Monday, October 31, 2011

Bosnian court: Shooter on US embassy in custody (AP)

SARAJEVO, Bosnia-Herzegovina ? A court has ordered the gunman who fired an automatic weapon at the U.S. Embassy in Sarajevo last week held in detention for a month while authorities investigate what they call a terrorist act.

The judge on Monday accepted the prosecution's argument that 23-year-old Mevlid Jasarevic could interfere with the investigation if not in custody.

Jasarevic is accused of shooting at the embassy building in Sarajevo for at least 30 minutes on Friday and injuring a policeman before a police sniper shot him in the leg.

Jasarevic said at the hearing that he does not recognize the court. His lawyer says his client is completely detached from reality and must be seen by a psychiatrist.

Jasarevic is a follower of the Sunni Muslim Wahhabi sect.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/europe/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20111031/ap_on_re_eu/eu_bosnia_embassy_attack

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NATO operation in Libya ends after 7 months, could it be a model?

Some see the end of the NATO operation in Libya as a moment for Europe to step up with more robust support of the alliance. The US remains skeptical.

NATO's mission in Libya ends today after seven months.

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What it accomplished in the short term is described in superlatives both by US and European diplomats. Operation Unified Protector was "a true alliance effort,? says Ivo Daalder, the US representative to NATO.

?As good a war as it comes?with limited civilian casualties,? says Tomas Valasek of the Centre for European Reform in London, citing the difference with other NATO operations in precision bombing. ?There were no Chinese embassies hit in Tripoli [as in Belgrade in 1999], no refugee convoys hit, no weddings that I know about [as in Afghanistan.]?

Yet whether the Libya operation is any kind of model ? or a ?one off? made possible by the circumstances of a potential humanitarian disaster in Benghazi ? remains unclear.

To optimists, this is a moment for Europe to step up its support for the 60-plus year alliance.To much of Europe the outcome in Libya is considered a clear cut victory. European leaders, led by Great Britain and France, may even see the Libyan NATO operation as a model for future operations giving the US a background role.

There is, however, more skepticism of that in US military circles. The French, who helped lead the effort, get high marks from Pentagon officials for the first time in many years.

But NATO is an institution that doesn?t operate separately from the collective agreement of its members and leaders. The resulting paucity of European might and resolve ? only eight of 28 NATO nations initially responded to the conflict ? underscores what Mr. Valasek describes as ?the appearance of a weaker European partner? in NATO.

Skeptics in the new post-war generations in Europe are unwilling in an era of austerity to wave much of a revamped NATO flag. And in some US circles, there are questions about why a small war took so long, and why allies at various points ran out of munitions.

Still, the level of European participation was a big change of NATO operations in Europe just over a decade ago. In Kosovo, the US conducted 90 percent of the strikes, and the other allies contributed 10 percent. In Libya, those figures were inverted, and the operation came with palpable support from places like the United Arab Emerites, Qatar, Jordon, and Morocco, as Mr. Daalder notes in The New York Times.

Thus far, there are no clear figures about civilian casualties in the UN mandated operation designed to protect civilians. Some commentators argue that estimates, if any, should be released to counter claims made and reported in some anti-Libya intervention blogs and media about tens of thousands of casualties.

The NATO alliance helped liberate a country whose National Transition Council leaders quickly opened up the question about whether Islamic rulings permitting polygamy should be revisited. European leaders don?t want to think that was part of any NATO liberation, and have said so in recent days.

Source: http://rss.csmonitor.com/~r/csmonitor/globalnews/~3/Q-eH9NW1DqU/NATO-operation-in-Libya-ends-after-7-months-could-it-be-a-model

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[OOC] The Gifts

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Sunday, October 30, 2011

Key expert to resume testimony for Jackson doctor (AP)

LOS ANGELES ? Jurors hearing the involuntary manslaughter case against Michael Jackson's doctor will hear an alternate version Friday of what may have occurred in the singer's bedroom in the hours before his death.

Dr. Paul White, an expert in the anesthetic propofol, will finally lay out his rationale for the defense theory that Jackson somehow gave himself a fatal dose of the drug when his doctor left the room.

White's testimony will likely be vigorously challenged by prosecutors, who spent four weeks laying out their case that Dr. Conrad Murray is a greedy, inept and reckless doctor who was giving Jackson propofol as a sleep aid. But cross-examination of White will be delayed until Monday to give prosecutors more time to review a new analysis prepared by the defense based on recently-conducted tests on samples taken during Jackson's autopsy.

"This is the entire crux of the defense case," Deputy District Attorney David Walgren said in arguing for a delay.

The judge hearing the case, which ends its fifth week on Friday, reluctantly agreed to delay the cross examination and said he is concerned about losing jurors. Superior Court Judge Michael Pastor however noted that the panel of has remained rapt throughout the trial.

"Every single member of that jury and all the alternates are paying extraordinary attention to every witness," Pastor said.

Murray has pleaded not guilty.

White's opinions will challenge those of the prosecution's main expert, Dr. Steven Shafer, who testified that the only scenario he believes explains Jackson's death is that Murray placed Jackson on an IV drip and left the room after he thought the singer was sleeping peacefully.

Murray told police he left Jackson's bedside, but claims he only gave the singer a small dose of propofol the morning of Jackson's death. He said he left the room and returned after two minutes to find the pop superstar unresponsive.

Murray's defense attorneys have repeatedly claimed that Jackson somehow gave himself the fatal dose, but it will be up to White to explain how that would be possible.

Defense attorney J. Michael Flanagan said that the new models White will show jurors on Friday will offer different simulations about the drugs propofol and sedative lorazepam. They are based on a new computer program and updated test results.

Flanagan did not reveal what conclusions White drew from the new models, or whether they would change his testimony.

White is a retired researcher and professor who performed clinical studies of propofol for years before it was approved for usage by the Food and Drug Administration in 1989. He said he was initially reluctant to become involved in the case, but after reading through more than a dozen expert reports, he couldn't figure out how others came to the conclusion that Murray would have had to leave Jackson on a propofol IV drip for the singer to have died with the anesthetic still coursing through his body.

He said the others' theories didn't make sense based on Murray's statement to police.

"I thought that there were questions if in fact Murray had administered the drugs that he described in his conversations with the police department in the doses he described, I would not have expected Michael Jackson to have died," White said.

He continued to work on the case after meeting with Murray, although White was not allowed to testify about his conversations with the Houston-based cardiologist.

Flanagan early in White's testimony on Thursday asked the doctor to address "the elephant in the room" ? whether he could justify Murray's actions if he left Jackson hooked to a propofol IV and then left the room.

"Absolutely not," White replied.

___

AP Special Correspondent Linda Deutsch contributed to this report.

___

McCartney can be reached at http://twitter.com/mccartneyAP

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/crime/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20111028/ap_en_mu/us_michael_jackson_doctor

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Microsoft: Windows Phone Mango now being delivered to '100 percent' of compatible devices

We just heard last week that the Windows Phone Mango update was available on nearly every compatible device, and Microsoft has now made things completely official. In a post on the Windows Phone blog today, Microsoft confirmed that it's "now delivering Mango to 100 percent of eligible phones around the world, regardless of carrier." That feat was reached less than a month after Microsoft announced that Mango was available on half of Windows Phones, which certainly an improvement on the pace of the earlier NoDo update. Included in this last batch is the LG Optimus 7 on Telefonica is Spain and the Samsung Omnia 7 on Deutsche Telekom. Now, about that Apollo update...

Microsoft: Windows Phone Mango now being delivered to '100 percent' of compatible devices originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 28 Oct 2011 02:11:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Source: http://www.engadget.com/2011/10/28/microsoft-windows-phone-mango-now-being-delivered-to-100-perce/

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Intestinal stem cells respond to food by supersizing the gut

Thursday, October 27, 2011

A new study from University of California, Berkeley, researchers demonstrates that adult stem cells can reshape our organs in response to changes in the body and the environment, a finding that could have implications for diabetes and obesity.

Current thinking has been that, once embryonic stem cells mature into adult stem cells, they sit quietly in our tissues, replacing cells that die or are injured but doing little else.

But in working with fruit flies, the researchers found that intestinal stem cells responded to increased food intake by producing more intestinal cells, expanding the size of the intestines as long as the food keeps flowing.

"When flies start to eat, the intestinal stem cells go into overdrive, and the gut expands," said UC Berkeley post-doctoral fellow Lucy O'Brien. "Four days later, the gut is four times bigger than before, but when food is taken away, the gut slims down."

Just as in humans and other mammals, O'Brien added, the fly intestine secretes its own insulin. In flies, intestinal insulin seems to be the signal that makes stem cells "supersize the gut."

"Because of the many similarities between the fruit fly and the human, the discovery may hold a key to understanding how human organs adapt to environmental change," said David Bilder, UC-Berkeley associate professor of molecular and cell biology.

The research will be published in the Oct. 28 issue of the journal Cell.

Stem cells key to adaptability

Many tissues grow or shrink with usage, including muscle, liver and intestine. Human intestines, for example, regrow after portions have been surgically removed because of cancer or injury, and hibernating animals see their intestines shrink to one-third their normal size during winter.

"One strategy animals use to deal with environmental variability is to tune the workings of their organ systems to match the conditions at hand," O'Brien said. "How exactly this 'organ adaptation' happens, particularly in adult animals that are no longer growing, has long been a mystery."

Following the surprising discovery of stem cells in the intestines of fruit flies five years ago, O'Brien and Bilder decided to investigate the role of adult stem cells in normal intestinal growth in hopes of finding clues to their role in vertebrates like us.

"I looked at stained stem cells in the fruit fly intestine, and they are studded throughout like jewels. The tissues were so beautiful, I knew I had to study them," O'Brien said.

O'Brien, Bilder and their colleagues discovered that when fruit flies feed, their intestines secrete insulin locally, which stimulates intestinal stem cells to divide and produce more intestinal cells.

"The real surprise was that the fruit fly intestine is capable of secreting its own insulin," BIlder said. "This intestinal insulin spikes immediately after feeding and talks directly to stem cells, so the intestine controls its own adaptation."

Stem cells can divide either asymmetrically, producing one stem cell and one intestinal cell, or symmetrically, producing two stem cells. The team found that, in response to food, intestinal stem cells underwent symmetric division more frequently than asymmetric division, which had the effect of maintaining the proportion of stem cells to intestinal cells, and is a more efficient way of ramping up the total number of cells, O'Brien said.

"Adaptive resizing of the intestine makes sense from the standpoint of physiological fitness," she said. "Upkeep of the intestinal lining is metabolically expensive, consuming up to 30 percent of the body's energy resources. By minimizing intestinal size when food is scarce, and maximizing digestive capacity when food is abundant, adaptive intestinal resizing by stem cells helps animals survive in constantly changing environments."

###

University of California - Berkeley: http://www.berkeley.edu

Thanks to University of California - Berkeley for this article.

This press release was posted to serve as a topic for discussion. Please comment below. We try our best to only post press releases that are associated with peer reviewed scientific literature. Critical discussions of the research are appreciated. If you need help finding a link to the original article, please contact us on twitter or via e-mail.

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Source: http://www.labspaces.net/114704/Intestinal_stem_cells_respond_to_food_by_supersizing_the_gut

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Saturday, October 29, 2011

How NOT To Manage Your Facebook Page (Star Wars Style)

by Ken on October 28, 2011 ?

Cover of "Star Wars Episode VI - Return o...

Cover via Amazon

As I was recording videos during my blogging hiatus, I thought that I would try my hand at something a bit more cinematic: a trilogy. This is the result.

I very often become frustrated when I go to the Facebook page for a business and I see things that lead me to believe that the business either doesn?t know what they are doing, or that they have just started and given up. I know that when I see these things I?m less inclined to ?like? the page and try to engage with them, and I have to believe that others feel the same way.

In this series of videos, I examine three different ways that businesses often mismanage their Facebook pages. And to make it a bit more interesting (I hope!), rather than discuss them, I ?dramatize? them, in what I like to think of as my own version of the initial Star Wars Trilogy.

So grab some pop corn, sit back, relax, and enjoy?

How NOT to Manage Your Facebook Page: The Trilogy

?Facebook, Episode IV: A New Beginning?A Facebook Page!

?

Facebook, Episode V: The Customer Strikes Back

?

?Facebook, Episode VI: The Return of the Customer

?

Oh, and by the way, the dashing and talented actor in those final two videos is my friend, Larry Martin. Larry is the owner of Fake Life Clothing. Fakelife is a clothing company founded on the non-business principal of earning a profit to give away. Proceeds from shirt sales help fund loans for small business entrepreneurs living in developing countries. Fakelife partners with bands to produce these t-shirts in order to provide these microloans. You should check them out and support them.

?

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/InklingMedia/~3/FbupsU-wzY0/

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No. 11 Sooners roll over No. 10 K-State, 58-17 (AP)

MANHATTAN, Kan. ? Landry Jones and Ryan Broyles helped No. 11 Oklahoma get back on track and spoil 10th-ranked Kansas State's dream season.

Jones threw for a school-record 505 yards and five touchdowns, his All-American wide receiver caught 14 passes for 171 yards and a score, and the Sooners bounced back from a stunning defeat to beat the previously unbeaten Wildcats 58-17 Saturday.

Kenny Stills added four catches for 101 yards, Roy Finch finished with 73 yards rushing and another 69 through the air, and the Sooners' potent, fast-paced attack managed 690 yards of total offense against the league's top-ranked defense.

Jones' passing total shattered the previous record of 468 yards he shared with Sam Bradford, while Broyles moved into first place on the Big 12's career list with 4,499 yards receiving.

It wasn't all good for Oklahoma (7-1, 4-1).

Leading rusher Dominique Whaley was hurt while blocking on the first play of the game. The Oklahoma medical staff put an air cast around his lower left leg and he was removed from the field on a cart. He later returned to the sideline on crutches, but the extent of the injury was unknown.

Little else went wrong, though, one week after everything did.

Their national championship hopes dashed by Texas Tech ? along with their 39-game home winning streak ? the Sooners were out to spoil the same hopes harbored by the Wildcats (7-1, 4-1). They were off to their best start since 1999, after being picked to finish near the bottom of the Big 12.

Relying on a smoke-and-mirrors offense that had been consistently out-gained all season, Kansas State still managed to climb into the top 10 by taking care of the ball, protecting the quarterback, making sure tackles and not getting called for penalties.

Well, that all changed against Oklahoma's relentless pressure.

Collin Klein was sacked seven times, the Wildcats were penalized an uncharacteristic five times, normally reliable kicker Anthony Cantele missed a chip-shot field goal and a defense that had been assignment sound all season crumbled against Oklahoma's onslaught.

Kansas State actually led 17-14 midway through the second quarter, but the Sooners scored late in the half, and John Hubert's fumble with 19 seconds remaining allowed Michael Hunnicutt to kick a 53-yard field goal on the final play for a 23-17 halftime advantage.

It was the start of 44 straight points scored by the Sooners.

Broyles hauled in a 29-yard touchdown catch early in the third quarter, tight-rope walking down the sideline for the final 10 yards. Moments later, Jones hit Jaz Reynolds for the second of his two touchdown catches to give Oklahoma a 37-17 lead.

Finch added a 31-yard touchdown run later in the third quarter and the rout was on.

By the time Trey Millard slipped through the porous Kansas State defensive front and outran the secondary to the endzone for a 61-yard touchdown run with 11 minutes left in the game, a crowd of 51,004 that was in such a festive mood early in the afternoon had started for the doors.

Klein finished with 92 yards and two TDs rushing for Kansas State, but he was just 8 of 16 for 58 yards through the air. Hubert added 71 yards rushing.

The Sooners have won five straight in the series, their last loss coming in the 2003 conference championship game. They haven't lost in Manhattan since 1996.

More importantly, the impressive performance keeps alive their Big 12 title hopes.

The Sooners and Wildcats are both chasing undefeated Oklahoma State, with Kansas State getting the first shot against the nation's third-ranked team next weekend. Oklahoma gets its chance against its in-state rival in the annual Bedlam game on Dec. 3.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/sports/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20111029/ap_on_sp_co_ga_su/fbc_t25_oklahoma_kansas_st

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China welcomes consensus reached at EU debt talks (Reuters)

BEIJING (Reuters) ? China welcomed on Thursday the consensus reached at the European Union's summit to tackle the euro zone debt crisis and supported measures taken by the bloc that could help the region's recovery.

Beijing, with its big holdings of European sovereign debt, is one of the main bystanders waiting to see if Europe can provide debt relief for Greece, which risks a default that could trigger a deeper crisis in Italy and other bigger euro zone economies.

After a summit in Brussels, European governments announced an agreement under which private banks and insurers would accept 50 percent losses on their Greek debt holdings in the latest bid to reduce Athens' massive debt load to sustainable levels.

In a telephone conversation with French President Nicolas Sarkozy on Thursday, President Hu Jintao said that he hopes Europe's deal to tackle the sovereign debt crisis will help the region's economic recovery, China's state television reported.

"China hopes all these new measures will help stabilize the European financial market and conquer the current difficulties and promote the economic recovery and development," Hu said.

China hopes the G20 summit in France early next month can send a strong signal on promoting robust and balanced global growth, he said. But he did not give further details.

An EU source had earlier said Sarkozy was expected to speak to Hu about Beijing's possible participation in the bailout fund.

"We hope that this consensus ... is conducive to boosting market confidence," Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Jiang Yu told a regular news briefing. "China is willing to make joint efforts to preserve the global economic recovery and growth."

China is also ready to increase cooperation with the EU in areas of investment, trade and finance, she added, without providing details.

"China supports the measures taken by the EU to deal with the debt crisis problem," Jiang said.

China's official Xinhua news agency said the outcome of the EU summit was "positive but filled with difficulties," adding that the deal showed that Europe could surmount its economic woes.

"It seems that all sides at this summit made big efforts and this will bring confidence to markets and also add impetus to the international community joining hands to respond to the current economic situation," it said.

"This summit shows that the countries of the European Union, especially its main economies, have the resolve to overcome difficulties and create an effective 'rescue umbrella' for the euro," said the Chinese-language agency.

"At the same time, it shows the systemic and structural problems the EU has when it comes to dealing with the crisis that demand improvement."

(Additional reporting by Aileen Wang and Kevin Yao; Editing by Yoko Nishikawa)

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/asia/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20111027/bs_nm/us_china_eu

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Friday, October 28, 2011

United, US Airways post profits, say demand strong (Reuters)

(Reuters) ? United Continental Holdings Inc (UAL.N) and its rival US Airways Group Inc (LCC.N) said on Thursday their quarterly profits were battered by soaring fuel costs, but travel demand appears to be robust despite gathering economic threats.

The third-quarter results conclude the earnings season on a mostly positive note for major U.S. airlines and reflect a newfound ability to manage capacity, one analyst said.

United Continental's shares gained 1.6 percent to $20.67 on the New York Stock Exchange although its profit came in below forecasts. US Airways shares gained 6.0 percent to $6.00.

"There's no signs of weakness yet," said Helane Becker, an analyst with Dahlman Rose & Co. "What you're seeing across the board for the group in general is pretty positive."

The airline industry is on the mend after a decade-long downturn that sent several carriers into bankruptcy. But even as soaring fuel costs and economic gloom threaten to disrupt the recovery, carriers have managed the plight effectively by cutting the number of seats they sell when times get rough.

Airline analysts had been on the lookout for signs of weakness in travel demand in the fourth quarter and in 2012. But those signs have yet to materialize.

"While everyone talks about economic weakness, we're not seeing it," said US Airways Chief Executive Doug Parker on a conference call with analysts and reporters.

United Continental, in a regulatory filing on Thursday, said its advance bookings for the next six weeks were up 3.2 percentage points from the same period a year ago on domestic routes and down half of a percentage point on international routes.

"Despite the concerns we all read about, we are not currently seeing a reduction in business demand," United Continental Chief Executive Jeff Smisek said on a conference call with analysts and reporters.

"Should we see demand decrease, however, we will respond nimbly and appropriately by decreasing capacity and taking costs out to help ensure we remain profitable throughout the business cycle," Smisek said.

The sentiments echo those voiced recently by Delta Air Lines Inc (DAL.N) and Southwest Airlines Co (LUV.N).

QUARTERLY PROFITS

United Continental, the parent of United Airlines, the world's largest carrier, said its third-quarter net profit fell to $653 million, or $1.69 per share, from $852 million, or $2.16 per share, a year earlier.

Excluding one-time items related to its 2010 merger, the company said it earned $2.00 per share. That compares with the average Wall Street forecast of $2.08 per share, according to Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S.

The company, formed last year from a merger of UAL Corp and United Airlines, reported revenue of $10.2 billion, up 8.7 percent from a year before.

United Continental said its third-quarter fuel expense, excluding the impact of hedges, increased 41.3 percent, or $1.0 billion, year-over-year.

The company took a $56 million charge related to "fuel hedge ineffectiveness" because it hedged in West Texas Intermediate crude oil, which saw a price decline in the quarter while jet fuel prices remained high.

United Continental ended the quarter with $8.4 billion in unrestricted cash, cash equivalents and short-term investments.

The airline flies as two carriers while it integrates operations but said it is on track to get government permission to operate as a single carrier by year's end.

US Airways reported a smaller quarterly net profit, hit by a 44 percent increase in its fuel costs. The carrier said its third-quarter profit was $76 million, or 41 cents per share, compared with $240 million, or $1.22 per share, a year before.

Excluding one-time items, the airline earned 51 cents per share. That beats a Wall Street average forecast for a profit of 48 cents per share, according to Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S.

The company reported about $19 million of net special items, including costs related to its Delta slot transaction.

US Airways said its revenue was $3.4 billion, up 8.1 percent from a year earlier. The company ended the quarter with $2.4 billion in total cash and cash equivalents, of which $384 million was restricted.

(Reporting by Kyle Peterson, editing by Gerald E. McCormick and Maureen Bavdek)

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/economy/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20111027/bs_nm/us_airlines

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IBM taps Rometty to succeed Palmisano as CEO (Reuters)

(Reuters) ? IBM global sales chief Virginia Rometty will take over as CEO from Sam Palmisano in January, becoming one of the most powerful women in business and technology today.

In taking the helm of the storied industry icon, she makes it the largest U.S. corporation by value to be headed by a woman.

IBM, which over the decades had a reputation of being a strait-laced, plodding, male-dominated business empire, will formally appoint the 54-year-old engineering and computer science graduate its first female CEO on January 1.

The selection went down well with Silicon Valley and Wall Street, especially because the 60-year-old Palmisano -- who helped transform Big Blue from a computer hardware company into a global services and software behemoth -- is staying on as chairman.

"Given Ginni's experience running the largest portion of the business by revenue, she was a logical choice," said Macquarie Securities analyst Brad Zelnick.

Her ascension will set up a rivalry with Hewlett-Packard CEO Meg Whitman for the mantle of most powerful woman in technology, mirroring a long-running rivalry between the two companies.

Rometty joins a relatively small circle of top female CEOs, including Whitman, Pepsico's Indra Nooyi, Xerox's Ursula Burns, Kraft Foods' Irene Rosenfeld and DuPont's Ellen Kullman.

Rometty -- who most recently served as senior vice president of global sales -- made her mark with the smooth 2002 integration of PriceWaterhouseCooper's consulting arm, a landmark move that catapulted IBM into the upper echelons of the technology consulting business.

Colleagues say that Rometty, often clad in elegant pastel-colored suits, cut a striking figure in IBM's staid hallways and impressed co-workers with both her cool-headedness and enthusiasm.

"She exudes energy," said Nelson Fraiman, professor at the Columbia University Graduate School of Business.

Fraiman, who has known the computer science and electrical engineering graduate from Northwestern for about a decade, said she was a good strategist and an early advocate for IBM's expansion into business analytics, or tools and services that help companies quickly analyze trends.

"She thinks in a very analytical way. That's part of her engineering training," he said.

One former IBM executive said Rometty -- who sometimes carries a backpack rather than a briefcase -- worked long hours and demanded that her subordinates do the same.

"People who work for her just don't sleep," said the source. "She has a style that is very different from anybody else's, but is all her own."

THE TRANSFORMATION

In nine years as IBM's leader, Palmisano exited low-margin businesses including PCs, printers and hard drives. He expanded the company's offerings in services, consulting and software.

Since the former history major took the reins, Big Blue's stock has outperformed HP's and matched Oracle's, according to Thomson Reuters data.

Wall Street appeared to approve of the choice of Rometty, and some analysts said that Palmisano had put in place a structure that would ease the way for anyone to follow in his footsteps.

Sources told Reuters in 2010 that Rometty had rebuffed advances from arch-rival HP, which was then looking to replace the ousted Mark Hurd, to stay at the company where she was seen as a rising star.

"She has done well at IBM. She has contributed to their expansion overseas -- emerging markets -- and has done a fantastic job in that space," said Morningstar analyst Sunit Gogia. "All the public knowledge about her performance is very encouraging."

But "computing is an industry that is always evolving," Gogia said. "It's moving into an era of cloud computing. The company will have to reinvent itself for the future, stay with the times and maintain the revenue base when they do that."

Shares in IBM slipped about a dollar from their $180.36 close following the announcement.

(Additional reporting by Jennifer Saba and Liana Baker in New York and Bill Rigby in Seattle; Editing by Robert MacMillan, Gary Hill)

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/enterprise/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20111025/bs_nm/us_ibm

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If Conservatives Are Racist, Why is Herman Cain Leading in the GOP Polls? (ContributorNetwork)

COMMENTARY | As a black woman, I'm watching with fascination the current GOP situation. Many liberals, me included, believe if you're a conservative, you might, and I say might, be a racist.

But then along comes Herman Cain, who has been rising in the Republican polls. A CBS/New York Times poll places him as the front-runner with 25 percent support. Mitt Romney gets 21 percent.

The black businessman's numbers rose from just 5 percent in September. Rick Perry, who everyone thought would surge full speed ahead, dropped from 23 percent to 6 percent.

When I first saw Cain on the political scene, I assumed he was just a candidate who had no hope of beating Romney or even Michele Bachmann. My thinking was based on one fact: Cain is black. It's as if I forgot all about the fact Barack Obama is not white.

Obama won the election, but he's backed by liberals. I expect liberals to be more accepting of a person of color. Why do I hold this view?

I think about the Republican National Convention and marvel at the fact I can count the number of dark faces. I think about Southern conservative voters and their history of racism. I think about Jim Crow laws and George Wallace and Martin Luther King Jr.'s eloquent speech at the 1963 March on Washington.

Is it the modern conservative movement of today? No, but when I listen to Newt Gingrich or see a member of the tea party holding a sign that compares Barack Obama to a monkey, those images come back.

It's a myth to say every black voter will vote for a black candidate. Although I believe Cain's 9-9-9 plan is an intriguing approach that may just work once everyone got used to it, I'm opposed to any candidate who calls homosexuality a "sin" and a "choice."

But it would be a lie if I didn't say I'm pleased to see a black man as the current front-runner for the GOP. Although Gingrich places third in the current poll with 10 percent, racial progress is happening. If not, Obama would not be president and Cain would not be leading in the Republican polls.

After all, it's 2011, not 1963.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/gop/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ac/20111026/us_ac/10297175_if_conservatives_are_racist_why_is_herman_cain_leading_in_the_gop_polls

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Thursday, October 27, 2011

CJ rues chaotic affair of probes


ISLAMABAD - The Supreme Court on Wednesday constituted a commission to be headed by Justice (Retd) Rehmat Hussain Jafferi to probe the negligence of the authorities concerned in the non-completion of rental power projects which have caused a major loss to the national exchequer.
The court said the officials responsible for the delay in the functioning of RPPs must be held accountable. It also directed that the commission could acquire the services of any expert in probing the matter and the Finance Ministry and all relevant departments would extend support to it and also bear the expenses. The commission would submit its report within four weeks.
A two-member bench headed by Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry and comprising Justice Khilji Arif Hussain was hearing the application filed by PML-N leader Khawaja Asif.
The Chief Justice said the court could not shut its eyes to corruption, adding that the cases of the officials involved in the RPPs? corruption would be sent to the National Accountability Bureau (NAB). He said the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) to whom the corruption cases have been sent is showing no progress and if the court orders action against the relevant officer he is promoted to high rank next day, while an honest and capable officer, who likes to perform his professional duties is transferred to Gilgit-Baltistan.
?Those who should be probed are being appointed secretaries and all the inquiries sent by the court are pending,? Chief Justice remarked.
The Chief Justice remarked that every institution in the country is infested with corruption and there is not even a single institution which could be trusted.
Petitioner Faisal Saleh Hayat, who has become Minister for Housing and Works after the PML-Q joined the PPP-led government about five months ago, informed the court that the Ministry of Water and Power is responsible for the non-completion of the rental power projects owing to which the country faced severe loadshedding. He added the Asian Development Bank has also mentioned this aspect in its report. He said the work on RPPs was intentionally delayed for the sake of kickbacks and the Ministry?s officials presented wrong data to the government and the Cabinet. Kh Tariq Rahim, counsel for Ministry of Water and Power, objected to the appearance of Faisal before the court. He said Faisal should have taken permission from the prime minister before appearing in the court. However, the court dismissed his objection.
Shahid Hamid, who represented the rental power companies, said that morally Faisal should have resigned like Babar Awan and Zulfiqar Mirza before appearing in the court. On this, the federal minister remarked no one should give him sermon on ethics as he was an elected member of the National Assembly for six times and was minister in various governments. Faisal said he knows his oath ?That I will protect the Constitution of Pakistan?.
The PML-Q leader said he has appeared before the bench on the court notice in his personal capacity. He said as he is not fully prepared, therefore, the court adjourned the case for today (Thursday). Earlier, during the course of hearing, Deputy Attorney General Shoaib Shaheen presented the Pepco report on rental power projects. The court after examining the report said the circumstances have come to a point where a file from the minister?s table reaches to secretary?s table in five months.
The Chief Justice said nobody is taking the matter seriously, while the officials? negligence has caused a huge loss to the national exchequer, adding that the nation is suffering due to the bickering of officers. The court observed had the government taken timely steps, the RPPs might have been completed and the people would not have become victim of loadshedding.
Kh Asif informed the court that due to government?s negligence the RPPs could not be completed so far. Had the RPPs been completed, the electricity would have been cheaper.
He said that Nandipur and Chicho Ki Malian Rental Power Projects were expected to produce 975 MW and for that Rs 6 billion were paid to a Chinese company in advance. The Nandipur machinery is lying at the seaport since April 2010, while the machinery for other RPPs was not imported so far. The court has directed to start work on these two projects.
The Chief Justice said the court would seek the opinion of the experts and after that the cases would be sent to NAB. On this, Kh Asif said the PML-N has challenged the appointment of NAB chairman therefore these cases should be sent to Public Accounts Committee. The CJP said they are unaware whether they have authority of it or not? He further said the Federal Ombudsman post is lying vacant, while the FIA not performing its duties, and if the appointment of the NAB chief is also challenged then where the court could send corruption cases?

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/pakistan-news-newspaper-daily-english-online/today-headlines/~3/Gsc4E7WOCa4/CJ-rues-chaotic-affair-of-probes

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Think tank retracts study on marijuana clinics

A nonprofit think tank on Monday retracted a widely reported study that linked last year's closing of hundreds of medical marijuana dispensaries in Los Angeles to a rise in crime rates in surrounding neighborhoods.

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Santa Monica-based Rand Corp. said in a statement that questions raised after the study was released last month prompted an unusual internal review.

Researchers relied on a commercial crime mapping service, believing it included information from various jurisdictions, including the Los Angeles Police Department. However, that agency did not give data to the service.

"That review determined the crime data used in the analysis are insufficient to answer the questions targeted by the study," the statement said.

The study looked at crime reports for neighborhoods surrounding 600 dispensaries in the 10 days before and 10 days after Los Angeles officials shuttered the pot clinics last summer after a new ordinance went into effect. The analysis showed crime increased about 60 percent within three blocks of a closed dispensary compared with those that remained open.

The report found that the further away from the clinics the less crime there was.

The Los Angeles city attorney's office called the study deeply flawed and demanded the retraction. Rand pulled the study from its website earlier this month.

"The city attorney's office believes that retracting the study was the right thing for Rand to do and we are pleased they were receptive to our concerns regarding the study's flaws," said city attorney spokesman Frank Mateljan. "The public interest and public safety is always better served when we use accurate and credible information."

Rand researchers plan to conduct a new analysis when they have adequate data.

Copyright 2011 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Source: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/45023116/ns/health-health_care/

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Banco Santander Q3 profit up 10 percent

MADRID (AP) ? Banco Santander said Thursday its third-quarter profits rose 10 percent compared to the same period a year ago to euro1.8 billion ($2.5 billion) thanks to higher revenue.

Spain's largest bank and the euro zone's biggest by market capitalization said in its earnings report that gross income rose 5.8 percent year-on-year, due to a good evolution of net interest income, which rose 4.4 percent, and fee income which was up 10.0 percent.

The bank also said it would reach a core capital ratio of 10 percent in June 2012, surpassing by one percentage point the new requirements of the European Banking Authority, with no need for a capital increase.

Banco Santander said a write-down of its exposure to European sovereign debt to market-value levels will cost it euro1.5 billion ($2.1 billion) but has made divestments to cover this.

The bank said gross income in the third quarter was 5.2 percent higher than in the same stretch of 2010 at euro11.1 billion, due to the good performance of basic revenues, which were up 5.3 percent.

However, for the nine months through the end of September the bank said its profits were down 13 percent to euro5.3 billion compared to the same period of 2010.

It said this was due in large part to euro620 million in provisions set aside in the second quarter in the United Kingdom to cover possible claims stemming from payment protection insurance.

The bank said that net operating income after provisions, which it called the best measure of its underlying business, increased 6.6 percent year-on-year as a result of a rise in basic revenues.

In Brazil, which accounts for a quarter of the bank's profits, these were down 4 percent to just under euro2 billion for the nine-month period, although lending there was up 19 percent.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/f70471f764144b2fab526d39972d37b3/Article_2011-10-27-EU-Spain-Earns-Santander/id-ed5a34859ebb46488b953a35e750be59

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Wednesday, October 26, 2011

Nurse: Jackson said only propofol let him sleep

A sometimes tearful nurse testified Tuesday that her efforts to save Michael Jackson from the drug he craved for sleep were rebuffed by the star, who insisted he needed the powerful anesthetic that eventually killed him.

Cherilyn Lee, who tried to shift Jackson to holistic sleep aids in the months before he died, said the singer told her Dipravan, a brand name for propofol, was the only thing that would knock him out for the sleep he needed. He told Lee he had experienced the drug once during surgery.

Lee almost didn't testify. She sat down in the witness box then said she felt dizzy, before starting to cry.

"This is just very sensitive for me," she said.

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Slideshow: The face of change (on this page)

Lee told of coming into Jackson's life at the beginning of 2009 and leaving just before Dr. Conrad Murray arrived. Murray has pleaded not guilty to involuntary manslaughter and is accused of giving Jackson a fatal dose of the drug Lee would not give him.

Lee recalled a meeting with the superstar at his rented mansion two months before his death.

"He was sitting very close to me," she said. "He looked at me and said, 'I have a lot of difficulty sleeping. I've tried a lot of things and I need something that will make me fall asleep right away. I need Dipravan."

Lee had never heard of the drug but did research and later told Jackson it was too dangerous to use in a home.

At one point she asked: "What if you didn't wake up?"

Jackson, however, was adamant the drug would be safe if he had a doctor who could monitor him while he slept.

Prosecutors claim Murray abandoned Jackson after administering the fatal dose of propofol and failed to have proper lifesaving and monitoring equipment on hand.

Lee was called to the stand by Murray's defense, but the impact of her testimony was mixed.

While she supported a defense theory that Jackson was doctor shopping in a desperate search for someone to give him propofol, a prosecutor seized on her warning to show Murray should have known the dangers too.

Lee said her final refusal to provide the drug came on April 19, 2009, and she never saw Jackson again.

Another medical witness, Dr. Allan Metzger, testified Monday that Jackson also implored him to provide the anesthetic. Metzger also refused and instead gave the singer sleeping pills that had proven effective in the past.

Attorneys for Murray are trying to show that Jackson was a strong-willed celebrity who became the architect of his own demise. They also alleged he gave himself the fatal dose after Murray left his bedroom.

Video: Surveillance video surfaces in Murray trial (on this page)

Lee said she had treated Jackson as he prepared for his planned series of "This Is It" comeback concerts.

Lee was followed to the witness stand by Randy Phillips, president and CEO of concert promoter AEG Live.

Defense attorneys had wanted to ask Phillips about Jackson's contract to show that Jackson would have owed $40 million to the promoter if the concerts were canceled. The lawyers said Jackson would be desperate to make sure the shows continued and needed sleep to get through his rehearsals.

Superior Court Judge Michael Pastor blocked that request and said allowing testimony about the contract might confuse jurors.

"This is not a contractual dispute. This is a homicide case," Pastor said.

Copyright 2011 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Source: http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/45032681/ns/today-entertainment/

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TiPb Asks: What apps are on your main iPhone 4S home screen?

What apps have earned a coveted spot on your main iPhone 4S home screen? Is it still default, just as Apple shipped it? Or have you moved everything around just so, including the dock icons? Do you organize by function or type of app, or by aesthetics...

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/TheIphoneBlog/~3/c09_uXK7_7g/

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5.2 quake hits Japan's Fukushima prefecture (AP)

NEW YORK ? A moderate earthquake has shaken the northeastern Japanese prefecture where the much more massive earthquake and tsunami touched off the worst nuclear crisis since Chernobyl earlier this year.

The 5.2-magnitude quake struck Fukushima Prefecture overnight just after 2 a.m. local time Wednesday (1700 GMT Tuesday). Its epicenter was on the coast near the town of Iwaki, 115 miles (186 km) north of Tokyo.

Fukushima was severely hit by the quake and tsunami in March that left more than 21,000 people dead or missing.

The Wednesday quake was about 70 miles (120 km south) of the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear facility.

Another 5.3 quake later Wednesday hit 262 miles (423 kilometers) southwest of Tokyo, off the Japan coast.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/weather/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20111025/ap_on_re_as/as_japan_earthquake

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PFT: Cowher, Gruden linked to Dolphins job

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On November 1, 2001, I busted a bottle of Boone?s Farm against my Commodore 64, and Profootballtalk.com was born.

There was no mission statement, no business plan, no bucket list.? I had done nine months of unpaid freelance work for the long-defunct NFLtalk.com, which was purchased along with the other Sportstalk.com sites in early 2001 after the tech bubble burst.? I then spent six months working from home for ESPN.com?s subscription-based Insider service, while also practicing law full time.

In October 2001, I was offered a one-year deal with ESPN.com, effective November 1.? (I still have the contract.)? I decided, for a variety of reasons that I won?t bore you with now (but might bore you with later), to launch an independent site (the word blog hadn?t been coined yet, and I have always despised it) that covered the NFL a bit more loosely, with entertainment being as important as information.

PFT launched November 1 of that year, we generated little or no revenue for at least three years, and then the snowball started to roll down the hill, a bit.? The watershed moment came in early 2006, when Ted Moon of Sprint reached out with a desire to explore an advertising relationship.? One thing led to another, we struck a deal, real money was flowing, and I knew at that point that, eventually, I wouldn?t be practicing law at all.

On July 1, 2009, it finally happened, and the two-plus years since then have been an exciting, fulfilling, challenging, and almost entirely enjoyable blur.

I?m not sure what we?ll do to commemorate the 10-year anniversary.? It would be nice if all of PFT Planet shows up next Tuesday and check in, if only to see if the hamsters powering the NBC servers will explode.? Maybe we?ll do something special for PFT Live.? Beyond that, I?m not looking for the day to be ensconced in self-congratulation.? It?s more about reflection and gratitude ? primarily to each of you ? and given the content of this post, the reflection already has started.

Actually, the reflection happens pretty much continuously.? I don?t know how or why this thing has grown, I don?t know how or why 90 percent of the people connected to the NFL read the site (the other 10 percent are lying), and I don?t know where this thing is going and how it will get there.? I?ve been enjoying the ride since Day One, and I?ll keep doing it as long as I can say that.

Hopefully, you?ve enjoyed it, too.? Hopefully, you?ll continue to do that.

If you have any suggestions on how we best should celebrate an unlikely 10-year anniversary, feel free to add them to the comments.? And be sure to check back next Tuesday to see what we do.? And every day between now and then.? And every day after that.? Until I either drop dead or decide to move on, or move out.

Source: http://profootballtalk.nbcsports.com/2011/10/25/cowher-gruden-linked-to-dolphins-job/related/

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Tuesday, October 25, 2011

Occupy Chicago: 130 arrested in city park protest (AP)

CHICAGO ? Anti-Wall Street demonstrators of the Occupy Chicago movement stood their ground in a downtown park in noisy but peaceful defiance of police orders to clear out, prompting 130 arrests early Sunday, authorities said.

Occupy Chicago spokesman Joshua Kaunert vowed after the arrests that protests would continue in the Midwest city.

"We're not going anywhere. There are still plenty of us," Kaunert told The Associated Press after the arrests, which took police more than an hour to complete.

Elsewhere in the nation, police reported 11 arrests overnight in the Occupy Cincinnati protests. Police said those arrested had stayed in that city's Fountain Square after Sunday's 3 a.m. closing time and each was charged with criminal trespass.

In Chicago, police began taking people into custody just before 1 a.m. Sunday. Those arrested were led in groups to vans and two large white buses as others clamored to be arrested.

"Take me next! Take me next!" some shouted as police began the arrests. Others chanted as they were led away: "We'll be back!"

Officers had begun placing metal barricades around the area of Chicago's Grant Park known as Congress Plaza about 11:10 p.m. Saturday, minutes after the park had closed. Afterward, police then went through the crowd and warned people to leave or risk arrest for remaining in the closed park in violation of a city ordinance.

Several of the protesters who stayed inside the barricades in the park sat on the ground. Others locked arms as police circled and then began arresting people.

"One: We are the people! Two: We are united! Three: The occupation is not leaving!" demonstrators shouted. Others joined in from just outside the park.

Chicago police said Sunday morning that 130 arrests had been made.

Kaunert said none of those arrested had resisted.

"Everybody was very peaceful and smiling and there was no violence, though a lot of chanting," he said.

He urged authorities to let the people resume protesting peacefully against the perceived greed and other ills they see on Wall Street and elsewhere in corporate America. He noted it was the second straight weekend that arrests had been made in the park after 175 arrests the previous Sunday after protesters set up tents past public hours.

"The police came in and again took away our right to free speech and assembly," he said. "Several paddywagons left and they had two very large prison buses and those are gone now."

Paulina Jasczuk, a 24-year-old dental receptionist, watched as her boyfriend, Philip Devon, was led away in the night hours. She threw him a white sweater against the chill of a fall night in Chicago.

"I'm proud of everyone who got arrested tonight," she told AP, adding she hoped they would inspire more demonstrators to join in the movement in the weeks ahead.

Demonstrators were taken away one by one and handcuffed with white plastic ties and. Some on the scene shouted: "This is what democracy looks like!"

Drums banged and some people clanged on metal.

Jonathan Sumner, 25, of Chicago, watched the arrests from outside the park and began shouting at officers: "Why are you doing this?"

"It's a sad day for the CPD" he said, referring to the Chicago Police Department.

Some said earlier that arrests only signal the importance of the Occupy movement.

"This movement will not be a serious movement until we take a stand, and getting arrested is just one way of taking a stand," said Max Farrar, 20, a junior political science major at DePaul University, speaking Saturday to a reporter.

About 1,500 people gathered for the protest that began Saturday. Demonstrators descended on the city park with hopes of making it the movement's permanent home. The group had started in Chicago's financial district before marching to the park.

Along the way, marchers chanted "Banks got bailed out, we got sold out!" and held signs that read "Greed Sucks" and "No War But The Class War" while police on horses blocked them from walking on the street on Michigan Avenue, leaving them with just the sidewalks to occupy.

Occupy Wall Street began a month ago in New York among a few young people, and has grown to tens of thousands around the country and the world.

In Cincinnati, Police Capt. Doug Wiesman said early Sunday that the 11 arrests carried out there were "straightforward" and without problems. A protester, Aaron Roco, told AP about 30 other protesters who remained on a sidewalk just outside the Cincinnati square during the police action weren't arrested.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/us/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20111023/ap_on_re_us/us_wall_street_protest_chicago

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Steve Jobs and Apple skewered on New York stage (Reuters)

NEW YORK (Reuters) ? In a sold-out theater in downtown Manhattan, two miles from the square where anti-Wall Street demonstrators daily use iPhones, iPads and other devices to mobilize their forces, a performance artist named Mike Daisey is mounting a subversive attack on Apple Inc.

Sitting at a stainless steel table set with nothing but a glass of water, the actor slyly describes his geeky devotion to the perfectionist designs and operating systems of the House of Macintosh and its progenitor, Steve Jobs.

Before long, however, Daisey is recounting a trip he took to China to investigate the heavily guarded massive factories where screens and other parts for countless Apple, Dell, Nokia, Samsung and other manufacturers' products are made.

He meets underage workers, some as young as 12, who describe 12-hour, 14-hour and even 34-hour shifts and their dormitory "cubes" stocked sardine-can style with 13 beds. He shows his iPhone to workers with crippled hands, and describes an "epidemic of suicides" that prompted Foxconn International Holdings, which he says manufactures more than 50 percent of the world's electronic device parts, to install nets around its massive factories in China. (It's "Foxconn's version of corporate responsibility," he says.)

The show, "The Agony and the Ecstasy of Steve Jobs," oscillates between Daisey's China experiences, including his misadventures posing as a prospective purchaser of both bootleg iPhones and Chinese companies, and his gradual disillusionment with his onetime hero, Jobs.

"I started to think," Daisey says, "and that's dangerous for any religion."

KNIFING THE BABY

He depicts Jobs, whom he never met, as an obsessive who divided his employees into either geniuses or bozos, who hooked the public on beautiful devices that he declared obsolete with each new product iteration ("the master of the forced upgrade," an "enemy of nostalgia" who was "never afraid to knife the baby") and who put business ahead of ethics.

"He knew these things," Daisey said of Jobs and the China supply chain, "and he decided not to act."

Daisey is framed onstage by a rectangular structure that flashes intermittently with LED-like illuminations to indicate chaos or order. When the stage lights are brightest, however, the frame is empty, opening on a bare view of brick wall and window - a metaphor, perhaps, for the void Daisey sees at the center of the consumer economy or for marketing creating an insatiable craving for new technology. "Steve Jobs," Daisey marvels, was "so good at making us need things we didn't know we needed."

The show opened in New York last week, days after Jobs's death following a long battle with pancreatic cancer. Daisey says Jobs had heard about earlier versions of the show from audience members and occasionally responded with the email: "Mike doesn't appreciate the complexity of the situation."

Recalling his own years basking in the nighttime glow of a MacBook, inhaling the burned PVC incense of a new device being fired up and coddling iPod parts in their perfect packaging, Daisey asks: "Do we just see what we want to see?"

DEAR MR COOK

Steve Dowling, an Apple spokesman, said the company is committed to "driving the highest standards of social responsibility throughout our supply chains," has on-site auditors at Foxconn and other suppliers, and requires suppliers to commit to a published code of conduct as a condition of doing business.

Apple posts five years' worth of audits verifying compliance on its website and has gone beyond monitoring labor conditions to areas such as breaking up indentured servitude rings, Dowling said.

Daisey, meanwhile, has no illusions that people will give up on electronic devices but as the audience files out of the show, whispering about whether to restart their cellphones, ushers distribute a single page suggesting "concrete steps" for what to do next.

It suggests e-mailing Apple CEO Tim Cook (Daisey gives his address) with a "firm, polite, resolute" plea to hire independent outside auditors to verify factory conditions.

It urges consumers to "think different" about the need to upgrade with the introduction of each new "amazing" Apple device. "If we weighed the human cost of each piece of technology we would become more stringent in our purchasing," Daisey writes

Evoking one of the show's wittiest scenes, in which the actor despairs about mind-numbing communications tools such as Microsoft's PowerPoint that lets people in the same room avoid talking to each other, the monologist ends his handout with a cry to spread the word about Chinese labor conditions.

"Talking about it, thinking about it when making purchasing decisions and understanding it is not just symbolic. In a world of silence, speaking itself is action," Daisey writes

(Reporting by Jed Horowitz; Editing by Tim Dobbyn)

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/applecomputer/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20111024/bs_nm/us_apple_daisey

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