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This article is more than 1 year old
Seagate loses $3bn in a year
But market is turning up
Seagate lost $3.09bn in its fiscal year to the end of June, with revenue plummeting 23 per cent to $9.8bn. In its final 2009 quarter it lost $81m, on revenue 19 per cent down at $2.35bn, compared to a profit of $160m a year ago.
The bare numbers are horrible but the outlook is much better.
The company spent $106m on restructuring and allied activities in the quarter. A six month cost-reduction and restructuring programme is showing results. Steve Luczo, Seagate's CEO who took back the reins from the ejected Bill Watson at the beginning of the year, said: "The overall organizational, operational, technical and product progress we have made during the last six months is reflected in our financial results for the June quarter and demonstrates meaningful progress." He also added: "We are also seeing signs that the storage markets are improving." He does not think this is due to inventory build-up in the channel.
The company's outlook is for first fiscal 2010 quarter revenues of $2.4bn - $2.6bn, higher than previous guidance of $2.35bn - $2.5bn. Seagate hopes to improve its margins in the quarter by 200-350 basis points.
These are pretty important numbers. The gross margin in the quarter was 17.6 percent, with previous guidance indicating about 15 percent. Seagate is now hoping for about 20 per cent next quarter, an increase from previous expectations of 18 per cent.
However, it warned that "the September quarter outlook does not include the impact of any potential new restructuring activities, future mergers, acquisitions, financing, dispositions or other business combinations the company may undertake."
Stifel Nicolaus analyst Aaron Rakers is hopeful, pointing out: "The company's transition to new areal density platform (250GB/platter 2.5-inch and 500GB/platter 3.5-inch) drives is progressing." He reckons the company had approximately half of its production from these new areal densities and is looking for 80 per cent in the next quarter. Luczo said: "For our long term growth we have redeployed our technical resources to refocus on areal density leadership across all of our products."
Seagate's Robert Whitmore, EVP and chief technology officer, said: "Launching new products at the next areal density point continues to be an important priority as well and several significant milestones were achieved in the June quarter. We delivered our aerial density leading 2.5-inch two disk 640 gigabyte drive (320GB/platter) to our US retail partners and will continue to ramp that product within this quarter. "
Seagate thinks it's important to have capacity leadership in retail products, for shelf appeal, and it hasn't had that over the past couple of years, which weakened its retail business.
Talking of discrete track recording and bit-patterned media, areal density improvement technologies slated to succeed the current perpendicular recording technology, Whitmore commented: "We see conventional perpendicular recording expanding for the next several generations. We're making investments so that we'll be ready for the conversion but we don't see that for a number of years in front of us."
Turning to solid state drives, he said: "Our solid state product development is on track and we remain focused on delivering our first enterprise SSD later this calendar year. We are fully engaged with our customers and supply chain partners and remain committed to delivering solid state storage devices with the performance and reliability this market demands." The first deliveries will be to OEMs, with much of 2010 taken up by qualifications by the OEMs.
In summary Rakers said: "Ample upside remains in this restructuring story that looks to benefit from an improved underlying demand environment," particularly in the enterprise market.
The recession appears to be bottoming out and even turning up for Seagate, although the way ahead still looks murky. Profitability hopefully beckons. ®


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His decision in 2007 to include fuller-figured models on his catwalk may have cost Mark Fast a stylist and creative director days before his show, but two years on and the Canadian designer's whispering latticework of fine-gauge and figure-loving knit dresses have won him a diffusion line for Topshop, an love affair with footwear thanks to Christian Louboutin, and a forthcoming jewelry collection. Tumbleweeds are bouncing through East London in the days before London Fashion Week as reclusive designers and entrenched creative teams beaver away in their studios. But we managed to lure Mark to the surface for (we hope!) a welcome distraction and a hint of what's to come in his SS11 collection.
What three things can you not do without right now?
My peaceful, quiet bedroom, family and my knitting assistants.
More From ELLE
From what did you draw inspiration for your SS11?
It's a collection about hope amongst despair. I'm mixing fragile textures with more dangerous ones, like a butterfly with alligators. I'm inspired by reptiles and the repetitive, uneven texture of their skins and I want to bring that danger to the clothes.
What's your color palette?
Black, burnt tropical colours and white.
Any new materials in the mix?
I'm working with these fantastic new jagged Swarovski elements. I'm looping the crystals into the knit and they'll drape off the body creating a beautiful lighting effect.
Your line for Topshop is on fire, any other collabs on the horizon?
I often see women wearing wearing my Topshop collab around London. It's such a great feeling to see my designs in a mass market. There are alot of exciting collabs for SS11 including a capsule collection with Pinko and an accessories line with Atelier Swarovski. I am happy!
Can we continue to count on fuller-figured models gracing your catwalks again this season?
I've fallen in love with the girls I've worked with in the past. They're like family.
Summer is fast becoming a distant memory, what were your holiday highlights?
I wasn't able to get back to Canada and swim in the lakes so the pool at my gym has been the closest thing to a holiday this summer.
What will you be looking forward to most when the maelstrom of Fashion Week quiets down?
I will go on holiday to Canada. I am a family guy, that's for sure.
Check ELLE.com next week for pictures of Mark's SS11 collection!

subset: commoncrawl


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Something's wrong somewhere.
— Clifford Odets (Golden Boy, 1937)
Something's wrong somewhere.
— William Saroyan (My Heart's in the Highlands, 1939)
It's unlikely that Michelle or Barack Obama have read or given much thought to American playwrights Clifford Odets and William Saroyan. Both men found their soaring voices during the Great Depression—great grand-daddy of the "Great Recession." (Frankly, I prefer to call it what it is, "Great Depression II.") Then, as now, it took gutsy artists to cut through the rich-slime world of Fred Astaire-Ginger Rogers Hollywood fantasies, to announce that the Emperor and Empress were wearing nothing but their vanity.
Perhaps it was easier then! Americans still read and the informed and urbane actually went to see plays with bite and social relevance. There was a labor movement, and men would stand up in their union halls and they learned how to hone their truths with hard-edged words about "bosses" and "the working man." Women would read Hans Christian Andersen's fables to their kids, and teach their children frugality and compassion for the less fortunate. They told the old stories–folk tales about right and wrong, monsters, and decency. Poets like Edna St. Vincent Millay took up the cause of Sacco and Vanzetti when they were scape-goated as anarchists. One of the most popular men in the country was Will Rogers, who would spin his lasso over the floor, and wryly comment that he only believed what he read in the papers—and everyone knew that meant he didn't believe a word of it—and neither should they!
No one twirls the lasso anymore; Americans may be the most de-contextualized people on the planet. About a month ago I caught a TV glimpse of Mother Michelle down on a beach on the oil-slicked Gulf of Mexico, urging her countrymen to come on down: enjoy the water, gulp the gumbo, support the economy! A couple of weeks later, there she is in low-cut evening wear—nice cleavage, First Lady!–trying to out-cougar Naomi Campbell! Seems there's a gala at the White House, starring billionaire beetle, Paul McCartney. Flash-forward a couple of weeks, and there she is with 10-year-old Sasha at the most expensive hotel in Spain. Word is the First Family is picking up the tab for their "personal expenses," but tax-payers are out at least $375,000 for fuel for Air Force 2, expenses for accompanying Secret Service, staff, etc. (A mere $6500 per night for the hotel—not counting room service!)
Hey, what's a lousy $375,000 these days?—chump-change for a little mom-daughter bonding. Ask the unemployed oyster-shuckers on the Gulf Coast what it's worth. Ask Mr. and Mrs. Dispossessed American, losing their house to the bailed-out banks.
Just don't ask the Clintons. Apparently, they've no problem shucking $2,000,000 for daughter Chelsea's wedding. Remember when Hillary's failed presidential bid ran up a huge debt? The Dems boo-hooed: Help poor Hillary pay back her stiletto-heeled dupes! Remember the Haiti earthquake of 6 months ago? There was Bill and new pal, George Warmonger Bush, doing their soft-shoe routine in the rubble of Port-Au-Prince, holding out their hats for American kids to send their pennies to the starving kids of Haiti.
Last I heard, there's still a lot of starving kids in Haiti, and a whole lot more of them in Iraq since the American invasion and occupation. How many kids could $2,000,000 feed?
Moscow is choking, Pakistan is drowning, Gaza is withering, war clouds gather over Iran and Korea… dead zones in the oceans… but, rejoice! Chelsea has married her investment banker!
Something's wrong somewhere!
Nine years after 9/11, and no one has bothered to build scale models of the twin towers and shoot scale-model jets into them to show how such a free-fall collapse could or could not have occurred! We're lost in the spin machines, "science" and "truth" serve the state and money, and we can laugh with Bush over missing weapons of mass destruction—and missing limbs on Iraqi kids!
We have no context for the hurrying images of our post-modern, technological existence: merely a fading mythological memory of Herculean heroes—Washington, Jefferson, Lincoln—all of whom, on closer inspection, had feet of clay. The long-sustaining, post-war vision of the future—the dream of a brave and independent people creating lives of fulfillment and security—recedes as we approach, and we find ourselves in a hell-hall of mirrors with nothing but distorted images of corrugated figures of "the working man," "blue-collar," "professionals," "progressives," "conservatives," "man," "woman"—and looming over all, like gods, giants and the Biblical Nephilim—our "celebrities," the Colossi of fame and fortune whom we love and fear and worship, for they possess the power of life and death.
Perhaps if we had a literary history, perhaps if we were still a people who read and thought, and supported activist theater… perhaps then we would be a people who could learn and grow in maturity and depth of vision. Then we might understand plays like Odets' and Saroyan's, and Eugene O'Neil's The Hairy Ape—poem-dramas about the dignity, even heroism, of "the little people." Then we might be wide-angle people with some comprehension of the breadth of human history; even our own–short, blood-drenched, and syncopated with acts of courage. We could meet and tell each other our stories. We'd gear our education, and evaluate it, not on the sham of No Kid Left Behind programs, and the equal sham and shame of Bush-era test-oriented "teaching," but on how well we told our stories, how well we acted under pressure; and the core, humane values we shared.
But we have no literary sense of ourselves. We do not see the great plays of the past acted on our wide-screen HDTVs, with their endless sports, killings, canned-laughter, packaged news and commentaries, unreality shows. We have Law and Order re-runs and spin-offs to teach us of the dangers of our streets and our sole salvation in the surrendering of self to official—and, increasingly officious and intrusive—authority. Mindless sitcoms demean life and trivialize the struggles of the "common folk" (actually, the majority). We no longer know how to talk to one another, to hear the simple eloquence of truth and moral character. We're a nation of pretense—hollow men and women, parading like mannequins in the malls of our children's nightmares.
I know that the past can acquire rosy hues. I don't bemoan any loss of the worst of it—the waste, ignorance and abuse. But… what cataracts have we grown that we can't even see through the glitterati who possess and oppress us now?


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February 8, 2012
Retirement reception Feb. 10 for Chuck Werring
Submitted by Communications and Marketing
Students, faculty and staff are invited to join housing and dining services from 3-5 p.m. Friday, Feb. 10, at the Frith Community Center in the Jardine Apartments Community to wish Charles "Chuck" Werring congratulations on his retirement. Brief remarks will be at 4 p.m.
Werring, assistant vice president for student life and past director of housing and dining services, retired in February 2012 after a distinguished career that included leadership in taking the $100 million Jardine project from the drawing board to reality. Werring joined K-State in 1990 and was promoted to assistant vice president in 2005.
"I want to personally thank Dr. Werring for his leadership of our department," said Derek Jackson, director of housing and dining services. "As he retires he is leaving a legacy of care for the students and staff. He is a visionary who has helped shape our department, campus and the campus housing profession."
Werring received numerous awards and honors during his career, including the William B. Sweet Distinguished Service Award from the Upper Midwest Region-Association of College and University Housing Officers in 2007, and the James C. Grimm Leadership and Service Award in 2002 from the Association of College and University Housing Officers-International, which he has served in many leadership roles.
Werring is also the founder of the Association of College and University Housing Officers-International STARS COLLEGE, which encourages and mentors undergraduate students in domestic and other countries who live in residence halls to seek a career in housing or other student affairs work.


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Hello Roar Little Dinosaur
Meet Roar, the brave and strong little dinosaur who knows it's okay to do things differently. The series consists of 6 books, this is just one of them. Roar books have been specially created to help children with high-functioning Autism/Asperger's Syndrome and those who live and work with them. Just like Roar, children with Autism think in a different way.
The enchanting books invite children, parents/carers and professionals to celebrate the strengths of children with Asperger's. Roar has many great qualities including honesty, determination, attention to detail, exceptional memory and a sense of humour. Roar helps children move from feeling, 'I've got it wrong!' to saying, 'This is me. I'm okay.'
Roar is the main character in each book, alongside a family member and her supportive friend. She uses her special talents and likes to be busy, but enjoys taking a break by hiding – just as children with Asperger's find joining in can be hard work and like to take a break, perhaps by doing a simple activity on their own; routine and ritual restore an overloaded mind.
While created for those on the autistic spectrum, Roar's zest for life will appeal to children and families everywhere!
Full colour throughout, written in rhyming verse, with 36 pages in each book. Size: 210 x 148mm.
Order Ref: admt12117
Call us on 091760446 to order or for a quotation.
Email - firstname.lastname@example.com


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Technology is a double edged sword that we wield that must be handled with care less we cut off one of our own limbs. Technology allows us to be more productive and work faster than without it but as we embrace more technology to relieve us of many manual tasks we must not let it rule our very existence.
Technology must be used as a lever, not a crutch. When we give up our ability to function in daily life and allow technology to rule our every move, we ultimately give up our freedom. To allow technology to dictate what we can do and when we can do it is to reduce ourselves to nothing more than compliant slaves to it.
When a hospital cannot perform operations or even see patients because their computers are down or we cannot communicate or travel because of computer hacking, we have allowed technology to become a crutch that prevents us from falling on our faces in its absence. When we cannot buy food or fuel or depend on electrical power for basic needs we have become too dependant on the technology we invented to assist us.
The use of technology is a good thing that allows us to move forward and build things we never dreamed of before but when it becomes a weakness, we need to reexamine our use of it. If we become so dependant on technology that we cannot function without it we are preparing ourselves for a doomsday scenario when it eventually fails and we are helpless to care for ourselves.
It is only logical to have backup systems to utilize in the event our technology fails for some reason. This is the whole reason we have people to warn us before hand such as the EMP Commission to tell us we are in danger if certain events happen. Technology provides us with many good things but it also leaves us susceptible to many bad things as well if we ignore our responsibility to use it wisely and not become too dependant on it.
Many people today can actually have withdrawal symptoms if they lose access to their technology for any length of time. This should be an alarm to society but most just brush it off as fear mongering. When the loss of technology causes a business to completely stop operations, that should be an indication they do not have sufficient backup systems to fall back on.
One of the prime tenants of the prepper movement is that they have multiple backup systems to rely on if technology stops working. This is just a logical step taken by people that have taken the time to analyze the threats posed by the loss our technology and determine action is warranted for the preservation of life following certain events. The less technology you require to take care of daily activities, the more freedom you have to live a normal life.
Most people still do not take the threat of technological disruptions to society seriously. They think that if something happens, someone will fix it and life will go on as normal. What they refuse to contemplate is if something happens and nobody can fix it. As society moves along this technological road they become more dependent on it and the risk to their lives increases as they lose the ability to do basic tasks. Hopefully this latest cyber attack will instill in people the need to have backup systems in place to continue their daily activities and live life as a free person and not be a slave to the technology they so eagerly seek.


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Terri Schiavo suffered a cardiac arrest in 1990. Her brain was deprived of oxygen and she lapsed into a "persistent vegetative state." That was fourteen years ago. Let her live or let her die? Who has the right to decide on Terri Schiavo's fate? While this is being debated, Terri's life hangs on the line. The tube that had allowed her to be fed was removed last Friday. She is not allowed to be nourished or hydrated. Dying by starvation and dehydration is a painfully slow process. It will take anything from two to four weeks for Terri to die.
One can only speculate why, after being awarded more than US$1 million in a malpractice suit that provided for Terri's lifetime care, her husband, Michael Schiavo, is unrelenting in his pursuit to end her life. According to Michael, on several occasions before her cardiac arrest, Terri had indicated to him that she would not want to continue living should she be in a condition she currently is in. It was exposed that this was not revealed by Michael during the malpractice proceedings.
Terri's case brought memories of another painful episode of Mum's last few days to the fore. When she lapsed into a coma and could not be fed or take her medicine orally, I decided not to send her back to the hospital. I believe that was her wish and I was determined to fulfil it.
"If I die, I want to die at home," she had pleaded to me at the hospital. "Please take me home."
My decision was based on those words. To take her back to the hospital and get a feeding tube or an intravenous drip inserted would have prolonged her life, for how long I do not know. But that was not what she had wanted. I stopped feeding her and stopped her medication. What was I supposed to do when she was no longer responsive to all stimuli short of sending her back to the hospital?
Friends that I consulted had their reservations regarding my decision. I could sense from the hesitation in their voice. However, they advised me to hydrate Mum, or at the very least keep her lips wet. Following their advice, Mum's lips were kept moist with a cotton ball every half hour.
When Peter came, he insisted that I feed Mum. He could not bear the thought of Mum going hungry. He crushed the tablets and mixed it with honey and fed Mum, bit by bit. She had problems swallowing. It was also a slow process because the medicine tasted awful even with the honey.
In a way, I am glad that Peter was adamant that Mum be fed. It was my mistake in not persisting to feed her. I made the decision to stop because the milk that was fed to her all dribbled out from the corner of her mouth. Eventually Mum learned to swallow. However, all oral medication was discontinued. The only medicine administered was rectal suppositories for her persistent fever.
That all happened within a frame of two days. I have no guilt in not sending Mum back to the hospital. I truly believe that was what she had wanted. As her only son, it was my duty to comply with her last request. She wanted the dignity to die at home. She died at home, surrounded by loved ones. I truly believe that was what she had wanted.
Decisions like these can be very painful and difficult to make. On one hand, we cannot bear to see our loved one's suffering prolonged but on the other to let them go is one thing that we are dreadfully reluctant to do. Ultimately, it all depends on what one's spiritual beliefs are. Do we subscribe to a religion that disallows euthanasia? Do we believe that we are at liberty to decide on our own fate and that of other's?
Terri is a Roman Catholic. So are her parents. The Roman Catholic Church is totally against any from of euthanasia. This should have been taken into account when the judge gave the order to remove the feeding tube. The other question is whether Michael Schiavo or Bob and Mary Schindler, Terri's parents, are in a better position to decide for Terri; and now whether the courts or the politicians can decide on that too. What has the worth of her life become when it can be decided by another human?
Last night, while we were talking about Terri's plight, I asked Wuan, "What will you do if I am in a similar situation?"
"I don't know," was her terse reply. "What do you want?"
"My faith disallows euthanasia," I continued, although I was acutely aware that she was getting uneasy.
"That is what we have to abide by then."
I left it at that. She understood what should be done. My stand was clear. I did not want to pursue that issue with her any further.
Related entries:
Coming Home
The Right To Die?
A Caring Society Reacts
Managing Me


text:
given to me by my friend Shira
Romaine lettuce, cut in bite size pieces
5 scallions, sliced
Handful of shredded white cabbage
3 tomatoes, cut in chunks
1 cup sour cream and onion flavored Nish Nosh crackers (or other brand like Tam Tam), broken in chunks
1/2 cup water
1/2 cup oil
3 tablespoons mayonnaise
4 tablespoons sugar
1 1/2 teaspoons dijon mustard
1 tablespoon soy sauce
Salt and pepper to taste
Mix all dressing ingredients together. Shake well. Top the salad with the dressing. Serve.


text:
Posts From April 2002
Duffel on DroorsThey are sporting him the flow for the moment but have him in line for the full monty. Rock on.
Chaos tour update.Report from Charlie Thomas. On the road....
Foundation crew crushes Oregon in one day. Tony Silva grinded a corner kinked rail. That's right a kink that goes around a corner. Corey Duffel was the tough guy of the day with a k-grind, backside 50-50, and feeble on a super kinked rail with steps as long as sidewalks. As if this was not enough, he did a front side board slide on a 12-stair rail with little or no room for landing. He then kick flipped over a quite large street barrier with a sign and a sand bag as a launching pad. This was all accomplished in one day.
The whole F crew then proceeded to destroy the Department of Skate Works Park in Portland. They shook some hands at skate shop Cal's Pharmacy and called it a day. They're on their way to Exit Real world Salem, OR to decimate the remainder of the state. Now why do they call Oregon the beaver state?
FOSKCO news.Daniel Shimizu just bought a new sleek black Civic 2002. If you see him coming get off the sidewalk immediately! Currently Daniel has some good stuff in the works for TWS, so keep your eyes peelin on and off the road.
It's officially official! Corey Duffel is now an official Glam Boy. If you did not know already the controversial and amazing rider of the boards Mr. Corey Duffel is the Foundation Skateboards newest rider and in FULL effect. Dubbed the "loose cannon" on Foundation, Corey is ready to take over. Check out his bio page for details, drawings and photos.
Corey is all healed up now from his encounter with the jocko rocko and is out shreeeding again. Word on the street is something about an 18 stair to huge drop. Amazing! Look out for that shit soon!
Justin Strubing is feeling much better and is starting to roll around. Look for him on the cover of the new monsterskate catalog.
Ethan Fowler has also been very busy. Right now he's working on a Pro Spotlight and a video part for TWS. Both of which are sure to be daft punk.
Jon West stopped by last week and hung around the headquarters for a couple days. Some heavy sessions went down everyday after work. Jon drove down from BC and was on a little mini tour for himself his girl and his baby. Hold up! Jon's girl is 7 months along and the baby is not born yet, but it's coming soon. If it looks anything like Jon and his girl, it will be gorgeous!
Tony Silva just accepted sponsorship on RVCA. This new clothing company is taking over!


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Story highlights
"What the kids are telling us, it was 24-7 either loud music or static," the police chief says
Girls said they ran to a neighbor's house to escape their knife-wielding stepfather, a report says
They tell police they may have been held captive for as long as two years, report says
Parents face charges of child abuse, kidnapping; stepfather faces sex abuse count
Three sisters who were imprisoned for possibly two years in a Tucson, Arizona, home were bombarded by a constant barrage of music or white noise day and night, police said Wednesday.
The psychological torture is the latest allegation in a case that was blown open early Tuesday morning when two of the girls, ages 12 and 13, ran to a neighbor's house to escape their knife-wielding stepfather, Police Chief Roberto Villasenor said during a news conference.
Authorities found the third sister, age 17, locked in a bedroom, he said.
The girls – who appeared malnourished and extremely filthy – told investigators that they had been "imprisoned in their bedrooms for at least the last several months and possibly up to two years," according to a police incident report.
Inside the house, authorities allege they found a macabre scene: locked doors with elaborate alarm systems and a video and sound system that allegedly allowed the stepfather and mother to watch the girls while torturing them with a "constant barrage" of music.
In September: 3-year-old starved to death
The girls' stepfather, Fernando Richter, 34, and the mother, Sophia Richter, 32, were arrested and booked into the Pima County Jail.
Sophia Richter faces three counts of kidnapping, three counts of child abuse/emotional abuse and three counts of child abuse/physical abuse. The stepfather faces the same charges, plus an additional count of sexual abuse with a person younger than 15, according to the report.
Villasenor would not elaborate on the sex abuse charge Wednesday, saying only, "We had enough to charge him with that."
A judge on Wednesday set bond for Fernando Richter at $100,000 and for Sophia Richter at $75,000 after the pair appeared in court via video, according to CNN affiliate KOLD.
The case began to unfold just after 4 a.m. Tuesday, when police responded to a report of a domestic incident involving a knife, according to the incident report.
When police went into the house, they found the 17-year-old locked in her bedroom.
Mother chains son to radiator for weeks
When they opened the door, they were met with loud music that they couldn't hear from the hallway because the room's duct work had been sealed and towels had been shoved under the door, Villasenor, the police chief, said.
"What the kids are telling us, it was 24-7 either loud music or static," Villasenor said.
Cameras were installed in the girls' bedrooms, and if it appeared the girls liked the music, they were then exposed to white noise or static, he said.
The girls were "extremely dirty" and told police they hadn't bathed in at least four months, according to the incident report.
"They were kept in filthy living conditions and allegedly only being fed once a day," it said.
Investigators also found evidence that they were forced to use their bedroom closets as a bathroom, according to the report.
Diaries kept by Ariel Castro's captives show torment, trauma
A reporter during the Wednesday news conference told Villasenor that the girls' grandmother accused the three of exaggerating their plight, saying the girls were home schooled and not allowed outside because their parents didn't like the neighborhood.
Several pieces of evidence suggest otherwise, the chief said, citing specifically a journal documenting the last 18 months found in the 17-year-old's satchel. There were also alarms on interior doors and constant video surveillance of the girls' bedrooms, he said.
When the sisters were reunited, Villasenor said, "to the detectives it appeared that they had not seen each other for quite some time."
The neighbors who gave the girls sanctuary the night they showed up asked not to be identified and told CNN affiliate KTVK that they had lived there since August and had never seen any children.
One of the neighbors said the girls "were distraught and visibly shaken. … They didn't have any shoes on, and they looked like they had just gotten out of bed."
CNN's Chelsea J. Carter contributed to this report.


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Parking in the city — don't wanna hear it. Take away 14 parking spots — come again? Yet add something nice in the neighborhood, and voilà, people forget those 14 parking spots ever existed. Or at least most people do.
Often, business owners see the parklets that have grown up along Valencia Street as an extension of commercial space. Customers and many residents see them as a social space. But to some residents, the park-like patches are hell on the ground — rest stops for the homeless or noisy drinkers.
In less than two years, six parklets have appeared in the Mission; four on Valencia and two on 22nd Street. Citywide the parklet population has jumped to 31 in little more than two years, according to pavementtoparks.sfplanning.org. The new public spaces met little early opposition, but that may be changing.
A new parklet proposed for the Mission Beach Café at Guerrero and 14th streets is running into a backlash. At least one proposed for 24th Street was shelved by neighbors who opposed it, and when the first-ever Mission parklet on 22nd and Bartlett disappeared for renovation, some neighbors were relieved to see it go and unhappy when it returned.
Another, planned for 826 Valencia, appears to be on schedule, however. According to Paul Chasan, the planner for this parklet, 826 is in the midst of designing the space. Once the design is finalized and approved, the Department of Public Works (DPW) will issue a final permit. At that point, they may begin building.
"More people can sit in a spot than [the] one car [that] can fit in a spot," said Betsy Barron, owner of Luxe & Love. She said the Crepe House parklet draws attention to her own business and creates a nice atmosphere along Valencia Street.
"It's a safe, clean place where people can mingle," added Kazu Matsuba from Taylor Stitch, near Four Barrel's parklet. He said crowds of people are good for business. "They'll sit there, then turn around and walk in."
"It eliminates the capitalist structure," said Ash, a barista at Revolution Café. "People can hang out and aren't forced to buy something."
That, said some, is just the problem. After business hours, homeless people move to the scene, and sometimes after-hours drinkers gather there. "People are getting territorial," said Heather from Currents soap store. "They spit, pee, do drugs." She said it's turned into a new element of the sidewalk.
Heather said she'd be furious if a parklet were to be installed near her home.
But others disagree. The Deepistan National Parklet — Valencia's only parklet by a private residence — is near an ice cream shop. Nearby resident Kong Son said people stop by, sit down and chat over ice cream.
Parking Issues?
But what about parking? Parklets reduce the already limited number of parking spots in the neighborhood.
"It's worth it," said Jeanne Finley, who drove to Lost Weekend to pick up a video. "It's an alternative way to interact with the community." Potrero Hill resident Jeff Saltzman doesn't mind, either. "I like to see nice things in my neighborhood," he said. Saltzman acknowledges that parking will always be a struggle, but said there will always be spots to find. A real solution to parking, Napa Valley resident Kurt Niznik said, would be parking garages.
Like many residents, some business owners don't see the loss of spaces as a big deal. "It's three parking spots…who cares?" said Leah of NO vintage boutique, referring to Four Barrel's nearby parklet. "It's OK if there's a few less spots," said Jena McWhirter of Escape From NY Pizza, referring to the parklet outside her business, which also provides outdoor seating for the business. "It affects the parking in the slightest amount."
Others see the big deal. Franny Giuliani of Paxton Gate pointed to the parklets as a cause of worsening parking conditions. "They're supposed to be nice for the community, but they take up parking spots," she said. "They cause more problems than they solve."
Jenny Liu, who runs Tokyo Futon + Tea, 924 Valencia St., agreed. She doesn't care for them and decided against one for the front of her store. "I encourage people to stay, but it takes up space," she said of the four along Valencia Street.
But only a few residents thought the parklets were a bad idea. "Parking is a smarter idea," said Aaron Garcia, taking out change from a plastic cup to feed his meter. If businesses want more outdoor seating, he said, they should set up tables along the sidewalk.
The loss of parking is a balancing act. Anthony from Fabric8 said his organization accepted the sacrifice when it eliminated one parking spot, and it's one he and his team are happy with. The parklet is open to families on the weekends, where they play games and create art. "We do urban street art," he said. "This parklet is an experiment of what that means."
The goal of parklets is to balance out the busy traffic with pedestrians, said Andres Power at DPW. Some also encourage bicycling by including bike parking rings. The Four Barrel parklet holds 27 bikes and the Freewheel Bike parklet holds six, adding 33 total bike rings in the city.
"Less Cars, More Better"
Many Missionites see the parklets as an incentive to start using new forms of transportation. "Less cars — anything that will promote people to use public transit, to walk and bike," said Son, who lives near Deepistan National Parklet.
Some visitors agreed, as well. "From what we hear," said an Australian couple visiting the Mission, "Americans really love their cars." The pair thinks the parklets are a fantastic idea — even better if they encourage people to use public transit.
It's not clear how much the lack of parking affects businesses. "I've never heard any complaints," said David Marks, owner of the vintage boutique Room 4, near the Freewheel Bike parklet. Marks said many of his customers come on foot. The owner of Mediterranean eatery Zaytoon Wraps, Chris Totah, helped install the parklet near his restaurant and doesn't see a parking issue. "The customers are locals in the Mission," he said. "They don't drive to get here; much of it is foot traffic."
And for those attached to their cars? "Oh geez," said green artist Kazoo, with a dose of sarcasm. "Less cars, more better." Kazoo creates bags that say "Bikes Make Everything Better." She's always happy to see fewer cars and more recreation.
But recreation, some believe, is a better fit for places other than city streets. David Chen, owner of the vintage furniture store The Touch, said if people want to hang out, they shouldn't be in the street. He's from China and knows what it's like to sit outside when cars pass by, belching exhaust fumes. He suggested Dolores Park as a more fitting place for outdoor socializing.
The Noise Problem
Cars aside, there's another issue at stake: noise.
Whenever people congregate, there's bound to be more noise and action — including homeless rowdiness — said McWhirter of Escape From NY Pizza. Next door, Café Revolution barista Ash said the area around their parklet is already known as a drug hub; the parklet just makes drug deals convenient.
The fear of noise led to the petition against Mission Beach Café's proposed parklet alongside its three-car garage.
Two people protested against it — one very close neighbor and one resident of Cole Valley. "They don't want people hanging out at night," said Mission Beach Cafe manager Justin Arbogast of the petitioners. "But we have a light system for security."
Arbogast defended his business's right to have a parklet. "It's our garage and our parking spots," he said. "People aren't even allowed to park there now, anyway." He said the parklet would alleviate traffic on Sundays, when there can be a two-hour wait in line to be seated. "It's a little city with a lot of people," he said. "We gotta create space."
The first attempt to create that space was at Café Revolution, where DPW installed a wooden bench parklet, funded by the city through the Pavement to Parks program. Eight of the city's 31 parklets were funded through Pavement to Parks; the other 23 were funded by businesses owners, like Fabric8, or a resident, like the Deepistan National Parklet. Many of these owners applied for grants on their own to help with funding.
"We were the prototype," said Ash of Revolution Café. "They wanted to see how people responded to it." Homeless people began hanging out there, which turned off some authorities, Ash said. So a new design emerged, featuring red tables and chairs that are taken in each night. Now Ash notices fewer homeless people using the space.
But homeless people still convene there, according to some reports. At last month's community meeting at the Mission District police station, one resident, who asked that his name not be disclosed, complained about noise around the Revolution Café after it closes for the night. He blamed it on people gathering at the parklet to drink.
A Long-Term Investment
So what does it take to create a parklet? Businesses or private residents submit proposals to DPW, which reviews the proposals and meets with the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency (SFMTA). If proposals follow DPW's guidelines and are selected, the city posts a 10-day public notice at the proposed location. If no one objects — and usually people don't, according to DPW's Power — a permit is issued and construction can begin. If there are objections, as in the case of the Mission Beach Cafe's proposal, a public hearing is scheduled.
Totah, the owner of Zaytoon Wraps, said he and the owner of the Crepe House endorsed their parklet. "It was a lot of money," said Totah, "but it's a long-term investment." The entire process took about six months, the permit two to three months, and cost about $14,000, Totah said.
"More and more people want them," said Power. Some are expecting them. Mohammed, a local at Revolution Café, said, "I can't wait to see parklets all over the city."


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Bellator Fighting Championships' 12-week debut season concluded with the two biggest fights in the organization's young history.
A lightweight tournament finale and championship fight between Eddie Alvarez and Toby Imada, and a middleweight title fight between Hector Lombard and Jared Hess, were the featured attractions at Friday's Week 12 show, which took place at the Seminole Hard Rock Hotel & Casino in Hollywood, Fla.
As with all Bellator shows, the event airs Saturday via one-day delay on ESPN Deportes.
Each of the four tournament finalists won two bouts to advance to Friday's finale in his respective eight-man tournament. Each winner at Friday's event received a championship belt, and perhaps more importantly, a $100,000 bonus check and a total of $175,000 in pay for the title run.
Staking claim to the lightweight title and bonus check was tournament favorite Alvarez, a first-round aggressor who couldn't seem to connect on any of his trademark heavy blows.
Things changed in the second round, though, when Alvarez floored Imada with a big right in the opening seconds of the frame. When Alvarez followed his opponent to the mat with a flurry of blows, Imada was forced to give up his back and eventually tap out from the fight-ending rear-naked choke. The stoppage came 38 seconds into the round.
Alvarez, who's surged up the worldwide lightweight rankings over the past couple years, moves to 18-2 with the win and has now won eight of his past nine fights (six via stoppage).
Imada (22-13), who advanced to the finale with submission victories over Alonzo Martinez and the heavily favored Jorge Masvidal, suffered his first loss in nine fights after a recent career resurrection.
In the night's middleweight finale, Lombard ran his unbeaten streak to 15 straight fights when he dominated the first three rounds of his fight with Hess before forcing a TKO stoppage due to a cut in the fourth.
Lombard, a former Cuban Olympic Judo competitor, used a solid sprawl, dominant top game and overpowering stand-up to stay a step ahead of his opponent. Hess suffered a deep gash near his right eye in the third round, and after Lombard scored the takedown early in the fourth, a timeout was soon called. The doctor checked the cut and determined Hess unfit to continue as blood continued gushing from the wound.
The stoppage came at 1:45 of the fourth round.
Lombard, now 21-2-1 and one of the middleweight division's true hidden gems, picked up three consecutive TKO victories en route to Bellator's middleweight belt.
Hess, who advanced to the finale with stoppage wins over Daniel Tabera and Yosmany Cabezas, falls to 9-1-1 with the first loss of his young career.
In non-tournament action, Jorge Masvidal rebounded from his May loss to Imada (via infamous inverted triangle choke) with a third-round submission victory over fellow lightweight semifinalist Eric Reynolds.
After a slow start in the first round, Masvidal picked up the pace with an absolutely dominant second that was heavy on ground and pound. A bit winded in the the third round, he regained his composure, took a dominant ground position and forced the tap-out from Reynolds via rear-naked choke at the 3:33 mark.
Masvidal (18-4) is now 4-1 in his past five fights. Meanwhile, Reynolds (10-3), who launched his career with nine consecutive victories, has lost three of his past four.
Also in action on the Bellator undercard was popular British female fighter Rosi Sexton, an EliteXC and BodogFIGHT veteran who moved to 10-1 with a first-round arm-bar of Valerie Coolbaugh (1-2).
Official results
- Eddie Alvarez def. Toby Imada via submission (rear-naked choke) – Round 2, 0:38 (becomes Bellator lightweight champion)
- Hector Lombard def. Jared Hess via TKO (cut) – Round 4, 1:45 (becomes Bellator middleweight champion)
- Fabio Mello def. Sami Aziz via submission (arm-bar) – Round 3, 1:58
- Jorge Masvidal def. Eric Reynolds via submission (rear-naked choke) – Round 3, 3:33
- Sergio Moraes def. Josh Martin via submission (triangle choke) – Round 1, 4:21
- Rosi Sexton def. Valerie Coolbaugh via submission (arm-bar) – Round 1, 3:40
- Luis Palomino def. Troy Gerhart via unanimous decision (29-28, 29-28, 29-28)
- Stefanie Guimaraes def. Yvonne Reis via TKO (knee strikes) – Round 1, 0:49
(Pictured: Eddie Alvarez)


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Product Description
- Changes 220/240 Volt (Foreign Electricity) to 110/120 Volt (U.S. Electricity)
- Fuse Protection with replaceable fuse (Comes with two extra fuses!!!)
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The THG-model Step Down converter is built with a durable industrial cord for long lasting use. This powerful converter is made to handle your toughest equipment. You will not have to worry about the risk of fraying or stripping the cord.
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Overseas Step Down Transformer
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- VOLTAGE CONVERTER STEP DOWN: 220-240 VOLTS CONVERTED TO 110 VOLTS (for Asia & Europe use)


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2010 Baylor Legacy Award
Sadie Jo Black, BS '50; Sue Holt Getterman, BA '50;
Harold Riley, BBA '52; Clifton Robinson, BBA '52
Presented to individuals who demonstrate extraordinary service and philanthropy to Baylor or to causes that fit our mission as a Christian university.
About Sadie Jo Black
Walk around Baylor's campus and you'll likely see the colorful imprint of Sadie Jo Black's love for Baylor. Sadie Jo provides many of the colorful flowers that adorn the campus. From the lush gardens in front of Pat Neff Hall to the stunning season decorations that adorn Robinson Tower, Sadie Jo wants every visitor to appreciate the beauty of the Baylor campus. A 1950 graduate and former Baylor professor, Sadie Jo has gives generously to student scholarships, and funds active medical research at Baylor.
Read more about Sadie Jo Black in Baylor Magazine.
About Sue Holt Getterman
A University Regent for nine years, Sue's dedicated support for Baylor has earned her status as one of the most decorated volunteers in University history. Having already established a history of generous gifts to student scholarships and other priorities, Sue and Ted inquired about areas of unmet need where their assistance might prove especially helpful to Baylor. And so began the partnership with women's softball that has helped catapult Baylor to national prominence in women's collegiate athletics. Sue's and Ted's steadfast example of leadership and generosity is an encouragement to the entire Baylor family, and their legacy of kindness will serve the Baylor today and for generations to come.
Read more about Sue Holt Getterman in Baylor Magazine.
About Harold Riley
Harold Riley explained to his high school football coach why he was turning down scholarship offers to LSU and Texas to tryout for Baylor: "If you cut my arm, I'll bleed Baylor." Riley meant it and still means it. Walk into Moody Memorial Library and you'll see the physical representation of Riley's love for his alma mater, and that is just the beginning. He's given to academic scholarship funds, set up an endowment for Sports Chaplaincy at Truett Theological Seminary, and has given to the same football program that gave him the only scholarship he ever wanted.
Read more about Harold Riley in Baylor Magazine.
About Clifton Robinson
A longtime Baylor benefactor, Clifton's generosity has taken the form of a donated office building on campus bearing his name, scholarships for high achieving students and in 2009, along with his business partner and family, the contribution of the General Tire facility to house the Baylor Research and Innovation Collaborative. This breakthrough collaborative will support the development, promotion and marketing of new and emerging science and engineering technologies, while creating jobs and educational opportunities that will have a profound economic impact in Central Texas for years to come. One of Baylor's most ardent supporters, Clifton Robinson's unwavering commitment to his alma mater makes us all Baylor proud.


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MIIS Professor Jan Black Elected to Amnesty International USA Board of Directors
A first generation Peace Corps volunteer in Chile, Monterey Institute professor Jan Knippers Black was propelled early on into human rights work by the danger of disappearance and torture confronting so many of her friends in Latin America. She would go on to pursue human rights in her academic research, including her first single-authored book United States Penetration of Brazil (University of Pennsylvania Press, 1977) now out in Portuguese translation. Her recent book The Politics of Human Rights Protection (Rowman & Littlefield, 2009) was very favorably reviewed and is now available in paperback.
Professor Black has been the anchor of Human Rights in the International Policy Studies degree program at the Monterey Institute and has through her mentoring of students spurned a new generation of professionals working for the promotion and preservation of human rights. She is also a prolific author and tireless advocate of the displaced, distressed and voiceless all over the world. Characteristically, she has already started to think of ways her new position will benefit her students and help strengthen the human rights program at the Institute.
Jan Knippers Black's election to a three-year term on the Board of Directors of Amnesty International USA is a yet another deserving recognition of her career as a human rights scholar and activist. "Amnesty International is the flagship of human rights protectors, and there is no organization I would be prouder to serve," says professor Black. Directors are elected by plurality of popular vote by members of the organization and not surprisingly to the MIIS community, professor Black received a convincing share of the votes for her seat.
For More Information
Jason Warburg
Eva Gudbergsdottir


text: Back Beating an Eating Disorder With eating disorders affecting girls at ever-younger ages, a surprisingly simple tactic might help: Dine as a family. Since society has so much influence on adolescents because of the high prevalence of obesity and the pressure to be skinny, many girls are turning to unhealthy ways of controlling their weight. Prioritizing structured family meals that take place in a positive environment can protect girls from destructive eating habits. It doesn't have to be a home-cooked meal. The idea is to bring people together. Eating disorders such as anorexia and bulimia have risen steadily. Diagnoses now peak among girls ages 11 to 13. Anorexia and bulimia can cause nutritional deficiencies, organ damage, and, in rare cases, death. It's vital to recognize and treat eating disorders quickly. Treatment involves mental health counseling and nutritional and medical therapy. Although both anorexia and bulimia are much more common in girls than in boys, males are affected as well. The sports connection Both girls and boys are at higher risk for developing an eating disorder in certain sports that emphasize thinness or that have weight restrictions. For girls, the critical sports are gymnastics, ice-skating, and ballet. For boys, the sports include gymnastics, running, bodybuilding, rowing, wrestling, ballet, and swimming. Males who are jockeys also are at higher risk for an eating disorder. What to look for Girls with anorexia: Intensely fear being fat Feel fat despite extreme thinness because of a distorted body image Are typically perfectionists with low self-esteem Eat very little, count calories and may weigh portions Often say they are vegetarians Often lose weight rapidly Deny feeling hungry and avoid eating in front of others May exercise compulsively Withdraw from social activities Girls with bulimia: Eat huge amounts within hours, then "purge" their bodies by taking laxatives or vomiting Often make excuses to go to the bathroom right after meals May eat abnormally large amounts of food without gaining weight May have average or above-average weights Often have pitted or eroded tooth enamel from stomach acid in the mouth after vomiting May appear to have swollen cheeks, from enlarged salivary glands Withdraw from social activities


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Despite the differences between light and sound, the same two basic methods have been used in most measurements of their respective speeds. The first method is based on simply measuring the time it takes a pulse of light or sound to traverse a known distance; dividing the distance by the transit time then gives the speed. The second method makes use of the wave nature common to these phenomena: by measuring both the frequency (f) and the wavelength () of the propagating wave, one can derive the speed of the wave from the simple wave relation, speed = f×. (The frequency of a wave is the number of crests that pass per second, whereas the wavelength is the distance between crests). Although the two phenomena share these measurement approaches, the fundamental differences between light and sound have led to very different experimental implementations, as well as different historical developments, in the determination of their speeds.
In its simplest form, sound can be thought of as a longitudinal wave consisting of compressions and extensions of a medium along the direction of propagation. Because sound requires a medium through which to propagate, the speed of a sound wave is determined by the properties of the medium itself (such as density, stiffness, and temperature). These parameters thus need to be included in any reported measurements. In fact, one can turn such measurements around and actually use them to determine thermodynamic properties of the medium (the ratio of specific heats, for example).
The first known theoretical treatise on sound was provided by Sir Isaac Newton in his Principia, which predicted a value for the speed of sound in air that differs by about 16 percent from the currently accepted value. Early experimental values were based on measurements of the time it took the sound of cannon blasts to cover a given distance and were good to better than 1 percent of the currently accepted value of 331.5 m/s at 0 degrees Celsius. Daniel Colladon and Charles-Francois Sturm first performed similar measurements in water in Lake Geneva in 1826. They found a value only 0.2 percent below the currently accepted value of ~1,440 m/s at 8 degrees C. These measurements all suffered from variations in the media themselves over long distances, so most subsequent determinations have been performed in the laboratory, where environmental parameters could be better controlled, and a larger variety of gases and liquids could be investigated. These experiments often use tubes of gas or liquid (or bars of solid material) with precisely calibrated lengths. One can then derive the speed of sound from a measurement of the time that an impulse of sound takes to traverse the tube. Alternatively (and usually more accurately), one can excite resonant frequencies of the tube (much like those of a flute) by inducing a vibration at one end with a loudspeaker, tuning fork, or other type of transducer. Because the corresponding resonant wavelengths have a simple relationship to the tube length, one can then determine the speed of sound from the wave relation and make corrections for tube geometry for comparisons with speeds in free space.
The wave nature of light is quite different from that of sound. In its simplest form, an electromagnetic wave (such as light, radio, or microwave) is transverse, consisting of oscillating electric and magnetic fields that are perpendicular to the direction of propagation. Moreover, although the medium through which light travels does affect its speed (reducing it by the index of refraction of the material), light can also travel through a vacuum, thus providing a unique context for defining its speed. In fact, the speed of light in a vacuum, c, is a fundamental building block of Einstein's theory of relativity, because it sets the upper limit for speeds in the universe. As a result, it appears in a wide range of physical formulae, perhaps the most famous of which is E=mc2. The speed of light can thus be measured in a variety of ways, but due to its extremely high value (~300,000 km/s or 186,000 mi/s), it was initially considerably harder to measure than the speed of sound. Early efforts such as Galileo's pair of observers sitting on opposing hills flashing lanterns back and forth lacked the technology needed to measure accurately the transit times of only a few microseconds. Remarkably, astronomical observations in the 18th century led to a determination of the speed of light with an uncertainty of only 1 percent. Better measurements, however, required a laboratory environment. Louis Fizeau and Leon Foucault were able to perform updated versions of Galileos experiment through the use of ingenious combinations of rotating mirrors (along with improved measurement technology) and they made a series of beautiful measurements of the speed of light. With still further improvements, Albert A. Michelson performed measurements good to nearly one part in ten thousand.
Metrology of the speed of light changed dramatically with a determination made here at NIST in 1972. This measurement was based on a helium-neon laser whose frequency was fixed by a feedback loop to match the frequency corresponding to the splitting between two quantized energy levels of the methane molecule. Both the frequency and wavelength of this highly stable laser were accurately measured, thereby leading to a 100-times reduction in the uncertainty for the value of the speed of light. This measurement and subsequent measurements based on other atomic/molecular standards were limited not by the measurement technique, but by uncertainties in the definition of the meter itself. Because it was clear that future measurements would be similarly limited, the 17th Confrence Gnrale des Poids et Mesures (General Conference on Weights and Measures) decided in 1983 to redefine the meter in terms of the speed of light. The speed of light thus became a constant (defined to be 299,792,458 m/s), never to be measured again. As a result, the definition of the meter is directly linked (via the relation c= f×) to that of frequency, which is by far the most accurately measured physical quantity (presently the best cesium atomic fountain clocks have a fractional frequency uncertainty of about 1x10-15).


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Elephant meat in Central Africa has an earning potential that could exceed that of ivory according to a new report by the IUCN SSC African Elephant Specialist Group and the CITES Monitoring the Illegal Killing of Elephants (MIKE) programme. To prevent a future increase in elephant poaching, consumer demand for elephant products must be reduced and law enforcement efforts should be focused on those who commission and fund the elephant hunting parties.
An investigation into the dynamics, scale and impact of the trade in elephant meat in four Congo Basin countries has revealed that the demand for elephant meat is higher than previously expected. The demand for elephant meat outstrips supply and the perception in cities that this meat is prestigious causes the price of elephant meat to be greater than most other meats. This demand and high earning potential gives hunters a great incentive to poach elephants for more than just their tusks.
Fortunately, due to the fear of being caught with illegal elephant products, the maximum value of an elephant carcass is not achieved by the hunters. Often, only the tusks and a small amount of meat are taken, but the potential value of meat can far exceed that of ivory. The meat from an adult male could earn a hunting party up to US$5,000, a price that could only be achieved by very large tusks. Potentially, the carcass of a single adult elephant with large tusks could earn a hunting group over US$10,000. Any relaxation in the enforcement of legislation would provide greater opportunities to hunters and increase the frequency of poaching.
The report also revealed the importance of commanditaires in the hunting of elephants. Commanditaires are usually influential people in the government, military or business that provide the equipment, money and often, weapons to an elephant hunting party. The primary aim of these hunting parties is to collect ivory, which the commanditaires will sell on. Without these wealthy people funding the hunting parties, fewer elephants would be poached.
The main reasons for elephant poaching given by those who participate in hunting were lack of law enforcement and poverty. Therefore the recommendations made by the report address these issues. In particular, law enforcement efforts should be concentrated on the commanditaires who initiate and support the hunting groups, as without these people many hunts would not occur. Additionally poor hunters who are employed by the commanditaires need alternative livelihoods or training opportunities to reduce the incentive to hunt.
However, ultimately it is the demand for ivory and elephant meat that is driving the killing of elephants. If consumer demand can be reduced, or better, eliminated, elephant products would sell for very little or not at all and thus remove the economic incentive to carry out the expensive, arduous and risky elephant hunts. Education and public awareness programmes should be increased to generate stigma associated with buying elephant products and persuade the public that elephants should be protected.
The report concludes that conservation of elephants in Central Africa requires integrated regional development and conservation policies which should be carried out by the COMFIFAC-CBFP (Commission of Ministers in Charge of Forest in Central Africa – Congo Basin Forest Partnership). By combining both development and nature conservation policies the incentive and opportunities to hunt elephants could be reduced.
Related links:
Download the report Elephant Meat Trade in Central Africa: Summary Report 5.17MB
IUCN SSC African Elephant Specialist Group
Source: http://www.iucnredlist.org


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KMLer is the ArcGIS extension for professional work with Google Earth. We recommend using this module and our free Typeconvert extension.
KMLer Plus also supports additional functionality at description building.
KMLer Pro also supports additional 3d features, LOD, Fade in Google Earth. Create overlays function in KMLer Pro supports Superoverlay projects creation now directly from your ArcMap project. You should only download and install Superoverlay 1.7.x or later and use your KMLer Pro license to obtain standard Superoverlay version
To install the geoprocessing tools:
1. Open ArcCatalog and search folder of KMLer. By default it is
C:\Program Files\GISCenter\KMLer\
2. You see toolbox KMLer. Right click on toolbox and select "Add to Toolbox". The KMLer toolbox stored in Toolbox.
If you have problems by installation then see this page
More info about KMLer see in Features


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You're looking at a prototype Leica 35mm film camera, known as the 0-series. It was one of just 25 produced in 1923 for testing, and only 12 of them are known to have survived to this day. That's why it's just set a record, becoming the world's most expensive camera.
It was sold at the WestLicht Photographica auction in Vienna, eventually fetching an eye-watering €2.16 million. That's about $2.8 million. Bidding started at a relatively respectable $390,000, but in the course of 4 minutes offers reached $2.3 million. The final price is higher because it includes a—rather sizeable—buyer's premium. In fact, you can watch the auction take place in the video below.
The world's previous most expensive camera was also a 0-series Leica, but it sold for a paltry $1.7 million. [BBC]
Image by Altertuem Liches


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Axefard History, Family Crest & Coats of Arms
Axefard is one of the many new names that came to England following the Norman Conquest of 1066. The Axefard family lived at Axford, in the county of Wiltshire. Checking further we found the name was derived from the Old English words aesc and ford, meaning ash tree and ford.
Early Origins of the Axefard family
The surname Axefard was first found in Wiltshire at Axford, a hamlet in the Kennet Valley which dates back to 1184 when it was listed as Axeford. The place name literally means "ford by the ash-trees," having derived from the Old English words "aesc" + "ford." [1] The family held a family seat at Ramsbury from ancient times. Today, Ramsbury is a village and civil parish that includes the hamlet Axford. It was originally spelt Ramesberrie. Ramsbury at the time of the Domesday Book was one of the larger holdings in the county of Wiltshire and consisted of 10 Mills. It was held by the Bishop of Salisbury. It also included Axford's Farm, from which the Axford family name is conjecturally descended. Axford's Farm is noted for its water mill. Axford is also a village in Hampshire, part of the civil parish of Nutley.
Early History of the Axefard family
This web page shows only a small excerpt of our Axefard research. Another 42 words (3 lines of text) covering the years 121 and 1216 are included under the topic Early Axefard History in all our PDF Extended History products and printed products wherever possible.
Axefard Spelling Variations
Anglo-Norman names are characterized by a multitude of spelling variations. When the Normans became the ruling people of England in the 11th century, they introduced a new language into a society where the main languages of Old and later Middle English had no definite spelling rules. These languages were more often spoken than written, so they blended freely with one another. Contributing to this mixing of tongues was the fact that medieval scribes spelled words according to sound, ensuring that a person's name would appear differently in nearly every document in which it was recorded. The name has been spelled Axford, Acksford, Ackford, Hackford, Hacksford, Hawksford, Hawkford, Hawkesford and many more.
Early Notables of the Axefard family (pre 1700)
More information is included under the topic Early Axefard Notables in all our PDF Extended History products and printed products wherever possible.
Migration of the Axefard family
For many English families, the political and religious disarray that plagued their homeland made the frontiers of the New World an attractive prospect. Thousands migrated, aboard cramped disease-ridden ships. They arrived sick, poor, and hungry, but were welcomed in many cases with far greater opportunity than at home in England. Many of these hardy settlers went on to make important contributions to the emerging nations in which they landed. Among early immigrants bearing the name Axefard or a variant listed above were: Ephraim Axford who settled in Virginia in 1670; Richard Axford who landed in Maryland in 1660; William Hawksford settled in Maryland in 1775.


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Firstly, a huge thank you to everybody who's purchased the two new workshop videos:
Ming Thein on Photography: The Fundamentals and
Making Outstanding Images, Episode One
I'm pleased to announce that we will definitely be continuing the series. Episodes two and three are in production now, along with 'Learning to See: visualizing Kuala Lumpur'.
But, before we get that far – please note that today will be the last day for the introductory $100 offer for both videos (instead of $120) – after today, prices will return to normal. The offer ends once all the time zones clear midnight on the 1st of September. More details on the videos, including testimonials, are here.
UPDATE: It's now 1 September everywhere, so the offer has now ended. Thank you for the support, and enjoy your videos! MT
Please note that due to special requests and PayPal/ correspondence email addresses differing, the download links are sent manually. I make every effort to send out your download link as soon as possible, but due to time differences there may be a delay of a few hours. Thanks for understanding!


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Welcome to the Catarosa Whitetail Ranch in South Texas. The Catarosa ranch is located in the heart of Texas trophy deer country, Dimmit County. The ranch is located just outside Catarina Texas, which puts it inside the famous "Golden Triangle". This being the true "golden triangle" and boasts some of the largest numbers of Boone and Crocket entries per capita mile. If you are looking to hunt trophy whitetails, there is nothing better in the United States than hunting the "Golden Triangle".
Why to Hunt the Catarosa?
- Outfitting is our livelihood
- No exotics
- No pay per inch


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FREE SHIPPING applies to all ONLINE Retail orders over $25.00 shipped within the continental United States! (Does NOT apply to wholesale orders)
PLEASE NOTE: Tax-Exempt and Book Store orders MUST be placed by phone or email. Email: email@example.com
NEW - All orders that require shipping outside the United States must be placed by telephone to +1-877-327-5343
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By Steve Wood with Jim Burnham. This best-selling book covers the eight commitments of St. Joseph's Covenant Keepers and gives dads the tools they need to succeed as a husband and father.


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AUSTIN, Texas -- NBA Hall of Famer Bill Russell says gay athletes' fight for equality and acceptance reminds him of the struggles black players faced in the 1960s.
Russell, who won 11 NBA championships with the Boston Celtics, joined NFL Hall of Fame running back Jim Brown during a panel discussion Wednesday at the Lyndon B. Johnson Presidential Library in Austin. The library is hosing events celebrating the 50th anniversary of the Civil Rights Act.
Russell and Brown, who are black, were key figures as athletes and leaders during the civil rights era.
Russell says questions about whether gay athletes can be good teammates or might disrupt locker rooms are the same questions that black athletes heard back then.
Russell says he'd have one question about a gay teammate: Can he play?


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Vegan Break
Hi, and welcome to Vegan Break! I'm Michelle Taylor, a recent graduate from Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio. I just moved back to Oakland, California, where I've lived all my life aside from college. I'm thrilled to be back home where I can walk outside in flip flops in the winter.
The story of my vegetarianism reaches back to when I was eight years old and made the connection between the meat on my plate and the flesh of animals. I used to think meat was just named after animals, and was horrified when I learned otherwise.
As a lifelong animal lover, I immediately switched to a vegetarian diet. Yet up until I went to college, I never met another vegetarian. Nor was I at all familiar with veganism; I had no idea why a person would choose to avoid milk products and eggs.
I became vegan much more recently, after reading Peter Singer's Animal Liberation (which I happened upon at a used bookstore, unaware of its significance in the animal rights movement and the profound effect it would have on me as an individual). As I learned about the realities of the egg and dairy industries, my transition to veganism was simultaneously inspired by Mercy For Animals speakers and free vegan dinners which I attended monthly. I embedded myself in a community of compassionate eaters, which made the transition to veganism easy and fun.
Becoming vegan opened up a whole new world of foods I never paid attention to before. My diet has transformed to the most healthful, varied and delicious diet I've ever eaten. Foods I once cringed at (tofu, soymilk, tomatoes and kale to name a few) I now love. Now that I'm back in the Bay Area living at home with a real kitchen, I'm having fun experimenting with vegan cooking and baking, and exploring the local veggie cuisine. I'm so excited to start sharing what I learn with you!
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Hi Bloggers! Do you have to share a story or a short reflection tagged with the letter "B"? For example I've written about BERLIN and BRUSSELS, BIRDS and BOATS, BALANCE and BABIES, BREAK THROUGHS and BLUE MOODS, BREAKFAST and BLOGGERS, BRIDGES and BANJOS, Pina BAUSCH or my wife BARBARA, BATHROOMS and BEDROOMS, BAHREIN or BURN OUT, BRAZIL and BELGIUM, BICYCLES and BIKERS, BIPOLAR or BLIND, BIN LADEN or SAUL BELLOW, BAKERS and BUTCHERS, BIOGRAPHIES or BLACK MUSIC, BOOKS or BMWs – I'm sure you have a topic to share, tagged with "B"!
tagged "B" – for example: BERLIN
I'm often in Berlin. At first I was shocked by the landmarks of evil history, starting from this town so many decades: the two world wars and then the spy state of Stasi and narrow minded administrations. But then I noticed, step by step new generations are making their own new business there – with a certain kind of humour, anarchism and creative ideas …
Vlado's comment: "Berlin has a lot of the 'free spirit' of the days of my youth, but doesn't live in the past – it is home of radically modern art and architecture, science and technology – but with a nice 'feel' to it …"
a-new-generation-in-berlin + travel-theme-rhythm + berlin-music-video + the-faces-of-houses + night and day + strolling-through-nonsense + capitalism-communism-anarchism + opened-walls + where-do-you-write + pull-the-plug + vimeo + berlin-on-my-mind + walls + berlin-tempelhof + www.flickr.com/photos/frizztext: BERLIN GALLERY


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Keri Russell's Home Burglarized
Actress Keri Russell had a rude awakening Wednesday when she heard burglars inside her rental home in Brooklyn, the New York Daily News reports.
The Americans star heard footsteps and chatter coming from the upstairs part of her brownstone at about 3 a.m. Wednesday, but the burglars were gone by the time she went into the room to investigate, according to the News. They reportedly made off with Russell's laptop, some jewelry and a Filson bag.
Fall TV Report Card: How are the new shows doing?
Police arrested an uncle and a nephew - Ronald Swindell, 50, and Steffon Swindell, 19 - whom they say entered Russell's home through an open window on the first floor, the Newsreports. The stolen items were recovered and returned to Russell.
Russell's husband, Shane Deary, and their children, 23-month-old Willa Lou and 6-year-old River, were not home at the time of the burglary. The family is renting the home while their permanent residence is undergoing renovations, according to the News.
View original Keri Russell's Home Burglarized at TVGuide.com
Other Links From TVGuide.com


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Knicks go for home-and-home sweep of the Raptors
The New York Knicks will go for a home-and-home sweep of the Toronto Raptors on Saturday night when the series shifts to Madison Square Garden.
The Knicks bested the Raptors, 99-94, on Friday at the Air Canada Centre. The victory clinched a playoff berth for the Knicks, who lead the Brooklyn Nets by 1 1/2 games for the top spot in the Atlantic Division. The Knicks are one game behind the Indiana Pacers for second in the Eastern Conference.
Carmelo Anthony, in only his second game back from injury, poured in 37 points to get the Knicks the win. Out for several games with a knee problem, Anthony did play over 43 minutes on Friday night.
"He played great," said Knicks head coach Mike Woodson. "I talked about it at the top of the game not playing him big minutes like that, but this was a game we had to go get. I feel bad about it. Hopefully he'll sleep tonight, ice up and be ready for tomorrow."
Kenyon Martin, who was in his 10th game since the Knicks signed him, started at center with both Amare Stoudemire and Tyson Chandler shelved with injuries. Martin had 19 points and 11 rebounds and J.R. Smith was the only other double- figure scorer for New York with 14.
The Knicks shot 53.5 percent from the field and 45.5 percent from behind the 3-point line.
The Raptors never led after early in the first quarter and trailed by as many as 15 points. They stayed competitive and were led by Alan Anderson, especially in the second half.
Anderson scored 20 of his career-best 35 points in the third quarter as he took many of the minutes when Rudy Gay didn't play in the second half due to back spasms.
"It feels really good personally but when you can't get the win, you wish you did a little bit more," said Anderson.
DeMar DeRozan chipped in 18 and Jonas Valanciunas added 10. No other Raptors player scored in double digits.
Gay's availability of Saturday night is unknown, but the Raptors' won't have to wait long for a chance at revenge.
"We definitely know that," said Amir Johnson. "It was a tough game, only lost by five. Melo had a great game. All we can say to them is 'We'll see you tomorrow.'"
The Raptors have lost three in a row and 10 of their last 13.
The Knicks have won three in a row since losing four straight on the western trip.
Toronto won the first two meetings this season prior to Friday's setback, including a 92-88 triumph at Madison Square Garden in February. The Raptors have won two of their last three in New York.


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AFRICANGLOBE – The image of the 21st century woman is confident, prosperous, glowing with health and beauty.
But for many of the 3.3 billion female occupants of our planet, the perks of the cyber age never arrived, they continue to feel the age-old lash of violence, repression, isolation, enforced ignorance and discrimination.
"These things are universal," says Taina Bien-Aime, executive director of New York-based Equality Now woman's right organisation. "There is not one single country where women can feel absolutely safe."
In spite of real progress in women's rights around the globe – better laws, political participation, education and income – the bedrock problems that have dogged women for centuries remain. Even in wealthy countries, there are pockets of private pain where women are unprotected and under attack.
Some countries, often the poorest and most conflict-ridden, have a level of violence that makes life unbearable for women. Richer ones may burden them with repressive laws, or sweep the problems of the least advantaged under the carpet. In any country, refugee women are among the most vulnerable.
So widespread are the disadvantages that it's hard to pinpoint the worst places in the world for women. Some surveys rate their problems by quality of life, others by health indicators. Human rights groups point to countries where violations are so severe that even murder is routine.
Literacy is one of the best indicators of women's status in their countries. But Amnesty International Canada's women's rights campaigner Cheryl Hotchkiss says building schools alone doesn't solve the problem of equal education.
"There's a huge range of barriers women face to getting an education," she says. "It may be free and available, but parents won't send their daughters out to school if they can be kidnapped and raped."
Health is another key indicator, including the care of pregnant women, who are sometimes forced into disastrous early marriage and childbearing, as well as infection with HIV/AIDS. But again, statistics fail to show the whole, complex story.
Putting power in women's hands is the biggest challenge for improving their lives in every country, advocates agree. Whether in the poorest countries of Africa, or the most repressive of the Middle East or Asia, lack of control over their own destinies blights women's lives from early childhood.
Here are 10 of the worst countries in the world to be a woman today:
• Afghanistan: The average Afghan girl will live to only 45 – one year less than an Afghan male. After three decades of war and religion-based repression, an overwhelming number of women are illiterate. More than half of all brides are under 16, and one woman dies in childbirth every half hour. Domestic violence is so common that 87 per cent of women admit to experiencing it. But more than one million widows are on the streets, often forced into prostitution. Afghanistan is the only country in which the female suicide rate is higher than that of males.
• Democratic Republic of Congo: In the eastern DRC, a war that claimed more than 3 million lives has ignited again, with women on the front line. Rapes are so brutal and systematic that UN investigators have called them unprecedented. Many victims die; others are infected with HIV and left to look after children alone. Foraging for food and water exposes women to yet more violence. Without money, transport or connections, they have no way of escape.
• Pakistan: Women are gang-raped as punishment for crimes committed by their male relatives. But honour killing is more widespread, and a renewed wave of religious extremism is targeting female politicians, human rights workers and lawyers.
• Iraq: The U.S.-led invasion to "liberate" Iraq from Saddam Hussein has imprisoned women in an inferno of sectarian violence that targets women and girls. The literacy rate, once the highest in the Arab world, is now among the lowest as families fear risking kidnapping and rape by sending girls to school. Women who once went out to work stay home. Meanwhile, more than 1 million women have been displaced from their homes, and millions more are unable to earn enough to eat.
• India: It is ranked as extremely hazardous because of the subcontinent's high level of female infanticide and sex trafficking. India's central bureau of investigation estimated that in 2009 about 90% of trafficking took place within the country and that there were some 3 million prostitutes, of which about 40% were children.
• Nepal: Early marriage and childbirth exhaust the country's malnourished women, and one in 24 will die in pregnancy or childbirth. Daughters who aren't married off may be sold to traffickers before they reach their teens. Widows face extreme abuse and discrimination if they're labelled bokshi, meaning witches. A low-level civil war between government and Maoist rebels has forced rural women into guerrilla groups.
• Sudan: While Sudanese women have made strides under reformed laws, the plight of those in Darfur, in western Sudan, has worsened. Abduction, rape or forced displacement have destroyed more than 1 million women's lives since 2003. The Arab janjaweed militias have used systematic rape as a demographic weapon, but access to justice is almost impossible for the female victims of violence.
• Mali: One of the world's poorest countries, few women escape the torture of genital mutilation, many are forced into early marriages, and one in 10 dies in pregnancy or childbirth
• Somalia: A vicious civil war has put women, who were the traditional mainstay of the family, under attack. In a society that has broken down, women are exposed daily to rape, dangerously poor health care for pregnancy, and attack by armed gangs.
• Saudi Arabia: Women are treated as lifelong dependents, under the guardianship of a male relative. Deprived of the right to drive a car or mix with men publicly, they are confined to strictly segregated lives on pain of severe punishment.


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Milan orders removal of naughty Christmas tree
MILAN (AP) — A provocatively adorned outdoor Christmas tree in central Milan was just too naughty for city officials, who have ordered it denuded of its racy red sex toys.
The city said in an order that the Christmas season, "qualifying as a holiday for children and families, requires sobriety in urban decorations," in particular when using "traditional symbols that distinguish Christmas."
Norma Rossetti, who launched an Italian sex toy e-commerce website this year, said Friday she complied immediately with the order. But she defended the so-called "Tree of Pleasure," saying the objects chosen were elegant and not obviously X-rated. She said her goal is to break down taboos by making sex toys "completely normal everyday objects. "
Rossetti acknowledged some complaints, but said most passers-by during the one-day display were enthusiastic.


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Making A Mark All His Own
When a guy is a mechanical engineer at a nuclear power plant, you figure he puts in a pretty good day of work.
Not so for Nolan Strawder, whose day job, as he calls it, is at the Wolf Creek Nuclear Power Plant in Burlington, Kan.
His nights – and mornings and weekends and any other free time – is putting his family's farm back together and making it his own.
Strawder, 25, is living back on his family's farm, 280 acres of land his mother, grandparents and great-grandparents established. The land is rented to other farmers and the old house sat empty for a few years, after his mom moved to town, so Strawder came home.
Here he can literally see his mother's, grandparents' and other relative's marks on the place – their names were written into the concrete pads set generations ago to plant barns and feedlots and, well, a business operation. He grew up here, watching how earlier generations made the place their own and knowing he wanted to do that, too.
"I always envisioned fixing up the feedlot and changing the farm to where I can put my name on something, and putting my mark on it," Strawder said. "I'm trying to make it unique to me because everybody that's lived out there has done something different."
You could say he's doing the same thing with his lifelong membership in the National Grange, the oldest agricultural organization in the country. Formed after the Civil War to champion farmers rights, the Grange was once a political powerhouse and had 858,000 members in 1875. But other political and commodity groups were created and came to overshadow the Grange, which now has just 200,000 members.
I met Strawder at a Kansas State Grange meeting last fall and caught up again with him in June at the Great Plains Regional Grange Conference in Lawrence, Kan. Nearly his entire family was there – mother, brother, sister, aunts, cousins – which is how the Grange meetings always are for him. He grew up few dozen people in the Kansas Grange, so meetings are a kind of family reunion for him.
Strawder hopes to build the Grange back up, too, to put his mark there by increasing membership and getting back to the days when kids planned their summers around Grange camp. The Grange is home to him, too, a fix-up much like his family farm, a geography he loves and describes like this:
"It's a comfortable place."
This is the fifth installment of My Farm Roots, Harvest Public Media's series chronicling Americans' connection to the land. Click here to explore more My Farm Roots stories and to share your own.
Harvest Public Media, based at KCUR, is a collaborative public media project that reports on important agriculture issues in the Midwest. Funded by a grant from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, Harvest Public Media has reporters at six NPR member stations in the region. To learn more, visit www.harvestpublicmedia.org, like Harvest Public Media on Facebook or follow @HarvestPM on Twitter.


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It boost Calls signal on 900MHz frequency, the frequency used in New Zealand used by mobile networks to deliver their mobile services: 2G (also known as GSM). It work on 900Mhz (Band 8) frequency for improving Vodafone, 2degrees, VOCUS and Warehouse Mobile carrier networks Voice Calls and Text signal.
Band Checker: Check frequency band is 8 show on your iPhone:
- Dial *3001#12345#*, then press Call button
- Click 'Serving Cell Info'
- Check 'Freq Band Indicator'.
Or with app "CellMapper" or "Network Signal Info Pro".
Signal booster can only amplify signal, but can't create signal. If there is no signal outside, the booster will not work for you.
No Miss Important Calls
SMS Text Messages Quickly
Vehicle Signal Improved
Kit comes complete with everything you need to increase signal, one price includes all peripheral items needed for a complete installation: external aerial, cables, booster base unit, internal aerial, and power adapter and its easy install.
1. Outside Antenna: Pulls in tower Signal
2. Signal Booster: Amplifies the Signal
3. Inside Antenna: Re-broadcasts Signal
4. Mobile Phone: Gets Boosted Signal
Upgrade External AerialExternal fishtail aerial connects via 3 meter coax lead to the signal booster unit which is located inside the car. The aerial with Three magnets, its more stable.
1. Convenient--- small beautiful appearance (cigarette box size), easy to carry, suitable for a variety of small space signal coverage.
2. Easy to use--- needs no complicated installation.
3. Open--- according to the external signal strength, automatic gain control ensure the signal.
4. Flexible---- can choose different power adapters, such as 220VAC adapter, mobile power, vehicle power adapter etc.
5. Low radiation--- a good signal coverage can reduce the radiation intensity of the mobile phone itself, effectively reduce the mobile phone radiation may harm the human body.
6. Environmental protection--- when you do not need to use the telephone or the Internet, can be removed at any time or unplug the power, elimination of radiation.
|Application & Bands
|Car, Vehicle Voice Calls (Band 8)
|New Zealand
|Boost All On
|Vodafone (2G)
2degrees (2G)
Warehouse Mobile (2G)
|Users Supporting
|10 Simultaneously
|Single Band 8
|Uplink 45±2; Downlink 40±2
|890~915 MHz
|935~960 MHz
|Export Power(Po)
|Uplink 10; Downlink 10
|Power Adapter
|Kit Includes
|1 x Car Signal Booster/Amplifier, 1 x External Magnetic-Mount Aerial, 1 x 12V DC Car Power Adapter, 1 x Easy to Follow Installation Manual
Instant Boost Signal up to 5 Bars
1 Year Money Back Guarantee
3 Year Warranty or Exchange
Full Kit Ready to Use & Easy Install