text:
In a standing-room-only speech to the Credit Union National Association meeting here, Greenspan also said U.S. household finances appeared generally sound, despite rising debt levels and bankruptcy filings. Low interest rates and surging home prices have given consumers flexibility to manage debt, he said.
"Overall, the household sector seems to be in good shape," Greenspan said.
Americans have been buying homes and refinancing mortgages at a record pace in the past several years, lured by low interest rates. Most mortgages are fixed rate, so consumers can prepay when rates go down but do not face higher costs if rates rise. Under adjustable-rate mortgages (ARMs), which made up about 28% of mortgages in January, borrowers usually have lower initial rates but face the risk of higher payments if rates in the broader economy rise.
While borrowers can refinance fixed-rate mortgages, Greenspan said homeowners were paying as much as 0.5 to 1.2 percentage points for that right and the protection against a potential rate rise, which could increase annual after-tax payments by several thousand dollars.
He said a Fed study suggested many homeowners could have saved tens of thousands of dollars in the last decade if they had ARMs. Those savings would not have been realized, however, had interest rates shot up.
"American consumers might benefit if lenders provided greater mortgage product alternatives to the traditional fixed-rate mortgage," Greenspan said.
Joseph McKenzie, deputy chief economist at the Federal Housing Finance Board, says buyers like the stability of fixed-rate mortgages, but there is increasing flexibility in products. "There are lots of innovative programs, especially targeting low-income and first-time buyers," he says.
The Mortgage Bankers Association said the average rate for a 30-year fixed mortgage in the week ended Feb. 13 was 5.46%, compared with 3.27% for a one-year ARM. Mark Zandi of Economy.com says that although Greenspan is technically correct, for some borrowers, including those with high debt, fixed-rate mortgages may be a better bet.


text:
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Updated 5-24-17

subset: commoncrawl


text:
Coming Apart: The State of White America, 1960-2010by Charles Murray
Charles Murray explores the formation of new American classes that are different in kind from anything we have ever known and focuses on whites to drive home the fact that the trends he describes do not break along lines of race or ethnicity.
- Overview
- Editorial Reviews
- Product Details
- Related Subjects
- Read an Excerpt
- What People Are Saying
- Meet the author
Charles Murray explores the formation of new American classes that are different in kind from anything we have ever known and focuses on whites to drive home the fact that the trends he describes do not break along lines of race or ethnicity.
Editorial Reviews
David Brooks, The New York Times
"Mr. Murray's sobering portrait is of a nation where millions of people are losing touch with the founding virtues that have long lent American lives purpose, direction and happiness."
W. Bradford Wilcox, The Wall Street Journal
"'Coming Apart: The State of White America 1960-2010' brims with ideas about what ails America."
The Economist
"a timely investigation into a worsening class divide no one can afford to ignore."
Publisher's Weekly
"[Charles Murray] argues for the need to focus on what has made the U.S. exceptional beyond its wealth and military power...religion, marriage, industriousness, and morality."
Booklist (Starred Review)
"Charles Murray ... has written an incisive, alarming, and hugely frustrating book about the state of American society."
Roger Lowenstein, Bloomberg Businessweek
Product Details
- 9780307453426
- Publisher:
- The Crown Publishing Group
- Publication date:
- 01/31/2012
- Pages:
- 416
- Product dimensions:
- 6.40(w) x 9.20(h) x 1.50(d)
Read an Excerpt
Our Kind of People
In which is described the emergence of a new and distinctive culture among a highly influential segment of American society.
ON SEPTEMBER 29, 1987, ABC premiered an hour-long dramatic series with the cryptic title thirtysomething. The opening scene is set in a bar. Not a Cheers bar, where Cliff the mailman perches on a bar stool alongside Norm the accountant and Frasier the psychiatrist, but an airy room, perhaps attached to a restaurant, with sunlight streaming in through paned windows onto off-white walls.
The room is crowded with an upscale clientele gathered for drinks after work, nattily uniformed servers moving among them. Two women in their late twenties or early thirties wearing tailored business outfits are seated at a table. A vase with a minimalist arrangement of irises and forsythia is visible in the background. On the table in front of the women are their drinks- both of them wine, served in classic long-stemmed glasses. Nary a peanut or a pretzel is in sight. One of the women is talking about a man she has started dating. He is attractive, funny, good in bed, she says, but there's a problem: He wears polyester shirts. "Am I allowed to have a relationship with someone who wears polyester shirts?" she asks.
She is Hope Murdoch, the female protagonist. She ends up marrying the man who wore the polyester shirts, who is sartorially correct by the time we see him. Hope went to Princeton. She is a writer who put a promising career on hold when she had a baby. He is Michael Steadman, one of two partners in a fledgling advertising agency in Philadelphia. He went to the University of Pennsylvania (the Ivy League one). Hope and Michael live with their seven-month-old daughter in an apartment with high ceilings, old-fashioned woodwork, and etched-glass windows. Grad-school-like bookcases are untidily crammed with books. An Art Deco poster is on the wall. A Native American blanket is draped over the top of the sofa.
In the remaining forty-five minutes, we get dialogue that includes a reference to left brain/right brain differences and an exchange about evolutionary sexual selection that begins, "You've got a bunch of Australopithecines out on the savanna, right?" The Steadmans buy a $278 baby stroller (1987 dollars). Michael shops for new backpacking gear at a high-end outdoors store, probably REI. No one wears suits at the office. Michael's best friend is a professor at Haverford. Hope breast-feeds her baby in a fashionable restaurant. Hope can't find a babysitter. Three of the four candidates she interviews are too stupid to be left with her child and the other is too Teutonic. Hope refuses to spend a night away from the baby ("I have to be available to her all the time"). Michael drives a car so cool that I couldn't identify the make. All this, in just the first episode.
The culture depicted in thirtysomething had no precedent, with its characters who were educated at elite schools, who discussed intellectually esoteric subjects, and whose sex lives were emotionally complicated and therefore needed to be talked about. The male leads in thirtysomething were on their way up through flair and creativity, not by being organization men. The female leads were conflicted about motherhood and yet obsessively devoted to being state-of-the-art moms. The characters all possessed a sensibility that shuddered equally at Fords and Cadillacs, ranch homes in the suburbs and ponderous mansions, Budweiser and Chivas Regal.
In the years to come, America would get other glimpses of this culture in Mad About You, Ally McBeal, Frasier, and The West Wing, among others, but no show ever focused with the same laser intensity on the culture that thirtysomething depicted-understandably, because the people who live in that culture do not make up much of the audience for network television series, and those who are the core demographic for network television series are not particularly fond of the culture that thirtysomething portrayed. It was the emerging culture of the new upper class.
Let us once again return to November 21, 1963, and try to find its counterpart.
The Baseline
The World of the Upper-Middle Class
Two conditions have to be met before a subculture can spring up within a mainstream culture. First, a sufficient number of people have to possess a distinctive set of tastes and preferences. Second, they have to be able to get together and form a critical mass large enough to shape the local scene. The Amish have managed to do it by achieving local dominance in selected rural areas. In 1963, other kinds of subcultures also existed in parts of the country. Then as now, America's major cities had distinctive urban styles, and so did regions such as Southern California, the Midwest, and the South. But in 1963 there was still no critical mass of the people who would later be called symbolic analysts, the educated class, the creative class, or the cognitive elite.
In the first place, not enough people had college educations to form a critical mass of people with the distinctive tastes and preferences fostered by advanced education. In the American adult population as a whole, just 8 percent had college degrees. Even in neighborhoods filled with managers and professionals, people with college degrees were a minority- just 32 percent of people in those jobs had college degrees in 1963. Only a dozen census tracts in the entire nation had adult populations in which more than 50 percent of the adults had college degrees, and all of them were on or near college campuses.
In the second place, affluence in 1963 meant enough money to afford a somewhat higher standard of living than other people, not a markedly different lifestyle. In 1963, the median family income of people working in managerial occupations and the professions was only $61,500 (2010 dollars, as are all dollar figures from now on). Fewer than 5 percent of American families in 1963 had incomes of $100,000 or more, and fewer than half of 1 percent had incomes of $200,000 or more.
This compressed income distribution was reflected in the residential landscape. In 1963, great mansions were something most Americans saw in the movies, not in person. Only the richest suburbs of New York, Chicago, and Los Angeles had entire neighborhoods consisting of mansions. The nature of the change since then can be seen by driving around suburban neighborhoods where the affluent of the 1960s lived, such as Chevy Chase, Maryland; Belmont, Massachusetts; or Shaker Heights, Ohio. Most of the housing stock remaining from that era looks nothing like the 15,000- and 20,000-square-foot homes built in affluent suburbs over the last few decades. No reproductions of French châteaux. No tennis courts. No three-story cathedral ceilings. Nor were the prices astronomically higher than the prices of middle-class homes. The average price of all new homes built in 1963 was $129,000. The average price of homes in Chevy Chase offered for sale in the classified ads of the Washington Post on the Sunday preceding November 21, 1963, was $272,000, and the most expensive was $567,000. To put it another way, you could live in a typical house in one of the most exclusive neighborhoods in the nation for about twice the average cost of all houses built that year nationwide.
There was a difference between the houses of the upper-middle class and of those who were merely in the middle class. An upper-middle- class home might have four bedrooms instead of two or three, two bathrooms and a powder room instead of one bathroom, and two floors instead of one. It might have a two-car garage, maybe a rec room for the kids and a study for Dad. But it seldom bore any resemblance to a mansion. For an example of elite housing in 1963, download an episode of Mad Men that shows the Drapers' suburban home- that's the kind of house that the creative director of a major New York advertising agency might well have lived in.
The members of the upper-middle-class elite did not have many options for distinguishing themselves by the cars they drove. You could find a few Mercedeses and Jaguars in major cities, but even there they were a pain to keep up, because it was so hard to get spare parts and find a mechanic who could service them. Another factor was at work, too: Executives and professionals in 1963, especially outside New York and Los Angeles, were self-conscious about being seen as show-offs. Many people in the upper-middle class who could have afforded them didn't drive Cadillacs because they were too ostentatious.
Another reason that the lifestyle of the upper-middle class was not dramatically different from that of the middle class was that people who were not wealthy could get access to the top of the line for a lot less in 1963 than in 2010, in the same way that you could live in Chevy Chase for not that much more than you would pay for a house anywhere else. It seems paradoxical from the perspective of 2010. Day- to-day life wasn't cheaper then than it is now. In Washington newspaper advertisements for November 1963, gas was cheaper, at the equivalent of $2.16 per gallon, but a dozen eggs were $3.92, a gallon of milk $3.49, chicken $2.06 a pound, and a sirloin steak $6.80 a pound. The best-selling 1963 Chevy Impala cost about $26,600. At Blum's restaurant in San Francisco, not an expensive restaurant, you paid $12.46 for the hot turkey sandwich, $13.17 for the chef's salad, and $5.34 for the hot fudge sundae. Pearson's liquor store in Washington, DC, had started a wine sale two days earlier, advertising its everyday wines at prices from about $6 to $12. All of these prices would have looked familiar, in some cases a little expensive, to a consumer in 2010.
But the most expensive wasn't necessarily out of reach of the middle class. In 1963, one of the most expensive restaurants in Washington was the newly opened Sans Souci, just a block from the White House and a great favorite of the Kennedy administration. The Washington Post's restaurant critic had a meal of endive salad, poached turbot, chocolate mousse, and coffee for a total of $44.91. The image of a luxury car to Americans in 1963 was a Cadillac. Its most expensive model, the Eldorado Biarritz, listed at $47,000. That same Pearson's advertisement selling vin ordinaire for $6 to $12 offered all the first-growth Bordeaux from the legendary 1959 vintage for about $50 a bottle (yes, I'm still using 2010 dollars).
And so there just wasn't that much difference between the lifestyle of a highly influential attorney or senior executive of a corporation and people who were several rungs down the ladder. Upper-middle-
class men in 1963 drank Jack Daniel's instead of Jim Beam in their highballs and drove Buicks (or perhaps Cadillacs) instead of Chevies. Their suits cost more, but they were all off the rack, and they all looked the same anyway. Their wives had more dress clothes and jewelry than wives in the rest of America, and their hairdressers were more expensive. But just about the only thing that amounted to a major day- to-day lifestyle difference between the upper-middle class and the rest of America was the country club, with its golf course, tennis court, and swimming pool that were closed to the hoi polloi. On the other hand, there were lots of municipal golf courses, tennis courts, and swimming pools, too.
The supreme emblem of wealth in 2010 didn't even exist in 1963. The first private jet, the Learjet Model 23, wouldn't be delivered for another year. Private and corporate planes consisted mostly of Cessnas and Beechcrafts, small and cramped. Only a few hundred large private planes existed, and they were all propeller-driven. The owners of even the poshest of them had to recognize that an economy seat on a commercial DC-8 or Boeing 707 provided a smoother, quieter, and much faster ride.
The World of the Rich
Still, a private plane is a major difference in lifestyle, even if it is not a jet, and private planes did exist in 1963. Shall we look for a distinct upper-class culture among the wealthy?
In 1963, millionaire was synonymous with not just the affluent but the wealthy. A million dollars was serious money even by today's standards, equivalent to about $7.2 million in 2010 dollars. But there were so few millionaires- fewer than 80,000, amounting to two-tenths of 1 percent of American families. The authentically wealthy in 1963 comprised a microscopic fraction of the population.
Some portion of that small number had no distinct preferences and tastes because they had made their money themselves after growing up in middle-class or working-class families. They hadn't gone to college at all, or they had attended the nearest state college. They might live in duplexes on Park Avenue or mansions on Nob Hill, but they were the nouveaux riches. Some acted like the stereotype of the nouveaux riches. Others continued to identify with their roots and lived well but not ostentatiously.
The subset of old-money millionaires did have something resembling a distinct culture. Besides living in a few select neighborhoods, they were concentrated in Boston, New York, and Philadelphia. They summered or wintered in a few select places such as Bar Harbor, Newport, and Palm Beach. They sent their children to a select set of prep schools and then to the Ivy League or the Seven Sisters. Within their enclaves, old-money America formed a distinct social group.
But besides being a tiny group numerically, there was another reason that they did not form an upper-class culture that made any difference to the rest of the nation. Those who hadn't made the money themselves weren't especially able or influential. Ernest Hemingway was right in his supposed exchange with F. Scott Fitzgerald. In 1963, the main difference between the old-money rich and everybody else was mainly that they had more money.
Take, for example, the woman who was the embodiment of the different world of the rich, Marjorie Merriweather Post. Heiress to the founder of the company that became General Foods, one of the wealthiest women in America, she owned palatial homes in Washington, Palm Beach, and on Long Island, furnished with antiques and objets from the castles of Europe. She summered in the Adirondacks, at Camp Topridge, surrounded by her private 207 acres of forest and lakes. She took her sailing vacations on Sea Cloud, the largest privately owned sailing yacht in the world, and flew in her own Vickers Viscount airliner, with a passenger cabin decorated as a living room, probably the largest privately owned aircraft in the world.
Hers was not a life familiar to many other Americans. But, with trivial exceptions, it was different only in the things that money could buy. When her guests assembled for dinner, the men wore black tie, a footman stood behind every chair, the silver was sterling, and the china had gold leaf.
What People are Saying About This
David Brooks, The New York Times
"Mr. Murray's sobering portrait is of a nation where millions of people are losing touch with the founding virtues that have long lent American lives purpose, direction and happiness."
W. Bradford Wilcox, The Wall Street Journal
"'Coming Apart: The State of White America 1960-2010' brims with ideas about what ails America."
The Economist
"a timely investigation into a worsening class divide no one can afford to ignore."
Publisher's Weekly
"[Charles Murray] argues for the need to focus on what has made the U.S. exceptional beyond its wealth and military power...religion, marriage, industriousness, and morality."
Booklist (Starred Review)
"Charles Murray ... has written an incisive, alarming, and hugely frustrating book about the state of American society."
Roger Lowenstein, Bloomberg Businessweek
Meet the Author
CHARLES MURRAY is the W. H. Brady Scholar at the American Enterprise Institute. He first came to national attention in 1984 with Losing Ground. His subsequent books include In Pursuit, The Bell Curve (with Richard J. Herrnstein), What It Means to Be a Libertarian, Human Accomplishment, In Our Hands, and Real Education. He received a bachelor's degree in history from Harvard and a Ph.D. in political science from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He lives with his wife in Burkittsville, Maryland.
Customer Reviews
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I read this book on the recommendation of my father-in-law so we could discuss it. While I did find it interesting, it read like a high school or college sociology textbook. I do not recommend it for Nook as the line graphs are hard to read and he refers to them often and it is hard to find them again.
i'm not sure why an author has to be "self-aware" as opposed to "self-absorbed" to write on a topic (i can find several examples of excellent books by authors who are most likely self-absorbed). in addition, how a reviewer boasts a solid conclusion to that effect is beyond self-righteousness. most likely an effect of being in an elite bubble that Murray wonderfully describes in the book. otherwise, how does a person say something subjective - unless he is a professional psychologist - as calling someone self-absorbed in an assured way as to seem objective? because he assumes he is right about everything, thus making him an elite. perhaps not in status, but in his own mind. the "Tom Wolfe" reviewer also uses the word "obviously", without backing his assertions up with any amount of proof or argument whatsoever. i found this to be another example of the absolutely obvious nature of the reviewer's self-righteousness. the statistics and conclusions in this book are incredibly rational with subjective nuances about human nature in tact. i will leave the potential reader with one example that does not necessarily require statistics or more proof than we've all seen with our own eyes: Murray comes to the conclusion that children brought up (gasp!) in two-parent homes do better in life. Murray also brings up several points regarding the pursuit of happiness as it was originally intented in what he calls "the American Project". in so doing, he uses basic definitions of happiness as opposed to "unhinged hedonism" some may associate with happiness in modern times. the book brings up excellent points about how culture is affecting destructive or what he calls "unseemly" behavior that results from a society with less codes of honor or morals. one such example he provides is an "unseemly" severence package for a failed CEO. Murray points out that these packages are NOT illegal but are morally reprehensible. in other words, Murray concludes that a society that loses it's moral bearings erodes itself from the inside. even if one disagrees with Murray's conclusion(s), it will provide the reader with a facinating read for those interested in the social sciences, or even human nature in general. [one can preview Murray's presentation and summary of the book on booktv's website - i believe only the elite would find Charles Murray "self-absorbed" because they can never admit they are wrong or argue on topic]
Startling statistics. So startling that even if half of what he says is true, it's hard to discount his basic premise. If you've ever felt like the classes were much further apart in America than they've ever been, this book provides some possible explanations. Recommended.
Excellent analysis of societal shift. Reads like a text book.
This is an enlightening and compelling book. It was much more so because Mr. Murray limited his data to only the white population, which took away the racial bias he had been accused of in some of his earlier work. I would have been interested though in hearing Mr. Murray expand on his views regarding the specific underlying political and social policy events that help to explain the changes that began to occur during the 70s and 80s. Were Medicaid and other social programs contributors, such as the expansion of the definition of disability under the social security program? Also what impact might illegal drug use have had, or was the increase in illegal drug use a consequence of the social/economic disparity that was beginning to occur during those decades?
This is not light reading, but author Charles Murray does make sociology and statistics understandable to the lay reader. His picture of the trajectories of the white upper and lower classes since about 1960 is in some respects just the opposite of media stereotypes. He is concerned and I think rightly so about the growing rigidity of socio-economic class distinctions in the US even as most Americans continue to deny that such classes exist at all. What to do about it is another matter. Murray admires how most of the upper class live their lives and wishes they would preach what they practice. That might help or not, but it doesn't seem like a one stop solution to the various problems he outlines.
My thoughts- This book was interesting, but I think that 300 pages for the main text was too long. It could have been shorter and gotten to the point faster. I have never thought that the census was that important and asked a lot of personal questions that it didn't need to. This book showed me how important the census is and what kind of information can be gotten from it. Without this information there would be no book. I thought the last chapter was the best, because it was no longer about numbers and it talked about Charles Murray's opinion and where the United States will be in the future. We can already see in Europe what happens when heritage is forgotten. As a country we need to get back to our founding fathers' virtues, so that we can have a strong future without such a strong separation between classes. I recommend this book to those who want to learn how America is coming apart culturally. Disclosure of Material Connection- I received Coming Apart: The State of White America, 1960-2010 by Charles Murray for free from the WaterBrook Multnomah "Blogging For Books" program. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission's 16 CFR, Part 255.
Murray relates his perspective of the social changes over the designated time frame, the resulting grouping of like minded population clusters, and the likely results therefrom. It may be that such "clustering" is to be expected and perhaps we shouldn't be too surprised by such. Someone else said it, but I suggest it applies in this case..."birds of a feather flock together".
This book was my first reading experience in the field of social sciences. After reading it, I now know why I am not a sociologist. The facts that Murray presented in Coming Apart concerning the shifts and changes that have taken place in American society over the last fifty years were very interesting, and he put into words and numbers trends and movements that I have vaguely sensed but never fully understood before. However, the sheer amount of detail he included was overwhelming, to say the least. Three hundred pages of detail, followed by another hundred pages of appendices. Everything was presented in an orderly manner with plenty of explanation and interpretation of the data, but I couldn't help thinking as I read, "You could have made the same point just as powerfully in about 1/3 the words". As I said, I'm not a sociologist, so there could be elements of the book that I failed to appreciate. However, as a reasonably good reader, I found Coming Apart to be simply too overloaded with dry details. The points the author made were interesting, though, and I for one wouldn't mind reading a condensed version of this book if one were to be published. I received this book free of charge from the publisher in exchange for my review. A favorable review was not required; my opinions are my own.


text:
Implementation and Support Unit (ISU)
|You are here: ISU Home > RTT Technical Assistance > Teacher & Leader Effectiveness/Standards & Assessments > Instructional Leadership > Preparing Instructional Leaders
Improving programs that prepare prospective instructional leaders is one of the handiest policy levers for States, given the scope of their authority and the impact that change at this entry point can have.
All 19 of the Race to the Top States have work underway on their principal preparation. They are trying to reframe what prospective leaders learn to reflect the new demands of college- and career-ready standards and educator effectiveness systems for evaluating both teachers and principals, create residency-based programs and hold all preparation programs accountable for delivering effective new leaders.
These efforts require strong partnerships between the policymakers who govern K-12 education and those who govern higher education and its preparation programs. Most Race to the Top States are developing public reporting to give programs data about the principals they prepare. The most aggressive require preparation programs to reapply for certification based on revamped criteria that includes curriculum- and performance-based assessments of graduates.
How Others Are Using This Policy and Practice Lever
- Illinois has begun a full review of all principal preparation programs. To win approval, programs must focus on instructional leadership and develop partnerships with local educational agencies (LEAs). The State also has begun developing a performance-based assessment for principal candidates, including two five-hour sessions to ensure principals meet the new standards.
- In New York City, the NYC Leadership Academy's Aspiring Principals Program (APP) is a 14-month program for educators identified through a rigorous application process who agree to work in high-need schools for at least five years. Participants undergo a six-week summer intensive during which they work on comprehensive, simulated school projects. Participants complete a 10-month residency under an experienced principal while attending twice-weekly leadership development sessions. Finally, participants attend a planning summer, which allows them to prepare for their transition.
The Reform Support Network developed this tool [PDF, 2.9M] to help States and others explore this policy and practice lever. Learn more about how others have considered this topic here [PDF, 545K].


text:
|538 sq. ft.
|Property type
|Minimum Stay
|4 - 5 nights
The house 'Santos' has a great location, quiet, near the old town and local trades. Easily accessible, where to park your car is no problem, close to all the local shops in the village
Of new construction, the 'Casa Santos' has a contemporary architecture with traditional features as well, the natural light is present throughout the building.
The 'Casa Santos' consists of 2 independent apartments, one on the ground floor, the other on the first floor.
The apartment on the 1st floor comfortably accommodates 2/3 people, has a terrace with a spectacular view over the village and the surrounding environment. The apartment consists of;
1 bedroom, living room, a bathroom and equipped kitchen appliances.
The Ground Floor Apartment sleeps 4/5 people comfortably, has 2 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, large living room and kitchen
The 'Casa Santos' is undoubtedly a great space for family holidays and friends.
The ' Casa Santos' has a great location, quiet and with a magnificent panoramic view, near the historic district, which invites to walks in the streets and alleys and from the discovery of Carrickfergus. Easy access to park your car is no problem, close to all local shops in the village (restaurants, bars, grocery store, market, surfshop).
New construction, the 'Casa Santos' has contemporary architecture with traditional features and natural light is present throughout the house. Equipped with various household items (washing machine, hairdryer, iron, toaster, microwave, blender), these are some examples that you can enjoy.
The carrapateira due to its geographical location, where the sea touches the mountains, offers various leisure activities.
A 3 minutes (car) of two main beaches, the supporters of the 'sun', can relax, beach Bordeira and its river, is undoubtedly the ideal place, this beach is also fantastic for practitioners of kitesurfing.
For the more adventurous, the surf is one of the main attractions of the region, and the beach of the Beloved the perfect place where you can find surf schools, and have access to all necessary equipment, as well as professionals for some tips so you can enjoy the waves.
The spit of Carrapateira derived to their geomorphological characteristics, it is indeed a place to visit, where the observation of flora and fauna are the backdrop to relax and hear the rumble of the sea.
You can also visit the museum of the 'Sea and Earth', located 5 minutes walk, here you can learn more about the ethnography, which are represented major local sustainability activities throughout the ages, a place to visit.
A 'chapel' Church Carrapateira is also a place to visit, its history dates back to the sixteenth century, Manueline style where the stone and clay are the main elements in its construction. Here you can enjoy a magnificent view over the carrapateira well as the horizon, which plays between the sea and the sky.
The walking routes are also another offer in the region, highlight the 'Rota Vicentina' a major in International Circuit hiking trails. Lovers of mountain biking can also take advantage of this route, where part of the course is designed for practitioners pedaling.
Lovers for bird watching, here too, can enjoy one of the most active areas of the migratory routes of birds, where rare species can be observed very closely.
Contact with nature is undoubtedly the largest supply of Carrapateira.
A little over half an hour, can also visit some historical places in the area and places of amusement.
There is the city of Lagos, Vila do Bispo, village of Sagres, Cape St. Vincent, village of Aljezur, Monchique mountains, city of Portimão.
We recommend the car rental.
Happy holidays with us.
See you soon
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Iraqi Christians who refuse to flee amid Isis attacks
Iraqi Christians have been fleeing in their thousands from areas attacked by rebels led by Isis (the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant).
However, some are refusing to leave, despite the threat of attacks.
The BBC's Quentin Sommerville reports from a mass in the town of Qaraqosh.
29 Jun
- From the section Middle East


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Awards Season is in full Bloom!
April 13th, 2016
We traditionally talk about the three stages of film making:
- Preproduction
- Production
- Post-Production
Here in Digital Media land at Dordt College, we add a fourth: Marketing.
What good is a good film if no one sees it?
So we take film festivals and competitions pretty seriously here and that's paying off for two student films right now.
Defector is a 15-minute film that comes out of our "Short Film Production" class held each Fall. This class is limited to six students—each with a very defined roll. In the Fall, the film is produced. In the Spring, it is marketed.
Last weekend, Defector took home a Student Emmy Award from NATAS (National Academy of Television Arts and Science)—the same group that gives out Emmys. Next weekend, it competes for the top prize at the IMPA (Iowa Motion Picture Association) Awards right here in Iowa. It's also been accepted into the Wild Rose Film Festival, the Los Angeles CineFest and more. What an exciting time for independent film makers! The production crew behind this award-winning film is made of up of:
- Kyle Fosse-Director
- Jessical Lillo-Producer
- Andrew Cameron-Cinematography
- Sam Malan-Cinematography
- Jason Miller-Editor
Over a year ago, Nathan Walter of Norfolk, NE was given a huge pile of photos, video footage and documents and asked if he could/would make a documentary film out of it all. He turned it into a senior project and created 8,000 Miles with Dad, an epic documentary film (1 hour) about a Dad and Son who travel by motorcycle from Nebraska to Brazil to sprinkle the ashes of missionary grandparents in the Amazon where they work
ed for 40 years. Wow, what a story! 8,000 Miles has already had a couple theatrical screenings with sold-out shows and another one in the works. It's competing this weekend for the same awards at the IMPA and we're still waiting on word from other film festivals around the nation.
Film is meant to be seen by people—lots of people. Festivals and Competitions give exposure to the films we work hard on, and often result in much-deserved awards for our students. These awards and accolades carry weight on the resume and help our students stand out from the pack "out there" in the marketplace.
Film Festivals and Student Emmys
March 16th, 2016
It's Awards Season for filmmakers.
Starting in January with the big one-Sundance Film Festival—and moving to SXSW in March, film makers around the world are eagerly waiting to hear if their films have been accepted, nominated and win different categories.
A team of Dordt College student film makers is part of that group! Last semester, Kyle, Jessica, Sam, Andrew and Jason produced an original film called "Defector." We entered it into several festivals and as of today, it's been accepted into three already! "Defector" is a contender in the Los Angeles CineFest, the High Country Film Festival in the Blue Ridge Mountains, and perhaps most exciting is that "Defector" is in the running for the Crystal Pillar award with the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences (Upper Midwest Chapter)—the same group that gives out the Emmys.
Last year, Dordt students took home the Crystal Pillar (known as the "student Emmy) for a music video called "Tyger & Lamb" and we have a chance to do it again this year!
Our Digital Media trophy case in the hallway in the Ribbens Academic Complex here at Dordt College is packed full of awards, laurel wreaths and trophies from films that have gained national and international recognition, and we're excited that "Defector" is in the running for some more.
Making films in class is good and important, but doing it outside of class—then entering your work in recognized competitions or doing the work for paying clients—that's where the critical learning takes place.
If you come to Dordt to study Digital Media, maybe you'll be receive your first Laurel Wreaths, trophies and international recognition for your work. Coming to Dordt might be the best thing you could do to jumpstart your career in film making. (Want to see "Defector"? Sorry, while it's in competition, we can't post in on YouTube, etc. Festivals don't like to entertain films that are already in circulation. We have to wait 'til all our awards and ceremonies are complete before we can post it. You can watch the trailer here.)
Experimental Film: Beyond Breaking
December 11th, 2015
Wade Vollink and Dan Woudenberg have embarked on a unique experiment in mixed media art.
Not content with standard narrative, these two upperclassmen want to push the boundaries of film and do things a little different. Using a green-screen-cube, four synchronized cameras and advanced movie magic, they want to attempt something unique.
So they got to work building a set. After a trip to the lumber yard they came back to the art department's sculpture studio, one of Dordt's stellar facilities, and started building a cube that is 8'x8′ and 8′ high. The only access is by ladder over the top.
While building and painting, Dan took this simple timelapse and keyed in some random artwork during the process. This is an unplanned video, but already gives a hint as to what these guys have in mind.
Stay tuned for updates.
8,000 Miles
December 1st, 2015
One of the really fun classes upper class men get to take is "Production Practicum," which is a fancy way to say, "Independent Study. " It's not a traditional go-to-class kind of class. It's a semester where the student gets to focus on a passion project, and make it come to life.
Nathan W is wrapping up his Production Practicum and it's a documentary film called "8,000 Miles With Dad." Friends of his–a father/son duo named Dale and Jay–took an incredible motorcycle ride from Nebraska to Brazil so they could sprinkle the ashes of the parents/grandparents in a river in the Amazon Jungle where they had served as missionaries for 45 years. Along the way they had some remarkable adventures, close calls, and bonding experiences most dads and their sons could only dream about. Oh, did I mention that grandpa's ashes are in a ziplock bag sewn into the lining of a backpack as they cross international borders?
They shot footage along the way, took pictures and journaled. They handed the entire pile to Nathan, and he's digging gold from the mountain of media.
If you love post-production–like Nathan does–than this is an editor's dream. Like all editing, it's a matter of finding those golden nuggets and discarding the unnecessary stuff. Then you string those great pieces together to form a story. To help it along, you create graphics, add text, maps, voiceover, score great music and create a compelling story that people will want to see.
Most people think post production is the final stage, but it isn't. Marketing is. And that's where you might be able to join this story. Nathan, Dale and Jay are taking this film on the road for four screenings before Nathan starts the film festival circuit.
- Dordt College, December 12 at 7:00 pm in SB1606,
- Movie theater in Norfolk NE (Hometown of Dale and Nathan) on Jan 23,
- Movie theater in Lincoln NE on Jan 24.
- Movie theater in Traverse City, MI (date TBD)
For updates, please like the Facebook page.
(For the techies among you: Nathan used Avid on a Mac to organize the mountains of media and edit the story. He used After Effects and Photoshop to create the graphics. )
Filming at the Top—and Bottom—of Africa
November 19th, 2015
How is that possible? Glad you asked!
In December, Digital Media students and Professor Volkers will make the long trek to South Africa to film the shepherds in the mountains of a little country called Lesotho. This altitudinous, very high and land-locked country puts us near the Top of Africa. It's location way down in South Africa puts us near the Bottom of Africa.
And there's your answer.
Interesting thing about Lesotho is there's a whole group of people who make their living as shepherds in the high, remote mountains. Many of them start out as boys, as young as 10. Shepherds in Lesotho are not well respected and are
often looked down upon. Their hard, rugged lifestyle means these boys have very little time for school, for learning manners, and for church. As such, they are an almost unreached group of young men.
AIM—Africa Inland Mission—is doing something about that and one of the people doing something is Dordt College graduate Mark Eekhof. Mark has been living with and roaming with the shepherd boys for over a year now and we have the privilege of helping Mark tell the story of these shepherds NOT to a US audience, but to the people of Lesotho.
Our hope is to have our media broadcast on Lesotho TV to help the Basotho people understand the plight of some of their own, take ownership and begin the outreach and discipleship that is so desperately needed.
If that's not content worth consuming—or media that matters—I do not know what is.
A Senior, a Junior and two Sophomores will be part of the team that roams the mountains, gets to know the shepherds, and works to tell their story.
Lesotho, entirely circled by South Africa, only has about 2 million people and the country is greatly underrated as a tourist destination. We're going in December—which is summer there. One place we'll go is Semonkong, the Place of Smoke. This little town on the Thaba Putsoa range, gets it's name from the nearby Maletsunyane Falls (600 feet), which is the starting point for many great hiking and pony-trekking trails. We'll spend New Year's Eve in the Johannesburg area, and finish up our tour with a safari to see some game.
Gear for the Shoot:
- Black Magic Cameras, including the brand new Ursa Mini 4.6k (assuming it arrives on time!)
- Panasonic AF-100
- Panasonic HVX
- GoPro Cameras
- MiniBurst lights
- Manfroto Tripod with Pocket Jib
- Senhuizer Mics
Miles Travelled: Almost 20,000
Dates: Dec 30-Jan 11
Why: To produce Content Worth Consuming
Filming on the Border
October 27th, 2015
We have a unique class here called "Short Film Production." We limit it to a maximum of six students. Each person has a role, like, "director," "cinematographer," "editor," "producer," and so forth.
The idea is that in one semester, the team produces a film from an original script, then enters it into film festivals.
It's a fantastic time, and a wonderful way to learn the different roles each person has to play while producing a narrative film.
This Fall, the crew is producing a film called "The Defector," written by Dordt student, Kyle Fosse. Kyle is also serving as director of the film.
In this film, John, an American soldier during WWII, has–let's say he has issues–on the front lines, and decides to go AWOL. He encounters a German in a similar situation.
The story is a revealing look into the minds of men who are sworn enemies, but who also discover a common humanity.
Principal shooting is almost done and the footage is gorgeous. The battle scenes are very real looking and the main actors are doing a great job. Shooting in the Fall, with the colored leaves and the crisp temperatures, is a joy as much of the shooting is going on in a thick forest–surrounded by recently-harvested fields–along the river that separates South Dakota and Iowa.
A bit more shooting remains, including a jump from WWII to the modern era, then Post production begins in earnest. You can follow the progress and watch the trailer at the Defector Facebook page.
Highlighting Student Work
June 30th, 2014
In some ways, art students and graphic design students have it easy. They can create a painting, a logo, a sculpture, a photograph, and mount it on the wall or set the piece in a corner for everyone to walk by and admire. But displaying student films; that's another matter. Yes, we can put them on YouTube, Vimeo and personal websites, but in an academic setting like ours, how do we actually display student work?
One thing we've done is to create a display case in a high-traffic area on campus where we show off student awards (and there's a growing collection of these beauties!) as well as have student films constantly looping on 7″ monitors inside the case. People stop by to admire the marquee, see the awards and watch a few minutes of one of the films. It's been a great way to get work out there. But we only have three monitors looping at a time, so what about some of the other projects students are working on?
We recently created a place specifically for that reason. It's a website–outside the official environs of our College web pages–where we can post student work and give a bit more detail about some of things going on. As more and more projects are created, we'll keep adding more and more content to the site. No, it's not a wall you can walk by and look at each time you're nearby, but we hope you'll bookmark the page and check back regularly to see what students here are up to.
The First Ever Dordt College Media Camp (DCMC)
June 23rd, 2014
Well, it's over already. Our first ever Media Camp. Seven brave high school students from around the country risked it all to be the first-ever participants in this camp and from their reactions, it was worth it!
As instructors, we had a blast with them. Tuesday was radio day. The students visited two different radio stations-KDCR and KSOU, worked on news stories, went out to do an interview, cut together stories and saw the inner-workings of a radio station. They even made a commercial to promote DCMC! John Slegers, Jim Bolkema, Denny DeWaard and Sheena all did a great job of helping our future media professionals understand the world of radio broadcasting.
Wednesday was announcer day for play-by-play at sporting events. The team went down to Sioux Falls to watch a ball game with Dordt's own Mike Byker who does much of the play-by-play for Defender sporting events. They spent time with professionals who do the announcing live on the radio and learned more about that aspect of media.
Thursday was digital media day with Mark Volkers. Students had a frank discussion about the role faith plays in media creation and consumption, had a fantastic tour of KTIV in Sioux City, did some shooting (and a bit of acting), then went into post-production in Dordt's professional media lab.
Evenings were full of activities including a round of "barnyard golf," swimming in the pool, restaurant visits, a BBQ and more. It was great having these young people with us for a week and who knows–it might just happen again next year!
A Summer of Educational Videos
May 28th, 2014
This is our third summer to work closely with Glynlyon publishing out of Phoenix, Arizona. Glynlyon develops curriculum for schools, homeschool families and more. They have lessons on how to be entrepreneurial in business, on medieval history, on geometry, algebra, science and, well, pretty much everything. Over the last two summers, a few students–working throughout the summer as paid interns for Prairie Grass Productions, produced a few videos to accompany those lessons. This summer, we're ramping it up!
Five Digital Media majors are working full time–the entire summer–producing educational videos for Glynlyon. What an opportunity!
They get a lesson–let's say it's on Polygons–then they write a script, or, treatment for what the video could look like. Once their instructor and the contact in Arizona green lights the script, they're off and running lining up interviews, finding actors, locations, costumes, creating animations, music, graphics and whatever else they need to create excellent work. Our goal is 15 of these videos over the summer. It's a big job, but Courtney, Kaylie, Lance, Megan and Tanner are up for the challenge. In their first week, they already have a number of scripts greenlighted and one in production. Go team!
Dordt College Media Camp–First One
May 19th, 2014
At Dordt, we have Discovery Days, the IDEAS camp for science and lots of other fantastic opportunities for young people to learn in the summer. And this summer–for the first time–we're hosting the Dordt College Media Camp!
Before I get into that, here are the things you'll want to know:
Dates: Monday June 16-Friday June 20, 2014
Check in: Monday from 6-7:30 pm.
Check out: Friday from 1-2 pm.
What happens between those times is where the fun takes place. This camp is for high school students who are interested in learning all kinds of things about media in all it's many facets. As of today, plans are still somewhat fluid, but here's what it's looking like:
Tuesday: Radio Broadcasting Day with time spent at a few different radio stations learning the ropes, going out to do live interviews preparing stories for on-air broadcast, then being part of that broadcast.
Wednesday: Sports Journalism/Play-by-Play. Hang out with a pro and learn what it takes to be part of this exciting and demanding career. By the end of the day, you'll be ready to actually DO a play-by-play announcing gig with your fellow classmates.
Thursday: Digital Media/Film Making. Learn about the equipment, the hardware, the software, and what goes into making a media product–whether that's a .30 ad for toothpaste, or a 2-hour feature-length film. You'll practice your craft on the same equipment Peter Jackson used to create The Hobbit, Lord of the Rings, and King Kong.
Friday: Photojournalism: Hang out with an awesome photographer and learn how to get better pictures, no matter what you're shooting.
Oh, and besides all that, there are field trips! Yup, field trips to shoot photography, go to a sports game and watch professional sports journalists at work, take in a tour of a TV news station and more.
It will be a full week with very little time to get bored. We're starting small–limiting this group to under 10 students but we think this could grow and become something great!
Should We Go See "Noah"?
March 27th, 2014
A few weeks ago, my mind wandered as I was sitting in church. It does that sometimes. I went to Genesis and started reading the fascinating story of Noah and the flood. Even though I've read or heard the story a gazillion times in my half century of life, I realized something for the first time during that reading: That Noah's grandpa, Methusalah, was 369 years old when Noah was born, and Noah was 600 years old when Grandpa Methusaleh died. Noah knew his grandpa for six centuries!
It's not earth-shattering stuff, but it was something I had never thought of before.
Fast-forward a few weeks. I'm reading an article in a journal I subscribe to called "American Cinematographer." The cover story is about the Noah movie with Russel Crowe and it was written by Iain Stasukevich. Iain interviews the main cinematographer about his techniques and lighting style and in the process of the interview, an interesting plot twist is revealed: "Noah plants a seed from Eden that was given to him by Methuselah, and the very next morning, water starts gushing out of the ground in front of Methuselah's mountain, and trees start popping up."
That's it. The article goes back to lighting techniques, which I won't bore you with. I reread that line a few times, then read it out loud to my wife. She was getting Sunday lunch ready so she gave a polite "uh-huh" and kept working, but I ran to get my Bible and found myself right back in Genesis 6. Of course, Scripture says nothing about magic seeds and trees popping up so I could only surmise that Darren Aronofsky, the director of the film, took a few liberties like this to make the film interesting and watchable.
And that's the point. Film, as a medium of communication, is intensely visual. If the visuals aren't interesting, no one watches it. Interesting visuals come from interesting story lines. The two must go together because without the interesting story line, there's no story which means there's no need for visuals. The Biblical account of Noah is a fabulous story and reveals to us what God wants to reveal to us as part of His holy word. But for a film, there's not enough detail. To make a film, some creative license will have to be employed to stand up to the standards of film as a medium, verses words on the printed page. Film is not print and print is not film. Marshall McLuhan is famous for saying it: "The medium is the message." The medium we choose to use for communication will have a lot to do with the way the message is constructed. To make a Noah film based exclusively on the words found in Scripture will ensure a film with large gaps in the story and in the character development because the medium used—film—will not support the story as expressed in the medium of printed words.
Which gets us to the main point: Should we go see "Noah"?
I haven't seen the film yet so I can't give a thumb's up or not (it's not out yet as I'm writing this.) But assuming that the film is well made and not full of heresy and gratuitous sex and foul language, then yes, I think we should support the film and enjoy the story. Why? Because for the last many decades, Christians have been brumming about how "they" never make "our" movies. But when "they" actually do try to make "our" movies, we complain and whine about how they missed the mark and didn't get it exactly right according to scripture and took too many liberties, too much creative license.
When I was a kid, I read "The Lord of the Rings" and "The Hobbit" multiple times. I also read "Guide to Middle Earth" and other behind-the-scenes kind of books. I was a Middle Earth nerd. Before the three "Rings" movies came out, I read each novel to my kids and did all the voices. We timed it so the end of our reading came the same week as the opening of the film. We were in the theatre on opening night. We didn't wear costumes because we're not quite that nerdy but it's close. I absolutely loved the movies because for all those years, the images in my mind of Frodo, Gandalf, Legolas et al were completely in my mind. For two glorious hours, I saw Peter Jackson's vision of what Gandalf looked like and sounded like, what Middle Earth might have looked like. His Orcs are far grosser than my Orcs and frankly, his are better. But to make the story work in a different medium, Jackson had to take some artistic license and deviate from J.R. Tolkien's carefully constructed story. Some things were left out completely. I was annoyed with that, but I was also thrilled with how the stories came to life in ways I never thought of. It was a beautiful experience for a Middle Earth nerd.
I also love Jesus. I love His holy word. I read it, study it, meditate on it. I see the stories in my mind. And I can't wait to see what a gifted director does with a story I know and love. His vision of Noah will be different than mine. Parts of it may be much better than mine. The movie's not even out yet, and I've already gone back to Scripture to see if indeed it is plausible that Methuselah could have handed some seeds down to Noah that came from a not-so-distant ancestor named Adam. Scripture says absolutely nothing about this but it's a fun thing to think about and it made me ponder anew many things about this story. The director of Noah will probably get a bunch of things wrong as he moves a story from one medium to another, but the reality is that we complain so often that "they" aren't telling "our" stories, so when "they" actually do go and spend tens of millions of dollars to do so, let's not be the first ones to start complaining that "they" told "our" story and how dare they do that!
Let's watch the film and judge it on its artistic qualities (film is an art form!); the quality of the story and the integrity with which it is told. Like "The Lord of the Rings," it will not be perfect. But it will play in theatres around the world and it's a Bible-based movie—exactly what we've been clamoring for for decades.
In the months to come, we're going to see quite a few Biblical movies. Let's be honest about something: The Hollywood machine isn't making these because they've had a change of heart and want to see America get close to God. They want to make money and they realize this is a good way to do it. But is that so wrong? Personally, I'm really tired of zombies and vampires. That trend—thank goodness—seems to have reached its peak and is slowly declining. Right now, the trend is Biblical stories. Hallelujah! I'll take Biblical epics over more zombie movies any day, even if they do take some creative license to help move the story to a different medium. Will these movies convert masses of people? I highly doubt it. But like me, it will expose people to stories they thought they knew and for many others, it might be the first time they actually want to open a Bible and see what it's all about. Will it shift the conversation in the office and at the work site? I suspect it will … for a time. Then a new trend will surface and Hollywood will surf that wave til the money runs out.
So rather than complain that "they" don't make "our" movies, and then complain when "they" do make "our" movies, let's enjoy the good and reject the bad. As my friend says, "eat the fish … and spit out the bones." Who knows, if these Biblical films make money, we may see a lot more of them in the days to come.
I'll take Bible movies over Zombie movies any day.
Seeing it First Hand
November 28th, 2011
One thing we figured out rather quickly here in the Digital Media dept at Dordt College, is that location means less and less with each passing year. With access to high-speed internet, and access to good airports, we can compete with pretty much anyone! Many other production houses are discovering the same thing. One of them is VVI, Vision Video Interactive, based in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, just an hour from Dordt College.
VVI does everything from local car ads to national political spots and Monday Night Football spots. They have a team of very creative individuals who work together in a fun, creative space. For the last few years, VVI has carved time out of their schedule to let our students in to see what they are working on, to ask them questions, to give advice on the job hunt and to be a sounding board for pretty much whatever the students want to ask them. It's a valuable time and a fun afternoon in Sioux Falls.
In the Spring Semester, our Communications Club–both Comm majors and DM majors–will once again head to Minneapolis/St.Paul for an overnight trip to visit public relations firms and production companies to see what's happening there. And believe me, there's a lot happening.
In today's world of media production, location is less important than ever. It used to be that production companies pretty much had to be on one of the coasts. Today, the heartland is a major player!
Independent Studies
October 19th, 2011
A Meeting in a Most Unusual Place
August 11th, 2011
The great thing about working in media is the opportunity to travel, meet people … and run into people in the most unlikely of places. Like the time I was filming in a rainforest in British Columbia. I crossed a small, swinging bridge in the forest and set up my gear for a shot back across that bridge. As I'm looking through the viewfinder, a face looms into view that looks like my good friend, Quentin. By the time I looked up from the camera, there was Quentin asking, "What are you doing here?"
Perhaps even more surreal was my meeting with friend and former student, Pete Hessels, last week. I dropped my son off in the middle of a huge forest in Northern Michigan for an 8-day cadet camporee. We really are talking the middle of the nowhere. My son forgot a bag he needed so the next morning, we drove into the forest to drop it off. I got out of the car and hiked through the forest, looking for another human. In the distance I could hear a small generator. I moved toward it and came upon a large mobile-home type of thing that the cadet leaders had hauled into the forest for some reason. There were lights on inside and I saw motion. I stood near a window and inside I saw a young man and thought he looked a lot like Pete Hessels, but it couldn't be because Pete lives near Toronto and was busy working.
When he looked up and saw me, it was instant recognition on both our parts. He from Toronto, me from N'W Iowa, meeting up in the forests of Northern Michigan. Pete was there as part of the production crew, producing 6 webisodes per day and uploading them via satellite uplink from that trailer.
As improbable as it sounds, I find this type of thing happens a lot in the media world. Because of the travel involved, and because of the very close relationships we build at Dordt College, it's going to happen even more as ever more students graduate from the Digital Media Production major and start making their way in the world. In a few months, several of us will be shooting in the Yucatan Peninsula, Mexico. I happen to know that one of our Digital Media graduates is there and we'll have a great reunion in Merida.
Meeting friends in the most unusual of places is such a treat. Maybe you'll be part of the reunion after you launch your media career.
Promoting the County
September 13th, 2010
Dordt College is in the heart of Sioux County, in the Northwest corner of Iowa, not far from Sioux Falls, South Dakota.
As you may have heard, agriculture is big business here. Don't be fooled. The gentle, rolling hills of corn and beans and the picturesque valleys full of cows by streams speak of a pastoral place where time might move more slowly than in New York City, but looks can be deceiving.
Sioux County is off the charts in what's it doing with innovate agriculture. In fact, tourists come here from Ireland, Germany and other places to see what's going on here. They hear about the 2 billion dollars generated in this county alone through agriculture. They hear about record beef, pork, and poultry production, cutting-edge genetic engineering and a high percentage of area farmers with bachelor's degrees and more.
That's why the Sioux County Chamber of Commerce approached us here at Prairie Grass Productions (Dordt College's film/video production company) to help them produce a promotional piece highlighting some of the amazing things going on here in Sioux County.
Three Digital Media seniors—Aaron, Brett and Gary—are busy right now shooting Hi-Def footage to help the county tell that story.
Aaron, of Ohio, is acting as producer on this project. As producer, he's responsible for the budget (yes, students often get paid for their work here), all the scheduling for all the shoots, being a liaison between the production crew (Brett and Gary/California and British Columbia) and the client (Sioux County Chamber) and keeping track of a million little details.
Gary and Brett are in charge of getting all that precious footage, coming up with some of the creative ideas that will make this product useful, and the post-production.
All three of these guys are doing this project for class credit. We call that an "Independent Study" and while right now it's strongly encouraged that each Digital Media student do an independent study as part of their digital media major, it will be a requirement starting Fall 2011.
These three guys are busy travelling across this great county, getting interviews with high-tech farmers, shooting sheep shearing, ginormous dairy operations, genetic engineers and so forth. The end product will be shown to those tourists I mentioned, as well as get shown to Jr. high and high school kids growing up in this county who don't have a clue about the amazing things going on right in their own backyard.
It's just another way that Dordt's Digital Media major stands out from the pack. We put our students to work on real-world projects with real-world clients so that at graduation, our grads go into the world with theory, head-knowledge, class-room experience in making films, AND a résumé that includes work they can be proud of.
We have other independent studies going on right now, but more on those later.
In case you're interested, here are some stats on Sioux County:
-In 2009 there were over 1600 farms in Sioux County, over 28% of county's 24,761 jobs.
-In 2009 the Av-market value of farm, buildings, and machinery was nearly 1.5 million – average sales = $673,764
-In 2007, the average age of a farmer was 51.4 years old
-In 2009, meat processing plants in Iowa produced nearly 3.5 million tons of red meat (beef, veal, pork and mutton)
-In 2009, total Ag receipts for Sioux County were over $2.1 billion (2,135,800,000) – 49.2% of all economic activity in the county for the year
-Sioux County farms cover over 478,000 acres – that's 97% of the surface of Sioux County
Swine Information (farrowing, nursery, finishing, packing plant)
-In 2007, there were 486 pig farms
-In 2009, there were 1,094,268 hogs or pigs in Sioux County
– In 2009, almost 3 million hogs and pigs were sold
-In 2007, Sioux County is #1 state in pigs marketed
-In 2009, Iowa continued to rank #1 in hog inventory in the United States
-In 2009, Iowa made up 29% of the nations hogs. Iowa has 19.2 million head
Beef Information (cow/calf and feedlot)
-In 2007, there were 725 farms that had cow/calf inventory which totaled almost 330,000 cows
-In 2007, Sioux County had 220 beef farms which combined had almost 15,000 cows
-440,000 cows were sold in Sioux County in 2007
-Iowa had 3.85 million head of cattle/calves in January 2010 (just under 4 million)
-In 2007, Sioux County is #1 in Cattle on Feed
In 2007, almost 440,000 head of cattle were sold
Dairy Information (facilities, calf raising, heifer growing)
-In 2007, there were 70 dairy farms in Sioux County
-In 2007, approximately 22,000 head of dairy cows were in Sioux County (#1 in state)
-Iowa dairy farmers produced $4.38 billion pounds of milk during 2009 (change to gallons)
-In 2009, the average dairy cow in Iowa produced 20,367 pounds of milk a year (gallons)
-In 2007, Sioux County had 166 horse farms. All together, they had almost 900 horses
Poultry (laying house, processing, pullet growing houses)
-In 2007, Sioux County had 58 laying hen farms. They totalled 4,490,702 hens.
-In 2007, Sioux County was #4 in laying hens
-In 2007, Sioux County had 45 goat farms with a total of over 2,000 goats
-Of those goats, 150 were milk goats and the other 1,850 were meat and other goats
-In 2007, Sioux County had 96 sheep farms totalling 25,565 sheep
-In 2007, Sioux County was #1 in Iowa in sheep
-In 2009, sheep and lambs totalled 210,000 head in Iowa at the beginning of 210
-An estimated 170,000 lambs were born during 2009 in Iowa
-In 2007, 155,000 lbs of wool was produced in Sioux County – show a pile of wool/graphic
Crops (land operations, equipment, GPS used, manure applications)
-In 2009, Sioux County had 479,000 acres of farm land which is also 2% of state number – compare to a football or Wal-Mart, make accessible, 97% – from ISU sheet
-2009, the average farm in Sioux County was made up of 289 acres
-In 2009, the value of acre of land in Sioux County was $6,028. This is almost 1/3 higher than the state average value per acre of $4,371.
-In 2007, total crop receipts were $6 billion for Iowa
-In 2009, Sioux County was 4th in Iowa for corn production. Sioux, Plymouth, Woodbury and Crawford were four among the top 6 in Iowa – total number of counties (99)
-In 2009, Sioux County produced between 38 million and 61 million bushels of corn
-In 2009, Sioux County was once again 4th in Iowa for Soybean production. Once again Northwest Iowa had six of the top nine counties
-In 2009, Sioux County produced between 7.5 million and 12 million bushels of beans
-In 2009, Sioux County produced 84,500 bushels of oats and is ranked #11th in the state
-In 2009, Sioux County produced approximately 39,000 bushels of Alfalfa Hay and is ranked 30th in the state (top 3rd)
-Sioux County harvested 395,000 acres of corn for grain, soybeans, oats, and hay
Dordt, India and the World.
August 24th, 2010
We have our very own production company here at Dordt College: Prairie Grass Productions (PGP for short).
Sometime last winter, an organization in Grand Rapids, Michigan called "Mission India" contacted us here with an interesting proposition.
"We would like to hire Prairie Grass Productions to help us film 10 episodes across India, post them on a custom-built website and help us raise a quarter of a million dollars in the process."
How could we say "no"?
In June, Dale Vande Griend, a digital media student here at Dordt College, and I went to India with Josh of Mission India, and Chris, our on-camera host out of Maryland. Once in Bombay (now known as Mumbai) we linked up with Jeremy, an Indian cameraman, Justin, our Indian on-camera host, and John, the guy who worked out all the logistics in India and kept things moving.
The next 12 days was a whirlwind of activity as we filmed in a couple slums in Bombay, then flew across India to Madras (now known as Chennai), drove south to Madurai, then up to Velore, back to Chennai, back to Bombay, and home.
What an adventure. Josh, our producer, scripted out 10 episodes in which Chris explored India, and explored what God is doing in India through Mission India. What we learned is that many are coming to Christ through this fantastic organization, and that there's still about a billion or so Indians who need to hear this incredible news.
And that's where we come in. That's the power of media, isn't it? To tell compelling stories, to engage interest, to help people explore things they might not otherwise explore, to create awareness, to generate a desire to pray; in short, to harness the incredible power of media for more than entertainment only.
Let me climb down off my soapbox and keep telling this story.
After a superb trip through India, it was back to Dordt's world-class post-production facilities to start bringing this story together.
Post-production (the editing and putting together) is where the magic really happens. Three of Dordt's digital media majors helped as assistant editors for several days by combing through all the footage, labeling it, organizing it, putting it into the proper bins in Avid, organizing our photos, helping us find sound effects, music, appropriate fonts and more.
Dale Vande Griend, Dan Kauten (both DM majors at Dordt) and I took on the job of lead editors and for the last six weeks—working 50-70 hours a week—marshaled all that footage into 10 sweet episodes and one killer teaser. And we got it done before deadline!
The amazing facilities at our disposal at Dordt College are what made all this possible. Our 20 Avids (Avid is the world's leading film-editing software. "Avatar," and almost every other film you've seen were cut on Avids) and our 16 terabytes (yes, you read that right … 16 terabytes) of media server made organization and collaboration a breeze.
We also spent a lot of time in After Effects creating animations and transitions that would NOT have been possible a few short years ago unless you had access to some very very pricey Hollywood style studios.
In short, Prairie Grass Productions—located in the heart of N'W Iowa—is in direct competition with the big boys on the coasts.
And here's what's so remarkable about this story.
Remember Josh, our producer out of Grand Rapids? He's a Dordt Grad.
Clickrain, the company based in Sioux Falls, SD that made the slick and polished website to host all these videos, is run by Paul Ten Haken. He's a Dordt Grad.
Prairie Grass Productions with me, the lead editors and the assistant editors: It's 100% Dordt College.
This global venture of telling stories on the other side of the world has Dordt College stamped all over it.
I think that's pretty amazing. So is the fact that just before going to India, Prairie Grass Productions (which means Dordt Students) shot among the Navajo in New Mexico … and among some poor communities in the Mississippi Delta … and in the slums in Kenya … and is in production right now helping the Sioux County Chamber of Commerce market itself to outsiders.
If you're looking for a film/video production program to launch your career, you have choices. But frankly, I don't know of any other program that gives you options like these.
These kinds of experiences are résumé builders like you can't believe.
Working on these kinds of projects for real-world clients hones your skills, increases your marketability and boosts your confidence.
And we do it all from a Christian perspective.
Personally, I think we have the best program out there. Check around, then check out the Digital Media Production major at Dordt College. Who knows? You might be on the crew of the next big project.
Check out the trailer here www.mypassporttoindia.org and be sure to sign up so you can see each episode as it's released.
Music Video for The Ready Set
July 3rd, 2010
Aaron Huisman, a Dordt grad now working in post-production in Los Angeles, just cut together this music video for The Ready Set. Great work Aaron!
Exploring Career Opportunities
June 15th, 2010
Thirteen of us had the priviledge of filming in the slums of Nairobi, Kenya, over the Christmas break. Twelve students and I did the third leg of our three-continent tour to produce this truly global look the one billion of us who live in slums.
While we were in Nairobi, we took a few hours out of our day to meet with Andy Brown of OFM—On-Field Media.
OFM is ministry of Africa Inland Mission, an organization with hundreds of missionaries scattered across Africa, doing evangelism, leadership training, Muslim outreach and so much more.
OFM exists to help tell stories of what God is doing through AIM missionaries across Africa. A lot of missionaries—gifted as they are—struggle when it comes time to go home and raise support, to tell their stories, to generate interest, prayers and giving. OFM does a superb job of helping them make professional videos, print pieces, webisodes and more. Our team spent a few hours with Andy, learning the history of OFM (it's not a very long history), learning what they do and how they do it, and what the opportunities are (there's a lot of opportunities!).
One of the exciting ideas that came out of our time together is a way to be mutually beneficial to eachother. OFM needs interns. Dordt's Digital Media major needs great places to send interns. The more we talked, the more excited we all got about summer interns from Dordt living and working in Nairobi, and even pursuing a semester abroad—working with OFM.
We'll see where it all goes, but in the meantime, the thirteen of us had our horizons expanded and students have yet another career option to consider.
Adventures in India
June 15th, 2010
- Map of India
After 10 years of trying to get to India, it's finally happening. Mission India, a group doing amazing things across India, has hired Prairie Grass Productions–Dordt's video production company–to produce a series of 12 webisodes to help them reach out to a current support base, and bring in a new target base.
Dale, a senior Digital Media student here at Dordt, and I will pick up our on-camera host en-route to Mumbai (Bombay). That's where the action begins.
Chris, our on-camera personality, will essentially explore Southern India to see what God is doing there. We'll film in slums, cities, towns and remote villages. We'll start in Mumbai and end in Madurai, way down south. It should be a fascinating exploration.
When we return, Dale and I will be joined by Dan, Vero and Cady–a team of five–to edit, edit, edit to meet deadline.
We're delighted that this organization singled out Dordt's digital media production company. It shows we're doing quality work and that budgets and expectations can be trusted with us. And since a huge part of the manpower for Prairie Grass Productions is made up of Digital Media majors here at Dordt, it gives our students unparalleled experience and resume-building material for those post-Dordt days which come faster than you can believe.
When our post-production work is done and the webisodes are posted, I'll post a link here so you can check out our Adventures in India.
Working in LA
December 6th, 2009
Our growing group of graduates from Dordt's Digital Media major are making their mark in many areas. Some of our students want to head out to the developing world to use their gifts in media there. Others want to get into documentary work, corporate work, advertising and so forth. A number of our grads are making their mark in the Los Angeles area.
One of them, Aaron Huisman, has been working with some big-name bands for the last few years as he cuts music videos and trailers for the Warner Music label. Aaron recently started his own company and is open for business. Check out his reel here.


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Unions group urges MPs to lead by example
The absence of all but five MPs at Wednesday's Parliament sitting was nothing but a "bad example" and sent out contradictory messages to the country, the Forum group of unions said.
The group of 11 unions said the 69 MPs were elected to carry out their duty, among other things, to their constituents and they were expected to attend regularly, punctually and contribute in the House of Representatives.
The unions condemned the absenteeism of MPs during Wednesday's Parliament sitting, which had to be called off because there were not enough members to form a quorum.
The sitting was called off at 6.22 p.m. because, at the time, there were only three government MPs: Ċensu Galea, Robert Arrigo and Parliamentary Secretary Mario Galea along with Opposition Whip Joe Mizzi and, for a brief period, Labour MP Roderick Galdes.
While appealing for such things never to happen again, Forum pointed out that the lack of quorum happened at the same time when the collective agreement of civil servants was being discussed.
It said during the talks the official side was insisting on unions to accept an electronic system that would keep tabs on when employees clock in and punch out in order to cut abuse.
See our Comments Policy Comments are submitted under the express understanding and condition that the editor may, and is authorised to, disclose any/all of the above personal information to any person or entity requesting the information for the purposes of legal action on grounds that such person or entity is aggrieved by any comment so submitted. Please allow some time for your comment to be moderated.


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Is Wolverine a Buddhist? Well, that may be pushing things, but as Jeffrey Kripal's book Mutants and Mystics: Science Fiction, Superhero Comics, and the Paranormal says, "Wolverine spent some time in Japan as a boy, speaks fluent Japanese, and practices Zazen." (He also, as Kripal adds, has practiced tai chi.) And now that he's got a new film, The Wolverine, coming out this summer, we see in both the advertising and the film itself that a little of his background is coming into play. See one of the film's posters to the left, which makes sly use of a pseudo-sumi-e style, and the film's trailer — which includes some temple-based brawling, as well as, as The AV Club puts it, "lots of sulking and ninjas." Enjoy, fellow comix fans, after the jump:
X-Men's Wolverine: A Zen Buddhist?
by Rod Meade Sperry|
About Rod Meade Sperry
Rod Meade Sperry is the editor of LionsRoar.com, a deputy editor of Lion's Roar magazine, and the editor of the anthology A Beginner's Guide to Meditation: Practical Advice and Inspiration from Contemporary Buddhist Teachers.


text: my name is Tom, i live in the tacoma washington area. I just inherited my grandfathers 1967 chevy 3/4 ton pick up. He ordered it from his local dealer in seattle, 327, 350 turbo, 411 rear end gears. Always garaged, never wrecked, all original parts, with the exception of possible rebuilt motor swap? has the small rear window which i hear was what the 67s came with. The bed is wood and never felt a single rain drop or the suns rays. i was always told as a youngin that one day this truck would be mine, and i have been driving it since i was 16. now that both grandparents are gone sure enough it is now in my possesion, and proud to own it! i will get some pics up soon. thanks for listening and makin me a part of this forum, Thomasa


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Patricia Paoletta is a partner with the law firm of Wiltshire & Grannis LLP, where she specializes in telecommunications, trade and technology policy. Ms. Paoletta provides advice on regulatory, trade and legislative policy to clients before the FCC, Congress and the Administration. Her clients include providers of content, cloud, mobile broadband, VoIP, international telecommunications, small cells, cognitive radio, public safety and homeland security solutions. She serves on Advisory Boards for several entities engaged in information services, communications and technology.
Ms. Paoletta has accrued considerable experience with telecommunications trade and policy in the public sector. From 1990 to 1995, she was senior advisor to the International Bureau Chief and Office Director at the Federal Communications Commission. In the mid 1990s, Ms. Paoletta served as Director of Telecommunications Trade Policy in the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative, Executive Office of the President, where she worked on the WTO Information Technology Agreement (ITA) and the Basic Telecommunications Agreement. After USTR, Ms. Paoletta served as Majority Counsel to the House Energy and Commerce Committee. She then moved to Level 3 Communications, as Vice President, Government Relations.
Ms. Paoletta is on the Steering Committee of the Transatlantic Roundtable on Telecommunications and Information Technology of the European Institute. She is a member of the USTR Alumni Association, Washington International Trade Association, the Federal Communications Bar Association (FCBA), and Women in Technology. Ms. Paoletta has served on the Board of Advisors for the Inter-American Dialogue's Latin America Telecom Advisor, Co-Chairman of the American Bar Association International Communications Committee, and as a member of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce's Technology Policy Committee.
Ms. Paoletta served as a delegate in 2012 to the ITU-R's Study Group 6 Working Party 6A Meeting and in 2009 and 2010 to the ITU-R's Study Group I Working Party IB Meetings; the 2009 meetings of CITEL (the Committee on International Telecommunications at the Organization of American States) PCC-II; the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) World Telecommunications Standards Assembly (2000); the ITU Internet Protocol Telephony Experts Group and the ITU World Telecommunications Policy Forum in 2001; as Chairman of the National Reliability and Interoperability Council (NRIC) Steering Committee (2000-2001); as Board Member for the Voice on the Net Coalition (2001); as Co-Chairman of the FCBA's Annual Seminar Committee (2009-2011); as a member of the FCBA's Ad Hoc Speakers Committee (2006-2007); as Co-Chairman for the FCBA International Practice Committee (2001-2002 and 2005-2006); and as a Co-Chairman of the FCBA Legislative Practice Committee (1999-2000).
The Federalist Society takes no position on particular legal or public policy issues. The people listed as Experts have spoken or otherwise participated in Federalist Society events, publications, or multimedia presentations. A person's appearance on this list does not imply any other endorsement or relationship between the person and the Federalist Society. All expressions of opinion by an expert are those of the expert.
Telecommunications & Electronic Media Practice Group Podcast
April 18, 2017
Telecommunications & Electronic Media Practice Group Podcast
December 22, 2015
The Future of Media
February 26, 2015
Telecommunications & Electronic Media Practice Group Podcast
April 02, 2014
Engage Volume 14, Issue 3 October 2013
February 28, 2014


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Haywood County News
Local, regional, and statewide news continually updated from thousands of sources on the web.
American Terrorism: Plain and Simple
29 Horribly Unflattering Photos Of Undeniably Beautiful...
Breastfeeding in public?
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Then and Now: How Did Your Favorite 2000s Stars Hold Up?
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21 Brave Gender-Fluid Celebrities Who Are Breaking the Mold
19 Hollywood Stars With Terrible Personal Hygiene Habits
Updated: Sat May 20, 2017 10:34 pm
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text: The three piece set, made by Bespaq, is made of wood and finished in mahogany. The Bistro Table has a faux marble top and measures 1 1/4" high and is 1" in diameter. The two tall stools are upholstered in a black leather fabric. This would be darling in your mini bistro or pub.


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VFC Program: Vaccines for Uninsured Children »
"The Vaccines for Children (VFC) Program offers vaccines at no cost for eligible children through doctors enrolled in the program. Find out if your child qualifies. Vaccinating on time means healthier children, families and communities.
Read the VFC Program: Vaccines for Uninsured Children article »
Typhim Consumer (continued)
Infrequently, temporary symptoms such as fainting/dizziness/lightheadedness, vision changes, numbness/tingling, or seizure-like movements have happened after vaccine injections. Tell your health care provider right away if you have any of these symptoms soon after receiving an injection. Sitting or lying down may relieve symptoms.
Remember that your health care professional has prescribed this medication because he or she has judged that the benefit to you is greater than the risk of side effects. Many people using this medication do not have serious side effects.
A very serious allergic reaction to this drug is rare. However, get medical help right away if you notice any symptoms of a serious allergic reaction, including: rash, itching/swelling (especially of the face/tongue/throat), severe dizziness, trouble breathing.
This is not a complete list of possible side effects. If you notice other effects not listed above, contact your doctor or pharmacist.
Contact the doctor for medical advice about side effects. The following numbers do not provide medical advice, but in the US you may report side effects to the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS) at 1-800-822-7967. In Canada, you may call the Vaccine Safety Section at Public Health Agency of Canada at 1-866-844-0018.
Read the Typhim (typhoid vi polysaccharide vaccine) Side Effects Center for a complete guide to possible side effects
PRECAUTIONS: Before receiving this vaccine, tell your health care professional if you are allergic to it; or to other vaccines; or if you have any other allergies. This product may contain inactive ingredients, which can cause allergic reactions or other problems. Talk to your pharmacist for more details.
Before receiving this vaccination, tell your health care professional your medical history, especially of: bleeding/clotting disorders (e.g., thrombocytopenia), immune system problems (e.g., HIV infection, leukemia), radiation treatment, current fever/illness.
During pregnancy, this vaccine should be used only when clearly needed. Discuss the risks and benefits with your doctor.
It is unknown if this vaccine passes into breast milk. Consult your doctor before breast-feeding.
Typhim Consumer Overview
Additional Typhim Information
Report Problems to the Food and Drug Administration
You are encouraged to report negative side effects of prescription drugs to the FDA. Visit the FDA MedWatch website or call 1-800-FDA-1088.
Women's Health
Find out what women really need.


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Train Rides
The Chippewa Valley Railroad Depot is located in Carson Park. A one-quarter sized steam train gives one-half mile rides through Carson Park. For more information, call the Chippewa Valley Railroad Association at (715) 831-0900 or visit their website: www.chippewavalleyrailroad.org
Hours: Open every Sunday from 12PM to 5PM, Memorial Day through Labor Day, also open on July 4.
Admission: Adults - $3.00 Children - $2.00
Interested volunteers are welcome to join us! Meetings are held the first Thursday of the month. Call for meeting time and location.


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Have HVAC Questions? Ask an HVAC Expert for Answers
Hello, My name is XXXXX XXXXX I will do my best to help you today.
That is right in line with the market in metro Atlanta and if they are replacing an entire trunk line and mastic all the connections for 1,100.00 that is a great price. This system does qualify for the 1,500 tax credit as well. I would make sure you ask them about the line set though make sure if you are getting this high end system that you have the correct sized line set. If the existing is too small and they use it you will not truly get the SEER you are being quoted.
American Standard is the same company as Trane and the AS line is actually the higher end. It's like Toyota and Lexus with the Trane being Toyota and AS being Lexus.


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2ND BIRTHDAY: Marin Ewert
Marin Claire Evie Ewert celebrated her second birthday Aug. 10, 2013. she celebrated her special day two different times with her siblings, Sierra, Aurora and Lorelei, as well as family and friends.
She is the daughter of Stacy and John Ewert, of Los Altos, Calif.
Her grandparents are Gary and Marianne Ewert, of Calumet, Mich., and Vernon and Jeanne Blystone, of Creekside.
Marin is the great-granddaughter of Girvin Wainwright, of Punxsutawney, and the late Frank Wainwright Sr., the late Rev. Reid and Rose Blystone.


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Wide Turnlock Cuff Bone Alligator
- Made with premium genuine alligator skin, domestic leather and a stainless steel buckle.
- Measures 1.5" W.
- The sizing measurements are the circumference of the bracelet.
- Small is our most popular size, fitting an average to small wrist.
- This item is eligible for exchange.
- Custom sizing is available for a perfect fit!
- All Leighelena products are proudly hand made in Austin TX. Slight variations due to the hand made nature and use of animal skins will occur.
We Also Recommend


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With all the excitement about the impending release of Nokia's first Windows Phone handset, we had almost forgotten about the other OEMs set to release new handsets in conjunction with the Winodws Phone Mango update.
However Microsoft has not been so absent minded, and at the Microsoft Worldwide Partnerss Conference yesterday evening, it showed off four new devices from Acer, Fujitsu, ZTE and Samsung. While Microsoft has since pointed out that these devices are not production models, it does give us a clear indication of what is coming down the line.
The standout handset was the Samsung model (seen above), rumoured to be the SGH-i937 and which bears a striking resemblance to the Samsung Galaxy S II, which is currently the best-selling phone on the market. The other phones look like the current crop of WP handsets, except for the Fujitsu model that is, which is clad in a waterproof pink casing.
There was no sign of Nokia's Sea Ray handset at the conference, after Nokia CEO Stephen Elop accidentally/on purpose gave us a sneak preview of the handset last month. With Mango scheduled for release in the coming months, it is good to see that Microsoft will be offering a range of handsets to support the platform and with ZTE coming to the table, hopefully it will mean they will also be more affordable.
In related news, those of you hoping that Mango could possibly be making an appearance on tablets in the near future will be disappointed by comments from Microsoft's Windows Phone president, Andy Lees. He told Electronista that Microsoft saw tablets as PCs and so Windows 8 would be the next version of Windows to be seen on a tablet.
Source: Microsoft