Smartphones drive record Samsung profit (Reuters)

SEOUL (Reuters) ? Samsung Electronics Co posted a record $4.7 billion quarterly operating profit, driven by booming smartphone sales, and will spend $22 billion this year to boost its production of chips and flat screens to further pull ahead of smaller rivals.

The South Korean firm, the world's top technology firm by revenue, is locked in breakneck competition with Apple Inc in the red-hot smartphone market, and said its telecoms business earned a record 2.64 trillion won profit in October-December on increased sales of its flagship Galaxy smartphones.

October-December operating profit of 5.3 trillion won was broadly in line with its earlier estimate and topped the previous record profit of 5 trillion won in the second quarter of 2010. The profit was up 76 percent from a year ago and 25 percent higher than in the third quarter.

"This year, the smartphone market will expand to more mid-and low-end models that are affordable to the wider public," said Baik Jae-yer, fund manager at Korea Investment Management.

"Rather than focusing on market share, I would point out the strong contribution of Samsung's handset business to earnings growth and margins. The battle of the two big smartphone powers, Apple versus Samsung, will go on."

Samsung trails Nokia in the overall mobile phone market, competes with Sony Corp and LG Electronics Inc in televisions, Toshiba and Hynix in chips and LG Display in displays.

Samsung said it will increase its investment this year by 9 percent to 25 trillion won, with 15 trillion won of that going to the chips division, 6.6 trillion won on flat screens and the rest mainly to boost capacity at overseas production sites and to build research and development centers.

RIVALRY WITH APPLE

Apple, overtaken by Samsung as the world's biggest maker of smartphones in the third quarter, looks certain to have regained the top spot in the fourth quarter with record sales of 37.04 million iPhones.

Samsung did not provide its own sales volume data for the fourth quarter, but said smartphone shipments rose by around 30 percent, suggesting sales of around 36 million, in line with analysts' estimates of 35-37 million.

Samsung only entered the smartphone market in earnest in 2010, some three years after Apple first introduced the iPhone with the touchscreen template.

Samsung may not have come up with the concept, but it has adopted Apple's breakthrough idea perhaps better than any other handset maker - and now seeks to offer the Apple experience at a better price, with better functionality.

Apple is Samsung's biggest client, buying mainly chips and displays, and the two firms are locked in a bruising patent battle in some 10 countries from the United States to Europe, Japan and Australia as they jostle for top spot in the booming smartphone and tablet market.

Apple, though, is streets ahead in profitability. Apple, which generates half its revenue from the iPhone, boasts a 37.4 percent operating margin versus Samsung's 11 percent, and its $17.3 billion operating profit is almost four times what Samsung earned from selling phones, chips, flat screens and TVs combined.

"Apple had good sales, but it's very unlikely this will be a trend that will overwhelm Samsung later," said Kim Young-chan, analyst at Shinhan Investment & Securities.

"There were many end-of-year promotions and, most importantly, the impact from (Apple founder Steve Jobs') death on sales growth can't be ruled out.

"It's unlikely Samsung and Apple will fight over each other's market share, but they will eat up the market share of smaller companies like HTC and RIM."

Shares in Samsung, also the world's top maker of memory chips and TVs, have risen by close to a fifth in the past three months and hit a life high of 1.125 million won earlier this week, outperforming a 3 percent gain on the KOSPI.

The stock was up 0.3 percent in early Seoul trading at 1.116 million won, while the broader market was a touch lower.

(Additional reporting by Seoul newsroom; Editing by Muralikumar Anantharaman and Jonathan Hopfner)

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/business/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20120127/bs_nm/us_samsung

camaro zl1 bob sanders evan longoria janeane garofalo janeane garofalo braves braves

Golden Globes trial exposes misleading negotiating tactics (Reuters)

LOS ANGELES, Jan 27 (TheWrap.com) ? Dick Clark Productions Chief Executive Officer Mark Shapiro had to admit in Los Angeles District Court late this week that he employed bluffs and half-truths to get NBC to agree to an $150 million deal to air the Golden Globes.

The practice is likely standard operating procedure in Hollywood, but copping to the ploys can not have been pleasant for Shapiro.

The deal is at the center of a legal scuffle between DCP and the Hollywood Foreign Press Association, the non-profit group behind the Globes, over who controls the rights to the broadcast of the highly-rated awards show. Marc Graboff, NBC's former business affairs chief, took the stand Friday morning, with testimony from CBS CEO Les Moonves expected next week.

The HFPA sued DCP and its parent company Red Zone Capital in November 2010, alleging that the company negotiated a new contract with NBC without their consent and that by failing to put the rights out for bidding by other networks, potentially cost them millions of dollars.

DCP claims that thanks to an amendment in its contract, the production company retains the rights to the broadcast every time it reaches a new deal with NBC. It also claims that it did not need the approval of the HFPA to extend the pact with the network.

Under questioning by HFPA attorney Linda Smith this week, Shapiro shied away from using the word "lie" or "mislead," but he did acknowledge that he led NBC executives to believe that he had HFPA's approval for the extension agreement.

Asked directly by Judge A. Howard Matz, at one point, if he had made false statements during negotiations with NBC, Shapiro said, "right."

He also claimed that he could hammer out a deal with NBC to air the awards pre-show, but said that he would need HFPA's approval before an agreement could be reached. He acknowledged that he told network executives that the HFPA was primarily interested in working out an extension of their deal before they tackled the issue of the pre-show.

Graboff told the court that NBC would not have done a deal for broadcast rights to the show if it had known that the HFPA was not being kept in the loop. But he also said if he had known that the organization was shopping the show to other networks -- as they apparently were trying to do with Moonves and CBS -- he would have tried to block a deal from taking place.

Moonves will likely emerge again during the course of the trial. The CBS chief is scheduled to testify next week -- although whether that testimony is given remotely via video conferencing or in-person is still the source of some debate.

HFPA Chairman Philip Berk met with Moonves in summer of 2010 to discuss the possibility of the Globes migrating to CBS, but DCP attorneys plan to argue that the lunch was in violation of its agreement with NBC. Under that pact, the HFPA was not allowed to talk to any third party about distributing the show until its deal with the network had expired.

The uncertainty around who would control the broadcast of the red carpet arrivals caused some friction. In a note, Graboff told Shapiro that DCP's reluctance to negotiate terms around the pre-show, while insisting that NBC immediately sign the extension agreement, "raises red flags for us."

As part of its justification for its "extensions clause," attorneys for DCP have argued that the HFPA was willing to give the production company broad rights to the program because its reputation was in tatters. The Golden Globes had been pushed off of the major broadcast networks for decades following a series of scandals involving their voting practices and allegations that Pia Zadora's husband had bought his wife an award by giving the group's members gifts.

Private correspondence that surfaced during the trial revealed Shapiro's unvarnished opinion of the controversial organization. In an email to William Morris Endeavor partner Ari Emanuel, Shapiro said that former NBCUniversal Chief Executive Officer Jeff Zucker understood the difficulty in dealing with the HFPA.

Wrote Shapiro: "Jeff knows these people are crazy."

(Editing By Zorianna Kit)

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/tv/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20120128/tv_nm/us_goldenglobes_trial

portland trail blazers leah messer justin timberlake engaged bluefin tuna jonestown hayden panettiere greg oden

Zoologger: How a blurry-eyed spider pounces on target

Species: Hasarius adansoni
Habitat: Hopping all over the tropics, including parts of north Africa, Europe, south Asia and Japan

For most of us, blurry vision is a bad thing, if only because it means we're going to have to spend a lot of money on a new pair of glasses. For one jumping spider, though, it's how it catches dinner.

Adanson's house jumper, as the name implies, is a jumping spider. It springs on unsuspecting prey insects from several centimetres away and swiftly dispatches them.

To pull off these leaps, it has to be an excellent judge of distance. And for that, paradoxically, it has part of its visual field permanently out of focus. It's the only animal known to judge distance in this way.

Stalk, jump and bite

The Adanson's house jumper is a cosmopolitan species ? meaning it lives all over the place. It hunts during the day, pouncing on insects and other prey, although like many jumping spiders it may also take the occasional drink of nectar.

To cope with its agile lifestyle, it must have excellent eyesight. How it works is not obvious, though. Lab tests have shown that it has top-class colour vision, but that doesn't help it judge distance.

Other animals have all sorts of ways to work out how far away an object is, the most obvious being simply to have two eyes with overlapping fields of vision and compare what they see.

There are also ways to judge distance using just one eye. Chameleons do it by changing the focus of the eye's lens, bringing the object in and out of focus. Alternatively, some insects move their heads from side to side to see how the object appears to move relative to the background.

According to Mitsumasa Koyanagi of Osaka University in Japan and colleagues, though, the Adanson's house jumper does it in a way that has been predicted from theory but never seen in a real animal before.

I can see you?

The spider has two pairs of forward-facing eyes: the central principal eyes are flanked by anterior lateral eyes. If the latter pair are blinkered, the spider can still judge distance, so the principal eyes must be able to do it alone. The visual fields of these eyes don't overlap, though, and they can't adjust their focus, so they can't be using any of the known methods of judging distance.

Koyanagi found a clue in a 1981 study of a related jumping spider, which like the Adanson's house jumper has four layers of light-sensitive cells in its retinas. Bafflingly, the second-deepest layer is full of receptors sensitive to green light, but green light is always out of focus on that layer, so the image there must be mostly blurred.

The same is true of the Adanson's house jumper's principal eyes. That means the blurry image on the second layer contrasts with the sharply focused image on the layer below. As the spider closes in on its prey, the defocused image will get blurrier still, allowing the spider to gauge the distance.

Koyanagi confirmed that this is how the spiders work by testing them under pure green and pure red lights. Under red light, the total absence of green should trick the spiders' perception of its defocused images, making all objects seem closer than they are, so the spiders' jumps should fall short. That was exactly what happened.

None like me

No other known animal judges distance like this, but then, no other group of animals has this retinal structure. All jumping spiders do, though, and so Koyanagi says they may all share the rangefinding ability.

Humans do something similar when we look at photos in which the subject is sharply focused against a blurred background, but that only tells us that the subject and background are at different distances: it doesn't tell us how far we are from the subject. However, there are microscopes that determine depth this way, and engineers working on computer vision have long been interested in the idea.

The Adanson's house jumper, it seems, got there first.

Journal reference: Science, DOI: 10.1126/science.1211667

Read previous Zoologger columns: Gecko's amputated tail has life of its own, Unique life form is half plant, half animal, Transgender fish perform reverse sex flip, My brain's so big it spills into my legs, Dozy hamsters reverse the ageing process, To kill a mockingbird? No, parasitise it, Chill out with the world's coldest insect, 'Werewolf birds' hook up by the full moon, Cannibal shrimp shows its romantic side, The only cross-dressing bird of prey, The biggest spider web in the world, Slime killer hagfish feasts in rotten flesh, Female monkeys indulge in synchronised sex.

If you would like to reuse any content from New Scientist, either in print or online, please contact the syndication department first for permission. New Scientist does not own rights to photos, but there are a variety of licensing options available for use of articles and graphics we own the copyright to.

Have your say

Only subscribers may leave comments on this article. Please log in.

Only personal subscribers may leave comments on this article

Subscribe now to comment.

All comments should respect the New Scientist House Rules. If you think a particular comment breaks these rules then please use the "Report" link in that comment to report it to us.

If you are having a technical problem posting a comment, please contact technical support.

Source: http://feeds.newscientist.com/c/749/f/10897/s/1c2a13c9/l/0L0Snewscientist0N0Carticle0Cdn213960Ezoologger0Ehow0Ea0Eblurryeyed0Espider0Epounces0Eon0Etarget0Bhtml0DDCMP0FOTC0Erss0Gnsref0Fonline0Enews/story01.htm

paul mccartney adam savage adam savage mos def jack o lantern jack o lantern dave thomas

More fruits, veggies in U.S. school lunch rules (Reuters)

WASHINGTON/LOS ANGELES (Reuters) ? U.S. schoolchildren, accustomed to a steady diet of pizza and french fries, will find more fruits, vegetables and whole grains on their cafeteria trays under new government school lunch rules announced on Wednesday.

The new U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) rules aim to boost the nutritional quality of the federally subsidized meals consumed by roughly 32 million U.S. schoolchildren daily.

The rules represent the first major revision of school meal standards in more than 15 years and are intended to combat the nation's childhood obesity crisis. Nearly one in three children in America is overweight or obese.

The overhaul comes just months after U.S. lawmakers acted to maintain pizza's status as a vegetable and killed proposed limits on weekly servings of starchy foods like potatoes.

In addition to doubling produce servings, the new guidelines call for fat-free and low-fat milk only, child-appropriate portion sizes and reductions in sodium, saturated fat and trans fats.

The changes were adopted under the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act (HHFKA), which was championed by first lady Michelle Obama and signed into law by President Barack Obama in 2010.

The new standards will be largely phased in, starting in the 2012-13 school year. They are expected to cost roughly $3.2 billion to implement over the first five years.

HHFKA authorized more funding to schools to help cover the extra costs associated with the menu changes.

The USDA gives school districts money for student lunches and breakfasts through its $18 billion school meals program.

The majority of children participating in the program are eligible for free or reduced-price meals. The USDA said 63 percent of lunches and 89 percent of breakfasts served are free or at a reduced cost.

FRIES WITH THAT?

Lawmakers altered the school lunch guidelines in November, when they barred the USDA from limiting the weekly servings of french fries and ensured that pizza continued to be counted as a vegetable portion because of its tomato paste.

Trade groups representing frozen-pizza sellers like ConAgra Foods Inc and Schwan Food Co, as well as french fry distributors McCain Foods Ltd and J.R. Simplot Co, were instrumental in blocking rule changes affecting those items.

Those actions caused a public uproar but won cheers from critics of the HHFKA rules, who cited the new regulations as an example of overreach by federal bureaucrats meddling in the food decisions of families.

"What we are announcing today are science-based rules and regulations that are going to substantially improve the meal qualities across the United States for children," USDA Undersecretary for Food, Nutrition and Consumer Services Kevin Concannon said on a conference call.

Margo Wootan, nutrition policy director for the nonprofit Center for Science in the Public Interest, said the new standards were a big improvement, despite food industry lobbying and the congressional revamp.

"Despite industry lobbying and congressional meddling, the new school meal standards are one of the most important advances in nutrition in decades," she said.

The Environmental Working Group said the adjustments could also curb healthcare costs since they may help reduce medical bills related to diabetes and other obesity-related chronic diseases.

"A healthier population will save billions of dollars in future healthcare costs," said Dawn Undurraga, EWG's staff nutritionist.

As an example of a new meal, the USDA said an elementary school lunch might consist of whole-wheat spaghetti with meat sauce and a whole-wheat roll, a vegetable mix of green beans, broccoli and cauliflower, plus sliced kiwi, low-fat milk, low-fat ranch dip and soft margarine.

That lunch would replace a meal of a hot dog on a bun with ketchup, canned pears, raw celery and carrots with ranch dressing, and low-fat chocolate milk.

Some school districts already have moved in the direction of the new rules. Results have been mixed.

Julia Bauscher, director of school nutrition services for Jefferson County Public Schools in Louisville, Kentucky, said her district already is serving whole-grain breads and greens like spinach, kale and romaine lettuce.

The district built acceptance by adding things gradually, working with student advisers and handing out samples of new menu items.

Bauscher acknowledged that children complained when the district started serving fewer potatoes to the 100,000 students in the meals program.

"They didn't like that so much, but they have learned to pick up something different," she said, noting that the potato-serving reductions are not required under the new rules but have been recommended by heath experts.

Some schools have had a tougher go.

Los Angeles Unified School District, one of the nation's largest, is revising its healthier lunch menus after initially missing the mark with students.

As part of the new standards, USDA also will increase the number of inspections of school menus. New guidelines for other food sold in schools, including items sold in vending machines and school stores, are due later this year.

(Reporting By Ian Simpson in Washington and Lisa Baertlein in Los Angeles; Editing by Steve Gorman, Paul Thomasch and Steve Orlofsky)

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/parenting/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20120125/hl_nm/us_school_food

john henry john henry zack greinke zack greinke siri san diego news ford evos

Steam community app available, access limited to beta participants for now

If you're a PC or Mac gamer, chances are you've used Steam, Valve Software's leading digital distribution platform for games. Today sees the launch of the official Steam app for Android, a new application that gives you access to the Steam store and community features like Steam chat on-the-go. If you're big on Steam and the Steam community, this could definitely be worth a look.

It's worth clarifying that this isn't a fully-fledged Steam client for Android, so you won't be playing Portal 2 on your Galaxy Tab any time soon, unfortunately. All it lets you do is buy PC and Mac games and chat to your Steam friends.

While the app itself is freely available on the Android Market (see the link after the jump), you'll need to be part of the Steam Mobile beta group in order to use it, or you'll be rejected at the login screen. This is a little strange given that the app is openly advertised on SteamPowered.com with no mention that a beta invite is required. So keep an eye on this one, folks. All signs point to a possible public launch in the near future. If you are in the beta group, however, you'll find a handy Market link after the break.

Source: SteamPowered.com

read more

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/androidcentral/~3/ZBNzeQrjQ2M/story01.htm

cain velasquez vs dos santos cain velasquez vs dos santos oregon stanford oregon stanford darrell hammond darrell hammond boxer rebellion

The Flame Alphabet

Marcus's novel has a meandering beginning but is a masterful examination of love and endurance.

Reviewed by Jeff VanderMeer for The Barnes & Noble Review

Skip to next paragraph

In Ben Marcus's chilly yet passionate new novel, The Flame Alphabet, the world ends not with a bang or a whimper but because of lingering collateral damage from daily speech -- communication as a killer. Marcus, author of Notable American Women and The Age of Wire and String, imagines a sudden universal plague, originating with Jewish children, in which the words of the young render adults sick and then dead. The ghastly symptoms include retching, speech fever, yellow skin, and bruising around the mouth. Victims eventually turn into "leaking sacks of mush."

A man named Sam relates the particulars of the affliction, stage by stage. He also chronicles the erosion of his relationship with his wife, Claire, and their twinned resentment and love of their teen daughter, Esther -- a defiant, sentimental hell-beast typical of the species -- whose words would be knives even without the arrival of a seemingly inexplicable epidemic. As Sam struggles to preserve his loved ones, the narrative continually turns in on itself to share in ever more poignant detail the paralysis of the family unit. The wider crisis is described just well enough to imbue the novel with the necessary semblance of reality, but no more than that.

The particulars of Sam's faith stand out in sharp relief against this backdrop of crisis, and the two seem linked by a second fabulist element in the book -- a network of secret huts through which Jewish couples receive "religious transmissions." The complex process by which Sam and Claire assemble the necessary equipment, attaching uncomfortably fleshy "listeners" to the orifice in the hut floor, would make William Burroughs smile in recognition.

The huts may serve as Marcus's bleak yet humorous comment on the eccentricity of religious ritual, but they also function as an important part of the plot. A man named Murphy believes the huts may hold the solution to the plague and has been "canvassing Jewish families?cornering, manipulating, extracting." After meeting Sam supposedly by accident, Murphy stalks his family and gives him The Proofs, an eccentric collection of documents documenting historical cases of deadly language. Murphy wants Sam to give up the secrets of the huts. This needling presence often sparks more reaction from Sam than his wife or daughter, because Murphy is an acceptable outlet on which to vent his anger, grief, and frustration.

Source: http://rss.csmonitor.com/~r/feeds/csm/~3/rniLZzRiKTQ/The-Flame-Alphabet

the hobbit movie trailer tcu xfactor frankincense cloudy with a chance of meatballs the hobbit movie orcl

Trial over Globes broadcast rights opens in LA (AP)

LOS ANGELES ? The executive who negotiated a deal that brought the Golden Globe Awards to NBC in the mid-1990s testified Tuesday that he didn't think it was necessary to tell its organizers they were signing away rights that could keep the show on the network indefinitely.

Former dick clark productions President Francis La Maina testified he informed the then-president of the Hollywood Foreign Press Association about the deal's "perpetuity clause" and he believed it was her responsibility to explain it to the full membership. The NBC deal was brought to the group in 1993, a decade after it had been bumped from network television because of scandal.

The clause allows the production company, which is no longer owned by entertainment pioneer Dick Clark, to work on the Globes as long as it airs on NBC.

La Maina was the first witness in a trial in federal court that will decide ownership of the broadcast rights to the Globes, a glitzy awards banquet that brings out Hollywood superstars and in some years serves as a predictor of Oscar contenders.

The production company, also known as dcp, used the language of the 1993 deal to support a $150 million contract extension signed in 2010 that keeps the Globes on NBC through 2018. It has noted that the association has known about the clause for years and even allowed the company to work on five shows without a formal extension, but waited until the new broadcast deal was struck to sue.

The HFPA contends the new agreement is invalid and it should be allowed to negotiate with other networks. Nearly 17 million people watched the most recent Globes, which aired Jan. 15.

"I don't think I misled the Hollywood Foreign Press," La Maina said, adding that he thought he was fulfilling his obligations by explaining the impact to the association's president. "My job is to deal with the top dog of Hollywood Foreign Press."

The trial is expected to last more than two weeks and could lead to the first restructuring of the HFPA's broadcast rights on its own terms in nearly 30 years. The group and dcp have worked together since 1983, but it wasn't until the 1993 deal with NBC was reached that both sides began to generate large sums for the Globes.

The association claims it would have never knowingly allowed the perpetuity clause and that it had assurances from dcp executives that they were not negotiating an extension with NBC in 2010. The group believes the perpetuity clause would mean it is likely to receive less money than the Globes are worth because dcp would have an incentive to keep the show on NBC.

The case will be decided by U.S. District Judge A. Howard Matz, who said Monday that the 1993 agreement and other evidence present enough ambiguity to warrant a trial.

La Maina, who left dcp in 2007, is expected to be on the stand for several days. Other witnesses may include Dick Clark, CBS CEO Leslie Moonves and several current and former HFPA members.

___

Follow Anthony McCartney at http://twitter.com/mccartneyAP

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/tv/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20120125/ap_en_tv/us_golden_globes_lawsuit

world series october 28 2011 october 28 2011 miami hurricanes vlad the impaler michael lohan fiddler on the roof

How Did 'Cosmopolis' Top 'Twilight' In Our Movie Brawl?

This week's 'Twilight' Tuesday takes a closer look at why fans chose Robert Pattinson's indie over 'Breaking Dawn - Part 2.'
By Kara Warner

Robert Pattinson and Sarah Gadon in "Cosmopolis"
Photo: Alfama Films

Over the course of the "Twilight Saga" movies, we at MTV News have come a long way in understanding the franchise's very passionate fanbase. So when we launched the MTV Movie Brawl 2012, I thought there was a very good chance "Twilight" fans would vote "Breaking Dawn - Part 2" through to the championship round and into the championship slot, no problem.

I was wrong. "The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn - Part 2" was ousted early, in the second round, by eventual champ "Cosmopolis." Yes, the two films share a very popular star in Robert Pattinson, but compared with the millions upon millions of "Twilight" fans who have read all of Stephenie Meyer's books, we're guessing not as many are familiar with "Cosmopolis" through its source material by Don DeLillo.

So here's what I think: All of you wonderfully dedicated Pattinson fans are in it for the long haul. You're choosing to grow and evolve right along with Pattinson and the ebbs and flows of his chosen profession. That sentiment is exemplified perfectly by this poignant comment by MTV community member and Pattinson fan, Lior: "VOTE COSMOPOLIS! Support Rob's new, professional career! SEE HIS TALENT BEYOND TWILIGHT."

Not that the excitement for the final chapter in "The Twilight Saga" has lessened in any way, of course, but because there's more mystery surrounding "Cosmopolis," it is the more intriguing of the two films.

And let's not forget about Pattinson's other upcoming film, "Bel Ami," which only narrowly lost to "Cosmopolis" in that first round. I would have thought the interest in seeing a lot of RPattz's bare bottom would have easily trumped the film about a young finance wiz taking a day-long limo ride through New York City. But then there's word of a particularly heated scene in the back of said limo, so what do I know? Regardless, consider me pleasantly surprised.

What do you think, "Twilight" fans? Why did "Cosmopolis" triumph over "Breaking Dawn - Part 2"? Let us know in the comments or tweet me @karawarner!

Check out everything we've got on "The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn - Part 2."

For young Hollywood news, fashion and "Twilight" updates around the clock, visit HollywoodCrush.MTV.com.

Source: http://www.mtv.com/news/articles/1677858/cosmopolis-tops-twilight-movie-brawl-2012.jhtml

julianne hough chris cook nest williams syndrome jay leno machine gun kelly lindsey lohan

First convictions from Fast and Furious gun probe (AP)

PHOENIX ? Two men pleaded guilty to buying guns that were destined to be smuggled into Mexico, the first convictions in the federal government's botched Operation Fast and Furious.

The men were so-called "straw buyers" who acknowledged purchasing guns that they knew were headed to Mexican drug gangs.

The goal of the federal government's investigation was to catch weapons-trafficking kingpins, but firearms agents lost track of many weapons they were trying to trace to smuggling ringleaders, and some guns ended up at crime scenes in Mexico and the U.S.

Jacob Wayne Chambers and Jacob Anthony Montelongo each pleaded guilty in federal court Monday to a conspiracy charge. Montelongo also pleaded guilty to dealing guns without a license.

The pair admitted being part of a 20-person smuggling ring that is accused of running guns into Mexico for use by the Sinaloa drug cartel.

Two rifles bought by the ring were found at the scene of a December 2010 shootout near the Arizona-Mexico border that mortally wounded Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry. The two guns weren't purchased by Chambers and Montelongo and instead were bought by another alleged ring member.

The investigation is the focus of an inquiry by congressional Republicans.

Several agents of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives have said they were ordered by superiors to let suspected straw buyers walk away from Phoenix-area gun shops with AK-47s and other weapons believed headed for Mexican drug cartels, rather than arrest the buyers and seize the guns there.

The federal agency lost track of some 1,400 of the more than 2,000 weapons whose purchases attracted the suspicion of the Fast and Furious investigators.

Chambers and Montelongo acknowledged buying the guns under the false claim that the weapons were for themselves, when they were actually being bought for organizers of the ring, and to knowing that the guns were being smuggling into Mexico.

Chambers bought 79 guns from three licensed dealers in Arizona from September 2009 to December 2009 and got paid $50 for each AK-47 and $100 for a .50-caliber rifle.

Montelongo purchased 109 guns from eight dealers in Arizona from January 2010 to July 2010. He was paid $50 for pistols, $100 for rifles and $150 each for six .50-caliber rifles.

Each faces up to five years in prison and a maximum $250,000 fine. Their sentencing is set for May 21.

Baltazar Iniguez, an attorney for Montelongo, and Phil Noland, lawyer for Jacob Wayne Chambers, didn't immediately return a call seeking comment Tuesday.

Trial for the remaining alleged ring members is set for Sept. 25. They have pleaded not guilty to the charges against them.

THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. AP's earlier story is below.

Two men pleaded guilty to buying guns that were destined to be smuggled into Mexico, the first convictions in the federal government's botched Operation Fast and Furious.

The men were so-called "straw buyers" who acknowledged purchasing guns that they knew were headed to Mexico.

The goal of the federal government's investigation was to catch weapons-trafficking kingpins, but firearms agents lost track of many weapons they were trying to track to smuggling ringleaders, and some guns ended up at crime scenes in Mexico and the U.S.

Jacob Wayne Chambers and Jacob Anthony Montelongo each pleaded guilty in federal court on Monday to a conspiracy charge.

The pair admitted being part of a 20-person smuggling ring that's accused of running guns into Mexico for use by the Sinaloa drug cartel.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/mexico/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20120124/ap_on_re_us/us_fast_and_furious

gary busey the x factor execution execution facebook music facebook music daphne guinness

Germany and France seek relaxation of bank capital rules: report (Reuters)

LONDON (Reuters) ? France and Germany will call on Monday for a relaxation of global bank capital rules to prevent lending to the real economy being choked off, the Financial Times reported on Monday.

German finance minister Wolfgang Schauble and his French counterpart Francois Baroin will urge special treatment for banks that own insurance companies, according to a joint paper seen by the newspaper.

The pair will also urge important elements of the Basel III guidelines on capital requirements to be watered down to mitigate any "negative effect" on growth, according to the article.

The FT said the paper calls for a three-year delay to the mandatory deadline to disclose leverage ratios, a measure of bank borrowing and risk.

Banks across the world will have to follow Basel III accords for disclosing the size and quality of their capital safety buffers from 2013 to help reassure investors they are stable.

(Reporting by Stephen Mangan; Editing by Kim Coghill)

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/economy/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20120123/bs_nm/us_france_germany_regulation

evelyn lauder devin hester devin hester shayne lamas cain velasquez dos santos waterboarding

Solar storm sparks dazzling northern lights

The aurora borealis, or Northern Lights, are seen near the city of Tromsoe, northern Norway, late Tuesday, Jan. 24, 2012. Stargazers were out in force in northern Europe on Tuesday, hoping to be awed by a spectacular showing of northern lights after the most powerful solar storm in six years. (AP Photo/Scanpix Norway, Rune Stoltz Bertinussen) NORWAY OUT

The aurora borealis, or Northern Lights, are seen near the city of Tromsoe, northern Norway, late Tuesday, Jan. 24, 2012. Stargazers were out in force in northern Europe on Tuesday, hoping to be awed by a spectacular showing of northern lights after the most powerful solar storm in six years. (AP Photo/Scanpix Norway, Rune Stoltz Bertinussen) NORWAY OUT

The aurora borealis, or Northern Lights, are seen near the city of Tromsoe, northern Norway, late Tuesday, Jan. 24, 2012. Stargazers were out in force in northern Europe on Tuesday, hoping to be awed by a spectacular showing of northern lights after the most powerful solar storm in six years. (AP Photo/Scanpix Norway, Rune Stoltz Bertinussen) NORWAY OUT

This handout image provided by NASA, taken Sunday night, Jan. 22, 2012, shows a solar flare erupting on the Sun's northeastern hemisphere. Space weather officials say the strongest solar storm in more than six years is already bombarding Earth with radiation with more to come. The Space Weather Prediction Center in Colorado observed a flare Sunday night at 11 p.m. EST. Physicist Doug Biesecker said the biggest concern from the speedy eruption is the radiation, which arrived on Earth an hour later. It will likely continue through Wednesday. It's mostly an issue for astronauts' health and satellite disruptions. It can cause communication problems for airplanes that go over the poles. (AP Photo/NASA)

This colorized NASA image, taken Monday, Jan. 23, 2012, from the Solar Dynamics Observatory, shows a flare shooting out of the top of the sun. It was taken in a special teal wavelength to best see the flare. Space weather officials say the strongest solar storm in more than six years is already bombarding Earth with radiation with more to come. The Space Weather Prediction Center in Colorado observed a flare Sunday night at 11 p.m. EST. Physicist Doug Biesecker said the biggest concern from the speedy eruption is the radiation, which arrived on Earth an hour later. It will likely continue through Wednesday. It's mostly an issue for astronauts' health and satellite disruptions. It can cause communication problems for airplanes that go over the poles. (AP Photo/NASA)

STOCKHOLM (AP) ? A storm from the broiling sun turned the chilly northernmost skies of Earth into an ever-changing and awe-provoking art show of northern lights on Tuesday.

Even experienced stargazers were stunned by the intensity of the aurora borealis that swept across the night sky in northern Scandinavia after the biggest solar flare in six years.

"It has been absolutely incredible," British astronomer John Mason cried from the deck of the MS Midnatsol, a cruise ship plying the fjord-fringed coast of northern Norway.

"I saw my first aurora 40 years ago, and this is one of the best," Mason told The Associated Press, his voice nearly drowning in the cheers of awe-struck fellow passengers.

U.S. space weather experts from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said Tuesday evening that so far they had heard of no problems from the storm that triggered the auroras, which made it as far south as Wales, where the weather often doesn't cooperate with good viewing.

It was part of the strongest solar storm in years, but the sun is likely to get even more active in the next few months and years, said physicist Doug Biesecker at the U.S. Space Weather Prediction Center in Boulder, Colorado.

"To me this was a wake up call. The sun is reminding us that solar max is approaching," Biesecker said. "A lot worse is in store for us. We hope that you guys are paying attention. I would say we passed with flying colors."

Even before particles from the solar storm reached the Earth on Tuesday, a different aurora Monday night was dancing across the sky as far south as Ireland and England, where people rarely get a chance to catch the stunning light show.

Those northern lights were likely just variations in normal background solar wind, not the solar storm that erupted Sunday, Biesecker said.

Tuesday's colorful display may not have moved that far south, limiting its audience, but those who got to see it got brilliance in the sky that had not been around for years.

"It was the biggest northern lights I've seen in the five-six years that I've worked here," said Andreas Hermansson, a tour guide at the Ice Hotel in the Swedish town of Jukkasjarvi, above the Arctic Circle.

He was leading a group of tourists on a bus tour in the area when a green glow that had lingered in the sky for much of the evening virtually exploded into a spectacle of colors around 10:15 p.m.

"We stopped the bus. And suddenly it was just this gigantic display of dancing lights and Technicolor," said Michele Cahill, an Irish psychologist, who was on the tour. "It was an absolutely awesome display. It went on for over an hour. Literally one would have to lie on the ground to capture it all."

But in -30 degrees F (-35 C), that didn't seem like a good idea.

An aurora appears when a magnetic solar wind slams into the Earth's magnetic field, exciting electrons of oxygen and nitrogen.

The northern lights are sometimes seen from northern Scotland, but they were also visible Monday night from northeast England and Ireland, where such sightings are a rarity.

"The lights appear as green and red mist. It's been mostly green the past few nights. I don't know if that's just special for Ireland," said Gerard O'Kane, a 41-year-old taxi driver and vice chairman of the Buncrana Camera Club in County Donegal in Ireland's northwest corner.

He and at least two dozen amateur photographers were meeting after dark at a local beach for an all-night stakeout. They've been shooting the horizon from dozens of locations since Friday night.

Scientists have been expecting solar eruptions to become more intense as the sun enters a more active phase of its 11-year cycle, with an expected peak in 2013.

But in recent years the sun appeared quieter than normal, leading scientists to speculate that it was going into an unusually quiet cycle that seems to happen once a century or so.

While the geomagnetic part of the solar eruption ? which happened around 11 p.m. EST Sunday ? was more of a fizzle, another earlier part of the sun's outburst was more powerful.

On Monday and Tuesday, the proton radiation from the eruption reached strong levels, the most powerful since October 2003. That mostly affects astronauts and satellites, but NASA said the crew on the International Space Station was not harmed and only a few minor problems with satellites were reported, Biesecker said.

However, some airplane flights over the North Pole have been rerouted because of expected communication problems from the radiation.

Geomagnetic storms cause awesome sights, but they can also bring trouble. According to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, problems can include current surges in power lines, and interference in the broadcast of radio, TV and telephone signals. No such problems were reported Tuesday.

Peter Richardson, a 49-year-old bar manager and part-time poet at the 17th-century Tan Hill Inn in northern England, said the pub ? normally dead on a Monday night in January ? was thronged until the wee hours of the morning with people who came to look at the lights.

"I just thought: 'Oh my God, this is just absolutely amazing,'" he said. "You do get a lot of spectacular skylines out here, but that was just something out of the ordinary. Very different."

Ken Kennedy, director of the Aurora section of the British Astronomical Association, said the northern lights may be visible for a few more days.

The Canadian Space Agency posted a geomagnetic storm warning Tuesday after residents were also treated to a spectacular show in the night sky.

John Manuel, a scientist with the Canadian Space Agency, said there's an increased chance of seeing northern lights over northern Canada on Tuesday night.

"It's not likely people in the major Canadian cities further south will see a significant aurora tonight," he said. "There's always a possibility but the current forecast is for a good show for people who live further north. It should be a particularly good night tonight."

___

AP Science Writer Borenstein reported from Washington. AP writers Louise Nordstrom in Stockholm, Shawn Pogatchnik in Dublin, Raphael Satter in London and Rob Gillies in Toronto contributed to this report.

___

Online:

http://www.auroraskystation.com/live-camera/9/

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/3d281c11a96b4ad082fe88aa0db04305/Article_2012-01-24-Europe-Northern%20Lights/id-7ab4fafd267b457e98a677533c3d2f33

hunger games trailer hunger games trailer austin rivers austin rivers ows kindle fire review community

US military raid in Somalia frees American, Dane (AP)

MOGADISHU, Somalia ? U.S. Special Forces troops flew into Somalia on a nighttime helicopter raid early Wednesday, freed an American and a Danish hostage and killed nine of the kidnappers in a mission that President Barack Obama said he personally authorized.

The Danish Refugee Council confirmed that the two aid workers, American Jessica Buchanan and Dane Poul Hagen Thisted, were freed and "are on their way to be reunited with their families."

The raiders came in very quickly, catching the guards as they were sleeping after having chewed the narcotic leaf qat for much of the evening, a pirate who gave his name as Bile Hussein told The Associated Press by phone. Hussein said he was not present at the site but had spoken with other pirates who were, and that they told him nine pirates had been killed in the raid and three were missing.

A second pirate who gave his name as Ahmed Hashi said two helicopters attacked at about 2 a.m. about 20 kilometers (12 miles) north of the Somali town of Adado where the hostages were being held.

Buchanan, 32, and Thisted, 60, were working with a de-mining unit of the Danish Refugee Council when they were kidnapped in October.

The U.S. military's Africa Command, based in Stuttgart, Germany, confirmed that nine kidnappers were killed.

"Last night's mission, boldly conducted by some of our nation's most courageous, competent, and committed special operations forces, exemplifies United States Africa Command's mission to protect Americans and American interests in Africa," said Gen. Carter F. Ham, commander of U.S. Africa Command.

Obama seemed to refer to the mission before his State of the Union address in Washington Tuesday night. By then it was already Wednesday morning in Somalia. As he entered the House chamber in the U.S. Capitol, Obama pointed at Defense Secretary Leon Panetta in the crowd and said, "Good job tonight."

"As Commander-in-Chief, I could not be prouder of the troops who carried out this mission, and the dedicated professionals who supported their efforts," Obama said in a statement released by the White House Wednesday. He said he had authorized the rescue mission on Monday.

"Jessica Buchanan was selflessly serving her fellow human beings when she was taken hostage by criminals and pirates who showed no regard for her health and well-being," Obama said. "The United States will not tolerate the abduction of our people, and will spare no effort to secure the safety of our citizens and to bring their captors to justice."

A Western official said the helicopters and the hostages flew to a U.S. military base called Camp Lemonnier in the Horn of Africa nation of Djibouti after the raid. Both officials spoke on condition of anonymity because the information had not been released publicly.

The timing of the raid may have been made more urgent by a medical condition. The Danish Refugee Council had been trying to work with Somali elders to win the hostages' freedom but had found little success.

"One of the hostages has a disease that was very serious and that had to be solved," Danish Foreign Minister Villy Soevndal told Denmark's TV2 channel. Soevndal did not provide any more details.

Soevndal congratulated the Americans for the raid and said he had been informed of the action.

Panetta visited Camp Lemonnier just over a month ago. A key U.S. ally in this region, Djibouti has the only U.S. base in sub-Saharan Africa. It hosts the military's Combined Joint Task Force-Horn of Africa.

The Danish Refugee Council said both freed hostages are unharmed "and at a safe location." The group said in a separate statement that the two "are on their way to be reunited with their families."

Ann Mary Olsen, head of the Danish Refugee Council's international department, was the one who informed the family of Hagen Thisted of the successful military operation.

"They (the family) were very happy and incredibly relieved that it is over," she said.

The two aid workers appear to have been kidnapped by criminals ? sometimes referred to as pirates ? and not by Somalia's al-Qaida-linked militant group al-Shabab. As large ships at sea have increased their defenses against pirate attacks, gangs have looked for other money making opportunities like land-based kidnappings.

The Danish Refugee Council had earlier enlisted traditional Somali elders and members of civil society to seek the release of the two hostages.

"We are really happy with the successful release of the innocents kidnapped by evildoers," said Mohamud Sahal, an elder in Galkayo town, by phone. "They were guests who were treated brutally. That was against Islam and our culture ... These men (pirates) have spoiled our good customs and culture, so Somalis should fight back."

Buchanan and Hagen Thisted were seized in October from the portion of Galkayo town under the control of a government-allied clan militia. The aid agency has said that Somalis held demonstrations demanding the pair's quick release.

Their Somali colleague was detained by police on suspicion of being involved in their kidnapping.

The two hostages were working in northern Somalia for the Danish Demining Group, whose experts have been clearing mines and unexploded ordnance in conflict zones in Africa and the Middle East.

Several hostages are still being held in Somalia, including a British tourist, two Spanish doctors seized from neighboring Kenya, and an American journalist kidnapped on Saturday.

___

Associated Press reporters Jason Straziuso in Nairobi, Kenya, and Jan M. Olsen in Copenhagen, Denmark contributed to this report. Houreld reported from Nairobi.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/obama/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20120125/ap_on_re_af/af_somalia_helicopter_raid

grandparents day 911 9/11 ground zero world trade center university of michigan university of michigan

Facebook Timeline feature, unflattering photos being pushed out to all users in next few weeks

Okay, so now that we've all had sufficient time to go on an untagging spree, Facebook is finally getting ready to begin pushing its new layout to all users. Timeline will be rolled out to everyone over the next few weeks, with the social network giving you seven days to preview it before going live, you know, just in case...

Facebook Timeline feature, unflattering photos being pushed out to all users in next few weeks originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 24 Jan 2012 11:16:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink All Things D  |  Facebook  | Email this | Comments

Source: http://feeds.engadget.com/~r/weblogsinc/engadget/~3/9Sisb_6FMqE/

michael dyer suspended new years ball drop new years rockin eve new york times square jaws brock lesnar first night

Too Bright for JWST: Some Exoplanets are Overwhelming

The planet Upsilon Andromedae b in close orbit to its parent star (NASA/JPL-Caltech)

Understanding the structure, dynamics, and chemistry of planetary atmospheres is key to exoplanetary science. It?s sobering to realize that as of now it is still an enormous challenge to model even the atmospheres of planets in our own solar system. Despite great advances, a variety of trickery has to be employed to simulate a swirling maelstrom like the Jovian atmosphere, pretending for example that it has a very different soupiness and energy transport in order to overcome computational demands. Modeling the atmospheres of gas giant exoplanets is even more in its infancy. Nonetheless, an intriguing result a couple of years ago came from Crossfield et al. and their study of how we see the infrared light varying in the planetary system of Upsilon Andromedae. Their Spitzer space telescope phase photometry (light seen as time passes) on Ups And reveals the glow emitted by the innermost, roughly Jupiter sized, planet around this F dwarf star (about 1.3 times the mass of the Sun).

The planet orbits very tightly, every 4.6 days, and is expected to have been evolved by tidal interaction with the star to a state of spin-orbit-synchronicity ? in other words, in the simplest case, its day will equal its year and there will be permanent day/night sides. This sets the planet up for an extreme case of thermal disparity (about 1,400 Celsius in this case). We?d expect hot atmosphere from the day-side to flow to the cold night half of the planet ? in doing so there might be great jet-stream like structures, and the hottest point of the planet might get shifted along in the direction of these winds. Something like this seems to be happening on Ups And b, but to an extent that is truly puzzling. As it zips around in its orbit, the glow of the hot atmosphere betrays that temperature distribution, in a fingerprint of infrared photons collected by Spitzer.

The misaligned hotspot of Ups And b (Credits in image)

In a nutshell ? the hottest part of the atmosphere is not in synch with the planet orbit ? or more specifically it is systematically offset or phase-shifted by almost 90 degrees. In other words, the hottest side of the planet is almost at right angles to the direction of the star. On the Earth this would be a bit like saying the hottest time of day is at sunset instead of noon.

It?s a puzzle. Some amount of offset might be expected, driven by the strongly blowing hot-to-cold winds, but this is extreme. There are various possible explanations ? maybe the stellar heating is reaching to greater depths in the planetary atmosphere than expected and altering the fundamental dynamics. Perhaps the winds are so strong that they are going supersonic, forming great shock waves that pile energy up on this side of the planet. It?s a tough call ? even theoretical models of these hot Jupiter-like planets disagree on such things, and none of them predict exactly what we see on Ups And b. The good thing about this result is that it challenges the modelers to really sort out what works and what doesn?t ? advances will be made.

Crossfield et al. also end their paper with an interesting fact. This system of Ups And is actually too bright for the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) to observe at shorter wavelengths ? its sensitive instruments would simply be saturated with photons, blinded by the light. They further point out that a small space telescope dedicated to studying the phase curves of nearby hot-Jupiter systems might just provide the data needed to crack the problems of these extraordinary regimes of planetary atmospherics. This is a sentiment that could also apply to the hunt for terrestrial-type exoplanets ? especially those that transit stars that are much closer to us than the distant Kepler objects. We need a dedicated all-sky survey to find the targets for powerhouse instruments like JWST, especially those that aren?t going to require planetary sunglasses.

(This post was adapted from an older post on Life, Unbounded in October 2010)

?

Source: http://rss.sciam.com/click.phdo?i=7f4aed222dd27fd83a14c34ff523cc3e

novak djokovic sarah mclachlan shakespeare bipolar symptoms qi osama bin laden osama bin laden

Boehner: Republicans may link pipeline to tax bill (reuters)

Share With Friends: | | Politics - Top Stories News, News Feeds and News via Feedzilla.

Source: http://news.feedzilla.com/en_us/stories/politics/top-stories/190057676?client_source=feed&format=rss

spongebob bot foot locker cats funny pics funny pics contagion

Standoff suspect surrenders to news anchor

By msnbc.com staff and news services

A man who was wanted in connection with a Madison County, Miss., standoff was taken into custody on Friday, after he surrendered to a reporter covering the manhunt,?according to local TV station WLBT.?

WLBT's Bert Case said Rodney Wayne Hill approached him Friday morning at the home where the standoff had ended hours earlier. Case said Hill, who appeared distressed, told him he needed help and had spent the night hiding in the woods nearby.?

"I thought I was being set up," Case, whose journalism career spans almost five decades, told WLBT. "I didn't believe that this was really happening."

One of the news station's videographers called the police. Case said he was worried he couldn't keep Hill talking until the police arrived. Within a few minutes, the sheriff and a deputy arrived at the scene and arrested Hill, according to WLBT.

The standoff began Thursday afternoon, when deputies responded to a call saying Hill had threatened a neighbor with a rifle. When the police arrived at his house, Hill was already gone.

Hill was taken to the Madison County Sheriff's Department on Friday, according to TV station WAPT. Sheriff Randy Tucker said Hill will undergo a mental evaluation, and the results may determine whether he will face felony charges for allegedly threatening his neighbor.

?

More content from msnbc.com and NBC News

Source: http://usnews.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/01/23/10217155-manhunt-ends-when-suspect-surrenders-to-miss-news-anchor

beebe michelle malkin goodrich death penalty gary busey the x factor execution

Rap is an overall winner, but loser at the Grammys (AP)

NEW YORK ? Since its beginnings in the 1970s, rap music has transformed from an underground, street-based sound to a definitive part of pop culture, transcending race and becoming one of the strongest ? and most prolific ? voices of today's generation. But at the Grammy Awards, rap has had a long-lasting losing streak in the top categories.

The hip-hop sound ? first recognized at the 1989 Grammys ? has garnered numerous prestigious nominations over the years, and for 10 of the last 14 years, rap acts have either led or tied for most Grammy nominations. But rarely will a hip-hop act win one of the show's top four honors ? album, song and record of the year, along with best new artist. Instead, rap acts tend to win rap awards.

50 Cent, who won his first and only Grammy two years ago, believes Grammy voters are out-of-touch and need a fresh outlook on what's going on in contemporary music.

"I think that the board is a lot older and they're conservative, so some of the content in the music is offensive on some level," said 50 Cent, who famously interrupted Evanescence's best new artist speech by walking onstage when he lost to the rock group in 2004. "There's a lot of people that don't accept that hip-hop culture is now pop culture."

This year, hip-hop leads the Grammys in nominations again, with Kanye West earning seven; it's his third year as the show's top-nominated act, and his fourth overall (he tied Mariah Carey and John Legend for most nominations at the 2006 Grammys). While his song "All of the Lights" is up for song of the year, his critically revered fifth album, "My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy," didn't score an album of the year nomination, a shock to many. Even Jimmy Jam ? the chair emeritus of the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences ? was surprised by West's snub.

"I think he's one of the genius artists, and I'm saying this as a person who's worked with Michael Jackson and Prince, so I don't throw that word around lightly," Jam said. "So, yes, I was surprised."

West's album with Jay-Z, "Watch the Throne," was also left out of the top album category; both CDs are nominated for best rap album.

Jay-Z, who once boycotted the Grammys because of the show's lack of love for hip-hop, says Grammy nominations are "cool," but he doesn't use the accolades as a barometer of his success.

"The Grammys and all of those other things, they're fine and it's a good way for everyone to get together amongst their peers and collect some trophies at the end of the night, but my whole thing is for the people, as long as the people accept it ? that's my real Grammy," Jay-Z said. "As long as it connects with an audience in a way."

But Steve Stoute, the former record executive who accused the Grammys of being irrelevant last year in a full-page advertisement in The New York Times after Eminem and Justin Bieber lost top awards, says there is a bigger problem. Stoute believes The Recording Academy doesn't have board members who understand hip-hop as a true art form.

"If (The Recording Academy) understood that, then (rappers) would be scoring technical points," he said. "They don't get the technical points."

In Grammy history, 14 hip-hop albums have received nominations for album of the year. Lauryn Hill has the distinction of being the first hip-hop artist to win album of the year for "The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill" in 1999, but the album, while featuring rap, was heavy on R&B. Hill also won best new artist that year, the second time a rap-based act had done so following Arrested Development's win in 1993. A rapper hasn't won the award since.

OutKast, the alternative, genre-bending hip-hop duo, followed in Hill's footsteps with an album of the year win in 2004 for the double disc "Speakerboxxx/The Love Below." It, too, was not strictly hip-hop, as Andre 3000 blended rock and even jazz for his half of the project.

But while there have been high-profile wins, what stands out more are the losses. No rapper has ever won record or song of the year, and both Eminem and West, each nominated three times, have failed to win the album of the year trophy in years where they appeared to be critical favorites.

At last year's Grammys, three of the five songs nominated for record of the year were rap smashes. Lady Antebellum's crossover hit, "Need You Now," ended up taking away the record and song of the year honors.

Ahmir "Questlove" Thompson, the leader and drummer of the Roots, says the hip-hop community shares some of the blame for its losing streak. He says those in the genre aren't involved enough with The Recording Academy, its community and its events.

"We're not active members of (The Recording Academy) and I promise to take a more active role in that," said Questlove, who has won three Grammys. "I should definitely come and be more involved in that. It's taxing time-wise, but you know, I can either sit and complain ... or do something about it."

Jam says rap's losses are also a reflection of the Grammy membership, which he said is "traditionally very heavy" with members of the country, jazz and classical music worlds.

"We're a membership organization and the members vote. So, if the numbers of members who consider themselves of the hip-hop genre ... if those numbers are lower, then the results probably point to that fact," Jam said.

But Stoute, who is the author of "The Tanning of America: How Hip-Hop Created a Culture That Rewrote the Rules of the New Economy," had harsh words for Jam, a founding member of funk-soul band The Time and best known for producing multiple hits for Janet Jackson, Usher, Boyz II Men and more with partner Terry Lewis. Stoute and Jam had a conversation after last year's awards, and Stoute was upset that Jay-Z's "Empire State of Mind" wasn't up for song of the year: At the Grammys, a track is not eligible for that award if it contains a sample or if it's not an original piece of work; that disqualifies much of rap, which relies heavily on sampling ("Empire State of Mind" samples The Moments' "Love on a Two-Way Street").

Stoute said Jam should be helping hip-hop, and blasted the renowned producer.

"What he's doing is not right," Stoute said of Jam. "And if he's supposed to be the guy who understands urban music because of his famed career as a producer ... (and) if he's not going to be sensitive to the creativity around hip-hop, I am sorry, we're in trouble."

Jam, who was The Recording Academy's chairman from 2005 to 2009, says his goal was to diversify the Grammy community, and if people have an issue with traditional Grammy rules, they should demand a change.

"You can write a proposal," Jam said. "I hope ... people step up to the challenge rather than dismiss it, which is the easy thing to do.'"

Jam also said he helped bring forth the best rap song award at the 2004 Grammys, which honors rap tracks that contain samples. Jam also implemented a new rule in 2009 that allowed anyone nominated for a Grammy to bypass the regular application process and automatically be made a member for a year. He said he did it so that nominated acts would easily be involved in the organization the following year.

"If hip-hop is the most nominated, then they should be the best represented according to what I did," Jam said.

_____

Online:

http://www.grammy.com/

_____

Mesfin Fekadu covers entertainment for The Associated Press. Follow him on Twitter at http://twitter.com/musicmesfin

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/entertainment/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20120123/ap_en_ot/us_music_grammywatch_rap_s_losses

execution facebook music facebook music daphne guinness daphne guinness mortgage rates mortgage rates

Taliban video highlights revenge on Pakistan military (Reuters)

DERA ISMAIL KHAN, Pakistan (Reuters) ? Fifteen Pakistani soldiers stood blindfolded, handcuffed to each other on a barren hilltop as one of their bearded Taliban captors held an AK-47 rifle and spoke with fury about revenge.

He left no doubt what would come at any second.

Pakistan's Taliban abducted the paramilitary troops on December 23 from near the country's lawless tribal areas to avenge military operations.

Now they have released a video as a warning to Pakistan's 600,000-member army, which has failed to break the back of the insurgents despite superior firepower and a series of offensives against their strongholds in forbidding mountain regions.

"Twelve of our comrades were besieged and mercilessly martyred in the Khyber Agency (area)," said the militant.

"Our pious women were also targeted. To avenge those comrades, we will kill these men. We warn the government of Pakistan that if the killing of our friends is not halted, this will be the fate of you all."

Before death, one of the men described how dozens of Taliban fighters stormed their fort in the northwestern Tank district and kidnapped the soldiers.

"They attacked us with rockets, killed a sentry. One ran away. The Taliban entered the fort and captured us with our weapons," he said, sitting in rows with other soldiers with their arms folded and legs crossed in front of Taliban banners.

"They tied our hands, put us in a Datsun and took us away."

The video then shows the men standing quietly. Taliban chanting can be heard. "We will cross all limits to avenge your blood," it said, referring to fighters killed by Pakistani security forces.

One of the men shoves a clip into his assault rifle and fires a few rounds into the back of the heads of a few of the soldiers. "God is greatest," the Taliban yell.

Other fighters step up and take turns pumping bullets into the men, some wearing green military uniforms. Each time a soldier collapses, the man standing next to him is pulled in that direction by the handcuffs.

The Taliban and Pakistan's military, one of the largest in the world, have entered exploratory peace talks that raised hopes that their conflict, which has killed thousands of people, could ease, or even end one day.

But the talks have faltered, a senior Pakistani security official told Reuters, and the video -- copied to compact discs and distributed in street markets in areas near the porous border with Afghanistan -- is likely to enrage the army.

Formed in 2007, the TTP is an umbrella group of Pakistani militant factions operating in Pakistan's tribal areas.

Allied with the Afghan Taliban and al Qaeda, it pledged to overthrow the Pakistani government after the military started operations against militant groups.

It is blamed for many of the suicide bombings across the country and has carried out audacious attacks, including one on army headquarters near the capital Islamabad in 2009.

After the shooting ends in the video, the Taliban militants stare at the bodies slumped over on the earth.

"If the killing of our friends is not stopped, this will be the fate of all infidel armies, God willing," says one militant.

Majeed Marwat, a commander of the Frontier Corps said morale among his men would always remain high despite such videos.

"Our soldiers enlist because they want to sacrifice for the country. We are taking care of the families of the martyred soldiers," he told Reuters. (Writing by Michael Georgy; Editing by Doina Chiacu)

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/asia/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20120121/wl_nm/us_pakistan_military_video

d2l d2l example example graphing calculator nfl odds indeed