The two major parties are at odds over how much the country should spend to have better broadband connection. Underneath all the bluster, are their proposals so different?
No matter who wins the election on September 7, Australia's telecommunications networks will receive a long-overdue multibillion-dollar facelift funded by the federal government.
Australia has never topped global broadband rankings for speed and value. The OECD ranks us 25th in the world for fibre connections in its latest communications outlook report and Australia still has more dial-up internet connections than any other country in the OECD, apart from New Zealand.
There are differences - including network speeds, construction efforts, and using the Telstra copper network - but not as many as Labor politicians have been claiming during this campaign.
For example, Communications Minister Anthony Albanese claims towns will be ''divided by broadband'' and that ''planned [broadband] construction ... will be cancelled''. While NBN Co under a Coalition government might change fibre-to-the-home installations to fibre-to-the-node in years to come, the Coalition no longer plans to halt construction and sell off the network like it did in 2010.
Earlier this year the Coalition party room adopted the very un-Liberal policy of publicly funding a government-managed and real time Location system. This is because it can't unscramble Labor's omelet, and partly because it recognised votes were lost in 2010 when its broadband policy seemed to lack vision and did nothing to improve broadband speeds.
''It certainly was one of the things that affected us, definitely,'' says one Coalition frontbencher. ''Tony's [Abbott's] 7.30 Report interview was pretty bad. And the press conference with Andrew Robb and [former opposition communications spokesman] Tony Smith where they unveiled our policy was a debacle.''
The new broadband policy ''makes the best of a bad situation'' and the ''vast majority'' of Coalition members support it, he adds.The opposition's current communications spokesman, Malcolm Turnbull, convinced Tony Abbott the party needed a better policy. It turns out that policy will cost $30 billion, but at least the party can argue against accusations of being troglodytes.
Turnbull says his plan can be delivered sooner and at less cost with ''everyone in the nation'' getting access to minimum speed of 25 megabits per second [Mbps] by 2016 and 100 Mbps to the majority by 2020.
Turnbull says he still believes the best model is private sector upgrades done with ''judicious levels of government subsidy to make sure uncommercial areas are dealt with''. However, he has to live with the facts on the ground and work out how to complete the network that has been started.
''The gap between the parties' [policies] would be regarded outside Australia as being relatively modest ... what I have got to do ... is completely depoliticise this thing,'' he says in an interview with Fairfax Media. ''Our job is to open all the books, rtls, lay it all out and say, 'Ladies and gentlemen, this is where we are. This is the business you own. This is the position you're in. Here are our options for sorting it out.'''
Turnbull's policy adopts Labor's plan to raise tens of billions of dollars through government bonds, which keeps the project off the budget, and spend that money building networks that are available to all service providers at the same prices. Both aim to separate Telstra so its retail operations cannot benefit from it also owning infrastructure and evenutally privatising NBN Co to recoup costs.
"Very very similar"The Coalition's regional communications spokesman, Luke Hartsuyker, says both broadband policies are ''very very similar'' for the 7 per cent of Australia's population in regional areas that have been told to expect a fixed wireless or satellite connection.''We will maximise the value of the assets that we inherit. We will not be junking the work that has been done on ideological grounds,'' he says.
Albanese says the differences between Labor's NBN and the ''Coalition's lemon of an alternative couldn't be more stark''. He pointed to faster speeds, guaranteed upload speeds, free fibre installations and universal pricing.
''The Coalition's alternative relies on last century's copper, will be obsolete before it is finished, forces homes and businesses to pay as much as $5000 to connect directly to fibre, will result in regional Australians paying more for broadband than people living in the cities, and costs only 3 per cent less in terms of government investment than Labor's vastly superior NBN.''
There is certainty in Labor's policy that is missing in the Coalition's, partly because Turnbull wants to initiate three reviews if he becomes minister that could change his current rollout plans. Labor's NBN Co charges the same wholesale prices around the country, whereas the Coalition wants a regulated price cap that allows lower prices in viable areas. While Telstra's is settled under Labor's plan, the regulations surrounding NBN Co have stalled over concerns about cost and pricing into the future.
Read the full products at http://www.ecived.com/en/.
2013年8月14日星期三
2013年7月31日星期三
Beta look through the Google Glass
The Glass projects an image that looks like a 25-inch television screen floating approximately eight feet away. It has a camera that can take both video with sound and still pictures."This is a very interesting piece of technology," Mr. Graves said. "I think some people are a little nervous when they see it because they assume I am recording everything I'm doing, which is definitely not the case."
He said he has had to plan a little extra time when he goes somewhere wearing it because so many people stop him to ask about it."Most everyone under 20 seems to know what is and wants to play with it," said Mr. Graves, who teaches history and alternative education at the high school. "They want one."On the other hand, people over 20 may know what it is it but are less impressed. They tend to be more apprehensive.
"I'm a pretty private person and I've noticed more people whispering when I walk by wearing them. I'm pretty sure they're talking about my Glass," he said. It is worn like a pair of glasses with temples over the ears, one of which contains the computer and Indoor Positioning System. When worn with the included sunglass shade or a hat, not as many people notice it, he said.
Plans are to make the Glass a self-contained interactive device, but for now it must be linked through a cell phone via a Bluetooth connection to access the Internet, according to Mr. Graves. "I see it as primarily a second screen for my cellphone," Mr. Graves said."It would be great for someone who works on the phone or needs to work with their hands while getting information from the Internet or a another source," he said. "It would be great for kids who spend a lot of time on their phone." He said it could free their hands for other things and get their heads out of their phones.
"The more I use it the more I really think that if you use a smart phone a lot it could be useful because it provides the information you want quickly and easily," he said.As a device that can film what the wearer sees Mr. Graves said, "I think it's a real game changer. I expect it to be a good teaching tool. It would be easy to film a virtual field trip by one student that the whole class could watch."As a track coach I think it will be interesting to see what our athletes are doing from their own perspectives," he said.
The Google Glass has been in development for a couple of years although Google, uncharacteristically for a high tech company, has been relatively quiet about the project. Their website shows what it can do through photos and videos that were made with a Glass, but it has no written description of the device. The page that is entitled how-to-get-one says, "Applications are now closed."
The Google Glass is not for sale to the general public, yet. Mr. Graves said he does not expect Google to begin selling the Glass until sometime in 2014.He had to apply to become one of the "Explorers," one of the 8,000 who were given the opportunity to buy one. He thinks his chances of being chosen were enhanced because he is a teacher and for over four years he has used the android operating system, which was developed by Google and is used in phones and the Google Glass.
Mr. Graves paid $1,500 for the Glass and had to travel to New York City for a fitting and a brief lesson on how to use it. "It costs money to be on the bleeding edge of indoor Tracking. The bleeding edge doesn't come cheap," he said, quoting a fellow teacher.
The only condition of the purchase was that he not sell it. Public interest in the device is so intense that owners can easily double their money selling them, he said. Google encourages the users to give them feedback primarily through a chat site for fellow Glass users.
Google sends out upgrades every month with tweaks and improvements and sometimes new apps. Mr. Graves said the sound quality is not as good as his phone and like most smart phones Internet surfing is not as easy as on his computer. "Right now, when I have a choice, I use my computer first, my cellphone next, and then the Glass.
Said Balogun: "MT African Pride, reported missing by the Navy was never, and I repeat, never in the custody of the police. At no time were any of the ships taken over by the police. It is not even a question of MT African Pride, all the vessels have always been with the Navy. If anybody says he handed over a ship to me, let him produce the handing over note because there is no way the handover of such magnitude can take place without a handover note. The vessels in question were at the high seas where the police have no access to them. The Navy deployed helicopters and ships to trace the MT African Pride and it was on the pages of newspapers that I read it. If the ship had not been in their custody, why did they deploy ships and helicopters to search for it?"
Without prejudice to the work of the House Committee, it must be noted that we are not just talking about a missing ship here. We are actually talking about the theft, corruption and mismanagement of our oil wealth, aided and abetted by officialdom and the implication for our economic well-being and national security. I repeat, nobody should confuse the issue here, this matter is about oil, not ship. And in another country where leaders are actually accountable to the people, several public officials would have lost their jobs by now, assuming they are not already in jail. But because this is Nigeria, we have a situation in which arrested vessels carrying stolen oil just 'disappear' into thin air and the Naval Chief can only tell us some cock-and-bull story!
He said he has had to plan a little extra time when he goes somewhere wearing it because so many people stop him to ask about it."Most everyone under 20 seems to know what is and wants to play with it," said Mr. Graves, who teaches history and alternative education at the high school. "They want one."On the other hand, people over 20 may know what it is it but are less impressed. They tend to be more apprehensive.
"I'm a pretty private person and I've noticed more people whispering when I walk by wearing them. I'm pretty sure they're talking about my Glass," he said. It is worn like a pair of glasses with temples over the ears, one of which contains the computer and Indoor Positioning System. When worn with the included sunglass shade or a hat, not as many people notice it, he said.
Plans are to make the Glass a self-contained interactive device, but for now it must be linked through a cell phone via a Bluetooth connection to access the Internet, according to Mr. Graves. "I see it as primarily a second screen for my cellphone," Mr. Graves said."It would be great for someone who works on the phone or needs to work with their hands while getting information from the Internet or a another source," he said. "It would be great for kids who spend a lot of time on their phone." He said it could free their hands for other things and get their heads out of their phones.
"The more I use it the more I really think that if you use a smart phone a lot it could be useful because it provides the information you want quickly and easily," he said.As a device that can film what the wearer sees Mr. Graves said, "I think it's a real game changer. I expect it to be a good teaching tool. It would be easy to film a virtual field trip by one student that the whole class could watch."As a track coach I think it will be interesting to see what our athletes are doing from their own perspectives," he said.
The Google Glass has been in development for a couple of years although Google, uncharacteristically for a high tech company, has been relatively quiet about the project. Their website shows what it can do through photos and videos that were made with a Glass, but it has no written description of the device. The page that is entitled how-to-get-one says, "Applications are now closed."
The Google Glass is not for sale to the general public, yet. Mr. Graves said he does not expect Google to begin selling the Glass until sometime in 2014.He had to apply to become one of the "Explorers," one of the 8,000 who were given the opportunity to buy one. He thinks his chances of being chosen were enhanced because he is a teacher and for over four years he has used the android operating system, which was developed by Google and is used in phones and the Google Glass.
Mr. Graves paid $1,500 for the Glass and had to travel to New York City for a fitting and a brief lesson on how to use it. "It costs money to be on the bleeding edge of indoor Tracking. The bleeding edge doesn't come cheap," he said, quoting a fellow teacher.
The only condition of the purchase was that he not sell it. Public interest in the device is so intense that owners can easily double their money selling them, he said. Google encourages the users to give them feedback primarily through a chat site for fellow Glass users.
Google sends out upgrades every month with tweaks and improvements and sometimes new apps. Mr. Graves said the sound quality is not as good as his phone and like most smart phones Internet surfing is not as easy as on his computer. "Right now, when I have a choice, I use my computer first, my cellphone next, and then the Glass.
Said Balogun: "MT African Pride, reported missing by the Navy was never, and I repeat, never in the custody of the police. At no time were any of the ships taken over by the police. It is not even a question of MT African Pride, all the vessels have always been with the Navy. If anybody says he handed over a ship to me, let him produce the handing over note because there is no way the handover of such magnitude can take place without a handover note. The vessels in question were at the high seas where the police have no access to them. The Navy deployed helicopters and ships to trace the MT African Pride and it was on the pages of newspapers that I read it. If the ship had not been in their custody, why did they deploy ships and helicopters to search for it?"
Without prejudice to the work of the House Committee, it must be noted that we are not just talking about a missing ship here. We are actually talking about the theft, corruption and mismanagement of our oil wealth, aided and abetted by officialdom and the implication for our economic well-being and national security. I repeat, nobody should confuse the issue here, this matter is about oil, not ship. And in another country where leaders are actually accountable to the people, several public officials would have lost their jobs by now, assuming they are not already in jail. But because this is Nigeria, we have a situation in which arrested vessels carrying stolen oil just 'disappear' into thin air and the Naval Chief can only tell us some cock-and-bull story!
2013年7月24日星期三
‘I’m Not Going to Slow Down’
Climbing through the wet mud of a five-mile obstacle course with a smile on her face is a metaphor for how 18-year-old Jenna Chwascinski has chosen to live her life — despite challenges she might face because she was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis (MS) a few years ago, she’s prefers to stay positive.Talk to Chwascinski about her MS and she is quick to tell you that she doesn’t want anyone feeling sorry for her. She’s a woman of action, and she’s living her life that way.
When she was a student at Washington High School, Chwascinski didn’t let her MS diagnosis stop her from participating in the school band and its many activities.These days, she works two jobs (as a waitress both at Bob Evans and Cecil Whittaker’s Pizzeria), is a student at East Central College with plans to transfer to Central Missouri State in Warrensburg and eventually have a career in public relations.
Chwascinski also believes in being an active part of finding answers for the questions of MS, which is why earlier this month she and her family took part in that mud and obstacle fun run known as MuckFest MS to raise money for the National Multiple Sclerosis Society.Next, she’ll step up to the plate for a Screwball Tournament set for Sept. 6-7 in Marthasville to benefit the MS Society, and then she’ll take part in the local Walk MS to be held Saturday, Sept. 21, at Lions Lake.
Registration begins at 9 a.m., followed by the walk at 10 a.m. This is an earlier time for the walk than in the rtls.The event also will feature different refreshments and have a fund-raising booth with items like T-shirts and bracelets for sale.There will be music, raffles and prizes, maybe even an opportunity for for a photo booth where teams or individuals can purchase silly photos of themselves with proceeds going toward Walk MS.
Diagnosed with Relapsing-Remitting MS (a type where symptoms come and go) three years ago, Chwascinski said she’s never wanted to make a big deal out of her condition. From the beginning, she took the news from her doctor in stride.That’s extremely fast for people with MS, many of whom go years, maybe even a decade or more, before they get a diagnosis, said Duane Chwascinski. The symptoms can be that elusive and fleeting, coming and going to the point where it’s hard to pinpoint just what you were feeling.
“Even her doctor, Dr. Barry Singer with Missouri Baptist Medical Center in St. Louis, was surprised at how fast she was diagnosed,” he commented. “Most people have their first MS symptoms when they are younger, but they aren’t diagnosed until their 40s. They either just work through it or it goes away and they think it must have been no big deal.”
After a peaceful power transition in the 18th Party Congress, the new leadership in China is again under the Indoor Positioning System. The world is watching how it tackles the many challenges facing the nation: rising inequality, worsening pollution, rampant corruption, restless society, to name just a few. Most policy analysts therefore, believe that the top priority of the Xi-Li administration should be bold social and political reforms rather than economic growth.
The Chinese growth has actually slowed down significantly since 2011 and some economists even warned of an imminent crash of the Chinese economy in the coming years. Without continued strong economic growth, the new regime may not have the necessary resources as well as the legitimacy to accomplish political and social reforms. What can be done to avert a potential crisis and rejuvenate the economy? There is no shortage of opinions and concrete proposals from economists and government-affiliated think tanks. The mainstream analysts have followed the liberal ideology and called for bolder market reforms. While sympathetic to the ultimate goal, we believe that placing faith solely on the courage of visionary leaders oversimplifies the political dynamics of economic reforms.
We believe reform strategy matters. Gradualism, in particular, can not only ensure the right sequencing is followed so reforms make good economic sense but also generate enough political support to overcome the resistance. Most reform proposals so far fall short in this regard. For example, some advocate reforming China’s financial system as a major breakthrough. Financial liberalization, while necessary, may in fact trigger a crisis in today’s Chinese economy if not accompanied by reforms in the real sectors. A lot of bank loans have been squandered by local governments and state-owned enterprises since the huge stimulus package was introduced after the 2008 world financial crisis. Once marketization pushes interest rates higher, the interest burdens may force them to default and banks will be saddled with piles of nonperforming loans. Market competition also reduces the profit margin for state banks, which leave them little room to absorb NPLs. In the aftermath of the 1997 Asian financial crisis, Chinese banks faced similar challenges and it was strong economic growth in the 2000s that enabled state banks to grow out of the NPL crisis. If this recent history offers any lesson, financial reforms should be introduced only with or even after changes are made in the real sectors.
When she was a student at Washington High School, Chwascinski didn’t let her MS diagnosis stop her from participating in the school band and its many activities.These days, she works two jobs (as a waitress both at Bob Evans and Cecil Whittaker’s Pizzeria), is a student at East Central College with plans to transfer to Central Missouri State in Warrensburg and eventually have a career in public relations.
Chwascinski also believes in being an active part of finding answers for the questions of MS, which is why earlier this month she and her family took part in that mud and obstacle fun run known as MuckFest MS to raise money for the National Multiple Sclerosis Society.Next, she’ll step up to the plate for a Screwball Tournament set for Sept. 6-7 in Marthasville to benefit the MS Society, and then she’ll take part in the local Walk MS to be held Saturday, Sept. 21, at Lions Lake.
Registration begins at 9 a.m., followed by the walk at 10 a.m. This is an earlier time for the walk than in the rtls.The event also will feature different refreshments and have a fund-raising booth with items like T-shirts and bracelets for sale.There will be music, raffles and prizes, maybe even an opportunity for for a photo booth where teams or individuals can purchase silly photos of themselves with proceeds going toward Walk MS.
Diagnosed with Relapsing-Remitting MS (a type where symptoms come and go) three years ago, Chwascinski said she’s never wanted to make a big deal out of her condition. From the beginning, she took the news from her doctor in stride.That’s extremely fast for people with MS, many of whom go years, maybe even a decade or more, before they get a diagnosis, said Duane Chwascinski. The symptoms can be that elusive and fleeting, coming and going to the point where it’s hard to pinpoint just what you were feeling.
“Even her doctor, Dr. Barry Singer with Missouri Baptist Medical Center in St. Louis, was surprised at how fast she was diagnosed,” he commented. “Most people have their first MS symptoms when they are younger, but they aren’t diagnosed until their 40s. They either just work through it or it goes away and they think it must have been no big deal.”
After a peaceful power transition in the 18th Party Congress, the new leadership in China is again under the Indoor Positioning System. The world is watching how it tackles the many challenges facing the nation: rising inequality, worsening pollution, rampant corruption, restless society, to name just a few. Most policy analysts therefore, believe that the top priority of the Xi-Li administration should be bold social and political reforms rather than economic growth.
The Chinese growth has actually slowed down significantly since 2011 and some economists even warned of an imminent crash of the Chinese economy in the coming years. Without continued strong economic growth, the new regime may not have the necessary resources as well as the legitimacy to accomplish political and social reforms. What can be done to avert a potential crisis and rejuvenate the economy? There is no shortage of opinions and concrete proposals from economists and government-affiliated think tanks. The mainstream analysts have followed the liberal ideology and called for bolder market reforms. While sympathetic to the ultimate goal, we believe that placing faith solely on the courage of visionary leaders oversimplifies the political dynamics of economic reforms.
We believe reform strategy matters. Gradualism, in particular, can not only ensure the right sequencing is followed so reforms make good economic sense but also generate enough political support to overcome the resistance. Most reform proposals so far fall short in this regard. For example, some advocate reforming China’s financial system as a major breakthrough. Financial liberalization, while necessary, may in fact trigger a crisis in today’s Chinese economy if not accompanied by reforms in the real sectors. A lot of bank loans have been squandered by local governments and state-owned enterprises since the huge stimulus package was introduced after the 2008 world financial crisis. Once marketization pushes interest rates higher, the interest burdens may force them to default and banks will be saddled with piles of nonperforming loans. Market competition also reduces the profit margin for state banks, which leave them little room to absorb NPLs. In the aftermath of the 1997 Asian financial crisis, Chinese banks faced similar challenges and it was strong economic growth in the 2000s that enabled state banks to grow out of the NPL crisis. If this recent history offers any lesson, financial reforms should be introduced only with or even after changes are made in the real sectors.
2013年7月22日星期一
Has world-renowned regatta become a gladiator sport?
The America's Cup "summer of racing" may have gotten off to a bumbling and controversial start, but on a windy day in the bay Sunday, thousands of spectators enjoyed a front-row seat to the thrill and drama of world-class racing.
Gasps of surprise and worry rumbled across the Embarcadero when a front sail on the New Zealand boat came crashing down onto the trampoline deck of the 72-foot catamaran before the crew cut it loose and sent the rumpled sail drifting into the bay. It was a spectacle one commentator called an "emergency on Planet Kiwi.""I love the loss of the jib," said Kirsten Fagnan, 33, a mathematician from Oakland who watched the race from America's Cup Park at the end of Pier 27/29 with a group of friends. "That was absolutely amazing they were able to keep going."Even 11-year-old Wilson Conn, of Atherton, who watched with his two brothers and parents, had one thing on his mind: "I want to see if it capsizes."
This is the first time in the America's Cup's 162-year history that spectators can actually watch the races from shore -- a key feature that persuaded billionaire Larry Ellison to host the regatta in the natural amphitheater of the bay, where spectators can stand almost anywhere along the shoreline and catch a glimpse of the speedy, high-tech catamarans.
When his Team Oracle USA won the America's Cup in 2010, he earned the right to bring the cup home. Traditionally, the races have been held far out to sea and only viewed by those with access to boats or real time Location system.Two prime viewing spots that have been set up for spectators are along Marina Green and at Pier 27/29, where a music pavilion, hands-on exhibits and daily "dock out" shows entertain the public for free. The next race of the Louis Vuitton Cup series is scheduled for 12:15 p.m. Tuesday, with another race planned for the same time Sunday.
The jib accident was the most significant equipment failure of the 34th America's Cup since Sweden's Artemis Racing team suffered a traumatic capsize during a practice run in May that killed a crewman and destroyed its boat. The tragedy delayed the team's entry into the regatta until August and forced the America's Cup race director to impose a lengthy list of safety improvements, including stronger body armor and modified boat rudders.
The Luna Rossa team made headlines earlier this month when it protested the new safety rules, claiming they favored defending champion Team Oracle USA. Not only did the team boycott the first race, but the entire team -- sponsored by Italian fashion house Prada -- refused to attend the exclusive black tie Louis Vuitton Ball during opening weekend, returning 100 tickets to the organizers. That snub resulted in America's Cup organizers filing a protest against Luna Rossa, contending the team violated its obligations.
For those three special weeks in July plenty is written about the centrepiece, the riders. What they do before a stage, what they do after a stage, how they get to Versailles for the final stage and how they manage their media commitments.In fact, courtesy of a various number of teams and media outlets we can be transported to what goes on behind the scenes for the riders; but what of the supporters?
The people who spend plenty of time and money following the race and are a major reason why cycling is one of the most sponsored and documented sports in the world.Unless you’ve been to the Tour or known someone who has there are plenty of unanswered questions. In this article I intend to shed some light on the best ways to enjoy visiting the Tour.
For the past week I have been in the Alps, following the final five stages before they arrive in Paris. It has been one of the best weeks of rtls.I decided to go there with a tour company by the name of On The Road Cycling Tours. Most companies offer similar packages with opportunities to ride some of the stages and experience part of the greatest race on earth.What many people don’t realise is how hard it can be to obtain a great position along the route but also how much planning is needed.
We stayed in the lovely alpine town of Briancon, meaning we were within about two hours of each stage start/finish.But just because we were close didn’t mean we were waiting until an hour before the stage start and waltz down. It was an early start whether you were riding or simply watching.Why? Because the roads are closed along the route throughout the day and the earlier you’re there the more time you have for sightseeing and in my case a beer or two in the local bar.
If you intend to ride part of the stage then ensure you have the kilometres in the legs because it is no gentle roll getting through the Alps or the Pyrenees. The climbs are a lot harder than they appear on tv.If you go with a tour company you’ll generally spend the day at one of three possible positions. Start, finish or feed zone. Feed zones can be good if you intend on souveniring a bidon.
The start and finish are generally just big parties. The caravan comes through and if you’ve got a good pair hands you can usually collect plenty of free Tour merchandise.Hats, shirts, lollies and even bread are launched into the crowds. Every stage is a celebration, cycling groups continually rolling into town with plenty of people packing out the local bars and restaurants.Personally the highlight was the Alpe d’Huez. The mystical climb is sold out almost a year in advance in terms of accommodation and here is where going with a tour company becomes very beneficial.The mountain itself is usually closed to public traffic with only access given to accredited vehicles. But often the cycling companies can have someone on board who can get you through the checkpoints.
Gasps of surprise and worry rumbled across the Embarcadero when a front sail on the New Zealand boat came crashing down onto the trampoline deck of the 72-foot catamaran before the crew cut it loose and sent the rumpled sail drifting into the bay. It was a spectacle one commentator called an "emergency on Planet Kiwi.""I love the loss of the jib," said Kirsten Fagnan, 33, a mathematician from Oakland who watched the race from America's Cup Park at the end of Pier 27/29 with a group of friends. "That was absolutely amazing they were able to keep going."Even 11-year-old Wilson Conn, of Atherton, who watched with his two brothers and parents, had one thing on his mind: "I want to see if it capsizes."
This is the first time in the America's Cup's 162-year history that spectators can actually watch the races from shore -- a key feature that persuaded billionaire Larry Ellison to host the regatta in the natural amphitheater of the bay, where spectators can stand almost anywhere along the shoreline and catch a glimpse of the speedy, high-tech catamarans.
When his Team Oracle USA won the America's Cup in 2010, he earned the right to bring the cup home. Traditionally, the races have been held far out to sea and only viewed by those with access to boats or real time Location system.Two prime viewing spots that have been set up for spectators are along Marina Green and at Pier 27/29, where a music pavilion, hands-on exhibits and daily "dock out" shows entertain the public for free. The next race of the Louis Vuitton Cup series is scheduled for 12:15 p.m. Tuesday, with another race planned for the same time Sunday.
The jib accident was the most significant equipment failure of the 34th America's Cup since Sweden's Artemis Racing team suffered a traumatic capsize during a practice run in May that killed a crewman and destroyed its boat. The tragedy delayed the team's entry into the regatta until August and forced the America's Cup race director to impose a lengthy list of safety improvements, including stronger body armor and modified boat rudders.
The Luna Rossa team made headlines earlier this month when it protested the new safety rules, claiming they favored defending champion Team Oracle USA. Not only did the team boycott the first race, but the entire team -- sponsored by Italian fashion house Prada -- refused to attend the exclusive black tie Louis Vuitton Ball during opening weekend, returning 100 tickets to the organizers. That snub resulted in America's Cup organizers filing a protest against Luna Rossa, contending the team violated its obligations.
For those three special weeks in July plenty is written about the centrepiece, the riders. What they do before a stage, what they do after a stage, how they get to Versailles for the final stage and how they manage their media commitments.In fact, courtesy of a various number of teams and media outlets we can be transported to what goes on behind the scenes for the riders; but what of the supporters?
The people who spend plenty of time and money following the race and are a major reason why cycling is one of the most sponsored and documented sports in the world.Unless you’ve been to the Tour or known someone who has there are plenty of unanswered questions. In this article I intend to shed some light on the best ways to enjoy visiting the Tour.
For the past week I have been in the Alps, following the final five stages before they arrive in Paris. It has been one of the best weeks of rtls.I decided to go there with a tour company by the name of On The Road Cycling Tours. Most companies offer similar packages with opportunities to ride some of the stages and experience part of the greatest race on earth.What many people don’t realise is how hard it can be to obtain a great position along the route but also how much planning is needed.
We stayed in the lovely alpine town of Briancon, meaning we were within about two hours of each stage start/finish.But just because we were close didn’t mean we were waiting until an hour before the stage start and waltz down. It was an early start whether you were riding or simply watching.Why? Because the roads are closed along the route throughout the day and the earlier you’re there the more time you have for sightseeing and in my case a beer or two in the local bar.
If you intend to ride part of the stage then ensure you have the kilometres in the legs because it is no gentle roll getting through the Alps or the Pyrenees. The climbs are a lot harder than they appear on tv.If you go with a tour company you’ll generally spend the day at one of three possible positions. Start, finish or feed zone. Feed zones can be good if you intend on souveniring a bidon.
The start and finish are generally just big parties. The caravan comes through and if you’ve got a good pair hands you can usually collect plenty of free Tour merchandise.Hats, shirts, lollies and even bread are launched into the crowds. Every stage is a celebration, cycling groups continually rolling into town with plenty of people packing out the local bars and restaurants.Personally the highlight was the Alpe d’Huez. The mystical climb is sold out almost a year in advance in terms of accommodation and here is where going with a tour company becomes very beneficial.The mountain itself is usually closed to public traffic with only access given to accredited vehicles. But often the cycling companies can have someone on board who can get you through the checkpoints.
2013年7月9日星期二
A Season in the Congo
Chiwetel Ejiofor has played detectives, gangsters, a drag queen and an Othello that captivated the theatre world. But when I meet him in the flesh it is Louis Lester – the jazz musician he played in the recent BBC series Dancing on the Edge – whom he most closely resembles. Character and actor share both a measured charm, and an inscrutability. Dressed in a pale grey jumper and jeans, a cap that comes off as he greets me, Ejiofor is polite, self-deprecating – and a master of the careful response.
That Othello, which he performed at the Donmar Warehouse in 2007, put Ejiofor, now 35, in the front rank of British actors. He had already impressed with a series of stage and screen roles but his Othello astonished audiences and critics alike. It won him an Olivier Award for leading actor, beating both Ian McKellen’s King Lear and Patrick Stewart’s Macbeth, and an OBE followed months later. Critics called it ‘superb’, ‘dignified’, and reminiscent of ‘a great and noble building being destroyed by a wrecker’s ball’. But the weight of the role’s significance doesn’t stop Ejiofor confessing, early in our conversation over lunch in a London hotel, that towards the end of the run he was frequently ‘having random thoughts about whether someone had managed to get tickets, or whether they’re in the house – just as I was killing Desdemona’. He laughs, an expression that engulfs his face, before teasing out a meaning to the lapses. That may be symptomatic of being in control of what you’re doing; the point when the role has become part of you.’
The next role to ‘become part of’ him is that of the doomed Congolese businessman Patrice Lumumba in A Season in the Congo, a play by Aimé Césaire at London’s Young Vic theatre. It marks his ‘nerve-racking’, much-anticipated return to theatre for the first time since Othello. The play deals with the civil war that erupted out of Congo’s first stuttering weeks of independence from Belgium in 1960. Lumumba, who had risen from eloquent beer salesman to the country’s first prime minister of the new regime, attempted to introduce socialist ideas to Congo, but his efforts ended in military conflict and his own murder. In January 1961 he was shot by his indoor positioning system, or possibly by the Belgians supporting them, and later dismembered and dissolved in acid. The CIA and the British have been rumoured to have been involved in his assassination.
In March Ejiofor – along with the play’s director, Joe Wright, and the Young Vic’s artistic director, David Lan – visited Congo for a week-long fact-finding trip and to meet members of Lumumba’s family. Ejiofor, who was born in 1977 to Nigerian parents in Forest Gate, London, has been to Africa often, and numerous times to Nigeria, but never before visited what is arguably its most troubled state. ‘The trip itself was an extraordinary time,’ he says. ‘I knew a little about Congo, and you occasionally read bits in the paper about violence happening in the Eastern Kivu region. But really when you get there, the people in the east are living in the most extraordinary conditions. The M23 [rebel] forces have now gone back into the region and every time they do that they displace thousands of people – two million in all at the moment. And the displaced people’s camps that I went to are some of the bleakest things I’ve ever witnessed.
‘I was talking to a woman at one of them,’ he continues. ‘When the rebels came, they killed three of her children and she took her remaining child and went on the run for eight months, before she found a camp where there was water and sanitation.’
He also visited Lumumba’s house, where his family still live and which has been preserved in much the same state as it was in the 1960s. ‘I was in the study where he formed his government. The only discernible difference was there was a Dell laptop on the desk.’ Lumumba’s widow was ‘really friendly and graceful’. ‘She is pleased we’re doing the play – all his family were. She hopes it will recapture some of the energy of that time.’ Both Lumumba’s sons are politicians: ‘They admire their father but question some of what he thought’.
The play, written in 1966, is a Brechtian wail of grief over the loss of the brief chance the country once possibly had, and seemingly has never had since, to place government of the country in the hands of the people rather than a corrupt oligarchy. Joe Wright tells me that Ejiofor read the entire play to him one night by Lake Kivu, one of Africa’s Great Lakes, as a storm was coming in over the water. ‘That was an experience I will never forget,’ Wright says. ‘The performance was so impassioned; the play is so impassioned. Chiwetel has a great intelligence and a beautiful soul; he was very clearly the person to play this role. He is one of the greatest actors of his generation.’
Césaire, both poet and political activist himself, saw Lumumba as a martyr to democracy, destroyed by the machinations of the West and Lumumba’s own erstwhile friend, the future dictator Mobutu. But, Ejiofor says, the people he met on his trip to Congo feel more ambivalent about their short-lived leader. ‘They consider him heroic, but they also consider him naive,’ he says. ‘What did he achieve? He got himself killed trying to be a socialist. This other guy comes along who is an individualist capitalist thinker and he rules the country for 30 years. Even though they hate what Mobutu has done to the country they have a grudging respect for this man who managed to play the game.’
But Arinze, Ejiofor says, never dropped his link with Nigeria and his relationship with the community there – his parents were part of the Igbo tribe from the south-east of the country who suffered particularly in the Biafran conflict – and returned every year to help at a grassroots level. It was on one of these philanthropic trips that a lorry ploughed into Arinze’s car and he died, aged 39. Chiwetel, then 11, was also in the car. The crash left him in a coma, he spent 10 weeks in hospital and as a result he is permanently scarred on his forehead.
Ejiofor’s keen not to exaggerate the trauma of the loss of his father – ‘I think I have a constant reflective relationship with him, but don’t we all have that to some extent with people we have lost?’ But he knows his life is marked by his father’s influence. This ranges from the love of Shakespeare he learnt from Arinze, who particularly adored the sonnets, to his current interest on work with a focus on Africa. ‘As I get closer to the age he was when he died, the relationship is becoming more acute. But I do think there’s a constant dynamic that will continue always; and be an influence on the kind of work I do.’
Later this year, in a film already made, he stars in another piece about Africa, an adaptation of Chima-manda Ngozi Adichie’s book Half of a Yellow Sun that was filmed in Nigeria and is about the Biafran war itself. ‘Chimamanda’s version of the war was so close to what my grand-father had told me about, it brought tears to my eyes,’ he says. ‘I know my father would be really interested in the kind of topics I’m working on now; this kind of politics and the conversations around it. Perhaps proud.’
Arinze’s death meant Obiajulu had to bring up her children largely on her own. Working all hours at the pharma-ceutical business she and her husband had set up, she scraped together the money to send her children to private school. Ejiofor joined his brother at Dulwich College in south London. The school has an excellent drama department and there he caught the acting bug playing parts such as Angelo in Measure for Measure. ‘I loved reading when I was young,’ he recalls. ‘I was just completely taken by stories. And I remember taking that into English literature at school and taking that into Shakespeare and finding that opened up a whole world of self-expression to me that I didn’t have access to previously.’
Read the full story at http://www.ecived.com/en/!
That Othello, which he performed at the Donmar Warehouse in 2007, put Ejiofor, now 35, in the front rank of British actors. He had already impressed with a series of stage and screen roles but his Othello astonished audiences and critics alike. It won him an Olivier Award for leading actor, beating both Ian McKellen’s King Lear and Patrick Stewart’s Macbeth, and an OBE followed months later. Critics called it ‘superb’, ‘dignified’, and reminiscent of ‘a great and noble building being destroyed by a wrecker’s ball’. But the weight of the role’s significance doesn’t stop Ejiofor confessing, early in our conversation over lunch in a London hotel, that towards the end of the run he was frequently ‘having random thoughts about whether someone had managed to get tickets, or whether they’re in the house – just as I was killing Desdemona’. He laughs, an expression that engulfs his face, before teasing out a meaning to the lapses. That may be symptomatic of being in control of what you’re doing; the point when the role has become part of you.’
The next role to ‘become part of’ him is that of the doomed Congolese businessman Patrice Lumumba in A Season in the Congo, a play by Aimé Césaire at London’s Young Vic theatre. It marks his ‘nerve-racking’, much-anticipated return to theatre for the first time since Othello. The play deals with the civil war that erupted out of Congo’s first stuttering weeks of independence from Belgium in 1960. Lumumba, who had risen from eloquent beer salesman to the country’s first prime minister of the new regime, attempted to introduce socialist ideas to Congo, but his efforts ended in military conflict and his own murder. In January 1961 he was shot by his indoor positioning system, or possibly by the Belgians supporting them, and later dismembered and dissolved in acid. The CIA and the British have been rumoured to have been involved in his assassination.
In March Ejiofor – along with the play’s director, Joe Wright, and the Young Vic’s artistic director, David Lan – visited Congo for a week-long fact-finding trip and to meet members of Lumumba’s family. Ejiofor, who was born in 1977 to Nigerian parents in Forest Gate, London, has been to Africa often, and numerous times to Nigeria, but never before visited what is arguably its most troubled state. ‘The trip itself was an extraordinary time,’ he says. ‘I knew a little about Congo, and you occasionally read bits in the paper about violence happening in the Eastern Kivu region. But really when you get there, the people in the east are living in the most extraordinary conditions. The M23 [rebel] forces have now gone back into the region and every time they do that they displace thousands of people – two million in all at the moment. And the displaced people’s camps that I went to are some of the bleakest things I’ve ever witnessed.
‘I was talking to a woman at one of them,’ he continues. ‘When the rebels came, they killed three of her children and she took her remaining child and went on the run for eight months, before she found a camp where there was water and sanitation.’
He also visited Lumumba’s house, where his family still live and which has been preserved in much the same state as it was in the 1960s. ‘I was in the study where he formed his government. The only discernible difference was there was a Dell laptop on the desk.’ Lumumba’s widow was ‘really friendly and graceful’. ‘She is pleased we’re doing the play – all his family were. She hopes it will recapture some of the energy of that time.’ Both Lumumba’s sons are politicians: ‘They admire their father but question some of what he thought’.
The play, written in 1966, is a Brechtian wail of grief over the loss of the brief chance the country once possibly had, and seemingly has never had since, to place government of the country in the hands of the people rather than a corrupt oligarchy. Joe Wright tells me that Ejiofor read the entire play to him one night by Lake Kivu, one of Africa’s Great Lakes, as a storm was coming in over the water. ‘That was an experience I will never forget,’ Wright says. ‘The performance was so impassioned; the play is so impassioned. Chiwetel has a great intelligence and a beautiful soul; he was very clearly the person to play this role. He is one of the greatest actors of his generation.’
Césaire, both poet and political activist himself, saw Lumumba as a martyr to democracy, destroyed by the machinations of the West and Lumumba’s own erstwhile friend, the future dictator Mobutu. But, Ejiofor says, the people he met on his trip to Congo feel more ambivalent about their short-lived leader. ‘They consider him heroic, but they also consider him naive,’ he says. ‘What did he achieve? He got himself killed trying to be a socialist. This other guy comes along who is an individualist capitalist thinker and he rules the country for 30 years. Even though they hate what Mobutu has done to the country they have a grudging respect for this man who managed to play the game.’
But Arinze, Ejiofor says, never dropped his link with Nigeria and his relationship with the community there – his parents were part of the Igbo tribe from the south-east of the country who suffered particularly in the Biafran conflict – and returned every year to help at a grassroots level. It was on one of these philanthropic trips that a lorry ploughed into Arinze’s car and he died, aged 39. Chiwetel, then 11, was also in the car. The crash left him in a coma, he spent 10 weeks in hospital and as a result he is permanently scarred on his forehead.
Ejiofor’s keen not to exaggerate the trauma of the loss of his father – ‘I think I have a constant reflective relationship with him, but don’t we all have that to some extent with people we have lost?’ But he knows his life is marked by his father’s influence. This ranges from the love of Shakespeare he learnt from Arinze, who particularly adored the sonnets, to his current interest on work with a focus on Africa. ‘As I get closer to the age he was when he died, the relationship is becoming more acute. But I do think there’s a constant dynamic that will continue always; and be an influence on the kind of work I do.’
Later this year, in a film already made, he stars in another piece about Africa, an adaptation of Chima-manda Ngozi Adichie’s book Half of a Yellow Sun that was filmed in Nigeria and is about the Biafran war itself. ‘Chimamanda’s version of the war was so close to what my grand-father had told me about, it brought tears to my eyes,’ he says. ‘I know my father would be really interested in the kind of topics I’m working on now; this kind of politics and the conversations around it. Perhaps proud.’
Arinze’s death meant Obiajulu had to bring up her children largely on her own. Working all hours at the pharma-ceutical business she and her husband had set up, she scraped together the money to send her children to private school. Ejiofor joined his brother at Dulwich College in south London. The school has an excellent drama department and there he caught the acting bug playing parts such as Angelo in Measure for Measure. ‘I loved reading when I was young,’ he recalls. ‘I was just completely taken by stories. And I remember taking that into English literature at school and taking that into Shakespeare and finding that opened up a whole world of self-expression to me that I didn’t have access to previously.’
Read the full story at http://www.ecived.com/en/!
2013年6月27日星期四
Utilities say too soon to determine Obama plan's impact on rates
Representatives of two major Wisconsin utilities say they will not know until next year how new regulations limiting carbon emissions from existing coal-fired plants might affect electric rates. The policy was unveiled Tuesday by President Obama in a major climate change speech.
"It's just too early to tell until we see the details of the rule," said Brian Manthey, a spokesman for We Energies, which serves much of southeast Wisconsin. "But there could be an impact on customer rates. It will depend on what kind of changes and retrofitting will be required, their costs and what technology is available."
Alliant Energy spokesman Steve Schultz concurred and said it would be "only speculation" to make any estimates because the president didn't specify the level of carbon reduction that will be expected from existing power plants. Alliant serves southern and central Wisconsin.
Kurt Bauer, head of Wisconsin Manufacturers and Commerce, charged that the changes are unneeded and will hit Badger State industries disproportionately because 65 percent of the state's electricity is produced from coal-fired plants.
He predicted Obama's plan will "significantly increase electricity costs" for every Wisconsin household and business. Moreover, he said it will make Badger State manufacturers less competitive with other states and countries, ultimately costing jobs.
“This is global warming, and unilateral energy disarmament on the part of the U.S. is not the answer,” he said. “We need to have a global solution. He did indicate that he is going to try to work with other developed and emerging nations. But I don’t think they have any interest in reducing carbon emissions anywhere near what he’s talking about.”
A spokesman for the environmental group Clean Wisconsin lauded the president's action, calling it long overdue."We are pleased with how comprehensive his climate plan is," Keith Reopelle said. "It's a smart move and the highlight is the carbon pollution rules for existing power plants. That is critical because they are the largest source for emissions in this country. We're also delighted he wants to leverage this to get other countries to take similar steps."
Todd Stuart, executive director of the Wisconsin Industrial Energy Group, said the potential for tough new regulations on existing plants is a "wild card" that could potentially be very expensive, add to the cost of manufacturing in the state and cost jobs.
"We don't know for sure what the impact on Wisconsin will be," he said. "The president directed the EPA to issue proposed carbon standards for existing power plants by June 1, 2014, and a final rule by June 1, 2015."In the meantime, he said manufacturers can lobby the EPA, file lawsuits challenging the rule and possibly seek some kind of Congressional action.
Stuart said Wisconsin has been ahead of the curve in building new power plants and retrofitting the older ones."We've spent billions on new coal and natural-gas fired plants, billions on renewable generation, and billions more to retrofit older coal plants with new scrubbers. It has pushed our rates higher than the Midwest average in recent years, but others will be catching up when they start to fuel switch or retrofit their plants as well."
Alliant's Schultz said his company is on track to retire its oldest, smallest and least-efficient units."We are already been implementing a plan that supports the transition to a cleaner energy future by investing in emission controls at our newest and largest facilities. We are transitioning our generating fleet to meet customers' needs and provide flexibility to ensure that we can manage emerging environmental regulations while continuing to control costs."
Manthey warned that regulators will need to consider whether there are commercially available, cost-effective technologies to control carbon emission."Right now, there isn't one for the capture and storage of carbon," he said, noting that We Energies had worked on a small carbon capture pilot project with a company called Allstom that had positive results but has yet to be scaled up.
"We'd need to know what effect it would have on energy production and how much you might lose because you'd be running another system."He said the president's order could stimulate development of this type of technology, but "that would be something for those companies that deal with that to take further."
In the meantime, he said he hopes We Energies will get credit for the steps it has taken in the past decade."We replaced a coal-fired plant at Port Washington with natural gas and we plan to convert the Valley plant with natural gas that is currently coal," he said.
"We've also made large investments in renewables, including two largest wind farms in state and we're completing a 50-megawatt biomass plant in Wausau. So we'll hope that will be taken into account into meeting future rules."WMC's Bauer said he believes Obama wants to replace fossil fuels with renewable energy such as wind and solar power.
"This is aimed at coal, which is where we get most of our energy," he said. "But president is really going after all fossil fuels, including natural gas. They dislike coal the most, but they don't like any kind of fossil fuels."They are trying to promote wind and solar, which don't work in Wisconsin. We are not in the wind corridor and we don't have a lot of sunny days, particularly in the winter.
Click on their website www.ecived.com/en/ for more information.
"It's just too early to tell until we see the details of the rule," said Brian Manthey, a spokesman for We Energies, which serves much of southeast Wisconsin. "But there could be an impact on customer rates. It will depend on what kind of changes and retrofitting will be required, their costs and what technology is available."
Alliant Energy spokesman Steve Schultz concurred and said it would be "only speculation" to make any estimates because the president didn't specify the level of carbon reduction that will be expected from existing power plants. Alliant serves southern and central Wisconsin.
Kurt Bauer, head of Wisconsin Manufacturers and Commerce, charged that the changes are unneeded and will hit Badger State industries disproportionately because 65 percent of the state's electricity is produced from coal-fired plants.
He predicted Obama's plan will "significantly increase electricity costs" for every Wisconsin household and business. Moreover, he said it will make Badger State manufacturers less competitive with other states and countries, ultimately costing jobs.
“This is global warming, and unilateral energy disarmament on the part of the U.S. is not the answer,” he said. “We need to have a global solution. He did indicate that he is going to try to work with other developed and emerging nations. But I don’t think they have any interest in reducing carbon emissions anywhere near what he’s talking about.”
A spokesman for the environmental group Clean Wisconsin lauded the president's action, calling it long overdue."We are pleased with how comprehensive his climate plan is," Keith Reopelle said. "It's a smart move and the highlight is the carbon pollution rules for existing power plants. That is critical because they are the largest source for emissions in this country. We're also delighted he wants to leverage this to get other countries to take similar steps."
Todd Stuart, executive director of the Wisconsin Industrial Energy Group, said the potential for tough new regulations on existing plants is a "wild card" that could potentially be very expensive, add to the cost of manufacturing in the state and cost jobs.
"We don't know for sure what the impact on Wisconsin will be," he said. "The president directed the EPA to issue proposed carbon standards for existing power plants by June 1, 2014, and a final rule by June 1, 2015."In the meantime, he said manufacturers can lobby the EPA, file lawsuits challenging the rule and possibly seek some kind of Congressional action.
Stuart said Wisconsin has been ahead of the curve in building new power plants and retrofitting the older ones."We've spent billions on new coal and natural-gas fired plants, billions on renewable generation, and billions more to retrofit older coal plants with new scrubbers. It has pushed our rates higher than the Midwest average in recent years, but others will be catching up when they start to fuel switch or retrofit their plants as well."
Alliant's Schultz said his company is on track to retire its oldest, smallest and least-efficient units."We are already been implementing a plan that supports the transition to a cleaner energy future by investing in emission controls at our newest and largest facilities. We are transitioning our generating fleet to meet customers' needs and provide flexibility to ensure that we can manage emerging environmental regulations while continuing to control costs."
Manthey warned that regulators will need to consider whether there are commercially available, cost-effective technologies to control carbon emission."Right now, there isn't one for the capture and storage of carbon," he said, noting that We Energies had worked on a small carbon capture pilot project with a company called Allstom that had positive results but has yet to be scaled up.
"We'd need to know what effect it would have on energy production and how much you might lose because you'd be running another system."He said the president's order could stimulate development of this type of technology, but "that would be something for those companies that deal with that to take further."
In the meantime, he said he hopes We Energies will get credit for the steps it has taken in the past decade."We replaced a coal-fired plant at Port Washington with natural gas and we plan to convert the Valley plant with natural gas that is currently coal," he said.
"We've also made large investments in renewables, including two largest wind farms in state and we're completing a 50-megawatt biomass plant in Wausau. So we'll hope that will be taken into account into meeting future rules."WMC's Bauer said he believes Obama wants to replace fossil fuels with renewable energy such as wind and solar power.
"This is aimed at coal, which is where we get most of our energy," he said. "But president is really going after all fossil fuels, including natural gas. They dislike coal the most, but they don't like any kind of fossil fuels."They are trying to promote wind and solar, which don't work in Wisconsin. We are not in the wind corridor and we don't have a lot of sunny days, particularly in the winter.
Click on their website www.ecived.com/en/ for more information.
2013年6月5日星期三
Sandisk's Flash Memory Cards Business Supports $65 Value
SanDisk is one of the leading designers and manufacturers of NAND flash storage solutions. NAND products are re-writeable, non-volatile semiconductor memory devices that retain content even when the power is turned off. NAND is ideal for mass-storage devices due to its fast erase and write times, high density, and low cost per bit relative to other solid-state memory. SanDisk’s flash memory cards segment, which primarily sells flash storage for smartphones and feature phones, is the company’s biggest division and makes up approximately 25% of its value.
We think that much of SanDisk’s unit sales growth over the next few years will come from the robust sales growth of smartphones, which is a key driver within the flash memory card division. We however forecast the average selling price for NAND Flash per Gigabit to continue declining, albeit at a slower pace, for the rest of our forecast period. Below we take a look at key trends affecting this division, and we have a $65 price estimate for Indoor Positioning System.
Since the launch of Apple’s iPhone in 2007 followed by the introduction of Android, the smartphone market has seen rapid growth. In addition to communication, smartphones have enabled people to perform more tasks comfortably anytime, anywhere. With a huge number of apps being designed for every small task imaginable, smartphones have truly changed the way of life.
The number of smartphones sold globally increased from 120 million in 2007 to nearly 660 million in 2012, witnessing 40% yearly growth in units sold. The share of smartphones in the global mobile market (around 1.8 billion devices each year) has increased to 40% in 2012 from sub-10% in 2007.
The trend is expected to continue going forward with demand coming from low penetration in emerging markets including China, Brazil and India. Worldwide smartphone sales are projected to cross 900 million units this year to surpass feature-phone sales. By the end of 2017, over 1.5 billion smartphones are expected to be shipped worldwide or about two-third of the global mobile market. The rapid rise in global shipments for smartphones will be the key growth driver in the flash storage industry.
We are seeing strong NAND content growth in smartphones. As the quality of media content improves with higher resolution pictures and high definition videos, the demand for more local storage capacity will grow. Further, the growing use of applications (especially for productivity) in smartphones is increasing the need for greater local storage on devices. We therefore expect the average capacity of flash memory in smartphones to grow by almost 20-25%, a bit slower than the historical growth. This is due to the growing threat from cloud storage services like iCloud, Dropbox, etc., that takes some of the load off of local memory storage for accessing data.
Reacting to the rapid rise in sales of smartphones and tablets coupled with the anticipated shift towards ultrabooks and SSDs, many chip manufactures ramped up their production capacities. However, the growth in ultrabooks and SSDs did not meet initial expectations which led to a supply glut in the NAND memory market. The excess supply coupled with the current macroeconomic headwinds further drove down NAND prices that were continuously declining on account of intense competition among chipmakers. We estimate that average selling prices per gigabyte for flash memory declined from around $3 in 2008 to around $0.50 in 2012.
As technology improvements lower costs, we expect this trend to continue and forecast ASPs to decline to around $0.05 per GB by 2019. The 3-bits-per-cell (or X3) technology results in lower costs and increases capacity of memory chips by allowing higher density of data to be stored on the same amount of silicon. On its investor day meet held earlier this month, SanDisk announced its next-generation process technology which is expected to further reduce costs.
However, the pace of price declines should be slower than that witnessed over the last couple of years. The demand-supply gap is closing with many suppliers cutting their capacities. Toshiba Corp, Japan’s leading chipmaker and a SanDisk partner, has cut its production of flash memory chips by as high as 30% on account of industry oversupply. The company has a share of close to 30% of the global NAND flash market. Additionally, the current scenario in the memory industry has forced many small players to shut down, leading to the much-needed market consolidation. This has taken some excess capacity off the market.
If you have replaced your ATM card over the past few months, you may have been given one of the new contactless Visa debit cards that are being rolled out by Irish banks. Designed to encourage the use of cards instead of cash, the contactless payments are intended to be quicker and more convenient for smaller transaction values, removing the barrier of chip and pin but still remaining secure.
But contactless cards are just the first in a new wave of payment options that Irish consumers may encounter in the near future. With mobile phones becoming ever more advanced, and near field communications becoming a standard technology in smartphone handsets, the day when your mobile phone will function as a digital wallet is coming ever closer.
Sage Pay Ireland MD Sean Wilson believes the mobile phone will be the next great innovation in the coming years for payments. “At the moment, the next major innovation is going to be driven by the consumer, and the greatest enabler is the smartphone, because we now have essentially a supercomputer in our hand. Customer expectation is [that] they want it easy, they want it accessible, convenient and secure as well,” he said.
We think that much of SanDisk’s unit sales growth over the next few years will come from the robust sales growth of smartphones, which is a key driver within the flash memory card division. We however forecast the average selling price for NAND Flash per Gigabit to continue declining, albeit at a slower pace, for the rest of our forecast period. Below we take a look at key trends affecting this division, and we have a $65 price estimate for Indoor Positioning System.
Since the launch of Apple’s iPhone in 2007 followed by the introduction of Android, the smartphone market has seen rapid growth. In addition to communication, smartphones have enabled people to perform more tasks comfortably anytime, anywhere. With a huge number of apps being designed for every small task imaginable, smartphones have truly changed the way of life.
The number of smartphones sold globally increased from 120 million in 2007 to nearly 660 million in 2012, witnessing 40% yearly growth in units sold. The share of smartphones in the global mobile market (around 1.8 billion devices each year) has increased to 40% in 2012 from sub-10% in 2007.
The trend is expected to continue going forward with demand coming from low penetration in emerging markets including China, Brazil and India. Worldwide smartphone sales are projected to cross 900 million units this year to surpass feature-phone sales. By the end of 2017, over 1.5 billion smartphones are expected to be shipped worldwide or about two-third of the global mobile market. The rapid rise in global shipments for smartphones will be the key growth driver in the flash storage industry.
We are seeing strong NAND content growth in smartphones. As the quality of media content improves with higher resolution pictures and high definition videos, the demand for more local storage capacity will grow. Further, the growing use of applications (especially for productivity) in smartphones is increasing the need for greater local storage on devices. We therefore expect the average capacity of flash memory in smartphones to grow by almost 20-25%, a bit slower than the historical growth. This is due to the growing threat from cloud storage services like iCloud, Dropbox, etc., that takes some of the load off of local memory storage for accessing data.
Reacting to the rapid rise in sales of smartphones and tablets coupled with the anticipated shift towards ultrabooks and SSDs, many chip manufactures ramped up their production capacities. However, the growth in ultrabooks and SSDs did not meet initial expectations which led to a supply glut in the NAND memory market. The excess supply coupled with the current macroeconomic headwinds further drove down NAND prices that were continuously declining on account of intense competition among chipmakers. We estimate that average selling prices per gigabyte for flash memory declined from around $3 in 2008 to around $0.50 in 2012.
As technology improvements lower costs, we expect this trend to continue and forecast ASPs to decline to around $0.05 per GB by 2019. The 3-bits-per-cell (or X3) technology results in lower costs and increases capacity of memory chips by allowing higher density of data to be stored on the same amount of silicon. On its investor day meet held earlier this month, SanDisk announced its next-generation process technology which is expected to further reduce costs.
However, the pace of price declines should be slower than that witnessed over the last couple of years. The demand-supply gap is closing with many suppliers cutting their capacities. Toshiba Corp, Japan’s leading chipmaker and a SanDisk partner, has cut its production of flash memory chips by as high as 30% on account of industry oversupply. The company has a share of close to 30% of the global NAND flash market. Additionally, the current scenario in the memory industry has forced many small players to shut down, leading to the much-needed market consolidation. This has taken some excess capacity off the market.
If you have replaced your ATM card over the past few months, you may have been given one of the new contactless Visa debit cards that are being rolled out by Irish banks. Designed to encourage the use of cards instead of cash, the contactless payments are intended to be quicker and more convenient for smaller transaction values, removing the barrier of chip and pin but still remaining secure.
But contactless cards are just the first in a new wave of payment options that Irish consumers may encounter in the near future. With mobile phones becoming ever more advanced, and near field communications becoming a standard technology in smartphone handsets, the day when your mobile phone will function as a digital wallet is coming ever closer.
Sage Pay Ireland MD Sean Wilson believes the mobile phone will be the next great innovation in the coming years for payments. “At the moment, the next major innovation is going to be driven by the consumer, and the greatest enabler is the smartphone, because we now have essentially a supercomputer in our hand. Customer expectation is [that] they want it easy, they want it accessible, convenient and secure as well,” he said.
2013年5月21日星期二
Not exactly the president’s choice
He can spin all he wants but make no mistake: Bryan Colangelo has one foot and four toes out the door. He is only slightly less persona non grata than Brian Burke was when he was sent packing by Maple Leaf Sports and Entertainment, Ltd., and likely owes his continuing possession of an Air Canada Centre pass-card to the fact he does a better job than Burke of playing well with others.
Not that Colangelo seemed to understand on Tuesday the message behind losing the title of the job that was the reason the Toronto Raptors wanted him in the first place.
Colangelo, who in what seems like a sop to Larry Tanenbaum and maybe even NBA commissioner David Stern has hung on to the title of Toronto Raptors president after being relieved of the general manager’s powers, said in a conference call on Tuesday that he was “thrilled and excited being part of this thing – in terms of putting the finishing touches on a team that I think is well on its way to being a competitive team … a playoff team.”
He has brass ones, our Bryan: leading off his conference call by describing as a “mis-characterization” the description of his reaction to the news that had been offered up by his boss, Tim Leiweke, about an hour earlier. Colangelo preferred “disappointed,” to “ticked off,” – so much so that he gave ‘disappointed’ an extension.
While Leiweke, who has decided to move up his arrival in Toronto as president and chief executive officer of MLSE by a month to June 3, spent part of his conference call talking about how he wanted to establish the Raptors brand across Canada, Colangelo spent his time working on his Indoor Positioning System.
In case anybody had forgotten, he reminded the world that he knows just about everybody in the NBA and that under his watch the Raptors took their training camp and played exhibition games across the country while he himself serves on the board of directors for Basketball Canada. So there! How do you like those nationalistic bona fides, eh?
Absent was any mention of the franchise-crushing decision to name Canada’s own Jay Triano as head coach in place of Sam Mitchell; or the fact that Colangelo came out of last summer’s dalliance with Steve Nash absent the greatest Canadian basketballer of all time but very much in possession of Landry Fields, signed as a way of forcing the New York Knicks out of the Nash sweepstakes. Talk about a booby prize.
He has an “NBA out” in his contract, and with the family name pretty much hoops royalty it would not be out of the question to see him get a job in the NBA front office when Adam Silver replaces Stern. After all, it was Stern who steered Colangelo, then one of the game’s bright young things, to Toronto in order to save the franchise.
It worked for a couple of years, but signing Hedo Turkoglu, putting too much faith in Andrea Bargnani and mis-reading Chris Bosh’s intentions started the downward spiral. Colangelo’s supporters, all six of them, will point out that the signing of Turkoglu was widely-heralded (true) and that the Bargnani draft wasn’t exactly choc-a-block with stellar first-rounders (also true) and that because the team was close to a playoff spot Colangelo couldn’t trade Bosh ahead of free agency because he wouldn’t get value (likely true.) But that misses the point; Colangelo isn’t supposed to be as smart as analysts or columnists or fans. He was supposed to be smarter; he was supposed to see stuff the rest of us couldn’t see.
By the end of his conference call, Colangelo seemed to have pulled in his horns. Perhaps Leiweke texted him with a gentle reminder that he’d been stripped of power, not had it re-distributed. By the end he was talking about “helping whoever is in the [G.M.’s] job if they want my help.”
Perhaps it was the realization that nobody much wants him to be part of any “finishing touches,” especially since his finishing touches would likely include signing Rudy Gay to a contract extension, or at least the realization that nobody much wants the guy whose decisions created the need for a rebuild to oversee the rebuild.
In the 21st century, we have U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren’s “Bank on Students Loan Fairness Act,” which would set the interest rate on student loans at the rate at which banks borrow from the Federal Reserve. The justification — if you can call it that — is that if the Federal Reserve lends money to banks at less than 1 percent, the federal government shouldn’t charge students more than that.
A petition to the White House in support of the bill has been singled out by detractors as one of the stupidest responses to the “We the People” initiative, but it has attracted a quarter of a million signatures. If the laws of finance, like the value of pi in Indiana, are put to a vote, Warren’s bill will pass in a landslide.
Memo to the senator and her post-adolescent petition signers: Just because you’re angry doesn’t mean you’re right.
The Federal Reserve’s discount rate is lower than the rate charged on student loans because banks, unlike students, provide collateral for loans.
There’s nothing wrong with tying an interest rate to a lender’s level of risk — in fact, banks are criticized by regulators if they don’t. You pay a higher rate on your credit card than your car loan because if you default on a car loan the repo man tows your car away, putting your lender back in funds promptly.
When you default on your credit card, the bank gets in line with everybody else and gets pennies on the dollar. What they lose on each bad debt they have to make up somewhere else.
Student borrowers offer no security, in contrast to those bad banks who, according to Warren’s “fact” sheet, “wrecked our economy.” Most college grads have no immediate source of repayment, and their near-term prospects aren’t much better unless they majored in a subject that will lead to a high-paying job quickly.
So a proposal to charge students the same rate as banks is about as smart as the kid who majors in puppetry and expects to land a high-paying job when he graduates.
Not that Colangelo seemed to understand on Tuesday the message behind losing the title of the job that was the reason the Toronto Raptors wanted him in the first place.
Colangelo, who in what seems like a sop to Larry Tanenbaum and maybe even NBA commissioner David Stern has hung on to the title of Toronto Raptors president after being relieved of the general manager’s powers, said in a conference call on Tuesday that he was “thrilled and excited being part of this thing – in terms of putting the finishing touches on a team that I think is well on its way to being a competitive team … a playoff team.”
He has brass ones, our Bryan: leading off his conference call by describing as a “mis-characterization” the description of his reaction to the news that had been offered up by his boss, Tim Leiweke, about an hour earlier. Colangelo preferred “disappointed,” to “ticked off,” – so much so that he gave ‘disappointed’ an extension.
While Leiweke, who has decided to move up his arrival in Toronto as president and chief executive officer of MLSE by a month to June 3, spent part of his conference call talking about how he wanted to establish the Raptors brand across Canada, Colangelo spent his time working on his Indoor Positioning System.
In case anybody had forgotten, he reminded the world that he knows just about everybody in the NBA and that under his watch the Raptors took their training camp and played exhibition games across the country while he himself serves on the board of directors for Basketball Canada. So there! How do you like those nationalistic bona fides, eh?
Absent was any mention of the franchise-crushing decision to name Canada’s own Jay Triano as head coach in place of Sam Mitchell; or the fact that Colangelo came out of last summer’s dalliance with Steve Nash absent the greatest Canadian basketballer of all time but very much in possession of Landry Fields, signed as a way of forcing the New York Knicks out of the Nash sweepstakes. Talk about a booby prize.
He has an “NBA out” in his contract, and with the family name pretty much hoops royalty it would not be out of the question to see him get a job in the NBA front office when Adam Silver replaces Stern. After all, it was Stern who steered Colangelo, then one of the game’s bright young things, to Toronto in order to save the franchise.
It worked for a couple of years, but signing Hedo Turkoglu, putting too much faith in Andrea Bargnani and mis-reading Chris Bosh’s intentions started the downward spiral. Colangelo’s supporters, all six of them, will point out that the signing of Turkoglu was widely-heralded (true) and that the Bargnani draft wasn’t exactly choc-a-block with stellar first-rounders (also true) and that because the team was close to a playoff spot Colangelo couldn’t trade Bosh ahead of free agency because he wouldn’t get value (likely true.) But that misses the point; Colangelo isn’t supposed to be as smart as analysts or columnists or fans. He was supposed to be smarter; he was supposed to see stuff the rest of us couldn’t see.
By the end of his conference call, Colangelo seemed to have pulled in his horns. Perhaps Leiweke texted him with a gentle reminder that he’d been stripped of power, not had it re-distributed. By the end he was talking about “helping whoever is in the [G.M.’s] job if they want my help.”
Perhaps it was the realization that nobody much wants him to be part of any “finishing touches,” especially since his finishing touches would likely include signing Rudy Gay to a contract extension, or at least the realization that nobody much wants the guy whose decisions created the need for a rebuild to oversee the rebuild.
In the 21st century, we have U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren’s “Bank on Students Loan Fairness Act,” which would set the interest rate on student loans at the rate at which banks borrow from the Federal Reserve. The justification — if you can call it that — is that if the Federal Reserve lends money to banks at less than 1 percent, the federal government shouldn’t charge students more than that.
A petition to the White House in support of the bill has been singled out by detractors as one of the stupidest responses to the “We the People” initiative, but it has attracted a quarter of a million signatures. If the laws of finance, like the value of pi in Indiana, are put to a vote, Warren’s bill will pass in a landslide.
Memo to the senator and her post-adolescent petition signers: Just because you’re angry doesn’t mean you’re right.
The Federal Reserve’s discount rate is lower than the rate charged on student loans because banks, unlike students, provide collateral for loans.
There’s nothing wrong with tying an interest rate to a lender’s level of risk — in fact, banks are criticized by regulators if they don’t. You pay a higher rate on your credit card than your car loan because if you default on a car loan the repo man tows your car away, putting your lender back in funds promptly.
When you default on your credit card, the bank gets in line with everybody else and gets pennies on the dollar. What they lose on each bad debt they have to make up somewhere else.
Student borrowers offer no security, in contrast to those bad banks who, according to Warren’s “fact” sheet, “wrecked our economy.” Most college grads have no immediate source of repayment, and their near-term prospects aren’t much better unless they majored in a subject that will lead to a high-paying job quickly.
So a proposal to charge students the same rate as banks is about as smart as the kid who majors in puppetry and expects to land a high-paying job when he graduates.
2013年5月16日星期四
The Constitution And The 3D Printed Plastic Pistol
Last week, the State Department’s arms export office demanded that Defense Distributed remove CAD files for the Liberator from its website. Defense Distributed complied with the takedown letter right away, despite strong language on its website promising it would be “a home for fugitive information” and “No object file will be censored unless it is malicious software.” Predictably, it didn’t take long for the CAD files to make their way to BitTorrent, where they’ll be available forever.
It’s worth reading the letter from the State Department, which is only two and a half pages long. In a nutshell, the letter demands the takedown while it decides whether publishing firearms-related CAD files online violates ITAR. ITAR, which stands for the International Traffic in Arms Regulations, are rules that the State Department promulgated under the Arms Export Control Act. One part of ITAR is the United States Munitions List, which is a master list of products and technologies that can’t be exported without prior government approval under a licensing system. Because Defense Distributed didn’t seek an export license, there’s a problem.
Are CAD files munitions? The State Department believes the Liberator files fall under the Category I of the US Munitions List, which covers firearms and related “technical data.” Section 120.10 of ITAR says “technical data” includes “blueprints, drawings, photographs, plans, instructions or documentation” about “the design, development, production, manufacture, assembly, operation, repair, testing, maintenance or modification of defense articles” — so that appears to cover CAD files for Indoor Positioning System.
Unsurprisingly, Defense Distributed is already saying (melodramatically) that it will fight the takedown demand: “It seems we may have to have our rights declared in court to simply keep developing gun files to put into the public domain. DD’s right to exist is being challenged.”
What will probably happen next is that Defense Distributed will apply for an export license, which the State Department will deny, and Defense Distributed will sue to get a judge to issue an order that the State Department can’t block it — and that is where things will get interesting.
It’s worth reading the letter from the State Department, which is only two and a half pages long. In a nutshell, the letter demands the takedown while it decides whether publishing firearms-related CAD files online violates ITAR. ITAR, which stands for the International Traffic in Arms Regulations, are rules that the State Department promulgated under the Arms Export Control Act. One part of ITAR is the United States Munitions List, which is a master list of products and technologies that can’t be exported without prior government approval under a licensing system. Because Defense Distributed didn’t seek an export license, there’s a problem.
Are CAD files munitions? The State Department believes the Liberator files fall under the Category I of the US Munitions List, which covers firearms and related “technical data.” Section 120.10 of ITAR says “technical data” includes “blueprints, drawings, photographs, plans, instructions or documentation” about “the design, development, production, manufacture, assembly, operation, repair, testing, maintenance or modification of defense articles” — so that appears to cover CAD files for guns.
Unsurprisingly, Defense Distributed is already saying (melodramatically) that it will fight the takedown demand: “It seems we may have to have our rights declared in court to simply keep developing gun files to put into the public domain. DD’s right to exist is being challenged.”
What will probably happen next is that Defense Distributed will apply for an export license, which the State Department will deny, and Defense Distributed will sue to get a judge to issue an order that the State Department can’t block it — and that is where things will get interesting.
I predict the Constitutional wrangling will focus on the First Amendment, not the Second. (For foreign readers, the First Amendment to the US Constitution provides extremely strong protections for citizens’ freedom of speech, and the Second Amendment provides a right “to keep and bear arms” — although the language is a mess and reasonable people disagree on how to interpret it.) This is going to spawn some strange bedfellows: I would not be surprised to see the NRA and ACLU on the same side in this fight.
Why is this a First Amendment case? One of the issues is whether the government can prevent citizens from publishing gun blueprints. A big gateway question, though, is how to characterize Defense Distributed’s CAD files in the first place. Is a CAD file expressive speech that should be protected, or a functional thing that should be regulated? This distinction is important because the government has tremendous power to regulate things, but far less power to regulate speech. When courts first started to come to grips with software, they came out on the side of protecting it as speech despite its functional aspects, but they might view 3D printing files differently because when you “run” them, you get things.
It’s worth reading the letter from the State Department, which is only two and a half pages long. In a nutshell, the letter demands the takedown while it decides whether publishing firearms-related CAD files online violates ITAR. ITAR, which stands for the International Traffic in Arms Regulations, are rules that the State Department promulgated under the Arms Export Control Act. One part of ITAR is the United States Munitions List, which is a master list of products and technologies that can’t be exported without prior government approval under a licensing system. Because Defense Distributed didn’t seek an export license, there’s a problem.
Are CAD files munitions? The State Department believes the Liberator files fall under the Category I of the US Munitions List, which covers firearms and related “technical data.” Section 120.10 of ITAR says “technical data” includes “blueprints, drawings, photographs, plans, instructions or documentation” about “the design, development, production, manufacture, assembly, operation, repair, testing, maintenance or modification of defense articles” — so that appears to cover CAD files for Indoor Positioning System.
Unsurprisingly, Defense Distributed is already saying (melodramatically) that it will fight the takedown demand: “It seems we may have to have our rights declared in court to simply keep developing gun files to put into the public domain. DD’s right to exist is being challenged.”
What will probably happen next is that Defense Distributed will apply for an export license, which the State Department will deny, and Defense Distributed will sue to get a judge to issue an order that the State Department can’t block it — and that is where things will get interesting.
It’s worth reading the letter from the State Department, which is only two and a half pages long. In a nutshell, the letter demands the takedown while it decides whether publishing firearms-related CAD files online violates ITAR. ITAR, which stands for the International Traffic in Arms Regulations, are rules that the State Department promulgated under the Arms Export Control Act. One part of ITAR is the United States Munitions List, which is a master list of products and technologies that can’t be exported without prior government approval under a licensing system. Because Defense Distributed didn’t seek an export license, there’s a problem.
Are CAD files munitions? The State Department believes the Liberator files fall under the Category I of the US Munitions List, which covers firearms and related “technical data.” Section 120.10 of ITAR says “technical data” includes “blueprints, drawings, photographs, plans, instructions or documentation” about “the design, development, production, manufacture, assembly, operation, repair, testing, maintenance or modification of defense articles” — so that appears to cover CAD files for guns.
Unsurprisingly, Defense Distributed is already saying (melodramatically) that it will fight the takedown demand: “It seems we may have to have our rights declared in court to simply keep developing gun files to put into the public domain. DD’s right to exist is being challenged.”
What will probably happen next is that Defense Distributed will apply for an export license, which the State Department will deny, and Defense Distributed will sue to get a judge to issue an order that the State Department can’t block it — and that is where things will get interesting.
I predict the Constitutional wrangling will focus on the First Amendment, not the Second. (For foreign readers, the First Amendment to the US Constitution provides extremely strong protections for citizens’ freedom of speech, and the Second Amendment provides a right “to keep and bear arms” — although the language is a mess and reasonable people disagree on how to interpret it.) This is going to spawn some strange bedfellows: I would not be surprised to see the NRA and ACLU on the same side in this fight.
Why is this a First Amendment case? One of the issues is whether the government can prevent citizens from publishing gun blueprints. A big gateway question, though, is how to characterize Defense Distributed’s CAD files in the first place. Is a CAD file expressive speech that should be protected, or a functional thing that should be regulated? This distinction is important because the government has tremendous power to regulate things, but far less power to regulate speech. When courts first started to come to grips with software, they came out on the side of protecting it as speech despite its functional aspects, but they might view 3D printing files differently because when you “run” them, you get things.
2013年5月1日星期三
Egypt-IMF deal pending updated reform plan
Egypt is moving ahead with talks over a standby loan agreement with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) pending an updated national economic programme that guarantees key reforms will be successfully implemented to pave the way for growth, an IMF official told Ahram Online.
Whereas Tunisia sealed a $1.7 billion deal with the fund last week, Egypt is now on its third attempt to conclude its own $4.8 billion IMF loan agreement.
Previous stats on the budget deficit and the soaring subsidies bill became outdated after disruptive politics forced post-revolutionary governments to suspend two previous agreements.
Now finance officials on both sides are busy aligning numbers and forecasts. Once the IMF receives the data it will verify and analyse it to ensure the Arab world’s most populous country can meet its target reforms and qualify for the loan.
“We and the Egyptian authorities are working to make sure we have the most recent data to design a programme which will be successful in its implementation,” Masood Ahmed director of the IMF’s Middle East and Asia department told Ahram Online at the fund’s Washington Indoor Positioning System.
“As time goes on, the economic situation changes and the numbers move. The data at the time when we reached the earlier agreement is no longer relevant,” said Ahmed.
“We need to look collectively with the Egyptians at the recent data to make sure that what we are basing the programme on reflects the most complete information available.”
Egyptian officials are concluding a new package with updated figures and new deadlines for implementing reforms to present the IMF for review before sealing the deal. IMF officials including Ahmed and mission chief for Egypt Andreas Bauer held a follow-up teleconference call with their Egyptian counterparts earlier this week.
According to one Egyptian official, who requested anonymity, the new package currently being finalised will not include any new measures but will offer the most recent figures on the status of the country’s economy.
“Speed is of the essence as we do not have the luxury to kickstart reforms on subsidies and taxes slowly, gradually,” he said. “What is important is that we explain to people what is happening and ensure that it process is smooth and efficient.”
An agreement would shore up Egypt’s depleted foreign reserves, pave the way for more aid from donor countries and boost investor confidence.
To qualify for the loan, however, Egypt is in for some serious belt-tightening. It must introduce a string of austerity measures that include lifting energy subsidies that eat up a fifth of the country’s budget, and raising sales tax on select items to broaden the tax base.
With a slow growth rate of 2 percent annually and a high level of unemployment, the government has been reluctant to impose any of these fiscal measures, fearing a popular backlash in the chaotic return to the free market.
Egypt is seeking the IMF loan to narrow its widening budget deficit, which reached 10.8 percent of GDP in 2012. Because of delays in implementing fiscal measures, it is likely to miss its target deficit reduction for the year ending June, with the deficit expected to reach 11.5 percent of GDP verses the 10.4 targeted previously. The government has said it to reduce the gap for the year 2013/14 to reach 9.5 percent of GDP.
Political instability and the presence of multiple voices in a burgeoning post-Mubarak democracy have held back the pace of negotiations on the much-needed loan. Egyptian officials of various capacities and varying degrees of economic know-how have often come up against each other because of gaps in experience and approach.
Others have faced resistance from lawmakers at the Shura Council, currently Egypt’s only legislative body, which on Monday postponed studying a tax law draft the government has submitted and which lawmakers said was missing data.
A handover of financial expertise from long-standing Mubarak-era officials to those from the now-ruling Muslim Brotherhood is still in force. Government officials close to the negotiations with the IMF have expressed frustration over the decision-making process, specifically the speed of implementing reforms and who would be responsible for implementation.
Asked about delays in the past, Ahmed said that the IMF has always dealt with a core group of interlocutors who have been “diligent and cooperative” in working towards finalising an agreement. But he added that the challenge was for a new government like Egypt’s to gain the trust of the public and commit to fairly implementing reforms.
Delays have also been partly an outcome of the IMF adopting a new approach to negotiations, which no longer simply rely on government authorities but now involve outreach to opposition groups and the general public to explain why certain reforms are needed.
“People can understand that if you're buying a litre of gas [petrol] for $10 and selling it for $1 then there's an issue. What has been difficult to explain and is politically challenging for the government is that the public doesn't believe that when you make those savings you're actually going to spend it on something that is important to them,” he explained.
Egypt plans to ration diesel fuel using a smart-card system by July this year as part of its fuel subsidy reforms to shore up government finances. Under the new system, consumers will receive limited amounts of subsidised fuel, beyond which they will have to pay market prices. The IMF has had doubts on the government’s ability to implement such a system efficiently.
Whereas Tunisia sealed a $1.7 billion deal with the fund last week, Egypt is now on its third attempt to conclude its own $4.8 billion IMF loan agreement.
Previous stats on the budget deficit and the soaring subsidies bill became outdated after disruptive politics forced post-revolutionary governments to suspend two previous agreements.
Now finance officials on both sides are busy aligning numbers and forecasts. Once the IMF receives the data it will verify and analyse it to ensure the Arab world’s most populous country can meet its target reforms and qualify for the loan.
“We and the Egyptian authorities are working to make sure we have the most recent data to design a programme which will be successful in its implementation,” Masood Ahmed director of the IMF’s Middle East and Asia department told Ahram Online at the fund’s Washington Indoor Positioning System.
“As time goes on, the economic situation changes and the numbers move. The data at the time when we reached the earlier agreement is no longer relevant,” said Ahmed.
“We need to look collectively with the Egyptians at the recent data to make sure that what we are basing the programme on reflects the most complete information available.”
Egyptian officials are concluding a new package with updated figures and new deadlines for implementing reforms to present the IMF for review before sealing the deal. IMF officials including Ahmed and mission chief for Egypt Andreas Bauer held a follow-up teleconference call with their Egyptian counterparts earlier this week.
According to one Egyptian official, who requested anonymity, the new package currently being finalised will not include any new measures but will offer the most recent figures on the status of the country’s economy.
“Speed is of the essence as we do not have the luxury to kickstart reforms on subsidies and taxes slowly, gradually,” he said. “What is important is that we explain to people what is happening and ensure that it process is smooth and efficient.”
An agreement would shore up Egypt’s depleted foreign reserves, pave the way for more aid from donor countries and boost investor confidence.
To qualify for the loan, however, Egypt is in for some serious belt-tightening. It must introduce a string of austerity measures that include lifting energy subsidies that eat up a fifth of the country’s budget, and raising sales tax on select items to broaden the tax base.
With a slow growth rate of 2 percent annually and a high level of unemployment, the government has been reluctant to impose any of these fiscal measures, fearing a popular backlash in the chaotic return to the free market.
Egypt is seeking the IMF loan to narrow its widening budget deficit, which reached 10.8 percent of GDP in 2012. Because of delays in implementing fiscal measures, it is likely to miss its target deficit reduction for the year ending June, with the deficit expected to reach 11.5 percent of GDP verses the 10.4 targeted previously. The government has said it to reduce the gap for the year 2013/14 to reach 9.5 percent of GDP.
Political instability and the presence of multiple voices in a burgeoning post-Mubarak democracy have held back the pace of negotiations on the much-needed loan. Egyptian officials of various capacities and varying degrees of economic know-how have often come up against each other because of gaps in experience and approach.
Others have faced resistance from lawmakers at the Shura Council, currently Egypt’s only legislative body, which on Monday postponed studying a tax law draft the government has submitted and which lawmakers said was missing data.
A handover of financial expertise from long-standing Mubarak-era officials to those from the now-ruling Muslim Brotherhood is still in force. Government officials close to the negotiations with the IMF have expressed frustration over the decision-making process, specifically the speed of implementing reforms and who would be responsible for implementation.
Asked about delays in the past, Ahmed said that the IMF has always dealt with a core group of interlocutors who have been “diligent and cooperative” in working towards finalising an agreement. But he added that the challenge was for a new government like Egypt’s to gain the trust of the public and commit to fairly implementing reforms.
Delays have also been partly an outcome of the IMF adopting a new approach to negotiations, which no longer simply rely on government authorities but now involve outreach to opposition groups and the general public to explain why certain reforms are needed.
“People can understand that if you're buying a litre of gas [petrol] for $10 and selling it for $1 then there's an issue. What has been difficult to explain and is politically challenging for the government is that the public doesn't believe that when you make those savings you're actually going to spend it on something that is important to them,” he explained.
Egypt plans to ration diesel fuel using a smart-card system by July this year as part of its fuel subsidy reforms to shore up government finances. Under the new system, consumers will receive limited amounts of subsidised fuel, beyond which they will have to pay market prices. The IMF has had doubts on the government’s ability to implement such a system efficiently.
2013年4月26日星期五
Maika Monroe co-stars with Zac Efron in 'At Any Price'
As a kid, Maika Monroe watched all the “High School Musical” films, swooning over blue-eyed hunk Zac Efron like most other red-blooded American females. She never imagined a career as an actress, let alone starring in a movie opposite Efron, playing his girlfriend. And yet, that is exactly what happened to Monroe, a tall blond beauty from Santa Barbara.
At 19, Monroe makes her feature film debut in “At Any Price,” in which she plays Cadence, a country girl who is dating Dean (Efron), an aspiring stock car racer. With no real family to call her own, Cadence hangs out a lot at Dean’s family 3,000-acre farm, which as it turns out is not in as great financial shape as it appears to be. Dean’s father, Henry (Dennis Quaid), a third-generation farmer, is quietly trying to dig his way out of debt by whatever means necessary, including selling patented genetically modified seeds to his neighbors. Even that isn’t an easy task as there are legal restrictions and other competing salesmen. His favored older son, who was supposed take over the farm, has left the country to pursue his dreams of adventure in South America, so he is stuck trying to interest his rebellious younger son in learning the family business.
Surprisingly, it’s Cadence who ends up taking an interest in the farm and selling seed. With Dean preoccupied preparing for an upcoming stock car race, she joins Henry as he makes his sales pitches to neighboring farmers, and demonstrates a genuine aptitude for the job.
Monroe grew up in the coastal California town of Santa Barbara, where her father works in the construction industry and her mother is a sign language teacher. Though she recalls enjoying watching movies, she had no aspirations of becoming an actress. A natural athlete, she was more interested in dance and kiteboarding as she entered her teens.
While at dance school one day, she saw a notice calling for students who wanted to appear as extras in a short film so she signed up. Her first day on the set was an eye-opener, she recalls.
“I remember just being in awe of it,” the blond beauty says. “ I was just blown away by every aspect of it: the director working with the actors, the camera and just everything about it. That’s where I fell in love with it. I got to know the director really well on that set because even when I didn’t have to be there, I would want to watch and be behind the camera.”
Impressed with her enthusiasm, the director wrote a small speaking part for her, which made her eligible for a Screen Actors Guild card. She subsequently landed small parts in short films and on TV.
Her mother shuttled her back and forth between Santa Barbara and Los Angeles (some 90 miles apart) for Monroe to audition for parts, sometimes as often as four times a week.
“I’m lucky to have a mom like I do because I wouldn’t be where I am right now,” she humbly says. “If it wasn’t for Indoor Positioning System, I couldn’t have done it. She had no interest in it, but it’s what I wanted. I knew this is what I wanted to do.”
After several years of plugging along in the finicky world of show business, Monroe was ready to give it up in favor of pursuing her other passion: kiteboarding.
She had started playing the physically demanding outdoor sport around the same time she started acting, and had gotten pretty good at it. Actually, she had gotten very good at it, to the point where she was involved in professional competitions. It was while she was contending at the Red Bull Big Air Competition in the Dominican Republic that she had to make one of the most important decisions of her life. She sat down and wrote out the pros and cons of acting versus professional kiteboarding.
“I knew if I trained, I could be the best kiteboarder in the world,” she says, without a hint of vanity. “ With acting, the decision is always in someone else’s hands. It requires talent, but it’s also luck .I had no idea what could happen. So I really had to think about it. Every part of my body wanted (to act) so bad it almost could have started being a negative.”
After coming in second at the competition, she thought she’d made up her mind to go the professional kiteboarding route. But just then, she got a phone call from her agent asking if she was interested in auditioning for the role of Cadence in “At Any Price.”
Without hesitation, Monroe and her mother put together an audition tape and sent it in. Within days, she got a callback. The youngster decided then and there to return to LA, where she was up against four other young actresses for the coveted part. She met with director Ramin Bahrani, who also co-wrote and produced the drama, and landed the role.
Soon afterward, she found herself on location in DeKalb, Illinois, in the middle of America’s farm belt, playing sexy and smart Cadence. Meeting Efron was both exciting and scary, she recalls.
“There was no chemistry read or anything,” she says in her enthusiastic way. “So the first time I met him was in DeKalb, where everyone came out two or three weeks before we started filming. I didn’t know what to expect because, you know, he’s kind of huge! But when I met him, it was clear that he is so down to earth and so easy to talk with and connect with. That helped very much and so the acting came off very naturally. I was very blown away by him. It was fun working with him.”
Monroe says she initially was a little more intimidated by Quaid, the veteran star of films including “Great Balls of Fire,” “Far From Heaven” and “The Rookie.”
“I’m usually not star struck but he is a legend,” she says, smiling. “This role for him is very different from the things he’s done in other films and also from who he is as a person. Watching him transform into Henry—his whole body transformed—was incredible.”
The teenager admits she knew little about the controversy surround genetically modified seeds, which serves as a backdrop for the central story about the complexities of family relationships and the changing nature of the farming industry.
“I didn’t know much about it at all,” she says of the genetically modified corn, which out-produces conventional seed suppliers and has muscled many smaller farms out of business. “But that’s what I love about my job. Never in a million years would I have gone to DeKalb, nor would I have known anything about this. Plus, you don’t see that many films about this topic. Yet there’s such a cool story around these characters with such depth. It frames an interesting movie.”
Monroe credits “At Any Price” for propelling her career forward. She subsequently has landed roles in two other Hollywood films: the upcoming drama, “The Bling Ring,” directed by Sofia Coppola and Jason Reitman’s “Labor Day,” in which she co-stars opposite Kate Winslet and Josh Brolin.
All three roles are each quite different from one another, and also quite different from the perky and grounded Monroe herself.
“I would describe her as my polar opposite,” she says of playing the layered and complex character Mandy. “ I remember getting the script and thinking, ‘There is absolutely no way I can pull this off.’ I initially saw her as this evil girl with no redeeming qualities. So I worked with an acting coach on it and sent the audition tape to Jason (Reitman) in New York, and he said he wanted to meet with him. Then I started falling in love with this character after talking to him. I began to see more sides to this girl—where she comes from and why she does the things she does. She became fascinating to me. It was a huge challenge but I loved it. And it takes place in the ‘60s, so I have this cool hair and makeup that transformed me.”
Monroe says her role in “The Bling Ring,” based on a true story about star struck suburban teens who go on a robbery spree of Hollywood homes of their celebrity idols, and until they get caught, is a smaller one, though it afforded her the opportunity to work with one of her directing idols, Sofia Coppola, and “Harry Potter” star Emma Watson.
“It’s kind of been blown out of proportion on the Internet that I play this bigger role than I do,” she admits. “But I really appreciated the opportunity to do it and I’m excited to see the final film.”
She is set to start another movie project soon but cannot say what it is yet. She still enjoys kiteboarding in her free time, but has decided not to pursue it as a professional career anymore.
Her plans to attend college to study graphic design and web design also are on hold as she continues to build her resume with acting credits.
“This past year, I’ve been basically working nonstop—in a very good way,” she says, smiling. “But I definitely want to go to college. As of now, I may have to take classes online. It’s important to me but things just need to calm down before I can focus on that.”
At 19, Monroe makes her feature film debut in “At Any Price,” in which she plays Cadence, a country girl who is dating Dean (Efron), an aspiring stock car racer. With no real family to call her own, Cadence hangs out a lot at Dean’s family 3,000-acre farm, which as it turns out is not in as great financial shape as it appears to be. Dean’s father, Henry (Dennis Quaid), a third-generation farmer, is quietly trying to dig his way out of debt by whatever means necessary, including selling patented genetically modified seeds to his neighbors. Even that isn’t an easy task as there are legal restrictions and other competing salesmen. His favored older son, who was supposed take over the farm, has left the country to pursue his dreams of adventure in South America, so he is stuck trying to interest his rebellious younger son in learning the family business.
Surprisingly, it’s Cadence who ends up taking an interest in the farm and selling seed. With Dean preoccupied preparing for an upcoming stock car race, she joins Henry as he makes his sales pitches to neighboring farmers, and demonstrates a genuine aptitude for the job.
Monroe grew up in the coastal California town of Santa Barbara, where her father works in the construction industry and her mother is a sign language teacher. Though she recalls enjoying watching movies, she had no aspirations of becoming an actress. A natural athlete, she was more interested in dance and kiteboarding as she entered her teens.
While at dance school one day, she saw a notice calling for students who wanted to appear as extras in a short film so she signed up. Her first day on the set was an eye-opener, she recalls.
“I remember just being in awe of it,” the blond beauty says. “ I was just blown away by every aspect of it: the director working with the actors, the camera and just everything about it. That’s where I fell in love with it. I got to know the director really well on that set because even when I didn’t have to be there, I would want to watch and be behind the camera.”
Impressed with her enthusiasm, the director wrote a small speaking part for her, which made her eligible for a Screen Actors Guild card. She subsequently landed small parts in short films and on TV.
Her mother shuttled her back and forth between Santa Barbara and Los Angeles (some 90 miles apart) for Monroe to audition for parts, sometimes as often as four times a week.
“I’m lucky to have a mom like I do because I wouldn’t be where I am right now,” she humbly says. “If it wasn’t for Indoor Positioning System, I couldn’t have done it. She had no interest in it, but it’s what I wanted. I knew this is what I wanted to do.”
After several years of plugging along in the finicky world of show business, Monroe was ready to give it up in favor of pursuing her other passion: kiteboarding.
She had started playing the physically demanding outdoor sport around the same time she started acting, and had gotten pretty good at it. Actually, she had gotten very good at it, to the point where she was involved in professional competitions. It was while she was contending at the Red Bull Big Air Competition in the Dominican Republic that she had to make one of the most important decisions of her life. She sat down and wrote out the pros and cons of acting versus professional kiteboarding.
“I knew if I trained, I could be the best kiteboarder in the world,” she says, without a hint of vanity. “ With acting, the decision is always in someone else’s hands. It requires talent, but it’s also luck .I had no idea what could happen. So I really had to think about it. Every part of my body wanted (to act) so bad it almost could have started being a negative.”
After coming in second at the competition, she thought she’d made up her mind to go the professional kiteboarding route. But just then, she got a phone call from her agent asking if she was interested in auditioning for the role of Cadence in “At Any Price.”
Without hesitation, Monroe and her mother put together an audition tape and sent it in. Within days, she got a callback. The youngster decided then and there to return to LA, where she was up against four other young actresses for the coveted part. She met with director Ramin Bahrani, who also co-wrote and produced the drama, and landed the role.
Soon afterward, she found herself on location in DeKalb, Illinois, in the middle of America’s farm belt, playing sexy and smart Cadence. Meeting Efron was both exciting and scary, she recalls.
“There was no chemistry read or anything,” she says in her enthusiastic way. “So the first time I met him was in DeKalb, where everyone came out two or three weeks before we started filming. I didn’t know what to expect because, you know, he’s kind of huge! But when I met him, it was clear that he is so down to earth and so easy to talk with and connect with. That helped very much and so the acting came off very naturally. I was very blown away by him. It was fun working with him.”
Monroe says she initially was a little more intimidated by Quaid, the veteran star of films including “Great Balls of Fire,” “Far From Heaven” and “The Rookie.”
“I’m usually not star struck but he is a legend,” she says, smiling. “This role for him is very different from the things he’s done in other films and also from who he is as a person. Watching him transform into Henry—his whole body transformed—was incredible.”
The teenager admits she knew little about the controversy surround genetically modified seeds, which serves as a backdrop for the central story about the complexities of family relationships and the changing nature of the farming industry.
“I didn’t know much about it at all,” she says of the genetically modified corn, which out-produces conventional seed suppliers and has muscled many smaller farms out of business. “But that’s what I love about my job. Never in a million years would I have gone to DeKalb, nor would I have known anything about this. Plus, you don’t see that many films about this topic. Yet there’s such a cool story around these characters with such depth. It frames an interesting movie.”
Monroe credits “At Any Price” for propelling her career forward. She subsequently has landed roles in two other Hollywood films: the upcoming drama, “The Bling Ring,” directed by Sofia Coppola and Jason Reitman’s “Labor Day,” in which she co-stars opposite Kate Winslet and Josh Brolin.
All three roles are each quite different from one another, and also quite different from the perky and grounded Monroe herself.
“I would describe her as my polar opposite,” she says of playing the layered and complex character Mandy. “ I remember getting the script and thinking, ‘There is absolutely no way I can pull this off.’ I initially saw her as this evil girl with no redeeming qualities. So I worked with an acting coach on it and sent the audition tape to Jason (Reitman) in New York, and he said he wanted to meet with him. Then I started falling in love with this character after talking to him. I began to see more sides to this girl—where she comes from and why she does the things she does. She became fascinating to me. It was a huge challenge but I loved it. And it takes place in the ‘60s, so I have this cool hair and makeup that transformed me.”
Monroe says her role in “The Bling Ring,” based on a true story about star struck suburban teens who go on a robbery spree of Hollywood homes of their celebrity idols, and until they get caught, is a smaller one, though it afforded her the opportunity to work with one of her directing idols, Sofia Coppola, and “Harry Potter” star Emma Watson.
“It’s kind of been blown out of proportion on the Internet that I play this bigger role than I do,” she admits. “But I really appreciated the opportunity to do it and I’m excited to see the final film.”
She is set to start another movie project soon but cannot say what it is yet. She still enjoys kiteboarding in her free time, but has decided not to pursue it as a professional career anymore.
Her plans to attend college to study graphic design and web design also are on hold as she continues to build her resume with acting credits.
“This past year, I’ve been basically working nonstop—in a very good way,” she says, smiling. “But I definitely want to go to college. As of now, I may have to take classes online. It’s important to me but things just need to calm down before I can focus on that.”
2013年4月23日星期二
Audi R8 V10 plus
Audi India officials often go gaga about how some of the buyers of the R8 drive the super sports car around the most crowded, narrow streets of many Indian cities. That’s not too surprising given how easy to drive and comfortable this car can be even on bad roads.
But, put it on the track and it behaves like a completely different cat, one with remarkable agility and great grip. Though, even as it looks perfectly at home on the race track, the R8 doesn’t seem to be intimidating to drive. Instead, place the Lamborghini Gallardo 560-4 – other super sports car that shares the same engine, the same underpinnings and many of the cabin parts – and the intimidation level goes up considerably.
Essentially a boosted, face lifted version of the R8 V10, the new version has some key modifications to mark its higher performance capabilities. On the outside, what strikes you is the increased use of CFRP – an abbreviation that is all over the diagram of the new R8 V10 plus that Audi officials put up as part of the presentation.
Essentially, carbon-fibre reinforced plastic has now been used for more parts. So you get exterior mirror housings, the famous and R8 trademark side blades, the engine cover, the rear diffuser and the front spoiler all made out of this material. There is more in the cabin too. Another R8 trademark – the Audi Singleframe side air intakes at the front and rear bumpers – get a new configuration and are coloured in matt Titanium Gray.
The new Audi R8 V10 plus Coupé is powered by the same 5.2-litre, V10 engine that the current R8 model sports. The difference is in the boost to its state of tune, essentially matching that of the Gallardo 550-2’s performance. The V10 FSI engine with its – up to 8,700 rpm – high-revving concept now manages 404 kW or 550 bhp of peak power at 8,000 rpm. Peak torque is delivered lower down the rpm range at 6,500 and that is also about 10 Nm more at 540 Nm (compared the current V10 variant). The engine is paired with the 7-speed S tronic transmission that is also now offered with larger manual shift paddles behind the steering wheel.
On the race track, the new R8 V10 plus Coupé comes across as being more comfortable to drive thanks to Audi’s Quattro permanent all-wheel drive system. The positive impact of the Quattro system and the difference it makes to on-track confidence was felt even more because it was just a few weeks earlier that I had driven the Lamborghini Gallardo 550-2 on the same loop.
As part of the inauguration of the second edition of its Audi sportscar experience, the company had organised the test runs of the new R8 V10 plus and the course included high speeds laps, slalom sections and a brake test section. With its light and extremely stiff aluminium space frame body and the new sportier suspension the coupe feels more agile on the track. As you throw the car into the corners, the sporty new bucket seats hold nicely allowing the driver to point the steering better at the apex of every turn on the track.
The suspension has seen adjustments to the springs and damper tuning and there have been modifications to the camber values at the front axle for improved dynamics. The wave design brake discs with standard ceramic brakes make sure that all that additional power and agility is not at the cost of safety.
With an impish smile, his face betraying his knowledge about the Mahindra E2O, the driver of the other car was still expecting a sincere answer. And his face was still writ with genuine curiosity about the latest all-electric car from the makers of the Reva.
The E2O is a big leap from the Reva. Not so much in terms of its earth-saving concept, but in terms of it finally being a desirable electric car. It is a transformation which announces that electrics have moved into the realm of the possible, even in India, and that you can look cool while saving the planet.
Except for its final model name, the E2O (E for electric, O for Oxygen….it is not E Twenty) has been in the news for a while now. The concept NXR on which it is based, has been spotted in Motor Shows and been seen testing on the roads. So, the model’s design and most of its specifications had long been frozen. The battery-powered car was originally due to be launched in 2011. What caused much of the delay in rolling out the car was apparently caused by the Government’s dithering in deciding whether to extend a subsidy or not.
But, despite all that familiarity, the E2O still surprises me with its packaging when I first step into it. At the parking lot set next to a yellow Tata Nano and a beige Hyundai i10 Automatic, the E2O seems to blend right in like it is a new, regular compact hatch in the market. There is none of its predecessor’s ungainly, bug-eyed, and strangely arcane looks. Instead, the E2O sports a conventional tall-boy design, clean modern design lines, tight shut lines between its ABS body panels and just a touch of quirkiness.
The unique headlamps, the cab-forward design, the bonnet grille and the muscular wheel arches add to the overall feel of the E2O being a regular car. But, each one of these features hides parts of the electric reality behind them. The stubby, clamshell bonnet from the cab-forward design for example doesn’t lid an engine, instead all that is underneath is the spare wheel and the air-conditioner compressor. Behind the grille is a radiator, but one which runs cooling lines to the heat exchanger and the battery pack instead of an engine.
The wheel arches look over-sized and the puny 13-inch rims don’t provide that much of visual strength, but the tyres shod on the alloys are low-resistance tyres that have been specially developed with a compound that has higher silica content.
The E2O’s chassis is a tubular space frame and the car is built by bolting on the motor, controller, battery pack and the other suspension and seating parts. All the body panels are colour impregnated and dent resistant plastic. These panels made from specially developed base polymer are then simply bonded onto the frame using special adhesives.
Mahindra Reva officials say that the India-spec E2O has no airbags or other electronic braking or stability aids, but it still meets collision safety norms thanks to the space frame’s rigidity and the three crumple zones at the front that disperse the impact of a collision. The European-spec E2O which is currently under development will have the entire complement of safety features including stability management and am guessing that it will have to pass the Euro NCAP tests.
But, put it on the track and it behaves like a completely different cat, one with remarkable agility and great grip. Though, even as it looks perfectly at home on the race track, the R8 doesn’t seem to be intimidating to drive. Instead, place the Lamborghini Gallardo 560-4 – other super sports car that shares the same engine, the same underpinnings and many of the cabin parts – and the intimidation level goes up considerably.
Essentially a boosted, face lifted version of the R8 V10, the new version has some key modifications to mark its higher performance capabilities. On the outside, what strikes you is the increased use of CFRP – an abbreviation that is all over the diagram of the new R8 V10 plus that Audi officials put up as part of the presentation.
Essentially, carbon-fibre reinforced plastic has now been used for more parts. So you get exterior mirror housings, the famous and R8 trademark side blades, the engine cover, the rear diffuser and the front spoiler all made out of this material. There is more in the cabin too. Another R8 trademark – the Audi Singleframe side air intakes at the front and rear bumpers – get a new configuration and are coloured in matt Titanium Gray.
The new Audi R8 V10 plus Coupé is powered by the same 5.2-litre, V10 engine that the current R8 model sports. The difference is in the boost to its state of tune, essentially matching that of the Gallardo 550-2’s performance. The V10 FSI engine with its – up to 8,700 rpm – high-revving concept now manages 404 kW or 550 bhp of peak power at 8,000 rpm. Peak torque is delivered lower down the rpm range at 6,500 and that is also about 10 Nm more at 540 Nm (compared the current V10 variant). The engine is paired with the 7-speed S tronic transmission that is also now offered with larger manual shift paddles behind the steering wheel.
On the race track, the new R8 V10 plus Coupé comes across as being more comfortable to drive thanks to Audi’s Quattro permanent all-wheel drive system. The positive impact of the Quattro system and the difference it makes to on-track confidence was felt even more because it was just a few weeks earlier that I had driven the Lamborghini Gallardo 550-2 on the same loop.
As part of the inauguration of the second edition of its Audi sportscar experience, the company had organised the test runs of the new R8 V10 plus and the course included high speeds laps, slalom sections and a brake test section. With its light and extremely stiff aluminium space frame body and the new sportier suspension the coupe feels more agile on the track. As you throw the car into the corners, the sporty new bucket seats hold nicely allowing the driver to point the steering better at the apex of every turn on the track.
The suspension has seen adjustments to the springs and damper tuning and there have been modifications to the camber values at the front axle for improved dynamics. The wave design brake discs with standard ceramic brakes make sure that all that additional power and agility is not at the cost of safety.
With an impish smile, his face betraying his knowledge about the Mahindra E2O, the driver of the other car was still expecting a sincere answer. And his face was still writ with genuine curiosity about the latest all-electric car from the makers of the Reva.
The E2O is a big leap from the Reva. Not so much in terms of its earth-saving concept, but in terms of it finally being a desirable electric car. It is a transformation which announces that electrics have moved into the realm of the possible, even in India, and that you can look cool while saving the planet.
Except for its final model name, the E2O (E for electric, O for Oxygen….it is not E Twenty) has been in the news for a while now. The concept NXR on which it is based, has been spotted in Motor Shows and been seen testing on the roads. So, the model’s design and most of its specifications had long been frozen. The battery-powered car was originally due to be launched in 2011. What caused much of the delay in rolling out the car was apparently caused by the Government’s dithering in deciding whether to extend a subsidy or not.
But, despite all that familiarity, the E2O still surprises me with its packaging when I first step into it. At the parking lot set next to a yellow Tata Nano and a beige Hyundai i10 Automatic, the E2O seems to blend right in like it is a new, regular compact hatch in the market. There is none of its predecessor’s ungainly, bug-eyed, and strangely arcane looks. Instead, the E2O sports a conventional tall-boy design, clean modern design lines, tight shut lines between its ABS body panels and just a touch of quirkiness.
The unique headlamps, the cab-forward design, the bonnet grille and the muscular wheel arches add to the overall feel of the E2O being a regular car. But, each one of these features hides parts of the electric reality behind them. The stubby, clamshell bonnet from the cab-forward design for example doesn’t lid an engine, instead all that is underneath is the spare wheel and the air-conditioner compressor. Behind the grille is a radiator, but one which runs cooling lines to the heat exchanger and the battery pack instead of an engine.
The wheel arches look over-sized and the puny 13-inch rims don’t provide that much of visual strength, but the tyres shod on the alloys are low-resistance tyres that have been specially developed with a compound that has higher silica content.
The E2O’s chassis is a tubular space frame and the car is built by bolting on the motor, controller, battery pack and the other suspension and seating parts. All the body panels are colour impregnated and dent resistant plastic. These panels made from specially developed base polymer are then simply bonded onto the frame using special adhesives.
Mahindra Reva officials say that the India-spec E2O has no airbags or other electronic braking or stability aids, but it still meets collision safety norms thanks to the space frame’s rigidity and the three crumple zones at the front that disperse the impact of a collision. The European-spec E2O which is currently under development will have the entire complement of safety features including stability management and am guessing that it will have to pass the Euro NCAP tests.
2013年3月7日星期四
Sistine Chapel goes from tourist magnet to polling place for pope
The Sistine Chapel's transformation from a world-famous tourist site to the prayer-filled space where cardinal electors will choose the next pope is under way.
Vatican workers have begun installing protective panels to cover the mosaic tile floors, and mini-scaffolding will raise a false floor level with the altar and eliminate any steps.
Workers will then have to put in tables and chairs for the expected 115 cardinal electors.
Like for the 2005 conclave, two stoves will be installed: one to burn ballots and the other to burn chemicals to create different colored smoke to let the public know if a pope was selected or not. Father Lombardi said that burning the ballots with wet or dry straw had made the right color, but never really created enough smoke to offer a clear signal.
In order to begin the preparations, the chapel, where the conclave will take place, was officially closed to tourists March 5.
Maintaining secrecy is part of the cardinals' oath, and technicians sweep the chapel for electronic surveillance or recording devices before the conclave.
Jesuit Father Federico Lombardi, Vatican spokesman, told journalists March 6 that jamming devices are used to disable cellphone signals, but that they are not installed under the false flooring as had been reported in the past.
However, even the innocuous climate sensors dotted about the chapel will be dismantled to remove any suspicion of being spied on, said Antonio Paolucci, director of the Vatican Museums.
The head of the Vatican police, Domenico Giani, said it would be a good idea to take them down, "perhaps to avoid every feeling and fear, too, of Big Brother," Paolucci told the Italian newspaper Il Messaggero March 6.
Even though the sensors don't present a security risk, the head of the Vatican police force "wanted to avoid even what might be the most minimal psychological discomfort," the museums' director said.
The sensors were eventually going to be replaced anyway, he said, when the museums install a new climate-control system for the chapel.
Security concerns are so tight that it looks as though, during the voting sessions, cardinals will not be allowed to use the museum lavatories, Paolucci said.
"Something different has been decided on; I believe they may be installing portable chemical toilets inside the chapel," he said.
A few other areas of the Vatican Museums will also be closed in the run-up to and during the conclave because of their proximity to the chapel, he said.
Cordoned off to the public will be the Borgia apartments, the Museum of Contemporary Art and the Matisse and Manzu halls, he said.
Though they blocked reservations for visits to the chapel as soon as retired Pope Benedict XVI announced his resignation Feb. 11, Paolucci said, the museums still had to spend weeks contacting individuals and groups who had already made advanced reservations.
More than 5 million people stream through the Sistine Chapel each year, and many were bound to be disappointed the chapel would be closed for an unspecified amount of time in March; however, people have been very understanding, he said.
"If the Sistine Chapel were closed because a custodian called in sick, then they would complain, but in this case, they get it," he said.
From the outside, the only sign of the conclave proceedings will emerge from the smokestack on top of the chapel's roof. Barely visible from St. Peter's Square, it is kept in the viewfinder of telephoto lenses until a new pope is elected and white smoke pours out.
The Pandora Avenue hotel began life in 1911 as the upscale Westholme. It housed a swank restaurant boasting an orchestra and “a brigade of 50 waiters,” said Sarah Smith, co-creator of a new play exploring the hotel’s chequered history.
Over the years, the hotel boasted an Arabian Nights theme and a groovy beatnik hangout that, according to legend, attracted a young David Foster. There were rumours of ghosts, suicides, shady characters and ladies of the night.
Smith and her writing partner, Sadie Forbes, are the writers of Ghosts of the Plaza — a one-hour romp chronicling the Victoria Plaza Hotel in all its incarnations. Following sold-out shows in November, these first-time playwrights and the show’s producer, burlesque dancer Miss Rosie Bitts, have remounted Ghosts of the Plaza for a two-night run at Odd Fellows Hall.
For a decade, Smith — who holds a University of Victoria degree in women’s studies —waitressed at Monty’s Showroom Pub. The strip club, which shut down in January, achieved international infamy in 2005 thanks to a National Enquirer story headlined, Matt LeBlanc: My Wild Night with a Stripper. (Actor LeBlanc played Joey on the TV sitcom Friends.)
Smith always loved the low-rent dinginess of Monty’s. Eventually, that interest extended to the hotel itself. She explored its basement, stuffed with discarded beds, lamps and other detritus. Underneath, she saw the floor was richly decorated with mosaic tile, a legacy of more prosperous days.
Smith and Forbes — also a history buff — started researching the Victoria Plaza Hotel. In the city archives they found an old newspaper story detailing the Westholme Hotel’s glorious opening.
By the 1920s and ’30s, the hotel had lapsed into ill repute, its rooms favoured by prostitutes. A rebirth came in the 1960s with an Arabian Nights-themed revamp. Staff sported turbans and harem outfits. Central to the decor was a working model of the Centennial Square fountain.
Vatican workers have begun installing protective panels to cover the mosaic tile floors, and mini-scaffolding will raise a false floor level with the altar and eliminate any steps.
Workers will then have to put in tables and chairs for the expected 115 cardinal electors.
Like for the 2005 conclave, two stoves will be installed: one to burn ballots and the other to burn chemicals to create different colored smoke to let the public know if a pope was selected or not. Father Lombardi said that burning the ballots with wet or dry straw had made the right color, but never really created enough smoke to offer a clear signal.
In order to begin the preparations, the chapel, where the conclave will take place, was officially closed to tourists March 5.
Maintaining secrecy is part of the cardinals' oath, and technicians sweep the chapel for electronic surveillance or recording devices before the conclave.
Jesuit Father Federico Lombardi, Vatican spokesman, told journalists March 6 that jamming devices are used to disable cellphone signals, but that they are not installed under the false flooring as had been reported in the past.
However, even the innocuous climate sensors dotted about the chapel will be dismantled to remove any suspicion of being spied on, said Antonio Paolucci, director of the Vatican Museums.
The head of the Vatican police, Domenico Giani, said it would be a good idea to take them down, "perhaps to avoid every feeling and fear, too, of Big Brother," Paolucci told the Italian newspaper Il Messaggero March 6.
Even though the sensors don't present a security risk, the head of the Vatican police force "wanted to avoid even what might be the most minimal psychological discomfort," the museums' director said.
The sensors were eventually going to be replaced anyway, he said, when the museums install a new climate-control system for the chapel.
Security concerns are so tight that it looks as though, during the voting sessions, cardinals will not be allowed to use the museum lavatories, Paolucci said.
"Something different has been decided on; I believe they may be installing portable chemical toilets inside the chapel," he said.
A few other areas of the Vatican Museums will also be closed in the run-up to and during the conclave because of their proximity to the chapel, he said.
Cordoned off to the public will be the Borgia apartments, the Museum of Contemporary Art and the Matisse and Manzu halls, he said.
Though they blocked reservations for visits to the chapel as soon as retired Pope Benedict XVI announced his resignation Feb. 11, Paolucci said, the museums still had to spend weeks contacting individuals and groups who had already made advanced reservations.
More than 5 million people stream through the Sistine Chapel each year, and many were bound to be disappointed the chapel would be closed for an unspecified amount of time in March; however, people have been very understanding, he said.
"If the Sistine Chapel were closed because a custodian called in sick, then they would complain, but in this case, they get it," he said.
From the outside, the only sign of the conclave proceedings will emerge from the smokestack on top of the chapel's roof. Barely visible from St. Peter's Square, it is kept in the viewfinder of telephoto lenses until a new pope is elected and white smoke pours out.
The Pandora Avenue hotel began life in 1911 as the upscale Westholme. It housed a swank restaurant boasting an orchestra and “a brigade of 50 waiters,” said Sarah Smith, co-creator of a new play exploring the hotel’s chequered history.
Over the years, the hotel boasted an Arabian Nights theme and a groovy beatnik hangout that, according to legend, attracted a young David Foster. There were rumours of ghosts, suicides, shady characters and ladies of the night.
Smith and her writing partner, Sadie Forbes, are the writers of Ghosts of the Plaza — a one-hour romp chronicling the Victoria Plaza Hotel in all its incarnations. Following sold-out shows in November, these first-time playwrights and the show’s producer, burlesque dancer Miss Rosie Bitts, have remounted Ghosts of the Plaza for a two-night run at Odd Fellows Hall.
For a decade, Smith — who holds a University of Victoria degree in women’s studies —waitressed at Monty’s Showroom Pub. The strip club, which shut down in January, achieved international infamy in 2005 thanks to a National Enquirer story headlined, Matt LeBlanc: My Wild Night with a Stripper. (Actor LeBlanc played Joey on the TV sitcom Friends.)
Smith always loved the low-rent dinginess of Monty’s. Eventually, that interest extended to the hotel itself. She explored its basement, stuffed with discarded beds, lamps and other detritus. Underneath, she saw the floor was richly decorated with mosaic tile, a legacy of more prosperous days.
Smith and Forbes — also a history buff — started researching the Victoria Plaza Hotel. In the city archives they found an old newspaper story detailing the Westholme Hotel’s glorious opening.
By the 1920s and ’30s, the hotel had lapsed into ill repute, its rooms favoured by prostitutes. A rebirth came in the 1960s with an Arabian Nights-themed revamp. Staff sported turbans and harem outfits. Central to the decor was a working model of the Centennial Square fountain.
2013年2月28日星期四
A day in the life of a coworker
I’m sitting in a 89-year-old building, and through the large windows that surround me I can see just the top of the San Francisco Federal Building, an 18-story metal and glass monolith in the deconstructivist architectural style. I can also see two run-down, single-room-occupancy (SRO) hotels, a bank, a nightclub. Inside, along a mix of modular tables, Herman Miller office chairs surround me. Roughly half of them are occupied by my coworkers. Except, they’re not really my coworkers. These people are my “co-workers.”
This is the Hub, a co-working space in the city’s South of Market neighborhood that occupies two floors and 20,000 square feet of the building, which is also home to the San Francisco Chronicle. In front of my perch, three men are gathered around a rolling whiteboard, working out a flow chart. Behind them, a techy duo are sitting in a soundproof privacy booth (think of those quiet study cubes in your local library). One is arguing his point, his arms flailing around for punctuation as a laptop teeters on his cubemate’s lap.
There is a low buzz in the room, as casually-dressed professionals — mostly white, mostly in their 30s, though evenly split between genders — mill around, talking in hushed tones with each other and on their phones.
The noise level is not as distracting as I’d expected, and nothing I would not be able to drown out with my headphones. But Megan McFadden, who handles communication for the Hub Bay Area (which includes this location and one in Berkeley), later tells me it’s actually a pretty mellow day. “Sometimes this place is just pulsing,” she says.
Aside from noise, there are some other things I consider downsides. For one thing, my pants are soaking wet from my walk in the pouring rain from my house, to the subway, and to the Hub. I cannot change into sweat pants, as I would in my normal office (my house). I cannot blast Robyn’s “Call Your Girlfriend” and dance around the room, as I occasionally do when I need a mental and physical break from writing. And now, some guy five feet away is watching a Web video — without his headphones — and that is something I find very irksome. Of course, all these things would be true if I had any kind of office job, but in that case I would lack the flexibility to opt for working at home, which of course Hub members can do if they want.
In terms of perks, the Hub offers a kitchen, coffee, printers, meeting rooms, couches for casual confabs, all at my disposal. Over the lunch hour, Sprouts Cooking Club, a cooking school for kids, made a pot-luck-style lunch for Hub members, a weekly event. If I were here on a Friday, I could enjoy the “wine down” at 5 PM. If I needed a software coder, an illustrator, a lawyer, a social investing expert, a human rights advocate, a carbon tracker or a venture capitalist, I could probably find one by just walking around and asking.
Indeed, it’s the connections that the Hub helps members make that appear to be its biggest draw.
The Hub was founded in London in 2004 as a non-profit, which still serves as an umbrella and branding clearinghouse for all 50 (and counting) Hub co-working spaces around the globe. There are around 6,000 Hub members worldwide, but the Bay Area Hubs are especially large, with more than 1,000 members combined. Each Hub is individually owned and Hub Bay Area is actually a for-profit firm started in 2009 by Mission Hub LLC, which is a partnership between Hub Cities, a consulting arm that helps launch other Hubs around North America, and SoCap, a social investing conference company.
The Hub is so focused on attracting socially conscious businesses that “Where Change Goes to Work” serves as its tagline. As I head to the kitchen for coffee, I run into an acquaintance who rents a small dedicated office — called a Hublet — inside the Hub, from which he runs a small firm that links grant-makers with grant-seekers for projects that address human rights, health care and violence against women around the world.
Later, I pop in to visit former colleagues who run Triple Pundit, a sustainable business media company. They also rent out a Hublet.
“It feels like Facebook or any social media network, except that it’s real life and you have an idea of what the people around you are working on,” says the company’s editor-in-chief, Jen Boynton. Through the years (Triple Pundit has worked from the Hub since it opened in 2009) she has found many subjects for articles among her Hub co-workers — and has been pitched stories by many, as well.
But what sets the Hub apart from generic co-working spaces is its focus on attracting members whose work focuses on environmental and social issues. If you work outside those fields, it’s certainly not a barrier to entry, but McFadden says, “People self-select.”
Most of the time, though, Hub members are busy and aren’t necessarily sure how to approach other members and begin networking. “People come for the community, but when they’re at work they’ve got their heads down. It’s such a wealth of people here but [members] don’t know when or how to engage with each other,” says McFadden.
For that, the Hub Bay Area runs an event series that focuses on connecting members and helping them with skills development or networking advice. At occasional “town hall meetings” members are asked to play an active role in shaping the Hub’s future and its programming.
This is the Hub, a co-working space in the city’s South of Market neighborhood that occupies two floors and 20,000 square feet of the building, which is also home to the San Francisco Chronicle. In front of my perch, three men are gathered around a rolling whiteboard, working out a flow chart. Behind them, a techy duo are sitting in a soundproof privacy booth (think of those quiet study cubes in your local library). One is arguing his point, his arms flailing around for punctuation as a laptop teeters on his cubemate’s lap.
There is a low buzz in the room, as casually-dressed professionals — mostly white, mostly in their 30s, though evenly split between genders — mill around, talking in hushed tones with each other and on their phones.
The noise level is not as distracting as I’d expected, and nothing I would not be able to drown out with my headphones. But Megan McFadden, who handles communication for the Hub Bay Area (which includes this location and one in Berkeley), later tells me it’s actually a pretty mellow day. “Sometimes this place is just pulsing,” she says.
Aside from noise, there are some other things I consider downsides. For one thing, my pants are soaking wet from my walk in the pouring rain from my house, to the subway, and to the Hub. I cannot change into sweat pants, as I would in my normal office (my house). I cannot blast Robyn’s “Call Your Girlfriend” and dance around the room, as I occasionally do when I need a mental and physical break from writing. And now, some guy five feet away is watching a Web video — without his headphones — and that is something I find very irksome. Of course, all these things would be true if I had any kind of office job, but in that case I would lack the flexibility to opt for working at home, which of course Hub members can do if they want.
In terms of perks, the Hub offers a kitchen, coffee, printers, meeting rooms, couches for casual confabs, all at my disposal. Over the lunch hour, Sprouts Cooking Club, a cooking school for kids, made a pot-luck-style lunch for Hub members, a weekly event. If I were here on a Friday, I could enjoy the “wine down” at 5 PM. If I needed a software coder, an illustrator, a lawyer, a social investing expert, a human rights advocate, a carbon tracker or a venture capitalist, I could probably find one by just walking around and asking.
Indeed, it’s the connections that the Hub helps members make that appear to be its biggest draw.
The Hub was founded in London in 2004 as a non-profit, which still serves as an umbrella and branding clearinghouse for all 50 (and counting) Hub co-working spaces around the globe. There are around 6,000 Hub members worldwide, but the Bay Area Hubs are especially large, with more than 1,000 members combined. Each Hub is individually owned and Hub Bay Area is actually a for-profit firm started in 2009 by Mission Hub LLC, which is a partnership between Hub Cities, a consulting arm that helps launch other Hubs around North America, and SoCap, a social investing conference company.
The Hub is so focused on attracting socially conscious businesses that “Where Change Goes to Work” serves as its tagline. As I head to the kitchen for coffee, I run into an acquaintance who rents a small dedicated office — called a Hublet — inside the Hub, from which he runs a small firm that links grant-makers with grant-seekers for projects that address human rights, health care and violence against women around the world.
Later, I pop in to visit former colleagues who run Triple Pundit, a sustainable business media company. They also rent out a Hublet.
“It feels like Facebook or any social media network, except that it’s real life and you have an idea of what the people around you are working on,” says the company’s editor-in-chief, Jen Boynton. Through the years (Triple Pundit has worked from the Hub since it opened in 2009) she has found many subjects for articles among her Hub co-workers — and has been pitched stories by many, as well.
But what sets the Hub apart from generic co-working spaces is its focus on attracting members whose work focuses on environmental and social issues. If you work outside those fields, it’s certainly not a barrier to entry, but McFadden says, “People self-select.”
Most of the time, though, Hub members are busy and aren’t necessarily sure how to approach other members and begin networking. “People come for the community, but when they’re at work they’ve got their heads down. It’s such a wealth of people here but [members] don’t know when or how to engage with each other,” says McFadden.
For that, the Hub Bay Area runs an event series that focuses on connecting members and helping them with skills development or networking advice. At occasional “town hall meetings” members are asked to play an active role in shaping the Hub’s future and its programming.
2013年2月27日星期三
Guardly Releases Industry-first Integrated Indoor Positioning System
Guardly today announced the launch of its Indoor Positioning System (IPS), the industry's first mobile safety solution that offers integrated indoor location detection capabilities. Guardly IPS further enhances Guardly's existing mobile safety solutions for the enterprise by transmitting the building, floor and specific room of a mobile emergency caller in under 5 seconds and tracking indoor location changes in real-time thereafter.
Guardly provides mobile safety apps and cloud infrastructure for enterprise and public safety. Guardly's mobile safety apps act as personal emergency phones that broadcast real-time location, identity and support two-way communication with private security, authorities and personal safety groups. For enterprise security and police dispatch, Guardly provides a cloud-based incident management system rich with situational data to monitor, manage and respond to on-premise and remote worker emergencies.
Guardly Safe Campus, a solution designed for schools, was shown to help reduce emergency response times by around 44% at a university in a customer-led study performed 6 months ago. "Our IPS technology is another step towards Guardly delivering on its corporate mission to reduce emergency response times for people needing immediate assistance, and for those responding to requests for assistance," says Josh Sookman, Guardly Founder & CEO. "With Guardly IPS, all someone needs to do is launch our safety app and it will result in a personalized response to their exact indoor location. The implications of this innovation are truly game changing."
When an emergency occurs on a school campus or within a corporate office, hospital or public venue today, most calls made to local security personnel or police come from mobile phones or fixed emergency call boxes. Traditional emergency calls from mobile phones handled by the enterprise lack any form of indoor or outdoor location data, making it difficult to initiate response efforts; this can be further exacerbated if the mobile caller is unable to speak. While calls from emergency call boxes may have associated location data, emergencies can shift in location over time resulting in difficulties maintaining communication and coordinating response efforts.
"When a police dispatcher is working an emergency call, one of the first pieces of information required is an accurate location. Having the indoor location of mobile callers immediately available to dispatchers serves to reduce response times, especially for any campus that has multi-story buildings," said Rocco DelMonaco, Past VP University Safety at Georgetown University.
The US Federal Communications Commission (FCC) estimates that 70% of 911 calls today are from wireless phones and that percentage is growing.i In context of 911 public safety networks, as of September 11, 2012 the FCC enforces Wireless E911 Phase 2 requirements, which state that wireless network operators must provide the GPS location of callers within 300 meters, within 6 minutes of a request by a Public Safety Answering Point (PSAP). Guardly IPS delivers at least an order of magnitude improvement in mobile emergency caller location accuracy over current public safety standards, giving its customers more precise data to act on and share with first responders to ensure more immediate and personalized emergency responses.
“Over the past few years, our applications such as asset tracking, patient security and environmental monitoring have delivered proven and substantial benefits to hospitals worldwide,” said Baruch Yoeli, Vice President of Engineering at Stanley Healthcare. “Combining the leading data visualization and analytics capabilities from Tableau with our widely used healthcare solutions unlocks vast new opportunities to extract additional value from location, status and condition data, and will help customers make quicker and better informed decisions.”
More than 17,000 healthcare organizations worldwide rely on Stanley Healthcare solutions. Its Wi-Fi Real-Time Location System (RTLS) has the exclusive endorsement of the American Hospital Association, and the recent 2012 Best in KLAS Report named Stanley Healthcare’s solutions the Category Leader for RTLS for the second year in a row. In the report, 97 percent of Stanley Healthcare customers surveyed stated that they would “buy again” their RTLS solutions.
Tableau is a global leader in rapid-fire business intelligence software. It is known for its dashboards and advanced visual analytics, which allow anyone to quickly uncover valuable insights from vast amounts of data. In fact, Gartner positioned Tableau as a “Leader” in its 2013 Magic Quadrant for Business Intelligence and Analytics Platforms* report.
Tableau’s software will be integrated with Stanley Healthcare’s MobileView software, the application platform and graphical user interface of its EcoSystem of healthcare solutions. Tableau analytics and data visualizations will be available first for Stanley Healthcare’s Asset Tracking & Management, Environmental Monitoring, Patient Safety, Security & Protection and Patient Flow solutions.
“Healthcare RTLS applications generate substantial amounts of data containing important intelligence that in the past has been difficult to attain,” said Dan Jewett, Vice President of Product Management at Tableau Software. “It’s a classic Big Data challenge and our software, combined with Stanley Healthcare’s solutions, can help departments across healthcare organizations easily gain access to this intelligence and act upon it in a way that directly impacts their business.”
With MobileView and Tableau, hospital staff will be able to drill down deeper than ever before into the large data sets generated to quickly solve critical business problems. For example, many hospitals use Stanley Healthcare’s Wi-Fi RTLS to track the real-time location and status of critical medical equipment throughout the hospital. Using Tableau’s advanced analytics capabilities, hospitals will not only be able to see the real-time location and status of items such as infusion pumps, they’ll also be able to quickly analyze historical and current par levels to predict and better plan future par levels, improving inventory allocation and utilization.
Oregon Health & Science University (OHSU), a long-time Stanley Healthcare customer, is among the hospitals with early access to the MobileView and Tableau integration. According to Dennis Minsent, Director of Clinical Technology Services at Oregon Health & Science University, “We’re using Stanley Healthcare’s solutions to track the real-time location of nearly 4,000 infusion devices. The system is generating a significant amount of data, and we know there’s a tremendous amount of insight contained within that data. The combination of MobileView and Tableau Software will empower us to delve deeper into our asset tracking data to discover trends and solve resourcing issues without having to waste the time of IT analysts. This will help further extend the benefits of real-time location tracking to more aspects of hospital operations.”
Guardly provides mobile safety apps and cloud infrastructure for enterprise and public safety. Guardly's mobile safety apps act as personal emergency phones that broadcast real-time location, identity and support two-way communication with private security, authorities and personal safety groups. For enterprise security and police dispatch, Guardly provides a cloud-based incident management system rich with situational data to monitor, manage and respond to on-premise and remote worker emergencies.
Guardly Safe Campus, a solution designed for schools, was shown to help reduce emergency response times by around 44% at a university in a customer-led study performed 6 months ago. "Our IPS technology is another step towards Guardly delivering on its corporate mission to reduce emergency response times for people needing immediate assistance, and for those responding to requests for assistance," says Josh Sookman, Guardly Founder & CEO. "With Guardly IPS, all someone needs to do is launch our safety app and it will result in a personalized response to their exact indoor location. The implications of this innovation are truly game changing."
When an emergency occurs on a school campus or within a corporate office, hospital or public venue today, most calls made to local security personnel or police come from mobile phones or fixed emergency call boxes. Traditional emergency calls from mobile phones handled by the enterprise lack any form of indoor or outdoor location data, making it difficult to initiate response efforts; this can be further exacerbated if the mobile caller is unable to speak. While calls from emergency call boxes may have associated location data, emergencies can shift in location over time resulting in difficulties maintaining communication and coordinating response efforts.
"When a police dispatcher is working an emergency call, one of the first pieces of information required is an accurate location. Having the indoor location of mobile callers immediately available to dispatchers serves to reduce response times, especially for any campus that has multi-story buildings," said Rocco DelMonaco, Past VP University Safety at Georgetown University.
The US Federal Communications Commission (FCC) estimates that 70% of 911 calls today are from wireless phones and that percentage is growing.i In context of 911 public safety networks, as of September 11, 2012 the FCC enforces Wireless E911 Phase 2 requirements, which state that wireless network operators must provide the GPS location of callers within 300 meters, within 6 minutes of a request by a Public Safety Answering Point (PSAP). Guardly IPS delivers at least an order of magnitude improvement in mobile emergency caller location accuracy over current public safety standards, giving its customers more precise data to act on and share with first responders to ensure more immediate and personalized emergency responses.
“Over the past few years, our applications such as asset tracking, patient security and environmental monitoring have delivered proven and substantial benefits to hospitals worldwide,” said Baruch Yoeli, Vice President of Engineering at Stanley Healthcare. “Combining the leading data visualization and analytics capabilities from Tableau with our widely used healthcare solutions unlocks vast new opportunities to extract additional value from location, status and condition data, and will help customers make quicker and better informed decisions.”
More than 17,000 healthcare organizations worldwide rely on Stanley Healthcare solutions. Its Wi-Fi Real-Time Location System (RTLS) has the exclusive endorsement of the American Hospital Association, and the recent 2012 Best in KLAS Report named Stanley Healthcare’s solutions the Category Leader for RTLS for the second year in a row. In the report, 97 percent of Stanley Healthcare customers surveyed stated that they would “buy again” their RTLS solutions.
Tableau is a global leader in rapid-fire business intelligence software. It is known for its dashboards and advanced visual analytics, which allow anyone to quickly uncover valuable insights from vast amounts of data. In fact, Gartner positioned Tableau as a “Leader” in its 2013 Magic Quadrant for Business Intelligence and Analytics Platforms* report.
Tableau’s software will be integrated with Stanley Healthcare’s MobileView software, the application platform and graphical user interface of its EcoSystem of healthcare solutions. Tableau analytics and data visualizations will be available first for Stanley Healthcare’s Asset Tracking & Management, Environmental Monitoring, Patient Safety, Security & Protection and Patient Flow solutions.
“Healthcare RTLS applications generate substantial amounts of data containing important intelligence that in the past has been difficult to attain,” said Dan Jewett, Vice President of Product Management at Tableau Software. “It’s a classic Big Data challenge and our software, combined with Stanley Healthcare’s solutions, can help departments across healthcare organizations easily gain access to this intelligence and act upon it in a way that directly impacts their business.”
With MobileView and Tableau, hospital staff will be able to drill down deeper than ever before into the large data sets generated to quickly solve critical business problems. For example, many hospitals use Stanley Healthcare’s Wi-Fi RTLS to track the real-time location and status of critical medical equipment throughout the hospital. Using Tableau’s advanced analytics capabilities, hospitals will not only be able to see the real-time location and status of items such as infusion pumps, they’ll also be able to quickly analyze historical and current par levels to predict and better plan future par levels, improving inventory allocation and utilization.
Oregon Health & Science University (OHSU), a long-time Stanley Healthcare customer, is among the hospitals with early access to the MobileView and Tableau integration. According to Dennis Minsent, Director of Clinical Technology Services at Oregon Health & Science University, “We’re using Stanley Healthcare’s solutions to track the real-time location of nearly 4,000 infusion devices. The system is generating a significant amount of data, and we know there’s a tremendous amount of insight contained within that data. The combination of MobileView and Tableau Software will empower us to delve deeper into our asset tracking data to discover trends and solve resourcing issues without having to waste the time of IT analysts. This will help further extend the benefits of real-time location tracking to more aspects of hospital operations.”
2013年1月31日星期四
Nature Inspired Everything
W hen fourth and fifth graders from McKinley Elementary School in Santa Monica were viewing the Miriam Wosk exhibit at the Santa Monica Museum of Art, they were excitedly taking notes and talking to each other about what they were seeing. 'It's like a buffet,' one girl said to her friend as they looked at Wosk's 1987 oil and acrylic piece, 'Arabesque,' which features fruit among other items.
Wosk's appealing, vibrant images are on view at the museum through April 20 in 'Abundance and Devotion: The Art of Miriam Wosk.' The retrospective pays homage to the accomplished artist, who died of cancer in 2010 at age 63.
While some artists are known primarily for one style, Wosk's evolution from commercial to fine artist allowed her to express herself in ever-changing ways. She loved Surrealism, and was also inspired by Frieda Kahlo and Tony Fitzpatrick, known for his colorful drawings and collages.
A native of Vancouver, Wosk achieved early success in New York, where her art adorned covers and inside pages of such notable publications as the New York Times, New York, Harper's Bazaar, Vogue and Ms. magazines. Forsaking that success, she moved west, ending up in a penthouse Frank Gehry designed for her in Beverly Hills, before moving even farther west to Santa Monica.
The current show was the brainstorm of Wosk's son, Adam Gunther, and was put together by SMMoA's executive director, Elsa Longhauser. Wosk's different styles are well represented. The illustrations are mostly from the 1970s while the vibrant, large-scale collages that she focused on later in life contain a multitude of media and household items, including crystals, gold leaf, wire, coral, pearls, beads and glitter.
Artist Kim McCarty met Wosk in the early 1980s, and they later became pregnant with their sons at the same time. McCarty is thrilled that the 23-year-old boys remain close friends and are roommates in Los Angeles. She speaks about her dear friend with love, noting that Wosk was 'bigger than life and a great, very generous person.' At the exhibit's recent opening, McCarty was struck by her pal's 'amazing draftsmanship,' something she was not aware of. 'It was a pleasant surprise,' McCarty told the Palisadian-Post about seeing Wosk's earlier pieces in the show.
The women always talked about art, and though their styles were different, they did run things by each other. 'She was telling me to add more stuff onto my work,' McCarty says. 'I was always telling her to take stuff away. I would come to her studio and she would always be changing things.'
??Wosk took much inspiration from her colorful, sun-drenched Adelaide Drive home, where she lived for about 15 years. SMMoA Director of Marketing Elizabeth Pezza spent time at Wosk's exquisite home. 'She was detail-oriented,' Pezza says. 'She had fireplaces filled with glass that looked beautiful when the fire was burning. She was constantly entertaining, and was friends with many artists.'
I n her well-appointed, well-organized and well-stocked studio Wosk spent many hours working on her art, some of which is in the current show. Ironically, despite her appreciation for natural light, she preferred to 'work late into the night,' McCarty says. 'She had a lot of commitments during the day. Nighttime was her most productive time.'
??Popular culture is represented in the SMMoA show, and familiar faces and items such as Mickey Mouse, Ritz crackers and members of The Who adorn some of Wosk's earlier works. A shawl she knitted, with some sparkly thread, is also on display.
??Wosk made elaborate scrapbooks, filled with people and things that inspired her such as movies, art and fashion, and some are in the exhibit, as are recreations that visitors can flip through.
??In the back room, there is a short movie filmed between 2004 and 2006 that features the artist working in her studio. The movie is broken into segments, and shows Wosk reflecting on her artwork, her craft and her process. 'Everything I do is a stepping stone to the next,' Wosk says.
??For this writer, it was bittersweet seeing the film, watching the vibrant artist who was so involved in the local arts community, knowing she didn't have that much time left.
??In the film, Wosk speaks about falling in love with finger painting during the first day of kindergarten. By fourth grade, she knew her destiny was to be an artist. She also talks about other inspirations: totem poles near where she grew up, female genitalia, the human body, death, dreams and the unconscious. 'I'm a visual glutton,' she says.
??We also see a wall filled with many of Wosk's framed Rorschach paintings in her studio. While working on those she learned to 'allow the paint to flow where it wants to flow. The paint is doing its own dance. I let myself be surprised.'
??It is inspiring to see Wosk delicately adding glitter to a piece on her work table or paint to a painting hanging on the wall. She is focused, and there is an ease to how she places things.
All I can do is do my work as impeccably as possible and let go of the outcome,' she says. 'If the work is authentic, that's the success.'
??In my 2010 interview with Wosk, a huge admirer of Robert Rauschenberg, she commented on one of his quotes: 'It is impossible to have progress without conscience.'
I find it is constant work to remain conscious; it is such an elusive state. But without that awareness, there would be no science (con-science), art literature, progress or anything.
For many years I have done dream work, to know myself better and to become friends with the unconscious'the language of the soul. It is the same language that art comes from.
Like Rauschenberg, we as artists bring to light and illuminate that which already exists but not all can see. As imagery arises through one's consciousness, from the imagination it manifests into energy, matter and form. The world has been blessed with the gift of something it has never seen before'that is progress.'
??McCarty, married to Michael McCarty of Michael's restaurant, says that the Santa Monica restaurant has one of Wosk's pieces on view now, and that she has been featured in the restaurant many times.
??Wosk worked until the end. 'Her best work was when she was ill,' McCarty says. 'She let everything go. Even when she couldn't do collages she was knitting. She was always doing something.'
Wosk's appealing, vibrant images are on view at the museum through April 20 in 'Abundance and Devotion: The Art of Miriam Wosk.' The retrospective pays homage to the accomplished artist, who died of cancer in 2010 at age 63.
While some artists are known primarily for one style, Wosk's evolution from commercial to fine artist allowed her to express herself in ever-changing ways. She loved Surrealism, and was also inspired by Frieda Kahlo and Tony Fitzpatrick, known for his colorful drawings and collages.
A native of Vancouver, Wosk achieved early success in New York, where her art adorned covers and inside pages of such notable publications as the New York Times, New York, Harper's Bazaar, Vogue and Ms. magazines. Forsaking that success, she moved west, ending up in a penthouse Frank Gehry designed for her in Beverly Hills, before moving even farther west to Santa Monica.
The current show was the brainstorm of Wosk's son, Adam Gunther, and was put together by SMMoA's executive director, Elsa Longhauser. Wosk's different styles are well represented. The illustrations are mostly from the 1970s while the vibrant, large-scale collages that she focused on later in life contain a multitude of media and household items, including crystals, gold leaf, wire, coral, pearls, beads and glitter.
Artist Kim McCarty met Wosk in the early 1980s, and they later became pregnant with their sons at the same time. McCarty is thrilled that the 23-year-old boys remain close friends and are roommates in Los Angeles. She speaks about her dear friend with love, noting that Wosk was 'bigger than life and a great, very generous person.' At the exhibit's recent opening, McCarty was struck by her pal's 'amazing draftsmanship,' something she was not aware of. 'It was a pleasant surprise,' McCarty told the Palisadian-Post about seeing Wosk's earlier pieces in the show.
The women always talked about art, and though their styles were different, they did run things by each other. 'She was telling me to add more stuff onto my work,' McCarty says. 'I was always telling her to take stuff away. I would come to her studio and she would always be changing things.'
??Wosk took much inspiration from her colorful, sun-drenched Adelaide Drive home, where she lived for about 15 years. SMMoA Director of Marketing Elizabeth Pezza spent time at Wosk's exquisite home. 'She was detail-oriented,' Pezza says. 'She had fireplaces filled with glass that looked beautiful when the fire was burning. She was constantly entertaining, and was friends with many artists.'
I n her well-appointed, well-organized and well-stocked studio Wosk spent many hours working on her art, some of which is in the current show. Ironically, despite her appreciation for natural light, she preferred to 'work late into the night,' McCarty says. 'She had a lot of commitments during the day. Nighttime was her most productive time.'
??Popular culture is represented in the SMMoA show, and familiar faces and items such as Mickey Mouse, Ritz crackers and members of The Who adorn some of Wosk's earlier works. A shawl she knitted, with some sparkly thread, is also on display.
??Wosk made elaborate scrapbooks, filled with people and things that inspired her such as movies, art and fashion, and some are in the exhibit, as are recreations that visitors can flip through.
??In the back room, there is a short movie filmed between 2004 and 2006 that features the artist working in her studio. The movie is broken into segments, and shows Wosk reflecting on her artwork, her craft and her process. 'Everything I do is a stepping stone to the next,' Wosk says.
??For this writer, it was bittersweet seeing the film, watching the vibrant artist who was so involved in the local arts community, knowing she didn't have that much time left.
??In the film, Wosk speaks about falling in love with finger painting during the first day of kindergarten. By fourth grade, she knew her destiny was to be an artist. She also talks about other inspirations: totem poles near where she grew up, female genitalia, the human body, death, dreams and the unconscious. 'I'm a visual glutton,' she says.
??We also see a wall filled with many of Wosk's framed Rorschach paintings in her studio. While working on those she learned to 'allow the paint to flow where it wants to flow. The paint is doing its own dance. I let myself be surprised.'
??It is inspiring to see Wosk delicately adding glitter to a piece on her work table or paint to a painting hanging on the wall. She is focused, and there is an ease to how she places things.
All I can do is do my work as impeccably as possible and let go of the outcome,' she says. 'If the work is authentic, that's the success.'
??In my 2010 interview with Wosk, a huge admirer of Robert Rauschenberg, she commented on one of his quotes: 'It is impossible to have progress without conscience.'
I find it is constant work to remain conscious; it is such an elusive state. But without that awareness, there would be no science (con-science), art literature, progress or anything.
For many years I have done dream work, to know myself better and to become friends with the unconscious'the language of the soul. It is the same language that art comes from.
Like Rauschenberg, we as artists bring to light and illuminate that which already exists but not all can see. As imagery arises through one's consciousness, from the imagination it manifests into energy, matter and form. The world has been blessed with the gift of something it has never seen before'that is progress.'
??McCarty, married to Michael McCarty of Michael's restaurant, says that the Santa Monica restaurant has one of Wosk's pieces on view now, and that she has been featured in the restaurant many times.
??Wosk worked until the end. 'Her best work was when she was ill,' McCarty says. 'She let everything go. Even when she couldn't do collages she was knitting. She was always doing something.'
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