text:
Sat Jan 19, 2013, 04:48 PM
ashtonelijah (319 posts)
Marchers Shot at During MLK Parade in Jackson, Miss. as Gun Rights Activists Rally Nearby at Capitol
Last edited Sat Jan 19, 2013, 08:18 PM - Edit history (3)
These are very early reports, I don't have the exact details, but for what it's worth:
There's not much information yet, but while gun activists were rallying at the Mississippi State Capitol in Jackson, Miss., shots were being fired at the annual Martin Luther King Jr. Parade in nearby downtown Jackson. Early accounts of the incident on Twitter said that at least one person was shot. Some mentioned horses running wild in the chaos.
39 replies, 6980 views
|39 replies
Marchers Shot at During MLK Parade in Jackson, Miss. as Gun Rights Activists Rally Nearby at Capitol (Original post)
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Response to ashtonelijah (Original post)
Sat Jan 19, 2013, 04:49 PM
Special Agent Oso (38 posts)
1. Mississippi has historically been full of racist nuts
Doesn't surprise me too much.
Response to ashtonelijah (Original post)
Sat Jan 19, 2013, 04:53 PM
tosh (3,881 posts)
2. Thank you for reporting this here.
Just awful.
Response to ashtonelijah (Original post)
Sat Jan 19, 2013, 05:18 PM
Downtown Hound (9,416 posts)
3. Just a bunch of responsible gun owners exercising their American tradition
Do I really need the sarcasm thingy?
Response to Downtown Hound (Reply #3)
Sat Jan 19, 2013, 05:47 PM
malaise (162,439 posts)
9. There was a bomb found at an MLK rally in another state last year
Cleaners spotted it before the rally started. I'll never understand the hatred
Response to malaise (Reply #9)
Sat Jan 19, 2013, 06:26 PM
Ilsa (45,528 posts)
16. I believe in Washington. I don't remember
If it was near Olympia, Seattle or where.
Response to Ilsa (Reply #16)
Sat Jan 19, 2013, 06:43 PM
Twinguard (531 posts)
19. It was in Spokane.
Response to Twinguard (Reply #19)
Sat Jan 19, 2013, 06:49 PM
Ilsa (45,528 posts)
22. Thank you! Should have figured it was way east! nt
Response to malaise (Reply #9)
Sun Jan 20, 2013, 10:31 AM
ananda (18,076 posts)
33. Hatred is learned..
From Nelson Mandela's Autobiography:
No one is born hating another person because of the colour of his skin, or his background, or his religion. People must learn to hate, and if they can learn to hate, they can be taught to love, for love comes more naturally to the human heart than its opposite.
I have to believe this. It's the only thing that keeps me activist.
Response to ananda (Reply #33)
Sun Jan 20, 2013, 10:41 AM
malaise (162,439 posts)
34. You are so right
Response to Downtown Hound (Reply #3)
Sat Jan 19, 2013, 07:16 PM
Recursion (50,978 posts)
29. Nobody was shot at their rally
They see gun violence as something people "not like them" (if you know what I mean, and you do) do. And those armed people not like them are why they want guns to begin with. This incident just confirmed that in their minds.
Response to ashtonelijah (Original post)
Sat Jan 19, 2013, 05:29 PM
bunnies (15,859 posts)
4. Looks like one man shot in the chest. Link:
Jackson Police Deputy Chief Eric Wall says a 21-year-old man was shot in the right chest area.
From the initial investigation, Chief Wall says it appears the shooting happened on Detroit Street.
After the victim was shot, he ran from Detroit Street, south onto Martin Luther King Jr. Drive. He then collapsed at the intersection of MLK Drive and Grandberry Street.
The shooter was arrested.
on edit:
Theres also a you-tube video taken by a witness. Shows the young man being taken away in an ambulance. Poor kid.
Response to ashtonelijah (Original post)
Sat Jan 19, 2013, 05:33 PM
Recursion (50,978 posts)
5. Jackson has one of the highest murder rates in the country for the city its size
I remember rolling my eyes when my friends who lived in Jackson were "worried about me" up in New York.
We'll see what this was. This reminds me of the time Eric Cantor's office got shot up, and it turned out that's just because it was in Richmond...
Response to Recursion (Reply #5)
Sat Jan 19, 2013, 05:43 PM
ashtonelijah (319 posts)
7. That's true
But it sure is a hell of a way to celebrate #GunAppreciationDay with Gov. Phil Bryant just miles away at the capitol rallying a crowd of gun lunatics.
Response to ashtonelijah (Reply #7)
Sat Jan 19, 2013, 06:51 PM
Recursion (50,978 posts)
24. I'm "from" this culture enough to guess their reaction
It will be along the lines of:
(WARNING: the following paragraph roughly approximates the right-wing thought process, as observed by someone who grew up around it. It is not a condoning of it.)
We honest small town (ie, white) folks came to the city and exercised our right to bear arms and nobody was hurt. Across the way, a bunch of liberals from the city (ie, black) had a gun-free parade and somebody got shot. The government won't do anything about these armed black kids, but they want to take my guns away. This is why gun control will never work, because that kid couldn't legally get a gun anyways.
(End right wing thought process)
This is what we'll have to counter.
Response to Recursion (Reply #5)
Sat Jan 19, 2013, 07:06 PM
leveymg (36,418 posts)
27. It went way up in May, 1970. The Jackson State shootings.
(The night of the Kent State shootings there was a demonstration at Jackson State, a predominantly Black college in Mississippi). Seventy-five city policemen and Mississippi State Police officers armed with carbines, submachine guns, shotguns, service revolvers and some personal weapons (arrived at the campus). Their combined armed presence on the Lynch Street side of Stewart Hall, a men's dormitory, staved off the crowd long enough for the firemen to extinguish the blaze and leave.After the firemen left, the police and state troopers marched along Lynch Street toward Alexander Center, a women's residence, weapons at the ready. No one seems to know why.
bulletholes2.JPG (12687 bytes) bulletholes1.JPG (19979 bytes)
Bullet holes from May 14, 1970 can still be seen on the walls of Alexander Hall;.
Falling back before the approaching officers, the students congregated in a thick not in front of the dormitory. At this point, the crowd numbered 75 to 100 people. Several students allegedly shouted "obscene catcalls" while others chanted and tossed bricks at the officers, who had closed to within 100 feet of the group.
The officers deployed into a line facing the students. Someone in the crowd either threw or dropped a bottle which shattered on the asphalt with a loud pop. At the same time, an officer fell, struck by a piece of thrown debris.
Accounts disagree as to what happened next. Some students said the police advanced in a line, warned them, then opened fire. Others said the police abruptly opened fire on the crowd and the dormitory. Other witnesses reported that the students were under the control of a campus security officer when the police opened fire. Police claimed they spotted a powder flare in the Alexander West Hall third floor stairwell window and opened fire in self-defense on the dormitory only. Two local television news reporters present at the shooting agreed that a shot was fired, but were uncertain of the direction. A radio reporter claimed to have seen an arm and a pistol extending from a dormitory window.
Whatever actually occurred, the police opened fire at approximately 12:05 a.m., May 15, and continued firing for more than 30 seconds. The students scattered, some running for the trees in front of the library, but most scrambling for the Alexander Hall west end door.
Response to leveymg (Reply #27)
Sat Jan 19, 2013, 07:08 PM
Recursion (50,978 posts)
28. Not really, unfortunately. 2 dead was a drop in the bucket
It was a much more violent time back then.
Response to ashtonelijah (Original post)
Sat Jan 19, 2013, 05:40 PM
jpak (33,258 posts)
6. Charge the gun nuts responsible with felonies and grab their guns
Response to jpak (Reply #6)
Sat Jan 19, 2013, 05:50 PM
Recursion (50,978 posts)
10. What's the diplomatic way to put this
The gun nuts at the rally are white, and from Brandon rather than Jackson.
The people at the MLK parade are... not white, and from Jackson.
If the shooter fit in at the MLK parade he would probably not have fit in at the gun nut rally, is what I'm trying to get at, as uncomfortable as this is.
Response to Recursion (Reply #10)
Sat Jan 19, 2013, 06:31 PM
JustABozoOnThisBus (15,047 posts)
17. I don't know Jackson, but there's a lot missing from the story
Is the state capitol near downtown? Were the two groups in the same area?
Trying to be diplomatic, was there a description of the shooter?
Who held the shooter down, the marchers? or the gun nuts?
What was the shooter's motive? was his victim random? or a deliberate target?
Just a guess: The parade was more diverse than the gun rights assembly.
I'm sure more will be published about this, unless it was a "personal" shooting.
Response to JustABozoOnThisBus (Reply #17)
Sat Jan 19, 2013, 06:38 PM
Recursion (50,978 posts)
18. Almost guaranteed the parade was more diverse
We'll see what we see
Response to ashtonelijah (Original post)
Sat Jan 19, 2013, 05:44 PM
Vietnameravet (1,085 posts)
8. Gun Appreciation Day??!!
If that doesn't sound like something out of a dark sci fi story I dont know what does..
Response to Vietnameravet (Reply #8)
Sat Jan 19, 2013, 06:13 PM
Spitfire of ATJ (32,723 posts)
13. "like something out of a dark sci fi story"
I absolutely NEED my disintegrator gun.
For duck hunting.
Response to ashtonelijah (Original post)
Sat Jan 19, 2013, 05:59 PM
cantbeserious (13,039 posts)
11. The Madness Of America's Gun Culture Strikes Again
Response to ashtonelijah (Original post)
Sat Jan 19, 2013, 06:11 PM
otohara (24,135 posts)
12. Movie Theaters, Schools, Malls, Parades
no where is safe in the United States of Yemen.
Response to ashtonelijah (Original post)
Sat Jan 19, 2013, 06:16 PM
pangaia (14,084 posts)
14. Gun Appreciation Day !!
Gun Appreciation Day ??? WTF is that??
Response to pangaia (Reply #14)
Sat Jan 19, 2013, 07:43 PM
MynameisBlarney (2,979 posts)
31. It's a thoughtless knee jerk reaction
apparently connected with a "white pride" group.
Response to ashtonelijah (Original post)
Sat Jan 19, 2013, 06:19 PM
Spitfire of ATJ (32,723 posts)
15. I'm telling you, if this turns out to be as bad as it sounds,...
....it's going to spark some major outrage, to the point where the pro-gun types aren't even going to have a seat at the table.
Think about how many Liberal ideas are delegated to a mass of totally ignored protestors outside of the room where decisions are being made and then think about the gun issue where the entire room is filled with people telling each other they are more pro-gun then the next guy.
Response to Spitfire of ATJ (Reply #15)
Sat Jan 19, 2013, 06:43 PM
Recursion (50,978 posts)
20. The opposite, unfortunately
If the shooter is some kid from Jackson, the exurban whites at the rally (where nobody was shot) have another "urban menace" (and we all know what "urban" means) to point to for why they "need" guns.
The line will be "nobody was shot at our armed parade, only at the gun free parade". It will be asinine and completely miss the point, but it will entrench what they believe more strongly.
Response to ashtonelijah (Original post)
Sat Jan 19, 2013, 06:46 PM
another_liberal (8,821 posts)
21. It's Gun Appreciation Day . . .
It's "Gun Appreciation Day." What did you think that meant?
Response to ashtonelijah (Original post)
Sat Jan 19, 2013, 06:49 PM
Thinkingabout (30,026 posts)
23. Wrote to my Representative John Culberson R-TX this morning, he is vowing to support
The Second Amendment. He also claims to be Pro-Life, he can not be both, people who ith guns are aborting lives of those born, if you err on the side of of life then don't send the guns in to kill. Congress members for Pro-Life needs to get the guns regulated to halt some of this killing and violence. ENOUGH!!!!
Response to ashtonelijah (Original post)
Sat Jan 19, 2013, 06:52 PM
Politicub (7,437 posts)
25. We need to stop the carnage now
People who shouldn't have assault riffles are rampant now.
Response to ashtonelijah (Original post)
Sat Jan 19, 2013, 07:01 PM
leveymg (36,418 posts)
26. One more reason to ban brandishing. If someone's carrying a gun, people should call the cops.
Response to ashtonelijah (Original post)
Sat Jan 19, 2013, 07:19 PM
awoke_in_2003 (34,582 posts)
30. Aggravated assault? WTF? nt
Response to awoke_in_2003 (Reply #30)
Sun Jan 20, 2013, 10:28 AM
Recursion (50,978 posts)
32. That's what that means (nt)
Response to Recursion (Reply #32)
Sun Jan 20, 2013, 02:00 PM
awoke_in_2003 (34,582 posts)
36. I would have thought...
at least manslaughter since the person he shot died. Of course, I am not a lawyer nor do I play on on TV (I wonder if anyone will catch that reference)
Response to awoke_in_2003 (Reply #36)
Sun Jan 20, 2013, 02:38 PM
Recursion (50,978 posts)
37. I didn't see anything about a death (nt)
Response to Recursion (Reply #37)
Sun Jan 20, 2013, 02:49 PM
awoke_in_2003 (34,582 posts)
39. I thought I had read...
an update where the guy he shot had died. I was mistaken, it said he collapsed. Sorry for the confusion, I had a bit of fever yesterday.
Response to ashtonelijah (Original post)
Sun Jan 20, 2013, 10:41 AM
stultusporcos (327 posts)
35. Interesting How the Headlines on WLBT are worded
One man shot during MLK parade
Story - Gunfire erupted Saturday near the Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., parade in Jackson, injuring one man.
The Rally of the Precious was also happening at the same time so why was not the headline One man shot during The Rally of the Precious? It makes about as much sense but it is MS so anything to smear the MLK holiday is expected even though the shooting had nothing to do with the parade.
Response to stultusporcos (Reply #35)
Sun Jan 20, 2013, 02:38 PM
Recursion (50,978 posts)
38. Because there's no sign the two are related, and mentioning it makes it sound like...
... it was one of the gun rights people who did the shooting.


text:
Shares in Primark owner Associated British Foods surged after it unveiled plans to launch the budget fashion chain in the US at the same time as it also published more strong trading figures from Europe.
The FTSE 100-listed conglomerate, whose operations cover sugar, agriculture, retail, grocery and ingredients, was the stand-out performer with a 9% rise during an otherwise lacklustre session for the London market.
The top-flight was 7 points lower at 6674.7 as weak manufacturing data in China proved a major obstacle to further gains after the euphoria at the start of the week over a flurry of major deals in the pharmaceuticals sector that helped add 56 points.
Loading article content
Blue-chip shares slid downwards despite more encouraging signs from the eurozone after a key measure of business activity rose to its highest level in three years. Worse-than-expected home sales data from the US helped dampen sentiment, with Germany's Dax and France's Cac 40 both sliding and New York's Dow Jones Industrial Average also in the red at the time of the close in London.
On currency markets, sterling lost ground after minutes from the latest meeting Bank of England's rate-setting committee expressed uncertainty about the level of slack in the economy.
The pound fell a cent against the greenback to 1.68 US dollars and was at 1.21 euros.
AB Foods delivered the biggest blue-chip rise of the session after Primark's plans for a store in Boston by the end of next year were accompanied by a 26% rise in retail profits. Shares were 240p higher at 2962p as AB Foods also reported a 4% rise in group profits to £468 million.
Elsewhere, drugs stocks continued to improve on the back of deal-making activity by GlaxoSmithKline and speculation linking AstraZeneca to a potential takeover by US giant Pfizer.
Glaxo rose 2.5p to 1642.5p and Astra added 2%, or 82.5p to 4042.5p, having risen by 5% in the previous session.
In the FTSE 250 Index, holiday company Thomas Cook rose 4.4p to 178p after its turnaround strategy was backed in a broker upgrade from Barclays, whose analysts expect a resumption of dividend payments in 2016.
Top flight rival TUI Travel also rose, by 1.2p, to 427.9p.
The biggest decline in the FTSE 250 Index came from power station business Drax after it was offered an investment contract from the government to convert just one of its two coal-fired generators to biomass fuel.
Drax shares slumped 13% or 99p to 657.5p.
The biggest FTSE 100 risers were Associated British Foods, up 240p to 2962p, Admiral up 45p to 1408p, Bunzl up 38p to 1654p and AstraZeneca up 82.5p to 4042.5p.
The biggest FTSE 100 fallers were Antofagasta down 48p to 796.5p, Centrica down 14.3 to 330.6p, Hargreaves Lansdown off 50p at 1197p and Sports Direct down 33p to 797p.

subset: commoncrawl


text:
Hello, I inadvertently deleted certain postgresql directories/files from my Debian Lenny installation (don't ask). These included /etc/init.d/postgresql, /etc/postgresql, and maybe others. Evidently these directory/files are installed during Lenny installation, but not during apt-get install postgresql following an apt-get --purge remove postgresql. So, now I can't run postgresql at all on my Debian Lenny system. Can any kind soul recommend a method of restoring these directory/files short of reinstalling Debian Lenny from scratch? Many thanks, LRP -- View this message in context: http://postgresql.1045698.n5.nabble.com/Need-to-reinstall-postgresql-files-tp4530800p4530800.html Sent from the PostgreSQL - admin mailing list archive at Nabble.com.
Next: From: Iñigo Martinez Lasala Date: 2011-06-28 09:20:18 Subject: Re: Urgent! Log full with inexistent PID processes Previous: From: Florian Weimer Date: 2011-06-27 13:40:49 Subject: Re: Urgent! Log full with inexistent PID processes


text:
Smartphones, Beacons Changing the In-store Landscape6 Aug, 2014 By: Doug McPherson
NEW YORK – A new report from the Business Insider Intelligence predicts that by 2015, 30,000 beacons will be active in the U.S. – and about 80 percent of them will be in retail stores.
It appears that's just start of a beacon trend because with more than 50 suppliers, analysts say a massive onslaught of beacon technology is on its way. The installed base is projected to grow 287 percent to 5 million beacons within four years. Four million of those are anticipated to be used by retailers.
The report notes that half of the top 100 retailers in the U.S. are testing beacons this year and a third of them are expected to deploy them in stores by the end of 2015.
And there's more good news on the smartphone side of the equation when considering the coming proliferation of in-store beacons: a new study from comScore says consumers are starting to use their smartphones to research products more deeply while in stores.
comScore says 36 percent of U.S. smartphone users in stores are using their devices to compare prices, and 16 percent conduct specific searches for or directly access online retailers.
Specific consumer smartphone actions include:
- Reading customer reviews: 27 percent
- Calling, E-mailing or texting friends and family to request feedback: 23 percent
- Reading product details: 22 percent
- Scanning a QR code: 18 percent
- Checking in-stock status at that retailer's other stores or website: 17 percent
- Taking photos of products: 14 percent.
Another 9 percent of U.S. smartphone users place orders on their devices in stores, though the study did not ask if those orders were placed with the retailer whose store a customer was in or with a competing retailer.
One challenge for the beacon business, insiders say, is the status of the phones receiving beacon signals.
While apps in iPhones can be instantly awakened with Apple's iBeacon technology, Android apps have to be running, at least in the background, which drains battery power, though that problem is expected to be solved in future iterations of Android.
There are about 260 million iOS smartphones and 310 million Android phones in use around the world that can scan for nearby beacons. By the end of next year, Business Insider Intelligence estimates the total number to pass more than 1 billion.
Chuck Martin, a writer with MediaPost News, said beacons "will be front and center" at this week's annual Online Media, Marketing, and Advertising (OMMA) conference in New York. "Mobile commerce has evolved to a point that no one can ignore it. And it's not going away," he says.
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text:
Sean Patrick Hagen
Vancouver, BC
Programmer, bit of a hacker, sci-fi nerd, 24/7 geek. Star Wars nerd. First video game was Commander Keen.
Thinks in Ruby and CoffeeScript. Working on becoming a hardware hacker as well. Also trying to pick up Clojure & Go.
Currently, he lives in and around Vancouver, British Columbia.


text:
Kai Ryssdal: We told you a week or so ago that the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation is in a bit of a squeeze. Its bank insurance fund was down to a mere $10 billion. Not as much as it might sound given the pace of bank failures this year, and to come perhaps.
Today the FDIC said it expects banks gone bust to cost $100 billion over the next four years and that its insurance fund could be out of cash by the end of the month. This month. Your money is safe, don't mishear what I said. But Marketplace's Steve Henn tell us the FDIC is doing everything it can to avoid asking for a bailout.
STEVE HENN: The FDIC is basically bank insurance. It guarantees your deposits by charging banks a premium.
But in the last three months, 50 banks have failed. And the agency's insurance fund will actually go into the red tomorrow. Still, Richard Bove, a banking analyst at Rochdale Securities says, don't panic, the FDIC has got your back.
RICHARD BOVE: It still has the ability to go to the Congress and ask for $150 all the way up to $500 billion, but it doesn't dare do so. In other words, the political backlash would be so enormous.
Instead, the agency asked banks for three years of premiums up front. This will bring in about $45 billion.
BOVE: But it isn't going to be enough.
Richard Bove.
BOVE: They're going to have to ask for more from the banks in the next few years even though they're saying they won't.
That's because Bove expects at least 200 more banks to fail.
And banking consultant Bert Ely says this is costing the FDIC more than it should because banks are in such bad shape by the time the FDIC steps in and takes them over.
BERT ELY: I find these high loss rates very, very troubling. Frankly it's an indication of really significant regulatory failure that the losses have gotten as bad as they are.
Last Friday the FDIC closed a bank in Georgia and immediately had to just write off 45 percent of the bank's value. Losses that bad were almost unheard of in the S&L crisis. And until losses come down, Ely says the FDIC will continue to burn through its cash.
In Washington, I'm Steve Henn for Marketplace.


text:
Least Privilege Legacy Apps and the Desktop "Wild West": Part 4
This week we report the conclusions of our recent survey of 185 IT Administrators and Help Desk Operatives, in a report Legacy Applications and Least Privilege Access Management' – which reveals the way legacy apps leave Windows desktop environments unnecessarily exposed to attack from malware, as well as providing an open door to insider threats.
Perhaps most the most revealing insight from our survey, was that while we knew legacy apps like Sage and Quickbooks, caused problems for IT Admins with over privileged users, we hadn't anticipated just how many others there were. When survey respondents were invited to name which legacy applications they were nominating when selecting 'Other' they revealed over 50 different applications, from the understandable (company needs it to run it's business) to the complete absurd (company doesn't need it to run it's business, and would violate compliance requirements if found with it.)
Notable examples include:
- Old Mainframe applications.
- Software used for running an office (printer drivers) or the desktop itself (defragmentor)
- Third party point of sale software provided to retailers.
- Adobe and Flash software.
- Respondents from industries such as oil, automotive, and chemical cited technical applications which, although used by a handful of employees, still enforce the entire desktop to be set to administrator or super user status.
- Applications downloaded by individual employees from the web to help them do their job better: for example, financial trading software.
- Applications downloaded and installed by employees for their own entertainment, including: iPhone applications, and in one instance, a Golf Course Game Application.
Indeed, this paints a revealing picture of enterprise desktop environments today: they are littered with applications, each of which requires different configuration settings for different users, and makes effective access management practically impossible.
Not surprisingly, many respondents said they had too many legacy applications to mention. Indeed, is it any wonder that today IT Admins consider desktops the "Wild West," not just because of the overwhelm of managing access to multiple applications, but also because they never know what they were going to encounter on a user's workstation. One desktop manager, reported: "We have limited control on what the end user can install and change on a desktop, and in many cases we have limited awareness of changes being made. In most cases it's too late if a user installs malware and adware, leaving our desktop resources left fire-fighting problems."
Fortunately, the fault is not the legacy applications. Business need not give up the applications they need to run business as usual. The fault is the lack of awareness of just how easy it is to automate the elevation of privilege user access at a granular level, based on the role definition of each employee.


text:
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Wiki란? 사용자들끼리의 협업을 통해서 웹 사이트의 컨텐츠를 구성할 수 있도록 해주는 서버 프로그램! 뭔 말인지 와닿지가 않죠? 쉽게 얘기하면 우리 모두 함께 이 페이지 자체를 구성한다는 얘기입니다. Wikipedia 백과사전을 생각하면 쉬워요 :) 간단한 예를 들어보겠습니다. 만약, "IBM"이라는 주제를 가지고 우리 팀원들이 컨텐츠를 작성한다면, ====================================================...
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Students and Cities at Work Blog de comunidad
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Take a closer look at any large city today and you'll find another city pulsating within it, made up of interconnected systems of many different functions and activities. � Similarly, educational curriculums are being redesigned to provide students from all...
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Cloud Evening for Academic in France: October 21st Blog de comunidad
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CE BLOG EST RESERVE A L'EVENEMENT "CLOUD FOR ACADEMIC" Vous êtes invités à la "Cloud Evening for Academic", qu'IBM organise Jeudi 21 Octobre, de 17h00 * à 20h00, sur quatre de ses implantations à Paris/Bois-Colombes, Lyon, Montpellier et...
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Open Source and Education
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Alas! LinuxCon has begun and I'm stuck here, up to my-- well... never you mind! I'm just not there this year. However, conventions about opensource things are increasingly friendly to virtual participation, so maybe I'll be able to look in a little. Today...
del Blog: Walden's Ponderings
Interview with Chandra Bhushan Kumar, IBM Center of Excellence coordinator in India
This week get to know Chandra Bhushan Kumar , training coordinator at an IBM Center of Excellence in India. IBM has just announced the launch of 75 new Centers of Excellence in India , so I thought it would be interesting to take an inside look at one. Learn...
Students, Summer hires, Interns... how about blogging here on developerWorks!
Are you a student, summer hire, co-op, or intern? Are you a techie with something to share? Come join our own dW co-ops Christian and Richard and start your own blog today! Getting started is simple! First register / sign-in to developerWorks. Click...
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Interview with Sam Lightstone, author of Making it Big in Software
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Sometimes I get lucky... recently Susan Visser connected me with Sam Lightstone, author of Making it Big in Software , and luckily, he agreed to an interview. Sam has a unique perspective to share on developing your career in software, so I hope you enjoy it!...
Interview with Ankita Nanwani, developer at IBM India Software Labs
This week I'm bringing you a fun interview with Ankita Nanwani , an ambitious software developer at the IBM India Software Labs. Learn more about Ankita and invite her to your network on her My developerWorks profile . Tell me about yourself and what you're...
Interview with Loiane Groner, Java developer in Brazil
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This week get to know Loiane Groner, a member of My developerWorks from Brazil who is sharing what she knows about Java and reaching out through the IBM Academic Initiative. (And if you haven't already heard, developerWorks is now in Brazilian Portuguese -...
The top 3 things students can do to prep for the IT workplace
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When I first moved from academia (as a college student) to a cubicle it was a jarring leap. At times I felt my nights working in restaurants, juggling trays, cooks and customers, had been better preparation than my days skimming textbooks (although one...
Live from RTP,NC - IBM University Day and Smarter Planet
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Happy Friday and Happy Saturday to my friends and colleagues on the other side of the world. I've kicked off my day with a very exciting break from my normal routine. I'm attending the IBM University Day program here in RTP, NC. I am surrounded by leaders...
Students have arrived at My developerWorks
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Good morning. Here at developerWorks , we have always worked hard to meet the needs of developers and IT professionals. As we started down the journey of what will forever be known as the transformation of developerWorks , we broadened our focus to more...
The Destination z scholarship -- and the community grows
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Just to be sure two important new features for the Destination z community don't get lost in all the recent news about the new System z10 Business Class mainframe : STUDENTS: You really don't want to miss this chance to win a scholarship to add to your...
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The Gelsenkirchen club begin their Champions League campaign against the Greek outfit, with both teams boasting unbeaten domestic records this season
Torosidis, Papazoglou, Siovas, Holebas
Abdoun, Maniatis, Fuster, Machado
Howedes, Papadopoulos, Matip, Fuchs
Jones, Neustadter
Farfan, Holby, Draxler
Olympiakos have confirmed that every player who featured in the weekend's 2-1 win over Giannina will be fit to face Schalke, though Avraam Papadopoulos remains sidelined with the knee injury he picked up during the course of Greece's Euro 2012 campaign.
Elsewhere, Giannis Maniatis and Vasilis Torosidis had sat out their club's last match, but coach Leonardo Jardim confirmed that they had been rested due to their involvement with the Greece national team and will be able to return for the clash with Huub Stevens' side.
Meanwhile, Schalke should name an unchanged 4-2-3-1 line-up from the one that beat Greuther Furth 2-0 over the weekend, with Lars Unnerstall continuing ahead of Ralf Fahrmann and the injured Timo Hildebrand.
Club captain Benedikt Howedes will continue at right-back, with Kyriakos Papadopoulos and Joel Matip at the heart of defence and Christan Fuchs on the left. The blossoming partership of Jermaine Jones and Roman Neustadter will be retained, and Lewis Holtby will keep his place in the No.10 role.
- Olympiakos also faced German opposition in the group stage of last season's Champions League. The Greeks beat Schalke's Ruhr rivals Borussia Dortmund 3-1 in Athens.
- Left-back, Jose Holebas (pictured, right) was born in Germany, but chose to elect Greece, the country of his father's birth.
- In Olympiakos' six competitive home fixtures against Bundesliga clubs there have been 29 goals, and the hosts have prevailed on four occasions, but lost twice.
- This match will be Schalke's 150th game in European club competition. The have won 77 of their fixtures to date, and won the 1997 Uefa cup.
- The Gelsenkirchen giants have failed to score on matchday one of their last four Champions League campaigns. One of those matches was a 2-0 loss to Olympiakos' arch-rivals Panathinaikos.
- Konigsblauen centre-back Kyriakos Papadopoulos came through the ranks at Olympiakos, before leaving the club at the Veltins Arena in 2010. He remains the youngest player to ever play in the Greek Super League.


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Pupils choosing GCSE courses are now often encouraged by schools to include courses which will enable them to achieve Ebacc as part of their Key Stage 4 education. Geography is a subject which can form part of the Ebacc. It is a solid academic subject and well respected by universities and employers alike.
Geography helps you to make sense of the world around you. It is hands on, it is relevant and it is fun. Current GCSE courses are a good mix of topics such as urban issues, world development, extreme environments, rivers and hazards to name but a few. The course will give you the chance to get to grips with some of the big questions which affect our world and understand the social, economic and physical forces and processes which shape and change our world.
There are so many ways of learning in geography. It is very practical with opportunities to learn new skills such as modern computer based mapping (called GIS), map skills, interpreting photographs, fieldwork skills, presenting, role play and debating techniques.
You will improve your literacy through your report writing and written work and make practical use of your numeracy skills when you interpret data and construct graphs.
Fieldwork, or working outside the classroom is a really important part of geography. Whether you go locally or get the chance to travel further away it will be a brilliant opportunity to experience some of the things you have learnt about in class, see things differently and of course have fun.
Your teacher will be able to tell you more about the specific GCSE course offered in your school. Don't forget to ask about what sort of topic you might cover in your controlled assessment and where you will do your fieldwork.
There has never been a better time to study geography so make the choice to go places with geography by taking geography at GCSE.
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<< How to read and understand sales
Last week, Japan saw the release of several titles with Etrian Odyssey V, Dragon Ball Fusions, Genkai Tokki: Seven Pirates, Dynasty Warriors: Eiketsuden, and more. Here are the weekly video game sales data for software and hardware that sold in the week of August 1 through August 7, 2016.
#1 was none other than Atlus' latest installment of their dungeon crawler series in Etrian Odyssey V: End of the Long Myth, which debuted at 92,518 copies in its first week. Below is a look at the past main-numbered Etrian Odyssey games and how they performed in their first-week sales:
As you can see, the numbers show that Etrian Odyssey has continued increasing numbers over the course of the past few installments, but the fifth title fell short by a little bit from Etrian Odyssey IV. We can say that while it hasn't exactly increased its fan-base with the new installment, it managed to keep them coming back for more. And let's not forget that fans have been treated to a couple remakes between IV and V with Etrian Odyssey Untold: The Millennium Girl in 2013 which sold 88,278 copies in its first week, followed by Etrian Odyssey Untold II: The Fafnir Knight in 2014 which sold 59,531 copies.
Dragon Ball Fusions made an impressive debut with 77,509 copies sold in its first week. It narrowly beat out the previous DBZ game on 3DS, Dragon Ball Z: Extreme Butoden, which sold 74,660 copies at launch.
At #5 Happinet Games' 12-Sai. Koi Suru Diary, a 3DS visual novel title aimed towards younger girls also impressed with 14,803 copies sold in its debut. The #7 spot goes to Genkai Tokki: Seven Pirates, which sold 12,264 copies at launch. A little less than the previous title of Compile Heart's brand with Genkai Tokki: Moero Crystal that sold 18,721 copies in its launch week last year.
Dynasty Warriors: Eiketsuden, the strategy RPG spinoff by Koei Tecmo landed on #15 for its debut with 6,084 units sold on PS4. A much lower number than what you'd expect from anything with the Dynasty Warriors logo attached to it, which tend to sell up to a couple hundred thousands, not to mention that its PS Vita and PS3 versions didn't even chart. But let's not forget that the game is of a completely different genre that we could consider the total opposite of the hack and slash genre, so we can say that its core audience wasn't enticed by it much, even with some of their favorite historic heroes involved.
And finally, the inXile Entertainment-developed Wasteland 2: Director's Cut made its debut for PS4 in Japan, published by Spike Chunsoft, and made its way into the top-20 at #18 with 5,471 units sold.
Hardware sales remained mostly the same, with a little less consoles sold compared to the previous week, except for the New 3DS (the non-LL) which actually went from 3,973 last week to 6,403 this week. Otherwise, even the New 3DS LL stayed at about the same with only five more units sold compared to last week. On a side note, I think it's pretty impressive how Pokémon Omega Ruby & Alpha Sapphire has continued selling well the past few weeks.
The top-20 chart for the week is as follows:


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Prices, promotions, styles, and availability may vary. Our local stores do not honor online pricing. Prices and availability of products and services are subject to change without notice. Errors will be corrected where discovered, and Lowe's reserves the right to revoke any stated offer and to correct any errors, inaccuracies or omissions including after an order has been submitted.
Patio block creations are great do-it-yourself projects. They can be fun, akin to putting puzzles together. A wide variety of block types and styles let you refine or redefine your landscape and convenient accessories help make your creations last.
Patio block can add an element of architectural design to your landscape. Block is available for projects like:
Decorative precast products like concrete block are made by pouring concrete into a variety of forms to create the desired shape and texture. Precast products can replicate the look of stone, brick, tile, slate and more. Their various shapes, textures, sizes and colors allow for a variety of patterns.
You can find block in collections, which means you can tie different projects together with similar looks. For example, for a raised bed you can choose wall block that coordinates with stone for a patio or walkway, giving you a truly designed look.
Concrete precast patio block is different from quarried stone products in that its shape and size are designed for installation requiring minimal cutting. Uniform sizes also simplify the planning and purchasing processes.
Precast patio block is relatively simple to install and maintain. While different types of block may have different installation requirements, you can complete most projects with a few tools. If you do need to cut the block, you'll need special tools and accessories. A brick chisel and engineer's hammer are sufficient for some cuts. Others require a power saw with a diamond blade. Keep in mind that block can be heavy and moving and placing a lot of it requires some physical exertion. If you don't want to haul block, you can have it delivered.
When considering a patio block project, make sure you're aware of any building codes or homeowner association rules that might apply to your work. Also take into account any underground utilities that may be in the area.
Use patio stones and pavers to create patios and walkways. You can lay them in different patterns to give your landscape the look you want. Some pavers already have designs molded into each block, giving the appearance of several small stones in one block. These pavers let you add texture to your landscape without having to construct a pattern from scratch. You can also find smaller pavers that you can interlock to create herringbone designs, "basketweave" patterns and more. Paver styles include the architectural design of brick, the rounded look of worn stone or river stones, and even the varied, irregular edges of natural slate.
Shop for Patio Stones and Pavers
Wall block is useful for creating raised planting beds, tree rings, fire pits and retaining walls. Wall block can look like old, tumbled stone, chiseled stone or can have cleaner, designed edges. Coordinating caps are available for some styles of wall block to help give your creation a finished look. Different block has different maximum wall heights, generally ranging from 15 inches to 2 feet in a standard installation, so make sure you know the maximums for the wall block you choose. Some wall block works with pins you can purchase separately to interlock each course (or layer), helping with alignment and stability.
Edging stones create breaks in a landscape. The edging provides clear, visually interesting borders between planting beds and lawns or patios, in addition to highlighting flowers and shrubs. From a practical point of view, edging stones help keep mulch where it belongs and provide a cleaner mowing and trimming line. You can create straight, angled or curved borders with ease and some edging stones interlock for simpler placement and design. Like other patio block, edging stones are available in different colors and styles to let you select the look that best compliments your home.
You'll find some accessories available with patio block to help make your project a success:
Paver base is gravel that forms part of the foundation of patio block projects. It gives the project stability, provides for drainage and helps you work with natural elevation changes in your landscape.
Paver base panels offer an alternative to traditional paver base and reduce the amount of paver sand you'll need. The panels interlock for simple installation.
Paver or leveling sand is another foundational layer that supports patio block projects. Paver sand helps fix the block in place.
Paver edge restraints are flexible strips that hold patio and walkway block in place. They work with both straight and curved edges. You use spikes to secure them against the outside edges of the patio or walkway.
Polymeric sand is a polymer / sand mixture for filling the joints or gaps between patio and walkway block. It's designed to be superior to regular sand for resistance to weeds, wind, rain, washout and freezing conditions. After filling the gaps between the block with polymeric sand and clearing it completely off the surface of the block, misting the polymeric sand with water allows it to harden.
Shop for Stones, Pavers and Accessories


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All happy families resemble one another, each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.
Part I: A Report:
A recent article in the New York Times, Prenatal Test Puts Down Syndrome in Hard Focus by Amy Harmon, implied that studies "suggest" that persons with Down Syndrome carry a "higher risk" of early-onset Alzheimer's disease. In a Newsweek column earlier this year, The Attack on Kids With Down Syndrome George Will also mentioned an "increased risk" of Alzheimer's for persons afflicted with Down syndrome.
According to Dr. Julie Moran, Director of the Geriatric Primary Care Clinic at the Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, to call the risk "higher" or "increased" is somewhat misleading. The current controversy on the matter within the medical profession is whether to describe the risk as 99% probable or 100% certain. The question arose in connection with a training video Dr. Moran produced, .
I recently attended a pre-screening of that video sponsored by People, Incorporated!, a non-profit agency in Fall River, Massachusetts specializing in services for the developmentally disabled. To my surprise, the screening was extremely well-attended, over 100 people, including professionals in the field and family members of those with Down syndrome and Alzheimer's. Even some students from the Health Careers Program at Diman Regional High School gave up a beautiful day of Summer vacation to voluntarily attend.
The video features :
- One of the top researchers in the world on this subject, Dr. Florence Lai, M. D. of Massachusetts General Hospital, Harvard Medical School and McLean Hospital. Dr. Lai is of the "100% certain" school of thought regarding Down syndrome and Alzheimer's;
- Ray Guay, a psychological assistant for the Massachusetts Department of Mental Retardation, highly experienced in the day-to-day provision of care for adults with Down syndrome and Alzheimer's;
- A caregiving family member of an adult with Down syndrome and Alzheimer's disease;
- An adult with Down syndrome and Alzheimer's disease. The caregiving family member is my mother, and the afflicted is my brother. He's 55 years old now and has been symptomatic of Alzheimer's for five of those years. He's been late-stage Alzheimer's for three or four years now-- probably four, but if only three, he knew the Red Sox won the World Series, and I prefer that illusion. In the video, Dr. Lai describes the pathology of the condition and its implications for caregiving. Because such persons were already low-functioning developmentally, for example, it can be difficult to diagnose early-onset Alzheimer's and, again because of the pre-existing condition, the progression to late-stage dementia happens sooner. Almost all adults with Down syndrome begin exhibiting symptoms of Alzheimer's at around age 50, though she points out in an article for the ARC Advocate, Spring 2006 (Waltham, MA), that symptoms can begin as early as age 40.
Mr. Guay provides a wealth of tips and practical advice for dealing with the myriad of problems associated with the condition(s), calming an agitated person and even how to avoid accidentally agitating the person yourself. "Approach from the front," he advises, for example, because objects in their peripheral vision tend to cause anxiety and fear.
My mother describes the experiences of a family member closely engaged in caregiving.
The video is, as Dr. Moran told me, "Geared to the caregiver, the people on the front line on a day-to-day basis." Her hint of battle or warfare is not inapt. As in all wars, the objective costs are measurably enormous--and feelings typically run immeasurably high. I asked two officials of People, Inc., Mark Duval, the Residential Director, and Nicole Cabral, the Coordinator of Psychological Services, about programs and costs.
Mr. Duval told me that the conventional day-hab model was obviously inadequate for this population that agencies will soon be required to provide for in increasing numbers. Even the typical group home, which has been the foundation for service provision to the developmentally disabled for a generation now, can't be sustained as a solution. Adults with Down syndrome and Alzheimer's not only require close and consistent staff contact to maintain their health and abilities for as long as possible, but the provision of such care in a day-hab or group home context deprives others in those facilities of needed staff contact. Any "new service model" capable of providing humane and effective services, he contended, will have to include some version of a "One to One staff program" probably related to current PCA (Personal Care Attendant) programs.
At the moment, their agency is only providing for one client in need of those special services, but they are already providing services for many adults with Down syndrome now, many of that certain age, so the construction of services and training of personnel is little short of urgent. Ms. Cabral pointed out, "it seems obvious once you think of it, "that even the real estate involved will have to be specialized. They're hoping to set up a house soon, but it will have to be gutted and the interior rebuilt. Facilities have to be one-story houses without steps inside or out.
Dr. Moran explained that to me. Negotiating stairs is actually a fairly complex task, requiring depth perception, balance, physical coordination and ordered movements. As the Alzheimer's sufferer regresses cognitively, they lose what they once knew. I know I first noticed the definite deterioration in my brother by watching him try to come down a set of stairs I'd watched him easily negotiate for years.
It seems obvious that providing even the minimum in humane care for this population is going to cost a lot of money, "public sector money in most cases, "and require considerable commitment of time and energy by professional and family caregivers. One of the reasons that this undertaking will be so great is the changes in social attitudes about the mentally retarded and other social issues that occurred over the last generation or two. But those very attitudes are destined to be the source of passionate conflict and those immeasurably high feelings I mentioned earlier.
Those attitudes combined with changes in medical protocols and technology have produced an odd, nearly paradoxical phenomenon I call "The Window." Before the 1950s or so, mental retardation and Down syndrome in particular was regarded as (at best) a tragedy to be resolved as quickly as possible. The tragedy sometimes resolved itself naturally because, according to Dr. Moran, infant mortality ran about 50% in such children. The resolution for most of the remaining children was institutionalization in short order, where they had estimated lifespans of about twenty years. So, death in infancy or after a childhood of institutionalization was the fate of most such persons. Thus, they weren't around to generate strong feelings in the public sphere. They were never discussed in public, and even in private, within families, they were frequently not discussed.
But beginning about 1950 (probably exactly in 1950, as I'll show below) to about 1970, attitudes transformed incrementally and Down syndrome children were more and more kept by their families and raised at home as modern medicine steadily increased both their chances of surviving infancy and their expected lifespan afterwards.
However, once medical science succeeded in identifying the genetic defect at the root of Down syndrome and amniocentesis was invented, allowing for testing for Down syndrome in utero, more and more prospective parents with fetuses known to be Down syndrome opted for termination of pregnancy, since, meanwhile, abortion had been decriminalized. According to the recent New York Times article cited above:
Until this year, only pregnant women 35 and older were routinely tested to see if their fetuses had the extra chromosome that causes Down syndrome. As a result many couples were given the diagnosis only at birth. But under a new recommendation from the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, doctors have begun to offer a new, safer screening procedure to all pregnant women, regardless of age.
About 90 percent of pregnant women who are given a Down syndrome diagnosis have chosen to have an abortion.
This means, in sum then, that whereas two generations ago, Down syndrome children were rare creatures, it seems likely that two generations hence, Down syndrome children will be similarly rare for an entirely different set of reasons. So society has a window of about two generations of persons afflicted with Down Syndrome who are relatively common within the social experience of most people.
Part II: A Brief Social History:
Prior to 1950 in almost all instances, and following that until about 1970 in lessening instances, Down syndrome was widely regarded in society at large as a "Shame," both in the sense of "Oh, what a shame" and in the more potent sense of something to be "ashamed of." One set of my in-laws (all dead now) were never told by my aunt that there was a Down syndrome child on her side of the family. Over thirty years she kept the family "secret."
Almost all obstetricians and pediatricians advised strongly against keeping a Down syndrome child at home and supported that advice with recommendations and diagnoses that were both disturbing and frightening. Mothers were told, for example, that bonding was counter-indicated because the baby would probably die soon in any event--so the children were kept from their Mothers. Since my brother was a first born, the doctors told my mother to "put him away" and have another baby as soon as possible to fill the void. If children were already present in a family, parents were told, as in the case of the playwright Arthur Miller, that a Down syndrome child in the home would retard the development of other children in the home, setting up an impossibly tragic conflict for parents between the best interests of two or more children within a family. (See: New York Times 1 Sep 2007, A New Stage for Arthur Miller's Most Private Drama of Fathers and Sons).
But social attitudes began to change on August 26, 1950. That was the day that Roy Rogers and Dale Evan's "Mongoloid" daughter Robin was born. Evans was an incomparably brave woman, for she not only defied the doctors' frightening advice by insisting on bringing her baby home to raise, but she defied the prevailing social convention of Shame by making sure that literally everyone in the country knew that her child was Down syndrome. Sadly, the doctors weren't completely wrong--poor Robin only lived for two days less than two years, yet her life was documented in book written by Evans that remains in print to this day, Angel Unaware by Dale Evans Rogers.
By the time George Will's Down syndrome son Jon was born in 1972, the culture of Shame and Fear had almost entirely faded, although a new complex of social attitudes had not quite established itself. Public sector programs like Special Education had been instituted and medical protocols had advanced to such a degree that Down syndrome children like my brother were growing into young adulthood socialized, educated appropriately and with their families comforted by the possibility of their children's potential for happiness, heath and security being fulfilled.
During the first twenty years or so of Jon's life, a new culture of Celebration and Rights developed--the celebration evident in the continuing stream of heartwarming stories which became a staple of local newspaper human interest and in the critically-acclaimed television series Life Goes On starring a highly-functioning Down syndrome actor, Chris Burke. You yourself feel the celebration as an ordinary person in the ordinary course of an ordinary life witnessing the forthright yet common presence of Down syndrome persons. That Down syndrome person you see smiling at you at the end of a supermarket checkout line never failed to soften whatever resentment you might've felt at the person ahead of you with eleven items in the ten-items-or-less line.
Simultaneously, the Disability Rights movement successfully pressed for legal and civil rights for the developmentally disabled in all fifty states, culminating in the Federal Americans with Disability Act.
So by the time Michael Berube's Down syndrome son Jamie was born in the early 1990's, the social, medical and legal environment surrounding those with developmental disabilities had been almost entirely reversed from what it had been barely a generation earlier. Berube, a Professor of Literature at Penn State, also wrote a book about his child, Life As We Know It: A Father, a Family, and an Exceptional Child. In addition to the painful personal narrative, the book lays out his literary theory of Disability Studies.
On one level, Berube's book is about as far from Dale Evans' book as it's possible to imagine and still place both objects in the category of "book," yet, on the other hand both are animated by the same emotive force, hanging from the same narrative frame. She was a provincial who left school to elope out of Uvalde Texas at age 14, a devoted and undoubting Fundamentalist Christian and conservative Republican; he, a New York City born, Ivy League educated liberal/left cosmopolitan. Nevertheless: They loved their Down syndrome child, they hurt, and they found solace in writing of their love and pain. Together, they perfectly frame the social history of Down Syndrome over the last 50 years.
Part III: An Essay:
Growth in a field thought barren is no less than thrilling, the redemptive reward for the planter infinite. Dale Evans explains in the brief first person introduction (the text proper is written from Robin's point of view) that:
It has been said that tragedy and sorrow never leave us where they find us. In this instance, both Roy and I are grateful to God for the privilege of learning some great lessons of truth through His tiny messenger, Robin Elizabeth Rogers.
And the point is emphasized by Norman Vincent Peale (The Power of Positive Thinking) in the introduction to Angel Unaware:
, Robin put on immortality and her mother found the very joy of God in what otherwise might have been an overwhelming tragedy. [emphasis added]
Here, with the declarations of joy, gratitude and privilege, we see the foundation of the culture of celebration. And yet . . . despite its obvious appeal to our more beneficent impulses and the morally superior demand for humane treatment of the developmentally disabled, there is something discordant and dissonant. It's all well and good to celebrate Evans's courage and strength of spirit, but what about "most" mothers who Peale himself says would be crushed by such events? Do we leave them abandoned and unconsidered because their lives aren't the kind of lives likely to be celebrated?
Even if Peale's language is hyperbole, if the experience isn't crushing for most, it's not fun. One of the mothers of a Down syndrome child quoted in the New York Times article on pre-natal testing says:
"If someone had told me Sam would still be in diapers at age 5," ugh, " I probably would have died. . . . Living through it, not such a big deal. Because you don't give birth to a 5-year-old, you grow with and love this kid for five years."
Which reminds me of a story. My brother was born. My mother changed his diapers for a year-and-a-half. Then the twins were born. She changed ours until we were toilet-trained at the normal age. Still she changed my brother's. Then my younger sister was born three years after the twins. Then my Mother changed her diapers. Still she changed my brother's. Changing diapers on the same child for five years is a Grind, especially when it seems possible that the diaper-changing will be perpetual. Every one of those tiny triumphs documented in those heartwarming local newspaper stories or on Berube's blog represents months or even years of grinding stagnation and failure. Not everyone is capable of withstanding that grind.
Tilling the seemingly barren field is always hard work, even when growth unexpectedly occurs--how demoralizing and dispiriting it must be to plant that field so diligently and to see little or nothing sprout.
I don't mean to sound bitter. I do indeed understand the rewards of those tiny triumphs. What I resent, I suppose, is romanticizing by the purveyors of the heart-warming sentiment, as if that's all there was to it. When you share a smile with the Down syndrome cart-collector at the supermarket and then step spritely to your car, you have no idea of the energy and effort that had been invested to give you that moment of touching grace. There was 23 hours and 59 minutes of grinding behind that minute of the day you were given. Deciding that that minute is worth the 23:59 is a value judgment, a trade off, that not everyone is willing or able to make.
The presumption that one Down syndrome family's experience will be as positive and rewarding as the next is simply unwarranted. In Tolstoy's construction, the part of the experience that's happy is the same for all of us; the part that is unhappy is unique to each of us. And the unhappy aspects don't make very interesting or uplifting stories. The predominant subtext in the current culture of Celebration and Rights is to generalize precisely those aspects of experience that don't need to be generalized or that have been repeatedly generalized already and to leave unstated those specific aspects of experience that do not easily fit the new attitude.
One aspect of the Down syndrome family narratives I've read, from the items in a local paper to the books, is how the families or authors almost invariably employ those experiences and construct those narratives to vindicate and validate pre-existing worldviews--this writer most definitely not excepted. I remember during the heated debates on the Terri Schiavo case one of my interlocutors brought me up short with the pointed rejoinder that just because my brother was one step away from Schiavo's condition didn't mean I owned the issue (and I expect there will be those who make a similar and not altogether unjustified claim about this very work).
Still, is it not notable that Dale Evans situates Robin in support of her view of Christianity, that Michael Berube situates Jamie within Literary Theory associated with Disability Studies and that George Will situates Jon as a powerful argument against Roe v. Wade?
The temptation seems to be all but irresistible, although perhaps necessary as a coping mechanism, but do we not lose something of the Down syndrome person as an individual when we use our experiences of them as a buttress for a worldview? When the Disability Rights laws were being passed in the 1990s one social worker excitedly informed my mother that my brother was now eligible to vote, and urged her to have him registered. The underlying generalization was that the developmentally disabled were citizens too, and should have all the rights citizens have.
Are you kidding me? No way my brother registers to vote. Philosophically, of course, he shouldn't vote because he is incapable of the kind of abstract thought required of a knowledgeable citizen. Granted, I'd love to have had an extra vote for Bill Clinton that year, which I could've had by simply taking my brother to the polls, having him clog the lines as he signed in, then telling him "Bill Clinton is the good guy, Bob Dole is the bad guy," but that wouldn't have been very ethical. But practically speaking, registering him to vote was a ridiculous idea.
He would register to vote. He'd get on the list of those subject to be called to jury duty. He'd get called. My mother would fill out some form declaring he's incompetent to serve. Some judge or bailiff would decide it's just someone trying to avoid jury duty. My mother would have to waste a day driving my brother to Dedham to present him in person for disqualification. It's not like that all hadn't happened before when some fool at the Pentagon tried to draft him to go to Vietnam. The well-intentioned social worker, at the end of the day, while celebrating the right to vote, was in all truth probably simply adding to the Grind.
Do I think the developmentally disabled should be allowed to vote? Actually, I don't know, or rather, I think it should be decided case-by-case, but in any event, it's not important. I'd rather my brother have the right to services that allow him comfort, happiness and security than that he be given a right he can never really understand or utilize as intended. Is mainstreaming and inclusion a good idea or a bad idea? Again: I don't know. It has to be case-by-case. Those who would or will benefit should be mainstreamed, those who wouldn't or won't should not be.
When I read this passage in the "Prenatal Test" article, I guess I must have shuddered:
[A] growing group of parents is seeking to insert their own positive perspectives into a decision often dominated by daunting medical statistics and doctors who feel obligated to describe the difficulties of life with a disabled child. . . . .
The parent are driven by a deep-seated fear for their children's well-being in a world where there are fewer people like them. [emphasis added]
The deep-seated fear, I get. The skepticism of the medical profession, I get. The evangelism, I don't. And that evangelism is implicit or explicit in almost all the family narratives that reach public notice. Will, for instance, says:
Jon, a sweet-tempered man, was born the year before Roe v. Wade inaugurated this era of the casual destruction of pre-born babies. And he was born just as prenatal genetic tests were becoming routine. Since then, it has become routine to abort babies like Jon because they are like Jon. Without this combination of diagnostic advances and moral regression, there would be more people like Jon, and the world would be a sweeter place.
Will also says in his column that life-expectancy for Down syndrome has risen to 56, although the Times article claims 49. But it really doesn't make any difference because those extra 7 years will simply be a rapid descent into late-stage Alzheimer's anyway. Isn't modern medicine "sweet"? Okay, that did sound bitter, and I meant it this time.
Will offers a general proposition, that the world is a sweeter place because his son Jon is in it. I'm sorely tempted to say that that is untrue simply because of the indirect influence Jon has on Will's polemics, but in truth, I don't know whether the proposition is true because I don't know Jon. Is the world a better place because it includes a population of persons with Down syndrome? As a general proposition, that remains an open question. I don't know.
I do know that my spirit is enriched and my own life is better for having lived it with my brother.


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The Need for Luteal Support in NC-FET
The recruitment status of this study is unknown. The completion date has passed and the status has not been verified in more than two years.
Verified June 2014 by Wolfson Medical Center.
Recruitment status was: Recruiting
Recruitment status was: Recruiting
Wolfson Medical Center
Information provided by (Responsible Party):
Wolfson Medical Center
ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier:
First received: November 29, 2011
Last updated: June 15, 2014
Last verified: June 2014
- Full Text View
- Tabular View
- No Study Results Posted
- Disclaimer
- How to Read a Study Record
No Study Results Posted on ClinicalTrials.gov for this Study
|Study Status:
|This study is currently recruiting participants.
|Estimated Study Completion Date:
|December 2014
|Estimated Primary Completion Date:
|December 2014 (Final data collection date for primary outcome measure)


text:
Evaluation of the Zilver® Vena™ Venous Stent (VIVO EU)
This study has been completed.
Cook Group Incorporated
Information provided by (Responsible Party):
Cook Group Incorporated
ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier:
First received: August 6, 2012
Last updated: October 31, 2016
Last verified: October 2016
- Full Text View
- Tabular View
- No Study Results Posted
- Disclaimer
- How to Read a Study Record
This prospective, non-randomized, multi-center study is intended to evaluate the Zilver® Vena™ stent in the treatment of symptomatic iliofemoral venous outflow obstruction.
|Iliofemoral Venous Outflow Obstruction
|Device: Zilver Vena Venous Stent
|Study Type:
|Study Design:
|Observational Model: Cohort
Time Perspective: Prospective
|Official Title:
|Evaluation of the Zilver® Vena™ Venous Stent
Further study details as provided by Cook Group Incorporated:
Primary Outcome Measures:
- Major Adverse Events [ Time Frame: 1 month ]
- Patency [ Time Frame: 12 months ]Assessed via ultrasound
|Study Start Date:
|November 2012
|Study Completion Date:
|July 2016
|Primary Completion Date:
|July 2016 (Final data collection date for primary outcome measure)
|Assigned Interventions
Device: Zilver Vena Venous Stent
Stenting iliofemoral venous outflow obstruction
|Ages Eligible for Study:
|18 Years and older (Adult, Senior)
|Sexes Eligible for Study:
|Accepts Healthy Volunteers:
|Sampling Method:
|Non-Probability Sample
Study Population
Patients with symptomatic iliofemoral venous outflow obstruction.
Inclusion Criteria:
- Symptomatic venous outflow obstruction in up to two iliofemoral venous segments (one in each limb), demonstrated by:
- CEAP 'C' ≥ 3, or
- VCSS pain score ≥ 2
Exclusion Criteria:
- < 18 years of age
- Pregnant or planning to become pregnant in the next 12 months
- Planned surgical or interventional procedures (except thrombolysis and thrombectomy in preparation for the procedure or vena cava filter placement prior to stent implantation in patients at high risk for pulmonary embolism) within 30 days prior to or after the study procedure.
- Lesions with intended treatment lengths extending into the inferior vena cava or below the level of the lesser trochanter
- Previous stenting of the target vessel
- Iliofemoral venous segment unsuitable for treatment with available sizes of study devices
Contacts and Locations
Choosing to participate in a study is an important personal decision. Talk with your doctor and family members or friends about deciding to join a study. To learn more about this study, you or your doctor may contact the study research staff using the Contacts provided below. For general information, see Learn About Clinical Studies.
Please refer to this study by its ClinicalTrials.gov identifier: NCT01663051
Please refer to this study by its ClinicalTrials.gov identifier: NCT01663051
|Klinikum Arnsberg GmbH
|Arnsberg, Germany
|Galway University Hospitals
|Galway, Ireland
|Hospital Madrid Monteprincipe
|Madrid, Spain
|Kantonsspital Winterthur
|Winterthur, Switzerland, 8401
|United Kingdom
|Guy's and St Thomas' Hospital
|London, United Kingdom, SE1 7EH
Sponsors and Collaborators
Cook Group Incorporated
More Information
Publications automatically indexed to this study by ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier (NCT Number):
ClinicalTrials.gov processed this record on September 21, 2017
Publications automatically indexed to this study by ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier (NCT Number):
O'Sullivan GJ, Waldron D, Mannion E, Keane M, Donnellan PP. Thrombolysis and iliofemoral vein stent placement in cancer patients with lower extremity swelling attributed to lymphedema. J Vasc Interv Radiol. 2015 Jan;26(1):39-45. doi: 10.1016/j.jvir.2014.10.010.
|Responsible Party:
|Cook Group Incorporated
|ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier:
|NCT01663051 History of Changes
|Other Study ID Numbers:
|Study First Received:
|August 6, 2012
|Last Updated:
|October 31, 2016
ClinicalTrials.gov processed this record on September 21, 2017


text:
Accuracy of Dilution of EUS-FNA Pancreatic Cyst Fluid for Carcinoembryonic Antigen (CEA) Measurement
- Full Text View
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- Disclaimer
- How to Read a Study Record
|Pancreatic Cyst
|Other: Laboratory processing for results
|Study Type:
|Study Design:
|Time Perspective: Prospective
|Official Title:
|Accuracy of Dilution of EUS-FNA Pancreatic Cyst Fluid for CEA Measurement
- Accuracy of diluted CEA level [ Time Frame: Pancreatic fluid is aspirated once during the procedure. ]The primary aim of this study is to determine if pancreatic cyst fluid can be diluted and provide an accurate CEA level.
|Study Start Date:
|April 2011
|Study Completion Date:
|July 2012
|Primary Completion Date:
|July 2012 (Final data collection date for primary outcome measure)
|Assigned Interventions
EUS-FNA of Pancreatic Cyst
Patients who have a pancreatic cyst requiring standard of care EUS-FNA that yields 2.25 ML (or greater) of fluid will be included in the study.
Other: Laboratory processing for results
There is no intervention. Extra fluid that is normally discarded will be processed.
Detailed Description:
Potential subjects will be identified based on the indication of a pancreatic cyst requiring EUS-FNA. The procedure will be performed as usual per standard protocol with EUS-FNA of the cyst. Once the fluid is aspirated, it will be measured and if the fluid volume is 2.25 mL or greater than the patient will be included in the study.
A micropipette will be used to ensure exact volumes are measured. The first 1 mL of cystic fluid will be sent to the lab for regular CEA analysis, per standard protocol. The remaining fluid, which would usually be discarded, will then be used for the study. The micropipette will be used to mix 0.75 mL of cyst fluid with 0.25 mL of normal saline (designated sample #2). Next, 0.5 mL of cyst fluid will be mixed with 0.5 mL of normal saline for the next study sample (designated sample #3). These two study samples will be sent to the lab separately using de-identified information, and these values will not be part of the patient's medical record and will not affect clinical management or decision-making. The study samples will be given a unique identifier that will not have any patient identification. The unique identifier will allow the study researchers to link the values to the correct patient by using a password protected program that cannot be accessed by the public.
This study will not require any additional patient participation, and will not impact the length of the procedure. The only additional time will be from the study researchers and the EUS technologists diluting the samples, which will not affect the procedure time itself. If a single patient has more than one cyst, each cyst can be included in the study separately. No additional photographs, videos or data other than the standard data for the procedure will be produced.
|Ages Eligible for Study:
|18 Years and older (Adult, Senior)
|Sexes Eligible for Study:
|Accepts Healthy Volunteers:
|Sampling Method:
|Probability Sample
Inclusion Criteria:
- Patients scheduled for EUS-FNA of a pancreatic cyst
- Cyst must yield 2.25ml (or greater) of fluid
Exclusion Criteria:
- Cysts yielding less than 2.25ml of fluid
Please refer to this study by its ClinicalTrials.gov identifier: NCT01494077
|United States, California
|H. H. Chao Comprehensive Digestive Disease Center
|Orange, California, United States, 92868
|Principal Investigator:
|Kenneth J. Chang, MD
|University of California, Irvine
|Responsible Party:
|Kenneth J. Chang, Professor of Clinical Medicine, University of California, Irvine
|ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier:
|NCT01494077 History of Changes
|Other Study ID Numbers:
|Study First Received:
|December 2, 2011
|Last Updated:
|December 10, 2014
Keywords provided by Kenneth J. Chang, University of California, Irvine:
Pancreatic Cyst Fluid
Carcinoembryonic Antigen (CEA)
Additional relevant MeSH terms:
Pancreatic Cyst
Pathological Conditions, Anatomical
Pancreatic Diseases
Digestive System Diseases
ClinicalTrials.gov processed this record on September 21, 2017


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Industries that are commodity based, such as the metals recycling industry, are subject to market-driven pricing volatility that is actually outside the industry participants' control. If you trade in nonferrous metals, the base price of the commodity is set by the value of that particular commodity contract as traded on various commodity exchanges, such as the London Metal Exchange (LME), the Chicago Mercantile Exchange (COMEX) or the Shanghai Metal Exchange (SME).
Many metals industry participants are trading metals futures on these exchanges as are nonmetals industry participants. However, large volumes of trades are controlled by various investment vehicles that heavily influence the market but do not physically handle the commodities they are trading. Ultimately, metals industry suppliers, consumers and traders operate their respective businesses with commodity pricing driven by these investment vehicles.
Historically, ferrous scrap pricing was determined by supply and demand fundamentals heavily influenced by geography. However, a ferrous contract recently was introduced, and now ferrous scrap pricing may be subject to the influence of participants outside of the industry.
Breaking with tradition
Traditionally, the exchange prices for each commodity were set by fundamental economic principles driven by supply and demand. This lent itself to somewhat stable markets. Within the last 10 years, however, base metals have become increasingly more attractive to the investment community, including but not limited to mutual funds, hedge funds and other various metals-based investments. As this occurred, the now familiar commodity pricing roller coaster ride began.
At times, metals prices began to move 2 percent to 3 percent per day. However, fluctuations in pricing began to exceed these movements. For instance, in May 2012 the exchange price of copper was about $3.80 per pound, and by the end of June it had fallen to $3.29 per pound, representing a price decrease of 13.5 percent. However, within the last month or so, the exchange copper price has reversed itself and moved from $3.40 per pound to as high as $3.80 per pound. This 40-cent-per-pound change is an increase of more than 11 percent.
Inventory and open priced orders are exposed to large price swings. If a company is carrying a copper inventory valued at $1 million, and the market experiences a downward swing of 11 percent, that equates to an unrealized loss of $110,000.
These dramatic swings in metals pricing, and specifically copper pricing, occur without regard to supply and demand fundamentals within the metals industries. Instead, the price volatility has been driven by nonindustry participants. In other words, various investment funds betting on movements in metals prices also are driving price volatility.
The investment funds' activities serve as the primary consideration for why scrap metal recyclers should contemplate using a mechanism to limit their exposure to fluctuations in exchange-based pricing. Hedging is an appropriate vehicle to mitigate exposure to price volatility.
Hedging your position
Commodity based industries engage in hedging to protect future sales and purchases of various metals while providing the industry the ability to have a price to buy or sell against at any given moment. A time-based disconnect exists between the sale, purchase and use of metals and, as such, leaves the participant exposed to the fluctuations in exchange pricing. This time-based disconnect occurs because of the time involved in collecting, preparing and shipping metals to various customers at each phase of the business cycle.
The hedging of metals prices serves to level the time-based inequity of the metals transaction. Hedging provides the industry with the necessary pricing liquidity to allow for the setting of prices for each commodity at any given time. Without hedging, it would not be possible to set pricing under a risk-management program when the upper levels of the industry are either "out of the market" or purchasing or selling products on "open priced" or "formula based" pricing options.
In the scrap metal industry, hedging against price fluctuations is achieved differently at each level of the business. The key thing to remember is that at every level of the business, price ultimately is based on, and traceable to, an exchange price. At the retail scrap purchasing level, peddlers lock in pricing by selling to the retail yard at a fixed price. The retail yard sets its buying prices based on a wholesaler's pricing. Likewise, the wholesaler's price is based on a larger scrap metal dealer's or a metal broker's pricing, which is based on sales to consumers at prices that are set against an exchange's price. The entire industry from retail buying to the sale of a consumer product is intertwined, and pricing is consistently driven by the price of a particular commodity as traded on one of the exchanges.
However, many factors are associated with setting commodity pricing and with mitigating the risk of exposure to an exchange's price fluctuations. If you are carrying inventory, the value is changing with every fluctuation of the exchange prices. If the commodity is purchased or ordered but requires some form of processing or delivery is set at some point in the future, participants are exposed to the market risk of price fluctuations.
For the industry to function fluidly, every participant needs a price to buy against. Brokers and larger-volume-yards establish pricing liquidity for the scrap metal industry. Yet, the ultimate challenge is mitigating the risk of exposure to exchange pricing when metals industry participants and supply and demand fundamentals are not driving price.
Mitigating risk
The question is whether a metals trader or dealer is able to design a risk-management program to mitigate the risk of the price fluctuations of using the exchanges. The answer is yes, through developing a comprehensive hedging program.
Many people will hear the word "hedging" and say, "Isn't that just speculating on the price of the commodity?" The reality is that without hedging you are speculating on the price.
In the simplest terms, hedging allows the metals trader or dealer to use the exchange as the opposite side to whatever transaction being entered into. This activity establishes pricing liquidity and allows pricing of the commodity to flow all the way down to the retail level.
Illustration A2 (p. 58) demonstrates how hedging can protect profitability in a transaction compared with Illustration A3 (p. 59), which is the same transaction without hedging. Remember that when you purchase physical metal, you sell contracts on the exchange, and when you sell physical metal, you buy contracts on the exchange.
This example is of a copper brokerage transaction where both the sale and purchase of the metal were done May 1, 2012, with a gross margin at 5 cents per pound. The sale and purchase are done at a spread to COMEX. The sale was at COMEX less 5 cents per pound, and the purchase was at COMEX less 10 cents per pound. The consumer priced the sales side May 1 by locking in the COMEX copper value. The supplier did not lock in the COMEX copper value until May 4, 2012. Inherently, there was a risk to price fluctuation for 72 hours.
Practical Considerations
If you decide to use hedging to mitigate price risk, you must be aware of a number of important variables. First, there is a requirement to post initial margin money as shown in Illustration A1. Margin serves as collateral. The amount of margin required is determined by the size of your hedge position, and posting margin will have an effect on cash flows.
Another consideration involves the effect of carrying a hedge position on your company's financial statements. It is a good practice to do a monthly "mark to market." A mark to market involves bringing all of your priced or provisionally priced orders and all priced hedgeable inventories to a market value determined as of the last day of each month. This offsets any unrealized gains or losses in your hedging account.
As stated earlier, the exchange is always the other side of your transaction, so you need to account for the physical unrealized gains/losses on your books, records and financial statements. You should consult with your accounting department or external accounting firm prior to starting a hedging program.
Many companies, both large and small, will decide not to actively hedge their purchases, sales or inventory using the exchanges but instead will design a risk management program with the help of metal brokers. Metal brokers in the industry will use hedging to manage price risk on behalf of their consumers and suppliers, which will not affect the consumers'/suppliers' cash flow. Metal brokers also offer formula pricing and other pricing options that allow consumers/suppliers to effectively hedge their respective sales, purchases and inventory by using the metal broker as a replacement for the commodity exchanges.
Each exchange operates under its own rules and policies and is governed by the laws of its domicile. For instance, COMEX is governed by the U.S. laws, specifically, the Commodity Exchange Act. Before engaging in trading, brokers or dealers should consult professionals to develop a working understanding of the brokerage account agreements and governing laws.
The authors are with Solon,Ohio-based Premier Metal Services LLC (www.premiermetalservices.com). Premier buys and sells ferrous and nonferrous scrap and offers risk management programs to suppliers and consumers.


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Amazing Hands Massage Therapy
Amazing Hands translates the complex body language of its clients with a diverse selection of massage styles and techniques expertly deployed to suit each body's aches and tensions. At each location, a team of licensed massage therapists harnesses eastern and western techniques to oust muscle tension and detoxify tendons as clients relax on heated tables. Therapists specialize in helping to heal shoulder, knee, and back injuries with a combination of invigorating massage strokes and deep-tissue pressure, which can also help break up scar tissue. They use up to nine essential oils to stoke simultaneous mind and body relaxation, much like practicing yoga or sharing a hammock with a hypnotist.


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Tesla Model 3
In case you missed the launch of the Tesla Model 3...
Brilliant strategy to deliver a car in about 18 months but take deposits now, with folks line up to put down money.
Passion in everything that we do. We don't follow, we lead...
Strada White Papers
Our Address
Toronto, ON
In case you missed the launch of the Tesla Model 3...
Brilliant strategy to deliver a car in about 18 months but take deposits now, with folks line up to put down money.
We started Think Verde almost 9 years ago. Back then we would have thought that by 2015 there would be a higher percentage of vehicle on the road with an electric motor. in one form or another.
Agreed...a lot of things have changed since 2007.
Is it the price of gas that is impacting hybrids and electric vehicles?
In no particular order...
A used vehicle is a green vehicle
Think about it, if you acquire a used vehicle you are recycling, you most probably replaced one used vehicle by another; saving a ton of resources, and energy, by recycling.
The path of least resistance
Absolutely, any vehicle with an ICE (Internal Combustion Engine) offers a path of least resistance, and potentially higher profits.
Consumer preference
Its easy to verbalise that consumers prefer vehicles with an ICE, especially with cheaper gas. It sounds good. Especially when the tone around electric, hybrid is appreciably more subdued starting with the auto manufacturers.
Shifting Interest
If 9 years ago the talk was electric, today the talk is self driving. The interest has shifted from electric to self driving.
Range Anxiety
Almost forgot that term, in cold climates it still exists. While we always see the occasional Tesla Model S in all kinds of climatic conditions. It remains an issue.
So...is it the Price of Gas?
From our perspective...NO.
It might be a factor, among a myriad of other factors that have dampened the interest, momentum in electric and hybrid vehicles.
We are not proponents of small diesel engines in cars (vehicles), although we realise that there is a subset of customers that appreciates a diesel engine in cars. Its presumably some sort of "green thing"...
With the recent VW events, and more stringent on the road testing you can conclude that there will be less small diesel engines in any vehicle, from any manufacturer. Obvious the bigger diesels with the urea tank will endure. Or will those diesels too be impacted? What do you think?
Want to be green get an hydrid, or an electric car as the game changer or disrupter. Not a presumed clean diesel.
If you sort of want to be green, then a clean diesel used to work for you.
In Canada with the increasing popularity of trucks be it CUV, SUV, pick ups the current population of diesel engines in these various vehicles will continue, perhaps even increase. The are big enough to require a bigger diesel engine, with a "urea" system. By now there are enough out there, that everyone is used to adding a "blue" something or other in the blue tank.
We think they are cool too...the Ram Diesel pick up captured our attention a few months ago. A few years ago the ML320 CDI was also of interest.
But is it the demise of diesels in smaller vehicles.
It might just evolve towards a simple question: Does it have a "blue tank"?
Informative study by NADA of used electric vehicle values.
The BMW i3 is elctric,has carbon fiber, and caught our attention some time ago.
If you have been following the auto industry, you surely know that manufacturers tear down, and benchmark vehicles from other manufacturers.
Munro & Assiciates has torn down an i3 this video (a little long) is an absolute must watch if you have an interest in electric cars, tear downs, and benchmarking.
BMW i3 Tear Down - Uncovering the Secrets from Automotive Megatrends on Vimeo.
One fast bike...a comprehansive walk around with Jay Leno
Informative reasearch on elctric cars...
With all the talk of self driving cars, an interesting video by Toyota...
The first race is today in Beijing...informative video on the development of Formula E.
A feel for the car with Tiff Needle...
Yes...an electric Harley-Davidson


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What is preferred shares
When you own shares of stock you become part owner of a company. If the company does well, the value of your stock should go up over time.
If the company does not do well, the value of your investment will decrease.
Companies issue two types of stock, common and preferred.
Common Stock:
Common stock is the basic form of ownership in a company. People who hold common stock have a claim on the assets of a firm after those of preferred stockholders and bondholders.
Preferred Stock:
Preferred stock is ownership in a company, which has a claim on the assets and earnings of a firm before those of common stockholders but after bondholders. The safety of the principal of preferred stock is greater than that of common stock.
Why does a company issue stock?
Why do investors pay good money for little pieces of paper called stock certificates?
What do investors look for?
To start with, if a company wants to raise capital (money) one of its options is to issue stock. It has other methods, such as issuing bonds or getting a loan from the bank.
But stock raises capital without creating debt, without creating a legal obligation to repay those funds.
What do the buyers of the stock -- the new owners of the company -- expect for their investment?
The popular answer, the answer many people would give is: they expect to make lots of money, they expect other people to pay them more than they paid themselves.
Well, that doesn't just happen randomly or by chance (well, maybe sometimes it
does, who knows?)
The less popular, less simple answer is: shareholders -- the company's owners -- expect their investment to earn more, for the company, than other forms of investment.
If that happens, if the return on investment is high, the price tends to increase.
Who really knows? But it is true that within an industry the Price/Earnings (P/E) ratio tends to stay within a narrow range over any reasonable period of time -- measured in months or a year or so.
So if the earnings go up, the price goes up. And investors look for companies whose earnings are likely to go up.
How much?
There's a number, the accountants call it Shareholder Equity, that in some magical sense represents the amount of money the investors have invested in the company.
I say magical because while it translates to (Assets - Liabilities) there is often a lot of accounting trickery that goes into determining Assets and Liabilities.
But looking at Shareholder Equity, (and dividing that by the number of shares held to get the book value per share) if a company is able to earn, say, 1.50 on a stock whose book value is 10, that's a 15% return.
That's actually a good return these days, much better than you can get in a bank or bond, and so people might be more encouraged to buy, while sellers are anxious to hold on.
So the price might be bid up to the point where sellers might be persuaded to sell!
Continue to the Next Page
Source: www.greekshares.com
Category: Forex
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