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Maggiel necesitaba un nuevo diseño de logotipo y lanzó un concurso de diseño en 99designs.
Un ganador ha sido elegido entre 112 diseños de 21 diseñadores freelance.
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We have been invited to the present at the Shanghai World Expo as one of Australia's leading food safety training online companies so we need something clean and fresh
Training Online delivers Nationally Accredited Food Safety training to the food industry including:
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This is an new trading name for a well established training organization CFT International http://www.cft.com.au
We do not necessarily want either the look or feel of the CFT brand for Training online
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We have been operating for 12 years hand have a good core group of customers including major hotels, restaurants, caterers, clubs, childcare, aged care cooks, food processing bakeries, . We want our existing clients to continue using our courses and want to attract new clients.
Logo and associated artwork will be used on:
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e-marketing campaigns
What we dont like- Chefs hats and clip art :)
The files we will require are:
Print file format - .ai (CMYK)
Web file format - .jpg and layered .psd (RGB)
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Descubre cómo funciona un concurso de diseño u obtén más información sobre nuestros servicios de diseño de logo.

subset: commoncrawl


text:
Don't Feed the Alpha Males
When I'm at a bar with a few friends and the night is not spicy enough to hold my attention, I have come up with the perfect solution - throw ice.
At least that's what some no-necked classmates of mine used to do on lazy Thursday nights. It's a quick way to generate hatred from your fellow bar-goers, which would instantly make anyone's night better.
I have a little man in my head whose job it is to remind me not to throw ice at people. He's due for a promotion soon, since I've never even thought of doing it. Hopefully, you've got that same little man working for you. If he's on a break, on strike, or never seems to show up on time, you are probably a bar jerk.
The impressive thing about bar jerks is that they can be bar jerks in any situation, even without the presence of alcohol. These same guys can elbow you out of the way to catch an elevator, catcall at your girlfriend while your arm is around her, and peel out of a parking space to get caught behind a red light. The bar jerk is a mere annoyance and often amounts to nothing. Which is ironic, since the route of the bar jerk's behavior is the galactically mistaken impression that he is more important than you.
The bar jerk's intelligence can vary. He may be a football player or a med student, or a football playing med student. But he throws ice, which puts him on an evolutionary par with the Cro-Magnon man and Howard Stern.
In some ways, I am the stereotypical classification of an Alpha Male. I played on seven intramural teams in college. I watch SportsCenter more than once a day, and often consecutively. I was the social chair of my school's Greek Council. I don't let a conversation go on in front of me without butting in. And my job is to get on a stage and entertain people. But the day I throw ice at you is the day someone sets you on fire.
My friends and I pride ourselves on being regular guys. We are guys that prefer conversation to blank stares. Guys that are equally comfortable in jeans and a t-shirt as we are in khakis and a polo. Guys that will call our girlfriends when we want to talk to them. Hell, we are guys that are willing to call someone our girlfriend in the first place.
If you're a guy reading this and wondering if you are an Alpha Male, you're probably not. An Alpha Male has already known he is an Alpha Male ever since he got in trouble for hitting on his third grade teacher. But more importantly, you are willingly reading something that does not contain pictures or statistics, virtually eliminating the possibility of your Alpha Maleness.
When I meet another guy, I can't always tell right away if he's a displaced bar jerk or not. When I meet him through a girl, I can always tell. Especially if one of us is dating her.
If he actively seeks conversation, he's usually a good guy. If he closes up, puts his arm around the girl, or insults me before he knows my last name, he is just a jerk marking his territory. And if he pees on her, well, maybe they're into that but it's not my style.
The reason why quality girls are left single is because they've been scorched by so many bar jerks that they inadvertently become very picky. They need to be sure not to repeat their poor choice, and thus are scared that the slightest male behavior will lead to ice-throwing. Bar jerks ruin it for the rest of us. In economic terms, quality guys are not competition for other quality guys. They just inflate the market demand. On the flipside, bar jerks are not worth the ice they throw at each other. Even if they're on fire.
So here's to the guys that hold the door open for people, regardless of gender. Here's to the guys that enjoy fancy dinners on anniversaries. Here's to the guys that walk someone home without the express intent of getting some, know how to cook more than cereal, and actually own a book. Maybe more than one. And here's to the guys that have enough respect for themselves that they can spare enough for the people around them.
Ladies - next time you meet a quality guy, make sure you appreciate how easy it would have been for him to be a bar jerk. Be happy that he has bucked the stereotype and come out a decent human being. Smile at how he actually listens to more than the rustling of your sweater when you stretch. Maybe even buy him a drink. On the rocks.


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Hotel | Hotell Zäta is situated in the centre of Östersund. From us you have a walking distance to a lot of what Östersund has to offer, like shops, restaurants, pubs and much more. You are also close to the railway station and the bus to the airport. If you have a car you can park in a garage and take the lift up to the reception.
The hotel has 32 rooms and 60 beds. Wifi in every room. We also have a longe where you can drink coffee, wine or beer.
Prices include breakfast.


text:
Social media was once an "experimental communication tool used by a few forwardthinking firms" in our industry. Now, on nearly every financial firm's website you'll find a trio of little blue boxes somewhere near the bottom. Corporate Insight, a research firm that provides competitive intelligence to financial institutions, released on Thursday a report spotlighting how financial firms have taken that growth and turned it into effective social media strategies.
"Over the past few years, the use of social media by financial services firms has increased exponentially," Alan Maginn, senior analyst and social media expert at Corporate Insight, said in a statement. "Social media is a critical way for companies to communicate with their clients, prospects and other targeted audiences on a personal level."
The report examines 90 financial services firms and ranks their Facebook pages, Twitter profiles, proprietary communities and blogs. While most firms that commit to a social media strategy will utilize the Big Three—Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn—Corporate Insight excluded LinkedIn from its report, as well as Google+ and YouTube.
LinkedIn has an extraordinary membership (150 million members worldwide), but Corporate Insight notes that "there's very little variance between one firm's LinkedIn presence and the next." Furthermore, most interactions are private, making engagement exceedingly difficult to measure accurately. YouTube offers better metrics by which to measure engagement, but the report found engagement tends to be low. The commenting feature is rarely used by fans of financial services channels, and in fact, is often disabled by the firms. Since Google+ allowed firms to create business pages in November 2011, roughly 50% of the firms tracked by Corporate Insight established a business page in their name. However, they appear to have done little more than that. "Until more firms have the chance to establish functioning accounts on this new community, we feel it is premature to grade their efforts," the report says.
Corporate Insight based its analysis of firms' social media accounts on audience, content and engagement, but is especially focused on engagement.
"Engagement is truly what sets social media apart from more traditional business-to-consumer communications, and this direct interaction with current and prospective clients is a major benefit of a well-executed social media offering," Maginn said.
Twitter is tops when it comes to which social media platform to favor, the report found. In 2010, Facebook was slightly more popular, but even though more firms had a Facebook page, the average number of Twitter accounts per firm was outpacing Facebook. By the end of 2011, 92% of the firms tracked by Corporate Insight had a Twitter presence, compared with 88% on Facebook.
The report noted that more conservative sectors of the industry like full-service brokerages and mutual fund companies were more likely to prefer Twitter to Facebook. Corporate Insight suggests this may be due to the compliance burden of reviewing and moderating comments from other users on their Facebook page.
"Social media was reserved for banks and self-directed brokerages, but now it's made its way to asset managers" and other financial services firms, Maginn told AdvisorOne on Friday.
"The key is having compliance involved when [firms are] developing their social media strategy," Maginn said. He noted that education is just as important for firms using social media as having the compliance department review posts before they are published.
"Whoever is writing the posts should be informed of what is acceptable and what isn't," he said. For example, Morgan Stanley Smith Barney launched a social media pilot program that allowed about a third of its advisors to use social media to publish pre-reviewed posts, Maginn said. In the past month or so, he continued, a much smaller group of advisors have been allowed to write and publish posts without approval.
Technology is also helping firms stay compliant, Maginn said. "There are several firms that allow companies to track and manage what's going out there."
Maginn said that as firms continue to utilize social media successfully with raising the ire of regulators, firms that have been reluctant to take on social media use will follow. In fact, he expects to see more and more asset managers take up social media over the next 12 to 18 months.
It's important for firms to use social media to support other campaigns and not just to push static content out to their followers, Maginn said. Firms should use their channels to communicate. "You need to be relating to individuals and engaging individuals to show you care, and that you have a stake in your brand."
Twitter is especially popular as a customer service tool due to its ability for real-time communication and private direct messaging. The trend toward maintaining a dedicated customer service Twitter account was led by Wachovia and Bank of America in 2008, but the insurance and brokerage industries are starting to follow that example.
Recruitment is another goal financial services firms have for their social media strategy. Roughly 10% of the properties analyzed provided information on careers or list available job opportunities.
Corporate Insight makes the following recommendations to financial services firms looking to develop an effective social media strategy:
1. Communicate in a manner appropriate to the social channel and industry. The report notes that depending on the audience, the tone may change between social networks and even between accounts in the same network. "For instance, informal, pithy comments may be appropriate for mascot accounts on Facebook and Twitter, but customer service Twitter accounts and blogs offering marketing commentary or financial insight should use a more formal tone to convey the seriousness of the issues being discussed."
Volume is also important. Hourly messages may be too much for Facebook fans and may drive clients away from using that method of communication. Twitter users, on the other hand, are accustomed to frequent updates.
2. Consider campaigns aimed at different client/support segments. While social media makes reaching a broad audience easy, that's not always the goal. "By isolating a subset of your broader audience, you can increase the value of the social interactions by enabling these individuals to share their experience with issues they share with their peers.
3. Offer guidance to users who express issues. The report notes that users who go through a firm's social media account for customer service are likely trying to avoid extended phone trees and hold times. If a firm doesn't provide a dedicated customer service account, it should be prepared to field questions and requests submitted through other accounts.
In fact, when questions are submitted publicly, the report recommends trying to solve them publicly if possible. Other clients may have the same problem, and it demonstrates that the firm is willing to solve problems, not hide them. "When necessary," the report adds, "direct users to use private messaging features or take the conversation offline and always remind them not to publish personal or account information."
4. Strive to provide the information users want, not the information you want to deliver. That may be easier said than done. The report notes that just providing insightful content isn't enough; to be the "go-to source" for what you provide your clients, you have to also be entertaining. Corporate Insight recommends incorporating pictures and videos into your message; using current events and holidays to provide context to financial topics; ask questions of clients to engage them and get them thinking about the topic; and share third-party content as well as your own.
5. Integrate social tools into your website design. "There's no longer a clear distinction between social media websites and the rest of the Internet," the report states. "The social web is the web." Firms should incorporate features like ratings, comments and link sharing in their websites. This doesn't just improve the experience for clients. It can help you determine what your clients find helpful.


text:
Reading The Bible Narcissistically
We often read the Bible as if it were fundamentally about us: our improvement, our life, our triumph, our victory, our faith, our holiness, our godliness. We treat it like a book of timeless principles that will give us our best life now if we simply apply those principles. We treat it, in other words, like it's a heaven-sent self-help manual. But by looking at the Bible as if it were fundamentally about us, we totally miss the Point–like the two on the road to Emmaus. As Luke 24 shows, it's possible to read the Bible, study the Bible, and memorize large portions of the Bible, while missing the whole point of the Bible. It's entirely possible, in other words, to read the stories and miss the Story. In fact, unless we go to the Bible to see Jesus and his work for us, even our devout Bible reading can become fuel for our own narcissistic self-improvement plans, the place we go for the help we need to "conquer today's challenges and take control of our lives."
Contrary to popular assumptions, the Bible is not a record of the blessed good, but rather the blessed bad. That's not a typo. The Bible is a record of the blessed bad. The Bible is not a witness to the best people making it up to God; it's a witness to God making it down to the worst people. Far from being a book full of moral heroes to emulate, what we discover is that the so-called heroes in the Bible are not really heroes at all. They fall and fail, they make huge mistakes, they get afraid, their selfish, deceptive, egotistical, and unreliable. The Bible is one long story of God meeting our rebellion with his rescue; our sin with his salvation; our failure with his favor; our guilt with his grace; our badness with his goodness.
So, if we read the Bible asking first, "What would Jesus do?" instead of asking "What has Jesus done" we'll miss the good news that alone can set us free.
As I've said before, the overwhelming focus of the Bible is not the work of the redeemed but the work of the Redeemer. Which means that the Bible is not first a recipe book for Christian living, but a revelation book of Jesus who is the answer to our unchristian living.


text:
In the past six months, the Friends In Service Here or F.I.S.H. organization has noticed an increase in its clients being approached in person or online by solicitors asking for money. This prompted the setting up of a recent workshop to help seniors learn practical ways in which they can guard against this growing problem crimes against the elderly.
More than 30 interested islanders gathered at the Sanibel Senior Center 4 Life last week to hear Detective Joe Roubicek, who has investigated more than 1,000 exploitation of the elderly crimes over the past 25 years. He spent 20 years as a detective with the Fort Lauderdale Police Department.
Article Photos
Bill Fellows, president of FISH, Detective Joe Roubicek and Christine Swierz, a licensed clinical social worker for FISH
"I am honored to be on Sanibel talking about preventing crimes against the elderly," Roubicek said. "This is a prime vacation spot I came to with my children. It holds a lot great memories."
In a lively debate, Roubicek answered questions from the audience and addressed concerns Sanibel residents had, particularly relating to online banking requests for money and other forms of phishing scams.
"There are two types of crimes," explained Roubicek. "There is fraud and exploitation."
The definition of fraud, according to the law, is deception. Of all the fraud crimes, phishing is the most common with Americans of all ages using the Internet to bank, pay bills and shop. Victims of phishing scams generally receive what appears to be a legitimate email from their banking institution or reputable business, which contains a link that requires your user name and password.
"Never click on a link inside an email," said Roubicek, who was nearly a victim of a phishing scam. "It is most likely a fake web site created to steal your user name and password information."
The second type of crime against the elderly, and one Roubicek has worked to improve laws against, is exploitation. This crime differs from fraud because it involves a person 60 years or older who has been taken advantage of due to a physical or emotional dysfunction.
In 1994, Roubicek testified before the Florida House and Senate to improve laws designed to protect the elderly and he contributed to the writing of Florida Statute 825.103: Exploitation of an Elderly Person or Disabled Adult.
"It's a great law because it brings the charges up to felonies, much like grand theft," explained Roubicek, who was joined by Lt. Michael Cooper at the workshop.
Cooper, a 30-year veteran with the Sanibel Police Department, discussed SPD's approach to crimes. He gave examples of practical ways residents can guard against these potential crimes. Cooper stated the police department strongly encourages residents to call them immediately if they have concerns or suspicions about online schemes or queries about suspicious tradespeople who had approached them for work.
"There is a city ordinance that states every contractor on the island must have a permit and carry a competency card," Cooper informed the crowd. "It is a misdemeanor crime on the island to work without a license and there is a list of approved contractors available at the building inspectors office. It lists landscapers, roofers, plumbers, everyone who has complied with the city's ordinance."
Cooper said seniors are targeted for these types of crimes because they more than likely have a nest egg, own their home, carry excellent credit, grew up trusting people and are less likely to report the crime.
"You are not alone," encouraged Cooper, who noted that many seniors feel they can't report the crime because they don't know who to call or are ashamed to be a victim.
Other crimes covered in the workshop included the Nigerian scam letter, home repair fraud, door-to-door sales fraud, sweepstakes scams, healthcare and Medicare fraud, telemarketing fraud and identity theft.
"Guard your personal information," advised Roubicek. "Shred trash with any personal information, reconcile with your bank weekly and keep a list of important phone numbers handy."
Additional tips to avoid becoming a victim include:
Stop and think about any spur of the moment scheme proposed.
"Don't be rushed into an immediate payment or donation," warned Roubicek.
Always request written information. Do not do anything if you have questions. Find out if the company is licensed or registered and check them out.
Never give your credit card, checking account or social security number to an unknown caller.
"Don't give out that information over the phone, at all," said Cooper.
Do not assume a friendly voice belongs to a friend or honest person. Check all unsolicited calls and offers.
If you have been a victim of this type of crime, call the Sanibel Police Department immediately at 239-472-3111. Your information is vital in catching the con-artist and preventing others from being victimized. Most people fall victim to a con-artist at some point in their life, so there is no need to be embarrassed.


text:
Airbus A380-800
A hive of activity
Airbus A380-800
The critical final assembly of the Airbus A380 takes place in a huge hangar in Toulouse – a place where work just never seems to cease. We take a trip to France to see for ourselves
First impression: tons of space. What we have here is a hangar of mammoth proportions almost the size of 50 soccer fields. It's also as tall as the Reichstag building in Berlin – dome included. Incredibly heavy components hang like weightless paper wings from rails anchored high up in the roof. The vertical stabilizer of an Airbus A380, already sporting the Lufthansa logo, comes in to land, all three and a half tons of it dangling from sturdy cables. The man in the telescopic basket lift keeps an eye on the aerial number while his workmate on the scaffolding steers the component toward the body of the plane as though he were guiding the side of a house on a portable Playstation – with total concentration and a sensitive touch.
Each movement inside the building makes the whole thing vibrate. When the wind blows, the roof stirs. A thudding of hammers and a screeching and whine of machinery fills the air in this hive of activity. We have come to Toulouse to witness firsthand the final assembly of the Airbus A380. One of the wide-body airliners due for delivery to Lufthansa has passed some electrical tests and is standing firmly on its feet. But it still needs its engines.
A few hundred meters away, the final assembly of another A380 ordered by Lufthansa resembles openheart surgery. The giant is waiting at Station 40, the "registry office" of the assembly and maintenance facility in Blagnac, near Toulouse for the "wedding," which is going to be huge affair. One hundred people work here in two shifts. The various body sections are already assembled and the main landing gear is in place, but the pale green aircraft still has a red nose, thanks to the protective cover sheathing its highly sensitive sensory organs. Parts of the skin are made of GLARE, a glass-reinforced fiber-metal laminate.
Seen from below, the A380 looms larger than life. It hovers a good two meters above the ground, supported by three pylons and surrounded by a complex construction of scaffolding and transparent staircases, a five-story building on rails that has been rolled up to the aircraft on either side. The base of the center wing box still reveals the plane's open flanks. This is where an up to 560-ton wide-body aircraft must withstand the burdens and shocks it will be exposed to when in operation.
The wings are ready and waiting to be adjusted with the help of lasers. Within two hours, the prestressed wing will be fitted to the fuselage and attached with 4,000 confidence-inspiring, sturdy magnesium, steel and titanium bolts and rivets designed to live a notional 100 years under toughest conditions. It can take 20 minutes to drill holes in the steel for the six-centimeter-long rivets. Treading carefully, we explore the vast building site that will one day be an aircraft. We climb up, clamber inside, bang our heads and make the painful discovery that not an inch of space has been wasted in the world's largest commercial aircraft.
In the bilge, the plane's underbelly dissected by a number of pipes, there is only enough room for technicians to crawl, and it's also very cramped in Cargo 1, the freight area on the lower deck. Working here can't be good for your back. At last, on level 3, we encounter the spacious main deck. The huge cabin, as yet without seats or paneling, looks grotesquely like a Baroque boudoir, a rounded den of fireproof foam veiled in protective fabric the delicate shades of spring green and lavender.
On the flight deck, above the pilot's controls, foam-sheathed contacts hang close together from the ceiling, all wrapped up like ultramodern Christmas decorations. Sections of the floor are still open, the permanent bearing fixtures visible. A carbon-fiber support is exposed, ovenbaked Formula One material, lightweight and robust, tougher than steel. But if a hammer falls and hits it, it has to be replaced. That's why everyone permitted into this inner sanctum has to move with utmost care, like photographer Jens Görlich, who handles his equipment like fragile Riedel glass.
The stairs to the upper deck have not yet been installed so level 4 is only accessible from outside. A long green serpent lying the length of the First Class cabin provides air conditioning for the technicians. At the tail end, the cabin wall curves away like the inside of a black ball. The semispherical rear pressure bulkhead made of robust composite materials that will seal the six-meter-high pressurized cabin is not yet in place.
Supply lines and cables are exposed, the thick brown pipes for air, water and waste water still waiting for their cowling. The electrical assemblies, cableforms and looms are a confusion of colors, but these serve as orientation. The golden wiring harness already has nine-phase alternating current passing through. No cables will be visible once the A380 is assembled. "Section 13 poses the biggest problem," explains Airbus Aircraft Manager Elmar Niggemeyer, who is responsible for seeing this particular plane through final assembly to operation, "because this is where the cables run from the flight deck to the actuators, the electric motors that control the wing flaps and hinges."
Instead of the outmoded balancing act of cable steering, the A380 uses electrical impulses in all of its control systems. This so-called fly-by-wire technology saves weight and is also more reliable. We step back out onto the temporary staircase on the outer wall and up to level 5, the "roof terrace." From here, we look down on a spectacular sight. The 15-meter-tall tail fin moves in to hover above the tail. Three men hold it firmly and guide it centimeter by centimeter into the perforated guide rail where it sinks into place. Bolts are then driven into the holes, each one asymmetrically shaped to make sure they remain safely wedged for the next 50 years or more. The gleaming silver bolts lie in a wooden crate more suited to holding fine wine. Each bolt has been specially crafted by hand.
Standing beneath the plane at the end of our tour, we ponder with amazement how such a plane can leave the ground fully laden. The towering main landing gear with its twin wheels is a monument to the history of technology, an incredible achievement. This is as big as landing gears will ever get because weight-saving materials and intelligent technologies notwithstanding, there are physical limits. It is impossible to further reduce the weight of a landing gear that has to absorb at least 400 tons without buckling. Interestingly, landing gears have incredibly long lives. An airplane travels around 400 000 kilometers on the ground before it is decommissioned. But the very first trip these wheels will take is over to Station 30 – just 300 meters away right here at the Airbus facility.


text:
Mars has fascinated us for millennia. Almost from the time astronomers first turned their telescopes on the planet shining in the night sky, we've imagined life there. Unlike our other planetary neighbor, Venus, which remains shrouded in cloudy mystery, the red planet has invited speculation and exploration. Since the 1960s, the U.S. and the Soviet Union and, later, Russia and Japan, have launched spacecraft destined to land on or orbit Mars.
The successful missions, like the very first Mars flyby in 1964 by the U.S. Mariner 4, have provided a treasure trove of data and, of course, introduced many new questions. Recently, those data, provided compliments of spacecraft such as the Phoenix Mars Lander, the Curiosity rover, and the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, have been arriving at Earth at a dizzying rate. It seems like a golden age for Mars exploration has arrived.
Here's what we've learned about the fourth planet from the sun while orbiting it, landing on it and sampling its contents: It's cold, dusty and dry, but that probably wasn't always the case. Ample data seem to point toward liquid water rushing over its surface in the form of lakes, rivers and an ocean at some undetermined point in the past. Traces of methane have been detected in the atmosphere, but its source is unknown. On Earth, much of the methane is produced by living organisms, like cows, which could bode well for the possibility of life on Mars. On the other hand, the gas could also have nonbiological origins, such as the Martian volcanoes.
One thing we do know: Humans won't be walking on Mars anytime soon. All manner of robots will have cruised its dusty surface long before we do. The next best thing to exploring Mars is reading about it, right? So get ready to launch into the fascinating world of the red planet. How did it form? What's the weather like? And most important, has water or life ever existed on Mars?
Mars History
As you can see from the accompanying image, Mars has few distinguishing features when viewed from Earth, even with the best telescopes. There are dark and light areas, as well as polar ice caps, but certainly not the clear features that you can see in images from orbiters around Mars. Therefore, we can excuse early astronomers for making mistakes or embellishing their observations. To these scientists searching the sky, Mars was a vastly different world than we know today.
In 1877, Giovanni Schiaparelli, an Italian astronomer, became the first person to map Mars. His sketch showed a system of streaks or channels, which he called canali. In 1910, the U.S. astronomer Percival Lowell made observations of Mars and wrote a book. In his book, Lowell described Mars as a dying planet where the civilizations built an extensive network of canals to distribute water from the polar regions to bands of cultivated vegetation along their banks.
Although Lowell's book captured the public's imagination, the scientific community summarily dismissed it because his observations weren't confirmed. Nevertheless, Lowell's writings sparked generations of science fiction writers. Edgar Rice Burroughs of Tarzan fame wrote several novels about Martian societies, including "The Princess of Mars," "The Gods of Mars" and "The Warlord of Mars." H.G. Wells wrote "The War of the Worlds" about invaders from Mars (Orson Welles' radio play of this book caused a national panic in 1938).
Hollywood has also fueled the public's fascination with the planet in films such as "The Angry Red Planet," "Invaders from Mars" and, more recently, "Mission to Mars," two versions of "Total Recall," and a live-action version of Burroughs' titular hero in "John Carter."
In the 1960s and 1970s, however, the American Mariner, Mars and Viking missions started sending back images of a world very different from that described by Lowell and his literary and silver-screen successors. The photos, snapped during flybys of the planet and eventually during the Viking landings, showed Mars as a dry, barren, lifeless world with variable weather that often included massive dust storms that could whip across a majority of the planet. So with thousands of photos as evidence, Mars was confirmed as a desert planet with rocks and boulders, rather than the home of irritable Martians and man-eating plants a la "The Angry Red Planet."
Now, we have extensively mapped the planet with Mars Global Surveyor, sent rovers to bump over its surface and scoop up soil samples, and launched orbiters to observe the planet from space. More missions are in the works. NASA and the European Space Agency (ESA) have committed to continued robotic and possibly human exploration of Mars.
So far these missions have enabled scientists to hazard a theory about how the red planet formed, and the story would actually make a pretty good movie. Read on to learn how solar system collisions gave Earth its next-door neighbor.
The Origins of Mars
Unfortunately, no human geologist has been to Mars. So the best information that we have about the planet's beginnings 4.6 billion years ago comes from images taken by orbiters and landers, Martian meteorites, and comparisons with its planetary peers (Mercury, Venus, Earth and Earth's moon). The current theory goes like this:
- Mars formed from clumping or accretion of small objects in the early solar system.
- However, unlike Earth and Venus, Mars finished forming within 2-4 million years and never grew beyond the planetary embryo stage.
- Possibly, aluminum 26 decay turned the planet into a magma ocean.
- After cooling, there was a period of intense bombardment from meteors.
- The hot mantle pushed through and lifted portions of the crust.
- One or more periods of intense volcanic activity and lava flows followed.
- The planet cooled and the atmosphere thinned.
Let's look at these steps in more detail.
Mars was created by the accretion of small objects in the early solar system, which took about 2-4 million years. Mars grew and developed a larger gravity field, which attracted more bodies. These bodies would fall into Mars, impact and generate heat. Some models suggest that such heating would not have been enough to bring about large-scale melting on Mars; rather, because the planet formed so quickly, it might have gobbled up enough of the aluminum 26 nuclide, which has a half-life of only 717,000 years, to melt from radioactive decay. Gradually, the material sorted itself out into a core, mantle and crust. Gases released from the cooling formed a primitive atmosphere [source: Dauphas and Pourmand].
But as an embryo planet formed in the solar system's chaotic early days, Mars couldn't catch a break. It was heavily bombarded by meteors in the inner solar system. These bombardments produced craters and multi-ring basins all over the planet, like the 1,400-mile- (2,300-kilometer-) wide Hellas Planitia impact crater in the planet's southern hemisphere. Some geologists think that a huge impact occurred that thinned the crust of the northern hemisphere. Similar impacts occurred on Earth and our moon at this same time. On Earth, the craters were eroded by wind and water. On the moon, the evidence of these great collisions is still visible.
Now imagine Mars is a soft-boiled egg; the inside is hot as the shell cools. If the shell is weak in spots, the egg will crack and the cooked yolk will protrude. A similar occurrence happened with the Tharsis region, a continent-sized land mass in the southern hemisphere. The hot mantle bulged out, pushing up the crust and fracturing the surrounding lava plains (forming Valles Marineris, a network of canyons). In other spots, the mantle pushed through the crust, giving rise to the region's many volcanoes, such as Olympus Mons. (We'll talk about all these Martian landmarks next.)
During this period, there were widespread volcanic eruptions. Lava flowed from volcanoes and filled the low-lying basins. Eruptions released gas that contributed to a thick atmosphere, which could have supported liquid water. Therefore, there might have been rain, flooding and erosion. The erosion would produce sedimentary rocks in the basins and plains, and form channels in the rock. More than one period of widespread volcanic eruptions may have occurred during Mars' history, but eventually the volcanoes stopped rumbling as much.
The bulges that caused the crustal uplifts and the widespread volcanic activity released vast amounts of heat from the inside of Mars. Since Mars isn't as large as the Earth, it cooled much faster, and the surface temperature cooled with it. Water and carbon dioxide from the atmosphere began to freeze and fall to the surface in vast quantities. This freezing removed large amounts of gas from the atmosphere, causing it to thin. In addition, any surface water may have frozen into the ground, forming permafrost layers. Intermittent volcanic eruptions would release more heat that would melt more water ice and cause flooding. The flooding would erode channels and carry more material down to the surrounding plains.
As for the rest of Mars' atmosphere, it was likely blown off under the assault of solar wind. Earth's magnetic field protects us from the worst of such effects, but the Mars equivalent shut down around 4 billion years ago, possibly due to a series of massive asteroid impacts that threw off the temperature gradient powering the planetary electric dynamo [source: Than].
While this is the current theory about the origin of Mars, it needs more data to back it up.
The Surface of Mars
We can divide the surface of Mars into three major regions:
- Southern highlands
- Northern plains (both the plains and the crustal upwarps)
- Polar regions
The southern highlands are extensive. The region's elevated terrain is heavily cratered like the moon. Scientists think the southern highlands are ancient because of the large number of craters. Most cratering in the solar system happened more than 3.9 billion years ago, at which point the rate of meteors bashing into the solar system's planetary bodies dropped steeply.
The northern plains are low-lying regions, much like the maria, or seas, on the moon. The plains show lava flows with small cinder cones -- evidence of volcanoes -- as well as dunes, wind streaks, and major channels and basins similar to dry "river valleys." There is a distinct change in elevation, of several kilometers, between the southern highlands and the northern plains.
Two continent-sized, high regions called crustal upwarps spread over the northern plains. In these upwarps areas the molten rock from the interior mantle pushed up the planet's thin crust, forming a high plateau. These regions are capped with shield volcanoes, where molten rock from the magma broke through the crust. The smaller region, named Elysium, is in the eastern hemisphere, while the larger one, called Tharsis, is located in the western hemisphere.
The highest point in the solar system that we know about rises up in the Tharsis region. This shield volcano called Olympus Mons (Mount Olympus from Greek mythology) towers 16 miles (25 kilometers) above the surrounding plains, and its base spans 370 miles (600 kilometers). In contrast, the largest volcano on Earth is Mauna Loa in Hawaii, which rises 6 miles (10 kilometers) above the ocean floor and is 140 miles (225 kilometers) wide at its base.
At the edge of the Tharsis region is a large system of canyons called Valles Marineris. The canyons stretch for 2,500 miles (4,000 kilometers). That's greater than the distance from New York to Los Angeles. The canyons are 370 miles (600 kilometers) wide and 5 to 6 miles (8 to 10 kilometers) deep. That makes Valles Marineris much larger than the Grand Canyon. Unlike the U.S. national landmark, which formed from water erosion from the Colorado River, Valles Marineris was created by the crust cracking when the Tharsis bulge formed.
We can see the polar regions from the Earth. Surrounded by vast dunes, the northern and southern polar ice caps seem to be made mostly of frozen carbon dioxide (dry ice) with some water ice. Like Earth, Mars has an axial tilt that causes it to experience seasons. The size of the polar ice caps varies with the season. In the summer, the carbon dioxide from the northern ice cap sublimes, or turns directly from ice to steam, revealing a sheet of water ice below. In fact, the water ice in this northern region is the reason why NASA sent the Phoenix lander there. With the help of its robotic arm, Phoenix dug down to the frozen layer and examined soil samples to investigate its composition.
The Interior of Mars
Let's compare the interior of Earth with that of Mars. Earth has a core with a radius of about 2,200 miles (3,500 kilometers) -- roughly the size of the entire planet of Mars. It is made of iron and has two parts: a solid inner core and a liquid outer core. Radioactive decay in the core generates the heat. This heat is lost from the core to the layers above. Convective currents in the liquid outer core along with the rotation of Earth produce its magnetic field.
Mars, the more petite planet, probably has a core radius between 900 and 1,200 miles (1,500 kilometers and 2,000 kilometers). Its core is probably made of a mixture of iron, sulfur and maybe oxygen. The outer part of the core may be molten, but it's unlikely, because Mars has only a weak magnetic field (less than 0.01 percent of Earth's magnetic field). Although Mars doesn't have a strong magnetic field now, it might have had a powerful one long ago.
Surrounding Earth's core is a thick layer of soft rock called the mantle. What do we mean by soft? Well, if the outer core is liquid, then the mantle is a paste, like toothpaste. The mantle is less dense than the core (which explains why it rests above the core). It's made of iron and magnesium silicates, and it stretches about 1,800 miles (3,000 kilometers) thick -- remember that the next time you try to dig a hole to China). The mantle is the source of lava that spews and trickles from volcanoes.
Like Earth, the mantle of Mars (the wide grayish-brown swath in the figure) is probably made of thick silicates; however, it's much smaller, at 800 to 1,100 miles (1,300 to 1,800 kilometers) thick. There must have been convective currents that rose up in the mantle at one time. These currents would account for the formation of the crustal upwarps, such as the Tharsis region, the Martian volcanoes and the fractures that formed Valles Marineris.
On Earth, the crust's continental plates float over the underlying mantle and rub against each other (continental drift). The areas where they rub produce uplift, cracks or faults, such as the San Andreas fault in California. These areas of contact between plates experience earthquakes and volcanoes. On Mars, the crust is also thin, but isn't broken into plates like the Earth's crust. Although we do not know of currently active volcanoes or marsquakes, evidence of quakes occurring as recently as a few million years ago suggest they are possible [source: Spotts].
Do you want to see all this for yourself? You might have difficulty breathing on Mars. Find out why next.
The Atmosphere of Mars
Of all the planets, Mars is our closest relation in terms of makeup (not distance -- Venus is closer), but that's not saying much. And it certainly doesn't mean that it is hospitable. The atmosphere of Mars differs from Earth's in many ways, and most of them don't bode well for humans living there.
- It's composed mostly of carbon dioxide (95.3 percent compared to less than 1 percent on Earth).
- Mars has much less nitrogen (2.7 percent compared to 78 percent on Earth).
- It has very little oxygen (0.13 percent compared to 21 percent on Earth).
- The red planet's atmosphere is only 0.03 percent water vapor, compared to Earth, where it makes up around 1 percent.
- On average, it exerts only 6.1 millibars of surface pressure (Earth's average sea-level atmospheric pressure is 1,013.25 millibars) [source: NASA].
Because the "air" on Mars is so thin, it holds little of the heat that comes from the ground after it absorbs solar radiation. The thin air also is responsible for the wide, daily swings in temperature (almost 100 degrees Fahrenheit or 60 degrees Celsius). Martian atmospheric pressure changes with the seasons. During the Martian summer, carbon dioxide sublimes from the polar ice caps into the atmosphere, increasing the pressure by about 2 millibars. As found by NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, during the Martian winter, carbon dioxide refreezes and falls from the atmosphere as carbon dioxide snow! This snowfall causes the pressure to decrease again. Finally, because the Martian atmospheric pressure is so low and the average temperature is so cold, liquid water cannot exist; under these conditions, water would either freeze, evaporate into the atmosphere or, as seen by NASA's 2008 Phoenix Lander mission, fall as snow [source: NASA].
The weather on Mars is pretty much the same each day: cold and dry with small daily and seasonal changes in temperature and pressure, plus a chance of dust storms and dust devils [source: NASA]. Light winds blow from one direction in the morning and then from the reverse direction in the evening. Clouds of water ice hover at altitudes of 12 to 18 miles (20 to 30 kilometers), and clouds of carbon dioxide form at approximately 30 miles (50 kilometers). Because Mars is so dry and cold, it never rains. That's why Mars resembles a desert, much like Antarctica on Earth.
During the spring and early summer, the sun heats up the atmosphere enough to cause small convection currents. These currents lift dust into the air. The dust absorbs more sunlight and heats the atmosphere further, causing more dust to lift into the air. As this cycle continues, a dust storm develops. Because the atmosphere is so thin, great speeds (60 to 120 mph or 100 to 200 kph) are required to stir up the dust. These dust storms spread across large regions of the planet and can last for months. All that dust can be bad for the rovers traversing the surface, but the storms can also clear off dirt caked on their solar panels.
Dust storms are also thought to be responsible for the variable dark regions on Mars that are seen from ground-based telescopes, which were mistaken for canals and vegetation by Percival Lowell and others. The storms are also a major source of erosion on the Martian surface.
Is all that dust making you thirsty? Read on to find out about water on Mars.
Water on Mars
Liquid water is essential for life, at least here on Earth. Presumably, the same goes for arid Mars. Or that's the assumption that governed NASA's "follow the water" strategy for Mars exploration.
Scientists don't think the liquid was always so scarce. Modern Mars may resemble a barren desert, but very early Mars may have been quite wet, judging from some of the geologic clues left behind. Floods may once have flowed over the planet's surface, rivers may have carved out channels or gullies, and lakes and oceans may have covered large swaths of the planet.
Evidence for this has vastly increased in recent years, with the observations of the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, which found thousands of deposits of phyllosilicates at locations around the planet. These claylike minerals arise solely in watery environments -- at temperatures friendly to life -- but were probably laid down in the early days of the solar system, around 4.6 to 3.8 billion years ago. Rovers like Opportunity and Curiosity have revealed that at least some of these lakes maintained salt and acidity levels friendly to life [sources: Rosen; Yeager].
Can't quite picture it? Visit Mono Lake in California, one of the world's oldest lakes at 760,000 years old and an average of 57 feet (17 meters) deep. Now imagine it without water and you'll have the Gusev Crater, a giant basin bisected by a dry riverbed that the Spirit rover searched for evidence of water.
When scientists looked at high-resolution, 3-D images of Mars taken in 2005 and compared them to pictures taken in 1999 of the same area, what they saw excited them: A series of bright, depositary streaks had formed in gullies during the intervening years. These streaks were reminiscent of flash floods that can carve away soil and leave behind new sediments on Earth. A bunch of streaks doesn't sound that monumental, but if water was the recent force behind them, that changes things. (To learn more about the discovery, read "Is there really water on Mars?")
Liquid water may be in short supply, but frozen water isn't. The Phoenix lander investigated the ice in the far north of Mars. The lander's robotic arm dug down into the icy layer for soil samples, which it analyzed with its onboard instruments.
In fact, the lander had three main objectives, all of them water-related:
- Study the history of water in all its phases.
- Determine if the Martian arctic soil could support life.
- Study Martian weather from a polar perspective.
Life on Mars?
This simple question has captivated minds for centuries. We still lack a definitive answer, although evidence has continued to mount as spacecraft carry out increasingly sophisticated tests for life processes, past and present, including analyzing Martian soil for traces of water and looking for the release of gases such as carbon dioxide, methane and oxygen that might suggest bacterial life.
It's possible that we need to revisit our idea of Martian life, exchanging egg-headed humanoids for much smaller organisms. Microbes are hardy little buggers, and there's good reason to believe that they could exist below ground. For example, biologists have unearthed bacteria living in Antarctica as well as a species, dormant for 120,000 years and buried 2 miles (3.2 kilometers) below Greenland's ice, that successfully awoke from its frozen slumber and started multiplying [source: Heinrichs].
There's also plenty of evidence that Mars' environment billions of years ago could have supported them. As we discussed, water is a key ingredient for life, and we know that Mars used to be wet. Curiosity rover was dispatched to Gale Crater because it marks a spot where water flowed for a long period. This history is recorded in the layer after layer of sediment that built its central feature, the 3.4-mile- (5.5-kilometer-) high Mount Sharp (aka Aeolis Mons), over billions of years [sources: Drake; Yeager].
Indeed, 10 years into its mission, Opportunity found another spot like Gale Crater where ancient water was not too acidic or salty for cells to flourish. Moreover, although Curiosity's drill has yet to locate the organic carbon compounds that would form life-related amino acids, it has dug up hydrogen, carbon, sulfur, nitrogen, phosphorous and oxygen -- a well-stocked pantry for single-celled organisms, if they did exist. Back on Earth, scientists have found Mars meteorites with internal structures that are consistent with a biological source [sources: Grant; NASA; Rosen].
In short, there's plenty of evidence that Mars was friendly to life long ago, but no smoking gun. Even if there were, we have to ask: Could it still be hanging around somewhere?
One promising sign of life would be the discovery of large amounts of methane in the Martian atmosphere. Scientists had previously detected the gas -- 90-95 percent of which on Earth is produced by microbes -- in Mars' atmosphere. They hypothesized that trapped methane from buried microorganisms might be released during seasonal ground thaws. So far, Curiosity's measurements indicate levels 1/10,000 of those found in Earth's atmosphere -- in other words, bupkes -- but, given more time, there's a slight chance that the rover might observe such a seasonal bloom. Then again, the methane clouds observed by scientists could arise from a natural process, such as the release of methane trapped in ice [sources: Savage; Wayman].
For more Mars madness, browse the stories and links on the next page.
Related Articles
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- Chaisson, Eric and Steve McMillan. "Astronomy Today." Third edition. Prentice Hall. 1999.
- Dauphas, Nicholas and Ali Pourmand. "Hf–W–Th Evidence for Rapid Growth of Mars and its Status as a Planetary Embryo." Nature. Vol. 473. Page 489. May 26, 2011 (March 19, 2014) http://www.earth.northwestern.edu/people/seth/351/dauphas.pdf
- Drake, Nadia. "Curiosity Goes to Mars." Science News. Dec.13, 2012. (March 20, 2014) https://www.sciencenews.org/article/curiosity-goes-mars
- Encyclopaedia Britannica. "Mars." 2008. (June 9, 2008) http://www.britannica.com/eb/article-54235
- Grant, Andrew. "Life-friendly Environment Confirmed on Mars." Science News. March 12, 2013. (March 20, 2014) https://www.sciencenews.org/article/life-friendly-environment-confirmed-mars
- Heinrich, Allison M. "Researchers at Penn State 'Awaken' Dormant Bacteria." Tribune-Review/Pittsburgh Tribune-Review. June 5, 2008. (June 17, 2008) http://www.redorbit.com/news/science/1417517/researchers_at_penn_state_awaken_dormant_bacteria/
- Jet Propulsion Laboratory. "Mars Rovers Sharpen Questions About Livable Conditions." Press release. Feb. 15, 2008. (June 9, 2008) http://marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov/newsroom/pressreleases/20080215a.html
- Marks, Paul. "Inflatable robots could explore Mars." NewScientist.com. May 30, 2008. (June 9, 2008) http://space.newscientist.com/article/dn14028-inflatable-robots-could-explore-mars.html?feedId=online-news_rss20
- "Mars." World Book at NASA. (June 5, 2008) http://www.nasa.gov/worldbook/mars_worldbook_prt.htm
- NASA. "Mars Extreme Planet: Earth/Mars Comparison." 2006. (June 18, 2008) http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/facts/
- NASA. "Mars Fact Sheet." July 1, 2013. (March 19, 2014) http://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/planetary/factsheet/marsfact.html
- NASA. "NASA Observations Point to 'Dry Ice' Snowfall on Mars." Sept. 11, 2012. (March 19, 2014) http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?release=2012-286
- NASA. "NASA Rover Providing New Weather and Radiation Data About Mars." Nov. 15, 2012. (March 19, 2014) http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?release=2012-361
- NASA. "NASA Scientists Find Evidence of Water in Meteorite, Reviving Debate Over Life on Mars." Jet Propulsion Laboratory. Feb. 27, 2014. (March 20, 2014) http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?release=2014-065
- NASA. "Phoenix Landing: Mission to the Martian Polar North." May 2008. (June 18, 2008) http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/press_kits/phoenix-landing.pdf
- Rosen, Meghan. "Old Rover Finds New Evidence of Water on Mars." Science News. Jan. 23, 2014. (March 20, 2014) https://www.sciencenews.org/article/old-rover-finds-new-evidence-water-mars
- Savage, Liz. "For Kids: Either Martians or Mars has Gas." Feb. 13, 2009. (March 20, 2014) https://www.sciencenews.org/article/kids-either-martians-or-mars-has-gas
- Skinner, Brian J. and Stephen C. Porter. "The Dynamic Earth." Second edition. John Wiley & Sons, Inc. 1992.
- Society for General Microbiology. "Where Man Boldly Goes, Bacteria Follow." ScienceDaily. May 30, 2008. (June 18, 2008) http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/05/080528191418.htm
- Spotts, Pete. "Marsquake? How Rumblings Could Bolster Hope for Life on Mars." Christian Science Monitor. Feb. 23, 2012. (March 19, 2014) http://www.csmonitor.com/Science/2012/0223/Marsquake-How-rumblings-could-bolster-hope-for-life-on-Mars
- Than, Ker. "'Supergiant' Asteroid Shut Down Mars's Magnetic Field." National Geographic News. May 11, 2009. (March 19, 2014) http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2009/05/090511-mars-asteroid.html
- Wayman, Erin. "Year in Review: Methane Shortage on Mars." Science News. Dec. 26, 2013. (March 20, 2014) https://www.sciencenews.org/article/year-review-methane-shortage-mars
- Yeager, Ashley. "Wet, Almost, All Over." Science News. July 16, 2008. (March 20, 2014) https://www.sciencenews.org/article/wet-almost-all-over


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Nov 26 2009
LONDON, ENGLAND – NOVEMBER 26: Roger Federer of Switzerland celebrates a point during the men's singles round robin match against Juan Martin Del Potro of Argentina during the Barclays ATP World Tour Finals at the O2 Arena on November 26, 2009 in London, England (Photo by Julian Finney/Getty Images)
Content © 2009 Getty Images All rights reserved.
The ATP World Tour takes a look at the top players of the decade.
1. Roger Federer
Roger Federer, possibly the greatest player ever to grace the game, has dominated men's tennis since the turn of the millennium, winning a record-breaking 15 Grand Slam titles.
2. Rafael Nadal
In recent years, Rafael Nadal has emerged as the strongest challenger to Federer's dominance and has established one of the most gripping rivalries in the history of men's tennis with the Swiss.
3. Lleyton Hewitt
The feisty Australian burst onto the scene in the late '90s, becoming the youngest winner on the ATP World Tour when he won his home-town title in Adelaide at the age of 16 years, 10 months in January 1998, and was the man to beat as the new millennium rolled in.
4. Andre Agassi
Andre Agassi retired in 2006 but his impact early in the decade guaranteed him a place in our Top 5 list. Agassi won three Australian Opens in 2000, '01 and '03 and in May 2003, at 33, he became the oldest player in the history of the South African Airways ATP Rankings (since 1973) to hold the No. 1 ranking.
5. Andy Roddick
Andy Roddick has faced the full weight of America's expectation throughout his career, as he looks to emulate the success of Pete Sampras and Andre Agassi, and the charismatic Texan has unblinkingly embraced the task.
For more, check out ATP World Tour: The Players of the Decade


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ashives necesitaba un nuevo diseño de logotipo y lanzó un concurso de diseño en 99designs.
Un ganador ha sido elegido entre 55 diseños de 21 diseñadores freelance.
This is a sales training program SALERANDING. I know it looks like a typo but it's simply "Sales + Branding". It teaches sales representatives how to "brand" themselves and the importance of this in today's market. Our target market is any sale professional. Because of the unique name I want the logo be unique while helping convey the message of "sales + branding".
I had the idea in my head to make the logo to look like a branding iron with a handle that has just made in the impression into the paper (website, etc.). In other words you see the branding iron just moving away revealing the word SaleRANDING. Maybe some smoke coming from the letters signifying that the branding iron was hot to brand the word. Not sure of the letter configuration as far as caps/lower case. SaleRanding, SALERanding, SaleRANDING etc.? Also not sure of color(s). This was my thought but I'm open to suggestions. Any ideas that you have that conveys the message of "sales + branding".
- I would like to incorporate the tagline: Increase YOUR SALES by building YOUR BRAND!
- Open to color choices etc.
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- Item 1...
Descubre cómo funciona un concurso de diseño u obtén más información sobre nuestros servicios de diseño de logo.


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text:
Replace your tired, cracked or missing factory mirror with this quality mirror form CIPA. It's a direct bolt-on replacement, fastening to the same holes with the original hardware, and is available with remote control and heat to match your original mirror. Easily paintable to match your car, the ABS plastic construction can never rust or corrode.
CIPA® is based in Port Huron, Michigan, a small suburb near Detroit, the heart and soul of the automotive industry. Most of CIPA's business is supplying OEMs with the best mirrors and accessories possible. The ability to swim (and survive) in the supplier shark pool means they have mastered the manufacturing and delivery of first-rate products. In turn that means that the OEM-replacement and unique aftermarket parts they sell are all of OEM quality.


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I see what he did there.
Linebacker Brian Urlacher has responded to Packers tight end Jermichael Finley, who said that the Bears are better off with the long-time anchor of their defense.
"Just like a couple of years ago, I think, he tore his ACL and the Packers were actually better without him," Urlacher told SiriusXM NFL Radio on Thursday, via the Chicago Sun-Times. "You know, they won the Super Bowl. I hope we can duplicate that as well because it won't hurt my feelings if we go on and win the Super Bowl without me like they did without him."
Urlacher said he's not troubled by the criticism. "People can say what they want," said Urlacher, who is out with a hamstring injury. "It feels like I deal with something like this every year. Someone's always saying something about me."
Finley should be glad that he took aim at Urlacher and not another member of the Bears team.
"That pisses me off," Urlacher said. "It's like your kids. It's OK to be talking about me or whatever but don't talk about my kids or my family."
Here's hoping Finley responds by talking about Urlacher's teammates. Or his kids. Or his family.


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Ravel's Bolero comes under psychiatric investigation
1 September 1997 - A British study, published in today's
Psychiatric Bulletin, suggests that Ravel's Bolero, reputed to be the
most often played composition in the repertoire, was the work of a
pathological mind. Dr Eva Cybulska, the author of the study, claims that
the famous melody repeated 18 times without change during the course of
the piece demonstrates that the French composer was possibly succumbing to
Alzheimer's disease. The Kent-based psychiatrist claims that
perseveration, an obsession with repeating words and gestures, is one of
the more notable symptoms of this pathology. In other words, the
repetitive nature of the score's principal theme is symptomatic of the
degenerative condition which began to trouble the French composer in 1927
at the age of 52. Was it really Alzheimer's disease or the budding tumor
which later killed Ravel during brain surgery in 1937? We look forward to
Dr Cybulska's diagnosis of the works of minimalist composers Philip Glass,
Terry Reilly and Steve Reich.
Discover Klassiknet's 101 Best recommended recording of Ravel's Bolero.
(See under 20th Century Music in France and Spain).
E-mail to klassiknet | Back to klassiknet | Back to Culturekiosque
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Mulan Jameela beautiful singer born in Garut West Java 23 August 1982 has the full name Wulan Sari, his name began to rebound when Maia retrieve from the Dimensions (a cafe band), to join in the ordinary and duo Ratu called Mulan Kwok. But as the conflict about financial transparency, they are broken. and then Mulan join and solo career with Republik Cinta Management and use the new name Mulan Jameela. Besides singing Mulan also a number of star sinetron and film.
First solo album was launched in January 2008, titled Mulan Jameela. The album that dominated pop music been this rock musicians by Ahmad Dhani. Mulan first album on this track is the excellent fruit of 4 hits, that is "Makhluk Tuhan Paling Sexy", "Wonder Woman", "Bukannya Aku Takut" and "Jatuh Cinta Lagi". Only in the period of less than 2 months, this album has left digit sales 75,000 coffee and get the platinum by EMI.
In other places, Mulan also be joined by a giant telecommunications company Malaysia, Maxis. In a few months only, Mulan has been able to break through a number of award nominations, he even became the only solo of a nominated on MTV Asia Awards 2008 in Genting, Malaysia.
In the compilation The Best Of Republik Cinta, Mulan in collaboration with the vocal group Dewi Dewi on the single entitled "Sakit Bukan Main" which was launched in August 2008.
Since becoming a celebrity, Mulan love of life are sought. Mulan known to marry at a young age and has two children, Tyarani Savitri and M Rafly Aziz. However, mahligai marriage foundered in the middle of the road. Mulan became a single parent with a career.
n the midst of chaotic household Maia-Dhani, Mulan third. Moreover, as many people reportedly escaped from the Queen, Mulan Dhani Them management into making increasingly tight relationship closeness. Mulan said no firmly confessed, after being widowed She does have a girlfriend, but not from the Among the musicians. Relationship with his girlfriend, Mulan upon approval by two of his children. Although very busy Mulan hope he returns cans new fostering households this year.


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Latest News
Berget 6 - Come see us at the game! (2008-06-05)
Redwolf are proud sponsors of Berget 6 - possibly the biggest airsoft event in Europe, which takes place between 24th-29th June. We will be there at the game with our very own booth, providing you with all your airsoft needs, whether it be advice, upgrades or repairs (there will be a couple of our highly-trained technicians at our booth). What's more, we are donating a superb custom Type 96 as a Berget Raffle prize and we have more prizes to give away - come visit our booth at Berget 6 to sign-up for our newsletters and automatically be entered into the draw to win a Redwolf Custom AEG, we will also be running an Airsoft Practical Shooting Competition and the winner of that competition will win an Airsoft Surgeon custom Glock 17.
|Airsoft Surgeon G17 - prize in the Redwolf APSC competition
|RWC Type 96 - Berget Raffle Prize
We're looking forward to seeing you all, so don't be shy, drop by and have a chat with us!
Check out the Berget 6 Facebook group here
Following is taken from www.berget-events.com/b6
What is Berget 6?
Berget 6 is intended to be the biggest international airsoft event 2008. We intend to give people from all over the world the opportunity to have a great airsoft experience and meet others alike. The game will raise airsoft gaming to a new level with elements of vehicle-convoys and airsoft-tank vs airsoft-tank firefights.
Berget 6 will invite both manufacturers and retailers to sell and show their latest products in the main Safe-zone. After the game, we will launch a huge beer party where all players can gather and have a nice evening together with the locals.
Tickets will be released periodically under October, November and January. The game will take place in H�rn�sand area in early summer of 2008. The ticket-price is 96 EURO.
The game area will be forest style with roads/tracks and some minor "military" objects on it. However it will not be devided into zones, it will be one big area. There is no underground bunker or fort on this game.
NOTE! This is not the same game-area as berget 5.
Times, Dates & Location Location: Sweden - H�rn�sand
Date: Wednesday the 25th - Sunday 29th of June 2008 Check in opens: Tuesday 24th 09:00 CET Pre-game Gathering: All players shall gather in Safe-zone 19:00 CET the 25th.
Game start: 22:00 CET Wednesday the 25th Game ends: 20:00 CET Saturday the 28th. Beer party starts: 21:00 CET Saturday the 28th Beer party ends: 03:00 CET Sunday the 29th
NOTE! Safezone, Gamearea and parking wont be open until tuesday the 24:th 09:00. Before that you have to stay at camping or hostel in H�rn�sand city.


text:
Kurt Nimmo
Prison Planet.com
Thursday, June 23, 2011
In Mafia don fashion, UK PM David Cameron and French President Sarkozy have dispatched assassins to kill Colonel Muammar Gaddafi.
The British security service MI6 and France's Directorate-General for External Security agents will hunt down the dictator in Operation Fire And Forget, The Daily Star reported earlier this week. News of the assassination plan was ignored by the corporate media in the United States.
The assassins speak Arabic and have lived in Libya for years, according to the report. "These agents are very brave people. If they get caught they will disappear and won't survive an hour," the paper quoted a senior security source.
Money is no object. It is estimated the operation may cost around a million pounds a week, the source said.
Government officials have sent conflicting messages on killing Gaddafi. In April, French French Foreign Minister Alain Juppé said it is not France's objective to kill Gaddafi or his family.
The same month, British Defense Secretary Liam Fox said Gaddafi is a legitimate target if he does not give up as NATO and the United States demand.
British Foreign Secretary William Hague said on April 25 that U.S. Predator drones would be used to kill Gaddafi.
On April 24, appearing on CNN's "State of the Union" program, Republican Senator Lindsey Graham called for killing Gaddafi and bombing Tripoli.
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Arizona Senator John McCain also called for killing Gaddafi and using more firepower against those who would resist militarily enforced regime change in their country.
In 2009, McCain praised Gaddafi for his peacemaking efforts in Africa and called for Congress to expand ties with him. Now he wants to kill him.
Libya had managed to restore full diplomatic ties with the United States during the Bush years. Gaddafi had agreed to dismantle his nascent nuclear program in exchange for the much sought after diplomatic recognition.
On May 1, it was reported that NATO had killed Saif al-Arab Gaddafi, the youngest son of Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi, and three of his grandchildren. The elder Gaddafi was reportedly in the house when his son and grand children were murdered.
Gaddafi's children appear to be a preferred target of the United States. In 1986, then president Reagan ordered a raid on Tripoli in response to a German disco bombing that killed two U.S. soldiers and was blamed on Gaddafi. In addition to killing 19 and wounding around 140 Libyans, the night time raid killed Gaddafi's recently adopted daughter.
This article was posted: Thursday, June 23, 2011 at 8:54 am


text:
Sapphire Radeon HD 5870 1GB Vapor-X Video Card (Page 12)
Version and / or Patch Used: Auto Patched at Load
Timedemo or Level Used: Built-in Test
Developer Homepage: http://www.ea.com
Product Homepage: http://www.battleforge.com
The Gods have disappeared and the old sun has died, letting a vile twilight engulf the world of Nyn. In exchange for all treasures the mortals possessed, the evil giants agreed to forge a new sun and hurl it into the sky.
But the deal was betrayed, the treasure stolen and now the mortals flee the wrath of the giants. Under the light of a new sun the mortals stumble into a world changed and twisted by an age of twilight. The long journey home has become a conquest of survival.
Note: Supporting DirectX 11, we have separated the graphs for NVIDIA and ATI cards. While the numbers between the two brands can be compared, you have to make note that ATI based HD 5000 series cards are running DirectX 11.
DirectX 11 (ATI HD 5000 Series Only)
We continue to see that across the board the performance jumps with the HD 5870 Vapor-X from Sapphire.
Last updated: Apr 7, 2020 at 12:28 pm CDT
PRICING: You can find products similar to this one for sale below.
United States: Find other tech and computer products like this over at Amazon.com
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- Page 1 [Introduction]
- Page 2 [The Package]
- Page 3 [Video Card]
- Page 4 [Test System Setup and 3DMark Vantage]
- Page 5 [Unigine Heaven Benchmark (DX10 & DX11)]
- Page 6 [Benchmarks - CINEBENCH R10]
- Page 7 [Benchmarks - Resident Evil 5]
- Page 8 [Benchmarks - Far Cry 2]
- Page 9 [Benchmarks - World in Conflict]
- Page 10 [Benchmarks - Batman Arkham Asylum]
- Page 11 [Benchmarks - Darkest of Days]
- Page 12 [Benchmarks - BattleForge]
- Page 13 [Benchmarks - High Quality AA and AF]
- Page 14 [Temperature and Sound Tests]
- Page 15 [Power Consumption Tests]
- Page 16 [Final Thoughts]


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Taking measure of the world: radar altimetry in spotlight at Venice event
The measurement of sea level is a topic of special significance for Venice. Appropriately, next spring the Italian lagoon city hosts a major scientific symposium on a class of space-borne sensor that precisely records the height of the global sea surface along with that of freshwater bodies, land surfaces and the icy cryosphere.
Sponsored by ESA and the French Space Agency CNES, the 15 Years of Progress in Radar Altimetry Symposium is being held in Venice Lido from 13 to 18 March 2006. Scientists with an interest in radar altimetry are invited to attend.
The event takes place in the 15th year since the launch of ESA's
From its 800-km-high polar orbit, Envisat's Radar Altimeter-2 (RA-2) sends 1800 separate radar pulses down to Earth per second then records how long their echoes take to bounce back. The sensor times its pulses' journey down to under a nanosecond to calculate the distance to the planet below to a maximum accuracy of two centimetres.
Measuring the ever-shifting sea surface in this way is valuable to science. Warm ocean currents can cause sea surface height to rise up to a metre above the surrounding waters, so radar altimetry is a means of mapping the circulation of Earth's ocean currents, as well as following El Niño events as they develop. Average wave height and wind speed can also be derived.
Radar altimetry also allows researchers to peer indirectly beneath the waves: undersea bathymetry features are revealed by persistent, slight deviations from the marine geoid - the theoretical smooth sea surface attracted by a uniform planetary gravity field - as are minor variations in the Earth's gravity.
Over land, radar altimetry delivers enhanced digital elevation models (DEMs) and improved processing algorithms mean that monitoring the levels of rivers and lakes is now possible, allowing more precise quantifying of the vast amounts of freshwater that flow across Earth's land surface.
For the Cryosphere – those regions of the Earth where water freezes – radar altimetry has been successful in measuring the mass balance of Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets, and providing initial global monitoring results for sea ice thickness.
Radar altimeters were first flown in space back in the 1970s, aboard NASA's Skylab and Seasat. Initially these sensors were dedicated to the study of oceans, but as the technology improved so did their reach.
Other space agencies have their own radar altimeters in orbit – the joint CNES and NASA mission TOPEX-Poseidon launched a year after ERS-1, with follow-up mission Jason-1 flown in 2001. Also currently in operation is the GFO mission, the US Navy's Geosat Follow-On Mission, which is a sequel to the previous Geosat mission (1985-1989).
A combined ground segment specially developed by CNES for altimetry missions called SSALTO-DUACS ('Segment Sol multi-mission d'ALTimétrie, d'Orbitographie et de localisation précise - Developing Use of Altimetry for Climate Studies') is able to combine radar altimetry data to provide the best possible global ocean coverage.
This makes a number of operational services possible, including a French system called Mercator Ocean that provides analysis and forecasts of ocean circulation around Europe for up to a fortnight ahead. An important science result is solid evidence of a steady sea level rise averaging 0.3 millimetres a year.
The Symposium will include discussion of all these radar altimetry fields, as well as discussions of unexpected applications, how altimetry can be used in synergy with other satellite and in-situ data and models, and what the future holds.
Along with this Symposium, three related events are scheduled to take place in Venice the same week: the annual meeting of the Ocean Surface Topography Science Team (OSTST – particularly concerned with GFO, TOPEX- Poseidon and Jason-1), the International DORIS Service (IDS) Workshop and the Argo Workshop.
DORIS (Doppler Orbitography and Radiopositioning Integrated by Satellite) is an onboard satellite radio receiver used for precise orbit determination. Altimetry measurements become more precise and scientifically useful when the satellite position is precisely known.
DORIS derives it to an accuracy of a few centimetres by detecting and measuring the Doppler shift on signals broadcast from a network of more than 50 radio beacons spread across the world. DORIS receivers are aboard many satellites including Envisat and CryoSat.
Argo is the name for an array of more than 2000 profiling floats which provide temperatures and salinity profiles for various depths across the global ocean. Argo results are scientifically valuable in their own right but can also be combined with altimetry data for enhanced environmental and climate knowledge.


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Valley of Kings
Lush and rugged, Hawaii's panoramic Waipio Valley is a royal resting place and a visitor's eden.
Standing thigh-deep in a roaring creek, Donnie Mitts wrestles a water-soaked plank. Before last night's downpour, the board served as a bridge over the stream. Today, Donnie fights the powerful current to muscle it back into place. From the creek bank, a cluster of onlookers watches nervously. If he loses his footing, the rushing water will sweep him over a waterfall just a few feet downstream―leaving the group stranded in the forest without a guide.
One last shove sets the narrow bridge firmly back where it belongs. Donnie looks up at his relieved audience and grins. "This is why I love my job," he says. "There's always an adventure along the way."
An organic farmer when he's not leading hikes for Hawaiian Walkways, Donnie can't promise such drama on every trip. But the Waipio Waterfall Adventure, which meanders along the rim of the lush Waipio (why-PEA-oh) Valley on the northeast coast of Hawaii's Big Island, does guarantee spectacular scenery. And Donnie's passion for his adopted state (he's an Oregon native who moved to Hawaii in 1975) inspires his guests. By the end of the half-day walk, they know the plants and animals around them as distinctive entities with unique traits.
Of course, some plants have more interesting qualities than others. The seedy, pulpy fruit of the strawberry guava really does taste like a strawberry. Donnie says it has thrived here since being imported from the Amazon basin in South America.
Many non-native species have altered the Waipio Valley since the days of King Kamehameha the Great and his successors in the 18th and 19th centuries. In addition to plants, animals such as feral pigs have arrived from other places. The pigs sometimes root through the soil along the trails, but Zoe makes sure they don't trouble hikers. She's Donnie's dog, a fuzzy terrier-Lhasa Apso mix who fears neither man nor beast. The hogs wisely stay away.
Donnie ends the day's adventure high above the valley's mouth, at a popular overlook. It shows the canyon's awesome scale―a mile across and 6 miles long. Once, thousands of people lived here. Native Hawaiians held it sacred, and many of their kings lie buried along its walls. But the waterfalls and the wide, flat beach hint at danger lurking amid the grandeur: The valley is particularly vulnerable to flooding and tsunamis.
Today, only a few dozen fishermen and taro farmers inhabit this place. The remote, undeveloped landscape and rain-forest climate keep it a relatively undiscovered treasure. Visitors can tour aboard four-wheel-drive or all-terrain vehicles. But exploring on foot, on horseback, or in a mule-drawn wagon seems more appropriate for soaking in the majestic surroundings.
Eight miles southeast, the one-main-street town of Honokaa (hoe-no-KAH-ah) offers dining, shopping, and lodging. Simply Natural, a cheery organic/natural foods restaurant, makes a terrific spicy tuna melt. Across the street, Café il Mondo creates excellent pizzas and calzones. Out on Highway 19, Tex Drive-In serves breakfast, lunch, and dinner daily. The main attraction, no matter what the hour, is the malasadas―puffy pillows of yeasty deep-fried dough, available with a variety of gooey fillings. Shops sell colorful hand-painted clothing, lovely wooden arts and crafts, custom aloha shirts, and minerals reputed to possess healing powers.
Just outside town sits an extraordinary bed-and-breakfast called Waianuhea (why-uh-new-HAY-uh). Luxurious contemporary furniture mingles with exotic Pacific island antiques, and the evening turndown service includes macadamia-nut chocolates. At breakfast one drizzly morning, a man and woman quietly occupy a table that would have afforded a nice view of the Mauna Kea volcano if not for the waianuhea ("fragrant mountain mist"). The woman stares out the window. "With all this rain and fog," she says, "it's like being in a cocoon."
After a few seconds, the man replies, "At times that's a good thing." He smiles. She looks into his eyes, then returns the smile. "And this is one of those times," she says.
Around the Valley
Lodging: Rates at Waianuhea start at $195; 888/775-2577 or waianuhea.com. For private rental homes, try vrbo.com (under "Hawaii" click on "Big Island," then "Honokaa").
Dining: Café il Mondo, lunch and dinner Tuesday-Saturday; 808/775-7711. Simply Natural, breakfast and lunch Monday-Saturday; 808/775-0119. Tex Drive-In, breakfast, lunch, and dinner daily; 808/775-0598.
Adventuring: Hawaiian Walkways' Waipio Waterfall Adventure, a moderately strenuous half-day guided hike along the Waipio Valley rim that includes a swim in a waterfall-fed pool, costs $95 per adult; 800/457-7759 or hawaiianwalkways.com. Waipio Naalapa Stables' horseback rides through the valley last two and a half hours; 808/775-0419 or naalapastables.com. Waipio Valley Wagon Tours operates tours by mule-drawn wagon for $55; 808/775-9518 or waipiovalleywagontours.com.


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PITTSBURG -- A renewed law in Pennsylvania makes it illegal to touch a pregnant woman's belly without permission.
The warning came after a case in the central part of the state.
"Essentially, someone had touched a pregnant woman's belly. That's very common that pregnant women have to go through. The only problem is when you harass, annoy, alarm in the act of touching, then it's a violation, a harassment charge," said attorney Phil DiLucente.
DiLucente said this particular harassment law has always been on the books.
"Simply stated, it's always been the law. It always will be the law,"DiLucente said.
Whether new or old, Jackie Collier, of Scott Township, said her recently pregnant daughter understands how belly-touching can get excessive.
"Especially if they don't know her or ask permission. It's kind of invasive," Collier said.
DiLucente said pressing charges is something done if the touching gets out of hand.


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kayaking loon
Since we live so far from most Maine "centers of geocaching", we like to take overnight trips. And since husband doesn't like to camp anymore, that means a motel room for one or two nights. Some places I can find on the internet but others I draw a blank. So I'd like to hear from cachers in different parts of the state: what motel would you recommend to friends and family? What is the best "locals" restaurant and is it near the motel? I like quiet, outside of the city places. In the Eustis-Stratton area where we live I recommend the Spillover Motel and the Looney Moose restaurant (the Porter House burned and the Looney Moose is the chef's new enterprise). Since we're from Boothbay Harbor originally (before retirement) I can recommend places there too: Flagship Inn, Mama D's for breakfast and lunch, Thistle Inn for dinner.... And we have stayed in Stonington (warning.. no restaurants open on Sunday nights, we ate cold pizza in our very nice room), Greenville, Jackman, a week in Orrington at Loon Hollow (nice but a bit expensive). Each place we go I gather tips and hints that might be useful to other people. So what have you got to offer for advice in your area or areas you have gone caching? Clean places, with comfortable beds, not TOO expensive..... Maine only. And I'm willing to offer hints in detail to those who want that.