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http://mmajunkie.com This week's episode of "The Ultimate Fighter: Team Nogueira vs. Team Mir" featured an overmatched Jules Bruchez in a light-heavyweight elimination bout with Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu world champion Vinny Magalhaes.
Representing Team Nogueira, Bruchez recognized that he was clearly the underdog going into the bout. And while his submission loss wasn't a surprise to most, Bruchez's culinary talents and back story may be.
Bruchez tells us more about his life in Louisiana, how he qualified for the show, what he expects in the future and more in this week's "Ten 'TUF' Questions."
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MMAjunkie.com: You were certainly one of the least experienced cast members this season. How did you qualify for the show?
Jules Bruchez: I had to take the route that I guess, well, not most of the people on the show had to take. I had to take the average route. I found out where the tryouts were. I found out exactly what you needed to do. You had to send in a tape and everything else. So that's exactly what I did.
I got to work. We went over for Easter at my mom's. I made the tape. I didn't make anything hyped up or silly or funny — even though I'm a jokester. I just told them sincerely what this meant to me, what it would mean to be in the UFC. I told them my feelings on past shows and things like that. I sent the tape in to them and got hold of the lady from the UFC.
She gave me a call. She's in charge of all the fighters coming into the UFC. She asked me a few questions. I gave her the run down. She told me that the tryouts were in Boston. She told me where they were at. I told her that I had already sent my tape, and that I had already booked my flight and booked my hotel in Boston. That pretty much impressed them right there.
I flew out to Boston. I went to the tryouts. I did everything that they told us to do. I was there from 7:30 a.m. to 9 o'clock at night. That was on a Thursday. I came home on a Friday. From there they said, "If you don't receive a phone call by Sunday, don't bother calling us. You have not made it. Thank you."
The next afternoon, I received a phone call. They said, "We appreciate everything you did for us. We'd like you to come down to (Las) Vegas."
So they flew me down to Vegas the whole next week, and that's where I went through the rest of the interviews, the medicals, and the rest of the stuff like that. After that, the said, "Shut your mouth. Don't tell anyone where you're at. We'll call you in two weeks."
MMAjunkie.com: You made it through your preliminary bout with relative ease. How did you assess your chances at that point?
Jules Bruchez: I was real excited. What a lot of people don't know is going in to the show I hadn't fought since Feb. 29, 2007. In that fight I received a pretty bad concussion. It seemed to be OK that night. We went to the hospital, got the brain scans, and everything looked fine. But when I woke up the next day, it was a living nightmare.
I was bedridden for a week straight, pretty much. I couldn't move my body. If I even looked to the side, that would make the room spin. My girlfriend would have to help me up to the bathroom. I didn't bathe for like three days since the fight. That knocked me out for about two months.
I went back into practice for like a week. And after the second practice lightly going through techniques, that upset my head and I was out for another four to six months. I couldn't even lift weights, or run. Anything that would increase my blood pressure would automatically make me sick or nauseated.
I had a lot of memory loss. I'd be talking, and in the middle of a sentence I would just forget what I was talking about. It was probably worse than what I let people on to believe, because I didn't want my girlfriend to freak out.
I got back into practice for about two weeks. I was real rusty. And I ran into Tim Credeur from last season. I was like, "Tim, I heard that the 205 (pound) weight class might be coming up in November. Is that true?"
And he said, "Yeah. The 205 (pound) class is coming up. But it's not in November. It's in a month."
I was like, "Oh, [expletive]." I was like 240 pounds. I was thinking, "You know what? I am in no way ready, qualified or prepared. But I'll be damned if I pass up this opportunity of a lifetime."
So I got back into the gym. I started busting my ass. I knew what do because I had been a strength and conditioning coach. But I had to do a couple of the wrong things to lose as much weight as possible. I went out there, and I did my job.
When it got to the fight, I got very nervous. I told one guy I had to read "The Agony in the Garden" from The Bible the night before because it was the only thing that would calm me down. I figured if one guy knew he was getting nailed to the cross, I guess it couldn't be so bad just stepping into a ring.
I was basically [expletive] balls, man. I'm not going to lie to you. It's the UFC. This is to make it into the UFC. I hadn't fought in almost year. I was coming off a brain concussion. I haven't been practicing. I haven't been sparring. I haven't done nothing. But here I am. Here's my opportunity. I'm going to seize it.
So I just went out there, and I did what I though was best. That's another reason why I didn't go out throwing a lot of punches. I was trying to conserve my energy. I felt that my weight hadn't got all the way back up to where I normally hydrate myself. That kind of made me uneasy.
I just kind of rolled with it, and it ended up working out the best for me. He just gave up the choke quick.
MMAjunkie.com: Junie's win from last episode made it two in a row for Team Mir. Was there any concern on Team Nogueira's part of the momentum switch?
Jules Bruchez: I can't say that we weren't worried. Obviously we had just lost two in a row. It was definitely different. We were sitting on our high horse for two weeks not having to worry about nothing. Now, all of a sudden, we didn't have control of anything.
The only thing I guess that's not so bad is you pretty much mentally prepared yourself that you're going to have to fight anyone in the house anyway. I don't care who you stick in front of me. I'm still going to try to go in there and punch your face in.
MMAjunkie.com: We saw some intense training from Team Mir in this episode, while your team's routine seemed a little less formal. What was your take on the difference in style?
Jules Bruchez: As far as our training, not too many of us really had a complaint about anything. We pretty much understood that what they knew was more than what we knew, and they were our coach for a reason. If there was something we really needed to work on, we would tell them, and they wold be more than happy to let us do it.
Editing does play a part of it. The two times where they show us having fun, playing around, that was an extremely good cardio work-out. What people don't know is that only happened twice, ever. We practiced twice a day for three weeks straight — except for the days we had fights. We still practiced those days, we just didn't have two practices. We practiced very hard, all the time.
There was no fun and games when people like Anderson Silva and Lyoto Machida showed up. We worked.
MMAjunkie.com: Your culinary talents have garnered you almost as much attention as your martial arts abilities. Where does that interest come from?
Jules Bruchez: I love to cook. I don't like to clean, but I love to cook. We're from Louisiana, so everything revolves around cooking and drinking. We definitely know how to cook.
I cooked some pretty good stuff for those guys. I cooked some turducken. I cooked some gumbo — things like that they're not used to eating. Chicken fettuccine. Crawfish. But I like cooking and I like baking. And our team was a pretty close-knit team, so I cooked a lot.
But it when it came around to Nogueira's birthday, I love to bake cakes. I'm getting married in May, and the one thing my fiance is upset about is I don't want anyone making my groom's cake. Because I don't like the way the cake tastes. I don't believe in paying $300 for a cake that tastes half-assed. I won't be decorating it, but I'll definitely be baking it.
MMAjunkie.com: Some of the members of Team Mir felt your team's unity was "fake" or questionable. Did you ever feel that the cohesiveness on your team wasn't genuine?
Jules Bruchez: It was definitely genuine. It's funny how the teams were picked. The other team had a lot of individualism. They kind of liked to do their own thing. We didn't have a team of captain. Our coaches didn't tell us that we needed to stick together. It just happened to run that way.
We don't have TV's. We don't have radios or magazines. All we had was each other. We're all there to not make friends and win the whole thing. But, let's be honest. Six weeks on the same schedule, you might as well make some friends and enjoy the time while you're there.
MMAjunkie.com: While your team didn't make the matchups, you had essentially been asking for a bout with Vinny. Why was that the fight you wanted considering the difference in styles and experience?
Jules Bruchez: One thing that people don't know is that Vinny would tell us that Eliot and Krzysztof were isolating themselves from their group. When they would go and train, they wouldn't really train with Vinny and Tom all that much. And they had a habit of talking about, "Oh, we're going to be in the finals together." So Tom has already lost, but imagine how Vinny feels.
That kind of pissed him off, so Vinny just starting leaking information to us and telling us who the picks were going to be.
MMAjunkie.com: You mentioned feeling the bout was a "no lose" situation. Do you wish you had approached the fight with a different mindset?
Jules Bruchez: I can see exactly how that comes off. But what I meant had no intention like that. It was the best situation for me. This was a good outcome no matter what. I really felt like I lost to a guy who was really bad-ass on the ground and who had won multiple world titles. But that didn't change the way I fought. That didn't cause me not to fight aggressive.
MMAjunkie.com: You seemed very cautious and apprehensive during the bout. Mir described it as terrified. What was going through your mind in that time?
Jules Bruchez:
I fought non-aggressive due to I felt that I hadn't sparred enough. Vinny is very good with his kicks, and that's not something that we expected. We knew Vinny was going to kick, but I didn't know that he was going to kick as hard. And I also didn't expect Vinny to kick with his foot. A lot of time in MMA, you're supposed to kick with your shin. Well Vinny being a little bit taller than me, and using his foot, that gave him an extra reach on me.
That kind of really threw my reach advantage off. That's where you really see the non-aggressiveness come from. And that's just part of it. No excuses. He straight up beat me, hands down. But I didn't come into the fight non-aggressive from that thought. It was mainly that I had mentally psyched myself out of it. I was trying to find my reach.
That's why you found me just walking the ring trying to figure out how I was going to get myself in there. Without a doubt I should have been more aggressive and worked myself in with the jab. It's so easy to look back and say that now.
MMAjunkie.com: What did you take from this experience? Do you feel like your time is now in MMA, or will you require more seasoning on the local shows?
Jules Bruchez: I feel like my time is now in MMA. But I'm realistic. I don't feel like I'm ready to go out there and fight Wanderlei Silva. I think if you called me back and told me that you were going to pair me up with someone that was in the house with me that's at that same magnitude, I think I'd be ready.
But there's always room for improvement. I'm never going to be content. I'm going to keep working and keep working.
MMAjunkie.com's "Ten TUF Questions" feature runs each Thursday and spotlights the latest eliminated cast member from "The Ultimate
Fighter: Team Nogueira vs. Team Mir." For full coverage of the show, including episode recaps and blogs from cast member Ryan Bader and
Team Mir assistant coach Ken Hahn, check out our section for "The Ultimate Fighter: Team Nogueira vs. Team Mir."


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With a relaxed waistline and tailored leg, slim straight jeans from AG Jeans offer comfortable fit to provide a classic, everyday look. From traditional denim to modern khaki, AG Jeans has a wide selection of slim straight men's pants to match your personal style, such as The Graduate and The Everett . These men's slim straight jeans styles are the foundation of your new work and weekend wardrobe.

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Stella McCartney's new spring line for adidas came out recently. In conjunction with the release, TravelerWIRE gives us a list of cool tennis resorts you can visit to show off your new outfits.
(It might be from a previous collection, but) I love this jacket:
In other Stella news, her line for Target (Australia) comes out on March 12, but is already available for preview online.
My favorite piece:
More after the cut…
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m/s Doris & Doris II are the most popular sea view restaurants in town
Dinner Cruise around the city and to the scenic villa areas of eastern archipelago is ideal entertainment for business and pleasure.
Just imagine the pretty villas of Villinki islands, you and your sea view table full of happy people, and the fresh dinner prepared in the authentic ship kitchen – à la carte of your choice, while the sun is setting.
At 19 you can also choose the classic 'Skärgårdsbord', cold archipelago buffet in season, either for starter or for a Nordic style summer dinner, popular in Finland and Sweden.
The dinner cruise is very popular entertainment in the working life of Helsinki, for instance on a team building night, in rewarding, HR, or with international guests, or with co-operation partners. In addition, many of our regular guests book the dinner with their friends, family, or spouse, to spend relaxed quality time together, or to celebrate birthdays and anniversaries – with a sea view.
Evening & Sunset Cruise, 1 ½ – 2 ½ hours
m/s Doris & m/s Doris II
– adult boat ticket 20 €
– skärgårdsbord (only at 19), archipelago buffet in season 24 €
– à la carte list, main courses 24-32 €
– three-course menu proposals 38/44 €
– cash or credit card (Visa, Master, OK, Amex, Diners)
1 June–29 August 2020
– Monday-Saturday, welcoming & check-in at 16:00, departure 16:30
– Monday-Saturday, welcoming & check-in at 18:30, departure 19:00
A table reservation is highly recommended for all dinner guests.
Please book and make your table reservation in advance.
The potential last free tables from the door of the ship ½ hour earlier.
+358 (0)9 6874 5050


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JF Ptak Science Books Post 1708
[This is one in a series of posts prompted by my current reading of Larry McMurtry's novel, Lonesome Dove.]
The Indian of the Plains had few options in the 1860s and 1870s. The buffalo were gone and hunting lands were being taken over by white settlers. With this dissipation of their food source came displacement resulting in inadequate food supply and (in many cases) starvation. The government offered reservation systems, but these in general flawed results of flawed and hurried thinking. In one attempt to determine the efficacy of the government's response to the growing crisis in caring for the removed Indian population, a committee under the titular leadership of Senator James Rood Doolittle of Wisconsin (Republican turned Democrat, 1815-1897), created in January 1867 a report (The Condition of the Tribes, Report of the Joint Committee...) containing a wealth of information about the state of Indians on the reservations, drawing on the results of a questionnaire completed by 27 high-ranking respondents in Indian affairs, including eleven army officers, thirteen agents or superintendents, one teacher, one missionary, and one physician. It does not paint a pretty picture, even coming at the hands of a Congressional investigation.
Continue reading "The Doolittle Report on the State of Indians in U.S. Reservations, 1867" »


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Photographer Antoine Rose captures Miami's beaches and its coastline in the series Up in the Air Miami. Shot from a bird's eye view, umbrellas, beach goers, and yachts are miniaturized and abstracted, and look like tiny toys used in a diorama. The candy-colored images offer an unusual glimpse into a day on the water, as we see only a general depiction of the beach yet its captured on a large scale. We aren't offered many details, but still, there is a lot of energy in these photographs. Rose communicates leisure, and minuscule figures evoke the famous French post-impressionist "bathers" series by Cezanne.
Emmanuel Fremin Gallery in New York City is exhibiting Rose's works, and they describe how the extreme point of view affects what we're seeing:
… people sharing common behaviors and exposing themselves like hedonistic herds. The stills of people swimming, surfing or just sitting down on their beach pads suggest a showcase or, given the distance, an Insectarium. One can even see a religious connotation: the bird's eye view makes people seem insignificant dots in the infinite space of the universe, crushed by the immensity of the water field, recalling the biblical universal flood; seen from the sky, like through god's eyes, people and nature coexist in harmonic or tense relationships.
Miami isn't the first or only place that Rose has photographed. Previous series of Up in the Air include the Hamptons, Long Island, and Wollman Skating Rink in New York City. To capture these images, he is situated outside of a helicopter that flies as low as 600 feet.
View Up in the Air Miami at the Emmanuel Fremin Gallery from February 27 – May 3.
Antoine Rose's Risks Death To Take These Bird's Eye Photos Of Miami Beaches appeared first on Beautiful/Decay Artist & Design


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20200 4.5W Corduroy Stepped
|Quality / Type of fabric:
|Off White
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Product number: 20200030-R
To place orders in our webshop you need to register as a business customer. It is not possible to create an account as a private person. Please note that we only deliver to companies with a valid VAT number. Do you already have an account? Please login. Not yet created an account? Please Sign up. | Rolls and Double folded options are shown with an average length. Therefor the actual amount of meters may vary. The exact amount of meters will be shown on the final order confirmation and invoice. | * We do our best to display the product photos as accurately as possible in our webshop. Despite that, it may happen that the color differs slightly from reality.


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- Home
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Ring Central
With a RingCentral cloud phone system, you plug IP desk phones and PCs into your Internet connection and install the RingCentral Mobile App on your employees' smartphones. These endpoints communicate with the RingCentral cloud platform for secure voice, fax, text, audio conferencing, and online meetings. It's that simple — for all your office locations.
Moving your business phone system to the cloud is simple and straightforward. Setup is fast, and a RingCentral implementation specialist will facilitate a smooth transition for all your office locations and remote workers.
Your account representative helps you determine how many users and how many IP phones your business will need. Use your existing IP phones, or rent them from RingCentral at affordable prices. You also can connect your PCs and smartphones to the service with free RingCentral applications.
If you wish your account representative will help you transfer your existing phone numbers, or order new lines, choosing from local, toll-free, and vanity numbers suitable for your business. Desk phones you order arrive in days, fully configured and ready to go. When you first log in, an online wizard walks you through setup of your users and phone system settings. As your business grows, you can easily add new users, groups, and phones. Virtually all these setup and management features are also available on RingCentral Mobile Apps for iPhone and Android.
Flexible Management
You can manage your entire RingCentral phone system from your desktop computer or smart devices for all users across all office locations. It's an integrated solution, all managed through the cloud. You have complete control. All using a familiar, user-friendly Web interface — check boxes, dropdown menus, fill-in text fields.
It's easy to add and change users, assign phones, manage extensions and groups anytime, from anywhere. No need to tie up your IT department, or schedule a visit from an expensive contractor or a phone-company technician. Best of all, your users can manage most of their own settings from their own computers and smartphones. So they take less of your time and resources.
When you see how easy it is to manage your cloud phone system, you will never look back leaving on-premise systems behind.
Mobile-enabled Phone System
For most businesses today, BYOD (Bring Your Own Device to work) is here to stay. Employees don't want to carry two phones, one for work and one for personal calls. Yet integrating personal mobile devices into the corporate system is a challenge for management—and for security.
RingCentral addresses this with the RingCentral Mobile App, which fully integrates employee mobile devices into the company business phone system. Using the RingCentral Mobile App, employees can make business calls, check business voicemail, send and receive business faxes and text messages, and access the company directory. They can set up or join voice conferences and online meetings. And because they are using their RingCentral business number, not their personal number, they maintain their business identity.
The Cloud also means an added level of security, a constant worry with mobile devices used in business. Because the RingCentral Mobile App streams everything to and from the Cloud, data such as company numbers, call logs, voicemail, text messages, and faxes are not permanently stored on the user's phone. If a phone is lost or an employee leaves, simply disabling the account login ensures that no important company data can be accessed.
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Troy, N.Y. – Researchers at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute have created a road map that brings academia and the semiconductor industry one step closer to realizing carbon nanotube interconnects, and alleviating the current bottleneck of information flow that is limiting the potential of computer chips in everything from personal computers to portable music players.
To better understand and more precisely measure the key characteristics of both copper nanowires and carbon nanotube bundles, the researchers used advanced quantum-mechanical computer modeling to run vast simulations on a high-powered supercomputer. It is the first such study to examine copper nanowire using quantum mechanics rather than empirical laws.
After crunching numbers for months with the help of Rensselaer's Computational Center for Nanotechnology Innovations, the most powerful university-based supercomputer in the world, the research team concluded that the carbon nanotube bundles boasted a much smaller electrical resistance than the copper nanowires. This lower resistance suggests carbon nanotube bundles would therefore be better suited for interconnect applications.
"With this study, we have provided a road map for accurately comparing the performance of copper wire and carbon nanotube wire," said Saroj Nayak, an associate professor in Rensselaer's Department of Department of Physics, Applied Physics, and Astronomy, who led the research team. "Given the data we collected, we believe that carbon nanotubes at 45 nanometers will outperform copper nanowire."
The research results will be featured in the March issue of Journal of Physics: Condensed Matter.
Because of the nanoscale size of interconnects, they are subject to quantum phenomena that are not apparent and not visible at the macroscale, Nayak said. Empirical and semi-classical laws cannot account for such phenomena that take place on the atomic and subatomic level, and, as a result, models and simulations based on those models cannot be used to accurately predict the behavior and performance of copper nanowire. Using quantum mechanics, which deals with physics at the atomic level, is more difficult but allows for a fuller, more accurate model.
"If you go to the nanoscale, objects do not behave as they do at the macroscale," Nayak said. "Looking forward to the future of computers, it is essential that we solve problems with quantum mechanics to obtain the most complete, reliable data possible."
The size of computer chips has shrunk dramatically over the past decade, but has recently hit a bottleneck, Nayak said. Interconnects, the tiny copper wires that transport electricity and information around the chip and to other chips, have also shrunk. As interconnects get smaller, the copper's resistance increases and its ability to conduct electricity degrades. This means fewer electrons are able to pass through the copper successfully, and any lingering electrons are expressed as heat. This heat can have negative effects on both a computer chip's speed and performance.
Researchers in both industry and academia are looking for alternative materials to replace copper as interconnects. Carbon nanotube bundles are a popular possible successor to copper, Nayak said, because of the material's excellent conductivity and mechanical integrity. It is generally accepted that a quality replacement for copper must be discovered and perfected in the next five to 10 years in order to further perpetuate Moore's Law – an industry mantra that states the number of transistors on a computer chip, and thus the chip's speed, should double every 18-24 months.
Nayak said there are still many challenges to overcome before mass-produced carbon nanotube interconnects can be realized. There are still issues concerning the cost of efficiency of creating bulk carbon nanotubes, and growing nanotubes that are solely metallic rather than their current state being of partially metallic and partially semiconductor. More study will also be required, he said, to model and simulate the effects of imperfections in carbon nanotubes on the electrical resistance, contact resistance, capacitance, and other vital characteristics of a nanotube interconnect.


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ConEd: NY Sandy Power Outages Slip; Costs Could Reach $450 Million
By REUTERS
November 11, 2012
NEW YORK (Reuters) - Consolidated Edison Inc on Sunday said about 3,900 customers in New York City and Westchester County remained without electricity nearly two weeks after Hurricane Sandy battered the U.S. Northeast.
Con Edison said its crews and thousands of utility workers from around the country were working to restore power to its more than 1 million customers affected by Sandy and the Nor'easter storm that followed a week later.
Response and restoration costs for both storms were estimated at $350 million to $450 million, the company said in a statement.
Con Edison said it used its experience with Hurricane Irene in August 2011 - previously the largest storm in the company's history - as a basis for the cost estimates, but said Sandy caused five times as many outages as Irene.
Hurricane Sandy came ashore on October 29 in southern New Jersey. A record storm surge across the Northeast, including in New York City, caused flooding and widespread damage to much of Con Edison's underground electrical equipment. In areas with overhead power lines, workers had to contend with more than 100,000 downed wires, blocked roads and flooding.
Con Edison said it was "on track" to restore power by the end of the weekend to virtually all customers who were affected by Sandy and whose equipment can accept service.
In shoreline communities in Brooklyn, Queens and Staten Island, the company had identified about 30,000 customers who needed electrical equipment repaired and certified as safe before service could be restored.
Approximately 8,000 of those customers now had service, but others would not able to get service until their own internal equipment was repaired, tested and certified by an electrician as ready.
The company said it was working with the New York City Buildings Department to expedite restoration for those customers, and it continued to work closely with the New York City Office of Emergency Management, the Westchester Office of Emergency Services and other emergency officials.
Con Edison said it had gone through a year's worth of some materials since Sandy, including the replacement of 60 miles of electric cable, and it has responded to "tens of thousands of locations."
(Reporting by Eileen Houlihan in New York; Editing by Leslie Adler)
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Washington (CNN) - On the eve of his State of the Union address, Barack Obama's approval rating is at its highest level in more than a year, according to a new national poll.
But a CNN/Opinion Research Corporation survey released Monday also indicates that while the president gets high marks on foreign policy and national security issues, a majority of the public disapproves of how he is handling the economy and the federal budget deficit - issues that are likely to dominate Obama's State of the Union address on Tuesday.
Fifty-five percent of people questioned in the poll say they approve of how Obama's handling his duties in the White House, with 44 percent saying they disapprove.
"The 55 percent figure is seven points higher than in December and 13 points higher than his September mark," says CNN Polling Director Keating Holland. "The president's approval rating has not been this high since November of 2009 in CNN polling."
Not surprising, Democrats overwhelming approve of the job Obama's doing, with Republicans disapproving. Fifty-four percent of independent voters questioned give a thumbs up to how the president's handling his duties.
"Fifty-three percent of men now have a positive view of Obama's track record, the first time a majority of men have approved of Obama since December of 2009," Holland says. "Obama's approval is now 61 percent in the Midwest - home to key battleground states like Ohio, Michigan and Wisconsin - making that his strongest region of the country. Even among Southerners, Obama's rating is now at 50 percent - something we have seen in our polls in a year."
On issues, the poll indicates that Obama benefits from his status as Commander in Chief. Six in ten approve of how he is handling terrorism; 57 percent like his track record on foreign policy and more than half approve of how he has dealt with the situation in Iraq and Afghanistan. But foreign affairs are not likely to take up much time when Obama gives his State of the Union speech.
By contrast, Obama continues to get his worst marks on the federal budget deficit - likely to be a major topic on Tuesday night and a growing flashpoint between him and the Republicans in Congress. Six in ten disapprove of how Obama is handling the deficit; 55 percent don't like his record on health care and 54 percent disapprove of his economic policies. The number who approve of how he has handled the economy, although still below 50 percent, has increased five points since November.
The president gives his State of the Union address to a joint session of Congress. According to the poll, congressional approval ratings remain very low, with more than seven in ten saying that they disapprove of how Congress is handling its job.
The survey indicates that Obama seems to have some residual advantage over the GOP leaders in Congress: 52 percent say Obama's policies will move the country in the right direction; only 46 percent feel that way about the Republican leadership. But Democratic congressional leaders fare as poorly, with only 45 percent saying that their policies would move the country in the right direction.
The CNN/Opinion Research Corporation poll was conducted Jan. 21-23, with 1,012 adult Americans questioned by telephone. The survey's overall sampling error is plus or minus three percentage points.
- CNN Deputy Political Director Paul Steinhauser contributed to this report
Is it me or is the country actually headed in the right direction finally.
Is it me or is the Right still complaining that the sun is shining and that its not raining?
Is it me or will the Right complain when the country gets fixed, and wont stop whining until theyre back in power to destroy it again?


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Barely a month into series production of the first all-electric sports car, Tesla Motors is making more of a name for itself lately for lawsuits than for the Roadster. Lawyers for Silicon Valley's darling automaker are busy charging former partner turned rival Henrik Fisker with the theft of trade secrets related to Tesla's WhiteStar hybrid sedan, while at the same time defending the five-year-old company from breach-of-contract accusations being leveled by former transmission supplier Magna Powertrain. That's a lot of drama on the receiving end for a startup that was supposed to teach Detroit how to build a lightning car at lightning speed. What's going on here?
The Magna suit (click here to download) is pretty standard fare in the automotive world. In fact, Ford is currently in the middle of a similar dispute with engine supplier Navistar for dramatically higher stakes--several hundred million dollars instead of the $5.6 million demanded by Magna. But even with that kind of cash at stake, truck engines (and, let's face it, Ford) aren't as sexy a grab as Tesla. The company's well-documented struggles to get an acceptable transmission in its Roadster have led to several stops and starts with both outside and inside development, and the Magna suit--if it goes much further--will give us an inside look into what went wrong. The actual dispute is pretty simple: Magna's done work for basically every major carmaker you can think of, and its lawyers say that when Tesla showed up in 2006 with a request for a two-speed transmission, Magna's seasoned engineers suggested that a one-speed drivetrain would be a better fit--but Tesla insisted on the two-speeder. When development stalled, Magna says Tesla walked away without paying.
The big issue for the court will be Magna's contract, which says Tesla only has to pay up for "satisfactory services performed and any actual costs that [Magna] may have incurred" if it cancels the deal. Tesla is likely to say that none of the services performed were satisfactory, but that doesn't explain why it hasn't paid Magna's costs, and the court will still have to decide if Tesla walked away for good cause. Without looking at a mountain of paperwork from both sides, there's really no way to predict how this one will turn out, except to say that Tesla's probably not going to be too enthusiastic about sharing transmission development specs, schedules and problems with the world during trial, a fact that Magna's lawyers will likely use as leverage to get a settlement. Still, if Tesla wants to become as big a player in the automotive scene as its own marketing suggests, Elon Musk and Co. had better get used to arguing with suppliers, making nice with the rest of the industry and waiting through long development cycles--it's just part of the game, one that the company may just now be learning to play for real.
More From Popular Mechanics
Sharing is at the heart of this week's other lawsuit (click here to download), which has a lot more going for it in terms of melodrama. Tesla says it hired Henrik Fisker and his company, Fisker Coachbuild, to design the upcoming WhiteStar, a four-door gas/electric hybrid sedan. What Tesla didn't hire Fisker to do was soak up as much information as it could while working with Tesla and then turn around and unveil the Fisker Karma, a sleek new--wait for it--four-door gas/electric hybrid sedan. Tesla says it gave Fisker employees full access to all kinds of data and production information during the WhiteStar development process, and that Fisker stole it all to build the Karma. Henrik Fisker was previously an Aston Martin designer, not an electric-vehicle developer, and Tesla says there's no way he and his company could have up and developed a high-performance electric vehicle without stealing Tesla's trade secrets--even if he was getting more of a look at the powertrain than at the motor and batteries, which are the real meat of any plug-in car. It's worth noting, by the way, that Fisker is building its electric vehicles with components from Quantum Technologies, a big government supplier that might have developed its own under-the-hood tech.
But since Tesla remains convinced that the Karma is chock-full of Tesla's electric ingredients, it has asked for a preliminary injunction against the Karma's sale, which, if granted, means that Fisker wouldn't even be able to take pre-orders for the Karma until the case was closed. What's more, Tesla has abandoned all of Fisker's work on the WhiteStar because it claims Fisker purposefully provided substandard designs to Tesla while working on the WhiteStar so that it could get the jump on them with the Karma--so Tesla wants the $800,000 it paid Fisker back, plus additional penalties.
Tesla's going to have to do some work to get that injunction, though. According to Matt Gavronski, a Chicago patent attorney: "In order to completely prevent Fisker from using its `trade secret' technology, Tesla will have to show that the allegedly stolen technology couldn't have been acquired simply by taking apart and analyzing a Tesla vehicle--once the vehicle is released to the public, anything that could be reverse-engineered by a mechanic, engineer or scientist with access to the vehicle loses its status as a protectable trade secret." While the WhiteStar isn't available yet, the Roadster is technically out there already (albeit just in Musk's garage); so if there are any technical overlaps between Tesla's first two cars, the court could potentially declare them unprotected.
That's not to say that Tesla doesn't have a case--the bait-and-switch they claim Fisker pulled off would be pretty outrageous, especially if the company didn't let Tesla know it was working on its own car, as Tesla alleges. But Tesla is not going to win the case by walking away, and this isn't going to get resolved quickly. It would be surprising if the court didn't grant the preliminary injunction, though, which would push the Karma's scheduled early 2009 release closer to 2010--approximately the same timeframe Tesla has established for the WhiteStar. This could upset the whole race for major production of an electric car in the U.S., which may be the main result of this whole drama. If anything, that's a win for Tesla. Let's just hope the company that set out to upend the automotive industry achieves its competitive goals in the lab and in the marketplace--and keeps its future fights out of the courtroom.
Copyright attorney Nilay Patel works at Chicago law firm Agency 68 and covers legal affairs and all things competitive daily at the supergeek blog Engadget.


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Few were surprised when Microsoft (along with Intel) announced that they would back HD DVD over Blu-ray. While Microsoft's stance on the next-generation of optical storage media was officially neutral, their close working relationship with Toshiba led us to suspect that HD DVD would get the nod. The interesting question is, why?
It has been said that Microsoft simply wouldn't back something put out by Sony, but that argument doesn't have traction. First, Microsoft's VC-1 video codec is supported by both Blu-ray and HD DVD; there's no strategic edge there to speak of. Additionally, over-emphasizing the competition between the PlayStation and the Xbox ignores the fact that Sony and Microsoft have a substantial working relationship. Witness Sony's line of Vaio computers, as well as Sony's Microsoft-DRM-backed music store.
The decision to back HD DVD stems not from a dislike of Sony, but from the assessment of the maturity and consumer-friendliness of HD DVD. No, seriously.
Managed Copy: what is it, and what it isn't
First, a little Realpolitik. We all know about CSS, the encryption scheme used to "protect" DVDs from unauthorized copying. It was cracked (famously), and both Blu-ray and HD DVD are designed to be much, much harder to circumvent. While calling anything crack-proof is pretty foolish, phenomena such as the iTunes Music Store demonstrate quite clearly that many people are comfortable with DRM if it allows for some flexibility. That is, DRM isn't going anywhere, and even the most pointy-haired geek should see that.
Making copies of a DVD is technically illegal in the United States, because circumventing access controls is forbidden by the US Code, except in rare instances. The problem with this, of course, is that it violates our Fair Use rights as citizens, and it punishes those of us who abide by the rules, while the real pirates (organized crime) go on largely unabated.
Microsoft, among others, wants to see this changed.
Currently, HD DVD is the only next-gen format to provide for the ability to legally make copies of optical content. Dubbed "Managed Copy," HD DVD implements part of the AACS control mechanism to allow for things such as putting digital copies of a disc on a hard drive, transferring a movie (legally) to a portable player, or streaming content on a home network. Furthermore, HD DVD makes Managed Copy mandatory: all content provided on HD DVD must give users the option of making at least one copy. Jordi Ribas, director of technical strategy for the Windows Digital Media Division, told me that while the feature is mandatory, the studios will have the option of charging for it. Ribas hopes that studios will allow at least a single copy "for free," but it may be market conditions that ultimately determine the cost of such features. The take-away, at least, is that studios have to offer something, and AACS is structured in such a way that the studios can tap into it to offer users more options.
Furthermore, because Managed Copy is part of the AACS specification, this isn't a feature exclusive to Microsoft or Intel solutions. While both companies believe that their respective products (Media Center Edition, and Viiv, respectively) will shine in a world were Managed Copy is available, AACS defines a set of requirements that technically any company could aspire to, be it Apple, Motorola, or another player in the game.
What about Blu-ray? Currently, Blu-ray has announced no such mandatory support. There are also plenty of questions about whether or not Blu-ray will entertain this option. The Blu-ray Disc Association so far has adopted AACS conditionally; it is still subject to review. Furthermore, Blu-ray to date has adopted content protections above and beyond AACS, adding BD+ and ROM-Mark to their arsenal. Such added protections appear to be part of an appeasement plan: the studios want more than AACS protection, at least least some of them do. The doors haven't closed on Managed Copy for Blu-ray, but Ribas suspects that if it does show, it may be completely optional, to the extent that content producers may simply not offer it at all. It also remains unclear as to how BD+'s unique compliance rules could be made to work with AACS's managed copy scheme. In general, Ribas' view is that the BDA is uncommitted to Managed Copy. I expect to talk to someone in the BDA in the next few days.
Hybrid mode: drop-in upgrade?
Ribas also emphasized that HD DVD's hybrid support was ideal for consumers. As I noted yesterday, the idea is simple: if HD DVD discs can play standard definition content in already-existing DVD players, then the entire industry could theoretically switch to HD DVD printing quickly, and kill two birds with one stone. As you may know, a DVD is comprised of two discs that when bonded together are 1.2mm thick. Toshiba's current plan is to put SD content on one side of the disc, and HD content on the other side. In theory, this eliminates problems with older DVD players having difficulties focusing on dual-layer content on one side of the disc. With the costs of converting existing DVD production lines to HD DVD lines being significantly cheaper than supporting Blu-ray, HD DVD proponents see HD DVD as being a no-brainer. The "future proofing" of the format means everyone goes home happy, including consumers who buy DVDs next year that will play back in HD whenever they get around to upgrading their players two years from now.
Finally, Ribbas said that Microsoft's decision was made with respects to where things are today, not where the respective formats' proponents claim they will be in several months. Today, Ribbas says, HD DVD has bigger capacity, and true hybrid support. In his view, HD DVD is at 30GB, while Blu-ray is at 25GB. On paper, Blu-ray has 50GB support, but outside of a lab context, the 50GB disc is missing in action. How feasible is a 50GB disc in the short term? Once Blu-ray devices ship (such as the PS3), the base configuration will be established. If 50GB disc support isn't nailed by then, then Blu-ray on the consumer player-level will weigh in at 25GB. Toshiba is now pointing to 30GB as the standard HD DVD disc size, and they claim to have perfected the manufacturing process already. So we can expect 30GB HD DVD support at launch. Additionally, HD DVD supports hybrid discs now, while Blu-ray's solution has yet to be demonstrated.
Despite all of this, Ribas indicated that Microsoft was still holding out hope for a universal standard, but such a standard would necessarily need to support things such as Managed Copy and hybrid support.
One thing is clear to me now: HD DVD looked down and out, but it now looks quite promising. The question now is how will the studios react? Is it too little, too late?
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Kansas legislators are resuming discussions of education funding in the wake of a state Supreme Court decision that faulted the way certain funds are distributed to school districts.
The court on Friday ruled the state's funding of schools unconstitutional, and pointed to two specific areas related to aid for poor districts as needing immediate attention.
Legislators have until July 1 to fix the problems, which the state Department of Education said could cost as much as $129 million.
House and Senate Education Committee members scheduled a joint hearing Monday on funding to help students considered at risk of failure because of their families' low incomes.


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In a month where many big-name automakers posted just so-so sales results, General Motors (GM -0.09%) did quite well for itself: GM's U.S. sales were up 7% in February, a good gain over a rough year-ago showing.
That compares well with the overall market's likely increase, which analysts expect to come in at just under 4% once all the numbers are tallied. And it's solidly ahead of the roughly 5% gain analysts expected for GM on the month.
So what went well for the General? Quite a few things, it turns out -- though there were a couple of red flags as well.
Will big truck sales lead to big profits?
For GM shareholders, the most striking number has to be the increase in the General's full-sized pickup sales. GM's pickup sales were up 28% over year-ago totals, well ahead of the 15% gain posted by rival Ford (F 0.79%), as an uptick in new-home construction drove increased demand.
That's significant. Pickups are among GM's most profitable products, a key driver of profits in GM's all-important North American region. That's why investors have been watching GM's truck inventories carefully in recent months. The company's inventories swelled to worrisome levels late last year, as GM moved to stockpile pickups ahead of a planned refitting of its truck factories -- leading to concerns that deep discounts would be required to clear out excess trucks.
GM has tried to assuage those concerns, pointing out (reasonably) that its truck factories will be offline for several weeks while they are fitted with new tooling to produce GM's redesigned next-generation pickups, due at dealers in late spring. But its inventories continued to swell -- to 117 selling days' worth as of the end of January.
Things are finally looking up on that front: GM reported on Friday that its pickup inventories had fallen to 97 days' worth as of the end of February. That's comfortably closer to the 90 days' worth considered optimal by most industry-watchers, and it comes thanks to those strong February sales.
But those sales may have come at a cost. While Ford's spending on incentives was likely down in February, according to estimates from analyst Jesse Toprak at TrueCar.com, GM's may have been up a bit over year-ago levels. That could have been a driver of pickup sales – but it could also end up cutting into GM's first-quarter profits.
A strong showing as Cadillac gathers steam
Looking beyond pickups, GM had a good month on several other fronts. Cadillac sales were up 20% in February, powered in part by the growing success of its hot ATS sedan. February was the best month yet for the ATS, as it continues to gain traction amid glowing reviews. The compact luxury sedan, a strong entry aimed directly at the class-standard BMW 3-Series, has quickly risen to become the second-best-selling Cadillac after the popular SRX crossover SUV.
While SRX sales were down, most of GM's other crossovers posted solid gains, just as you'd expect in a snowy February. Sales of the Chevy Equinox were up 15.7%, and the GMC Terrain posted a 21.2% gain. And interest in the Chevy Volt continued to build, as sales of the innovative hybrid were up nearly 59% in February.
But the story elsewhere was mixed, as Chevy's bread-and-butter Malibu, Cruze, and Sonic all posted sales declines -- though the weather in many parts of the country (unseasonably warm a year ago, snowy last month) may have affected year-over-year comparisons. Still, it's clear that GM needs more new products.
Fortunately, more new products are coming soon.
Next up: New sedans for Cadillac and Buick
GM's ongoing new-product offensive will continue at the New York Auto Show later in March, where GM has said it will show three new premium sedans: the Buick LaCrosse and Regal, and the important all-new Cadillac CTS.
The Cadillac in particular will be worth watching closely. Rebuilding the Cadillac brand is key to GM's global ambitions, and the CTS -- which will compete directly with the BMW 5-Series and Lexus ES sedans -- needs to be a "no excuses" top-notch competitor when it makes its debut. Will it be? Watch this space.


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Story by
Ben WoodsEurope Editor
Ben is a technology journalist with a specialism in mobile devices and a geeky love of mobile spectrum issues. Ben used to be a professional Ben is a technology journalist with a specialism in mobile devices and a geeky love of mobile spectrum issues. Ben used to be a professional online poker player. You can contact him via Twitter or on Google+.
Watching the skies, keeping our ears to the ground – paying attention to the newest, most exciting startups is a pretty big part of what we do here at The Next Web.
But now and again, we like to collaborate with other companies that share our focus. So, we teamed up with Beta List – a site that documents early stage and pre-launch startups – to bring you a shortlist of some of the most exciting startups that have just launched, or are just about to launch in one form or another.
Some are further down the road than others, but all are early stage startups you might want to keep an eye on in the year ahead.
To view this post on one page click here.
We caught up with Updatey's founder Benjamin Dell to find out what he was cooking up.
What is Updatey and who's it for?
"Project tracking, presented beautifully. Simply, manage, track and visualize the progress of your project; share the results with your team, clients and stakeholders. [We] focus on presenting typical project information and 'noise' in a meaningful and elegant way, Updatey is perfect for teams that see the value in keeping everyone on the same page and providing timelines, reports and information that almost anyone can understand."
How is it different to your competitors?
"Our primary objective is to create a suite of tools that anyone within the team – whether they're a developer, a project coordinator or a client – can understand and make use of. We're fanatic about ensuring that when someone adds information to a project, no matter whether it's a deadline, a task, a comment or a status update, that it is presented back to the wider team in a clean, beautiful and intuitive way.
"And this, it turns out, is quite an important focus to have, as it can have quite a transformative effect on the way that you and your wider team think about and engage with your project."
"By contrast, you only need to look at a random selection of existing project management tools and you'll quickly find that the way project information and key metrics are presented is far from elegant or easy to digest."
How big is your team and how have you funded the project so far?
"We're a small team of 5, based in the UK and privately funded. Although we're not actively looking for funding or investment, I am conscious that with the right financial injection and partnership, Updatey's ambitions could be realized far sooner – I like to keep my ears to the ground in case such an opportunity were to present itself."
What stage are you at now with the launch?
"We unveiled the beta 'badge' back in October 2013. During the 3 months that ensued, we attracted over 3,500 beta signups and an incredible response from the community. We officially moved out of beta and into revenue mode in mid January 2014. We're now heavily focused on delivering the next phase – including enhanced project management capabilities, in a typically 'Updatey' way, of course."
➤ Updatey
We got in contact with Miguel Estrada from Snippit.
What is Snippit and who's it for?
"Snippit is a new social music app to share your moments through music by creating short snips (of four to 10 seconds) and having the option to add a photo or caption to share with your friends and followers. It's a completely new way to express yourself not only with a picture or words but with a verse that fits the moment. It's also a great tool for music discovery, allowing users to search and download music through the app. Snippit is for everyone: from teenagers to musicians or music lovers."
How is it different to your competitors?
"Everyone loves music but so far there [hasn't been] any app or social network that gives you the opportunity to be creative using music as a way to express yourself and share your moments or feelings… Most music apps just show you what your friends are listening to, or allow you to share just a pre-set 30 second song preview. Snippit gives users the ability to choose an exact verse or section of the song to share, and that creative control is very powerful and fun."
How big is your team and how have you funded the project so far?
"Our co-founders are Joe Grano and Sam Jurist, and we have a design and development team of six people. Joe and Sam previously worked together at a sustainability company called Ecological LLC and had success in that venture. Joe has spent the last couple years working in the entertainment industry at Leverage, working with the producers and creators of shows like Entourage and Boardwalk Empire. His experience in film and music was very influential in the creation of Snippit. Joe and Sam formed Snippit Media Inc. in May 2013, and thus far the company has raised an internal friends and family seed round of $500,000."
What stage are you at now with the launch?
"We had a soft launch in December for friends and testers and we had our official launch at the beginning of February. So far the feedback has been incredible and we've been seeing some nice growth in user base. Currently we are working on updates and marketing to get Snippit in the hands of users, musicians, and social media influencers. We're very excited for more people to discover Snippit and have fun with the app. We truly feel it's unlike anything out there."
➤ Snippit
TNW contacted Range's Bartosz Pietrzak to find out about the newest team software on the block.
What is Range and who's it for?
"Range is a team scheduling software for agencies & studios. It fits between and enhances both project management and the sales process. Imagine that you're running a design/development studio and a new client approaches you with a project of specific size that requires a specific skill set. "When can you start?" is one of the questions that Range helps you answer."
How is it different to your competitors?
"Most of our competitors try to do too much – e.g. they incorporate tasks management into scheduling software. We have been designing Range with two goals in mind: first, that it should not replace existing tools but enhance them, and second, that the scheduling process should be as smooth as possible."
How big is your team and how have you funded the project so far?
"Range is bootstrapped at Monterail, a design & web development agency. We have the funds as well as competencies to create the product in-house."
"The team consists of Monterail's CTO Tymon Tobolski, Head of Product Design Krzysztof Trzewiczek, and its founders me [Bartosz Pietrzak] and Szymon Boniecki."
What stage are you at now with the launch?
"We have the prototype that we're testing with teams of different sizes. After months of figuring out the best way to manage our team members' time and schedules in a software agency, we think we have a solution. We are very excited to see if this could bring value to other teams."
➤ Range
We got in touch with Shadow's founder Hunter Lee Soik to find out about his dream project.
What is Shadow and who's it for?
"We want to build the largest global dream database with a community of dreamers, we welcome anyone and everyone."
How is it different to your competitors?
"We are happy to share the space with the other apps on the market, we have organized eight [team members with] Ph.Ds who are all focused around the study of sleep in dreaming and hope to forward the global understanding."
How have you funded the project so far?
"We have raised around $80,000 on Kickstarter and we're in the process of finding the right angels to help on our mission."
What stage are you at now with the launch?
"We are internally testing and will release a beta to the early backers on Kickstarter in the near future."
➤ Shadow
TNW got in touch with Peak Director Marshall Haas.
What is Peak and who's it for?
"Peak is an automated way to keep track of what everyone is working on. It's aimed at growing companies that feel out of touch with who's working on what. As your headcount grows, it becomes harder to keep track of what's happening day to day."
How is it different to your competitors?
"There are many apps that aim to help you keep up with your team. The difference with Peak is we do it without ever requiring users to input, upload, or type out anything day to day. Peak figures out what you're working on by connecting with the services you're already using. Everything happens automatically. This approach also helps cut down on workplace interruptions. Your team is free to focus on their tasks at hand without having to worry about updating the correct people."
How big is your team and how have you funded the project so far?
"Peak is a product of MetaLab, which is a bootstrapped company that's been around for over 7 years. We have a couple other successful products, Flow and Ballpark. My team team consists of 3 backend devs, 1 front-end dev, 1 designer, and myself."
What stage are you at now with the launch?
"We're approaching our public launch. We launched privately a few months ago and have sales in the five figure range."
➤ Peak
We caught up with Chad Newell, founder of Snapwire.
What is Snapwire and who's it for?
"Snapwire is a mobile app that gives mobile photographers a real-time feed of paid photo requests from creatives, businesses, and brands. Stock photo buyers post a photo request on our website and photographers use our iOS app to submit creative photos to match. If your photo gets purchased, you get paid."
How is it different to your competitors?
"Creative collaboration – that's our big differentiator. Think 99 Designs for stock photos."
How big is your team and how have you funded the project so far?
"[There's me], Paul Filitchkin (Lead Dev and Chief Architect), Kerry Usry (Senior Dev), Eric Willis (Agile & Scrum Lead Software Dev), Danielle Storllie (UI/UX product) and Lindley Marie (Community Manager)"
What stage are you at now with the launch?
"[Snapwire] just moved from private beta into a [public] beta."
➤ Snapwire
We got in touch with one of Exposure's creators, Kyle Bragger.
What is Exposure and who's it for?
"Exposure is a tool designed to help you create beautiful photo narratives — that is, to tell a story through sets of photos and written word. We started out by targeting different groups of photographers, from hobbyists to semi-pros, all the way to full-time professionals. As we've grown, though, we've definitely noticed that our most active users tend to be somewhere in the highly skilled hobbyist to semi-pro realm."
How is it different to your competitors?
"Aside from a clear, up-front business model, our singular goal was to give users the absolute best photo narrative builder around. Using Exposure means your photography looks great no matter the device or screen size. In other words, we make it effortless to tell a great story."
How big is your team and how have you funded the project so far?
"The team right now is Luke Beard, myself, and Luke Crawford. We're incubated at a company called Elepath, which took a little funding a few years ago and is the brainchild of Jake Lodwick, creator of Vimeo. Our mission is to fill the world with great software. To us, that means releasing well-designed, thoughtful, and sustainable products which make their users' lives better."
What stage are you at now with the launch?
"We launched to the world in December 2013 and are now happily on our way to profitability. Prior to that, we ran a private beta for a few months with about 150 photographers."
➤ Exposure
Featured Image Credit – Shutterstock
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Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance2012 Action/Adventure | Suspense/Thriller | Comedy | SciFi/Fantasy
In the successor to the worldwide hit "Ghost Rider", Johnny still struggling with his curse as the devil's bounty hunter is hiding out in a remote part of Eastern Europe when he is recruited by a secret sect of the church to save a young boy from the devil. At first, Johnny is reluctant to embrace the power of the Ghost Rider, but it is the only way to protect the boy and possibly rid himself of the curse forever. In 3D at select locations.
Streaming Now On
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text:
Comfort Design Furniture - A Quality American Furniture Company
Our name merely speaks for itself. We put comfort into every piece of our diverse, designer line of upholstery. Only the best ingredients go into our products. We use 2.5 Density high resiliency foam. Our fiber backs are enclosed in bags with partitions where applicable to maintain appearance. Frames are made from only hardwoods, mortise and tenon construction. And this is just the start.
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text: ACCEPT At 16:55 5/15/00 -0400, Steven M. Christey wrote: >[...] > >Spaf was one of the strongest advocates for organizational-level >signatures, but he's shown support for Scott's suggestion. So barring >any concerns to the contrary, I propose that we append the following >after the text of the statement, before the signatures: > > "This statement represents the professional opinion of each > individual signer, and may or may not represent the official > position of the signer's parent organization." > >How does that sound? > >- Steve


text:
Officially, the Chevrolet Volt gets 60 mpg when running on electricity and gasoline. But one GM engineer who ran electric-only mode for several weeks traveled 1,554 miles on half a gallon of gas — or 3,108 mpg.
Andy Oury's video posted by GM also shows the Volt's "maintenance mode," where the car senses its engine has sat unused and turns it on for a few minutes to circulate its fluids. If Oury doesn't use his entire tank of gas within a year, the Volt will run a longer engine burn to empty its tank before the gas gets stale. The Nissan Leaf employs a similar strategy to keep fuel fresh — although it only works for diesel used by tow trucks.


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What's your love temperature?
Have you checked out the Love Lab over at Science Gallery? Participated in the survey and tests? Contributed your face for the construction of the reputedly most beautiful average face? Or attended either the speed dating or scientific blind date event? If so, what's your verdict?
Anyone who hasn't yet drop by should do it now. The exhibition is winding down, with many of the once-off associated events over now – but there's still the Kiss and Make Up body casting event tomorrow, which will be interesting to attend.
Love Lab ends next week, on Friday 12 March 2010. So go on, measure your love temperature there.


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DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. — There was no fire or rain. Still, another frantic finish at Daytona International Speedway.
Tony Stewart emerged the winner, charging past Daytona 500 winner Matt Kenseth on the last lap and holding on as the challengers stacked up behind him Saturday night in one of Daytona's trademark wrecks.
"I don't even remember what happened that last lap," Stewart said.
He has 18 victories at Daytona, second only to the late Dale Earnhardt.
Stewart qualified second but started near the back of the field because his time was thrown out by NASCAR when his Chevrolet failed inspection. He rode around in the back for much of the event, letting Roush Fenway Racing teammates Kenseth and Greg Biffle control the front.
The Roush drivers thought they had the field covered, and probably still liked their chances on the final green-white-checkered restart. Kenseth was the leader with Biffle on his bumper, as second-place Stewart was lined up with Kasey Kahne.
Kenseth and Biffle pulled away for a lap, but Stewart came quick on the outside, moved to the front, then crossed down the track in front of Kenseth for the lead. Seconds later, Biffle seemed to wiggle in traffic and cars began wrecking all over the track.
"I'm not really sure what happened, they just started wrecking behind us," said Kenseth, who started from the pole in his bid to become the first driver since 1982 to sweep the two Daytona races in the same season.
"It seems like we always end these things in green-white-checkers, and whenever you do, really anybody that's in the front few tandems has a shot to win the thing. It's so unpredictable. You do things those last two laps that you'd never do the rest of the race. It's really hard to figure. You sit out there and ride around and be leading the whole race and come down to one of the green-white-checkers and have no idea where you're going to finish."
The final results showed Jeff Burton came from nowhere to finish second in a Richard Childress Racing Chevrolet, followed by Kenseth in a Ford and Joey Logano in a Toyota.
Stewart teammate Ryan Newman, who was involved in a pit road incident with Kahne and Jeff Gordon, finished fifth. Roush driver Carl Edwards was sixth and was followed by Kahne, Brad Keselowski in a Dodge and Michael Waltrip. Bobby Labonte rounded out the top 10.
Biffle, who was in third on the final restart, dropped all the way to 21st.
Roughly 90 minutes before the race, NASCAR announced AJ Allmendinger had been suspended for failing a random drug test taken last week at Kentucky. Penske Racing rushed Sam Hornish Jr. in from North Carolina to drive Allmendinger's car, and Hornish arrived just minutes before it was time to climb in the car.
He was doing an admirable job until a tire problem caused him to spin, bringing out the first caution just past the halfway point. Hornish finished 33rd, and Penske officials said they'll meet this week with Allmendinger to get a better understanding of the situation.
Stewart, meanwhile, picked up his third win of the season, which ties him for the most in the Sprint Cup Series with Keselowski. The defending series champion has won this race at Daytona four times in his career, all within the last eight years.


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Zoran Tasin
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Siemens 6SL3220-2YE62-1CP0 available at EU Automation. Get in touch today for a quick price.
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I had a great experience with EU…
I had a great experience with EU Automation, they're reliable and robust. Everything I bought is good.
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john grosso
We had a major piece of equipment fail…
We had a major piece of equipment fail and needed 2 prox switches ASAP. Between Erica Olivo and Denis Pavel, they made it happen. very fast. Excellent communication and follow up. Thank you both very much. John
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I dealt with a really great salesperson! Was able to locate the Breaker I needed in Germany and drop shipped it to me in less than a week. Great price and very reasonable shipping charge. Did not have a previous account either. Top Notch!
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Service is fast and quality is assured. Thank you so much Fabrice Marclay
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Allways know the root cause for your machine malfunction!!!
I bought a MITSUBISHI servo motor brand new (prestime original package) that was delivered without any issues. It is working PERFECTELY!! Please be advised that they sell PARTS. Industrial machines are very complex and a part failure can be caused by another faulty part our machine missuse. Allways be extremely certain that you know the root cause of the failure - otherwise you may replace a part that fails shortly after replacement ( and blame the PARTS suplier... )
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Floods. (shiver) Here in New Orleans, we're a little shell-shocked about them because we're located about a dozen feet below sea level. In my lifetime, I've seen it happen several times, most famously in 2005 thanks to Hurricane Katrina. My home was among the many casualties, although you'd never know it to look around here now. Seriously, I think someone sneaks useless trash and clutter into my house while we're asleep.
But let's get back to floods. I want to talk about the biggest flood of all times. Because its story is being told on the big screen in a movie that opens this Friday, March 28. It's called simply … Noah. Have you seen the trailer yet?
I'll be seeing this movie very soon, most likely with my mother. And I'll be positively hyperventilating during all the destruction scenes. Water-related disasters (Titanic, The Perfect Storm, Jaws) get me in the gut every time. Maybe I need to rethink those cheese sticks and go for something more "stomach-friendly" for this one.
(We all know I'm still getting the cheese sticks, right?)
Oh, and before I forget, my friends at Grace Hill Media asked Mel and me to help promote the movie release with a little giveaway. Actually, we have TWO giveaways because everything related to this movie should be done in PAIRS. (I'll just assume you get that joke.) Wanna see what you could win? Remember, ODNT has a very limited marketing budget so we can't afford to hire any fancy models for the photo shoot.
Each prize package contains three items: A hoodie shirt, a raincoat (duh!) and a baseball cap.
Be flattered. Because I absolutely despise how I look in baseball caps. And I never put them on. For anyone. Here's why.
Don't even TRY to tell me you don't see the resemblance.
* * * * * * * * * *
So, I'll be keeping the shirt and the raincoat but passing the cap on to my Godchild. Named NOAH, of course. His birthday is this week. (Happy birthday, buddy!!!) Want a set of Noah merchandise of your very own? Mel and I can totally make that happen. Right now.
Remember to fill out the rafflecopter completely. Just clicking the 'tweet the giveaway' option can earn you TEN extra entries each day. The promotion ends on Monday, March 31, 2014.
* * * * * * * * * *
Good luck!
For more information about the movie, visit noahmovie.com.


text: Window Pane Plaid Loyal Dark Blue 12710 46 $12.52 $2.98 yard Number of yards (min. 1/2) -- 1/4 1/2 3/4 Qty. Add to Cart This item is currently on backorder but you can still purchase it now and we'll ship as soon as more become available. Wonderfully soft brushed flannel from Primitive Gatherings for Moda. These are woven fabrics that are very soft and work very well in rag quilts. Tweet


text:
Vancouver, BC (PRWEB) July 05, 2012
Lumerical Solutions, Inc. (http://www.lumerical.com), a global provider of optoelectronic design software, announced today the release of FDTD Solutions 8.0, the leading nanophotonic design environment based on the finite-difference time-domain (FDTD) technique. Release 8.0 extends the material modeling capabilities of prior versions to include the ability to model liquid crystals and other spatially-varying anisotropic materials, and a Flexible Material Plugin (FMP) framework that enables researchers to model a wide variety of other materials, including nonlinear, magneto-optical, and saturable gain materials.
The new FMP framework enables researchers to describe via computer source code a materials polarization and magnetization as a function of the electromagnetic field and other physical quantities. Release 8.0 is expected to contribute to the development of components in the fields of optical switching, integrated magneto-optical polarization control, quantum communications and silicon photonics owing to the wide array of nonlinear effects available in silicon.
Flexible Material Plugin Method Provides Arbitrary Accuracy and Unrestricted Complexity
Modular FMPs can be combined with Lumericals proprietary Multi-Coefficient Materials (MCMs), providing an extensible design environment for modeling complex nanophotonic systems. With MCMs offering the turn-key ability to generate accurate broadband material models, and the FMP providing an open framework for researchers to add onto those MCMs nonlinearities, gain and other effects of interest, users can build broadband material models offering arbitrary accuracy and unrestricted complexity.
Weve been in discussions with the nonlinear photonics community for years, working to understand their diverse interests and to develop a design environment that can accommodate their needs, according to Dr. James Pond, Lumericals CTO. With the release of FDTD Solutions 8.0, researchers can quickly write a few lines of code to incorporate a Kerr medium into their simulation, or painstakingly develop hundreds of lines of code to model a multi-level atomic system. Either way, when it comes to simulation, with FDTD Solutions 8.0 researchers can focus on developing sophisticated material models while relying on Lumerical for everything else.
"As an existing user of Lumericals software, I am especially pleased by the new nonlinear optics capabilities available in FDTD Solutions 8.0, according to Professor Robert Boyd of the University of Ottawa in Canada and the University of Rochester in the United States. "Much of my current research entails the design of photonic structures and devices for use in applications such as all-optical switching. The new capabilities of Lumerical will conveniently allow my group to treat both the linear and nonlinear properties of these structures using the same numerical platform."
Native Source Code Fosters Collaboration and Accelerates Innovation
To facilitate the development and sharing of these FMPs, they are written in native C/C++/FORTRAN computer source code and compiled into dynamically linked library plugins for FDTD Solutions. This allows for the open joint development of source code by collaborators, or the restricted sharing of binary material models coded by third-party developers. Validated FMPs developed by external parties that are shared with Lumerical will be included in standard, cross-platform build packages available to the photonics community.
For many established research programs that have already been working on modeling such materials, materials may be introduced into FDTD Solutions 8.0 with minimal modifications to existing source code. Our team in the Electronics and Photonics Department is specialized in the area of computational electromagnetics for next-generation active devices in the fields of plasmonics, photonics and nanophotonics according to Dr. E. P. Li, Department Director of Electronics and Photonics at the Institute for High Performance Computing in Singapore. As pioneers in this field, we are interested to start integrating our existing material algorithms into Lumericals FDTD framework. We anticipate that this will make our advanced algorithms more accessible to a broad range of end users."
Lumerical is now shipping FDTD Solutions 8.0. Interested parties can download a free, 30-day trial or learn more about FDTD Solutions online at http://www.lumerical.com/tcad-products/fdtd/.
About Lumerical
Since its inception in 2003, Lumerical has pioneered breakthrough simulation technologies that help bring new optical product concepts to life. By empowering research and product development professionals with high performance optoelectronic design software that leverages recent advances in computing technology, Lumerical helps optical designers tackle challenging design goals and meet strict deadlines. Lumerical's design software solutions have been licensed in more than 30 countries by global technology leaders like Agilent, ASML, Bosch, Canon, Harris, Northrop Grumman, Olympus, Philips, Samsung, and STMicroelectronics, and prominent research institutions including Caltech, Harvard, Max Planck Institute, MIT, NIST, University of Tokyo and the Chinese Academy of Sciences. Discover how Lumerical can help you meet your own design objectives by visiting us online at http://www.lumerical.com.


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(CNN Student News) -- Students will investigate the contributions of Hispanic Americans to U.S. culture, and what it means to be an Hispanic in America today.
Point out to students that Hispanic Heritage Month (September 15 - October 15) celebrates the culture and traditions of those who trace their roots to Spain, Mexico and the Spanish-speaking nations of Central America, South America and the Caribbean. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, "September 15 was chosen as the starting point for the celebration because it is the anniversary of independence of five Latin American countries: Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras and Nicaragua. In addition, Mexico and Chile celebrate their independence days on September 16 and September 18, respectively."
In observance of Hispanic Heritage Month, send student groups on a multimedia scavenger hunt to investigate how Hispanic Americans have contributed to U.S. culture, and the opportunities and challenges that exist for Hispanics in America today. Pose the following questions to guide students' research:
1. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, what is the estimated Hispanic population of the United States? What percent of the total U.S. population does this number represent?
2. What aspects of Hispanic culture can be found in the U.S?
3. Who are some Hispanic Americans who have had an impact in U.S. politics and government?
4. Who are some famous Hispanic-American musicians, artists, writers and actors? How have they impacted U.S. culture?
5. What Hispanic businesses exist in your community and other parts of the U.S.? How have these businesses contributed to the U.S. economy?
6. What issues have you seen or heard about in recent news that are of interest to the Hispanic community?
Have groups share and discuss their findings with the class.
Instruct each student to interview several Hispanic-American teens and adults to get their responses to the following question: What would you like other Americans to know about what it means to be Hispanic in America today? Have students summarize the interviewees' responses and share them with the class.
Correlated Standards
Social Studies
I. Culture
Social studies programs should include experiences that provide for the study of culture and cultural diversity.
V. Individuals, Groups and Institutions
Social studies programs should include experiences that provide for the study of interactions among individuals, groups, and institutions.
The Curriculum Standards for Social Studies (http://www.socialstudies.org/standards/ are published by the National Council for Social Studies (http://www.socialstudies.org).


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He's been called the "Latino messiah," and "the next Obama" — and San Antonio Mayor Julian Castro, at 38, hasn't even been elected to a statewide or federal office yet.
But if his hot-hot appearance Monday in San Francisco at the Commonwealth Club of California is any indication, he may be one to watch.
Castro, who was the energetic and widely-praised keynote speaker at the 2012 Democratic National Convention, will be addressing the public interest group today at 6 p.m. in San Francisco.
And already, the event at the Market Street headquarters is sold out.
The San Antonio Mayor and Stanford alum is the twin brother to another Democratic rising star — Texas Rep. Joaquin Castro, who was recently named the head of the 113th Congress' Democratic class.
For old time's sake, here's the mayor's much heralded 2012 convention speech:
We'll be covering the mayor's speech in San Francisco and delivering updates on his remarks later today.
Stay tuned.