Facebook Hold A Major Press Event on Tuesday About New Facebook Phone or Mobile OS

As reported, Facebook is inviting global presses to hold a press event on Tuesday while an event in London is running simultaneously.

Lindsay Lohan willingly under 'house arrest'

The actress is two weeks from the end of her probation period - which is connected to her 2007 arrest for driving under the influence

Google launches 'scan and match' music service

Google is popping over a scan and match'' support for Google Tunes end users to store copies in their songs online, providing at no cost what Apple fees $25 a 12 months for.

Pepsi Revives Michael Jackson in Marketing Campaign

PepsiCo Inc. is resurrecting Michael Jackson to try to pump life into its flagship cola, three years after the singer's death and greater than a quarter century.

Four Journalists Murdered in Mexico in a week

The morning just after attending a panel discussion with regard to the murders of Mexican journalists I am sad to report a lot more killings.

Thursday 31 October 2013

Saudi Arabia Legalises 800,000 Pakistani Workers

The World News:- Almost 800,000 Pakistanis have been legalised by Saudi Arabia ahead of the November 4 deadline making expatriates bound to ensure their visas are valid or else be ready for possible deportation.
Muhammad Naeem Khan, Pakistan’s Ambassador to the country, pointed out in an interview with the Arab News that a total of 729,932 Pakistani workers have so far benefited from the amnesty deadline.
Khan said more than 396,152 nationals have already changed their sponsorships, while 333,780 workers are in the process of legalization of status in the Kingdom.
“Our assessment is that more than 800,000 people have corrected their status, if we include those who came to Saudi Arabia on Umrah and Hajj visas and other domestic workers like drivers, housemaids, watchman and agricultural workers,” he said.
“It would be helpful for those remaining Pakistanis who have not yet been able to regularise their status if special concession and grace period is announced by the Saudi authorities,” he added.
“I would like to extend my appreciation to the Saudi Ministries of Interior, Foreign Affairs and Labour as well as the Immigration Department for their cooperation and support especially to the Pakistani community in the Kingdom,” Naeem Khan said.

“It is a huge success for us to achieve the goal to legalise our nationals.”
Addressing the issue of nationals who will not be able to correct their statuses, the ambassador said: “We are going to start a new registration campaign after the amnesty deadline in which we will facilitate procedures for those who are not covered by the existing amnesty period.”
Elaborating, he said: “The embassy has created 80 different focal points all over the Kingdom to help illegal workers register with the embassy.”
Khan emphasised the fact that all undocumented workers must legalise their status before the Nov 4 deadline. He urged Pakistani workers who did find jobs to coordinate with the embassy and consulate general in Jeddah for help.
With the new concessions in the Saudi labour laws, he explained, “workers who arrived in the Kingdom after April 6 as freelancers or those who are declared as runaway workers are not included in the amnesty. They should not hesitate to register with the embassy, focal points and the consulate general in Jeddah.”
“Umrah and Haj overstayers who possess no documentation to claim that they entered the Kingdom legally and are not even fingerprinted, should immediately contact us. We will try to help them and find a way to legalize them.”
The Ministry of Labour earlier stressed that after the expiry of the amnesty deadline, penalties will be imposed on violators and their employers.
The recruiters of illegal workers could face jail up to two years and fines of up to SR100,000.
About a third of Saudi Arabia’s 27 million population comprises of foreign workers.
The kingdom has turned a blind eye to minor violations of its strict labour regulations for decades, allowing an influx of cheap labour used both by companies and as domestic workers.
Yemen, Egypt, Lebanon, Ethiopia, India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Indonesia and the Philippines all have large numbers of citizens working in the country and all rely heavily on their remittances.
As part of a series of reforms over the last two years, Saudi Arabia has tried to free up jobs for its own citizens, 12 per cent of whom are unemployed, according to official data.
Ends-SANA-TR-ZS

Tuesday 17 September 2013

Prosecutor Calls for Death in Delhi Bus Rape Case

The World News:- The prosecutor while in the fatal New Delhi gang rape known as Wednesday for all 4 convicted rapists to get hanged, though one of several defendants shouted out his innocence as law enforcement drove him into your courthouse.

It was not obvious which from the four males was shouting, due to the fact his facial area was obscured driving the law enforcement van's major steel mesh, but he continuously called out, "I am innocent! I am harmless!" because the van drove earlier a scrum of reporters.

The boys have been convicted Tuesday within the December gang rape of a 23-year-old lady on a going New Delhi bus, a brutal criminal offense that unleashed a wave of community anger over the treatment of Indian girls in addition to a long-unspoken epidemic of sexual violence. The sufferer died two weeks soon after the attack.

The four face possibly existence imprisonment or death by hanging. Phone calls to the adult men for being executed have developed significantly loud, with every person within the victim's parents to major political leaders demanding the men be sentenced to dying.

Prosecutor Dayan Krishnan said the attack stunned India's "collective conscience," noting the law enforcement report showed the lads pulled out a few of the victim's physique parts immediately after savagely penetrating her using an iron rod.



"There is usually nothing far more diabolic than a helpless woman place as a result of torture," he claimed.

Judge Yogesh Khanna said he would hand down the sentences on Friday.

The four men sat in in the back of the tiny courtroom in T-shirts or short-sleeved polo shirts, unshackled and with policemen holding them from both sides. They appeared impassive, though it was not clear how much they understood of the proceedings. Most of the day's arguments were in English, a language that only one of the men, Vinay Sharma, is able to speak. They had no translator.

The defense lawyers have long proclaimed their clients' innocence, while sometimes indicating some of the men may have been on the bus. They insist that any confessions were coerced by police torture.

On Wednesday, they called for the judge to avoid the death penalty.

"If they have committed a mistake, and the court accepted that they committed a mistake, then they should be given a chance to reform," lawyer A.P. Singh, who has worked with all the defendants at various times, said outside the courthouse. "The accused are not habitual and professional criminals. They should be given one chance to reform themselves."

Vivek Sharma, a lawyer representing Pawan Gupta, a 19-year-old fruit vendor, asked for a sentence of life imprisonment, noting that Indian law calls for execution only in very exceptional cases.

Sharma said Wednesday the crime may have happened "on the spur of the moment" and urged leniency for his client because of his age and because he had to support his impoverished family. He said Gupta did not join in the rape or in violating the victim with the rod.

The family of the victim watched from one row in front of the prisoners, close enough to touch one another.

When the hearing ended, they again called for the men to be hanged.

"They finished our daughter," said the father, who cannot be named under Indian laws guarding his daughter's identity as a rape victim. "We want them finished."

An airport baggage handler who makes a little more than $200 a month, he and his wife had broken with the conservative rural culture in which they had been raised, encouraging their daughter to study hard and even leave home to get a degree in physiotherapy. At the time of the attack, she was awaiting her exam results.

India's Supreme Court has ruled that the death penalty should only be used in "the rarest of rare cases," though what defines those cases remains highly debated.

By most estimates, more than 100 people are sentenced to death in India in most years, but the vast majority of those cases are eventually commuted to life in prison.

India had an unofficial moratorium on capital punishment that lasted eight years, ending with the November 2012 execution of Mohammed Ajmal Kasab, the lone surviving gunmen in the 2008 Mumbai terror attacks. Two months later, Mohammad Afzal Guru, convicted in a deadly 2001 attack on India's Parliament, was also hanged.

Indian media reports say about 400 prisoners are believed to be currently awaiting execution.

In addition to their confessions, the four convicted rapists were identified by the woman's male friend who was with her on the night of the attack. The two were coming home from a movie when the men tricked them into boarding a bus they were joy-riding. They quickly beat the friend into submission, held the woman down and took turns raping her. They also penetrated her with the rod, causing severe internal injuries that led to her death.

The defendants, like the victim, come from poor and ill-educated families. One, Mukesh Singh, occasionally drove the bus where the crime occurred and cleaned it. Another, Vinay Sharma, was a 20-year-old assistant at a gym and the only one of the attackers to graduate from high school. Akshay Thakur, 28, occasionally worked as a driver's helper on the bus.

With them on the bus were two other men. Police say Ram Singh, 33, hanged himself in prison, though his family insists he was murdered. He was the brother of Mukesh Singh. Another man - an 18-year-old who was a juvenile at the time of the attack and cannot be identified under Indian law - was convicted in August and will serve the maximum sentence he faced, three years in a reform home.

About two dozen protesters gathered Wednesday by the courthouse, calling for the four men to be executed and taunting defense lawyers.

Brazil Leader Postpones US State Visit Over Spy Row

The World News:- Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff postponed a long-planned state visit to Washington on Tuesday, quite possibly the most significant diplomatic fall-out yet from Edward Snowden's leak of US strategies.

When both sides couched the cancellation in diplomatic phrases, it marks an embarrassment for President Barack Obama along with a blow to his initiatives to enhance ties with the critical Latin American energy.

The visit experienced been scheduled for 23 Oct but was termed into problem soon after documents leaked by Snowden, a previous US intelligence technician, unveiled the extent of yankee spying on its Brazilian ally.

Obama has become attempting to defuse the row, most just lately throughout talks with Rousseff over the sidelines of this month's G20 summit, and he spoke together with her yet again on Monday by telephone.

But Brazil was unmoved, and on Tuesday Rousseff introduced an end into the speculation, confirming that her vacation was off.

"The two presidents chose to postpone the condition check out because the end result of this stop by should really not be conditioned on a concern which for Brazil has not been satisfactorily resolved," Rousseff's office stated.




Sovereignty violation

Her statement reflected Brazil's anger over Snowden's disclosures that the NSA spied on her email communications and on the state-run energy giant Petrobras.

"The illegal interceptions of communications and data of citizens, companies and members of the Brazilian government represents a serious act which violates national sovereignty and is incompatible with democratic coexistence between friendly countries," Rousseff's statement said.

In Washington, White House spokesperson Jay Carney, put a brave face on the situation.

"It's because the relationship is so important and because it has so many facets that the president agrees with this decision they made together to postpone the visit," Carney said.

Insisting that another later visit could be organised, Carney added: "It should not be overshadowed by a bilateral issue no matter how important or challenging the issue may be".

The spying row stems from allegations made by Snowden, a former NSA contractor who fled the United States and revealed the scope of the NSA's activities to Brazil-based journalist Glenn Greenwald.

In July, the Brazilian daily Globo, citing documents provided by Snowden, who has been granted temporary asylum in Russia, reported that US agencies eavesdrop on Brazilians' phone calls and Internet communications.

The report said Washington maintained an intelligence base in Brasilia, part of a network of 16 such stations operated by the NSA around the world to intercept foreign satellite transmissions.

Brazilian Communications Minister Paulo Bernardo dismissed claims by US officials that the NSA was only collecting metadata - logs of phone numbers called and the duration of such calls - and not listening in on calls.

Washington, he said, is conducting a "much deeper surveillance".

Brazil demanded an investigation and a US promise to stop such spying.

Snowden, who first fled to Hong Kong before moving on to Russia, is wanted by the United States on espionage charges.

Rousseff is to address the UN General Assembly session in New York later this month and her aides said she will raise the spying issue.

Contract on hold

Brazil's first woman president visited Washington last year, returning a visit to Brazil by Obama the previous year.

Brazil is Latin America's economic powerhouse and Obama made it a priority to improve ties, which were often prickly under Rousseff's predecessor Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva.

As the cancelled visit shows, the Snowden row has damaged tied between the two trading giants of the Western Hemisphere.

A Brazilian government source said last week that the spying row may have brought negotiations on buying US warplanes to a halt.

The talks to buy 36 fighter jets at a cost of around $5bn have been going on for years, and got a nudge when US Vice President Joe Biden visited Brazil in May.

Vying for the lucrative Air Force contract are the US Boeing F/A-18 Super Hornet, the Rafale from France's Dassault the Gripen NG by Saab of Sweden.

The United States is currently Brazil's second biggest trading partner behind China.

Snowden's revelations about international US spying and snooping programs have also caused Obama acute embarrassment and in relations with other allies.

Mexico's President Enrique Pena Nieto complained to Obama over reports US spies had gone through his emails.

There have also been pointed questions on the NSA issue from the likes of German Chancellor Angela Merkel, for whom the revelations caused discomfort during a re-election campaign.

Washington Shooter Was A Cold Blooded

The World News:- The Washington shooter experimented with to recreate the bloody slaughter he noticed in video games during his massacre, a colleague claimed on Tuesday.
Aaron Alexis 'trained' himself on Contact of Duty then used buckshot bullets to determine his victims get blown up, explained Michael Ritrovato, who has know him for 4 a long time.
Mr Ritrovato reported the usage of buckshot showed that Alexis had been cold-blooded and experienced not simply snapped.

He said: 'He wished to determine the blood and guts, that's what he'd seen about the online video video games.
'That's what I noticed once i checked out him actively playing these online games, he would blow persons apart.
'If he utilized buckshot the intention was to try and do the gore detail with these folks like he did in all those video games.

'He was blowing people apart like he'd practiced at home.'
Mr Ritrovato added: 'If I saw him now I'd say: what sort of demonic person have you become?'
Another close friend of the Washington Navy Yard shooter had described him as a 'hardcore drinker'.

Nutpisit Suthamtewakul said he had known Aaron Alexis for three years and that they had been drinking buddies.
Alexis worked at Suthamtewakul's Happy Bowl Thai restaurant in Fort Worth, Texas and for a time lived with the owner and his wife.
Alexis shot dead 12 people and injured eight others in the Monday morning attack on the Navy Yard in Washington, D.C. The 34-year-old was being treated for serious mental illness and had been 'hearing voices.'
Mr Suthamtewakul also said that he would bring his friend food during violent video gaming sessions that would last for hours.
Such was Alexis' obsession that friends said that he would play mammoth 16-hour sessions of game Call Of Duty at a time.
Mr Ritrovato, a 50-year-old government worker and New York native, said that Alexis, an African-American, had complained to him that he was the victim of racial discrimination.
However Mr Suthamtewakul said that his friend was a recently-converted Buddhist who liked to meditate. He told the WSJ: 'He cursed a lot, but I [didn’t] see him angry very much.'

The restaurant owner invited Alexis to work at Happy Bowl, where he said that he got on well with customers and spoke Thai which he had learned during an extended trip to the country.
However, Mr Suthamtewakul was forced to reprimand his friend after he appeared at work one day with a gun tucked inside his waistband.
The Happy Bowl owner said that Alexis had moved out of his home around May after there was tension with Mr Suthamtewakul's wife over their pet cats.
He said he had not heard from Alexis in the weeks before the shooting and had believed he was flying to Japan as part of his government contractor job.
At the time of the shootings, Alexis worked for The Experts, a subcontractor on a Hewlett Packard contract to refresh equipment used on the Navy Marine Corps intranet network.
Despite entering the Navy Yard carrying an AR-15 and another weapon, Alexis appears to have drawn little attention as he was carrying a valid military ID card, according to the Washington Post.


Conflicting descriptions of the mass shooter continued to emerge as the family of Alexis said they were 'distraught' to learn that he carried out the massacre.
A family member said on Monday that the mother and sister of Aaron Alexis were also 'shocked' that he could have done this.
While some neighbors and acquaintances described him as 'nice,' his father once told detectives in Seattle that his son had anger management problems related to post-traumatic stress brought on by the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001.
Alexis also complained about the Navy and being a victim of discrimination during his time as a reservist from 2007 to 2011.
After leaving the reserves, Alexis worked as a waiter and a delivery driver at the Happy Bowl Thai restaurant in White Settlement, a suburb of Fort Worth, according to Afton Bradley, a former co-worker. The two overlapped for about eight months before Alexis left in May, Bradley said.
Having traveled to Thailand, Alexis learned some Thai and could speak to Thai customers in their native language.
'He was a very nice person,' Bradley said in a phone interview. 'It kind of blows my mind away. I wouldn't think anything bad at all.'
Ty Thairintr, a congregant at Wat Budsaya, a Buddhist temple in Fort Worth which Alexis would attend, said: 'We are all shocked. We are nonviolent. Aaron was a very good practitioner of Buddhism. He could chant better than even some of the Thai congregants.'
Thairintr said Alexis told him he was upset with the Navy because 'he thought he never got a promotion because of the color of his skin. He hated his commander'.

As Thairintr and others at the temple understood, Alexis took a job as a contractor and he indicated to them he was going to go to Virginia. He last saw him five weeks ago.
'He was a very devoted Buddhist. There was no tell-tale sign of this behavior,' Thairintr said.
The shooter's family lives in a run-down area of Brooklyn called Bedford-Stuyvesant, which was known in the 1980s for being at the center of New York's crack epidemic.
His mother Cathleen, 60, lives in a fourth floor walk up apartment worth $130,000 with other relatives.
When MailOnline knocked on the door an attractive woman in her early 30s answered the door wearing a red top.
She let a female friend who had come to the door but refused to comment.

The street was then sealed off by police and FBI agents who stood guard outside and refused to let anybody into the side of the street where the house is.
Later the gunman's brother-in-law Anthony Little, who is married to Alexis' sister Naomi, 31, arrived and said: 'The family are distraught...They're shocked'.
Mr Little said it had been several years since had Alexis spoken with his family in Brooklyn.

Naomi wrote a note to say she would report us to the landlord. She got nasty about it. She wasn't nice'.
Today at around 5pm two FBI agents arrived and questioned neighbors and workmen who were inside the apartment doing renovations but left after 15 minutes and refused to answer questions.
Two different portraits of the shooter have emerged, as his criminal record runs in contrast to the reports of friends and family.
He was arrested for gun-related incidents in 2004 and 2010, while he was also kept in jail in Georgia for two nights in 2008 for disorderly conduct.
Alexis had joined the Navy in 2007 but was kicked out in 2011, the year after the second gun arrest. In both gun cases, charges were never filed.

He was a Petty Officer Third Class in the Navy prior to his dismissal. Alexis was awarded the Global War on Terrorism Service Medal and the National Defense Service Medal prior to his discharge.
Alexis was stationed at the Naval Air Station Joint Reserve Base in Fort Worth. His LinkedIn profile reveals that he attended Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University and worked as a network technician at SinglePoint Technologies.
He received a general discharge from the Navy Reserve in 2011 after a series of misconduct issues, a Navy official said.
Two construction workers told police that Aaron Alexis walked out of a home next door on May 6, 2004, pulled a pistol from his waistband and fired three shots into the rear tires of their parked car. Alexis later told police he thought the victims had "disrespected him."
Court records show he was released on the condition he not have contact with any of the construction workers.
The same documents from his 2004 arrest in Seattle show that Alexis said he had 'been present' during the September 11th attacks.
'Those events disturbed him,' the police documents said and his father told police that his son had experienced rage issues and blamed his experience of 9/11 for causing his post traumatic stress disorder.
The 2011 arrest stems from when Alexis was charged with property damage and the discharge of a firearm and the Seattle Police Department reported that the charges were later dismissed.
Seattle police said in a statement Monday that detectives later spoke with Alexis' father, who told police Alexis had anger management problems associated with PTSD, and had participated in rescue attempts on September 11th, 2001.
NBC5 today said that the suspect was arrested in 2010 for firing a gun through the ceiling of his Forth Worth apartment.
His neighbor called the police after the bullet came through her floor and hit the ceiling.

Wednesday 21 August 2013

2014 Chevrolet Corvette Stingray

The World News:- Upon its launch in 1953, the Chevrolet Corvette's sticker price of $3,490 was high but not outlandish for a two-seat sports car — slightly more than a median family's annual income, and well below the Cadillacs and Imperials of the era. In the six decades since, that relationship between how much Americans earn in a year of toil and how much it takes to buy the nation's oldest sports car has stayed surprisingly consistent. Today, the median U.S. family of four earns $51,000 a year, and lo and behold, the 2014 Chevrolet Corvette Stingray starts at $52,000.
But what Corvette buyers get for their money has varied wildly. In the '60s, they bought an uncivilized street race car wrapped in one of the most attractive fiberglass bodies ever made. In the '70s and '80s, they drove home smog-choked big blocks and the first digital dashboards. In more recent times, those loyal Vette shoppers often came home feeling like they'd snagged a bargain, since the aging Vette needed rebates to motivate its aging fans.
So what does the new 2014 Stingray offer a public that's tuned out all things Corvette over the past decade?

Everything.
Here's one insight into how much this car means around General Motors: For the launch in California, Chevy decided to arrange test drives of every generation of Corvette, from a 1955 model through the outgoing 2013 edition. GM has its own museum, but its Corvettes from before the current model year were too rare and valuable to risk at the hands of people like me. Instead, GM North American chief Mark Reuss had Chevy staffers buy gently used examples of five generations of Vettes with his own money — which helped explain why a couple were never left with us alone.
Driving those cars back to back reveals a Sisyphean struggle against cost cutting and maximum performance. The 1955 version I sampled felt like wheeling a tugboat around, with a steering wheel the size of a Prius tire. The 1966 Sting Ray 427 had a monster under the hood that we could only poke at, and never unleash. By the 1970 LT-1 edition, the chassis had started to feel stable, and by 1985 the shape of the modern Corvette took hold, even if it would take another three decades to save the interior from the budget cutters. And after driving all six preceding generations, it's correct to say the 2014 Corvette Stingray marks the greatest advancement of the Chevy sports car since its launch 60 years ago.
Let's not set the bar too low; any new car has to be far better than a decade-old predecessor, if for no other reason than the march of technology. But given the delays of GM's bankruptcy, Corvette chief engineer Tadge Juechter and team kept pushing further, and when they finally stopped they had a car that shared only two parts with the previous Corvette.
Start with the engine. It's still a pushrod V-8, with two valves per cylinder, as familiar as the small-block Chevy began putting into the Vette in 1955. And yet, everything that touches or controls it is thoroughly modern, from the variable valve timing and direct injection that helps provide 460 hp and 460 lb.-ft. of torque, to the ability to shut off four cylinders at highway speed and keep the Vette loafing at 65 mph with just 12 hp. If your hand rests on the shifter when the system kicks in, you can feel a brief tremolo through the stick as the "V-4" light on the dash turns green. Otherwise, it's unnoticeable, and a key reason why the Vette has a 29 mpg highway rating (and can get to 30 mpg with a light foot).
To handle that power and produce a 0-60 time of 3.8 seconds, Juechter and company caught the Corvette up with software. The 21st-century standard of world-class sports cars requires electronic driving controls as discreet as an English butler — always ready to help, always anticipating disaster, but never suggesting that the lord of the manor has lost authority. The new Vette uses a combination of technologies, from an electronic limited-slip differential to third-generation magnetorheological dampers, all tied together by sensors and programming that eternally wonder what's next.
Over 200 miles of driving and a few laps of an autocross course, I found I couldn't fool the Vette without directly telling it to play dumb. If I screwed up a corner, there was always either more torque to wheel me around faster or the right amount of braking to recover gracefully. In its standard "Touring" driving mode, the Vette devours highway miles with little wind noise and a non-fatiguing ride. In track mode, the display switches to a race-centric view of rpms, the engine growls deeper and those seats grip tighter. I miss the steering feel of the hydraulic units, but the Vette's electronic version ranks among the best I've sampled. Chevy engineers swapped a rubber bushing for a straight bolted connection to give the steering some sense of what's happening on the road.
On a lap of Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca with Rick Malone from Ron Fellows Driving School in Las Vegas, the Vette undramatically hit 125 mph and pulled 1.17 gs of turning force through a corner. If the Vette's five programmable driving modes aren't quite as refined as the Porsche 911s, they're closer than most drivers will ever discover — especially the track settings which can be further tuned to give plenty of room for disaster. (Malone, as you can tell, enjoyed himself.)

About that seven-speed manual transmission: The top two gears are almost superfluous, and even at 70 mph on a freeway I worried the V-8 might stall in top gear. Juechter says the team hasn't done its top-speed testing yet, but expects the Vette to reach somewhere north of 190 mph in fifth gear. In fact, from about 40 mph on, there's no need for anything but fifth — because the torque band of the V-8 has been stretched so wide. And the seven-speed's rev matching makes it the shifter of choice over the six-speed automatic. Turn it on, and that balancing act of throttle and clutch that scares so many stick-shift neophytes disappears; the Vette measures your speed and momentum, guesses which gear you're going to next (either up or down) and spins the engine appropriately. Clutch, shift, clutch — even a 16-year-old can look smooth doing it.
Exterior design chief Tom Peters wanted to give the Vette a look that would banish some of the previous model's anonymity; he talks of trying to create the next bedroom poster car for today's 10-year-olds. In that, he's succeeded, and even the hubbub over the tail lights has waned. From behind the wheel, the fenders of the Vette have been raised in homage to the '63 Sting Ray, a design refined by clay sculptors rather than in a computer because the shape had to feel right under hand. The composite and carbon-fiber body panels no longer need huge gaps to expand and contract; the Vette has the same 3mm seams as any steel-bodied model, and the interior finally banishes the last bits of Emerson-grade electronics and bad PVC for real aluminum and leather.
Were we to pick nits on every last thing about the Vette, we could come up with a few complaints. The interior still has a bit too much plastic for a $52,000 car. The electronic entertainments and switchable displays work as advertised, but fall victim to the auto industry's eternal 18-month lag with the latest tech, taking long pauses between a command or button punch and the right response. Those Michelin Pilot Super Sport run-flat tires will be expensive to replace. There's no spare tire.
And that's about it.
For a starting price of $52,000, and a properly Z51-equipped model for $57,000, the Corvette offers more performance for the dollar than any other new sports car. It's not that GM has hidden its cost cutting, although some switch gear will look familiar to Chevy Cruze owners. It's that without the Corvette Stingray, foreign sports car makers could get away with overcharging for things that shouldn't cost so much. Because the Vette will share an engine block with millions of GM's pickups and SUVs, and engineering talent for basics like safety tests and fuel economy, it costs far less to build than Porsche or BMW can ever match. In the world of performance cars, the Stingray's a bargain. Keeping the rest of the world honest is just gravy.

Saturday 27 July 2013

New Nexus 7 with Faster Speed Is Going to Be on Sale Next Week

The World News:- Google unveiled the New Nexus 7 on Wednesday. The Nexus 7 2nd generation is going to be on sale in the coming week. The New Nexus 7 has doubled its RAM and the CPU will be twice as fast as the previous Nexus 7.
Google Unveiled the New Nexus 7 on Wednesday
Google has finally unveiled this Nexus 7 2nd generation which the customers has been waiting for a long time. This New Nexus 7keeps the dimensions as the previous Nexus 7, but has a higher resolution of 1920*1200 with the 7-inch screen, and the PPI is 323 pixels, which means the Nexus 7 2nd generation users will have a better visual experience than the previous Nexus 7. Google improved the RAM of New Nexus 7 to 2GB, and the CPU uses a quad-core Qualcomm Snap Dragon S4 Pro processor, so everything runs faster than the previous Nexus 7. The operating system of this tablet is Android Jelly Bean 4.3, the latest version of Android OS. Google also claimed that they had made an improvement on the speaker performance so that the Nexus 7 2nd generation can last nine hours for a high definition video. The Wi-Fi versions of New Nexus 7 will be on available on the 30th and the 4G LTE version will be on sale in the coming weeks.
The New Nexus 7 Front
The senior vice president of Google, Pichai says, “By the end of 2013, consumers are going to buy more tablets every year than personal computers.” It is reasonable for him to say like that. As Apple has started a revolution of the tablet market, more and more users choose the tablets for daily uses. But Apple still pays their attentions to the senior consumers and the price of iPad somewhat keeps high. But the Nexus 7 2nd generation, the New Nexus 7 16GB version will be only $229.99 when it is on sale next week. That price is attractive to most of the tablet consumers. And the high-speed development of communication is another reason. Wi-Fi has been widely used all over the world, and the 4G communication is just approaching. So a tablet which can be used over Wi-Fi will be popular for sure. The New Nexus 7, which allows Wi-Fi and mobile data only, will meet the consumers’ needs well in the competitions of tablet market.
The Nexus 7 2nd generation uses the HD IPS screen as the previous Nexus 7 does, which provides natural images with accuracy. If users transfer movies from iPad mini to Nexus 7 2nd, they will be surprised by the wonderful visual experience the New Nexus 7 provides.

Wednesday 17 July 2013

How BlackBerry 8800 Saved My Job and Long Distance Relationship

Social Media and Smartphones

The World News:- And how l learn to leverage the power and benefits of the BlackBerry 8800.
One of the greatest paradoxes of our time is that social media and smartphones contribute to distance people who are close; yet, they make people who are far away feel much closer. Is this a bad thing? Let me tell you my story, if you’d like to read.

Undeniably Functional and Convenient

When it comes to high-tech, I don’t consider myself an early adopter. Actually, I got my first smartphone only three years ago. My company, headquartered in Canada, bought me a BlackBerry 8800, a corporate phone. It was tricky. On one hand, I had unlimited access to work emails and my bosses could reach me at any time via BBM, so work wise, it was undeniably functional and convenient. Now, on the personal side, it got to be a bit overwhelming. Ever since the moment I was turning off the alarm clock in the morning I couldn't keep myself from seeing my work email notifications –even on weekends! Same thing during leisure time. I couldn't disconnect from work, literally. So it got to a point where I thought I didn't have a ‘mobile phone’ but a ‘mobile office.’ And that, my friends, is not fun.


BlackBerry 8800 Ringtones

I realized what the ‘catch’ was, I knew I had to do something about it.
One day, I got to discover BlackBerry 8800 ringtones and my whole predisposition about the smartphone changed. That discovery became a major turning point for me. I really started to have fun with the process. I would invest so much time on searching for my favorite songs or the hottest hits. I’d include my favorite tunes for incoming calls, choosing different tunes for each group of contacts: family members, colleagues, neighbors, friends from college, friends with benefits –just kidding…sort of! The most important thing is that my emotions towards the smartphone completely shifted –it was not a ‘mobile office’ anymore, yet, it also made me feel motivated about work.

BlackBerry 8800 Themes

After the ringtones, BlackBerry 8800 themes followed. My phone became the perfect extension of my personality. It took a while, but I had fun with the process –that’s all it matters.
But I really got to take my BlackBerry experience to the next level was when I got to meet someone ‘especial.’ Let me elaborate.

Random Encounter with Cute Dutch

I was travelling on my own through Rhode Island, when I met this cute guy from Netherlands. We spent a few days together as he was also travelling and had a great time. We had to say good bye as I was going back home to Chicago and he was returning to Amsterdam, not before we exchanged our PIN numbers–can you believe we had the same phone? Anyway. I kept doing my thing in Chicago while he was doing his in Amsterdam. But my life never got to be the same after that random encounter with that cute Dutch. We chatted every day. Before we knew it, we found ourselves immersed in a long distance relationship. I still remember the day that he created two BlackBerry 8800 wallpapers so that we could both display them.

My Bosses in Toronto and my Love in Amsterdam

Let’s just say that two of the most important things in my life –my bosses in Toronto and my love in Amsterdam- were far away and only my smartphone could make me feel closer to them.
I have to admit that this was not easy to handle for my Chicago friends and family. They saw me getting a bit consumed by the long distance –especially with my boyfriend. We managed to travel back and forth four times a year during a year, but now, I am happy to announce you that we have successfully ended our long-distance relationship! He just moved to Chicago and we are now living together! So it all worked out eventually!

What’s your BlackBerry Story?

I learned my lesson. High-tech devices are what you want them to be and represent what you want them to represent.
So, what’s your BlackBerry story?

Friday 5 July 2013

Facebook Timeline - Using Social Media


The World News:- There is no denying that social media is massive nowadays. In fact, almost everybody, both young and old has access to a Facebook account. In addition to this, any business who wants to actually take themselves forward needs to have a Facebook page. It doesn't matter whether they are a company operating in the local area or a much larger enterprise, without an account on Facebook they really are holding themselves back. On this page I want to take a little look at how you can use simple images to help develop an online identity using Facebook Graphics.
Now that is cleared up, let's veer away from Facebook ever so slightly. I am sure you know this already, but one of the best ways to increase your ranking through the search engines is through Social Networking. That doesn't mean you should be sitting on Facebook every single day posting link after link though. Instead, you should let people share content for you. This means they hop on over to your website, feast their eyes upon something that they absolutely love and then just hit the Social Media Icons that they want, sharing it with their friends and family. This is instantly going to boost your social media reputation, and perhaps bring in a number of brand new customers as a result.

Before we delve into using Facebook graphics though, lets consider for a second why it is so important that a business has a Facebook profile nowadays. To put it simply, it allows you to connect with your customers. That's all there is to it, by having a social media page, you are giving customers the chance to engage with you on a personal level and give you their feedback. It also works as a great marketing tool, as the majority of the people who are going to 'like' you on Facebook are of course going to be customers, or potential customers. This makes them incredibly simple to sell to. In addition to that, effective social media can also give a nice little boost to your search engine rankings, which could bring in even more business. Now, before you start to dream big though, you need to realize that you are going to need to entice people to actually want to look at your social media page, and changing the graphics is one of the main things to do.
Perhaps one of the most controversial updates in recent years to Facebook was the addition of the Facebook Timeline. Part of the reason for this is that people absolutely loathe change, especially to something they were very familiar with. In my opinion though, the addition of the Facebook Timeline works wonders for businesses as it is far simpler to introduce 'brand recognition' to your social media campaign. Perhaps the most useful feature, and yet something that very few businesses utilize to its full potential, is the cover photo. This sits at the top of your Facebook Business Page, and you can put any message that you want here, providing it is in line with the rules put in place by Facebook. This means that you can easily set your page apart from the plethora of other ones on Facebook, and really start to boost recognition of your brand.
Now, there are plenty of people out there who invest in designers to create their timeline images for them, which can be expensive. I don't think this is necessary though. You can save a considerable amount of money by finding a company which offers downloadable Facebook art where you have to do nothing more than change a couple of pieces of information. They are easy to customize too, if you wish to inject a tiny bit more personality into them.
I believe the key to building up brand recognition through social media is to ensure that you always stick to the same basic theme for your image. There are plenty of people who change them every single week, and this is just going to cause people to get confused. Yes, you can change your message that your Timeline Art displays, but make sure you always stick to the same theme. Honestly, your brand will benefit a lot as a result. If you do want to test different styles, test them on another account, or when you first start ... before your brand becomes established.
Don't forget, you can also download Facebook Timeline Images to put up on your personal page as well. Remember, your personal page is going to be a reflection of your personality, so when you are choosing those Facebook graphics, make sure that you are choosing ones which are in line with who you are as a person. If you can find a website with a huge array of timeline images to choose from, you shouldn't have too much of a problem finding one you like and that reflects your personality.
Of course, to make all this work, you are going to need to have a good collection of social media icon buttons on your site. These buttons are something which need to stand out in order to entice people to click on them, although of course they shouldn't be too overpowering as this could put people off! (don't you just hate those persistent popups!?). I suggest taking a browse through a collection of social media icon buttons, a great deal of which can be found online at affordable prices (ones that haven't been used on hundreds of thousands of sites), and choose ones which suit the niche that you are working in, as well as the overall design of your website. Choose well, because if you can make social media work, then you will see business increase, and you may even find yourself climbing up those search engine rankings.
It doesn't matter if you are an individual or a company, there is a whole plethora of Facebook Timeline graphics and social media icon buttons to out there. Why not check a few of them out? Honestly, this is probably one of the best ways to boost your brand identity through social media. This is because not only is it simple to do, but it is also very cost effective. I've been using social media for a while now and am often still surprised by how effective it can be!

Is The USA Doomed As History Repeats Itself?


"Doom" has a religious color; history is unique

The World News:- Milleramanda53 asked this question: "Are we doomed as a society for history to constantly repeat itself?"
In her profile, I find that milleramanda53 is from Florida, USA so I presume that when she says "Are we..." she is referring to the USA.
We register our reaction to the question as an outsider. We focus our discussion on the concepts "doom" and "history repeats itself."
Doomed


“Doom” is a term with a religious connotation. It has elements of predestination and as a form of punishment. Doomed indicates failure on the part of the perpetrator; it is a judgment with accompanying sufferance. This judgment is passed upon accumulated misdeeds.
As a nation what could have been the misdeeds of USA?
Let’s start with the history of USA since 1783 when the 13 former British colonies gained their independence from the British empire.
Misdeed on Mexico
The occupation and grabbing of part of Mexico can be considered a misdeed of USA. That grabbing is called the American-Mexican war where the American army was victorious under the command of Gen. Zachary Taylor. That part of Mexico now comprises one-third of the contiguous territory of USA.
[Taylor himself would become president of USA. Under his command were soldiers who became prominent in the USA history: Jefferson Davis (then a colonel) who became president of the Confederate States of America; Gen. Winfield Scott who became chief of staff of the armed forces until the presidency of Lincoln; Gen. George McClellan who became commander of the North army in the American Civil War; Gen. Robert Lee who became commander of the South army under Davis; Gen. Ulysses Grant who became commander of the North army during the American civil war].
Misdeed on the Philippines
Another misdeed of USA is the conquest of the Philippines in 1899 to make it its first territory of its empire in the far east and as a jumping board to the great China market. The Filipino revolutionary leaders who were in exile in Hong Kong met with Admiral George Dewey. The Filipinos had the impression that the Americans were defenders of freedom. There was an understanding between Dewey and the Filipinos in exile that the Dewey would help in the fight for freedom of the Filipinos from Spain.
Upon their return the exiled Filipino leaders, with purchased arms, reactivated the armed revolution against Spain. They went as far as surrounding Manila, the capital of the Philippines and were about to capture the Spanish officials. Before they could do that, there was a battle between the USA navy under Dewey and the Spanish navy in Manila bay resulting in the defeat of the Spaniards. This was a mock battle because the Americans bought the Philippines from Spain. The point is that the Filipinos had virtually captured the Spaniards. That purchase was a ruse on the part of USA to make the Philippines its territory. Having realized the betrayal on the part of USA, the Filipinos went on to proclaim independence, lead by Gen. Emilio Aguinaldo in Kawit, Cavity on June 12,1898. The following year, Filipino leaders met in the first Philippine congress in Barasoain church in Malolos, Bulacan.
When the Americans started to implement their purchase of the Philippines, the Philippine-American war broke out. There was a great debate in USA whether to annex the Philippines or not. Mark Twain joined the debate against the taking of the islands. He said that if the annexation were for the enlightenment of the Filipinos he would go for it but if it were for business interest he would go against it. The business interests won.
The next misdeed of the USA against the Philippines is by turning this nation its neocolony. Filipino leaders were able to work out a peaceful way to independence where US control over the islands would end on July 4,1945. That was delayed to July 4,1946 because of the intervening World War II. That war saw the defeat of Japan, liberation of Korea from Japan, and support of the USA for Gen. Chiang Kai-shek, leader of Nationalist China that was pro-feudalism.
In post-WWII, the USA had some policies as follows:
“If conservative nationalists likely to shift the economic assets of a new state from the old colonial power toward the United States dominated the resistance, as in Dutch East Indies, Washington was anti colonial and pro-independence. Where, on the other hand, the Left controlled the resistance and had a mass base, the United States recommended trusteeship or a prolonged but ‘liberalized’ continuation of colonialism, as in Indochina and Korea” (Kolko, J. and G. Kolko. “Korea, 1945-1948: The American Way of Liberation.” The Limits of Power. 1972: 277-299).
In the Philippines, along these policies, the Americans dismantled the leadership of some groups. During the Japanese occupation, some patriotic Filipinos in central Luzon organized the Hukbo ng Bayan Laban sa Hapon (Army of the country against the Japanese) monickered “Hukbalahap.” This group had carried out some redistribution of land so acquired during the Spanish regime. They leaned toward the Marxist-Leninist ideology. In the first free election after the Japanese occupation, they had candidates who ran for Congress and won. These were charged with some contrived crimes like collaboration with the Japanese, and electoral fraud then tried, convicted, and imprisoned.
The USA pressured the Philippines to amend its constitution to allow Americans to exploit natural resources and engage in retail trade. Also the Americans were allowed to maintain military bases that were eventually terminated in 1990. Trade quotas were also imposed on some Philippine export items such that the economy would be tied up with the USA.
Misdeed on Korea
Another misdeed of USA is the destruction of Korea in a proxy war as part of the Cold War. During the Korean war (1950-53) the USA served as caretaker of the United Nations army; subsumed the South Korean army and provided the commander of these coalition. Gen. Douglas MacArthur was the first commander, succeeded by Gen. Bradley. The Americans bombed every building in the South and North Korea that could be used as shelter by the North Koreans (same source as above).
Misdeed on its allies in Europe
There are more misdeeds committed by the USA like the shaping of the economies of Europe after WWII to its advantage. This was an exercise in power that the USA acquired as a result of WWII. USA was the only source of credit at that time. In the loans under Marshal plan I and II, a country that applied for a loan of say, US$ 1 billion, would have to put a counterpart of US$ 1 billion to make the whole package US$ 2 billion. The latter was charged an interest of 5% that belonged to USA. In effect, the borrower was paying interest on his counterpart of US$1 billion.
France, Great Britain and other European countries who were allies in the war effort to defeat Hitler’s Germany were not spared of Marshal plan loan scheme.
Misdeed of USA upon itself
If it is any commiseration or expiation on the part of USA, it has committed misdeeds upon itself. For example, conveying to private business the power to control the economy of the USA through the Federal ‘Reserve Bank. Today if the chairman of the Fed raised the interest rate by 1% the president of USA has nothing to do with this decision. The president cannot abrogate it if it proves to be detrimental to the USA economy.
The agnostic or the scientist or the modern executive will not agree with the concept of “doom,” especially if it has a religious connotation.
History repeats itself?
There are no laws of history as history is not a science. It belongs in the humanities according to a Filipino historian, Teodoro A. Agoncillo, author of “A History of the Filipino People,” published in 1990.
Every event in history is unique, as every flow of blood in an artery is unique, or the flow of flood waters is unique.
The psychology of man may follow a pattern and that pattern could be repeated. The craving for food is repeated often enough during the lifetime of man/woman. Of course a law in psychology is not a law in history.

Thursday 4 July 2013

3 Best Pure Android Phones Right Now


The World News:- There are a variety of Android mobile phones in the market. While many offer the basic Android OS experience with their own skin (user interface) over the OS interface, there are still some other phones launched till date, attempting to offer users the pure Android experience. Apart from Google offering the pure Android mobile OS on its Nexus range of devices, many giants have started to offer pure Android on their flagship models. For example, Samsung chucked out its Nature TouchWiz user interface for a pure Android phone. HTC throws away its Sense user interface for a pure Google version. Many others are in queue to launch their pure Android avatars this year.
So, currently if you are looking for a list of the most appealing mobile phones that rock pure, stock Android, you will find the answer here. In the following, 3 best pure Android phones to date will be shared.

HTC One Google Play Edition
If you ask me which phone is the current king of stock Android smartphone, no doubt HTC One Google Play Edition takes that honor. The all metallic stunning HTC One finally went for a special pure Android edition. It’s an Android 4.2.2 Jelly Bean Phone, coming with 4.7-inch Super IPS LCD 3 display, quad core Qualcomm Snapdragon 600 processor clocked at 1.7GHz supported by an Adreno 320 graphics processor, 2GB of RAM and 32GB internal storage. It has been in news for its 4 megapixel HTC UltraPixel camera on back. Both of its primary and secondary cameras are capable of recording 1080p full HD videos. Its powerful speakers are icing on the cake.
Price and Shipment: HTC One Google Play Edition is priced at $599. It makes available in the US only through Google’s online Play store. Shipment is expected by July 9, 2013.

Samsung Galaxy S4 Google Play Edition
When it comes to the best pure Android phones, the Samsung Galaxy S4 Google Play Edition should be mentioned. The S4 Google Edition is announced at the Google I/O this year, combing stock Android with the S4′s powerful hardware for Android purists. You can get the same 5-inch 1080p display, sharp 13-MP camera, speedy quad-core processor, a removable battery and SD card slot for extra expansion, plus the benefit of getting software straight from Google – no carrier intervention required. Of course, you will never find Samsung’s unique software features like eye scanning, gesture based input, etc. on this S4 Google Edition.
Price and Shipment: You have to pay $649 to get a S4 Google Edition. The shipment is the same as HTC One Google Edition – July 9, 2013.

LG Nexus 4
The Nexus 4 always runs out of the stock, but that also shows how popular the phone it is. The Nexus 4 made a great success, thanks to its pure Android experience, competitive price and high-end hardware features packed. Running Android 4.2 Jelly Bean, the Nexus 4 is driven by a 1.5GHz quad-core Snapdragon CPU. The handset will be first in line to receive fresh Android updates, just along with HTC One Google Play Edition and Samsung Galaxy S4 Google Play Edition. One shortcut is Nexus 4 lack of 4G LTE support.
Besides above, we might soon see a Google Edition of Sony’s flagship Xperia Z launched this year. It’s speculated that Google might bring the Android 4.3 Jelly Bean to the new phone, and the phone is expected to be announced this July.
So which one is your favorite pure Android phone? Welcome to share your ideas.



Monday 24 June 2013

Let's Review Man OF Steel


The World News:- The action...is amazing.
I've never seen a film that had more action AND BETTER action.
95 percent of the film is awesome, awesome action sequences. The Amazing Spider-Man may have pocketed their whole budget and used it on cocaine or something, because Man of Steel cost only a little bit more and looks 200 times more generous.
I barely even like this movie, and I'm gonna see it again. I haven't even seen the Seth Rogen movie yet. I put it off so I could see Man of Steel. And I just might put it off again.


But as you've noticed, it only gets a 58 percent from critics on rottentomatoes, Sure we're talking about people who aren't Roger Ebert...but they still have kind of a point.
The problem with Superman can all be stemmed to one thing...Superman II (1980)
It's one thing to make a kick ass Superman movie, it's another thing to make one of the top 20 movies ever made, and that's what Superman II was.
Superman II has ruined the Superman franchise. Ever since then, no two people on planet Earth can come up with a simple straight answer as to what they expect a Superman film to be.
Superman III is easily better then 95 percent of the superhero films ever made since, and it got a beatdown.
Superman IV was made by Golan and Globus who are notorious cheapskates, men who if they weren't making movies would be talking back to John Taffer on Bar Rescue. They didn't even try with Superman IV, making a thoughtless, cheesy film on a third of the normal budget and somehow kept every one of those 17 million dollars off the screen regardless.
Superman Returns was a big insult to life. It was a bad day for philistines the world over, because this was their Superman -- taking proud bows after landing a confiscated plane all awkwardly like one of the three blind mice, having kids, religious parables, it was funny to watch Warner Brothers hand over the reigns to Brian Singer and watch him immediately get tripped up by the same problems that would plague any of us ordinary people who are fans with no input being heard...it's more then having a good script. You have to get that theme song right. That John Williams theme is Superman every bit as much as Hans Zimmer's score in Nolan's movies were Batman and Danny Elfman's score was Spider-Man. Sure you could have a cold opening...but that's actually a cool way to open a movie and we're talking about Warner Brothers here. So Brian Singer goes and copies the theme, uses Marlon Brando symbolism, that's cowardly stuff. He didn't have the nuts to face the pressure that would normally face anyone in that situation.
Superman II made Superman 1 look seriously seriously boring. And Superman 1 was a historical document. No man in well-fed Hollywood history faced the kind of pressure that Richard Donner did and by extension, Alexander and Ilya Salkind the producers. What they pulled that winter in 1977 set the ground work for every film that features big time special effects SET DURING THE DAY. You didn't just have to have the story in space to avoid seeing wires. And he blended it in with a genuine story and cast and there was subtlely throughout. Gene Hackman didn't have to raise his voice to be a menacing criminal in a superhero movie. And yet...Superman II...containing the bulk of the action that Superman I didn't...still managed to get all those other aspects down as good or better. Superman II was a transcendent superhero movie, and it's kept films like this new one, Man of Steel, from getting the praise it deserves. Man of Steel doesn't have its shit together like Superman II, it does what Amazing Spider-Man does -- insisting that the parents have to be big time roles who get lots of talking time. Having Martin Sheen and Sally Field, Kevin Costner and Diane Lane? Stop laying the cheese on the damn pizza. Two origin stories in the last two years have been altered for the worse. Not that I really care, I'm just illustrating why this Superman series is so screwed...even at Level 1, it's screwed. For how much money did it cost to pay these actors so they could be such a detriment?
Then the writers got the idea that they were going to turn this whole thing into the Dark Knight of Superman tales. If you look at the Nolan Batman movies and listen to Liam Neeson and Heath Ledger and Tom Hardy and Anne Hathaway and Aaron Eckhart talk...what they're saying makes perfect sense to some people. I would never propose to understand or give some kind of a sympathetic ear to that f*cker in Colorado who killed all those people at the Dark Knight screening, but what I'm saying is that these films sort of taunt and bait people. If you're vulnerable, depressed, just broke up with your girl, lost your job, and you have Heath Ledger's words about "they're only as good as the world allows them to be", you might contemplate crapping on the world. Well this is a trend that Nolan and Goyer keep up in Man of Steel by presenting us the most sympathetic General Zod you'll ever see in your life. They took the speed freak from "Chicago Cab" and made him General Zod, it was a hell of an idea, but all Zod does in this one is very passionately and zealously try to protect the people of Krypton. If there is no more Krypton...he's going to murder the Earth so he can turn THAT into Krypton, but he's still doing it to protect the people of Krypton. See? And then he tells off Kryptonian Congress in the beginning..."Our world is falling apart because you all sit there all day and debate nothing!" It's hard to hope Zod fails.
Nolan and Goyer also seemed to have gripes when it came to Lois Lane. They want to make her smarter, they can't bear the idea that she looks at someone with glasses on and can't recognize them without...and they can't bare the idea of Superman having "underwear" over his pants...these are gripes from smart-asses who barely give a damn. It's not part of scripture that these things have to be changed. The people who don't care...won't start caring because you made these changes. The people who do care...will choke yo ass. See the difference?
But the action is UN-BEEE-LIEEE-VABLE. You won't believe it's CGI. It looks amazing. Everything does. There's cool stuff on Krypton...in fact...if all the film was Krypton, it would still be worth seeing. The flying looks real and it's FUN. You're flying with Superman and you feel the weight and you hear the winds, he's fighting Zod on the street and they're just carving up the street by smeering each other into it at full speeds, and they got over this whole hang-up with 9/11 imagery. Buildings come down because stuff flies into them. People run and panic. It looks GREAT.
It is worth all the money. Every penny. But if you feel like taking a long wizz once Kal-El first gets to Earth, take your time. But be back promptly for the second hour!!!!

Tuesday 21 May 2013

China and Its Connection to Israel and Middle East

The World News:- Historically, the Middle East has had only four major powers involved in it: France, Britain, America, and Russia. In the early years, before and just after Israel's creation it was France and England heavily involved. It was not until the early 1960's, America replaced both as the major player and weapons importer\exporter to Israel. Russia meddled in the region in the 50's, with weapon exports to many Arab countries.

Since the 60's, the two major powers influencing the area have been Russia and America, however, this declined after 1992, when Russia ended communist rule. They did continue to support Syria, Egypt and others but were focused more on themselves. This left only America until now.
Today, Russia is re-emerging in Syria under Putin, Iran is a new player and heavily involved and may be in cahoots with Russia to keep Syria- Syria under Assad. America seems to be hesitant to do much in the area unless a real provocative act occurs, and China, which up to now has shown little interest in the region.
China's interest in keeping the Middle East and Israel at peace is economic. Since 1988, China has recognized the Palestinians in the Gaza area as a "state" and has always supported its attempt to upgrade its status in the UN. On May 6th, it proposed its own peace plan for the Middle East dilemma that was really regurgitated points presented many times before. Recently, Israel's PM visited China and found that China greatly valued the Israel state for economic reasons now and in the future.
China is Israel’s third largest trade partner after the US and EU, with trade set to grow from around $8 billion to $10 billion in three years. Besides Russia and America, it is the third most desired high tech area for innovative designs in weapon systems. China buys Israeli technology to improve upon just as they did with Russian technology, which then they sell to Iran. Ironically, Israel and China signed five agreements in cooperation and trade in aerospace, agricultural research, financial cooperation, science and technology. In fact, in a disturbing comment, Israel's Netanyahu suggested that if China serves as an “engine for Israeli economic growth . . . I propose that Israel in many ways be the R&D lab for China.”
What?
China is one of Iran's largest purchasers of its oil. The sanctions Obama imposed on Iran did little to China because they were exempt! Iran's weapons are Chinese versions of Russian ones, which Iran buys. But China wants to keep Israel within its own influence for the two natural gas fields off the Israeli coast containing up to 19 trillion cubic feet. China wants some of it and as the fields become developed, no doubt will obtain some that benefits Israel.
But, whose side would China be on should there be another regional war? Would China act like Russia in sending military assets to protect their interests they have invest in? Would they back the Palestinians or Israel? Which side do they think provides more economic value?
One can see how China, Russia, Iran and America are now the major influences in this area of the world for economic and political reasons.