divimg alt="" src="http://hits.guardian.co.uk/b/ss/guardiangu-feeds/1/H.15.1/43908?ns=guardianpageName=World+news%3A+Forty+years+on%2C+Laos+reaps+bitter+harvest+of+the+secret+warch=World+newsc3=The+Guardianc4=World+newsc5=Not+commercially+usefulc6=Ian+MacKinnonc7=2008_12_03c8=1127780c9=articlec10=GUc11=World+newsc12=c13=c14=h2=GU%2FWorld+news%2F" width="1" height="1" //divpThe entrance to Craters restaurant is guarded by a phalanx of bombshells, each as big as a man. Opposite, the Dokkhoune hotel boasts an even finer warhead collection. For tourists who have not cottoned on, the Lao town of Phonsavanh lies at the heart of the most cluster-bombed province of the most bombed country on earth./ppThe haul of unexploded ordnance (UXO) is just a taster of that littering the countryside, or sitting in vast piles around homes and scrapyards. The deadly harvest from the US bombing of this landlocked country 30 years ago in the so-called "secret war" as the real battle raged in next-door Vietnam has become big business. Steel prices that surged on the back of soaring demand from China's go-go economy drove up scrap prices five-fold in eight years in impoverished Laos. It sent subsistence rice farmers, struggling make to ends meet amid spiralling food and fuel prices, scurrying into their fields in search of the new "cash crop"./ppBut it comes at a high price. At least 13,000 people have been killed or maimed, either digging in fields contaminated with live bombs or, increasingly, in their quest for lucrative scrap metal. Half the casualties are young boys, most killed by exploding tennis-ball-sized cluster bomblets - christened "bombies" locally - that are everywhere./ppThe scale of the contamination is mind-boggling. Laos was hit by an average of one B-52 bomb-load every eight minutes, 24 hours a day, between 1964 and 1973. US bombers dropped more ordnance on Laos in this period than was dropped during the whole of the second world war. Of the 260m "bombies" that rained down, particularly on Xieng Khouang province, 80m failed to explode, leaving a deadly legacy./ppOverwhelmed by the immensity of the clear-up, Laos - which has dealt with just 400,000 unexploded munitions - had resisted the signing today in Oslo of a treaty banning cluster bombs and demanding that remnants be cleared within 10 years. But the country has had a rethink and will now be a key player in the ceremony./ppFor Laos it could be a godsend, focusing world attention on its plight and bringing international resources to tackle the problem. With 37% of agricultural ground made unsafe by unexploded munitions in a nation where four-fifths of people farm the land, the scourge has stifled development./ppYet farmers eking out a living below the dollar-a-day poverty line have no choice. Bombs unearthed as they gingerly peck at the soil are planted around, or moved to the side of the field./pp"In the end the Lao people regard lack of food as much greater threat than unexploded bombs," said David Hayter, the Lao country director of British-based Mines Advisory Group (MAG). "It's just that each UXO death is marked by a big bang, but deaths from lack of food or poor water are less noticeable."/ppFatalistic acceptance of the danger is fostered by familiarity. Bomb remains are fashioned into everyday items: cluster-bomb casings become fencing; houses perch on stilts crafted from 500lb bombs; mortars with fins are used as table lamps. "People's familiarity is the most striking thing for me," said Jo Pereira, an occupational therapist with the Lao charity Cope, which fits UXO victims with prosthetic limbs. "They've lived with it for so long. Much of it is in their houses. Children think 'we've got those at home' and don't see the risks."/ppSo when scrap metal prices rocketed many saw it as a heaven-sent opportunity to boost meagre incomes. For those unable to grow enough rice to feed their families throughout the year, there is little choice but to collect UXO scrap despite the dangers./pp"People have lived with this for two generations," said Gregory Cathcart, an MAG programme officer. "They don't view it as risky. It's simply a cash crop. The problem is the main scrap on the surface is gone, so they've to dig it up which is extremely dangerous."/ppCheap Vietnamese metal detectors costing as little as pound;7.36 boost the business. Landless families have turned full-time scrap collectors, earning up to pound;2.70 a day if they unearth six or seven kilos. Stumble on half a cluster bomb casing of "best Detroit steel" and they hit pay-dirt, worth pound;20 to pound;27./ppNo such luck for Sher Ya, 25. He plonks a plastic bag of bullet casings on the scrap dealer's scales and anxiously eyes the needle. His teenage brother dredged the shells from their village rice field. It earns a welcome 40p. "My family grows only enough rice for six months," he said. "So when we're not planting or harvesting we collect bomb scraps. It's scary, but we've no choice."/ppThe trade is so lucrative that scrap dealers ferry collectors by truck to virgin forests every day. Sypha Phommachan, 45, need not to go to such lengths. Farmers around Thajok village beat a path to the scrap dealer's door. A pile of fragments, casings, and mortars is all she had left after the foundry took away nearly eight tonnes a few days before./pp"That took me about three weeks to collect," she said. "That's quite slow because it's the rice harvest season and people are busy farming. In a couple of months they'll be out furiously collecting to raise cash for the Hmong festival." Yet she carefully inspects the bomb harvest, rejecting live munitions. She knows the risks. In the six years she has lived in the village, 10 people have been killed collecting scrap. One 50-year-old man died three months ago when he tossed half a "bombie" he believed safe into the wicker basket on his back. It exploded and the ball-bearings it threw out went clean through his chest, killing him instantly./ppToday's treaty banning the stockpile and use of cluster munitions is due to be signed by 107 countries - including the UK, which has been the third biggest user. Those holding out include the US, China, Russia and Israel. /ppBut Richard Moyes, co-chair of the Cluster Munition Coalition, is confident that the convention will change the climate. "We sense we'll see a dramatic decline in cluster munitions use even among states that don't sign."/pa 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/0isZpde_2gKB0VQVLsihe6OOssY/a"img src="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~at/0isZpde_2gKB0VQVLsihe6OOssY/i" border="0" ismap="true"/img/a/p

divimg alt="" src="http://hits.guardian.co.uk/b/ss/guardiangu-feeds/1/H.15.1/88711?ns=guardianpageName=Politics%3A+Lie+detector+tests+to+catch+benefit+cheatsch=Politicsc3=The+Guardianc4=Queen%27s+speech%2CWelfare+%28Politics%29%2CLaw+%28News%29%2CState+benefits%2CMoney%2CSociety%2CSocial+exclusion+%28Society%29%2CPolitics%2CUK+newsc5=Society+Weekly%2CPersonal+Finance%2CUnclassified%2CNot+commercially+useful%2CSocial+Care+Societyc6=Patrick+Wintourc7=2008_12_03c8=1127796c9=articlec10=GUc11=Politicsc12=Queen%27s+speechc13=c14=h2=GU%2FPolitics%2FQueen%27s+speech" width="1" height="1" //divpBenefit claimants will face lie detector tests and will lose benefits for a month if found guilty of fiddling the system under proposals unveiled by Gordon Brown on the eve of today's Queen's speech. /ppThe "one strike and you're out" proposal is contained in a tough summary of the speech released yesterday by the Cabinet Office. The government is also proposing to give the public clearer information, mainly via the internet, on how criminals are sentenced in local courts. Communities are to be given a bigger role in deciding what form of community punishment local criminals should be forced to undertake. /ppThe proposals mark a break by the prime minister from his focus on the economic crisis for the past five months and suggest he knows he needs to broaden his political agenda if he is to claw back lost votes. /ppThe introduction of a lie detector test for benefit claimants is the most striking shift to a more populist programme, similar to Tony Blair's respect agenda./ppSo far, 25 local councils administering housing benefit to 500,000 claimants are using "voice risk analysis technology" to test whether a claimant is providing false information./ppThe government introduced the technology in Harrow, north-west London, last year, but says it plans to make the technology available nationwide. In the first three months of using the technology Harrow saved pound;300,000, suggesting that levels of benefit fraud may be higher than government estimates. Ministers are cracking down on benefit fraud even though it is officially at its lowest recorded level, down 66% since 2001./ppThe government currently withdraws 13 weeks of benefit from anyone found making a fraudulent claim twice in five years, but said yesterday it intends to tighten this process by withdrawing four weeks' benefit for first-time fraudsters. /ppThe benefit withdrawal will be taken against both those that suffer an administrative penalty as well as those found guilty in a criminal court. Currently the Department for Work and Pensions seeks court penalties only where the alleged fraud is worth more than pound;2,000./ppIn other proposals in the Cabinet Office's paper, the power of public servants to use force may be strengthened. The paper says: "The public looks to healthcare professionals, neighbourhood wardens and teachers to deal with unacceptable behaviour in public places. /pp"If they are not able to fulfil that role because they are not sure the law is on their side, or because they do not see it as part of their job, that sends the wrong message about what we as a society are prepared to tolerate."/ppIt also suggests most family intervention projects will grow so they reach 20,000 families with the most severe difficulties. The paper also proposes an alcohol code limiting "all you can drink" promotions, and setting conditions on premises in local hotspots./ppLap dancing clubs will be reclassified as sex establishments, allowing councils greater scope to close them./ppJames Purnell, the work and pensions secretary, was criticised yesterday for plans disclosed on Monday night to tighten the requirements on lone parents and on disabled people to do more to prepare themselves for work or face mounting benefit penalties./ppUnder Gordon Brown, ministers have played down Blair's respect agenda, believing it played into the theme of a "broken society" promoted by David Cameron. But there have been signs of a rethink over the past three months. /ppThe Cabinet Office paper tries to put the emphasis on fair rules in the context of the credit crunch. It says: "As everyone enters difficult economic times ... fair rules will become more important. /pp"If people perceive that not everyone is treated equally, that some get preferential treatment, that people who break the rules get away with it, respect for rules is undermined."/pdiv style="float: left; margin-right: 10px; margin-bottom: 10px;"ullia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/queens-speech"Queen's speech/a/lilia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/welfare"Welfare/a/lilia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/law"Law/a/lilia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/money/statebenefits"State benefits/a/lilia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/socialexclusion"Social exclusion/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/qSTIlBk-m1aU1GvqOeBh7EZYy-k/a"img src="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~at/qSTIlBk-m1aU1GvqOeBh7EZYy-k/i" border="0" ismap="true"/img/a/p

divimg alt="" src="http://hits.guardian.co.uk/b/ss/guardiangu-feeds/1/H.15.1/71206?ns=guardianpageName=Business%3A+Mighty+Tesco+feels+bite+of+the+Hamsterch=Businessc3=The+Guardianc4=Tesco+%28Business%29%2CMorrisons+%28Business%29%2CSupermarkets+%28business%29%2CAdvertising+%28media%29%2CCredit+crunch+%28Business%29%2CRecession+%28UK%29%2CUK+news%2CBusiness%2CMediac5=Credit+Crunch%2CNot+commercially+useful%2CBusiness+Markets%2CMedia+Weekly%2CAdvertising+Mediac6=Julia+Finchc7=2008_12_03c8=1127801c9=articlec10=GUc11=Businessc12=Tescoc13=c14=h2=GU%2FBusiness%2FTesco" width="1" height="1" //divpOn one side there is an ageing crooner in a cardigan and on the other an impish TV presenter who favours wooden beads. It is Countdown vs Top Gear with Des O'Connor versus Richard Hammond - and the man known as The Hamster is winning hands down./ppHammond and O'Connor are going head-to-head as the Christmas TV faces of two of the UK's biggest supermarkets, and O'Connor's Tesco is now trailing way behind Hammond's Morrisons. Tesco, the UK's biggest retailer, yesterday revealed its worst sales figures for 14 years. Like-for-like sales - which exclude gains from new stores - were ahead just 2% in the last three months, or half the growth achieved in the previous quarter./ppIn an unusually gloomy quarterly trading update, Tesco's chief executive, Sir Terry Leahy, blamed the economic downturn: "We are pleased with our progress, but we are also realistic - the current economic climate and the strain this is putting on consumers everywhere is something that all businesses are feeling, including ours." But not all supermarkets are as gloomy. Bradford-based Morrisons is - so far - storming through the recession. Tomorrow it is expected to reveal recent sales up around 7.5% on last year - maintaining much the same impressive rate of growth as it reported three months ago./ppTesco's performance is also markedly worse than its rivals Sainsbury and Asda. Sainsbury - which has hired "I'm a Celebrity ..." hosts Ant and Dec to star in its adverts alongside its usual frontman Jamie Oliver - last month revealed like-for-like sales up 3.9%. Meanwhile Asda, which is reflecting the new austerity by shunning celebrities and filming traditional family Christmas ads in the Yorkshire Dales, grew 6.9% in the three months to the end of September. But Morrisons is now top of the pile, pulling in thousands of new shoppers every week, especially in the south-east, where it was almost unheard of until a couple of years ago./ppThe Morrisons empire, built by Sir Ken Morrison, was always a fiercely Yorkshire business. But it descended into chaos, with tumbling sales and profits after it took over its larger rival Safeway. Shareholders demanded a management shake-up and Marc Bolland was installed as chief executive, even though he had spent his career working for Dutch brewer Heineken and had never run a shop. Bolland did, however, understand marketing./ppThe stores were given a new green and yellow look and out went the outmoded "More reasons to shop at Morrisons" adverts. In their place Bolland brought in a raft of celebrities - Denise van Outen, Lulu, Alan Hansen, Nick Hancock and, more recently, Richard Hammond./ppThe TV adverts now concentrate on image, while press adverts go toe-to-toe with Tesco and the others on price. One retail executive said: "It was an old-fashioned grocer competing with the slicker marketing of rivals. The new Bolland empire has given the brand a slick new look and feel. He has taken the brand and the business and given it a polish". It is, however, far too soon to write off Tesco. Yesterday's poor sales figures were actually slightly better than most City experts had predicted, and its shares rose. The grocer, which accounts for pound;1 out of every pound;7 spent on the UK high street, decided months ago that a full-scale recession was on its way and, in a bid to stop bargain-hunting shoppers drifting away to discount outlets such as Aldi and Lidl, launched its own range of Discounter goods./ppIn September, some 350 new lines - from Shampoo to curry sauce and teabags - went onto Tesco's shelves. The range was the biggest since Tesco launched its Value label in the last recession, with prices higher than Value, but lower than the premium, proprietary brands and the grocer's standard own-label equivalents. The supermarket rebranded itself as "Britain's biggest discounter" and the bargain range has been expanded to 800 products. Yesterday's lower sales figures, said Tesco, are a direct result of introducing these lower-priced goods. "We think this is the right strategy to help our business and our customers through the tougher times ahead."/ppAccording to Tesco, the new range is pulling in 300,000 new customers a week and now accounts for 5% of everything that goes through its tills. At the same time, sales of higher-priced organic foods and the grocer's Finest upmarket heat-and-eat meals has gone into reverse. Aside from the impact of the discount range, the big supermarkets are currently locked in a fierce price war. For retailers, discounting means selling more just to stand still./ppCity analysts were yesterday divided over exactly whether Tesco was cleverly planning for the future, or falling out of favour. Oriel Securities said it was obvious that shoppers were switching to Tesco's lower-priced Discounter range "but in general we are seeing a waning in the UK's love affair with the market leader"./ppBut another from broker Cazenove, said the data showed Tesco "is back on the front foot in the UK and is ahead of its competitors in preparing for battle fought in a deflationary world"./pdiv style="float: left; margin-right: 10px; margin-bottom: 10px;"ullia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/tesco"Tesco/a/lilia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/morrisons"Morrisons/a/lilia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/supermarkets"Supermarkets/a/lilia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/advertising"Advertising/a/lilia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/creditcrunch"Credit crunch/a/lilia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/recession"Recession/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/CLbwvFvARtn2nH1AAGdlSI88mF4/a"img src="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~at/CLbwvFvARtn2nH1AAGdlSI88mF4/i" border="0" ismap="true"/img/a/p

a href="http://adage.com/agencynews/article.php?article_id=132941"/aLONDON (AdAge.com) -- Belgian brewer InBev has appointed Mother, London, to handle a $30 million global campaign for Stella Artois after a three-month-long pitch. pa href="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~a/qpf6rOg4LLYa96n7djL1Jbdkn54/a"img src="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~a/qpf6rOg4LLYa96n7djL1Jbdkn54/i" border="0" ismap="true"/img/a/pimg src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/adage/complete/~4/5MX80aJcNsA" height="1" width="1"/

Nvidia Has Been Stockpiling New 55nm High-End Chips for Over Three Months - Picture

Posted by Dennis Sellers

Apple’s iPhone 3G is being credited by the Needham & Company research group as the major force responsible for growth of the smartphone market during the September quarter. In a report issued Tuesday, the firm said that worldwide smartphone shipments increased 28.6 percdent during the three-month period ending September, boosting...

centerobject width="425" height="344"param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/4qxWGr8VhzQcolor1=0xb1b1b1color2=0xcfcfcfhl=enfeature=player_embeddedfs=1"/paramparam name="allowFullScreen" value="true"/paramembed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/4qxWGr8VhzQcolor1=0xb1b1b1color2=0xcfcfcfhl=enfeature=player_embeddedfs=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"/embed/object/center centeriVideo: Yip Yip aliens discover a radio (via a href="http://blog.free103point9.org/newsroom.html"free103point9's blog/a)/i/centerbr / pLots of radio-related activity this week. Art collective a href="http://www.finishing-school.net/"Finishing School/a will, um, finish their three-month residency at MOCA on Thursday with their project a href="http://www.moca.org/party/"iFinding Joy/i/a. The title "finding joy" is a military term for establishing radio contact in battle. In preparation for this one night event, Finishing School conducted and prerecorded a series of interviews in which interviewees discuss what brings them joy. Part workshop and part treasure hunt, participants will be asked to build small DIY radios in order to pick up transmissions of these interviews, which are dispersed throughout the museum. The public is also invited to call in and share their thoughts about joy, and Finishing School have set up a a href="http://www.moca.org/party/?p=301""Finding Joy Hotline"/a for this purpose. /p pNew York-area freeform radio station a href="http://wfmu.org/"WFMU/a is what brings me joy, and beginning this weekend WFMU will hold a a href="http://printedmatter.org/news/news.cfm?article_id=389email=cookie1=F88B5307-1C42-ECEB-78664196F01692A6"benefit art sale/a at a href="http://printedmatter.org/"Printed Matter/a, accompanied by an a href="http://art.wfmu.org/"online auction/a as well. This is their 50th year in operation, and most listeners will agree, WFMU have long standing commitment to supporting and covering the arts. Tauba Auerbach, Olaf Breuning, Mike Kelley, Christian Marclay, Richard Prince, Gelitin, Swoon are only a few of the artists auctioning work, which is "priced to sell."/pimg src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/rhizome-fp/~4/472700300" height="1" width="1"/

via AppleInsider:

Apple this week began accepting orders for a pair of new headphone options designed for iPods, nearly three months after the accessories were first announced at a September media event.


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Apple this week began accepting orders for a pair of new headphone options designed for iPods, nearly three months after the accessories were first announced at a September media event.

divimg alt="" src="http://hits.guardian.co.uk/b/ss/guardiangu-feeds/1/H.15.1/57980?ns=guardianpageName=Politics%3A+Gordon+Brown+to+crack+down+on+benefit+cheats+in+Queen%27s+speechch=Politicsc3=guardian.co.ukc4=Queen%27s+speech%2CPolitics%2CUK+news%2CWelfare+%28Politics%29%2CSociety%2CSocial+exclusion+%28Society%29c5=Society+Weekly%2CNot+commercially+useful%2CSocial+Care+Societyc6=Patrick+Wintourc7=2008_12_02c8=1127455c9=articlec10=GUc11=Politicsc12=Queen%27s+speechc13=c14=h2=GU%2FPolitics%2FQueen%27s+speech" width="1" height="1" //divpGordon Brown has returned to New Labour's so-called "respect agenda" with proposals that all benefit cheats will lose access to benefits for a month, and also find themselves subject to lie detector tests. /ppThe "one strike and your out" proposals forms part of a tough commentary on the Queen's speech released today by the Cabinet Office./ppFresh proposals are also to be launched to give the public clearer information on how criminals were sentenced in local courts, while communities are to be given a bigger role in deciding what form of community punishment local criminals should be forced to undertake. /ppThe government also highlighted a pilot covering 25 local councils administering housing benefit to 500,000 claimants, saying "voice risk analysis technology" will be used to test whether a claimant is providing false information. The government first introduced the technology in Harrow in north London last year, but now says it plans to make the technology available nationwide. In the first three months Harrow council saved £300,000, suggesting levels of benefit fraud may be higher than government estimates. /ppMinisters are taking the action even though benefit fraud is now officially at the lowest level ever recorded, down 66% since 2001. /ppThe government currently withdraws benefit for at least 13 weeks to anyone found making a fraudulent benefit claim twice in five years, but said it intends to harden this process by punishing first-time benefit fraud with four weeks' withdrawal. The action will be taken against those that suffer an administrative penalty and those found guilty in court. /ppThe Department of Work and Pensions applies civil penalties where the fraud is worth less than £2,000./ppMinisters also announced plans to make claimants for employment support allowance (ESA), the new incapacity benefit, commit themselves to complete an action plan designed to make them "work ready" in return for benefit. /ppa href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2008/dec/02/welfare-trade-unions"Lone parents with children aged between one and seven are also to be required for the first time/a as a condition of benefit to make themselves work ready by attending regular interviews with employment staff, drawing up an action plan and making themselves available to take skills, health or drug courses. /pp The proposals in a new government report were put forward by Professor Paul Gregg, who said today he did not expect the proposals to come into force until the recession had ended. About 300,000 ESA claimants will be deemed to be too mentally or physical unfit to prepare for work. Gregg also proposed that a clearer sanctions regime is introduced since at present different sanctions apply according to the benefit claimed. /ppIn other proposals the Cabinet Office paper suggests the power of public servants to use force may be strengthened. It argues that "the public looks to healthcare professionals, neighbourhood wardens and teachers to deal with unacceptable behaviour in public places. If they are not able to fulfil that role because they are not sure the law is on their side, or because they do not see it as part of their job. that sends the wrong message about what we as a society are prepared to tolerate."/ppIt also suggests most family intervention projects will reach 20,000 families with the most severe difficulties./ppThe paper also proposes an alcohol code limiting "all you can drink" promotions, and setting conditions on premises in particular local trouble hotspots. Lap dancing clubs will be reclassified as sex establishments so local councils have greater scope to close them. Ministers are also to look at preventing the clustering of betting shops. /ppThe paper draws heavily on the work of Louise Casey, the former "respect tsar", now working in the Home Office, Liam Byrne, the former immigration minister now co-ordinating much government policy from the Cabinet Office, and Hazel Blears, the communities secretary and a strong advocate of community empowerment. /ppThe paper tries to put the emphasis on fair rules in the context of the credit crunch. It says: "As everyone enters difficult economic times, with families working harder, household budgets coming under pressure, and more demand being placed on public resources, fair rules will become more important. /pp"If people perceive that not everyone is treated equally, that some get preferential treatment, that people who break the rules get away with it, respect for rules is undermined."/pdiv style="float: left; margin-right: 10px; margin-bottom: 10px;"ullia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/queensspeech"Queen's speech/a/lilia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/welfare"Welfare/a/lilia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/socialexclusion"Social exclusion/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/teiQ5qmkgdRPB1rEz6tU2ZcaO0Y/a"img src="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~at/teiQ5qmkgdRPB1rEz6tU2ZcaO0Y/i" border="0" ismap="true"/img/a/p

pAs the newspaper industry's prospects darken, and rounds of buyouts and layoffs have left little room for more cuts, The McClatchy Company (a href="http://finance.paidcontent.org/paidcontent?Page=QUOTETicker=MNI" class="ticker" title="MNI"NYSE: MNI/a) is joining with the non-profit iChristian Science Monitor/i on sharing foreign news coverage on a trial basis. The trial will last for three months and then the two will evaluate whether the combo worked. The exchange will involve two iCS Monitor/i correspondents, one in New Delhi and the other in Mexico City, and two McClatchy foreign correspondents in Nairobi and in Caracas. The arrangement comes two months after McClatchy said it would a href="http://www.paidcontent.org/entry/419-mcclatchy-eliminates-another-1150-jobs-or-10-percent-of-workforce-sees-" title="cut an additional"cut an additional/a 1,150 jobs—10 percent of its workforce—while iCS Monitor/i is a href="http://www.paidcontent.org/entry/419-christian-science-monitor-shifts-from-daily-paper-to-print-weekly-onlin" title="preparing to shift"preparing to shift/a from a daily to a weekly print pub and going online-only for breaking news. Meanwhile, the Associated Press is a href="http://www.paidcontent.org/entry/419-ap-to-cut-10-percent-of-jobs-in-2009" title="planning to slash"planning to slash/a 10 percent of its staff next year. a href="http://www.mcclatchy.com/pressreleases/story/2205.html" title="Release"Release/a /p p -- a href="http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1003918219" title="Three Florida papers form tie-up with J-school"Three Florida papers form tie-up with J-school/a: The trend of cooperative content has been happening in Florida since August, when three of the state's largest dailies came together to pool resources. Now, the three—Tribune Company's iThe Sun Sentinel/i, McClatchy's iThe Miami Herald/i, and Cox's iThe Palm (a href="http://finance.paidcontent.org/paidcontent?Page=QUOTETicker=PALM" class="ticker" title="PALM"NSDQ: PALM/a) Beach Post/i—are forming a news service with online and print pieces reported by Florida International University j-school students, a href="http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1003918219" title="EP reports"EP reports/a. The South Florida News Services launches next month and will run at least until March.nbsp; /p pstrongRelated/strong/p ul class="related" lia href="http://www.paidcontent.org/entry/419-cnn-positioning-its-wire-service-as-alternative-to-ap/" title="AP Acknowledges Threat From CNN's Wire Service; But Challenger Still 'Needs Improvement'"AP Acknowledges Threat From CNN's Wire Service; But Challenger Still 'Needs Improvement'/a/li lia href="http://www.paidcontent.org/entry/419-ap-to-cut-10-percent-of-jobs-in-2009" title="AP to Cut 10 Percent of Jobs in 2009; Mainly Through Attrition"AP to Cut 10 Percent of Jobs in 2009; Mainly Through Attrition/a/li lia href="http://www.paidcontent.org/entry/419-yes-it-is-bad-newspapers-online-ad-revenues-down-for-q3-as-well" title="Yes, It is Bad: Newspapers' Online Ad Revenues Down For Q3 As Well"Yes, It is Bad: Newspapers' Online Ad Revenues Down For Q3 As Well/a/li /ul p!-- iMark Logic Digital Publishing Summit, Thursday November 6, Westin Times Square. Insight and perspective from Outsell, Gilbane, Simon Schuster, BusinessWeek.com, more. Evening cocktail reception. Cost is complimentary. a href="http://content.adbureau.net/accipiter/adclick/CID=000010cb0000000000000000/SITE=PC_US/AAMSZ=PREMB_NEWS/relocate=http://marklogicdps.eventbrite.com/"Register now!/a/i --/p pa href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~a/pcorg?a=PPYCku"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~a/pcorg?i=PPYCku" border="0"/img/a/pdiv class="feedflare" a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/pcorg?a=tDVrO"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/pcorg?i=tDVrO" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/pcorg?a=atkvO"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/pcorg?i=atkvO" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/pcorg?a=BqjUo"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/pcorg?i=BqjUo" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/pcorg?a=gw8lO"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/pcorg?i=gw8lO" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/pcorg?a=YyQUO"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/pcorg?i=YyQUO" border="0"/img/a /divimg src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/pcorg/~4/472071499" height="1" width="1"/

During the December 1 edition of Hardball, MSNBC again hosted commentator and author Christopher Hitchens, who again attacked Sen. Hillary Clinton, President-elect Barack Obama's nominee for secretary of state. Hitchens said Clinton "only cares about one thing, namely herself and her own prospects." He continued: "After that, her impeached, disbarred husband and the many undeclared interests of his and hers that they nurture for the future. Barack Obama has picked someone who will always be thinking about something else as well as her job."

Salon.com editor-in-chief Joan Walsh also appeared as a panelist and repeatedly called Hitchens' assertions "ridiculous." She said of Clinton's nomination, as well as the other nominations announced the same day, "I think this is a terrific appointment. I think it's a terrific set of appointments."

Later in the segment, referring to economic conditions and expected attacks by conservatives, Matthews asked Hitchens if Obama picked Clinton because he "need[s] the Democratic Party united to weather that storm." Hitchens replied: "Well, whatever the answer to that question may be, it still divides us as between those of us who think that a job must be found for Hillary Clinton, that the country would be somehow disgraced if she wasn't in an important position, and those of us who could do without her. And neither answer to that question is going to make any difference at all to where the market performs." Walsh responded to Hitchens by asserting, "[T]hat second group is a very small group, a group of eccentric Clinton haters who have made a career out of trashing the Clintons. It's a small group. It's a small group, it's not -- it's not an important group in American domestic or foreign policy." Hitchens then asked, "Which group are you talking about?" Walsh replied, "The group of people who would rather see Hillary Clinton off the world stage. I don't think Barack Obama was thinking about that at all because that group of people is eccentric, they are devoted to looking at everything the Clintons do in the worst possible light."

Toward the end of the segment, Hitchens asserted, "What you want, as president, is to know your secretary of state spends all her time working to make sure that your policies stick. With this woman, that can't be said. She's always thinking first about herself, second about her husband."

As Media Matters for America has documented, in the context of reports that Obama intended to nominate Clinton, Hitchens repeatedly attacked Clinton's foreign policy credentials during appearances on MSNBC:

• On the November 18 edition of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, Hitchens suggested that Clinton was not "respected in the Pentagon," despite ample evidence that Clinton "has gained a lot of respect among military leadership" and has "built relationships" with military leaders such as Gen. David H. Petraeus and Adm. William J. Fallon.

• During the November 17 edition of Hardball, as well as the November 18 edition of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, Hitchens revived his accusation, which he has yet to source, that Hillary Clinton blocked any action by the Clinton administration in war-torn Bosnia in 1993 because she didn't want it to interfere with passage of her health-care plan.

Further, as Media Matters has noted, MSNBC allowed Hitchens to attack Clinton during the presidential campaign.

• During the April 5 edition of MSNBC's Tim Russert, Russert asked Hitchens if "we [are] seeing the gender card played" by Clinton in response to calls for her to drop out of the Democratic presidential primary race. Hitchens replied: "Oh, well, if you call it a card. It's just another side of her terrible self-pity and self-righteousness. If it isn't one, it's the other." Hitchens further asserted that "if you think of women who really have been put upon by men and by male supremacy, like [late Pakistani leader] Benazir Bhutto, as well, you can't imagine her resorting to this kind of self-pity or suddenly decide to feminize herself in the most clichéd way, of such -- by welling up and sobbing." Hitchens later added: "I just think that if she knew how it made her look, sort of alternately soppy and bitchy, she'd stop it. But she can't help herself, can she? She just can't."

• During the September 12, 2007, edition of Morning Joe, Hitchens asserted: "The Democratic candidates are all pretending to be as pious as they possibly can be. You see Mrs. Clinton, looking like the dog being washed, and talking about how her faith got her through the impeachment crisis with her husband." After host Joe Scarborough asked him whether he thought that "Hillary Clinton is pretending to be religious," Hitchens replied: "It can't be that she suddenly decides that she's a person of faith. She has never particularly mentioned it before." Hitchens claimed that Clinton was feigning faith in order to "play to what are called the 'values voters.' " He concluded: "[A]s with everything Mrs. Clinton does, you can see the machinery working, you can see the wheels turning inside her head as she makes her maneuvers." In fact, contrary to Hitchens' claim that she has only recently begun asserting that she is a person of faith as part of her campaign for president, Clinton has publicly discussed her faith for years.

From the December 1 edition of MSNBC's Hardball with Chris Matthews:

CHRIS MATTHEWS (host): But first, President-elect Obama announced his national security team today with Senator Hillary Clinton as his choice for secretary of state. Christopher Hitchens is a columnist for Vanity Fair, and Joan Walsh is editor-in-chief of Salon. I want to ask you both about my theory, which is Barack Obama knows he's going to change foreign policy, he's going to take it a notch or two to the left. He needs people a notch or two to the right to cover for him. That explains General James Jones as his national security adviser, Senator Hillary Cinton as his secretary of state, and who else? Robert Gates, the holdover secretary of defense in that same position. Your thoughts, Christopher?

HITCHENS: Well, I think you have the left-right bit wrong. I mean, he -- General Petraeus isn't a right-winger. He's the guy who's defending secular democracy in Iraq. And I think it's tolerably well-known that he hoped very much for an extension for Gates. Susan Rice, who I think should have been nominated for secretary of state -- really do think should have been -- has a long track record of arguing for political and humanitarian interventionism of the sort many of us have advocated in Darfur, in Rwanda --

MATTHEWS: But not in Iraq.

HITCHENS: Not in Iraq, no.

MATTHEWS: Why are you arguing over nomenclature when I make a simple fact, Christopher, that Hillary Clinton was a notch to the right of Barack Obama during the campaign with regard to her position on Iraq and to some extent --

WALSH: A notch --

MATTHEWS: -- with regard with Iran? Why do you not -- why do you challenge that?

HITCHENS: I was hoping you could ask, was Hillary Clinton -- is essentially in this argument, nonpolitical. She only cares about one thing, namely herself and her own prospects, and after that, her impeached, disbarred husband and the many undeclared interests of his and hers that they nurture for the future. Barack Obama has picked someone who will always be thinking about something else as well as her job. That's not a left-or-right question.

[...]

WALSH: I think this is a terrific appointment. I think it's a terrific set of appointments. I'd like to just talk about the whole team up there, Chris. And I'm going to agree with Christopher on one point, which is I'm not sure that the left-right lens is exactly the best lens for analyzing what this team is about. I saw a team of tremendous diversity, not in any kind of cheesy, politically correct way but in terms of ideology, in terms of -- you've got Republicans up there, age, gender, regional diversity as well as race, three African-Americans. That's historic. That's impressive. And then I also saw a team that will clash, that will disagree, and a man of tremendous self-confidence who said, "The buck stops with me. I want clashing ideas. I want differences. And then I'm going to make the decision." So, I think it's a day that people can feel there's going to be a balance -- those people on that stage believe in America's military power, but they also believe in diplomacy, and I think you're going to see a rounding back to -- a balance between those two ways that we operate in the world that should make Americans feel safer.

[...]

MATTHEWS: Christopher and Joan, what do you make of his commitment -- his renewed commitment today, president-elect Obama, to removing our combat troops from Iraq in 16 months, Christopher?

HITCHENS: Well, he's been rescued by the Iraqi parliament. I mean, he's probably the luckiest politician one's ever seen since Kennedy in any case, but real the luck is that the Iraqis are demanding roughly what he's been asking for for a long time, which is a deadline and a date certain.

WALSH: Right.

HITCHENS: The actual date doesn't matter once you start talking about that. Can I just add, though, that I thought Obama's answer just there was incredibly cheap and evasive. I mean, he was right the first time to say this woman doesn't, in fact, have any foreign policy experience. And he could have added -- which also came up in the campaign -- that the experience she has claimed, such as in Bosnia, was fake, was fabricated. And he could also have added that she, like his other nominee for the attorney generalship, main qualification in politics is being a friend of Marc Rich, which I don't think has changed. Now, I do believe --

MATTHEWS: Well, why do you think he made this -- Christopher --

WALSH: That's a ridiculous thing to say.

HITCHENS: There's no change.

WALSH: How is that a main qualification?

HITCHENS: I don't know. Couldn't we have --

MATTHEWS: You make it sound like he's not -- he hasn't got his head together. Why would he make this appointment the most profound appointment so far --

HITCHENS: The best-known -- the best-known -- the best-known decision, the best known - the best-known thing Mr. Holder ever did as a government lawyer, shall we just say, and the biggest intervention in foreign policy made by Mrs. Clinton were both in -- to try and get this crook off in exchange for favors we don't even want to think about.

MATTHEWS: Well, we don't know what they are, do we?

WALSH: I think that's a ridiculous thing to say.

HITCHENS: Call it what you like. It's not change. It's a reminder --

MATTHEWS: Why do you -- Christopher --

HITCHENS: -- of the more sordid -- the more sordid elements of the Clinton era, which was not an era of foreign policy triumph.

MATTHEWS: What's the sordid or any motive behind this appointment then, Christopher?

HITCHENS: I didn't say this is a sordidly motivated act.

MATTHEWS: Well, what is -- what is it?

HITCHENS: I just -- I just think it's very disappointing for those who were hoping for a foreign policy change.

MATTHEWS: Well, what's the motive behind it? What's the motive?

HITCHENS: If you wanted to see foreign policy change, you should have -- you should -- consensual, I suppose. It's party unity, that sort of thing. Probably a gesture to NOW, that no doubt is involved, and so forth. Nonetheless, it's a terrible missed opportunity. Susan Rice would have made a very good appointment, safe to say. You'd have known where she stood, a person who has always approached foreign policy as a matter of principle who doesn't carry any baggage, who hasn't been a servant to special interests, is given a relatively unimportant job -- it's a major job, of course [untelligible] --

WALSH: It's a major job. It's a major job. Susan's a terrific person. She's a friend of mine.

HITCHENS: Hillary Clinton is not qualified in any way to be secretary of state --

MATTHEWS: OK, let me -- Joan --

HITCHENS: -- and she doesn't have any interests but herself and her husband --

WALSH: I think that's absolutely ridiculous.

[...]

MATTHEWS: Christopher, I want to go back to your point that this is a political move by Barack Obama, naming Senator Clinton to be secretary of state, apart from foreign policy. He must know and you all know -- certainly Joan knows, and you and I and Christopher know -- that we're facing a bad couple of years of economic history coming at us, maybe a lot more than two bad years. Not just a deep recession but a prolonged, perhaps something approaching a depression. It could be, does he need the Democratic Party united to weather that storm? Because he's going to get hit like hell by the conservatives and Republicans within about three months.

HITCHENS: Well, whatever the answer to that question may be, it still divides us as between those of us who think that a job must be found for Hillary Clinton, that the country would be somehow disgraced if she wasn't in an important position, and those of us who could do without her. And neither answer to that question is going to make any difference at all to where the market performs. However --

WALSH: But that second group is a very small group --

HITCHENS: -- the president -- the president -- it doesn't -- it doesn't help --

WALSH: -- a group of eccentric Clinton haters who have made a career out of trashing the Clintons. It's a small group, it's not -- it's not an important group in American domestic or foreign policy. And I don't think --

HITCHENS: Which group are you talking about?

WALSH: The group of people who would rather see Hillary Clinton off the world stage. I don't think Barack Obama was thinking about that at all because that group of people is eccentric, they are devoted to looking at everything the Clintons do in the worst possible light. And he's trying to solve problems. And, to you, Chris, I don't think it was done with domestic politics and --

HITCHENS: Christopher.

WALSH: No, I'm sorry, I'm talking to Chris. It's tough here, Christopher, I did call you Christopher.

MATTHEWS: Well, no, I'm looking that the 18 million -- look, I'm looking at the 18 million that voted for her and thinking that if he's looking at Lincoln as a role model, he clearly is looking at bringing in that constituency, not just Senator Clinton, or former President Clinton, but the 18 million working people that voted for him.

WALSH: But Chris --

MATTHEWS: I'm just thinking he might be a politician.

WALSH: Sure.

MATTHEWS: That's not a knock.

WALSH: But quite honestly, he brought them in -- no, and I know you don't mean it as a knock, at all. But he brought those people in on November 4th. For all that you and I spent a year talking every week about what was going to happen to those Clinton voters, and even I had some, you know, some weeks where I worried about it. The fact is, he brought those people in. He's not worried about that. I genuinely think if he's got an eye toward politics, it's global politics. And he wants the strength --

HITCHENS: Yes.

WALSH: -- of the Clinton name, the Clinton brand.

MATTHEWS: OK, let's -- Christopher --

HITCHENS: That's what the secretary -- that's what the secretary of state -- that's what the secretary of state is for. And what you want as president --

WALSH: Right.

HITCHENS: -- is to know your secretary of state spends all her time working to make sure that your policies stick. With this woman, that can't be said. She's always thinking first about herself, second about her husband.

MATTHEWS: What about her husband? [unintelligible]

WALSH: Well, I trust Barack Obama's opinion more than yours.

MATTHEWS: Christopher, last question here --

HITCHENS: -- [unintelligible] always. That's never changed -- that's never changed and it's never going to, so he would have [inaudible], nor would anyone.

WALSH: That's your opinion, Christopher.

HITCHENS: Well, guess what? Guess who's saying it? That's a very clever thing to say. Shall I ask, would you prefer I uttered your opinion? What a fatuous remark.

MATTHEWS: Christopher -- let me ask you, Christopher, let's raise this --

WALSH: You know, I prefer Barack Obama's opinion. Barack Obama is the supremely qualified person whose opinion matters.

a href="http://img.qj.net/uploads/articles_module/126909/MidwayBIG_qjgenth.jpg?068218" rel="lightbox[article126909]" title="Midway 20Games 20- 20Image 201 20 26nbsp 3B 20 20 26nbsp 3B 20 3Ca 20href 3D 22http 3A//img.qj.net/uploads/articles_module/126909/MidwayBIG.jpg 3F068218 22 20target 3D 22_blank 22 3E 3Cimg 20src 3D 22/img/newwindow.png 22 20title 3D 22Open 20in 20new 20window 22 20border 3D 220 22 3E 3C/a 3E"img style="margin-bottom: 3px; margin-left: 3px;" alt="Midway Games - Image 1" title="Midway Games - Image 1" src="http://img.qj.net/uploads/articles_module/126909/MidwayBIG_qjgenth.jpg?068218" align="right" border="0"/aSummer Redstone, chairman of National Amusement, Inc and previously the owning investor of a href="http://ps3.qj.net/tags/midway-games/7285" id="tag" title="Game developer, developing PS3 version of Mortal Kombat"Midway Games/a, has sold his 87 percent controlling stake in Midway Games, inc for US 100,000 or approximately US 0.0012 per share. The 20 year old span style="font-style: italic;"Mortal Kombat/span publisher was sold to a private investor, Mark Thomas.brbrAlthough the sale is obviously a significant loss for Redstone, the dirt-low price did secure for him a healthy US 800 million in tax savings for his other company, National Amusements, Inc, which is reportedly in debt for around US 1.6 million.brbrAs for Midway itself, the future is starting to look very bleak. Their losses had doubled to US 76 million in the course of just three months ending in September and, more recently, they're facing delisting in the New York Stock Exchange for having shares that have far too little value. brbrWhen it rains, it pours. Good luck to you, Midway.brbrhr style="width: 100 ; height: 2px;"brspan style="font-weight: bold;"Related Articles:/spanbrullia title="Midway stock faces delisting from NYSE" href="http://www.qj.net/Midway-stock-faces-delisting-from-NYSE/pg/49/aid/126585"span style="font-style: italic;"Midway stock faces delisting from NYSE/span/a/lilispan style="font-style: italic;"a title="Unreal Engine 3: at fault for Midway Games' losses?" href="http://www.qj.net/Unreal-Engine-3-at-fault-for-Midway-Games-losses-/pg/49/aid/126413"Unreal Engine 3: at fault for Midway Games' losses?/abr/span/li/ulbrbrimg src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/qj/ps3/~4/7vRrO-_24Cs" height="1" width="1"/

a href="http://img.qj.net/uploads/articles_module/126909/MidwayBIG_qjgenth.jpg?068218" rel="lightbox[article126909]" title="Midway 20Games 20- 20Image 201 20 26nbsp 3B 20 20 26nbsp 3B 20 3Ca 20href 3D 22http 3A//img.qj.net/uploads/articles_module/126909/MidwayBIG.jpg 3F068218 22 20target 3D 22_blank 22 3E 3Cimg 20src 3D 22/img/newwindow.png 22 20title 3D 22Open 20in 20new 20window 22 20border 3D 220 22 3E 3C/a 3E"img style="margin-bottom: 3px; margin-left: 3px;" alt="Midway Games - Image 1" title="Midway Games - Image 1" src="http://img.qj.net/uploads/articles_module/126909/MidwayBIG_qjgenth.jpg?068218" align="right" border="0"/aSummer Redstone, chairman of National Amusement, Inc and previously the owning investor of a href="http://pspupdates.qj.net/tags/midway-games/7285" id="tag" title="Game developer, developing PS3 version of Mortal Kombat"Midway Games/a, has sold his 87 percent controlling stake in Midway Games, inc for US 100,000 or approximately US 0.0012 per share. The 20 year old span style="font-style: italic;"Mortal Kombat/span publisher was sold to a private investor, Mark Thomas.brbrAlthough the sale is obviously a significant loss for Redstone, the dirt-low price did secure for him a healthy US 800 million in tax savings for his other company, National Amusements, Inc, which is reportedly in debt for around US 1.6 million.brbrAs for Midway itself, the future is starting to look very bleak. Their losses had doubled to US 76 million in the course of just three months ending in September and, more recently, they're facing delisting in the New York Stock Exchange for having shares that have far too little value. brbrWhen it rains, it pours. Good luck to you, Midway.brbrhr style="width: 100 ; height: 2px;"brspan style="font-weight: bold;"Related Articles:/spanbrullia title="Midway stock faces delisting from NYSE" href="http://www.qj.net/Midway-stock-faces-delisting-from-NYSE/pg/49/aid/126585"span style="font-style: italic;"Midway stock faces delisting from NYSE/span/a/lilispan style="font-style: italic;"a title="Unreal Engine 3: at fault for Midway Games' losses?" href="http://www.qj.net/Unreal-Engine-3-at-fault-for-Midway-Games-losses-/pg/49/aid/126413"Unreal Engine 3: at fault for Midway Games' losses?/abr/span/li/ulbrbrdiv class="feedflare" a href="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/QJ/PSP?a=4wWX2Mwe"img src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/QJ/PSP?d=41" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/QJ/PSP?a=BfNKtNhk"img src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/QJ/PSP?d=50" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/QJ/PSP?a=0XYwsD6P"img src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/QJ/PSP?d=43" border="0"/img/a /divimg src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/QJ/PSP/~4/Qvaps9lFxLg" height="1" width="1"/

a href="http://img.qj.net/uploads/articles_module/126909/MidwayBIG_qjgenth.jpg?068218" rel="lightbox[article126909]" title="Midway 20Games 20- 20Image 201 20 26nbsp 3B 20 20 26nbsp 3B 20 3Ca 20href 3D 22http 3A//img.qj.net/uploads/articles_module/126909/MidwayBIG.jpg 3F068218 22 20target 3D 22_blank 22 3E 3Cimg 20src 3D 22/img/newwindow.png 22 20title 3D 22Open 20in 20new 20window 22 20border 3D 220 22 3E 3C/a 3E"img style="margin-bottom: 3px; margin-left: 3px;" alt="Midway Games - Image 1" title="Midway Games - Image 1" src="http://img.qj.net/uploads/articles_module/126909/MidwayBIG_qjgenth.jpg?068218" align="right" border="0"/aSummer Redstone, chairman of National Amusement, Inc and previously the owning investor of a href="http://wii.qj.net/tags/midway-games/7285" id="tag" title="Game developer, developing PS3 version of Mortal Kombat"Midway Games/a, has sold his 87 percent controlling stake in Midway Games, inc for US 100,000 or approximately US 0.0012 per share. The 20 year old span style="font-style: italic;"Mortal Kombat/span publisher was sold to a private investor, Mark Thomas.brbrAlthough the sale is obviously a significant loss for Redstone, the dirt-low price did secure for him a healthy US 800 million in tax savings for his other company, National Amusements, Inc, which is reportedly in debt for around US 1.6 million.brbrAs for Midway itself, the future is starting to look very bleak. Their losses had doubled to US 76 million in the course of just three months ending in September and, more recently, they're facing delisting in the New York Stock Exchange for having shares that have far too little value. brbrWhen it rains, it pours. Good luck to you, Midway.brbrhr style="width: 100 ; height: 2px;"brspan style="font-weight: bold;"Related Articles:/spanbrullia title="Midway stock faces delisting from NYSE" href="http://www.qj.net/Midway-stock-faces-delisting-from-NYSE/pg/49/aid/126585"span style="font-style: italic;"Midway stock faces delisting from NYSE/span/a/lilispan style="font-style: italic;"a title="Unreal Engine 3: at fault for Midway Games' losses?" href="http://www.qj.net/Unreal-Engine-3-at-fault-for-Midway-Games-losses-/pg/49/aid/126413"Unreal Engine 3: at fault for Midway Games' losses?/abr/span/li/ulbrbrdiv class="feedflare" a href="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/qj/wii?a=BfdUH46R"img src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/qj/wii?d=41" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/qj/wii?a=VbB10Z8a"img src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/qj/wii?d=43" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/qj/wii?a=umoYU62T"img src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/qj/wii?d=50" border="0"/img/a /divimg src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/qj/wii/~4/aEcUb4XJjrA" height="1" width="1"/