-wide programs to remove and store the windowmounted units and the manufacturing of improved installation kits for all units. The sleeve models are supposed to stay in place year-round, but they can be winterised to plug holes, the report says. It also counsels against a common practice by many residents: buying cheaper window units instead of the appropriate models to fter embracing environmentally friendly construction, Martin Dunn, a developer of affordable housing in the city, made a frustrating discovery: The energy that he hoped to save with improved insulation and efficient boilers was being siphoned off through gaps around the air-conditioners in apartment windows. The warm air was escaping, substantially raising his utility bills. "It defeats the purpose of all the other improvements you've done," he said. And it was not just the heated air that was escaping: In the summertime, the gaps around units that did not fit tightly were letting out refrigerated air. The scope of the problem is outlined in a report released recently by the Urban Green Council. The report, titled "There Are Holes in Our City's Walls," estimates that poorly fitted air-conditioners cost buildings in New York City $130 million to $180 million a year in extra fuel consumption, which in turn is linked to an extra 375,000 to 525,000 tonnes of carbon diox- A fit into the existing metal sleeves, ensuring a bad fit. Getting residents to remove window-mounted air-conditioners when they are not in use is a daunting challenge, the report says. One reason is the expense: residents of high-rise buildings are often required to hire professional help to remove and reinstall the units as a safety precaution. Another is lack of storage space, the report noted. Daniel Dubno, a tenant of a three-bedroom apartment on the Upper West Side with five window units that have become permanent fixtures, can think of another reason. John H. Slattery, a real estate agent who is treasurer of his Upper East Side coop building, said that he paid to remove his air-conditioners in the fall but that it had nothing to do with saving energy. "I take them out because they're ugly, and they rob me of light," he said. At the same time, Slattery considers the twice-yearly removal and reinstallation "a nuisance." What if, he said, "an installation goes wrong, and it falls out the window and kills someone?" --Mireya Navarro/ The New york Times News Service Award of Excellence Designer: Waleed Rabin C section ex life & ra style w w w.t i m e s o f o m a n . c o m s at U R day, a p R i l 9, 2 0 1 1 Crashing Comets The rings of Saturn and Jupiter contain ripples caused by comets that hit them decades ago. Monitoring how the rings wobble could reveal how common comet impacts are � and may also help astronomers map the planets' cores.>C10 Flares fuel the denim dreams With the novelty of skinny jeans wearing off and sales growth sagging in the $13 billion US market, retailers are showing off styles with legs up to two feet wide to hook fashionistas etailers from American Eagle Outfitters to Bloomingdale's are betting that women are ready to shed skinny jeans for a return to flared styles, a change that may firm up more than sagging denim sales. "The fashion shift is coming," said Christine Chen, an apparel retail analyst at Needham & Co. in San Francisco. "Once the bottom changes, your tops are wrong. It's a whole new reason for the consumer to spend." Form-hugging denim, around since the middle of the last decade, boosted jeans purchases during the recession with styles like J. Crew's "matchstick." Now the novelty has worn off, with sales of women's premium denim sliding more than six per cent last year to $1.36 billion, according to Port Washington, New York-based NPD Group. Upscale department stores like Bloomingdale's aim to buck that trend with designer jeans from J Brand resembling upside down martini glasses for $185. If women buy in, retailers and jean makers such as True Religion Apparel may have just the trend to revive demand in the $13 billion US market, helping to offset price increases spurred by record cotton costs. "It's been a hit," said Stephanie Solomon, women's fashion director at Bloomingdale's. "We've all been wearing skinnies or jeggings for too long. It's a reason to buy." Flares have fuelled denim sales this spring and are outselling skinny jeans, Solomon said. The style, which showed up on runways last year, has also reached mass-market retailers such as Pittsburgh-based American Eagle, which unveiled a "vintage flare" this spring for $49.50. True Religion, based in Vernon, California, offers a dozen flared styles for as much as $319. Fashion had focused on slimmer shapes since the mid-1990s, when women's magazines began looking more to Kate Moss than Cindy Crawford, said Lourdes Font, a professor of art history at the Fashion Institute of Technology in New York. Skinnies, leggings and jeggings (leggings that look like jeans) have left designers with nowhere else to go but bigger. "It's at the very limits of physical reality," Font said. "The only other thing tighter is your own skin." The flare revival itself could make much of women's old wardrobes obsolete, Chen said, because pants often spur other trends. Flowing tops and shirt-dresses came into being to compensate for the ultra-skinny. Wide legs will usher in an era of shorter and tighter blouses, sweaters and jackets, Chen said. Footwear will change too, said Amy Noblin, an apparel-chain analyst for Weeden & Co. in Greenbrae, California. Skinny jeans pair well with boots, propelling sales past $5 billion last year and sparking an explosion in brands like Ugg. Bell bottoms, instead, hide much of the foot and may curb the appeal of today's ubiquitous knee-high boots. That could lead to a renaissance in footwear with flat soles such as sandals or platforms, Solomon said. The wide leg may also gain acceptance faster than skinny because it's more flattering and many women still have a flare or two in their closets, Noblin said. "People don't have to go back too far in their lifetime to remember the last time they wore a pair of flare jeans, which makes me think this is an embraceable, democratic trend," Noblin said. Still, a fashion shift of this magnitude won't be a boon for every retailer. While San Francisco-based Gap also is offering flares for $69.50, it may have difficulty connecting with shoppers because it's known more for basics and not the "hippie chic" look that's spurring this trend, said Chen."This is right up our alley," Louise Callagy, a spokeswoman for Gap, said when asked how the retailer is likely to fare with the new trend. "Gap has always done best when it participates in culture, and flare jeans and pants are an example of that."- THE WASHINGTON POST/BLOOMBERG NEWS SERVICE R Award of Excellence Designer: Waleed Rabin C section ex life & ra style w w w.t i m e s o f o m a n . c o m s at U R day, m ay 1 4 , 2 0 1 1 MALARIA ERADICATION Researchers have identified a bug that nips malaria in the bud by halting the development of the parasite, plasmodium falciparum, that causes it.>C12 Researchers say increased screen time may be a consequence of ADHD, but fear it may be a cause, as well. T he mother had brought in a note from her son's elementary school teacher: Dear doctor, I think this child needs to be tested for attention deficit disorder. "She's worried about how he can't sit still in school and do his work," the mother said. "He's always getting into trouble." But then she brightened. "But he can't have attention deficit, I know that." Why? Her son could sit for hours concentrating on video games, it turned out, so she was certain there was nothing wrong with his attention span. It's an assertion I've heard many times when a child has attention problems. Sometimes parents make the same point about television: My child can sit and watch for hours -- he can't have ADHD. In fact, a child's ability to stay focused on a screen, though not anywhere else, is actually characteristic of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. There are complex behavioural and neurological connections linking screens and attention, and many experts believe that these children do spend more time playing video games and watching television than their peers. But is a child's fascination with the screen a cause or an effect of attention problems -- or both? It's a complicated question that researchers are still struggling to tease out. The kind of concentration that children bring to video games and television is not the kind they need to thrive in school or elsewhere in real life, according to Dr Christopher Lucas, associate professor of child psychiatry at New York University School of Medicine. "It's not sustained attention in the absence of rewards," he said. "It's sustained attention with frequent intermittent rewards." The child may be playing for points accumulated, or levels achieved, but the brain's reward may be the release of the neurotransmitter dopamine. Children with ADHD may find video games even more gratifying than other children do because their dopamine reward circuitry may be otherwise deficient. Study Indeed, at least one study has found that when children with ADHD were treated with methylphenidate (Ritalin), which increases dopamine activity in the brain, they played video games less. The authors suggested that video games might serve as a kind of self-medication for these children. So increased screen time may be a consequence of ADHD, but some researchers fear it may be a cause, as well. Some studies have found that children who spend more time in front of the screen are more likely to develop attention problems later on. In a 2010 study in the journal Paediatrics, viewing more television and playing more video games were associated with subsequent attention problems in both schoolchildren and college undergraduates. The stimulation that video games provide "is really about the pacing, how fast the scene changes per minute," said Dr Dimitri Christakis, a paediatrician at the University of Washington School of Medicine who studies children and media. If a child's brain gets habituated to that pace and to the extreme alertness needed to keep responding and winning, he said, the child ultimately may "find the realities of the world underwhelming, understimulating." But a 2007 study in the journal Media Psychology compared television watching in a group of children diagnosed with ADHD and a group without. The researchers conclud- This inability to see causal relations may affect this social problem we've known for 30 years. These kids have dramatic social problems. They're highly rejected by their peers Richard Milich Professor of Psychology ed that most differences were accounted for by family factors and environment, including whether the children had televisions in their bedrooms. ADHD by itself didn't seem to make the difference. Connection The connections between ADHD and screens, the authors concluded, were complex. Elizabeth Lorch, a professor of psychology at the University of Kentucky and one of the authors of that study, also studied children's ability to comprehend televised stories. While children with ADHD were able to recall facts from the stories they watched just as well as other children, there was a difference in their ability to understand the narrative and to separate out what was important. "Why did an event happen, why did a character do this -- that's where the comprehension and recall of children with ADHD tends to fall down," she said. Her co-author Richard Milich, also a professor of psychology at the University of Kentucky, suggested that besides the primary implications of this problem for academic performance, this finding may also shed light on social difficulties. "This inability to see causal relations may affect this social problem we've known for 30 years," he said. "These kids have dramatic social problems. They're highly rejected by their peers." It may be a self-perpetuating loop, experts say: Children who have trouble with their social skills may be thrown back even more to the screen for electronic companionship. Children whose brains need neurochemical rewards seek out an activity that provides it. Children with social problems spend more time alone, facing a screen. Children struggling in the classroom develop mastery in a virtual world. I talk to parents of children with ADHD about basic dos and don'ts: No screens in the child's bedroom. Pay attention to the content of the games, especially to violence. Set limits on screen time, and look for other ways to manage family interactions. If I can't tell parents what they hope to hear, at least I can argue that these children's fascination with the glowing screen may teach us something about their brains, the neurobiology, the rewards, and even the yearning and learning. - Perri Klass/THE NEW YORK TIMES NEWS SERVICE Award of Excellence Designer: Waleed Rabin b8 t h u r s day, J u N E 2 , 2 0 1 1 ETCETEra iven that nine months of her year is taken up shooting Gossip Girl, Blake Lively has to be very choosy about the one film a year she is able to make. this year the actress has joined the superhero bandwagon, playing Carol Ferris in The Green Lantern. the film stars ryan reynolds as hal Jordan, the first human to be invited to join a group of immortals charged with using willpower to protect the universe. Ferris is the VP of Ferris aircraft and hal's long-term love interest. she becomes the supervillain star sapphire. however it's likely that the villain plot narrative will play more prominence in a sequel should the first film be successful. the 23-year-old actress, it seems, is trying to broaden her following away from the prominently female audience of Gossip Girl, in which she plays an upper East sider, serena van der Woodsen, who is trying to change her wild ways. she is earmarked to be one of the big stars of the coming decade, and director Martin Campbell, who directed Casino Girl, has admitted that Warner Brothers were very keen that he should cast the tall, leggy star opposite reynolds. despite all talk of career trajectories and fan base, Lively insists her choices are made through far more simple criteria: "People often ask me whose career I look at or would I like mine to be like, or if I want to break out of this or that genre and if the role I'm about to do can help me do that." she recounts, when asked about playing in a comic-book film: "It's not really a suitable question because the decisions I make on parts come from a far more emotional place. It has to be a character that I connect will or someone I can have empathy with." the actress also adds that it helps if the part is not like her character on Gossip Girl, "I think it's important to play different roles because you want to challenge yourself; you want to experience new things and never get in a rut. When you are in a tV show, you play the same character every day, and so when you get the opportunity to play something different it's that much more exciting because it's not like you are going from film to film." In last year's The Town she played a poor single mother from the wrong side of the tracks. the actress has a six-season contract on Gossip Girl and, having just completed season four, is happy when she can refute the claim that in real life she is just like serena. "I wear pretty clothes and live in New york so people think I'm very similar to her; they see her talk and interact in their homes once a week and they probably assume that is who I am, but it's not me." Instead she insists she's far more homely, preferring to cook and go on walks. she also claims to be great at decorating, although she doesn't have much chance to pursue these hobbies. Nonetheless, Lively is a girl who lives up to her name. On both occasions I've met her she has been easy to chat with and seems to enjoy the benefits that come with appearing in one of the most popular shows on television. as she walks in she looks immaculate in a dress and high heels. When commented on, she explains: "But none of it is mine. It's nice to play dress-up, it's like being a little girl and putting on make up and outfits. I grew up in Burbank (California) and I love living in New york City so much (because of the shopping) and I now have a way better wardrobe." One of the downsides to fame is that she has become the focus of paparazzi. the latest gossip swirling the Internet has linked her with Leonardo diCaprio after a picture of them walking in Italy was taken last weekend. a couple of months ago the rumour mill had her attached to ryan Gosling. It seems that life is imitating art as tongues get wagging on every occasion she is out with a beau, no matter what the nature of their relationship. the actress became single when she broke up with her Gossip Girl co-star Penn Badgley last October. her representatives shot down rumours that the romance was back on last month. so it's a surprise that Lively is not as damning on the paparazzi as one might expect. It's hard to complain about gossip when it's the modus operandi of her show. she says: "It makes sense to draw parallels between the show and what goes on in my real life. the G characters on the show are somewhat famous in the world that they inhabit and they make stuff up and people are documenting what they do all the time and so being in the tabloids no doubt helps keep our ratings high, and if we don't like it, I'm sure our producers don't mind." the paparazzi do overstep the mark on occasion and Lively has her share of horror stories, recounting how she was happy that photos of her on vacation only appeared after she returned home, as to have known photographers were watching her would have ruined her break, and how paparazzi will pay off customs to find out what hotel she's staying in. she's wary about her image and tries to be careful in public so as not to be shot in compromising positions. It's easy to see why, given how a slew of stars courted as the next big thing such as Lindsay Lohan and Mischa Barton have seen their careers slide. she says: "I was raised in a very rounded family from the south and never much of a party girl, and if I were I would think of the obligations that I have to young girls, because I feel that there are not too many great role models, although now some are emerging. In the last few years the paparazzi have played out the lives of these girls for everyone to see, and so many people make mistakes at that age in our lives and it all takes place in front of the camera." the actress comes from an acting family. her father was an actor and mother an acting coach and it was one of her siblings, her brother, who encouraged Lively to act when she'd set her heart on going to college at stanford. Ideas of college have been put on the back-burner and the actress admits that she wouldn't know what she would study if she were to do so. "I've already got a profession, so it would have to be a subject that allowed me to generally learn more," she muses. One of the benefits of being on the show is that her peers are all going through similar processes. "a lot of our cast have had great successes not only in our work as actors but also we have incredible musicians in our midst. It's really amazing because we are all really young, to be able to share that and to do that all with each other, it's been like our own college experience." One of her favourite experiences on Gossip Girl was shooting the first two episodes of season four in Paris last July. she says: "It was amazing to shoot in Paris. We shoot in Manhattan all the time, which is such a great place. Paris is just magical: the culture, the history that you see at every turn is really unbelievable. Growing up in La, the thing we are most proud of is made in the 1980s. In Paris there was this one building they told me had been there in the seventies, and I said, `that looks very old', and they added, `the 1570s'. One of the reasons I love living in New york so much is that it has more of a European feel than California because there is more culture and history. the icing on the cake was being there during couture fashion week." she recently has done a spot of designing herself. she was one of 10 celebrities, alongside Karl Lagerfeld, Lady Gaga, Nicole Kidman and Gwyneth Paltrow, to create t-shirts for uniqlo, with the proceeds benefiting the Japanese red Cross. she created a picture of a butterfly with the Japanese flag in its wings that sat above the slogan, `just when the caterpillar thought the world was over, it became a butterfly'. Given her model looks it's no surprise that she has been employed by Chanel to promote their Mademoiselle bags. Karl Lagerfeld shot the adverts that first appeared in March. Lively dyed her hair red recently to play a role in hick alongside Chloe Moretz and alex Baldwin. In keeping with her desire to play completely different roles, she plays a southern woman who is also a meth addict and the mother of 13-year-old Moretz. It seems that the actress just can't avoid creating gossip. - Kaleem Aftab/THE INDEPENDENT A lot of our cast have had great successes not only in our work as actors but also we have incredible musicians in our midst. It's really amazing because we are all really young, to be able to share that and to do that all with each other, it's been like our own college experience k chic manhattan `Gossip Girl' made Blake Lively a star. And now the actress has made the show's location her home. Here she tells about her new turn as a big-screen super-villain in `The Green Lantern' Award of Excellence Designer: Waleed Rabin c4 wednesday, november 2, 2011 FEATURE rage against the dvr machine There are 160 million so-called set-top boxes in the United States, one for every two people, and that number is rising... as well as the energy consumption. T hose little boxes that usher cable signals and digital recording capacity into televisions have become the single largest electricity drain in many Us homes, with some typical home entertainment configurations eating more power than a new refrigerator and even some central air-conditioning systems. There are 160 million so-called set-top boxes in the United states, one for every two people, and that number is rising. many homes now have one or more basic cable boxes as well as add-on dvrs, or digital video recorders, which use 40 per cent more power than the set-top box. one high-definition dvr and one high-definition cable box use an average of 446 kilowatt hours a year, about 10 per cent more than a 21cubic-foot energy-efficient refrigerator, a recent study found. These set-top boxes are energy hogs mostly because their drives, tuners and other components are generally running full tilt, or nearly so, 24 hours a day even when not in active use. The recent study, by the natural resources defence Council, concluded that the boxes consumed $3 billion in electricity per year in the United states -- and 66 per cent of that power is wasted when no one is watching and shows are not being recorded. That is more power than the state of maryland uses over 12 months. "People in the energy efficiency community worry a lot about these boxes, since they will make it more difficult to lower home energy use," said John wilson, a former member of the California energy Commission, now with the san Francisco-based energy Foundation. "Companies say it can't be done, or it's too expensive. but in my experience, neither one is true. It can be done, and it often doesn't cost much, if anything." The perpetually "powered on" state is largely a function of design and programming choices made by electronics companies and cable and Internet providers, which are related to the way cable networks currently function in the United states. Fixes exist, but they are not currently being mandated or deployed in the United states, critics say. similar devices in some european countries, for example, can automatically go into standby mode when not in use, cutting power drawn by half. They can also go into an optional "deep sleep," which can reduce energy consumption by about 95 per cent compared to when the machine is active. one british company, Pace, sells such boxes to Us providers, who do not take advantage of the reduced energy options because of worries that the lowest energy states could disrupt service. Cable companies say customers will not tolerate the time it takes to reboot the system once the system has been shut down or put to sleep. "The issue of having more efficient equipment is of interest to us," said Justin venech, a spokesman for Time warner Cable. but, he added, "when we purchase the equipment, functionality and cost are the primary considerations." Technical fixes but energy efficiency experts say that technical fixes could eliminate or minimise the waiting time and inconvenience, some at little expense. Low-energy european systems reboot from deep sleep in one to two minutes. alan meier, a scientist at Lawrence berkeley national Laboratory, said of the industry in the United states, "I don't want to use the word `lazy,' but they have had different priorities, and saving energy is not one of them." The environmental Protection agency has established energy star standards for set-top boxes, and has plans to tighten them significantly by 2013, said ann bailey, director of energy star product labelling, in an email. The voluntary seal indicates products that use energy efficiently. but today, there are many boxes on the list of products that meet the energy star standard that do not offer an automatic standby or sleep mode. "If you hit the on/off button it only dims the clock, it doesn't significantly reduce power use," said noah Horowitz, senior scientist at the natural resources council. energy efficiency is a function of hardware, software, the cable network and how a customer uses the service, said robert Turner, an engineer at Pace, which makes set-top boxes that can operate using less power while not in active use. sometimes energy efficiency can be vastly improved by remotely adjusting software over a cable, Turner said. In this way, Pace reduced the energy consumption of some of its older boxes by half. -- ELISABETH ROSENTHAL/ The New York Times News Service Award of Excellence Designer: Waleed Rabin C10 t u e s day, M a r c h 1 5, 2 0 1 1 EXTRA Researchers have been able to strengthen memories formed well in the past using a brain substance involved in anchoring and maintaining the memory in the first place RetRieving memoRies F or years scientists have dreamed of developing a genuine memory booster, a drug that could tune the brain's biological search engine so that it's better at retrieving not only recently learned facts, like last night's dinner menu, but details that seem all but lost in the fog of time, like childhood classmates' names and antics. Such a substance would have obvious appeal -- for people at risk of dementia, to name just one group -- but the search has been very slow going. Stimulants like caffeine and nicotine can sharpen the memory, but like other temporary enhancers, they need to be taken when the information is learned or retrieved to make a difference. Now, researchers in Israel and New York report that they have been able to strengthen memories formed well in the past, using a brain substance involved in anchoring and maintaining the memory in the first place. The finding, reported last week in the journal Science, is one of two recent studies in which neuroscientists used molecules active in memory formation to, in effect, goose the system and improve recall. Both studies were conducted in rats, which provide a very rough model for human memory. "The idea that an older memory can be strengthened is a novel and exciting finding," said Jim McGaugh, a neuroscientist at the University of California, Irvine, who was not involved in the research. "But it also raises the question: How does this work? And, does it apply to all memories?" In the study published last week, researchers at the Weizmann Institute of Science in Rehovot, Israel, and the SUNY Downstate Medical Centre in New York found that giving rats an infusion of an enzyme known to be active in storing memories strongly sharpened their aversion to drinking a sweet liquid. The animals had learned, six days earlier, that the liquid could make them sick. Six days is a long time for a rat, said Todd C. Sacktor, a neuroscientist at SUNY Downstate and an author of the paper. "For years we thought that once a memory goes into longterm storage, no one could do anything with it; it would just gradually fade. Well, apparently that's not true." The researchers argue the substance they injected may act on almost any memory that the brain tries to retrieve while the drug is active. "It is unlikely that such memory, though enhanced, will not be subjected so some processes of weakening over time," another of the authors, Yadin Dudai of the Weizmann Institute, said in an e-mail. "We do not think that we will be able to create the analogue of Funes, that famous fictional protagonist of Jorge Luis Borges who remembered forever every detail he ever encountered." In a paper published several weeks earlier, however, researchers at Mount Sinai School of Medicine showed they could make a specific memory last a long time -- again, by using a brain substance involved in the initial learning. Rats that received an injection of the substance, called a growth factor, immediately after learning how to avoid a foot shock in their cage retained a memory of the experience that was as fresh a week or more later as on the first day. "This is a substance that's involved in the natural regulation of memory consolidation, and an injection significantly slows down forgetting," said Cristina M. Alberini, a neuroscientist at Mount Sinai and a co-author of the earlier study, published in the journal Nature. Turning these findings into useful drugs is another matter altogether, experts say. Researchers still have little idea of how these experimental drugs sharpen memories, whether they affect only specific memories, or what the risks are. "I've been working on memory enhancement since 1957, and I don't know of a single drug that came out of work with animals that was later developed for humans," said McGaugh. "It's very interesting work; now let's see where it goes." -- Benedict Carey/THE NEW YORK TIMES NEWS SERVICE Award of Excellence Designer: Waleed Rabin B SECTION ex life & ra style W W W.T I M E S O f O M a N . C O M W E D N E S Day, M ay 2 5, 2 0 1 1 BAND AND THE BULGE! Gastric band is becoming a quick fix for the overweight. People are opting for surgery instead of trying to shed pounds through dieting but experts are divided over the benefits... >B11 Top of The pops Popcorn is becoming a major hit as em beyond cin althy � with a he and makeover ing ow mind-bl urs new flavo hether it's party time or snack time, there is only one word on everyone's lips; only one snack in everyone's mouth this summer: popcorn. The puffed-up kernel of corn has moved out of the cinema-screen gloom and into the party-circuit limelight, thanks to a transformation of flavour and calorie content of which even Heston Blumenthal might approve. Popcorn is suddenly hot. And it's keeping some very exalted company. At a party thrown by modish auction house Phillips de Pury recently, instead of foie gras and caviar, sleek packets of Metcalfe's wasabi-flavoured popcorn went around on the waiters' trays. And at JW Anderson's last menswear show, models were given packs of ultra-light, air-popped snack to nibble on when not on the catwalk. And now Marks & Spencer, the great barometer of middle-class esteem, has become the first supermarket to launch its own "gourmet range", which includes such unconventional flavours as curried coconut & black onion seed, chocolate & paprika and salted caramel. "We first spotted big-flavoured, low-fat popcorn in San Francisco last year," says Matt McAuliffe, M&S product development manager and the man who masterminded the souped-up snack's move into M&S stores. "As we are such a nation of cinemagoers, we knew it was likely to suit British palates. Though we've given it an adventurous flavour makeover, while keeping the salt and calorie content as low as possible." Indeed, so low-cal is the new-style popcorn -- which is mostly made by popping kernels of corn in warm air, rather than the traditional oil popping method -- Weight Watchers has recommended one of the new brands, Diva Gourmet Popcorn (4g fat, 100 calories per 23g bag), to its flock of dieters. "They're a great snack to eat between meals or could be just the ticket to eat with your sandwich at lunch instead of crisps," advises Laia Farran Graves in the group's latest missive on snacking. Sandwich chain Pret a Manger have tapped into demand for a healthy lunchtime snack, too. Brightly coloured packets of `skinny topcorn' now nestle alongside the stores' parsnip, beetroot and carrot crisps (themselves pioneering products when they launched in the late 1990s) in the chain's 160 UK stores. "Our skinny Topcorn responded to the British consumers' desire for innovative takes on old favourites, in a similar way to our crisp flavours and they have proven a real best seller," says Sandy Collyer, Head of Food at Pret. "Topcorn is tasty, while also being low fat, so is great for snackers and fitness fanatics." While the sumptuous coating on some brands can nudge up the calorie-counter to crisp-like levels, on the whole the new tide of popcorn brands have a first-rate nutritional profile. So good in fact, that start-up company Peter Popple Popcorn is marketing its wholegrain fruit chutney and golden syrup flavours (both contain 1.6g fat, 79 calories per 20g) as a children's lunchbox filler. "Whether you're looking for party food or a snack for the children, popcorn is just the thing: it's full of vitamin B and E, has a low GI number and has a similar quantity of fibre as the equivalent weight of whole-wheat pasta," says Louise George, the brains behind the brand. It is not, however, just children and health-conscious snackers it appeals to. The higher reaches of foodie-land have cottoned on to popcorn's potential too. The ABC Kitchen in New York has had popcorn ice cream on its dessert menu since 2009. And, in London, Joel Atunes, head chef at Brasserie Joel at the Park Plaza Hotel, Westminster Bridge, has been using popcorn in his dishes since last November. "I put popcorn custard and ice cream on the children's menu last year as a bit of fun, but we had so many adults asking for it that I moved it onto the main menu; now we sell between 60-80 dishes every week. I also serve corn soup with popcorn and truffle oil from time to time -- that flies, too." says Atunes. "I'm 48 now and I really want to have fun cooking � and popcorn is a versatile, creative food. And, more importantly, it's fun to serve up to my diners." Perhaps that's why we've fallen so deeply, and so quickly, in love with the popping corn kernel's newest incarnation: it's the ultimate guilt-free, fun food. You can nibble daintily on individual pieces of it, or grab great handfuls and funnel them into your mouth; you can serve it as nibbles with your martinis, or use it as a base for some interesting culinary creativity. And, if you choose your brand wisely, you needn't worry about your waistline. Food blogger and linchpin of the London supper club scene James Ramsden certainly thinks that's why we can't get enough of it: "It's so adaptable, so evocative of fun. It's great to see people updating and reinventing it. "I had a smoked butter popcorn the other day and it was absolutely fantastic. It beats a bag of crisps handsdown."- THE INDEPENDENT W Award of Excellence Designer: Waleed Rabin B4 S AT U R DAY, M AY 2 8, 2 0 1 1 FEATURE There are also pages devoted to deactivating accounts, but perhaps they aren't numerous because would-be posters have already left the site. `I am gonna deactivate my account today OMG!' has only 27 members, while `How would your life change if the Facebook was deactivated for one week?' has 132 tephen Widom tried to quit. Really. The 23year-old customer service representative from Rockland County, N.Y., gave it up four times, once for as long as a year. Like any obsession, though, the urge persisted. "Every couple of months I'll go back on it and immediately I feel all the negative aspects again." His addiction? Facebook. Widom says social networking was starting to affect how he made decisions. "I was doing things with Facebook in mind," he said. "I was like, `oh if I did this I could post it on Facebook and people would think I was cool.'" This time, he says, he's given it up for real. Facebook turned seven years old in March and now has 500 million active users, the company says, up from a million in 2004. Accounts are considered active if someone has logged on in the past 30 days. But what of users who don't want to be on Facebook? While numbers on them are hard to come by, there's plenty of anecdotal evidence to suggest they are out there. Much of it, ironically, is on Facebook. There are 550 Facebook groups and pages with the words "Facebook Addiction" in the title. The most popular, "I suffer from FAD -- `Facebook Addiction Disorder,'" has almost 35,000 "likes." It includes such (misspelled) posts as "most of us r suffering ..." or, under a picture of a black feline stretched across a keyboard, "Thyis is bad even my cat is addicted." There are also pages devoted to deactivating accounts, but perhaps they aren't numerous because would-be posters have already left the site. "I am gonna deactivate my S ALYSIA SANTO account today OMG!" has only 27 members, while "How would your life change if the Facebook was deactivated for one week?" has 132. And "I reckon if I deactivated Facebook, my life would also be deactivated" has 48 members; instead of a profile picture, it has a photo of a syringe with Facebook written on it. A glance at Google Trends, which tracks the most-searched terms on that search engine, shows that "Facebook addiction" has been climbing steadily since late 2008, when it first showed up as a trend. It is now four times what it was then. The term "deactivating Facebook" popped up on Google Trends a year ago, and is searched twice as frequently as Facebook addiction. Anyone who does want to leave Facebook ends up on a page that says "Are you sure you want to deactivate your account?" Below the question are pictures of the account holder with different friends, saying that "(Insert friend here) will miss you." Would-be Facebook deactivators must also provide a reason for leaving from a menu of choices. A spokesman for Facebook did not return e-mails requesting comment about deactivation trends. Morgan Waltrip, 23, hasn't joined any of these pages, although she has deactivated and reactivated her account about 30 times over the past six years. "You find yourself looking at people you don't want to see," she said. "When I got off it was like, ignorance is bliss." Every now and again, though, she felt compelled to reactivate for a few hours to see "what everyone was doing." She is now back on Facebook, reluctantly, with an unsearchable profile and uses her middle name instead of her last. "I control it now. I don't see things I don't care about." Brian Solis, a social media blogger, marketer and author, calls such cyclical account holders "super log-offs." "There are individuals who realise they must deactivate in order to have control over it again," says Solis, "The super log-off becomes a way of compartmentalising the experience. You come and go as you see necessary instead of it grabbing you." Michael Fenichel, a psychologist, author and the past-president of the International Society for Mental Health Online, says this on-Facebook-again, off-Facebook-again behaviour generally falls under the cat- This on-Facebook-again, off-Facebook-again behaviour generally falls under the category of impulse control disorders. It's an easy place to land your focus. Facebook is the most effective addiction-inducing total experience that's possible Michael Fenichel A psychologist and author egory of impulse control disorders. "It's an easy place to land your focus," adding that he sees Facebook as "the most effective addiction-inducing total experience that's possible." Facebook's very ubiquity can also influence people to leave the site. Ryan Beppel, a 23-year-old sound engineer, says he didn't like the loss of privacy he felt. "At first I was untagging everything, erasing all wall posts. I didn't even use Google for a while when I realised it saved your searches," he said. He has deactivated and rebooted his account seven times, in part because he might want to run for political office someday. "I hope I don't go back on," he says, "but I probably will." The common thread between those who quit and rejoin Facebook multiple times is their own uncertainty about the social price of not being on it. Corina Menagias, 19, says she reluctantly reactivated her account because of peer pressure, "Everyone kept saying `I can't talk to you, you're out of the loop.'" Menagias says she hopes she doesn't reactivate again, even though she recently came unprepared to an event at the hair school she attends because the invitation was sent out only via Facebook. "I came in without my makeup done and I looked like crap. People were like, `oops I forgot you didn't have it.'" Tiffany Jung, 22, a self-described addict, has taken down her account five times. "I have completed a four-hour-long Facebook session, felt disgusted with myself, then promptly deactivated my Facebook." She says is all depends on her mood at the time, "I'm sure I'll keep on going back and forth with it." -- The New York Times News Service Award of Excellence Designer: Winie Ariany B4 W E D N E S DAY, AU G U ST 24 , 2 0 1 1 FEATURE W CLOUD COMPUTING Data grows, and so do storage sites three per cent, or 4.5 million people, have at least nine different gadgets. If that seems to be a lot, think about this: a person may have a home computer and a work computer, and other members of the family may each have computers. Then count smartphones and tablets, and it's not hard to get to a large number of machines. "It just sort of clicked," Levie. "There ended up being a tremendous amount of interest." "Our vision is to simplify millions of peoples' lives," said Drew Houston, chief executive of Dropbox, where 25 million users upload files at the rate of 300 million a day. "You don't have to worry that you have some files on your Mac, some stuff on your work computer and then some more on your iPhone." Dropbox stores 100b files A growing number of people believe him. Dropbox stores 100 billion files on its servers. Box.net says it has six million users while Mozy says it has three million. Meanwhile, storage companies benefit financially from a constant decline in costs as servers and data storage devices get cheaper each year. Leasing server space is five to eight times cheaper than when Box.net started in 2005, Levie said. The sales pitch for online storage is that it lets users make changes to a Word file, for example, so that there is a single version available from both their work and home computers. It is a process known as synchronisation, or sync for short. Users can also collaborate on a documents with colleagues or share video clips and photos with friends. Many online storage services let users store a minimal amount of data free of charge. For more space, users pay up to $20 a month. (Dropbox gives users who enlist more customers additional storage.) Saved files are accessible from any Internet connected device. Backing up files is a side benefit. Users no longer risk losing their children's photos if they forget their mobile phone in a cab or their homework if their hard drive crashes. George Hamilton, an analyst with Yankee Group, said that online storage largely appealed to tech-oriented consumers, although it has been gaining more mainstream adoption recently. But one thing still gives most consumers the willies: security. While there are no known cases of purloined or exposed documents on these services, well-publicised hackings and thefts at big companies like Sony, RSA Security and the email marketing firm Epsilon Data Management worry the late adopters. "I wouldn't want to put anything with a Social Security number on a cloud-based storage service," said Hamilton. A security expert did recently complain to the Federal Trade Commission about how Dropbox encrypted files on its service. Dropbox's employees could get access to unencrypted files, he said, and he accused the company of failing to disclose this. Houston called the criticism a "rite of passage" and emphasised that Dropbox takes security very seriously, including prohibiting employees from rooting through user files. However, the company, like any other, must turn over data if it is legally required to do so. In general, Dropbox likens its protections to what banks and the military use. Files saved with Dropbox are encrypted during transmission to Amazon.com's servers, which the company leases. After reaching their destination, those files are divided into discrete blocks, no bigger than a few megabytes. Those blocks are then individually encrypted in storage. Flooded with competitors Houston says he saves nearly everything to Dropbox including copies of his driver's licence and passport. "I have five or six laptops, and they are totally interchangeable," he said. The field is flooded with competitors in part because no one company has a clear advantage in the market, which spans both consumers and business customers. Two months ago, Amazon introduced Cloud Drive for storing all kinds of files, including digital music. Cx.com, another service, premiered in January with financing from TomorrowVentures, a venture capital company controlled by Eric E. Schmidt, Google's chairman and former chief executive. Brad Robertson, chief executive of Cx.com, which has around 200,000 users and which is free as it tests its service, said he was not intimidated by all the competition. Focusing on security will help set his company apart from rivals, he said. "If you take search or email, or any feature where you have new products in the marketplace, you have a while before each one finds its uniqueness," said Robertson, whose company is based in Palo Alto, Calif. He acknowledged that eventually "some get gobbled up and go away." -- VERNE G. KOPYTOFF / The New York Times News Service hen people had only one or two computers, file sharing wasn't a big worry. Now, gaining access to personal files is a chore for people who own an arsenal of computers, smartphones and tablets. The annoyance of emailing documents to themselves or saving their work to a thumb drive has given new life to an old idea -- online storage. People simply save their Word documents, spreadsheets and photos in "the cloud," a Webbased file cabinet accessible from any device that has an Internet connection. A number of companies focused on online storage are quickly gaining users and attention. New investment is driving a boomlet in the niche business, adding to an already lengthy list of competitors: Dropbox, YouSendIt.com, Cx.com, Box.net, 4Shared and SpiderOak. Apple may do something similar with its iCloud service, to be introduced in June. Google began acclimating people to the notion of storing documents in the cloud with its Google Docs feature in 2005. And online backup or storage services like MobileMe from Apple, Windows Live SkyDrive from Microsoft, Mozy from EMC and SugarSync are now familiar. What's changed is that more people have discovered a need for them. Aaron Levie, chief executive of Box.net, an early online storage company based in Palo Alto, California, said that the increased adoption of mobile devices and ubiquity of online connections had created a bigger need for companies like his. Nearly 60 per cent of adults with online access own at least two Internet connected devices, according to Forrester Research. Just under Award of Excellence Designer: Srinivasa Rao Award of Excellence Designer: Osama Aljawish Award of Excellence Designer: Osama Aljawish Award of Excellence Designer: Antonio Farach 7 email@example.com 6 2010 2000 1851 () . . . : ( ) ( ) : ( ) . . 3,935 5,602 ( ) () � . 24,279 41,229 ( ) () 12 � 10 12 � 8 25 � 15 ( ) ( ) 5 3 6 � 4 50 - 30 ( ) ( ) () ( ) 70,024 102,794 () () () ( ) � 2 1 . : 2 . 40 3 "" . . . ."" . . . 1/3 1 . 1 1 2.5 . 1 4 5 . . ( 8) . ( 3) . 32 37 () 2 . 16 . ( 5) 25 1 . 4 2 5 . 3 . ( ) . : . ( ) ) ( . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . () . . . : Award of Excellence Designer: Antonio Farach


text:
Welcome To Spirit HalloweenX
Thank you for signing up to receive Spirit Halloween emails!
You will now be eligible to receive special email offers and discounts.
So Much Fun It's Scary!® - Only Days Until HALLOWEEN!
Water Princess
1 - 1 of 1
Sort by:
1 of 1
Sort by:
1 of 1
Related Categories: Hair Spray | Pink Hair | Pink Wig | Hairspray | Hair Color | Pink | Hair Color Spray | Colored Hairspray
Pink Hairspray
Think Pink! This temporary, colored pink hairspray will give you color to coordinate with your punk costume or princess costume, flash up your outfit for the club, or shock your friends on April Fools Day! Washes out easily with shampoo and water.
Sort by:
1 of 1
Sign Up Today & Receive Discounts, Exclusive Offers & Breaking News!
I agree to receive Spirit Halloween Superstores LLC's newsletter containing news, updates and promotions regarding Spirit Halloween Superstores LLC's products. You can withdraw your consent at any time. Please refer to our Privacy Policy or Contact Us for more details

subset: commoncrawl


text:
- Advertisement -
Dan Froomkin: Don't Blame The Supreme Court For Citizens United -- Blame Congress, The FEC And The IRSQuicklink submitted by Sheila Samples Permalink
Become a Fan
(39 fans)
|When people rail against Citizens United these days, they're often complaining about the candidate-specific super PACs that implausibly claim to be independent of the candidates they're backing, and the political slush funds that can accept unlimited secret donations by claiming to be issue-oriented nonprofits. They are things that could be fixed either legislatively, administratively, or both. But without a good shove, Congress, the Federal Election Commission and the Internal Revenue Service all appear unlikely to pursue solutions.
Read the rest of the story HERE:
At www.huffingtonpost.com
The time limit for entering new comments on this Quicklink has expired.
This limit can be removed. Our paid membership program is designed to give you many benefits, such as removing this time limit. To learn more, please click here.
|No comments