I was just reading about how Russia lent 4 billion euros to Iceland to shore up its financial system. I was very surprised that the EU or USA had not helped out. The Iceland bailout maybe the beginning of bailouts of small countries by larger countries. A global financial crisis such as the one we are going through right now shows the benefits of being part of a larger country or belonging to a country association such as the EU. The little country that must be most worried now is Switzerland. With its federal system how are the small cantons going to be able to help out if one of the Swiss giants needs $100?

What the world now needs is a well functioning global financial institution. An IMF that is not neoliberal but who understands that what works around the world is sociocapitalism not pure capitalism and stands ready to help.

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Watching Ninja Blade in action for the first time at Microsoft's Daitabashi offices, it reminded us of another From Software action classic, Otogi: Myth of Demons. While Ninja Blade and Otogi don't really have that much in common outside of being hack and slash action games, there's something to protagonist Ken Ogawa's three weapons — especially the giant, armor-smashing sword he carries — that makes us think "Hey, these guys made Otogi. Maybe this'll be good."
Kazuhiro Hamatani, planner for Ninja Blade told us, rather unfortunately, that the game is not a spiritual successor to the two Otogi games that hit the original Xbox.
"[Ninja Blade] was not intended to be Otogi 3," Hamatani said via his translator. "But people who like action action games like Otogi will like this game."
Well, so what *about* Otogi 3? How's that coming along anyway?
"I have no idea," was the response to our inquiries about the possibility of a sequel. We'd consider the matter totally done with, if only Hamatani wasn't deviously gigging while delivering the answer. Perhaps someday...
We'll have hands-on impressions of Ninja Blade later this week, as the game will be playable at Microsoft's massive TGS booth.

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Guitarist with J Drew Sheard's Whyte Noyse and Kiki Sheard's BRL Choir Tom Stoepker plays Giant Steps.

Author: outconsider Keywords: tom stoepker drew sheard kiki tim stewart kurt rosenwinkel wayne krantz guitar jay vox maui hip-hop Added: October 8, 2008

Google’s mission is to organize the world’s information — be it via search, email, online maps or mobile apps — but it could someday help you manage your daily energy consumption, too. At a speech at the Commonwealth Club in San Francisco last week, Google CEO Eric Schmidt said that as part of its recently announced collaboration with GE, the search engine giant is currently looking at designing tools to help consumers understand their energy consumption. Google has also been actively looking at utilities’ smart meter projects, he said, and at using its strong connection with consumers to play a role in consumer energy management.

In fact, out of all of Google’s grand energy schemes, among them its $4.4 trillion energy proposal, its $45 million investment into energy-related startups and its plug-in vehicle project, energy data management could be one of the only places where Google plans to generate revenues. Schmidt said during his speech that there is an internal debate going on at the company as to how much of its energy initiatives will turn into real revenues, but that, “[T]o the degree that we can be in the information businesses or communications businesses about energy and its impact on the world, we are clearly going to be there.”

Helping consumers, even utilities, manage energy data is a perfect fit for Google. Power grids throughout the world will need to undergo a dramatic buildout and restructuring to accommodate both an increased demand for energy and a switch to renewable power. By 2050, the world???s population is forecast to balloon to 9 billion people from 6.5 billion — all while the world is trying to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by some 80 percent. The power grid in its current form won???t be able to support the loads — inefficient and unintelligent, it has yet to benefit from the technologies of the information age. Meanwhile, at the edges of the grid, consumers know very little about their energy use; monthly electricity bills have an appalling lack of transparency and options compared to industries like cell phones.

But change is on its way. Utilities are starting to install smart meters in homes to provide two-way digital communication. According to data from the Cleantech Group, venture capitalists invested a record $220 million into smart grid startups in the third quarter of 2008, including companies like GridPoint, Eka Systems, BPL Global and Trilliant. Startups like Greenbox, PowerMand, and EnergyHub are building energy dashboards and wireless home network products to help consumers manage energy use. Google could easily acquire its way into this market, too. (See our report on 25 up-and-coming Smart Energy Home startups) As Cees Links, the CEO of GreenPeak, a startup that builds wireless energy sensor networks, put it, there???s a simple but revolutionary change going on, that of ???a growing awareness of energy being a precious resource.???

That said, there probably isn???t a company that has changed consumer behavior online more than Google. It has not only shaped how consumers access information — from news to images to direction — some have argued that Google is even changing the way we think and process information (See the Atlantic???s “Is Google Making Us Stupid?”). The company has spent years organizing personal consumer information through web searches, advertising, and email, information that could come in very handy when it comes to building smart tools to offer energy-saving services.

So Google is wise to be looking into online tools, or even a wireless home networking product, that could help consumers change their energy consumption behavior. They’re clearly headed in that direction: ???It seems obvious to me that if you give [energy] information to end users they behave smartly,” Schmidt said in his speech. “So we are working on that.” It could ultimately be the most important contribution Google makes to fighting climate change. As Stanford???s Precourt Institute for Energy Efficiency notes, advanced technology deployments will take several decades and a lot of capital. Simple tools that can affect the behavior of the average consumer???s energy usage will be more cost-effective and can be implemented now. For all its do-gooder intentions and philanthropic Google.org aims, how can Google resist such an easy target?

Image courtesy of Google.

The very first time you touch the BlackBerry Storm&mdash;RIM's first all-touchscreen keyboard-free smartphone, just announced for Verizon Wireless&mdash;you will be startled. No matter how many times your fingers dance on the screen like you've been trained on every other touchscreen, nothing will happen. At least, not until you push the screen all the way down and you feel a click. Yes, the screen is a giant button, one you have to punch for basically every action, even every letter you type, completely breaking the touchscreen paradigm. Surprisingly, it works.
While the Storm's defining feature is this, what RIM ungracefully calls ClickThrough, the phone is much, much more. The term "iPhone killer" is clumsily tossed around by bloggers and journos (including us) to describe almost any phone with a touchscreen, but by trying to actually innovate rather than imitate, RIM has conjured up the phone most deserving of the title yet. It's got an innovative multi-touch UI, runs on Verizon's EV-DO 3G network in the US as well as any GSM HSPA 3G networks when abroad, so it's a true global smartphone. OK, maybe there never will be an "iPhone killer"&mdash;it's a stupid idea anyway&mdash;but based on our limited time with the BlackBerry Storm, it seems like it will definitely hold its own against every other marquee handset on the market.
Let's talk more about ClickThrough, since using the Storm means using it. RIM co-CEO Mike Lazaridis, who notoriously said he can't type on a piece of glass, told me that it was in development for years as they looked to evolve past the trackball while accomplishing something no touchscreen has before: Separating navigation from confirmation. So you have to push the touchscreen like a button every time you do something. Typing with it takes some getting used to, even if you can fly on an iPhone or other touchscreen device, because you have to retrain yourself to actually lift your thumb back off of the screen to let it pop back up between every single letter. Since you can't "flow" continuously in a stream but are pounding out a series of clicks, it's hard to tell in the limited time I had with it how fast you would be able to go once you're completely re-trained. It's a unique and finely tuned sensation, and I liked it, but I could definitely see people loathing it.
More on navigation. One annoyance when typing is that it highlights letters in blue rather than doing a magnified pop-up like the iPhone or LG Vu, so letters will probably be obscured if you have fat fingers. One of the weird inconsistencies (there are a few) with needing to clickthrough for an action actually occurs with copy and paste, which took a few seconds to get down since it involved a long hold and drag when it was demoed for me&mdash;they oddly didn't show me the multitouch method shown in the leaked user guide, though RIM later confirmed it would be there. Also worth noting is that it has an accelerometer (which seemed to be a hair more sensitive than the iPhone's), so it detects whether it's in landscape or portrait orientation, using the QWERTY keyboard for text entry in the former and SureType for the latter.
While the BlackBerry OS has been optimized for grubby fingers, all of the standard BlackBerry navigation paradigms are in play, so there's plenty of pushing the four buttons along the bottom of the screen: menu, back, send and end like you would on a regular BlackBerry to get around.
The browser improves upon the one in the Bold and is even more competent at rendering HTML. You have a couple different ways to navigate around a page, though the most unique makes use of the whole screen as a trackpad, so that once you have the cursor pop up, you can put your finger anywhere on the screen to move it around, just like on a notebook. It's context sensitive, so it'll do what it's supposed to when you hit a link or whatnot. It had some trouble with a text entry field in the browser, and had some other jitters but then it obviously wasn't a final version. RIM's concern with the user experience is very apparent, so I expect it to be cleaned up when the final version ships, presumably in November for a still undetermined price (crossing fingers for $199).
Overall, it was a solid browsing experience, though one thing to take note that is per Verizon standards, you'll be doing it over EV-DO, not Wi-Fi, since it doesn't have the latter. Lack of Wi-Fi is one of the biggest knocks on the phone, no matter how damn good Verizon's network might be. The fact that it packs both EV-DO and HSPA into a single phone is a truly impressive feat worth marveling over, but why couldn't they cram Wi-Fi in there too?
The screen is gorgeous. I haven't seen the HTC Touch HD in person, but barring that, the 480x360 184-pixel-per-inch stunner could be the best screen on the market. It's bright, contrasty, the colors are beautiful and the viewing angle is ridiculous. I think I could watch the whole of Iron Man on it. Media navigation isn't as intuitive as the iPhone, basically re-using the usual BlackBerry UI, but it's not difficult to get around by any means. Still, RIM clearly intends to take the fight seriously, since the Storm will come with an 8GB microSD card and supports stereo Bluetooth.
The Storm is RIM's most consumer-oriented device yet, but it's also still a BlackBerry heart, with all of the standard enterprise features like Office document editing, full email search, Exchange support&mdash;everything a BlackBerry user expects. Not to mention littler touches like BlackBerry Maps (it'll have Verizon's VZ Navigator too), BrickBreaker and Facebook pre-installed.
You've already seen the app store in leaks, and RIM told me that there will be an SDK for the phone in short order. The weird explosion of consumer-oriented BlackBerry apps a little while ago was not a coincidence&mdash;RIM seems fully aware that a strong developer community and killer apps are more critical than ever in the consumer smartphone market.
This will be the most important phone in Verizon's lineup, and from the looks of it, the best. Some people will hate ClickThrough&mdash;it's not a perfect solution, but it's genuinely innovative and really damn good. Some people will hate that it's not the iPhone (or the G1, since it's another tightly integrated hardware/software package). But for BlackBerry users looking for a touchscreen phone, or Verizon customers who don't want to do without the carrier's superior coverage area, this is the best there is.
If you've got questions, leave them in the comments, I'll answer them.
BlackBerry Takes the World by Storm on the Most Reliable Networks in Europe and the U.S.
Verizon Wireless, Vodafone and RIM Deliver the Power of a Smartphone with the World’s First Tactile Touch Display on a BlackBerry
BASKING RIDGE, N.J., NEWBURY, England, and WATERLOO, Ontario – Verizon Wireless, Vodafone Group (NYSE and LSE: VOD) and Research In Motion (RIM) (NASDAQ: RIMM; TSX: RIM) today announced that the BlackBerry® Storm™ will be available exclusively to Verizon Wireless customers in the U.S. and Vodafone customers in Europe, Australia and New Zealand next month.
Designed to appeal to both consumers and business customers, the BlackBerry Storm combines the powerful communication features and productivity tools of a global BlackBerry smartphone with revolutionary technology that provides for easy and precise touch screen typing on the world’s first tactile touch display that responds like a keyboard and combines multi-touch and gesture support for intuitive selection and application navigation.
In the U.S., BlackBerry Storm customers will benefit from the nation’s most reliable wireless voice network and the pervasiveness of Verizon Wireless’ reliable high-speed Evolution-Data Optimized (EV-DO) Revision A (Rev. A) network for rich Internet browsing. Building on the strong business heritage of BlackBerry, the Storm offers consumers a host of fun and practical features, including:
o Large high resolution screen coupled with a rich multi-media suite
o Text (SMS), picture messaging (MMS), the ability to watch 30-second video clips, instant messaging and access to popular social networking sites
o Removable and rechargeable 1400 mAhr battery that provides approximately 5.5 hours of talk time and 15 days of standby time.
”The BlackBerry Storm offers our customers more ways to stay connected to both their personal and professional lives – whether in their community or around the globe,” said Mike Lanman, vice president and chief marketing officer of Verizon Wireless. ”The BlackBerry Storm combines the reliability of our network with the dependability and network efficiency of the BlackBerry platform to deliver our customers the ultimate wireless experience – all in one of the coolest smartphones available on the market today.”
The Power is in The Touch
The BlackBerry Storm comes with a unique touch screen that gives a distinct ‘click’ confirmation when depressed ever so slightly, very similar in experience to a keyboard-based BlackBerry smartphone. An easy to use menu adds support for multi-touches, taps, slides, swipes and other gestures, so customers can easily select, scroll, pan, and zoom for smooth navigation.
The tactile touch screen display gives customers worldwide a choice of virtual keyboards – RIM’s SureType® layout in portrait and a full QWERTY* layout in landscape orientation. Relevant features such as cut and paste are only a touch away for the ultimate smartphone experience.
World Class Smartphone
The BlackBerry Storm is a top of the line mobile phone with global connectivity. In the U.S., the BlackBerry Storm gives Verizon Wireless customers EV-DO Rev. A/CDMA – technology – and (2100Mhz) HSPA/UMTS as well as quad-band EDGE/GPRS/GSM for global use. The BlackBerry Storm 9500 from Vodafone supports (2100Mhz) HSPA and quad-band EDGE/GPRS/GSM networks.
Browse the World Over
Customers will enjoy a full HTML high performance browser that works in either portrait or landscape orientation. Navigating Web sites is fast and easy with the touch screen interface that lets users tap to zoom in and slide their finger to scroll. Icons along the bottom of the display allow for quickly accessing ”Favorites”, opening the virtual keyboard to enter text, switching between ”Page View” and ”Column View”, as well as the ability to toggle between ”Pan” mode and ”Cursor” mode. The enhanced browser supports file downloading, streaming audio and video, and with its built-in RSS support, new content from supported Web sites can be automatically pushed to the user.
Packed with Additional Features
The BlackBerry Storm, exclusively from Verizon Wireless and Vodafone, also includes the following features and functions:
o BlackBerry® Internet Service, BlackBerry® Unite!, BlackBerry® Professional Software and BlackBerry® Enterprise Server support for seamless integration with corporate email systems and the security and IT policy controls that enterprise customers require
o Edit Microsoft® Word, Excel and PowerPoint files directly on the handset
o 3.2 megapixel camera, with variable zoom, auto focus, and a powerful flash that also provides continuous lighting when recording video; the camera records video in half-VGA resolution (480x320) or at 176x144 for MMS
o 1 GB of on board memory storage and 8 GB microSD memory card included in expandable memory card slot
o Media player that can find content on the handset in an instant, display pictures and slideshows quickly, play movies smoothly in full screen mode in any orientation, and manage an entire music collection; playlists can be created directly on the handset and there’s an equalizer with 11 preset filters – including ”Lounge”, ”Jazz” and ”Hip Hop” – for customized audio ranges when using wired headphones or external speakers
o Sleek, elegant design with contoured corners, stainless steel back and chrome side-accents that frame its large (3.26”), touch sensitive, glass lens display; its exceptional 360 x 480 resolution at 184ppi, offering the highest resolution display ever introduced on a BlackBerry smartphone, is crisp and colorful with clarity that’s easy on the eyes
o A sensor automatically adjusts to ambient light for ideal screen viewing and an orientation sensor allows customers to use the handset in a portrait or landscape position
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pimg src="http://paidcontent.org/images/uploads/mlb-logo.gif" alt="image" align="right" width="175" height="95" /What does Major League Baseball Advanced Media have in store for baseball fans next season? Come to a href="http://www.contentnext.com/econsports" title="EconSports"EconSports/a, Oct. 29 at the Edison Ballroom in New York, to find out. There, bBob Bowman/b, MLBAM's president and CEO, will be featured in a Spotlight QA. Other QAs at the event will be with NHL Commissioner bGary Bettman/b and bJohn Skipper/b, EVP of content for ESPN. /p p Recently, D.C. United a href="http://www.paidcontent.org/entry/419-dc-united-two-other-mls-teams-break-with-mls-on-digitsl-strategy/" title="broke with Major League Soccer"broke with Major League Soccer/a on its digital strategy and a few weeks ago, a href="http://www.paidcontent.org/entry/419-nhlcom-gets-full-zamboni-treatment-nhl-gamecenter-live-subscription-ser/" title="NHL.com launched"NHL.com launched/a in public beta, offering live and archived video, among other features. Earlier this summer we reported on a href="http://www.paidcontent.org/entry/419-espn-mlbam-have-new-digital-rights-deal-with-live-streaming-internation" title="ESPN and MLBAM extended"ESPN and MLBAM extending/a their digital rights deal until 2013, one that gives the sports media giant live streaming rights for online and mobile—a first for Major League Baseball. We a href="http://www.paidcontent.org/entry/419-espn-mlbam-skipper-just-needed-a-new-deal-bowman-local-live-steaming-wh" title="spoke with Skipper and Bowman"spoke with Skipper and Bowman/a about the reason for the change, rev share and more. Will online baseball a href="http://www.paidcontent.org/entry/419-sports-stream-update-mlb-says-will-try-again-next-year-nfl-network/" title="be live"be live/a in local markets next season? Read ongoing coverage on a href="http://www.paidcontent.org/channel/name/sports"our sports channel/a and discuss these issues and more at EconSports. /p p a href="http://www.contentnext.com/econsports/register/"img src="http://paidcontent.org/images/uploads/register_econsports.jpg" //a /p p EconSports tickets are available for $300; EconSports/a href="http://www.contentnext.com/econwomen" title="EconSports"EconWomen/a combos are available for $500 and ticket packages for EconSports, EconWomen and the a href="http://www.fobmconference.com" title="Future of Business Media"Future of Business Media/a are $999. /p p Thanks to our event partners and sponsors, including FOBM platinum sponsor a href="http://www.jegi.com" title="The Jordan, Edmiston Group, Inc."The Jordan, Edmiston Group, Inc./a; FOBM silver sponsors a href="http://www.theoreminc.net" title="Theorem"Theorem/a and a href="http://www.dowjones.com" title="Dow Jones"Dow Jones/a; and EconWomen silver sponsor, a href="http://www.sheknows.com" title="SheKnows"SheKnows/a. /p p If you have any questions about the program, email us at events AT contentnext.com. For sponsorship queries as well as questions regarding group or company discounts, email our business side at advertising AT contentnext.com. br / /p piOur mobile application for Blackberry and other Smartphones brings you the latest headlines when you're on the go. Go a href="http://m.paid.mwap.at/"here to download/a./i /p pa href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~a/pcorg?a=EOkzqY"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~a/pcorg?i=EOkzqY" border="0"/img/a/pdiv class="feedflare" a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/pcorg?a=CAGDM"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/pcorg?i=CAGDM" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/pcorg?a=MLotM"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/pcorg?i=MLotM" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/pcorg?a=ab62m"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/pcorg?i=ab62m" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/pcorg?a=IakCM"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/pcorg?i=IakCM" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/pcorg?a=mpzwM"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/pcorg?i=mpzwM" border="0"/img/a /div

During the October 5 Fox News special Saving Our Economy, chief White House correspondent Brett Baier repeated or failed to challenge numerous false assertions about the role of affordable housing initiatives in the financial crisis and Democratic responses to the crisis, including the following: the false suggestion that banks were pressured under the Community Reinvestment Act (CRA) to lend to unqualified buyers, causing the mortgage crisis; a repetition of his false suggestion that Rep. Barney Frank (D-MA) opposed strengthening oversight over Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac; the false claim that congressional Democrats sought to give $20 billion in taxpayer money to a controversial community organization during negotiations over legislation to authorize the U.S. Treasury to purchase up to $700 billion in mortgage-backed assets; the false claim that during a House vote on the bill, Speaker Nancy Pelosi's floor speech resulted in "10 to 20" Republicans deciding to vote against the bill; and the false claim that Democrats held the majority in the Senate in 2006 and caused a reform bill to "fail[]."

During the report, Amity Shlaes, a former Wall Street Journal columnist and author of The Forgotten Man: A New History of the Great Depression, claimed of the CRA: "We want to have everyone be able to buy a house anywhere. We're going to lend to people of all colors. Nothing wrong with that. We're going to make sure those banks do it, and they don't discriminate. But the law went overboard. Institutions made loans that they probably didn't want to make, because they couldn't seem racist." But the suggestion that the financial crisis was caused by banks lending irresponsibly to comply with the CRA is false. The CRA applies only to depository institutions -- such as banks and savings and loan associations -- which have been estimated to have issued approximately 20 percent of subprime mortgages. Further, a study released earlier this year by a law firm specializing in CRA compliance estimated that in the 15 most populous metropolitan areas, 84.3 percent of high-cost loans in 2006 were made by financial institutions not governed by the CRA. In fact, Janet Yellen, president and CEO of the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco, stated in a March speech that "studies have shown that the CRA has increased the volume of responsible lending to low- and moderate-income households" [emphasis added].

During the Fox News special, Baier further claimed of subprime loans given to low- and middle-income borrowers, "[A]t the tail end of the Clinton administration, Fannie Mae was told to substantially increase the percentage of those mortgages in its portfolio." Baier later asserted, "In April 2001, during the Bush administration's first year, the White House saw danger on the horizon." Baier went on to discuss legislative efforts to enhance oversight of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, showing Frank's comments from 2003 on the issue. But at no point did Baier or host David Asman point out Frank's efforts in 2005 and 2007 to pass legislation in the House to provide greater oversight of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Moreover, neither Baier nor Asman pointed out that in 2004, the Bush administration increased Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac's affordable housing goals from 50 percent to 56 percent. Indeed, in a June 10 article, The Washington Post reported that in 2004, "President Bush's HUD ratcheted up the main affordable-housing goal over the next four years, from 50 percent to 56 percent."

Moreover, in Financial Shock, Mark Zandi, chief economist and cofounder of Moody's Economy.com and reportedly a McCain campaign economic adviser, wrote [Page 151]:

The Clinton administration was especially proud of the rise in home ownership during the 1990s, particularly among lower income and minority groups. While home ownership rose 7% among white households during the decade, it increased 13% among African American households and 18% among Hispanic households. This could not have happened without the regulators' blessing and encouragement.

President Bush readily took up the homeownership baton at the start of his administration in 2001. Owning a home became one pillar of his "ownership society," a vision in which everyone would possess a stake in the American economy. For millions, this meant owning their own home. In summer 2002, Bush challenged lenders to add 5.5 million new minority homeowners by the end of the decade; in 2003 he signed the American Dream Downpayment Act, a program offering money to lower income households to help with down payments and closing costs on a first home. Lenders gladly accepted Bush's challenge.

To reinforce this effort, the Bush administration put substantial pressure on Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to increase their funding of mortgage loans to lower-income groups. Both Fannie and Freddie had been shown to have substantial problems during the corporate accounting scandals in the early 2000s, and both were willing to go along with any request from the administration. [The Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight] OFHEO set aggressive goals for the two giant institutions, which they met in part by purchasing subprime mortgage securities. By the time of the subprime financial shock, both had become sizable buyers of the Aaa tranches of these securities.

In addition, Baier stated, "Fannie and Freddie spread around the campaign contributions, too," and later asserted, "For the record, Republican presidential nominee John McCain took $21,550." But a September 9 New York Times article reported that McCain accepted at least $169,000 from "directors, officers and lobbyists" connected to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac during the 2008 election cycle, and Obama has received "smaller amounts" from similar officials. The Times reported that the Center for Responsive Politics said Obama "received $122,850, of which $101,150 was from Fannie Mae."

During the Fox broadcast, Baier also failed to challenge an assertion by Fox News political contributor and former House Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-GA) that during the congressional debate over the bailout bill, Democrats "wanted, for example, to have $20 billion ultimately go to ACORN and other left-wing groups out of tax money." In fact, neither the draft proposal nor the final version of the bill contained any language mentioning ACORN (Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now). Gingrich's false claim misrepresented a provision -- since removed -- that would have directed 20 percent of any profits realized on troubled assets purchased under the plan into two previously established funds, the Housing Trust Fund and the Capital Magnet Fund, which would be distributed through block grants to the states and through a competitive bidding process, respectively.

Gingrich further claimed of the initial House bill -- without challenge -- "Speaker Pelosi gave a speech that was very different from her prepared text, and I think it was designed to appease her left, which was mad at her for being for the bill. And if you were a conservative Republican trying to talk yourself into voting for this bill, Pelosi gave you every possible excuse not to. And I suspect they lost 10 to 20 votes." Baier did not point out that Fox News senior House producer Chad Pergram reported nearly an hour before Pelosi's speech began that he was "hearing from the Republican side of the aisle, they may only have 40 to 60 of their members" supporting the bill, a number that Pergram stated "leaves us very short there." Moreover, several Republican House members dismissed as untrue the claim that they and their colleagues opposed the bill for any reason other than personal conviction.

Moreover, Baier stated, "In 2006, Senate Republicans introduced another bill to deal with the mushrooming problem," later asserting, "But once again, the votes went along party lines: Republicans for, Democrats against. With the Democrats in the majority, the bill failed." In fact, Republicans were in the majority in 2006.

From the October 5 Fox News special Saving Our Economy: What's Next?:

BAIER: And the risks kept rising over the years, in part because the federal government wanted it that way. In particular there was the Community Reinvestment Act, or CRA, passed in 1977 during Jimmy Carter's first year in office. The law increased oversight of financial institutions to ensure that they were giving credit to low-income families so that more people would have the chance to own homes.

SHLAES: We want to have everyone be able to buy a house anywhere. We're going to lend to people of all colors. Nothing wrong with that. We're going to make sure those banks do it, and they don't discriminate. But the law went overboard. Institutions made loans that they probably didn't want to make, because they couldn't seem racist.

You might not be allowed to do things you were going to do -- regular course of business, such as merge with another bank. It empowered these community groups, who would then bully the banks. ACORN bullied the banks.

BAIER: Indeed, ACORN, the Association of Community Organizers for Reform Now, would before long come up with a new tactic: challenging a thrift merger in Illinois, claiming they didn't make the kind of loans that ACORN felt were required under the CRA. The bank complained that such loans would be financially irresponsible.

A young community organizer named Barack Obama worked closely with the ACORN activists behind the new strategy. And that strategy worked. ACORN prevailed in court, and soon credit standards were being lowered across the country.

While at first Fannie actually resisted buying up some of those shaky mortgages, at the tail end of the Clinton administration, Fannie Mae was told to substantially increase the percentage of those mortgages in its portfolio.

[...]

BAIER: In April 2001, during the Bush administration's first year, the White House saw danger on the horizon. In their budget request for the following year, the administration recognized Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were, quote, "a potential problem," and noted that if either were in trouble, it could, quote, "cause strong repercussions in financial markets." But the markets had reeled when the dot-com bubble burst, and then they were hit hard by 9-11. Few wanted to hear gloomy talk about what seemed to be the one bright spot in the economy: the boom in real estate prices. By 2002, one powerful voice, The Wall Street Journal editorial page, was starting to send up flares.

GIGOT: When housing prices start to go up 10, 15, 20 percent a year. You know that that just can't last.

BAIER: Paul Gigot is the editorial page editor of the Journal, which was acquired by News Corp., the parent company of Fox News, in 2008.

GIGOT: You add that to these institutions Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, which channeled so much money from abroad into housing, because investors could channel some of their savings into these mortgage-backed securities where they got a really nice deal, because they got a nice yield. So they loved channeling money into these instruments, and that flowed right into the housing market.

BAIER: And few in Washington, on Wall Street, and along Main Street wanted to hear about the risks.

GIGOT: They had so much political support, both in Washington because the members of Congress were bathed in their campaign contributions, and they loved all that support from Fannie and Freddie, and then from Wall Street as well, because Wall Street could sell those mortgage-backed securities -- guaranteed by Fannie Mae, guaranteed by the taxpayer -- and they made terrific fees.

BAIER: Gigot says that when the Journal tried to question what was happening in the mortgage market, he ran right into what he calls a Fannie Mae-Freddie Mac buzz saw.

GIGOT: I just remember one episode regarding the former CEO of Countrywide Financial, Angelo Mozillo, and he got right into my face and started yelling at me and said, "You don't know what you're talking about. You don't understand the mortgage market. You are in the pockets of the competitors of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac," and went on like that for a while.

So it is an illustration of the degree to which people who were a part of this mania didn't want anybody to say, "Are you sure this is the right way to go?"

WALLISON: They were thugs, and where you crossed them in any way, you got into trouble.

BAIER: And you didn't have to be a journalist, says Peter Wallison, the former general counsel of the Treasury Department.

WALLISON: Well, I'm sure congressmen and senators were very afraid. There was a real question in my mind whether Congress controlled Fannie Mae, or Fannie Mae controlled Congress.

BAIER: A question underscored in 2003. The Bush administration nevertheless decided to take on the mortgage giants. It recommended significant regulatory changes. As then-Treasury Secretary John Snow told the House Financial Services Committee, more supervision was needed for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, known in Washington terms as government-supported enterprises, or GSEs.

SNOW: We need a strong, world-class regulatory agency to oversee the prudential operations of the GSEs.

FRANK: I think we see entities that are fundamentally sound financially, and --

BAIER: Democratic Representative Barney Frank was then the ranking member of the Financial Services Committee.

FRANK: The more pressure there is there, then the less I think we see in terms of affordable housing.

BAIER: Affordable housing. That was the primary concern of Democrats, even in the face of increasingly dire warnings about Fannie and Freddie.

WALLISON: The affordable housing that Congress really wanted was the housing that Democrats represented, and when Fannie and Freddie supported affordable housing by buying subprime and similar kinds of weak loans, they got a lot of political support from Congress.

BAIER: In the meantime, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac had begun cooking their books. That made the situation seem less risky than it actually was. It also allowed Fannie and Freddie executives to keep pocketing huge bonuses for their lending efforts. They were finally caught in 2004.

Fannie Mae chairman Franklin Raines, who had been appointed by President Clinton, stepped down. The Securities and Exchange Commission is still investigating the accounting issues.

WALLISON: The accounting scandals were very important, because what they did was convince some people -- and some important people -- that these were companies that really had to be watched. They were a threat. And one of those people was the chairman of the Federal Reserve Board, Alan Greenspan.

GREENSPAN: If we fail to strengthen GSE regulation, we increase the possibility of insolvency and crisis. We put at risk our ability to preserve safe and sound financial markets in the United States.

BAIER: But Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac still had powerful defenders. For instance, Democratic Senator Charles Schumer of New York.

SCHUMER: Things are good in the housing market. Why are people entertaining radical change?

WALLISON: Chuck Schumer would go to an area of the state of New York. He would get Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac to make loans in that area. What they knew was that political support from a Chuck Schumer was a very important thing for them. That would protect their privileges in Congress.

BAIER: Fannie and Freddie spread around the campaign contributions, too. Democratic Senator Christopher Dodd of Connecticut had been the biggest recipient of money from Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac for the past 20 years: more than $165,000.

And despite having been in the Senate just three-plus years, number two on that list: Barack Obama, with more than $126,000. The Republican who got the most donations: Utah Senator Robert Bennett, just under $108,000. For the record, Republican presidential nominee John McCain took $21,550.

Fannie and Freddie's defenders stepped up big time in 2005, when the Bush administration renewed its call for action.

SNOW: These large portfolios, unchecked in their growth over the last decade or so, pose a real problem.

BAIER: The Senate Banking Committee adopted strong legislation, which would have stopped Fannie and Freddie from acquiring these bad mortgages. All of the Republicans on the committee voted for it. All of the Democrats, including now-Chairman Chris Dodd, voted against. But the Democrats were able to block a vote by the whole Senate.

WALLISON: None of the Democrats would support the bill that came out of the Senate Banking Committee. So a really tough bill that in 19 -- that in 2005 could have actually prevented a lot of the problems we're seeing today probably would have prevented the collapse of Fannie and Freddie.

BAIER: In 2006, Senate Republicans introduced another bill to deal with the mushrooming problem. One of its sponsors: John McCain.

WALLISON: McCain made a statement on the floor of the Senate, saying it was necessary to adopt this bill. He's always been an opponent of what he called corporate welfare, and Fannie and Freddie were, I would say, the poster children for corporate welfare.

BAIER: But once again, the votes went along party lines: Republicans for, Democrats against. With the Democrats in the majority, the bill failed.

As 2006 turned into 2007, the housing bubble was starting to burst. Bad mortgages began to default, and as the defaults started to rise, the entire portfolio of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac was questioned. And with the entire structure headed for collapse, plenty of politicians have come around to the view that GSEs were a major contributor to the crisis, especially after major institutions that invested heavily in their subprime securities began to go under.

SEN. MEL MARTINEZ (R-FL): A lot of what we're dealing with today had its origins in Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

SEN. ELIZABETH DOLE (R-NC): The mismanagement of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, which was made possible by weak oversight and little accountability.

SEN. CHRISTOPHER DODD (D-CT): What is tragic and lamentable is that the ensuing calamity was entirely foreseeable and preventable.

[...]

BAIER: Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson came up with a plan where the government would back up $700 billion in mortgage-related assets, but the devil was going to be in the details. The administration argued that a bailout was inevitable.

PAULSON: And it may make you angry -- it makes me angry -- when you ask about taxpayers being on the hook. Guess what? They are already on the hook.

BAIER: But there were quite a few House Republicans who did not entirely agree. For one thing, they balked at the idea of giving the government -- even a Republican treasury secretary -- a blank taxpayer check without an independent body looking over his shoulder. For another thing, they had strong objections to some goodies that the Democrats had stuck in the bill.

GINGRICH: So they wanted, for example, to have $20 billion ultimately go to ACORN and other left-wing groups out of tax money.

BAIER: President Bush appeared on national television to lobby for the bailout.

[...]

BAIER: By the end of the weekend, it looked like they'd hammered out a deal, all ready to go on Monday, September 29. Then, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi made this speech.

PELOSI: Seven hundred billion dollars, a staggering number but only a part of the cost of the failed Bush economic policies to our country.

GINGRICH: Speaker Pelosi gave a speech that was very different from her prepared text, and I think it was designed to appease her left, which was mad at her for being for the bill. And if you were a conservative Republican trying to talk yourself into voting for this bill, Pelosi gave you every possible excuse not to. And I suspect they lost 10 to 20 votes.

CANTOR: Right here is the reason I believe this vote failed, and this is Speaker Pelosi's speech that frankly struck the tone of partisanship that frankly was inappropriate in this discussion.

BAIER: The House rejected the emergency act by a vote of 228 to 205. Republicans opposed the measure 133 to 65, but Democrats were far from unified themselves, only supporting it 140 to 95.

Google’s mission is to organize the world’s information — be it via search, email, online maps or mobile apps — but it could someday help you manage your daily energy consumption, too. At a speech at the Commonwealth Club in San Francisco last week, Google CEO Eric Schmidt said that as part of its recently announced collaboration with GE, the search engine giant is currently looking at designing tools to help consumers understand their energy consumption. Google has also been actively looking at utilities’ smart meter projects, he said, and at using its strong connection with consumers to play a role in consumer energy management.

In fact, out of all of Google’s grand energy schemes, among them its $4.4 trillion energy proposal, its $45 million investment into energy-related startups and its plug-in vehicle project, energy data management could be one of the only places where Google plans to generate revenues. Schmidt said during his speech that there is an internal debate going on at the company as to how much of its energy initiatives will turn into real revenues, but that, “[T]o the degree that we can be in the information businesses or communications businesses about energy and its impact on the world, we are clearly going to be there.”

Helping consumers, even utilities, manage energy data is a perfect fit for Google. Power grids throughout the world will need to undergo a dramatic buildout and restructuring to accommodate both an increased demand for energy and a switch to renewable power. By 2050, the world’s population is forecast to balloon to 9 billion people from 6.5 billion — all while the world is trying to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by some 80 percent. The power grid in its current form won’t be able to support the loads — inefficient and unintelligent, it has yet to benefit from the technologies of the information age. Meanwhile, at the edges of the grid, consumers know very little about their energy use; monthly electricity bills have an appalling lack of transparency and options compared to industries like cell phones.

But change is on its way. Utilities are starting to install smart meters in homes to provide two-way digital communication. According to data from the Cleantech Group, venture capitalists invested a record $220 million into smart grid startups in the third quarter of 2008, including companies like GridPoint, Eka Systems, BPL Global and Trilliant. Startups like Greenbox, PowerMand, and EnergyHub are building energy dashboards and wireless home network products to help consumers manage energy use. Google could easily acquire its way into this market, too. (See our report on 25 up-and-coming Smart Energy Home startups) As Cees Links, the CEO of GreenPeak, a startup that builds wireless energy sensor networks, put it, there’s a simple but revolutionary change going on, that of “a growing awareness of energy being a precious resource.”

That said, there probably isn’t a company that has changed consumer behavior online more than Google. It has not only shaped how consumers access information — from news to images to direction — some have argued that Google is even changing the way we think and process information (See the Atlantic’s “Is Google Making Us Stupid?”). The company has spent years organizing personal consumer information through web searches, advertising, and email, information that could come in very handy when it comes to building smart tools to offer energy-saving services.

So Google is wise to be looking into online tools, or even a wireless home networking product, that could help consumers change their energy consumption behavior. They’re clearly headed in that direction: “It seems obvious to me that if you give [energy] information to end users they behave smartly,” Schmidt said in his speech. “So we are working on that.” It could ultimately be the most important contribution Google makes to fighting climate change. As Stanford’s Precourt Institute for Energy Efficiency notes, advanced technology deployments will take several decades and a lot of capital. Simple tools that can affect the behavior of the average consumer’s energy usage will be more cost-effective and can be implemented now. For all its do-gooder intentions and philanthropic Google.org aims, how can Google resist such an easy target?

Image courtesy of Google.

Author : Duncan Shields, Staff Writer

It’s light outside which means that if we leave our hiding place, we will be seen and killed.

Not too long ago, human history was exposed and swept clear. Everything we sent at them just bounced off. Its six months later and I have no idea how many of us are left. They seem to have stopped actively hunting us which is good. We’re more like vermin now. They lay traps and go about their business. It’s still very unsafe to travel in the daylight.

They have dry, deep-blue skin the same texture as cork. Bullets go about an inch in and stop. It’s like they’re made of rock with a light coating of clay. They’re huge. Two massive elephant-foot legs. Two arm-tentacles that split into a mess of smaller tentacles at the end. Those tentacles are very efficient and ridiculously strong. Watching them operate the complex mining machinery they brought with them is almost thrilling.

Watching those tentacles go into a loved one’s head orifices and squeeze is another matter entirely.

 

They wear what look like black rubber overalls with giant galoshes. About the only weak point we can find is that they need to wear filter masks poking out of their mouths to breathe this atmosphere.

If you shoot them in the filter and none of their friends are around to give them a replacement, it takes them about half an hour to die. It’s a rather gruesome thing to watch. It’s like their insides are made of slugs and someone is pouring salt down their throats. It looks agonizing. We’d rather give them a quick death like they gave so many of us but beggars can’t be choosers.

I laughed once when Teddy referred to us as ‘the resistance’. As far as I could see, we scavenge for food and try to avoid the new owners of this planet. We fight when cornered and almost always lose. Resistance indeed. Pah.

Gwendolyn’s pregnant now. She’s the only woman with our little group who is of child bearing age. None of the three men in our group is admitting to being the father but she’s not pointing fingers. Anyway, it could be one of the other six of us that have been killed over the last three months. It’s maddening not knowing if we’re the last ones in Britain. We met one other person in the last four months but she couldn’t talk. She died not too long after we met her.

We lost.

 

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pimg src="http://cache.gawker.com/assets/images/gizmodo/2008/10/blackberrystormhandson.jpg" align="left" hspace="4" vspace="2" width="600" height="405" style="display:block;float:none;" //p div style='float:right; margin-left:-9px;'script type="text/javascript" digg_skin = 'compact'; digg_bgcolor = '#f1f8fa'; digg_url = 'http://digg.com/gadgets/BlackBerry_Storm_First_Hands_On'; /scriptscript src="http://digg.com/tools/diggthis.js" type="text/javascript" /script/div pThe very first time you touch the BlackBerry Stormmdash;RIM's first all-touchscreen keyboard-free smartphone, just announced for Verizon Wirelessmdash;you will be startled. No matter how many times your fingers dance on the screen like you've been trained on every other touchscreen, nothing will happen. At least, not until you push the screen all the way down and you feel a click. Yes, the screen is a giant button, one you have to punch for basically every action, even every letter you type, completely breaking the touchscreen paradigm. Surprisingly, it works. script type="text/javascript" charset="utf-8" galleryPost('blackberrystormhandson', 3, ''); /script/p pWhile the Storm's defining feature is this, what RIM ungracefully calls ClickThrough, the phone is much, much more. The term "iPhone killer" is clumsily tossed around by bloggers and journos (including us) to describe almost any phone with a touchscreen, but by trying to actually innovate rather than imitate, RIM has conjured up the phone most deserving of the title yet. It's got an innovative multi-touch UI, runs on Verizon's EV-DO 3G network in the US as well as any GSM HSPA 3G networks when abroad, so it's a true global smartphone. OK, maybe there never will be an "iPhone killer"mdash;it's a stupid idea anywaymdash;but based on our limited time with the BlackBerry Storm, it seems like it will definitely hold its own against every other marquee handset on the market./p pLet's talk more about ClickThrough, since using the Storm means using it. RIM co-CEO Mike Lazaridis told me that it was in development for years as they looked to evolve past the trackball while accomplishing something no touchscreen has before: Separating navigation from confirmation. So you have to push the touchscreen like a button every time you do something. Typing with it takes some getting used to, even if you can fly on an iPhone or other touchscreen device, because you have to retrain yourself to actually lift your thumb back off of the screen to let it pop back up between every single letter. Since you can't "flow" continuously in a stream but are pounding out a series of clicks, it's hard to tell in the limited time I had with it how fast you would be able to go once you're completely re-trained. It's a unique sensation, and I liked it, but I could definitely see people loathing it./p pMore on navigation. One annoyance when typing is that it highlights letters in blue rather than doing a magnified pop-up like the iPhone or LG Vu, so letters will probably be obscured if you have fat fingers. One of the weird inconsistencies (there are a few) with needing to clickthrough for an action actually occurs with copy and paste, which took a few seconds to get down since it involved a long hold and drag when it was demoed for memdash;they oddly didn't show me the multitouch method shown in the leaked user guide, though RIM later confirmed it would be there./p pWhile the BlackBerry OS has been optimized for grubby fingers, all of the standard BlackBerry navigation paradigms are in play, so there's plenty of pushing the four buttons along the bottom of the screen: menu, back, send and end like you would on a regular BlackBerry to get around./p pThe browser improves upon the one in the Bold and is even more competent at rendering HTML. You have a couple different ways to navigate around a page, though the most unique makes use of the whole screen as a trackpad, so that once you have the cursor pop up, you can put your finger anywhere on the screen to move it around, just like on a notebook. It's context sensitive, so it'll do what it's supposed to when you hit a link or whatnot. It had some trouble with a text entry field in the browser, and had some other jitters but then it obviously wasn't a final version. RIM's concern with the user experience is very apparent, so I expect it to be cleaned up when the final version ships, presumably in November./p pOverall, it was a solid browsing experience, though one thing to take note that is per Verizon standards, you'll be doing it over EV-DO, not Wi-Fi, since it doesn't have the latter. Lack of Wi-Fi is one of the biggest knocks on the phone, no matter how damn good Verizon's network might be. The fact that it packs both EV-DO and HSPA into a single phone is a truly impressive feat worth marveling over, but why couldn't they cram Wi-Fi in there too?/p pThe screen is gorgeous. I haven't seen the HTC Touch HD in person, but barring that, the 480x360 184ppi stunner could be the best screen on the market. It's bright, contrasty, the colors are beautiful and the viewing angle is ridiculous. I think I could watch the whole of Iron Man on it. Media navigation isn't as intuitive as the iPhone, basically re-using the usual BlackBerry UI, but it's not difficult to get around by any means. Still, RIM clearly intends to take the fight to it, since the Storm will come with an 8GB microSD card./p pThe Storm is RIM's most consumer-oriented device yet, but it's also still a BlackBerry heart, with all of the standard enterprise features like Office document editing, full email searchmdash;everything a BlackBerry user expects. Not to mention littler touches like BlackBerry Maps (it'll have Verizon's VZ Navigator too), BrickBreaker and Facebook pre-installed./p pThis is the most important phone in Verizon's lineup, and from the looks of it, the best. Some people will hate ClickThroughmdash;it's not a perfect solution, but it's damn good. Some people will hate that it's not the iPhone (or the G1, since it's another tightly integrated hardware/software package). But for BlackBerry users looking for a touchscreen phone, or people who just don't want to abandon Verizon's superior network, this is what they're looking for./p pIf you've got questions, leave them in the comments, I'll answer them./p pimg src="http://cache.gawker.com/assets/images/gizmodo/2008/10/specsheet.jpg" class="center" width="800" height="331" style="display:block;float:none;" //p blockquote pBlackBerry Takes the World by Storm on the Most Reliable Networks in Europe and the U.S./p pVerizon Wireless, Vodafone and RIM Deliver the Power of a Smartphone with the World’s First Tactile Touch Display on a BlackBerry/p pBASKING RIDGE, N.J., NEWBURY, England, and WATERLOO, Ontario – Verizon Wireless, Vodafone Group (NYSE and LSE: VOD) and Research In Motion (RIM) (NASDAQ: RIMM; TSX: RIM) today announced that the BlackBerry® Stormâ„¢ will be available exclusively to Verizon Wireless customers in the U.S. and Vodafone customers in Europe, Australia and New Zealand next month./p pDesigned to appeal to both consumers and business customers, the BlackBerry Storm combines the powerful communication features and productivity tools of a global BlackBerry smartphone with revolutionary technology that provides for easy and precise touch screen typing on the world’s first tactile touch display that responds like a keyboard and combines multi-touch and gesture support for intuitive selection and application navigation./p pIn the U.S., BlackBerry Storm customers will benefit from the nation’s most reliable wireless voice network and the pervasiveness of Verizon Wireless’ reliable high-speed Evolution-Data Optimized (EV-DO) Revision A (Rev. A) network for rich Internet browsing. Building on the strong business heritage of BlackBerry, the Storm offers consumers a host of fun and practical features, including:/p po Large high resolution screen coupled with a rich multi-media suitebr o Text (SMS), picture messaging (MMS), the ability to watch 30-second video clips, instant messaging and access to popular social networking sitesbr o Removable and rechargeable 1400 mAhr battery that provides approximately 5.5 hours of talk time and 15 days of standby time./p p“The BlackBerry Storm offers our customers more ways to stay connected to both their personal and professional lives – whether in their community or around the globe,” said Mike Lanman, vice president and chief marketing officer of Verizon Wireless. “The BlackBerry Storm combines the reliability of our network with the dependability and network efficiency of the BlackBerry platform to deliver our customers the ultimate wireless experience – all in one of the coolest smartphones available on the market today.”/p pThe Power is in The Touchbr The BlackBerry Storm comes with a unique touch screen that gives a distinct ‘click’ confirmation when depressed ever so slightly, very similar in experience to a keyboard-based BlackBerry smartphone. An easy to use menu adds support for multi-touches, taps, slides, swipes and other gestures, so customers can easily select, scroll, pan, and zoom for smooth navigation./p pThe tactile touch screen display gives customers worldwide a choice of virtual keyboards – RIM’s SureType® layout in portrait and a full QWERTY* layout in landscape orientation. Relevant features such as cut and paste are only a touch away for the ultimate smartphone experience./p pWorld Class Smartphonebr The BlackBerry Storm is a top of the line mobile phone with global connectivity. In the U.S., the BlackBerry Storm gives Verizon Wireless customers EV-DO Rev. A/CDMA – technology – and (2100Mhz) HSPA/UMTS as well as quad-band EDGE/GPRS/GSM for global use. The BlackBerry Storm 9500 from Vodafone supports (2100Mhz) HSPA and quad-band EDGE/GPRS/GSM networks./p pBrowse the World Overbr Customers will enjoy a full HTML high performance browser that works in either portrait or landscape orientation. Navigating Web sites is fast and easy with the touch screen interface that lets users tap to zoom in and slide their finger to scroll. Icons along the bottom of the display allow for quickly accessing “Favorites”, opening the virtual keyboard to enter text, switching between “Page View” and “Column View”, as well as the ability to toggle between “Pan” mode and “Cursor” mode. The enhanced browser supports file downloading, streaming audio and video, and with its built-in RSS support, new content from supported Web sites can be automatically pushed to the user./p pPacked with Additional Featuresbr The BlackBerry Storm, exclusively from Verizon Wireless and Vodafone, also includes the following features and functions:br o BlackBerry® Internet Service, BlackBerry® Unite!, BlackBerry® Professional Software and BlackBerry® Enterprise Server support for seamless integration with corporate email systems and the security and IT policy controls that enterprise customers requirebr o Edit Microsoft® Word, Excel and PowerPoint files directly on the handsetbr o 3.2 megapixel camera, with variable zoom, auto focus, and a powerful flash that also provides continuous lighting when recording video; the camera records video in half-VGA resolution (480x320) or at 176x144 for MMSbr o 1 GB of on board memory storage and 8 GB microSD memory card included in expandable memory card slotbr o Media player that can find content on the handset in an instant, display pictures and slideshows quickly, play movies smoothly in full screen mode in any orientation, and manage an entire music collection; playlists can be created directly on the handset and there’s an equalizer with 11 preset filters – including “Lounge”, “Jazz” and “Hip Hop” – for customized audio ranges when using wired headphones or external speakersbr o Sleek, elegant design with contoured corners, stainless steel back and chrome side-accents that frame its large (3.26”), touch sensitive, glass lens display; its exceptional 360 x 480 resolution at 184ppi, offering the highest resolution display ever introduced on a BlackBerry smartphone, is crisp and colorful with clarity that’s easy on the eyesbr o A sensor automatically adjusts to ambient light for ideal screen viewing and an orientation sensor allows customers to use the handset in a portrait or landscape position/p /blockquote br style="clear: both;"/ img alt="" style="border: 0; height:1px; width:1px;" border="0" src="http://www.pheedo.com/img.phdo?i=c4c359f347dbe0e6ec7c9e38bc12cf53" height="1" width="1"/ img src="http://www.pheedo.com/feeds/tracker.php?i=c4c359f347dbe0e6ec7c9e38bc12cf53" style="display: none;" border="0" height="1" width="1" alt=""/ pa href="http://feeds.gawker.com/~a/gizmodo/full?a=SS3ttf"img src="http://feeds.gawker.com/~a/gizmodo/full?i=SS3ttf" border="0"/img/a/pdiv class="feedflare" a href="http://feeds.gawker.com/~f/gizmodo/full?a=95pCM"img src="http://feeds.gawker.com/~f/gizmodo/full?i=95pCM" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.gawker.com/~f/gizmodo/full?a=VCD0M"img src="http://feeds.gawker.com/~f/gizmodo/full?i=VCD0M" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.gawker.com/~f/gizmodo/full?a=Ebdzm"img src="http://feeds.gawker.com/~f/gizmodo/full?i=Ebdzm" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.gawker.com/~f/gizmodo/full?a=Z9LNm"img src="http://feeds.gawker.com/~f/gizmodo/full?i=Z9LNm" border="0"/img/a /divimg src="http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/gizmodo/full/~4/414443559" height="1" width="1"/