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Best viewed in "landscape" mode.
How to: Ship Speakers
warranty submissions - packing materials - packing lists
Shipping speaker parts properly is not very difficult, as long as you make sure there is enough padding material between the parts and the box to protect both from damage in transit.
There is a big difference, of course, in how you should pack old parts that are being replaced or completely rebuilt versus ones where some of their cone material is expected to be re-used (if they are to be refoamed, for example).
With "dead" parts, all that matters is that they not get bent and that the package does not tear or burst open. "Live" parts also must be packed in such a way that nothing is pressing on the remaining cone material.
"Dead" parts can be placed in the packaging in any convenient way that ensures that no metal on any of the parts can hit any of the others. This is done by making sure there is at least an inch of packing material between all edges of any parts. In addition, there should be at least two inches of packing material between the edge of any part and the outer carton.
With pairs of woofers a good trick is to bolt or zip-tie them face to face. Then wrap them up with bubble wrap and stuff the rest of the shipping box with packing material.
If you use styrofoam peanuts for packing, be sure to wrap the parts in heavy plastic or bubble wrap to keep the bits out of the speaker's guts.
The carton itself should be made of corrugated cardboard. Single wall will be sufficient, but double wall is always better. New boxes are much better than used ones.
warranty submissions - packing materials - packing lists
Shipping complete speaker systems.
Speaker systems (the entire cabinet with all its components installed) are bulky, heavy, and rather delicate, so packing them for shipping requires planning and care.
First, the speaker should be enclosed in a plastic bag, to prevent abrasion or sticking from internal padding material, and to prevent any liquid contaminants in the freight vehicles from reaching the goods.
Second, there should be at least three inches of good shock absorbing packing material between the product and the outer carton. The only exception to this is some original packaging which uses multi-layer corrugated cardboard around all the corners, top, and bottom, and is still in good shape. Even then, "overboxing" that carton with another one to allow a couple more inches of protection is a very good idea, since there is no way of knowing if the carton was designed for individual shipping as opposed to travelling on pallets.
The outer carton should be made of double-wall corrugated cardboard, that has not been shipped before. Previous shipment reduces the impact absorbing and weight carrying capabilities of corrugated cartons. One good new box should be adequate for two trips, but more is beginning to take chances.
warranty submissions - packing materials - packing lists
All packages should be insured for the amount it would take to replace the contents if the package is lost or damaged. In some cases there is a bit of guesswork involved here, since we are often sending products that have not been on the market for a long time. In that case, you should pick a figure that is some sort of compromise based on how much it would take to buy something like it new, and how much it would take to replace it by buying something used and perhaps having it made "like new" by me.
When damage does occur in shipping, there are some important guidelines to follow. First and foremost, all packaging materials should be retained. This is how the carrier can determine that the goods were properly packed. Then, it is typical that whoever shipped the package has to do the paperwork, and is the one reimbursed for the loss - this is because they are the one who bought the insurance. Usually the carrier will want the entire package, contents and packing material, to examine and possibly return to the shipper. Then the shipper makes their claim for loss and follows up with whatever steps are appropriate.
warranty submissions - packing materials - packing lists
Warranty submissions, specifically, items sent back to me to be replaced or repaired under the HUMAN Speakers warranty, should be packed very carefully. This is so that when they arrive here, they will have nothing else wrong with them except the reason you are sending them in. This makes it so I can determine what might have happened to them, to improve future quality and perhaps advise on how to avoid the problem in the future. Also, if they are repairable, all I have to do is fix the problem. Equally important, sometimes there is nothing wrong with the suspect part, and the problem lies elsewhere. It would be a shame to damage a good part shipping it back to be tested and remedied.
I do not require that you obtain an "RMA" prior to returning warranty claims, or even that you contact me first, but please follow these packaging and shipping guidelines carefully. Also, please be sure to include a clear explanatory note with full contact information on your packing list.
warranty submissions - packing materials - packing lists
Packing materials are generally the stuff you use to protect the parts in the box from damage due to dropping and collisions with other heavy packages in shipping - which will be guaranteed to occur.
"Popcorn" or "peanuts" - styrofoam bits - are not too bad, if your packed materials won't shift around and are in a bag so the plastic bits don't get stuck to them, in them, and all around them. Please, if you ship drivers to me in this packing material, put them in bags so I dont have to pick out the styrofoam pieces one by one!
Crumpled paper is very good, but there must be enough of it. It holds things in place well, but must be packed fairly tightly. The nice thing about this is that we all have newspaper lying around to use. Well, we should, anyway.
Bubble wrap also works very well, especially when first wrapped around the item(s) and taped securely. Then the remaining space can be filled with any of the materials listed here.
The latest thing I have seen in packing material are sort of like giant bubble wraps - large inflated plastic bag-like things. Although these have their place in the shipping universe, and probably save a lot in materials and recycling efforts, they are not ideal for packing speaker parts. Speaker parts tend to have sharp edges, and are usually quite heavy. Once one or two of these plastic bag things have been punctured by that heavy, sharp-edged speaker, the entire contents become loose and free to move around, perhaps getting damaged. One place they will work is if the parts are well-wrapped first in bubble wrap to protect the larger bag things from all sharp edges. One other drawback to them is that I cannot "safely" recycle them - that is, use them in packages I am shipping out - so I have to throw them away.
All the other packing materials listed here can be reused many times, which I make a point of doing to minimize waste.
All packages should be sealed and taped properly.
warranty submissions - packing materials - packing lists
You should always create a "packing list" with:
- the destination address
- return address and contact information,
- list of contents of the entire shipment
- contents of this particular package if there is more than one
- directions for the work to be done
A copy of this packing list should be attached to the outside of each package and labeled as such, and a copy should be enclosed inside each carton.
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Top - Contact
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EPI and Epicure - Genesis Physics
Prices can change and specifications will improve without notice


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How do you clean for a fungal infection/mites (the vet isn't sure what it is).
I've already cleaned the bedding with detergent along with some vinegar.
Should I re-wash them and use a tiny amount of bleach instead?
And with the actual cage, should I use a tiny bit of bleach mixed with water to clean it? Or will the usual vinegar and water suffice?

subset: commoncrawl


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July 22, 2013
Links: Australian Glass and the Pacific Northwest at Museum of Glass
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Drama, Comedy
At "Prom," every couple has a story and no two are exactly alike. Several intersecting stories unfold at one high school as the big dance approaches. "Prom" portrays the precarious passage from high school to independence as some relationships unravel and others ignite. For Nova Prescott, it's a battle of wills as she finds herself drawn to the guy who gets in the way of her perfect prom. Fellow seniors Mei and Tyler harbor secrets, while others face all the insecurity and anticipation that surrounds one of high school's most seminal events. There are hundreds of nights in high school, but there's only one "Prom."
Rated PG for mild language and a brief fight.
Visit the official site
Cast: Jonathan Keltz, Dean Norris, Aimee Teegarden, Nicholas Braun, Danielle Campbell
Produced by:
Directed by: Joe Nussbaum
Written by: Katie Wech
Running time: 1hr 43min
Opens: Apr 29, 2011 Nationwide


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Arch Campbell on Prometheus
June 7, 2012 - 06:08 pm
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Prometheus raises the bar on sci-fi horror. Noomi Repace plays a passionate scientist hoping to discover the origin of creation. Instead, she finds an abandoned spaceship on a distant planet full of oozy things.
Arch Campbell has a full review.
Would you like to contribute to this story? Join the discussion.


text: Guitar Walk at Cavenaugh Park WEBSITE ADD TO Trip Planner A 115-ft-long by 40-ft-wide guitar, based on an Epiphone Casino played by John Lennon, honors the musicians that played along the nearby Rock 'N Roll Highway 67 plus the stop by The Beatles in Walnut Ridge in 1964.It features nine plaques dedicated to some of the country's musical legends, including Conway Twitty, Johnny Cash, Elvis Presley, Jerry Lee Lewis, Sonny Burgess and Billy Lee Riley. Others added periodically. Get Directions Gas Calculator Details Website: http://www.rock67.com/guitar-walk Phone: 501-412-6497 Email: email@example.com Address: 110 SW 2nd StreetWalnut Ridge, AR 72476 Things to Do In Walnut Ridge EXPLORE


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(770) 977-1111
1827 Powers Ferry Road SE, 16-200, Atlanta, GA 30339 map »
Numerous phone calls & e-mails to Chris Farris, Proj Mgr were ignored. One year after the exterior work was completed the paint began to peel, carpentry work they performed was poor quality. Chris... never responded to requests to send at least one crew member back to our home to fix some of the problems despite the 5-year warranty.VIEW MORE »VIEW LESS »
We had panda paint our home's exterior and I have to say it was the easiest time I've had dealing with home improvement. The crew was early everyday and worked like the dickens until dark. I couldnt... believe how quickly the whole house was finished. The best part is I found that their pricing is very reasonable. I will absolutely recommend panda painting to anyone looking for an easy, affordable company to work with.VIEW MORE »VIEW LESS »
Reviews: 1
Posted on: 3/19/2013
I couldn't have asked for a better job. The painting is perfect, the trim really stands out and there was no clean up for me to do. I am extremely happy with the crew. They were efficient, on-time and took great pains to understand what I wanted and that it was done to my satisfaction. I would highly recommend panda to anyone!!
Reviews: 2
Posted on: 5/25/2015
Numerous phone calls & e-mails to Chris Farris, Proj Mgr were ignored. One year after the exterior work was completed the paint began to peel, carpentry work they performed was poor quality. Chris never responded to requests to send at least one crew member back to our home to fix some of the problems despite the 5-year warranty.
We had panda paint our home's exterior and I have to say it was the easiest time I've had dealing with home improvement. The crew was early everyday and worked like the dickens until dark. I couldnt believe how quickly the whole house was finished. The best part is I found that their pricing is very reasonable. I will absolutely recommend panda painting to anyone looking for an easy, affordable company to work with.
Reviews: 1
Posted on: 2/2/2015
I've been flipping houses for around 5 years and I've always used Panda to do any and all painting and repairs. They always come within budget and stay on the job until they are finished. I really don't have to check on them anymore, as I know that everything will be done correctly. I highly recommend Panda and other people I've referred have all been very pleased as well.
Panda painting was recommended by a real estate agent. Painting was sloppy, holes were not filled, closets missed, doors missed. Started painting with wrong color, then made me pay to correct their mistake. One week after exterior finished, it's already starting to peel. Trying to reach their project manager is a joke. No response to email, full voice mail box... you get the idea. Find another painter
Reviews: 1
Posted on: 5/13/2014
Great group of people to work with......work was completed in a timely fashion and would use their services again.
My house was in dire need of a paint job. It had a lot of fading and peeling paint, a paint job was long over due. I called around and got several quotes. I selected Panda Painting because I though that they would do the best job and they were right in the middle for cost among all the quotes I got. The Crew was very professional and did and very good job. It looks like the house was torn down and rebuilt new! When it is time to paint again, I will without a doubt call on Panda Painting again!
Reviews: 1
Posted on: 5/9/2014
Panda painting was referred to me by a neighbor, and I have to say that I couldn't be happier with the customer service and the paint job. Chris was responsive to my questions and concerns, and the crew leader Alfonso was great as well. I'm not sure how the negative review below could be for the same company, because I have nothing but great things to say about Panda. I would happily refer them to friends and family. I've posted some shots below of before and after. The house was originally the cr�me and tan color you see, and was then painted a cool neutral blue with an off-white trim. Give Panda a try. You'll be happy you did!
I'm not one to give much credence to online reviews, however I just wanted to let everyone know how pleased we are with panda painters! There were four of us in the neighborhood who had our houses painted this past week. Panda sent 2 crews to take care of our houses. The workers were quiet and stayed on task for the duration of the job. Everything that was to be done was explained up front and the field manager was by multiple times to make sure we knew what was going on. I don't know about my neighbors, but I know that I will be hiring them to paint some rooms inside this spring! Thanks again Panda!
Reviews: 12
Posted on: 5/2/2014
Do not waste your money. Everything they state on their website is a lie. Don�t be fooled by the 5yr warranty. I live in the Gwinnett County area. Chris sent a crew to paint the exterior of my home in May of 2013. I never saw Chris at any time during the work process. The painting crew came and left quickly, cutting every corner. The caulking they used only lasted about 6 months. Months later the paint was peeling on my garage and I noticed wood rot on the siding that they painted over. They never painted the windows, or replaced the damaged wood (which was in the written agreement). My mistake was paying them and assuming they did what they were supposed to. I called Chris and he became very defensive. He also conveniently lost my service agreement. I have made every attempt to contact him. When he does return my calls He says he will come out to fix it but he cancels every appointment. I have heard every excuse from him. The latest cancellation was due to his stomach virus. I have been trying to get them to come out for two months now. I paid a lot of money for horrible service. He is very unprofessional! This company has the absolute worse customer service I have ever experienced. I would never use this company again nor would I recommend them to anyone! Stay away from this company!
We just had our exterior home painted by Raul�s crew. They were very professional. We had some dry rotted and moisture damage and that was corrected to perfection. We are so pleased with the outcome and the quality of all work preformed. I would not hesitate to use Panda painting again but only if Raul and his crew would do the work.
I have an historic home here in Atlanta that was in dire need of some TLC. I needed a full paint job, and lots of wood needed to be replaced. I received 4 quotes and Panda was the most thorough and fell right in the middle with all my other quotes. What really made me decide to use them was that they were the only ones, I felt, that really understood the prep process that was going to be needed. I must say, I was ultimately impressed with how they went about this! All the sanding and scraping and cleaning was exactly what I was looking for. The colors I picked look fantastic. My home looks like it probably did when it was built. I really like that I didn't have to pay anything until the job was finished, so I felt comfortable that it was going to be done correctly. We did a walk through with the crew chief and the crew hung around to take care of any little spot we found. Actually, the crew chief found all the "touch up" spots, so I knew he wanted it to be done right! I will definitely be using them for my interior work (when I can afford it), and I will tell you this: If you're looking for honest, hard working guys, Panda Painting is the company for YOU!
On 09-09-2013, I received a sales call from a guy who said he was representing Panda Painting. His phone number was 770-980-4052 and the Caller "Pan P". I told him that I did not except sales calls and his response was to laugh at me. I have been on the do not call list for years. He should have checked that before he called me. We have never done business and I will try to keep it that way. Are you tired of Telemarketers? Then don't do business with this company.
Reviews: 1
Posted on: 8/5/2013
I am really pleased with the project I hired Panda to do. I took four estimates from different companies originally, and thought that the one from Panda was the most detailed, and thorough. They actually took the time to write it up on a form, when everyone else emailed it to me days later. Panda gave me theirs on site! I also liked that they took the time to follow up with me the next week. Price wise - they were very competitive(not the highest, but not the lowest). I felt very comfortable choosing Panda and I am really glad that i did. Trust me when I tell you that when the crew gets here, they get busy. I didn't notice any standing around, or milling about. All business all the time. My estimator was here throughout the job making sure i was happy, which was a big plus. I really liked that they didn't take any money until the job was finished. I will absolutely recommend Panda Painting, and will definitely use them again. - J. Schroeder
I had heard from friends how great Panda Painting was, so I decided to get an estimate on all of the outside work as well as some inside work. The estimator was on time and very courteous. I had other estimates, but none were as professional and thorough. Panda was priced right in the middle of all of our other quotes. I must say i was quite surprised at how efficient the work was being done. No one was standing around, everyone was working on getting the house finished. I was especially pleased with how quiet they were, and respectful to my family. Needless to say, I am super satisfied! The house looks great! The whole process was easy as pie!
I called twice over three days and left messages for a call back to schedule an appt for an estimate on interior house job, also sent an email. Got a return call a day after the first call. Unfortunately, I couldn't take the call at that time. I called back no more than 5 minutes later and got voice mail, left another message with details... again. No call back at all?! I can't comment on their quality or value due to fact they never did anything.


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Texas on the Potomac
Washington news with a Texas accent
Posts filtered on Tag
Happy 90th birthday to Ralph Hall — the oldest House member in history
When Rep. Ralph Hall was first elected to office Ronald Reagan had ousted Jimmy Carter to become president, Pink Floyd's "The Wall" hit number one, and gas was around $1.25 per gallon. Back then, like most of Texas, Hall was a Democrat. Today, like most of Texas, Hall is a Republican. Hall celebrates his 90th birthday today, leading […] [Read More]
Ron Paul's wife Carol celebrates her nineteenth birthday, a day that comes around once every four years
Today, Ron Paul's wife, Carol, celebrates her birthday. The couple's first date was around this same time in 1952, when Carol asked Ron to be her escort to her Sadie-Hawkins-style birthday party. Nineteen leap years later, he's still her birthday date. [Read More]


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SMPlayer is a free open source multimedia player, often use to play audio and video files (such as mp3, ogg, flac, avi, ogm, mkv). It is actually a frontend for MPlayer, providing a convenient graphical interface to control the player. This provides the power of MPlayer combined with the ease of use players like Totem.
smplayer can be installed in the Software Center or with APT. It is comparable to VLC (an alternative to MPlayer of comparable capabilities), though SMPlayer's interface does not provide access to all the features of MPlayer.
See the project site and this Ubuntu wiki page for more information.


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Owerri — Commercial and social activities in Owerri, the Imo State Capital were temporarily brought to a halt yesterday by youths from the 27 local government areas of the state who were protesting what they described as distraction of the government by some people.
The protesters under the aegis of Conference of Imo Progressive youths (CIPY) blocked the major roads in the city such as Whetheral, Bank road and Port Harcourt road respectively, thereby preventing free flow of traffic.
Addressing journalists, leader of the group Barr.Kennedy Ibe, said they were protesting against what he described as the continued distraction of the present government by some highly placed Imo citizens.


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Pay real close attention to the guys he is striking out too...
Pay real close attention to the guys he is striking out too...
Ugh. I was totally prepared to lose game 1, and was just going to accept it. Now you got me all jazzed up.
This ones on you 44!
Skinny kid. Not so much anymore.
Games are won on run differential -- scoring more than your opponent. Runs are runs, scored or prevented they all count the same. Worry about scoring more and allowing fewer, not which positions contribute to which side of the equation or how "consistent" you are at your current level of performance.
"You only have to bat a thousand in two things; flying and heart transplants. Everything else you can go 4-for-5."
-Beano Cook
Board Moderators may, at their discretion and judgment, delete and/or edit any messages that violate any of the following guidelines: 1. Explicit references to alleged illegal or unlawful acts. 2. Graphic sexual descriptions. 3. Racial or ethnic slurs. 4. Use of edgy language (including masked profanity). 5. Direct personal attacks, flames, fights, trolling, baiting, name-calling, general nuisance, excessive player criticism or anything along those lines. 6. Posting spam. 7. Each person may have only one user account. It is fine to be critical here - that's what this board is for. But let's not beat a subject or a player to death, please.


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HSBC "lift" by Grey London
Agency: Grey London
Rating: 5.0
By Matthew Chapman, campaignlive.co.uk, Monday, 30 April 2012 09:18AM
The campaign, created by CHI & Partners, introduces a new 3D animated style and now has a female narrator, TV actress Angela Griffin, as the brand seeks to make itself less masculine.
Chris Brocklehurst, head of advertising at British Gas, said the energy firm decided to drop Timothy Spall in favour of a female narrator, because most of its engineers were men, meaning British Gas has a very masculine image.
The animated style will also allow the characters in the ads to talk in future executions, according to Brocklehurst.
Creative pushes the ways customers can use online services to manage the account by stating, "From checking your balance to submitting metre readings, managing your energy online is super simple with British Gas."
The brand's mobile app also features in the spot and represents the first time British Gas has advertised its app in broadcast media, as the company seeks to demonstrate it is using technology to make things simpler.
Last week, British Gas confirmed it was planning to close a call centre in Southampton with the loss of 550 jobs.
Brocklehurst denied this had put extra pressure on the ad being a success in order to migrate people to online, and instead said the campaign was about "giving customers more choice" by allowing them to use call centres or online services.
The campaign will run for six weeks and will be supported by press advertising.
Follow Matthew Chapman at @mattchapmanUK
This article was first published on campaignlive.co.uk
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If you see a comment you find offensive, you can flag it as inappropriate. In the top right-hand corner of an individual comment, you will see 'flag as inappropriate'. Clicking this prompts us to review the comment. For further information see our rules for commenting on articles.
Agency: Grey London
Rating: 5.0


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|calendar>>May 1. 2014 Juche 103
Kim Jong Il's Work Published in Italy
| Pyongyang, May 1 (KCNA) -- Leader Kim Jong Il's work "The Democratic People's Republic of Korea Is a Juche-Oriented Socialist State with Invincible Might" was brought out in booklet by the Movement for Peace and Socialism of Italy on April 21.
The work, published on Sept. 5, Juche 97 (2008), says that invincible might of the DPRK lies in defending and eternally glorifying the Juche-oriented state-building idea and exploits of President Kim Il Sung.
Copyright (C) KOREA NEWS SERVICE(KNS) All Rights Reserved.


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Learn more about Nyko Wii Charge Base Induction Charger (includes 2 NiMH rechargeable batteries):
Format: Wii
Manufacturer: Nyko Technologies
Mfg Part#: 87048
Sku: 211824337
See more in Batteries & Chargers
|The successor to the worlds best-selling charging solution for Wii has arrived with Nyko's Charge Base IC. The Charge Base IC uses high end induction technology that allows for contact-less recharging meaning that silicone sleeves, Wii Motion Plus and other attachments do not need to be removed before placing in the Wii Remote or Wand in the dock. The Charge Base IC dual port rapid recharging dock features 2 unique cradles that magnetically hold each controller, suspending and displaying it inside in the dock. Each cradle also glows indicating the charge status of the NiMH rechargeable batteries which can both supply up to 10 hours of playtime on a full charge. The Charge Base IC conveniently plugs into any wall outlet allowing for the fastest recharging time possible, and with Nyko's Port Free AC adaptor with an outlet pass-through port, the unit won't take up any additional power outlets. The powered USB port in back also allows you to easily recharge USB compatible devices. The Charge Base IC's stunning and unique design matches the Wii aesthetic and is perfect to display and charge your controllers.


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Great articles on other sites
Great articles on other sites
- Unless kids are working, coding should not be taught: Abbott | ZDNet
- CSIRO, NICTA merger could cost 200 jobs - Training & Development - News - iTnews.com.au
- Sydney Opal card travel history can be accessed by police
- NBN analysis 'like foxes reviewing the hen house': Clare
- Call made to end inflight phone ban
- Australian government undoing profit shifting clamp down: Labor
- National security law reforms
- Victorian Government calls for contributions to shape Victoria's digital economy
- Will IBM pip Azure at the Aussie cloud post?
- Competition watchdog should break up Foxtel monopoly: Ludlam
Posts Tagged 'open technology foundation'
Featured, News - Monday, August 29, 2011 11:34 - 6 Comments
Defence conducts OpenOffice.org trial
The Department of Defence has reportedly conducted an informal trial of the open source OpenOffice.org productivity suite involving some 100 users.
According to iTNews (click here for the full story), the initiative was kicked off by Defence chief technology officer Matt Yannopoulos over the past year. However, it does not appear likely the initiative will immediately broaden into a wider rollout at Defence, with Yannopoulos noting it would be a major decision for the department, which has long been a Microsoft shop.
The news comes as Australia appears to be witnessing a resurgence in interest in open source technologies this year, with the Federal Government taking several bold moves in the area in the past six months.
In January, for example, the Federal Government dramatically changed its position on the use of open source software by departments and agencies, publishing a policy which mandated the consideration of such options in any technology purchase. Previously, the Government's stated policy on open source had been one of "informed neutrality" — meaning agencies picked the technology (closed or open source) which represented the best value for money and fit for purpose.


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Watch Rizzoli & Isles S03E02 (Season 3 Episode 2)
Watch Rizzoli & Isles S03E02
Dirty Little Secret
Tensions continue to mount between Jane and Maura, causing those close to them to be caught in the middle. But they must put aside their differences when they investigate the case of a college student who died in a tunnel. Meanwhile, Frankie Sr. returns with news that upsets Angela.. You can watch Rizzoli & Isles S03E02 here.
Previous episode
Watch Rizzoli & Isles S03E01 - What Doesn't Kill You
Next episode
Watch Rizzoli & Isles S03E03 - This Is How a Heart Breaks
Guest stars
Colin Egglesfield, Tina Huang, Odessa Rae, John Nielsen, Rick Ravanello, Elizabeth Dennehy, Omar J. Dorsey, Stefanie Black, Chazz Palminteri


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MacBook Air
Apple MacBook Air refresh: Here's what it needs to beat26 February 2015
You might be able to get your hands on a Retina MacBook Air by next month. The current MacBook Air is the only Apple laptop without a Retina display, and the hope worldwide is that Apple will soon announce a Retina version of the MacBook Air. Although... >>
MacBook Air refresh imminent: Intel Broadwell chips likely but not 12-inch Retina display9 February 2015
Apple is said to be refreshing its MacBook Air range on 24 February but previous rumours that it will be introducing a 12-inch model with a Retina display could prove to be unfounded. Instead, the new models will feature improved Intel Broadwell processors... >>
12-inch MacBook Air parts spotted, is this Apple's next laptop?26 January 2015
Leaked photos have given us more evidence that Apple could be building a 12-inch MacBook Air to be released later this year. Fresh "spy shots" of what is claimed to be the rear casing and new logo of the supposed new ultra-small, ultra-thin laptop have... >>
Retina Macbook Air and 4K Macs planned for October?24 July 2014
Apple plans to release its next operating system, OS X Yosemite, this October. There could also be an appearance of a new 12-inch Retina MacBook Air and 4K desktop Mac. According to sources of 9to5mac, Apple is currently finishing work on its next-generation... >>
Apple turns to Breaking Bad's Walter White, Space Invaders and Homer Simpson to sell new MacBook Air23 July 2014
Walter White in his Heisenberg guise is one of many icons used by Apple for its new MacBook Air TV advert. Showing just the back of the laptop and the iconic Apple symbol, the "Stickers" ad rattles through a large variety of customisations that include... >>
WWDC 2014 rumours: What to expect at Apple's Worldwide Developer Conference 20142 June 2014
Apple will start is Worldwide Developer Conference for 2014 in San Francisco today, with a keynote speech to kick it off. But what can we expect to be announced at the show based on all the chatter, rumours, speculation, and gossip so far doing the rounds?... >>
Apple MacBook Air 2014 model with faster processor out now with lower price29 April 2014
Apple has just updated its online store with a new version of the MacBook Air, featuring a faster processor. But before you get too excited there isn't much else to speak of. No Retina display is a noticeable omission from the fruit giant. The speed bump... >>
Apple could release new MacBook Airs next week, but will they be Retina?25 April 2014
Apple is more than likely going to refresh its line of MacBook Air laptops as early as next week. But it's not likely the Retina model will arrive with that batch. According to sources of Mac Generation the refreshed 11-inch and 13-inch MacBook Air models... >>
Apple planning slim 12-inch MacBook Air with buttonless trackpad?22 March 2014
Apple is planning to launch a new, slim 12-inch MacBook Air with several changes to the laptop line, according to a new rumour on the web. The MacBook Air updates are coming soon, the rumour says, with MacBook Pro updates not occurring until September.... >>
Simple tool makes the MacBook's MagSafe a little less finicky16 December 2013
Proud owners of a recent-generation MacBook will probably notice the MagSafe connector falls out extremely easy. If you're lying in bed or have your laptop in your lap, it doesn't take much for the MagSafe connector to fallout. It happens to us daily.... >>


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Press Release - Exhibition showcases designs for new research station in Antarctica
Issue date: 15 Nov 2004
Number: 14-2004
FaberMaunsell Ltd / Hugh Broughton Architects Ltd FaberMaunsell is part of the worldwide AECOM Technology Corporation, which has been responsible for the construction of more facilities in Antarctica than any other company in the world. Projects have included the South Pole Observatory and the South Pole Station Dormitory. The multi-disciplinary engineering team is led from FaberMaunsell's UK headquarters in St. Albans, but draws on worldwide specialist cold climate and remote location expertise. Architectural design has been provided by the dynamic young practice of Hugh Broughton Architects.
Francis Design Ltd / Ove Arup & Partners International Ltd BMT Nigel & Associates Ltd / Gardiner & Theobald LLP Francis Design Ltd is a multidisciplinary design practice, with projects ranging from marine design to interior architecture and engineering. They create boats from conception through to delivery for worldwide operation, providing self-sufficient and self-sustaining machines for living and working in. BMT Nigel Gee & Associates Ltd reinforce this with their background in commercial fast ferry design and extensive knowledge of high tech composite materials. The team is complemented by Ove Arup & Partners with their acknowledged experience in advanced structures having worked on projects such as the Beddington ZED, which pioneers zero fossil fuel development and British Antarctic Survey's Halley V Research Station. Gardiner & Theobald tie the team together by providing the vital aspect of project management, cost management and logistics, which they have demonstrated on numerous projects including the building of the Falkland Islands Mount Pleasant Airfield where all materials and works were sourced in the UK. Hopkins Architects Ltd / Expedition Engineers Ltd / DLE / HL Technik / Rowan Williams Davies & Irwin Hopkins Architects, Expedition Engineering, HL Technik, RWDI and DLE comprise a team that combines a proven track record of realising pioneering projects through creative thought, with an international range of experience in working in some of the world's most challenging environments. They share a commitment to the environmentally responsible and socially responsive use of technology for the good of mankind. Hopkins Architects are renowned as innovators and leaders in the fields of prefabrication, lightweight construction and sustainability. Their projects range from the Patera Building to the RIBA Sustainability Award winning Jubilee Campus at the University of Nottingham. Expedition Engineers have been actively involved in a diverse range of projects including the skeleton of the World's Green Highrise (Commerzbank Frankfurt), water management systems at Heathrow's Terminal 5 and close proximity projects such as an oak submarine and a human-powered airship. Hopkins Architects and Expedition Engineering have collaborated on a number of cutting-edge environmentally driven projects, which include their proposals for an offshore residential tower in the Middle East featured in the Royal Academy Summer Exhibition last year. Make Places Ltd / The Design Laboratory / Ove Arup & Partners International Ltd / Archicafe / DLE Make is headed by world renowned architect Ken Shuttleworth who recently departed from Foster and Partners where he was responsible for landmarks around the world including the Swiss Re HQ, London City Hall and Chek Lap Kok Airport in Hong Kong. make is currently involved in creating the Vortex Tower in London. Arup practices in over 30 countries worldwide collaborating with international esteemed architects. Arup's engineering portfolio includes: 2008 Olympic stadium in Beijing, Heathrow's Terminal 5 and the Channel Tunnel Rail Link in the UK. The Design Laboratory at Central Saint Martins led by Brent Richards functions as a leading creative consultancy and employs an overall team of 30 multi-talented international Project Designers. Recent projects have included short-listing for the RIBA Future House London Competition and a major project with Isozaki Architects in Spain. Richard Rogers Partnership / Ove Arup & Partners International Ltd / BDSP Partnership Ltd Richard Rogers Partnership has a high-profile history of innovative design including projects like the Pompidou Centre, Lloyds of London, the Millennium Dome and the Bordeaux Law Courts. RRP see the Halley VI competition as a means of exploring some of the practice's core values going back to such projects as the Zip-Up House (1969) and continuing an on-going process of first-principle environmental analysis. With Arup, key members of the design team have recently been involved in the technical challenges raised by the New Heathrow Air Traffic Control Tower project (recently completing a 900-tonne move of part of the Tower across the southern runway). Successful collaboration with BDSP on a number of benchmark projects dates back many years and currently includes the Welsh Assembly Building, the Protos Winery and Mossbourne Academy in Hackney. British Antarctic Survey is a world leader in research into global issues in an Antarctic context. It is the UK's national operator and is a component of the Natural Environment Research Council. It has an annual budget of around ?40 million, runs nine research programmes and operates five research stations, two Royal Research Ships and five aircraft in and around Antarctica. More information about the work of the Survey can be found at: www.antarctica.ac.uk The Royal Institute of British Architects, one of the most influential architectural institutions in the world, has been promoting architecture and architects since being awarded its Royal Charter in 1837. The RIBA has vast experience of organising competitions on behalf of a wide range of clients. The service offered by the RIBA is independent and impartial, bearing no allegiance to a particular design team or method of procurement. The involvement of the RIBA ensures that correct procedures are followed and that the process of selection is seen to be fair. More information can be found at www.ribacompetitions.com
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Chapter 15. Language and Our Divided Brain
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GrrlScientist Since today is caturday, that wonderful day when the blogosphere takes a breather from hell-raising to celebrate pets, I thought some of my favourite animals: corvids. I ran across this lovely video created by Cornell University's Laboratory of Ornithology (more fondly referred to as the "Lab of O") that discusses the differences between and potential meanings of the sounds made by crows and ravens. If you watch birds, even casually, you might be confused by trying to distinguish these two large black corvid species. However, both species are quite chatty, and these birds' sounds provide important identifying information. In this video, narrated by Kevin McGowan, an ornithologist at the Cornell Lab of O, you'll learn how to distinguish crows and ravens on the basis of their voices alone. Both crows and ravens make loud raspy signature calls, described as "caw" and "kraa" respectively, but American crows and common ravens have large repertoires of sounds in addition to these calls. They also can learn to imitate the calls of other birds. As you'll learn in this video, crows often make a "rattle" sound along with their territorial "caw". They also communicate using a wide variety of other sounds including clicks and bell-like notes. Ravens, on the other hand, produce deep, throaty kraa calls.
Keyword: Animal Communication
Link ID: 20255 - Posted: 10.29.2014
By Virginia Morell Human fetuses are clever students, able to distinguish male from female voices and the voices of their mothers from those of strangers between 32 and 39 weeks after conception. Now, researchers have demonstrated that the embryos of the superb fairy-wren (Malurus cyaneus, pictured), an Australian songbird, also learn to discriminate among the calls they hear. The scientists played 1-minute recordings to 43 fairy-wren eggs collected from nests in the wild. The eggs were between days 9 and 13 of a 13- to 14-day incubation period. The sounds included white noise, a contact call of a winter wren, or a female fairy-wren's incubation call. Those embryos that listened to the fairy-wrens' incubation calls and the contact calls of the winter wrens lowered their heart rates, a sign that they were learning to discriminate between the calls of a different species and those of their own kind, the researchers report online today in the Proceedings of the Royal Society B. (None showed this response to the white noise.) Thus, even before hatching, these small birds' brains are engaged in tasks requiring attention, learning, and possibly memory—the first time embryonic learning has been seen outside humans, the scientists say. The behavior is key because fairy-wren embryos must learn a password from their mothers' incubation calls; otherwise, they're less successful at soliciting food from their parents after hatching. © 2014 American Association for the Advancement of Science.
Keyword: Language; Development of the Brain
Link ID: 20254 - Posted: 10.29.2014
With the passing away of Professor Allison Doupe on Friday, October 24, of cancer, UCSF and biomedical science have lost a scholar of extraordinary intelligence and erudition and a campus leader. Allison Doupe was a psychiatrist and systems neuroscientist who became a leader of her field, the study of sensorimotor learning and its neural control. Allison was recruited to the Departments of Psychiatry and Physiology and the Neuroscience Graduate Program in 1993, rising to Professor in 2000. Her academic career has been outstanding at every stage, including First Class Honors at McGill, an MD and PhD in Neurobiology from Harvard, and a prestigious Junior Fellowship from the Harvard University Society of Fellows. Her PhD work with Professor Paul Patterson definitively established the role of particular environmental factors in the development of autonomic neurons and was important in the molecular and cellular investigations of the roles of hormones and growth factors in that system. After internship at the Massachusetts General Hospital and residency in psychiatry at UCLA, she chose to pursue a postdoctoral fellowship at Caltech, studying song learning in birds with Professor Mark Konishi as a way of combining her clinical interests in behavior and development with research in cognitive neuroscience. The development of birdsong is in many important respects similar to language development in humans. The pioneering work of Peter Marler, on song sparrows in Golden Gate Park, showed that each baby songbird learns its father's dialect but could readily learn the dialect of any singing bird of the same species placed in the role of tutor. Many birds, including the ones studied by Allison Doupe, learn their song by listening to their father sing during a period of life in which they are not themselves singing, and they later practice and perfect their own song by comparison with their memory of the father's (or tutor's) song.
Keyword: Animal Communication; Language
Link ID: 20248 - Posted: 10.28.2014
|By Steve Mirsky People have been leaving messages on bathroom walls for thousands of years. Just google "ancient Roman bathroom graffiti." But we're not the only ones to use latrines for information exchange—as two German researchers have confirmed after hundreds of hours watching lemurs pee and poop. For science. Primatologists Iris Dröscher and Peter Kappeler concentrated on seven sets of pair-bonded members of a species called white-footed sportive lemurs, at a nature reserve in southern Madagascar. Their report is in the journal Behavioral Ecology and Sociobiology. [Iris Dröscher & Peter M. Kappeler Maintenance of familiarity and social bonding via communal latrine use in a solitary primate (Lepilemur leucopus)] Many animals use the same spots repeatedly to do their business, primates in particular. For these lemurs, a specific tree becomes the urine and feces focal point. And because chemical compounds in their waste transmit information, the so-called latrine tree becomes like a bulletin board to post messages for the rest of the community. Based on their 1,097 hours of observations, the researchers conclude that urine and glandular secretions left on the tree trunk are the primary message vehicles. Feces mostly just collects on the ground. Some urine telegrams are probably signals from a particular lemur to the neighbors that he or she is around. But male lemurs upped their latrine visits when potential competitors for females came into their home area. So the frequent chemical messages left on the tree probably say in that case, "Buzz off, buddy, she's with me." In lemur. © 2014 Scientific American,
Keyword: Chemical Senses (Smell & Taste); Animal Communication
Link ID: 20211 - Posted: 10.18.2014
by Colin Barras LOCKED in but not shut out: for the first time people who have lost the ability to move or talk because of a stroke may be able to communicate with their loved ones using a brain-computer interface. Brain injuries can leave people aware but almost completely paralysed, a condition called locked-in syndrome. Brain-computer interfaces (BCIs) can help some people communicate by passing signals from electrodes attuned to their brain activity as they watch a screen displaying letters. Subtle changes in neural activity let researchers know when a person wishes to select a particular on-screen item, allowing them to spell out messages by thought alone. Until now, BCIs have only been tested on healthy volunteers and people with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, a neurodegenerative disease that leads to muscle wasting. But no one had tested whether the technology could help people locked in after a brain stem stroke. Now Eric Sellers and his colleagues at East Tennessee State University in Johnson City have tested the technique on a 68-year-old man. After more than a year of training he learned to communicate reliably via the BCI. He took the opportunity to thank his wife for her hard work, and to give his thoughts on gift purchases for his children (Science Translational Medicine, DOI: 10.1126/scitranslmed.3007801). © Copyright Reed Business Information Ltd.
Keyword: Stroke; Robotics
Link ID: 20185 - Posted: 10.09.2014
By Virginia Morell Two years ago, scientists showed that dolphins imitate the sounds of whales. Now, it seems, whales have returned the favor. Researchers analyzed the vocal repertoires of 10 captive orcas (Orcinus orca), three of which lived with bottlenose dolphins (Tursiops truncatus) and the rest with their own kind. Of the 1551 vocalizations these seven latter orcas made, more than 95% were the typical pulsed calls of killer whales. In contrast, the three orcas that had only dolphins as pals busily whistled and emitted dolphinlike click trains and terminal buzzes, the scientists report in the October issue of The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America. (Watch a video as bioacoustician and co-author Ann Bowles describes the difference between killer whale and orca whistles.) The findings make orcas one of the few species of animals that, like humans, is capable of vocal learning—a talent considered a key underpinning of language. © 2014 American Association for the Advancement of Science.
Keyword: Language; Animal Communication
Link ID: 20173 - Posted: 10.08.2014
|By Tori Rodriguez The safety of football continues to be a heated topic for players and parents, with mixed evidence regarding the effect of head injuries on mental illness. Past studies on the connection have often been methodologically flawed or yielded ambiguous results. Now a paper in April in the American Journal of Psychiatry, the largest study yet to investigate the link, finds that even a single head injury indeed increases the risk of later mental illness, especially if the injury occurs during adolescence. Using Danish medical registries, researchers led by physician Sonja Orlovska of the University of Copenhagen studied 113,906 people who had been hospitalized for head injuries over a 23-year period. They discovered that in addition to cognitive symptoms caused by structural damage to the brain (such as delirium), these people were subsequently more likely than the general population to develop several psychiatric illnesses. Risk increased by 65 percent for schizophrenia and 59 percent for depression. Risk was highest in the first year postinjury but remained significantly elevated throughout the next 15 years. After the team controlled for several potential confounders, such as accident proneness and a family history of psychiatric problems, they found the strongest injury-related predictor for later onset of schizophrenia, depression and bipolar disorder was a head trauma experienced between the ages of 11 and 15. "Previous studies have shown that head injury induces inflammation in the brain, which causes several changes—for example, an increased permeability of the blood-brain barrier," Orlovska says. Normally the barrier protects the brain from potentially harmful contents in the bloodstream, but injury-induced inflammation may allow these substances access to the brain. "For some individuals, this might initiate damaging processes in the brain," she says. © 2014 Scientific American,
Keyword: Brain Injury/Concussion; Schizophrenia
Link ID: 20164 - Posted: 10.06.2014
by Jason M. Breslow As the NFL nears an end to its long-running legal battle over concussions, new data from the nation's largest brain bank focused on traumatic brain injury has found evidence of a degenerative brain disease in 76 of the 79 former players it's examined. The findings represent a more than twofold increase in the number of cases of chronic traumatic encephalopathy, or CTE, that have been reported by the Department of Veterans Affairs' brain repository in Bedford, Mass. Researchers there have now examined the brain tissue of 128 football players who, before their deaths, played the game professionally, semi-professionally, in college or in high school. Of that sample, 101 players, or just under 80 percent, tested positive for CTE. To be sure, players represented in the data represent a skewed population. CTE can only be definitively identified posthumously, and many of the players who have donated their brains for research suspected that they may have had the disease while still alive. For example, former Chicago Bears star Dave Duerson committed suicide in 2011 by shooting himself in the chest, reportedly to preserve his brain for examination. Nonetheless, Dr. Ann McKee, the director of the brain bank, believes the findings suggest a clear link between football and traumatic brain injury. "Obviously this high percentage of living individuals is not suffering from CTE," said McKee, a neuropathologist who directs the brain bank as part of a collaboration between the VA and Boston University's CTE Center. But "playing football, and the higher the level you play football and the longer you play football, the higher your risk." ©1995-2014 WGBH Educational Foundation
Keyword: Brain Injury/Concussion
Link ID: 20146 - Posted: 10.01.2014
By Melissa Dahl If you are the sort of person who has a hard time just watching TV — if you've got to be simultaneously using your iPad or laptop or smartphone — here's some bad news. New research shows a link between juggling multiple digital devices and a lower-than-usual amount of gray matter, the stuff that's made up of brain cells, in the region of the brain associated with cognitive and emotional control. More details, via the press release: The researchers at the University of Sussex's Sackler Centre for Consciousness used functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to look at the brain structures of 75 adults, who had all answered a questionnaire regarding their use and consumption of media devices, including mobile phones and computers, as well as television and print media. They found that, independent of individual personality traits, people who used a higher number of media devices concurrently also had smaller grey matter density in the part of the brain known as the anterior cingulate cortex (ACC), the region notably responsible for cognitive and emotional control functions. But a predilection for using several devices at once isn't necessarily causing a decrease in gray matter, the authors note — this is a purely correlational finding. As Earl Miller, a neuroscientist at MIT who was not involved in this research, wrote in an email, "It could be (in fact, is possibly more likely) that the relationship is the other way around." In other words, the people who are least content using just one device at a time may have less gray matter in the first place.
Keyword: Attention; Brain imaging
Link ID: 20123 - Posted: 09.27.2014
by Helen Thomson My, what big eyes you have – you must be trying really hard. A study of how pupils dilate with physical effort could allow us to make strenuous tasks seem easier by zapping specific areas of the brain. We know pupils dilate with mental effort, when we think about a difficult maths problem, for example. To see if this was also true of physical exertion, Alexandre Zenon at the Catholic University of Louvain in Belgium, measured the pupils of 18 volunteers as they squeezed a device which reads grip strength. Sure enough, the more force they exerted, the larger their pupils. To see whether pupil size was related to actual or perceived effort, the volunteers were asked to squeeze the device with four different grip strengths. Various tests enabled the researchers to tell how much effort participants felt they used, from none at all to the most effort possible. Comparing the results from both sets of experiments suggested that pupil dilation correlated more closely with perceived effort than actual effort. The fact that both mental effort and perceived physical effort are reflected in pupil size suggests there is a common representation of effort in the brain, says Zenon. To see where in the brain this might be, the team looked at which areas were active while similar grip tasks were being performed. Zenon says they were able to identify areas within the supplementary motor cortex – which plays a role in movement – associated with how effortful a task is perceived to be. © Copyright Reed Business Information Ltd.
Keyword: Attention
Link ID: 20121 - Posted: 09.27.2014
By Smitha Mundasad Health reporter, BBC News A spice commonly found in curries may boost the brain's ability to heal itself, according to a report in the journal Stem Cell Research and Therapy. The German study suggests a compound found in turmeric could encourage the growth of nerve cells thought to be part of the brain's repair kit. Scientists say this work, based in rats, may pave the way for future drugs for strokes and Alzheimer's disease. But they say more trials are needed to see whether this applies to humans. Researchers from the Institute of Neuroscience and Medicine in Julich, Germany, studied the effects of aromatic-turmerone - a compound found naturally in turmeric. Rats were injected with the compound and their brains were then scanned. Particular parts of the brain, known to be involved in nerve cell growth, were seen to be more active after the aromatic-turmerone infusion. Scientists say the compound may encourage a proliferation of brain cells. In a separate part of the trial, researchers bathed rodent neural stem cells (NSCs) in different concentrations of aromatic-tumerone extract. NSCs have the ability to transform into any type of brain cell and scientists suggest they could have a role in repair after damage or disease. Dr Maria Adele Rueger, who was part of the research team, said: "In humans and higher developed animals their abilities do not seem to be sufficient to repair the brain but in fish and smaller animals they seem to work well." Picture of the spice turmeric Turmeric belongs to the same plant family as ginger BBC © 2014
Keyword: Alzheimers; Stroke
Link ID: 20119 - Posted: 09.27.2014
By SAM BORDEN Bellini, a Brazilian soccer star who led the team that won the 1958 World Cup and was honored with a statue outside the Estádio do Maracanã in Rio de Janeiro, had a degenerative brain disease linked to dozens of boxers and American football players when he died in March at age 83. At the time, his death was attributed to complications related to Alzheimer's disease. But researchers now say he had an advanced case of chronic traumatic encephalopathy, or C.T.E., which is caused by repeated blows to the head and has symptoms similar to those of Alzheimer's. C.T.E. can be diagnosed only posthumously, and few brains of former soccer players have been examined. Bellini is the second known case, according to Dr. Ann McKee, a neuropathologist at Boston University and the Veterans Affairs Medical Center in Bedford, Mass., who assisted in examining Bellini's brain. McKee was also involved this year when researchers found C.T.E. in the brain of a 29-year-old man from New Mexico who had played soccer semiprofessionally. McKee said in an interview that she was aware of a third former soccer player who had C.T.E. but that she was not yet authorized to publicly identify the person. As C.T.E. began to gain widespread attention about six years ago, it was often thought of as an American problem. Many of the early cases of the disease, for which there is no known cure, were connected to boxers and American football players. © 2014 The New York Times Company
Keyword: Brain Injury/Concussion
Link ID: 20110 - Posted: 09.24.2014
Jia You In the future, a nurse could determine whether a baby is likely to develop a reading disorder simply by attaching a few electrodes to its scalp and watching its brain waves respond to human speech. Such is the scenario suggested by a new study, which finds a potential biological indicator of how well preschool children perceive rhythm, an ability linked to language development. "It's really impressive to work with children this young, who are not often looked at," says Aniruddh Patel, a cognitive neuroscientist at Tufts University in Medford, Massachusetts, who was not involved with the research. Spoken language consists of sound waves occurring over multiple timescales. A syllable, for example, takes place over a quarter of a second, while a sentence unfolds over a few seconds. To make sense of this complex auditory information, humans use rhythmic cues such as stress and pause to discern words and syllables. Adults and school-aged children with reading disorders, however, struggle to pick up on these rhythmic patterns. Scientists estimate that dyslexia and other reading disabilities plague about 5% to 10% of the population. Detecting such impairments early could lead to more effective intervention, but observing telltale signs in younger children who have not learned to read has proven a challenge. So biologist Nina Kraus of Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois, and her colleagues looked for automatic brain responses that can track language development in preschoolers, who have not learned to read. © 2014 American Association for the Advancement of Science
Keyword: Dyslexia; Development of the Brain
Link ID: 20105 - Posted: 09.23.2014
2014 by Dan Jones The vast majority of people think we have free will and are the authors of our own life stories. But if neuroscientists were one day able to predict our every action based on brain scans, would people abandon this belief in droves? A new study concludes that such knowledge would not by itself be enough to shake our confidence in our own volition. Many neuroscientists, such as the late Francis Crick, have argued that our sense of free will is no more than the behaviour of a vast assembly of nerve cells. This is tied to the idea of determinism, which has it that every effect is preceded by a cause, with cause and effect connected by physical laws. This is why the behaviour of physical systems can be predicted – even the brain, in principle. As author Sam Harris puts it: "If determinism is true, the future is set – and this includes all our future states of mind and our subsequent behaviour." If people lost their belief in their own free will, that would have important consequences for how we think about moral responsibility, and even how we behave. For example, numerous studies have shown that when people are led to reject free will they are more likely to cheat, and are also less bothered about punishing other wrongdoers. For those who argue that what we know about neuroscience is incompatible with free will, predicting what our brain is about to do should reveal the illusory nature of free will, and lead people to reject it. Experimental philosopher Eddy Nahmias at Georgia State University in Atlanta dubs this view "willusionism". He recently set out to test it. © Copyright Reed Business Information Ltd.
Keyword: Consciousness
Link ID: 20102 - Posted: 09.22.2014
2014 by Helen Thomson Shall I compare thee to... well, no one actually. A 76-year-old woman has developed an incredibly rare disorder – she has the compulsive urge to write poetry. Her brain is now being studied by scientists who want to understand more about the neurological basis for creativity. In 2013, the woman arrived at a UK hospital complaining of memory problems and a tendency to lose her way in familiar locations. For the previous two years, she had experienced occasional seizures. She was diagnosed with temporal lobe epilepsy and treated with the drug lamotrigine, which stopped her seizures. However, as they receded, a strange behaviour took hold. She began to compulsively write poetry – something she hadn't shown any interest in previously. Suddenly, the woman was writing 10 to 15 poems a day, becoming annoyed if she was disrupted. Her work rhymed but the content was banal if a touch wistful – a style her husband described as doggerel (see "Unstoppable creativity"). About six months after her seizures stopped, the desire to write became less strong, although it still persists to some extent. Doctors call the intense desire to write hypergraphia. It typically occurs alongside schizophrenia and an individual's output is usually rambling and disorganised. "It was highly unusual to see such highly structured and creative hypergraphia without any of the other behavioural disturbances," says the woman's neurologist, Jason Warren at University College London. © Copyright Reed Business Information Ltd
Keyword: Epilepsy; Language
Link ID: 20099 - Posted: 09.22.2014
By Elizabeth Pennisi "What's for dinner?" The words roll off the tongue without even thinking about it—for adults, at least. But how do humans learn to speak as children? Now, a new study in mice shows how a gene, called FOXP2, implicated in a language disorder may have changed between humans and chimps to make learning to speak possible—or at least a little easier. As a uniquely human trait, language has long baffled evolutionary biologists. Not until FOXP2 was linked to a genetic disorder that caused problems in forming words could they even begin to study language's roots in our genes. Soon after that discovery, a team at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany, discovered that just two bases, the letters that make up DNA, distinguished the human and chimp versions of FOXP2. To try to determine how those changes influenced the gene's function, that group put the human version of the gene in mice. In 2009, they observed that these "humanized" mice produced more frequent and complex alarm calls, suggesting the human mutations may have been involved in the evolution of more complex speech. Another study showed that humanized mice have different activity in the part of the brain called the striatum, which is involved in learning, among other tasks. But the details of how the human FOXP2 mutations might affect real-world learning remained murky. To solve the mystery, the Max Planck researchers sent graduate student Christiane Schreiweis to work with Ann Graybiel, a neuroscientist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge. She's an expert in testing mouse smarts by seeing how quickly they can learn to find rewards in mazes. © 2014 American Association for the Advancement of Science
Keyword: Learning & Memory; Language
Link ID: 20081 - Posted: 09.16.2014
By KEN BELSON The National Football League, which for years disputed evidence that its players had a high rate of severe brain damage, has stated in federal court documents that it expects nearly a third of retired players to develop long-term cognitive problems and that the conditions are likely to emerge at "notably younger ages" than in the general population. The findings are a result of data prepared by actuaries hired by the league and provided to the United States District Court judge presiding over the settlement between the N.F.L. and 5,000 former players who sued the league, alleging that it had hidden the dangers of concussions from them. "Thus, our assumptions result in prevalence rates by age group that are materially higher than those expected in the general population," said the report, prepared by the Segal Group for the N.F.L. "Furthermore, the model forecasts that players will develop these diagnoses at notably younger ages than the generation population." The statements are the league's most unvarnished admission yet that the sport's professional participants sustain severe brain injuries at far higher rates than the general population. They also appear to confirm what scientists have said for years: that playing football increases the risk of developing neurological conditions like chronic traumatic encephalopathy, a degenerative brain disease that can be identified only in an autopsy. "This statement clears up all the confusion and doubt manufactured over the years questioning the link between brain trauma and long-term neurological impairment," said Chris Nowinski, the executive director of the Sports Legacy Institute, who has for many years pressured the league to acknowledge the connection between football and brain diseases. © 2014 The New York Times Company
Keyword: Brain Injury/Concussion
Link ID: 20073 - Posted: 09.13.2014
By Lesley Evans Ogden Humans are noisy creatures, our cacophony of jet engines and jackhammering drowning out the communications of other species. In response, a number of animals, including marmosets and whales, turn up their own volume to be heard above the din, a phenomenon called the Lombard effect. A new study reveals that even fish "shout." Researchers took a close look at the blacktail shiner (Cyprinella venusta), which is common to freshwater streams of the southeastern United States and whose short-distance acoustic signals are often exposed to boat and road noise. Only male shiners make sounds; popping sounds called knocks are used aggressively toward other males, while staticky-sounding "growls" are used for courtship, both heard in the above video. When the scientists brought the fish back to the lab and cranked up white noise from an underwater amplifier, they found that shiner males emitted fewer, shorter pulses, and cranked up the volume of their acoustic signals to be heard above background noise. Published in Behavioral Ecology, it's the first study documenting the Lombard effect in fish, suggesting that freshwater fish are another group potentially impacted by our ever-increasing hubbub. © 2014 American Association for the Advancement of Science
Keyword: Animal Communication; Hearing
Link ID: 20059 - Posted: 09.11.2014
By Virginia Morell A dog's bark may sound like nothing but noise, but it encodes important information. In 2005, scientists showed that people can tell whether a dog is lonely, happy, or aggressive just by listening to his bark. Now, the same group has shown that dogs themselves distinguish between the barks of pooches they're familiar with and the barks of strangers and respond differently to each. The team tested pet dogs' reactions to barks by playing back recorded barks of a familiar and unfamiliar dog. The recordings were made in two different settings: when the pooch was alone, and when he was barking at a stranger at his home's fence. When the test dogs heard a strange dog barking, they stayed closer to and for a longer period of time at their home's gate than when they heard the bark of a familiar dog. But when they heard an unknown and lonely dog barking, they stayed close to their house and away from the gate, the team reports this month in Applied Animal Behaviour Science. They also moved closer toward their house when they heard a familiar dog's barks, and they barked more often in response to a strange dog barking. Dogs, the scientists conclude from this first study of pet dogs barking in their natural environment (their owners' homes), do indeed pay attention to and glean detailed information from their fellows' barks. © 2014 American Association for the Advancement of Science
Keyword: Animal Communication; Language
Link ID: 20012 - Posted: 08.30.2014
Erin Allday When a person suddenly loses the ability to speak or to understand what others are saying, the hardships that cascade from that loss can be overwhelming - from the seemingly trite to the devastatingly depressing. What hit Derrick Wong, 49, hardest was losing the ability to tell a joke. Ralph Soriano, 56, hates taking his car to the mechanic, knowing he will barely understand what's being said. "Girls," said Luke Waterman, 30, with a sigh. Flirting used to come easy. All three men - actually a pretty happy, hopeful gang for the most part - are longtime members of a group therapy program at the Aphasia Center of California, an Oakland nonprofit that offers treatment and ongoing education to people who have suffered communication disorders as a result of stroke or other brain injury. The nonprofit specializes in long-term therapy, an area of aphasia treatment that has taken off in the past few years. For many decades, doctors and speech pathologists assumed that patients had a window of six months to a year to recover language skills lost to a brain injury. Now, anecdotal reports and clinical research suggest that the window is much wider, and may even stay open a lifetime. "There is evidence that people can improve and regain skills, even years after a stroke," said Blair Menn, a speech language pathologist at Kaiser Permanente Medical Center in Redwood City. © 2014 Hearst Communications, Inc.
Keyword: Stroke; Language
Link ID: 19996 - Posted: 08.26.2014


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John Battista, Mayor���s Office of Film, Theatre and Broadcasting
October 9, 2013
- For more than a decade, John Battista has served as the deputy commissioner of the Mayor's Office of Film, Theatre and Broadcasting, helping to coordinate some of the most elaborate sequences ever to be filmed in New York City. Now he begins a new chapter in his career, and we look back at his time with the City.
In 1999, Battista became the commanding officer of the NYPD Movie/TV Unit, the division of police officers assigned to monitor productions for safety. "It was my first experience with the industry," he recalled. "There wasn't much filming here at the time."
When he was still in charge of the NYPD Movie/TV Unit, he was called upon for what was one of the most logistically challenging sequences to ever be done in New York City. For the 2001 film
Vanilla Sky
, which starred Tom Cruise, the production wanted to clear Times Square of all people and vehicles for a scene that finds Cruise running through an empty Times Square. After going through potential ideas, Battista helped determine how much time the production would get and when they could film – two hours on a weekend morning just after dawn – and through close coordination with traffic agents and the filmmakers, they were able to successfully execute the sequence.
"This opened the door to studios realizing New York City could be a place to bring films and TV shows," he said.
In 2002, Battista was getting ready to retire from the police force. Before he did, he brought the then newly appointed film commissioner, Katherine Oliver, around to various sets and explained the logistics and challenges of filming in a city of 8 million people. "She understood," Battista said, and when Commissioner Oliver asked him to stay on as deputy commissioner, he agreed. "It was a great opportunity to do something I enjoy," he said.
Because Mayor Bloomberg and Commissioner Oliver were bringing a business model to City agencies, Battista saw it as a powerful statement. "It meant that we were able to say 'yes' to more requests," he said. "We had the support of the Mayor."
"One of the first challenges I faced as the new film commissioner was a complicated location shoot with
," remembered Commissioner Oliver. "I quickly realized a critical part of our job was traffic control and logistics. John Battista not only had the know-how to coordinate the shoots from experiences in the NYPD and traffic, but he had the right attitude to get things done and make everyone – both production and the communities – feel like they got what they needed. And he always did so with a smile and a winning personality."
With this renewed atmosphere of collaboration with the film industry and a number of innovations spearheaded by the Mayor's Office of Film, Theatre and Broadcasting to make filming in the City as easy as possible, production levels grew, as did the complexity of their requests. Whether it was staging a complicated dragon dance in Chinatown for
The Sorcerer's Apprentice
or recreating the Thanksgiving Day Parade for
Tower Heist
a week after the real one – "We had two Thanksgiving Day Parades that year" – Battista and the film office were able to accomplish the seemingly impossible. "Every time we were challenged, we were always able to meet the demand," he said.
Arguably the most complicated production to film in the City was
I Am Legend
, which starred Will Smith. For a pivotal evacuation scene, the sequence was filmed over a series of five nights, featuring 1,200 background actors, a Blackhawk helicopter, Hummers, Coast Guard cutters and a number of barges. "We were coordinating with City, state and federal agencies," said Battista, "and were pretty successful in the end."
Throughout this increase in filming, Battista has always been cognizant of balancing the needs of the studios and productions with the concerns of the community. "We realize it's a viable business and employs a tremendous amount of people, but we're sensitive to the needs of small businesses and the community," he said. With productions now required to follow a set of guidelines when filming in a community, like posting contact info so that residents can address any of their concerns, and the film office responding to all of the phone calls and emails it receives, it's gone a long way to keep New York City film friendly.
"Everyone at the Mayor's Office learned so much from him over the years, and we are certainly well positioned for the future," said Commissioner Oliver.
Now Battista is looking forward to working with the industry in a new capacity. As of October 1, he is the executive vice president of operations and client services for York Studios, one of the newest qualified production facilities in the City. Located in Maspeth, Queens, minutes from Manhattan, the 40,000 square foot space includes shooting studios, production offices, dressing rooms and on-site parking.
"I'll still be connected with the people I've worked with in the past and all the friendships I've developed," said Battista. He aims to bring his singular experience to the job and help the industry in new and exciting ways.
His years of service and all that he's accomplished will not soon be forgotten by the staff of the Mayor's Office of Film, Theatre and Broadcasting and the countless productions he's worked with over the years. "We thank him for his service," said Commissioner Oliver.
"After 31 years of working with the City," Battista said, "I'm proud of all that we've accomplished based on the teamwork of everyone in the film office and the leadership provided by KO."
Industry Star
Margarita Acevedo, Mayor's Office of Film, Theatre and Broadcasting
John Battista, Mayor's Office of Film, Theatre and Broadcasting
Tom Reidy, Madison Square Park
Steven Holtzman, Canal Creatures Productions
Jennifer Lenihan, Office of Film, Theatre and Broadcasting
Lynne Meadow, Manhattan Theatre Club
Thomas O'Donnell, Local 817
Katy Finch, Brooklyn Workforce Innovations
Meredith Conti, Grand Central Terminal
Gino Lucci, Picture Cars East
Habibah Ali-Love, OFTB
McCord Fitzsimmons, Former OFTB Intern
Lis Pearson, New York Public Library
Veronica Miles, EcoSet
Lisa Rubin, Hudson River Park Trust
Mari Jo Winkler, PGA Green
Michael Super, Coney Island, Parks and Recreational Manager
Caroline Stephenson, NYC Economic Development Corporation
Lisa Lucas, Tribeca Film Institute
Harriet Taub, Material for the Arts
David Moy, OFTB
Fred Cerullo, Grand Central Partnership
Marge Feinberg, DOE
Nate Grove, Marinas
Frank Gribbon, FDNY
Jeffrey Sangrund, Brooklyn Bridge Park
Javonne Parker, Staten Island Ferry
Justin Green, Build It Green! NYC
Tom Ross, "Law & Order: Criminal Intent"
Eric Peterson, Randall's Island
Connie Fitzgerald, Department of Environmental Protection
Joey Violante, Technicolor
Stephanie Argamaso, OFTB
Vito Turso, DSNY
Elizabeth Rapuano, Governor's Island
Estelle Cooper, Flushing Meadows Corona Park
Alvah Holmes, Former MOFTB Intern
Dana Kuznetzkoff, Line Producer
Eva Radke, Film Biz Recycling
Karen Meyerhoff, Guggenheim
Meredith Rothstein, Roseland Ballroom
Charlotte St. Martin, The Broadway League
The Artists Company
Celina Sze, OFTB
Sharon Jensen, The Alliance for Inclusion in the Arts
Terence Gray, New York Television Festival
Sam Levy, Summer Play Festival
Wes French, General Services Administration
Tom Maiorano, Brooklyn Navy Yard
Joan Cooney, South Street Seaport
Jeannine Marotta, Staten Island Economic Development Corporation
Brooke Smy, Tishman Speyer
Elliott Kerman, Tax Credit Accountant
Matthew Kania, Assistant Location Manager
Lieutenant Joe Lassen, Movie/TV Unit
In Memoriam - Nancy Littlefield
Ivory Henderson-Robb, Department of Transportation
Jack Powers, New York City Economic Development Corporation
Robin Forst, Lower Manhattan Construction Command Center
Kitty Preston, CUNY Locations
Liz Carollo, Greenmarket
Donna Masly, Roosevelt Island Operating Corporation
Sean Jones, New York City Department of Corrections
Sheila Greene, NYCHA
Ralph Musolino, Parks and Recreation
Rick Cotton, NBC Universal
Joe Fontao, Location Manager
Gretchen McGowan, HDNet Films/Open City Films
Tim Tompkins, Times Square Alliance
Erika Feldman, Theatre Row
Vin Lenza, Staten Island Development Corporation
Tristan Assent, "Made in NY" PA
Denise Motta, New York City Economic Development Corporation
Terry Lawler, New York Women in Film and Television
Monty Ross, 40 Acres and a Mule
Pat White, Local 764
Michelle Byrd, Independent Feature Project
Matt Miller, AICP
Kyle McCarthy, MTA Metro-North
Jeannette Pinero, Department of Correction
Bambi Brook, Dawn Animal Agency
Andy Nagy, NYCHA
Juan Rosario, HPD
James J. Claffey, Jr., IATSE Local One
Mac Brown, Producer
Cheryl Hodge, VTU
Llewellyn Wells, Executive Producer
Lawrence Major, Parks and Recreation
Ken Konfong, Economic Development Corporation
Whoopi Goldberg, Actress/Producer
Caroline Baron, FilmAid International
Thomas O'Donnell Sr., Local 817
Drew Jiritano, Special Effects Coordinator
Carla Rajj, Location Manager
Al Cerullo, Film Pilot
James Lauer, FDNY
Dan Mercado, Parks and Recreation
Rebecca Seale, DCAS
Alberteen Anderson, MTA
Joseph Ellis, NYPD
Peter Basich, DOT
Richie Silverman, NYPD
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During 2010/11 artist Rachel Carter was commissioned to create a sculpture for her home town of Heanor, Derbyshire. This book charts the research and development of the idea process and the creation of the new sculpture.
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Banners and bunting are everywhere in the party world. Wherever we party stylists can find a place to stick cutout triangles stringed together, we do. There is just something so festive about them. Not to mention how ridiculously easy and simple they are to make! For a recent birthday party photo shoot I styled, I designed printable bunting using the popular chevron pattern. Just print, cut and string with ribbon or twine. I hung the bunting behind the desserts to help create a focal point. The free printable alphabet banner featured on the blog Ruffled is so adorable and can be used for so many occasions. Fabric bunting is another great option for parties and decorating. Party stylist Kate Landers and I collaborated on a Wizard of Oz inspired party, and she used yards and yards of custom made flags over the blue and white children's table.
printable chevron bunting {photo by laura winslow}, free printable alphabet bunting, fabric bunting
Another popular trend that I love is using mini bunting to decorate simple cakes. This can also be done using paper or fabric, along with ribbon or twine. Simply attach to skewers or decorative straws and your simple cake becomes the life of the party. Super cute, right?
multi-colored cake bunting, red & blue bunting, yellow & white bunting


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Macworld/iWorld 2012 Preview: What You've Got to See
This year's edition of Macworld, taking place January 26-28, is shaping up to be a bit of a departure from Macworlds of the past. 2012 is a year of evolution for the event, now branded as Macworld/iWorld.
And that evolution begins tonight with a blast.


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This is a full new car review of the 2013 Volvo XC70 crossover. Read more
The 2012 Volvo XC70 is an appealing luxury crossover with style and safety to spare. Read more about this Swedish star in our full review. Read more
The stylish 2014 Volvo S80 often gets lost in the luxury-sedan shuffle. But is this sleek, swift Swede a hidden gem? Find out in our review. Read more
The 2014 Volvo XC60 is a stylish and highly capable luxury SUV, but can it take on models from Audi, BMW and others? Find out in our review. Read more
The 2013 Volvo XC60 is a highly capable premium SUV that's loaded with safety features and upscale appointments. Read more
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Bulletproofing Our IRS
Bulletproof and IRS are two words you don't normally see in the same sentence. The guys making 500-plus hp and more than 500 lb-ft of torque usually run it through a solid-axle rearend. But Corvettes since 1963 have been built with an independent rear suspension (IRS) for good reason. The ride and handling from an IRS are far superior to the antiquated design of any solid- axle rear. Unfortunately, your Vette's IRS was never designed to handle more power than the factory engine developed, so getting it to cope with our big-power big-block started with some very stout race-ready parts. The source—Tom's Differentials.
The parts list from Tom's is extensive, but cut corners here and you'll find yourself stranded on the side of the road. Tom's provided a 3.73 U.S. gearset, an oversized and hardened cross-shaft, a 31-spline spindle kit, a billet 1330 pinion flange, Eaton solid clutches, a hardened spider-gearset, and 30-spline inner stub axles. Throw in the fact that every nut, bolt, and shim are hardened, and you'll see we've basically replaced everything but the case. After all, to do it right, all the "weak links" in the system need to be removed from the equation.
While we were at it, we also tossed the original trailing arms and ordered new arms, bearing supports, and parking-brake components from Lonestar Caliper.
With parts in hand, it was time to move on to the machining, setup, and assembly of our rear diff. The experts at Tom's warned us that there are only a handful of machinists left who have the experience to build an IRS capable of handling this type of power. The reason? It's an incredibly time- and labor-intensive process, and everything inside the diff needs to be set to within thousandths of an inch. At the top of the "recommended" list was Mike Dyer, a 35-year veteran and the owner of Precision Corvette Differential.
Dyer starts by cleaning and media blasting everything, and then boring the new carrier to fit the oversized axles and cross-shaft. He machines a new flat for the cross-shaft lock bolt that is 0.060 deeper, then radiuses the edges and polishes the carrier to remove any casting imperfections. The clutches are pre-scuffed so they're already seated before you turn the first wheel, and the spider gears are shimmed to 0.002 backlash. The ring gear is installed with Loctite, and the axles are machined to 0.005 endplay. Even the tips are polished.
The ears on the case are also machined off for axle clearance, and the bearing-cap holes are drilled and tapped for 1/2-inch bolts. (Dyer machines these HD caps from raw blanks.)
The Timken bearings and races for the carrier and case are installed next, followed by the pinion and carrier themselves. The gears are then set up by pattern—and then the whole thing is disassembled and cleaned to surgical standards.
Finally, Dyer does it all over just to make sure it's perfect. The final assembly includes the installation of the new Torrington stub axle bearings, along with the pinion and crush sleeve; the pre-load is then set to 15 in-lbs. The carrier is then installed and set to 0.007 backlash. As with building a race engine, everything is checked and rechecked.
When we received the complete rear diff and new trailing arms (which Dyer also built), one spin of the axle stubs told us everything we needed to know. The fresh setup had that smooth, almost silky feel that only comes with a machined part that's perfectly on spec. Our project now truly has a Precision Corvette Differential.
While we were at it, we ordered larger-diameter, "nitrous-ready" halfshafts and a new HD main shaft from Denny's Driveshafts. (The Denny's units come complete with heavy-duty universal joints as well.) By comparison, our old half- and mainshafts looked like they came out of a Corolla. Denny's even used our old parts as a template for size, length, and correct yoke spline, to make sure everything will go back together just the way it came out.
So there you have it: big-block power, a super-duty transmission, a bulletproof rear diff, and a set of nitrous-ready halfshafts and mainshaft. Guess where the weak link is now? The rear tires. We're gonna shred 'em like mozzarella cheese.


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Originally written on Patriots Life | Last updated 1/13/13
Rob Gronkowski missed five weeks earlier this season after breaking his forearm blocking an extra point against the Colts. He finally returned in Week 17 to limited action. In the first quarter of today's game, Gronkowski landed on that same arm (which has heavily wrapped) hauling in a deep pass from Tom Brady that landed out of bounds. He never returned and the news isn't good.Boston Herald:Tight end Rob Gronkowski has broken his left forearm again, and he'll need season-ending surgery, according to a source.Pretty terrible news to come out on Gronkowski. Granted the Patriots have handled the Houston Texans this far, they also only lost one game without Rob Gronkowski. Still, he is a key cog in the Patriots offense and his absence could be a huge factor in the coming games should the Patriots hold on against the Texans.
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Weather Channel's Jim Cantore knees a video-bomber in the groin and doesn't miss a beatAdd to Favorites | Storm Stories
Jim Cantore is "The Rock Star of Meteorologists" for a reason. He narrates "Storm Stories" and is generally considered a kick-butt guy in his field. Now he can add impromptu martial artist to the list of reasons.
In the above video, watch as Cantore covers winter storm Leon in Charleston, S.C. He's on the campus of the College of Charleston and apparently, one of the male students decided video bomb Cantore.
As the young fella runs screaming into the shot, Cantore just calmly lifts his knee up and deflects the young man's attack, never missing a beat as he delivers the weather report. Amazing.
Below is the Weather Channel's Top 5 Cantore moments video, which is also a lot of fun.
Photo/Video credit: The Weather Channel


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From: Richard R. Byard
Ellicott City
The letter from Edwin Strakna (Howard County Sun, Readers write, "Bring in Wal-Mart," March 22) is a classic example of how people respond when they don't know what the issue is.
From: Richard R. Byard
Ellicott City
The letter from Edwin Strakna (Howard County Sun, Readers write, "Bring in Wal-Mart," March 22) is a classic example of how people respond when they don't know what the issue is.
Strakna indicated he believes Howard County should have a Wal-Mart to keep him from going outside the county to shop. Whether or not Wal-Mart is in Howard County is not the issue; we would welcome Wal-Mart into Howard County if it acted like a responsible business and was willing to locate where it already has been decided such businesses should be located.
Theissue is whether or not to rezone an area currently zoned for small-office use to permit two airplane hangar-type buildings to be built on that parcel of land.
The land currently is almost gridlocked with traffic. It will only cause our citizens to pay more taxes to buildmore roads to accommodate a Wal-Mart located in an area not zoned for it. Shopping centers in this area have many empty stores now because there are more stores than there are customers already. But more taxes, more stores going out of business and citizens' opposition are not the deciding factors.
The rule for rezoning is that the land only can be rezoned if the county erred in its original zoning, or there has been a substantial change in the neighborhood. The only change in that area has been that it has become more of a residential neighborhood.
Also, the citizens of that area do not believe the county erred in its initial zoning. History tells us that it is rare (almostnever) that the county errs in initial zoning. So it should be a foregone conclusion that Wal-Mart will not get what it wants in this case.
A major question is, why does Wal-Mart insist that it will havethis particular location? Wal-Mart was invited by the Rouse Co. to locate near Columbia, but declined. Being in Columbia would provide Strakna, who lives in Columbia, more convenience in his shopping at Wal-Mart.
When a company such as Wal-Mart insists on changing the zoning laws to locate in an area not zoned for it, and where there is strong citizen opposition to the change, it seems to me that Wal-Mart has something up its sleeve. There must be some as-yet-unknown reason why Wal-Mart is trying to force itself into a particular piece of property not zoned for it and where it is not wanted.
Since the topicof Wal-Mart being in this area has arisen, I have visited some of their stores in other states, such as Virginia and Indiana, where prices should be lower than in this area. It is my opinion that Wal-Mart'sprices in those stores are no lower than the prices of K mart. In myopinion, Wal-Mart is nothing more than a K mart in disguise, but with larger buildings.
More importantly, that they insist on locatingin an area where they are not wanted tells me they are not interested in the desires of those they propose to serve.
From: Lloyd Knowles
The new trash tax proposed byHoward County Executive (Charles I.) Ecker should be defeated.
Two reasons: 100 percent of the cost of this basic governmental servicewould be transferred to the homeowners; and, unlike other taxes, theso-called "fee" would not be deductible from state and federal income taxes.
And, since the fee cannot be deducted, the county will share in the individual's increased state income tax, via the local 50 percent (up to 60 percent?) piggy-back surcharge. Perhaps this is an unintentional minor windfall, but Machiavelli would have loved it.
From: Marilyn S. Dlugos
Ellicott City
Is anyone else upset with Howard Cable Television?
They are the only game in town, and we must play by their rules. Our only other option isto quit playing and paying, which is what I decided to do.
The cable magazine no longer arrives on time (mine came on the 12th). Service representatives have been surly and rude and given many excuses for the magazine's late arrival. It no longer is sent first-class mail but bulk rate, lowering HCTV's operating expenses and ensuring that the magazine will always be late.
Calls to a supervisor and a manager have not been returned. One call to a supervisor had me reduced totears.
They can rely on the complacency of their subscribers who want to be entertained and have no other alternative. I can only hopea good many more people will be moved to cancel their cable and perhaps HCTV will realize they provide a service where the customer should matter.
I am sure we will experience a period of adjustment, butthe positive benefits should bring my family closer together, healthier and a little richer. I feel a sense of personal satisfaction knowing I will no longer pay to be mistreated.
From: Joe Russo
The Hammond High School girls basketball team and coaching staff would like to share with you our appreciation to Gary Lambrecht for his coverage of our basketball team, especiallythe article regarding our state championship win.


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Originally designed by Richard Paolino for Progetti, the London Skyline Wall Clock features the lovely London skyline vividly outlined in black on a wood panel painted white. Featuring the London Bridge, St. Paul's Cathedral, the Gherkin, and more, this Progetti clock cleverly uses Big Ben as the base of the clock face.
Battery quartz movement. Mounting hardware and batteries included.
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Thousands of nutritious recipes. Choose your kind of healthy. Learn more
My family loved this recipe..healthy and light and easy to prepare.
I am wondering if anyone has tried making just the egg pancake and freezing it. I am thinking that you could make the pancake part ahead of time and then make different fillings with whatever you had on hand or whatever struck your fancy at the time. Has anyone tried making just the pancake and freezing it? If so how did that work out? Thanks.
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