Gamasutra reports on a set of standards (PDF) published by the Entertainment Merchants Association to promote the use of technology that would "disable" games and DVDs until they are activated when purchased. "The effort is codenamed 'Project Lazarus,' and the EMA says it's assembled a consortium of retailers, home video companies and video game publishers to see how easily such 'benefit denial technology' could be implemented, and to evaluate possible cost-benefit analyses. The initiative is similar to security tags used in clothing retail that spill ink on garments if they're forcibly removed, thereby destroying the item. In such a situation, shoplifting is discouraged by implementing a solution that only the retailer can remove at the point of sale."pa href="http://games.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/12/02/0416231amp;from=rss"img src="http://games.slashdot.org/slashdot-it.pl?from=rssamp;op=imageamp;style=h0amp;sid=08/12/02/0416231"/a/ppa href="http://games.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/12/02/0416231amp;from=rss"Read more of this story/a at Slashdot./p pa href="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~a/vAac3qUSeVcu9_c_8U7vqZQ5Xho/a"img src="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~a/vAac3qUSeVcu9_c_8U7vqZQ5Xho/i" border="0" ismap="true"/img/a/pimg src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Slashdot/slashdotGames/~4/v4CrDafbJV0" height="1" width="1"/

divimg alt="" src="http://hits.guardian.co.uk/b/ss/guardiangu-feeds/1/H.15.1/48298?ns=guardianpageName=Business%3A+Shoppers+paying+less+at+checkout+as+VAT+is+cutch=Businessc3=The+Guardianc4=Retail+industry+%28Business%29%2CTax+and+spending%2CBusiness%2CCredit+crunch+%28Business%29%2CConsumer+affairs+%28Money%29%2CMoneyc5=Personal+Finance%2CCredit+Crunch%2CBusiness+Marketsc6=Richard+Wray%2CChris+Tryhornc7=2008_12_02c8=1127194c9=articlec10=GUc11=Businessc12=Retail+industryc13=c14=h2=GU%2FBusiness%2FRetail+industry" width="1" height="1" //divpMany shoppers found yesterday that the price at the till was less than the one on the label, as the cut in VAT came into effect./ppAlistair Darling announced last week that standard value added tax would be cut from 17.5% to 15% for 13 months, to raise consumer confidence. The reduction would cost the government pound;12.5bn in lost revenue and retailers pound;200m as they reprice items./ppShops that have decided to pass on the reduction to consumers have two weeks to bring labels into line with the prices they charge. Tesco and Sainsbury's dropped their prices over the weekend, before the official cut. DSG International, which owns Currys and PC World, cut its prices hours after the chancellor ended his speech./ppOther businesses introduced the rate yesterday. "Most retailers, particularly major retailers, are passing the VAT cut on to customers," said a spokesman for the British Retail Consortium. /ppA group of 20 retailers including MS, Next and Sir Philip Green's Arcadia, said last week they would pass on the reduction. MS has not reduced advertised prices but customers get the reduced price at tills. At Asda, price labels on shelves are being changed but reduced VAT will be automatically calculated at checkouts. Discount store Aldi has already rounded down prices of 350 non-food items (there is no VAT on food) and 500 "special buys". While gas and electricity are on an unchanged 5% rate, telecoms services are on standard VAT. BT spent the weekend changing its billing systems so customers would benefit from yesterday. /ppIts basic broadband was pound;7.95 for the first three months and is now pound;7.78; its top of the range broadband was pound;23.99 a month and is now pound;23.48. The head of BT's consumer business, John Petter, said: "We have had a bit of a hectic weekend. It makes for slightly jagged price points so ... we will probably at some stage tidy up our prices just to get a sensible price point customers can add up in their heads."/ppVirgin Media cut its call charges yesterday and hopes to introduce the new rate across all services soon. Any customer inadvertently overcharged would get a rebate in subsequent bills./ppBT's public payphones have also been changed. Although the minimum remains 40p, callers get more time, as do mobile customers with top-up cards. Vodafone and Orange have added 25p-worth of calls to their pound;10 top-up vouchers. Customers who pay by monthly contract will see VAT fall on their next bill./ppThe price of petrol will not drop. A spokesman for the AA said that, based on the weekend's average price, the most recent available, VAT at the new rate accounted for 13.62p of the price of a litre - 1.69p less than it did at 17.5%. But the government is also raising fuel duty by 2p a litre, so customers lose overall, with an extra pound;200,000 a day to the Treasury./ppOne filling station began offering fuel with no VAT. Chris Woodruff, who runs the Jet station in Darsham, Suffolk, claimed his was the cheapest in the country, at 79.9p a litre for petrol and diesel at 93.9p a litre, for the first 10,000 litres sold: "We're practically giving it away. It'll probably cost us pound;1,000 in lost profits, but we wanted to make a point. In rural Suffolk, we don't have a network of public transport, so whenever the government puts up fuel duty it hits hard."/pdiv style="float: left; margin-right: 10px; margin-bottom: 10px;"ullia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/retail"Retail industry/a/lilia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/taxandspending"Tax and spending/a/lilia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/creditcrunch"Credit crunch/a/lilia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/money/consumeraffairs"Consumer affairs/a/li/ul/diva href="http://www.guardian.co.uk"guardian.co.uk/a copy; Guardian News Media Limited 2008 | Use of this content is subject to our a href="http://users.guardian.co.uk/help/article/0,,933909,00.html"Terms Conditions/a | a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/webfeeds/1,,1309488,00.html"More Feeds/a pa href="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~at/2t9CXQOvJDTrXGS3v5lE63coKb4/a"img src="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~at/2t9CXQOvJDTrXGS3v5lE63coKb4/i" border="0" ismap="true"/img/a/p

divimg alt="" src="http://hits.guardian.co.uk/b/ss/guardiangu-feeds/1/H.15.1/50619?ns=guardianpageName=Politics%3A+Lone+parents+told+to+be+ready+to+work+or+face+benefit+cutch=Politicsc3=The+Guardianc4=Welfare+%28Politics%29%2CPolitics%2CSocietyc5=Society+Weekly%2CNot+commercially+useful%2CSocial+Care+Societyc6=Patrick+Wintourc7=2008_12_02c8=1127204c9=articlec10=GUc11=Politicsc12=Welfarec13=c14=h2=GU%2FPolitics%2FWelfare" width="1" height="1" //divpThe government will announce further stringent welfare reforms today which would force lone parents with children aged one or more to prepare themselves for work or face benefit sanctions./ppThe proposals, likely to provoke a confrontation in tomorrow's Queen's speech, represent a further extension of the government's responsibilities agenda. Ministers already faced a backlash over aspects of the planned welfare reform bill as lobbyists argued plans to tighten sanctions and give private contractors a bigger role in job placement, should be shelved in view of the recession./ppBut James Purnell, the work and pensions secretary, will defy critics when he publishes a review prepared by the academic Paul Gregg that will propose all lone parents with children as young as one should be required to make themselves ready for work./ppThe government proposed in a green paper in July to make it a requirement for lone parents with children aged seven or more to seek work, proposals that had already led to a backlash. It is estimated there are 600,000 lone parents with children aged under seven. /ppGregg is to propose a new category of benefit claimants - the progression to work group - who he says should face clearer state requirements to make themselves ready for work. /ppThe Department for Work and Pensions said this group would include lone parents with children as young as one, partners of people on benefits with children under seven and incapacity benefit claimants deemed to be capable of work. /ppThis group, before they are actually ready to actively seek work, would be expected to address debt, confidence or health problems, as well as taking on work and skills training. Young mothers might also be required to make inquiries about access to childcare in their locality. /pp"Sanctions would only apply to those who refuse to take steps to be job-ready that have been jointly agreed with their personal advisers in Job Centres", said a DWP official. /ppFrom 2010 many of these advisers would be employed by the private sector or charities. /ppThe Gregg review stemmed from concerns in the DWP that the current path to benefit entitlement was not clear. Ministers favoured the example of Scandinavia, especially Denmark, where almost everyone is expected to do something in return for receiving unemployment benefit. /ppThe government's previous proposals have already been attacked by Richard Tilt, chairman of the independent social security advisory committee, and by the leftwing pressure group Compass which has argued "it is wrong to profit from the sick and the unemployed"./pdiv style="float: left; margin-right: 10px; margin-bottom: 10px;"ullia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/welfare"Welfare/a/li/ul/diva href="http://www.guardian.co.uk"guardian.co.uk/a copy; Guardian News Media Limited 2008 | Use of this content is subject to our a href="http://users.guardian.co.uk/help/article/0,,933909,00.html"Terms Conditions/a | a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/webfeeds/1,,1309488,00.html"More Feeds/a pa href="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~at/JMp04tVf-dS_kaq5Er-qbQ4urwA/a"img src="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~at/JMp04tVf-dS_kaq5Er-qbQ4urwA/i" border="0" ismap="true"/img/a/p

p style="padding-left: 30px;"a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/marketsNews/idINN0151494720081201?rpc=44"img class="float_right" src="/~~/f?id=48567ec2796c7a0f00aece9fmaxX=372maxY=226" border="0" alt="bewkespauliewalnuts.jpg" title="bewkespauliewalnuts.jpg" width="372" height="226" /Reuters:/a Time Warner is asking its shareholders to vote for a reverse stock split, in a bid to boost its languishing market price and improve the shares' liquidity, according to a regulatory filing on Monday.span/spanspan/span/p p style="padding-left: 30px;"The media company, which owns cable news network CNN and movie studio Warner Bros among its media properties, is proposing the split after it separates from its Time Warner Cable Inc unit early in 2009./p p style="padding-left: 30px;"span/span/p p style="padding-left: 30px;"A special meeting of stockholders will be held on Jan. 16 at its New York headquarters. It said in a proxy filing that stockholders will be asked to vote on a reverse stock split in a ratio of either 1-for-2 or 1-for-3, as determined by the board./p p style="padding-left: 30px;"span/span/p p style="padding-left: 30px;"Time Warner owns 84 percent of Time Warner Cable and its shareholders will receive a special one-time dividend of $10.9 billion when it separates from the cable unit./p p style="padding-left: 30px;"span/span/p p style="padding-left: 30px;"The media company said its board believes that following the separation, the market price and trading ranges for Time Warner stock may be significantly lower than the current market price due to the fact that Time Warner will have distributed all of its Time Warner Cable shares to Time Warner shareholders./p p style="padding-left: 30px;"span/span/p p style="padding-left: 30px;"The board said it believes that increasing Time Warner's absolute share price will make it a more liquid and marketable stock. It said some institutional investors and investment funds are prohibited from investing in lower-priced stocks./p pAnother benefit: The new stock price will be less embarrassing./p pa href="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~at/P0ZOQZkfQj72oCqEfsMG79f-n00/a"img src="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~at/P0ZOQZkfQj72oCqEfsMG79f-n00/i" border="0" ismap="true"/img/a/pdiv class="feedflare" a href="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/typepad/alleyinsider/silicon_alley_insider?a=v8cd0iiC"img src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/typepad/alleyinsider/silicon_alley_insider?i=v8cd0iiC" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/typepad/alleyinsider/silicon_alley_insider?a=oeCFweQa"img src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/typepad/alleyinsider/silicon_alley_insider?d=52" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/typepad/alleyinsider/silicon_alley_insider?a=gfYZPeVG"img src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/typepad/alleyinsider/silicon_alley_insider?d=80" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/typepad/alleyinsider/silicon_alley_insider?a=tXPtVUo8"img src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/typepad/alleyinsider/silicon_alley_insider?i=tXPtVUo8" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/typepad/alleyinsider/silicon_alley_insider?a=rIbUJW8e"img src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/typepad/alleyinsider/silicon_alley_insider?d=131" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/typepad/alleyinsider/silicon_alley_insider?a=dIF4KHee"img src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/typepad/alleyinsider/silicon_alley_insider?d=336" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/typepad/alleyinsider/silicon_alley_insider?a=xOxSUoaR"img src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/typepad/alleyinsider/silicon_alley_insider?d=41" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/typepad/alleyinsider/silicon_alley_insider?a=pipBivyP"img src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/typepad/alleyinsider/silicon_alley_insider?d=50" border="0"/img/a /divimg src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/typepad/alleyinsider/silicon_alley_insider/~4/H4aLj0H8MxQ" height="1" width="1"/

Academic and high-tech industry representatives discuss potential federal innovation policy reforms, saying its time to bring together powerful constituencies who would benefit from new policies.

Academic and high-tech industry representatives discuss potential federal innovation policy reforms, saying its time to bring together powerful constituencies who would benefit from new policies.

Academic and high-tech industry representatives discuss potential federal innovation policy reforms, saying its time to bring together powerful constituencies who would benefit from new policies.

pemsmallPhoto by stronga href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/sunggnus" target="_blank"Sung Kim/a/strong/small/embr /br /Given all the silly undertakings stronga href="http://www.weezer.com/" target="_blank"Weezer/a/strong have, uh, undertaken in recent months, it's easy to forget that Weezer are, at the end of the day, a band. A band which, like many bands, makes music. Too much music, as it turns out: as Rivers Cuomo stronga href="http://www.billboard.com/bbcom/news/weezer-raids-vaults-records-xmas-carols-1003917715.story" target="_blank"revealed to Billboard.com/a/strong recently, the veteran power-poppers are cooking up a little odds and ends collection tentatively titled, you guessed it, emOdds and Ends/em.br /br /According to Cuomo, this is "just another fun project. They're great songs, but for some reason they didn't make the final cut for [a] record. They span a vast period of time from the very beginning of our career in the early '90s right up to the present day." There's no word yet on a release for emOdds and Ends/em, but considering Cuomo's own stronga href="/article/news/146861-rivers-cuomo-talks-alone-ii-weezer-that-hair" target="_blank"emAlone II/em/a/strong clearing house comp just hit shelves last week, it may be a minute.br /br /Due much sooner according to Rivers are Weezer renditions of six beloved Christmas carols, including "O Holy Night", set to appear span style="text-decoration: line-through;"on a holiday benefit comp/span as downloadable add-ons for the iPhone game stronga href="http://tapulous.com/taptap/" target="_blank"emTap Tap Revenge/em/a/strong. Because nothing brings good tidings like you burying your face in some electronic gadget.br /br /But wait, there's more: Cuomo spilled the (pork and) beans on what could well prove a career-defining moment for the songwriter. Yes, Rivers has apparently written a song with teen pop sister act stronga href="http://www.alyandaj.com/" target="_blank"Aly amp; AJ/a/strong. Who knows when (or how) we'll ultimately hear it, but as Rivers told Billboard.com, "It was such a blast to remember how teenagers approach songwriting. Their minds just work so fast and they have no fear and no ego." We'll sound the alarm once he starts wondering about the clothes they wear to school, how they decorate their rooms, and, um, stronga href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ise4axZMDxo" target="_blank"yeah/a/strong.br /br /Weezer's camp couldn't confirm any of the above at this time, so we'll just have to take Rivers at his word for now./p pa href="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~a/OqYKDPr9V7EAuV-jj66B_aJBbWs/a"img src="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~a/OqYKDPr9V7EAuV-jj66B_aJBbWs/i" border="0" ismap="true"/img/a/pimg src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/pitchfork/today/~4/UJWZY5R7J4c" height="1" width="1"/

pThe a href="/article/news/50842-byrnedirty-projectors-collab-sufjan-feist-on-comp"strongeagerly anticipated/strong/a compilation emDark Was the Night/em, a href="/article/news/50921-aaron-dessner-discusses-red-hot-comp-the-national"strongcurated by Aaron and Bryce Dessner of the National/strong/a to benefit the a href="http://www.redhot.org/"strongRed Hot Organization/strong/a, has now completed its all-star lineup, and man, is it impressive./p pa href="/article/news/147030-more-details-about-dessners-aids-benefit-comp"strongAs previously reported/strong/a, emDark Was the Night /emarrives on double CD, triple LP, or download February 17 from a href="http://4ad.com/"strong4AD/strong/a, benefiting both your record collection and Red Hot's AIDS-fighting efforts around the world. It's Red Hot's 20th such compilation, released in conjunction with the organization's 20th anniversary, and they pulled out all the stops for this celebration./p pDeep breath...br /br /Sufjan Stevens turns in a track of his own, and he also appears on a Buck 65 remix alongside Chicago rapper Serengeti. Feist joins Grizzly Bear for a track and Death Cab for Cutie's Ben Gibbard for another, and the Grizz turn in a tune by themselves. Conor Oberst is joined by Gillian Welch, David Byrne joins the Dirty Projectors, Joseacute; Gonzaacute;lez jumps on a cover of Nick Drake's "Cello Song" with the Books, and Blonde Redhead meet up with Devastations. Spoon's got a song on there, as do Arcade Fire, the Decemberists, Cat Power and Dirty Delta Blues, Belle and Sebastian's Stuart Murdoch, Yo La Tengo, Kevin Drew of Broken Social Scene, Beirut, Iron and Wine, Andrew Bird, My Morning Jacket, the New Pornographers, Beach House, Yeasayer, Sigur Roacute;s offshoot Riceboy Sleeps, Bon Iver, TV on the Radio's Dave Sitek, Sharon Jones and the Dap Kings, Yeasayer, My Brightest Diamond (doing "Feeling Good", made famous by Nina Simone), and the Kronos Quartet, doing the Blind Willie Johnson song "Dark Was the Night"./p pThe National boys, not content to stay put in the curator's chair, turn in quite a few appearances on the thing as well. Bryce Dessner is joined by Antony Hegarty on a track, Bon Iver and Aaron Dessner join forces for a tune, and the National themselves loan one to the proceedings.br /br /On a related note, today (December 1) is World AIDS Day. To find out how you can pitch in, visit a href="http://www.worldaidscampaign.org/static/en/"strongworldaidscampaign.org/strong/a./p pa href="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~a/1t9yvawvMq8buVJXQzS-UR5zJsk/a"img src="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~a/1t9yvawvMq8buVJXQzS-UR5zJsk/i" border="0" ismap="true"/img/a/pimg src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/pitchfork/today/~4/9Jfrj-pEZK4" height="1" width="1"/

Bidding begins Monday, December 1st (World AIDS Day) on eBay for BID 2 BEAT AIDS, a massive annual auction of rare and autographed items and meet-and-greets with celebrities. Fans can bid on meet-and-greets with the Jonas Brothers, Tony Hawk, Joan Rivers, Michael Phelps or autographed items from Beyonce, Madonna, Lindsay Lohan, Lance Bass, Tori Spelling, Amy Winehouse, Jim Carrey, Aretha Franklin, Ne-Yo, Matthew McConaughey, Jennifer Hudson, Rihanna, Mariah Carey and many more. Proceeds benefit LIFEbeat, the Music Industry Fights AIDS. Sponsors include MTV and Borders. (PRWeb Dec 1, 2008)

Read the full story at http://www.prweb.com/releases/2008/12/prweb1673814.htm

In recent days, The Washington Times and the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review have published op-eds by members of the Heritage Foundation containing the false claim that union autoworkers earn $75 an hour in wages and benefits. In a November 28 Washington Times op-ed, Heritage Foundation president Ed Feulner claimed that "UAW [United Auto Workers] employees earn three times as much as an average blue collar worker makes -- $75 per hour on average in wages and benefits." Similarly, in a November 25 Pittsburgh Tribune-Review op-ed, Heritage fellow James Sherk claimed that "UAW workers are among the world's most affluent. They take home an eye-popping $75 an hour in wages and benefits -- triple what the average private-sector worker earns." In fact, autoworkers do not take home an average of $75 per hour. According to General Motors, these claims are based not only on current workers' hourly wages and benefits, such as health care and retirement, but also retirement and health-care benefits that U.S. automakers are providing for current retirees, as Media Matters for America has repeatedly noted.

Heritage senior research fellow James Gattuso also recently asserted without challenge on MSNBC's Hardball that "there's no reason that a UAW worker should get total compensation of $70 an hour when the average American only makes about $25 an hour in total compensation." Numerous media figures have also advanced the false claim that autoworkers earn $70 or more per hour in wages and benefits, some using it to blame auto workers for the domestic auto industry's financial straits.

From Feulner's November 28 op-ed in The Washington Times:

For starters, the Big Three need an affordable labor deal. Across the decades, Detroit's powerful United Auto Workers union has negotiated unsustainable pay packages for its members. UAW employees earn three times as much as an average blue collar worker makes -- $75 per hour on average in wages and benefits. That's also about $25 per hour more than American employees of Japanese automakers earn.

Health care for retirees and current workers costs the company $4.6 billion in 2007. That, in turn, adds $1,200 to the cost of each new GM vehicle produced in the United States.

A bailout would mean taxpayers -- many of whom make far less than the average autoworker -- would be stuck paying for these unaffordable pay packages. Under bankruptcy protection, though, automakers could hammer out better deals, allowing them to close unnecessary plants, trim their work forces and reduce pay and benefit packages to bring them in line with those offered by other heavy manufacturing.

To succeed in the long haul, the automakers must also be able to shut down makes and models that don't sell very well, and also close underperforming car dealerships.

From Sherk's November 25 op-ed in the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review:

Many factors have combined to bring the Big Three down, including poor management, too many brands, poor product design and too many costly dealerships. But the main reason they're on the verge of bankruptcy can be summed up in three letters: UAW.

UAW workers are among the world's most affluent. They take home an eye-popping $75 an hour in wages and benefits -- triple what the average private-sector worker earns. They get seven weeks' paid vacation and holidays.

UAW workers retire after 30 years on a generous pension. If they don't qualify for Social Security benefits because they're in their 50s, they get special bonus payments until they do.

[...]

Management also made its share of mistakes. Focusing on gas-guzzling SUVs was foolish in hindsight. But even that was brought on by the UAW. At $75 an hour the Big Three couldn't compete in the small and midsize car market. So they concentrated on making the trucks and SUVs on which they could still make a profit. Until oil hit $140 a barrel.

Companies are turning to open source for cost savings and productivity, but will vendors benefit?

Companies are turning to open source for cost savings and productivity, but will vendors benefit?

pimg src="http://www.gamasutra.com/db_area/images/news2001/21306/ema.jpg" align="left" hspace="5"/Could point-of-sale "activation" software for games and DVDs discourage theft? The Entertainment Merchants Association seems to think so, and has published a set of standards for what it calls "benefit denial technology" that would render discs inoperable until they're paid for at retail. The effort is codenamed "Project Lazarus," and the EMA says it's assembled a consortium of retailers, home video companies and video game publishers to see how easily such "benefit denial technology" could .../pdiv class="feedflare" a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/GamasutraNews?a=CPb9O"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/GamasutraNews?i=CPb9O" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/GamasutraNews?a=C3xoO"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/GamasutraNews?i=C3xoO" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/GamasutraNews?a=g7ijO"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/GamasutraNews?i=g7ijO" border="0"/img/a /divimg src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/GamasutraNews/~4/471558313" height="1" width="1"/

pimg alt="Facebook Connect" src="http://www.readwriteweb.com/imgFacebookConnect.jpg" width="150" height="175" /If the initial development race of Web 2.0 centered around "building a better social network" then the next phase will certainly focus on extending the reach of existing social networks beyond their current domain. How? By using the elements of the a href="http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/social_graph_concepts_and_issues.php"social graph/a as the foundational components that will drive the social Web. Where we once focused on going to a destination - particular social network to participate - we will now begin to carry components of social networks along with us, wherever we go. In the next phase of the social Web, every site will become social./p p align="right"emSponsor/embr /a href='http://d.openx.org/ck.php?n=12758amp;cb=12758' target='_blank'img src='http://d.openx.org/avw.php?zoneid=861amp;cb=12758amp;n=12758' border='0' alt='' align="right" //a/p pTo date, a href="http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/google_friend_connect_manages.php"Google Friend Connect/a, a href="http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/yahoo_opens_yos_to_developers.php"Yahoo! Open Strategy/a, and a href="http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/facebook_connect_coming_soon_t.php"Facebook Connect/a have all been rushing to take the lead in this next phase. Today, a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/01/technology/internet/01facebook.html?pagewanted=2_r=1partner=rssemc=rss"The New York Times reports/a that Facebook has taken another step forward by delivering Connect functionality to new crop of sites./p pWhile the first group of sites that were allowed to leverage Connect - CBS The Insider, CNN The Forum, Connected Weddings, Global Grind, Govit, Indie GoGo, MoveOn.org, and Red Bull - were a good test case, Facebook is stepping into a whole new realm with its next round of sites - Discovery Channel, The San Francisco Chronicle, Geni, Hulu, and Digg. It's a safe bet that Digg will be the most interesting test case to date./p h2What Does Facebook Connect Do?/h2 pFacebook Connect proposes to make data and friend connections currently held within the walled garden of Facebook accessible to other services. This has two distinct benefits, one for the sites and one for Facebook./p pFor the participating sites, Facebook Connect provides more social functionality without a great deal of additional development. A new user can opt to share the profile information in Facebook instead of developing a new account. This gives the user access to the site and its services without the tedium of developing yet another profile on yet another site. In addition, users can use the relationship information in Facebook to connect to their friends on the other services. In short, it makes the new partner site an extension of Facebook./p pAnd that hits upon the distinct benefit for Facebook: more data. Before Connect, Facebook's understanding of user behavior was relegated to what occurred on Facebook and, potentially, through third-party Facebook apps. With Connect, Facebook will extend its reach exponentially. In so doing, it will gather even more data on Facebook users, whether they're within the walled garden or not./p h2Facebook Beacon, Part 2?/h2 pOne of Facebook's primary marketing concerns with Facebook Connect has been to extend the value of its advertising-based revenue model while - obviously - avoiding the a href="http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/facebook_beacon_apology.php"debacle that was Facebook Beacon/a. That has pushed Facebook to pursue a slow, methodical release of Connect, proceeding with caution to avoid any similar gaffs./p pFor now, they have the luxury of time. Facebook has continued to roll out their distributed social offering more quickly than the competition. And no doubt, they're learning a few things along the way that will give them a decided advantage over similar services. /p pBut can they turn that early lead into a decisive victory?/p h2Adoption Is the Key/h2 pIf Facebook beats everyone else to the party, that doesn't mean they've won the race. The true value for Facebook is getting users to adopt Facebook Connect and extend their profiles to these external sites. Adoption will be the true deciding factor./p pAnd that's why this new group of Facebook Connect sites will be interesting to watch. With the first group, Facebook was able to prove the concept had merit. With this latest group, they will be working to prove that users actually want to use the service. /p pWill Digg users be willing to connect their profiles and begin shouting to their Facebook friends? Is there a great deal of crossover between Facebook users and Discovery Channel? Will enough Facebook users watch the latest SNL skit on Hulu to provide useful data? /p pIt's safe to assume that there is crossover between Facebook and any number of sites. But, the question remains: will the population of users who opt to use Connect be large enough to pay off? It's hard to say. We'll just have to wait and see how Connect performs in the wild./p stronga href="http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/facebook_connect_readies.php#comments-open"Discuss/a/strong pa href="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~at/bEq1wLjzqEqpTmjliRi5b_ItsFM/a"img src="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~at/bEq1wLjzqEqpTmjliRi5b_ItsFM/i" border="0" ismap="true"/img/a/pdiv class="feedflare" a href="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/readwriteweb?a=sUZOjjKY"img src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/readwriteweb?d=1035" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/readwriteweb?a=MIyodfNo"img src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/readwriteweb?d=41" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/readwriteweb?a=96vBE9fK"img src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/readwriteweb?i=96vBE9fK" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/readwriteweb?a=zffafNEi"img src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/readwriteweb?i=zffafNEi" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/readwriteweb?a=pjrdfaLG"img src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/readwriteweb?i=pjrdfaLG" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/readwriteweb?a=a5vHmDlS"img src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/readwriteweb?d=52" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/readwriteweb?a=SaJs0XjR"img src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/readwriteweb?d=1034" border="0"/img/a /divimg src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/readwriteweb/~4/hb9oaMvHRnw" height="1" width="1"/

TESTAMENT frontman Chuck Billy joined DEATH ANGEL on stage for a cover of METALLICA's Leper Messiah during the benefit concert for DEFTONES bassist Chi Cheng, which was held on Saturday, November 29 at Fat City in San Francisco, California.

iBreast Cancer, Vol. 15, No. 1. (15 January 2008), pp. 49-56./ibr /br /Abstract  Clinical application of truly targeted therapy relies on identification of a specific molecular feature (the target) that is biologically relevant, reproducibly measurable and definably correlated with clinical benefit. Ideally the target should be crucial to the tumor’s malignant phenotype. The target must be easily measurable in readily obtained clinical samples. Interruption, interference or inhibition of the target should yield a clinical response in a significant proportion of patients whose tumors express the target but in few patients whose tumors do not express the target. As such, targeted therapy offers the twin hopes of maximizing efficacy while minimizing toxicity. A critical review of the hallmarks of malignancy provides a framework for considering potential targets and novel therapeutic interventions. The hallmarks of malignancy include uncontrolled proliferation, insensitivity to negative growth regulation, evasion of apoptosis, lack of senescence, invasion and metastasis, angiogenesis, and genomic elasticity. Existing therapies predominantly target proliferation either with cytotoxic agents, ionizing radiation or inhibition of estrogen receptor and HER2 growth factor signaling pathways. Further improvements in therapy must attack the other hallmarks of malignancy and will undoubtedly be accompanied by better means of individual patient selection for such therapies. Indeed, each of these hallmarks presents a therapeutic opportunity. To believe otherwise would be to assume that a feature is both biologically crucial yet therapeutically unimportant, an unlikely paradox.br /iDanielle Doyle, Kathy Miller/i

HowtoForge: "This tutorial provides step-by-step instructions on how to install VMware Server 2 on an Ubuntu 8.10 desktop system. With VMware Server you can create and run guest operating systems ("virtual machines") such as Linux, Windows, FreeBSD, etc. under a host operating system. This has the benefit that you can run multiple operating systems on the same hardware which saves a lot of money, and you can move virtual machines from one VMware Server to the next one (or to a system that has the VMware Player which is also free)."

Hi, I'm new to this forum and not so new to photography but new to the whole idea of actually going somewhere with it.

I'm only 17 and I'm ready to begin my career. I know a lot of people say photography is one of the riskiest careers and I should keep it as a hobby. I know that once I begin, nothing will stand in my way. (my motivation)

Anyway, this is what I needed help on.

I'm new to photography(obviously), but I need help. I'm purchasing a Nikon D40 at the end of December. I've seen a lot of posts made about the Nikon D40 99.1% positive. Since I was 12, I played with Digital Compact cameras that were Nikon. I'm used to Nikon and I only trust Nikon.

Question 1. Can anyone tell me what lens are compatible with the D40. I know that some of the Nikon/Nikkor (whatever) lenses won't work with the Nikon D40. Please explain and give me details =].

Question 2. Since I'm new and I don't plan on making a lot of money as of right now, should I do the whole sell to stock photo websites. I know I'm pretty great at taking portraits and landscaping but I wonder if Stock Photo websites would really benefit an amateur.

Question 3. I know I shouldn't be asking anyone this and I should only be asking myself but I have to share th