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Friday, 28 October 2011

'Shame' slapped with NC-17 rating

Director Steve McQueen's "Shame," a no-holds-barred movie about a man in the grip of sexual addiction, has officially received an NC-17 rating.

The rating was widely expected and Fox Searchlight knew the film, starring Michael Fassbender and Carey Mulligan, would likely receive an NC-17. It includes full frontal male and female nudity and graphic sex.

Story: Smart, stylish 'Drive' travels down a dark road

The movie opens in limited ? and with the NC-17, extremely limited ? release on Dec. 2.

According to the Motion Picture Association of America, which rates movies, NC-17 films are "patently adult." Children are not admitted, even with their parents.

An NC-17 rating affects a movie's ability to make money for a number of reasons. Among the most important, many theaters won't show them. The rating also makes advertising difficult.

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The movie is an Oscar contender, and Fox Searchlight is aggressively pushing it for a number of awards including Best Picture, Best Actor, Best Supporting Actress and Best Director.

"Shame" stars Fassbender as Brandon, a man who is addicted to sex, whose private life is disrupted when his sister, Cissy, played by Mulligan, shows up for an unannounced ? and indefinite ? visit.

Source: http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/45048460/ns/today-entertainment/

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Thursday, 27 October 2011

Proposed Puerto Rico pipeline could face lawsuit (AP)

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico ? Eleven individuals and environmental groups have served notice on the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers that they will sue to block construction of a proposed natural gas pipeline in Puerto Rico.

The planned 92-mile (148-kilometer) pipeline is the signature infrastructure project of Gov. Luis Fortuno.

The groups say the Corps of Engineers failed to properly research the project's effects on at least 38 animal and plant species.

Nancy Sticht is a spokeswoman for the Florida-based office of the Corps of Engineers. She says the agency will not comment on Wednesday's letter.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/energy/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20111026/ap_on_bi_ge/cb_puerto_rico_pipeline

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The IPO market, an engine of job growth, stalls (AP)

NEW YORK ? Two companies with quirky names, Ubiquiti Networks and Zeltiq Aesthetics, made their public debuts earlier this month with listings on the Nasdaq Stock Market. Each company's stock went up modestly on the first day of trading.

Ubiquiti pocketed $106 million for the day, and Zeltiq made $91 million. They were the most successful stock debuts of the past two months. Then again, they were the only stock debuts of the past two months.

The market for initial public offerings, or IPOs, is suffering through a drought of Texas proportions. Companies thinking of going public are deciding it's just too risky.

The stock market lost nearly 20 percent of its value in a month this past summer. Swings of 200 points for the Dow Jones industrial average continue to be commonplace. Getting the timing wrong for a coming-out party can mean missing out on millions of dollars.

A dried-up IPO market matters because stock debuts aren't just a chance for tech whizzes to become overnight billionaires and ring the bell at the New York Stock Exchange. Companies use the cash they raise to grow ? and that means hiring people.

And at a time when 14 million Americans are looking for work and the unemployment rate has been stuck near 9 percent for two years, the last thing the economy needs is for one engine of hiring to stall.

There are 215 companies waiting to go public. They've filed the necessary paperwork and lined up bankers, and are just holding out for the right time to unleash their stock. The waiting list is the longest since 2001, according to Renaissance Capital, an investment advice firm.

LogMeIn, a Massachusetts software company, went public in July 2009, raised $107 million and harnessed the cash to hire people. Within two years, its work force grew by a third, to 432 people. Without the IPO, the company might have added only 10 percent to its work force, says Jim Kelliher, the chief financial officer.

"It's cash to expand your business," he says.

That's how it usually works. For upstart companies, IPOs and hiring sprees go hand in hand:

? LinkedIn, the online social network for professionals, went public in May to fanfare, raising $353 million. In the three months through the end of June, it expanded its staff by 17 percent.

? Pandora, which streams music online, debuted in June. It bulked up the product development staff by 74 percent and sales and marketing by 125 percent. Pandora employed about 300 people at the end of January and now has more than 400.

? ReachLocal, an online marketing company, went public in May 2010. From the month before its coming-out party through the end of the year, its work force grew 30 percent, to 1,381.

In good times, an open door for stock market debuts can start a snowball of benefits, says Steven Kaplan, a professor of finance at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business.

Venture capital firms bankroll small upstarts, like Amazon and Google, years before they go public. A successful IPO enriches the venture capital backers. They then have an easier time raising money from new investors to plow into companies that might be the next Amazon or Google.

"There's a feedback effect," Kaplan says.

For profitable businesses, an IPO can also unlock the door to corporate debt markets, another source of cash that helps a company grow.

Entrepreneurs and investors describe going public as a crucial hurdle for fast-growing companies, one that divides the Amazons and Googles of the world from the graveyard of startups.

Those that clear the hurdle can transform themselves from obscure businesses to household names. A recent study by the National Venture Capital Association, a trade group, and IHS Global Insight, an economic forecasting firm, examined companies that went public from 1970 to 2010 and had been backed by venture capital before their IPO.

It found that 92 percent of the people hired by those companies over the four decades came on after the IPO.

A separate report by Nasdaq OMX, which owns the Nasdaq Stock Market, examined companies that went public from 2001 to 2009 and found that they increased their collective work force by 70 percent. The number of employed people in the United States in that time rose 1.3 percent.

Of course, the economy has bigger problems than a barren IPO market. Even if all the promising upstarts in line for an IPO went public, it might not put a dent in the 9.1 percent unemployment rate.

And it's difficult to know exactly what companies will do with the money. Most are vague in regulatory paperwork about their next steps. And would-be public companies are barred from talking about their plans until a month after their debut.

Before this past summer, fast-growing companies like LinkedIn and Pandora had been jumping into the stock market at a brisk pace. The companies got a good initial price, and their stock generally did well after that. LinkedIn went public May 19, and its stock more than doubled on its first day.

For a while, it appeared that 2011 would be the best year for IPOs since the Internet bubble popped in 2000. Investors were ready for Internet companies like Zynga and Facebook to go public.

They're still waiting. The Dow lost more than 2,000 points from late July through mid-August. And while the market has rallied since early October, the past two months have been a series of up and down lurches.

As dry as it's been, the drought for IPOs is still not as bad as during the financial crisis. Just one company, Grand Canyon Education, managed to go public in six months, August 2008 to February 2009.

Faced with a long wait and a volatile stock market, some companies have decided to give up. At least 15 private companies have withdrawn their IPO paperwork from the Securities and Exchange Commission in the past two months.

Others are getting snapped up by larger corporations. Of the five companies that pulled their IPOs in September, three were acquired. Hitachi, Nestle and private equity firms all picked up companies that gave up their dream of going public.

What will it take to end the drought? Calmer markets. In recent weeks, moves by European officials to end the region's debt crisis have lifted stocks, but the market remains volatile.

In the meantime, companies are warily eyeing the calendar. Groupon, the daily-deal email service, plans to go public in early November. It was valued as high as $25 billion in June, but it now expects less than half that.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/topstories/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20111024/ap_on_bi_ge/us_ipo_drought

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Wednesday, 26 October 2011

Group: Last Javan rhino in Vietnam killed for horn (AP)

HANOI, Vietnam ? Vietnam has lost its fight to save its rare Javan rhinoceros population after poachers apparently killed the country's last animal for its horn, pushing one of the world's most endangered species closer to extinction, a conservation group said Tuesday.

Vietnam's Cat Tien National Park has had no sightings, footprints or dung from live rhinos since the last known animal living there was found dead last April, shot through the leg with its horn chopped off, the WWF said. Genetic analysis of rhino feces had confirmed in 2004 that at least two rhinos were living in the park, raising hopes that Vietnam's population might survive.

Only 40 to 60 Javan rhinos now remain in Ujung Kulon National Park in Indonesia. They are the last known living members of the species, with none in captivity.

Vietnam's Javan rhino population had been shrinking for decades as land conversion and a rising local population threatened the animal's habitat, but poaching and a lack of effective park management and patrols hastened the decline, said Christy Williams, coordinator of WWF's Asian Elephant and Rhino Program.

"It appears that protection is not being given a high priority by the Vietnamese government," he said.

Park director Tran Van Thanh said that while some of his rangers failed to fulfill their duties, it is impossible for them to stop all of the estimated 100,000 people living near the park from hunting exotic animals when the average farmer there earns around 150,000 dong ($7.50) per day.

"We're not trying to avoid our responsibility in the death of the rhinos, but we've done our best to protect them," Thanh said.

Demand for rhino horn has surged in recent years among Vietnamese and Chinese who believe it can cure an array of ailments. Horns can now fetch up to $50,000 per pound (about $100,000 per kilogram), the WWF report said Tuesday. A small amount of ground-up powder can bring hundreds of dollars on the black market. Global demand has also increased in the last four to five years as some people have begun to consider rhino horn a remedy for cancer, Williams said.

WWF, along with the International Rhino Foundation, confirmed that the last rhino had died in Vietnam by collecting and analyzing its feces. Twenty-two of the rhino's dung piles were found in Cat Tien from October 2009 to February 5, 2010, but no dung piles or fresh rhino footprints were seen in the subsequent nine weeks, the 44-page report said.

Before 1988, the Javan rhino was believed to be extinct from mainland Asia. A small population was then discovered in Vietnam's park, and for the past 20 years, a number of wildlife conservationists have worked closely with the government to try to prevent the species from dying out in Vietnam.

But the rhino's habitat has been cut in half since 1988 to about 74,000 acres (30,000 hectares) today.

South Africa is a prime source country for rhino horns. According to the South African government, a record 333 rhinos were poached in 2010 ? a nearly threefold increase from 2009.

In September, Vietnamese officials traveled to South Africa to address the problem, three years after Hanoi recalled a diplomat from its embassy there after she was caught on tape receiving illegal rhino horns. Ha Cong Tuan, an environmental affairs official, called on Vietnamese medical researchers to study what he called the "rumor" that rhino horn cures cancer and then publicize their findings.

The WWF report said Vietnam is on the verge of an "extinction crisis" with several other species ? including the saola and the Tonkin snub-nosed monkey ? threatened by deforestation, widespread poaching and a "largely uncontrolled" illegal wildlife trade.

Cat Tien was established in 1998 as a composite of three existing protected areas. From 1998 to 2004 WWF invested $6.3 million in the park, with up to $600,000 earmarked for rhino conservation work.

In Hanoi, the Vietnamese capital, 100 grams (about 7 ounces) of crushed rhino horn retail for about 43 million dong ($2,150), with the average prescription costing 200,000 dong ($10), a rhino horn vendor in the city's bustling old quarter said Monday, requesting anonymity because the practice is illegal here.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/environment/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20111025/ap_on_re_as/as_vietnam_rhino_lost

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Tuesday, 25 October 2011

NASA telescopes help solve ancient supernova mystery

ScienceDaily (Oct. 24, 2011) ? A mystery that began nearly 2,000 years ago, when Chinese astronomers witnessed what would turn out to be an exploding star in the sky, has been solved. New infrared observations from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope and Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer, or WISE, reveal how the first supernova ever recorded occurred and how its shattered remains ultimately spread out to great distances.

The findings show that the stellar explosion took place in a hollowed-out cavity, allowing material expelled by the star to travel much faster and farther than it would have otherwise.

"This supernova remnant got really big, really fast," said Brian J. Williams, an astronomer at North Carolina State University in Raleigh. Williams is lead author of a new study detailing the findings online in the Astrophysical Journal. "It's two to three times bigger than we would expect for a supernova that was witnessed exploding nearly 2,000 years ago. Now, we've been able to finally pinpoint the cause."

A new image of the supernova, known as RCW 86, is online at http://go.nasa.gov/pnv6Oy .

In 185 A.D., Chinese astronomers noted a "guest star" that mysteriously appeared in the sky and stayed for about 8 months. By the 1960s, scientists had determined that the mysterious object was the first documented supernova. Later, they pinpointed RCW 86 as a supernova remnant located about 8,000 light-years away. But a puzzle persisted. The star's spherical remains are larger than expected. If they could be seen in the sky today in infrared light, they'd take up more space than our full moon.

The solution arrived through new infrared observations made with Spitzer and WISE, and previous data from NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory and the European Space Agency's XMM-Newton Observatory.

The findings reveal that the event is a "Type Ia" supernova, created by the relatively peaceful death of a star like our sun, which then shrank into a dense star called a white dwarf. The white dwarf is thought to have later blown up in a supernova after siphoning matter, or fuel, from a nearby star.

"A white dwarf is like a smoking cinder from a burnt-out fire," Williams said. "If you pour gasoline on it, it will explode."

The observations also show for the first time that a white dwarf can create a cavity around it before blowing up in a Type Ia event. A cavity would explain why the remains of RCW 86 are so big. When the explosion occurred, the ejected material would have traveled unimpeded by gas and dust and spread out quickly.

Spitzer and WISE allowed the team to measure the temperature of the dust making up the RCW 86 remnant at about minus 325 degrees Fahrenheit, or minus 200 degrees Celsius. They then calculated how much gas must be present within the remnant to heat the dust to those temperatures. The results point to a low-density environment for much of the life of the remnant, essentially a cavity.

Scientists initially suspected that RCW 86 was the result of a core-collapse supernova, the most powerful type of stellar blast. They had seen hints of a cavity around the remnant, and, at that time, such cavities were only associated with core-collapse supernovae. In those events, massive stars blow material away from them before they blow up, carving out holes around them.

But other evidence argued against a core-collapse supernova. X-ray data from Chandra and XMM-Newton indicated that the object consisted of high amounts of iron, a telltale sign of a Type Ia blast. Together with the infrared observations, a picture of a Type Ia explosion into a cavity emerged.

"Modern astronomers unveiled one secret of a two-millennia-old cosmic mystery only to reveal another," said Bill Danchi, Spitzer and WISE program scientist at NASA Headquarters in Washington. "Now, with multiple observatories extending our senses in space, we can fully appreciate the remarkable physics behind this star's death throes, yet still be as in awe of the cosmos as the ancient astronomers."

NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif., manages the Spitzer Space Telescope mission for NASA's Science Mission Directorate, Washington. Science operations are conducted at the Spitzer Science Center at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena. Caltech manages JPL for NASA. For more information about Spitzer, visit http://spitzer.caltech.edu/ and http://www.nasa.gov/spitzer .

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Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/~3/bSxiePUbP-Y/111024135111.htm

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Occupy London Update: St Paul's considers taking legal action ...

St Paul?s considers taking legal action

Officials consult lawyers over how to remove Occupy camp as closure costs ?20,000 a day in lost revenues

Peter Walker?and?Riazat Butt??Sunday 23 October 2011 19.56 BST?

Officials from St Paul?s Cathedral and the wider City district are considering legal action to force protesters to remove a camp set up outside the church more than a week ago, following an impasse between the two sides.

Read full story: ?The Guardian

Source: http://citizensnewsdaily.com/2011/10/23/occupy-london-update-st-pauls-considers-taking-legal-action/

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Top 5 early revelations from 'exclusive' Steve Jobs biography (Digital Trends)

The long-awaited biography on the late Apple co-founder and famed chief executive Steve Jobs ? aptly titled Steve Jobs: The Exclusive Biography, by author Walter Isaacson ? is now available through Amazon?s Kindle, iBooks and in bookstores nation-wide. That means the press is now free to busily pump out stories that reveal all the best tidbits. To take the condensation of the book even further, we?ve compiled here the five most i-teresting revelations from Steve Jobs, available so far. Now you won?t have to read the book at all (Kidding! Kinda?).

1. Jobs thought ?Antennagate? was a smear campaign by Google and Motorola

After reports began to surface that signal strength would drop significantly on the then-newly-released iPhone 4 when the phone was held in a certain way ? a scandal, commonly known as ?Antennagate,? which only affected a relatively small number of devices ? Jobs apparently thought Google and Motorola were trying to ?shoot down Apple,? according to the book.

After holding a special press conference, in which Apple offered customers free bumper cases that prevented the issue, Jobs told Isaacson that the problem was ?blown so out of proportion that it?s incredible.?

2. Jobs? and Bill Gates? first visit was a ?weird seduction?

From an excerpt of the book published today in Fortune: ?Gates frequently went down to Cupertino for demonstrations of the Macintosh operating system, and he was not very impressed. ?I remember the first time we went down, Steve had this app where it was just things bouncing around on the screen,? he told me. ?That was the only app that ran.? Gates was also put off by Jobs?s attitude. ?It was kind of a weird seduction visit where Steve was saying we don?t really need you and we?re doing this great thing, and it?s under the cover. He?s in his Steve Jobs sales mode, but kind of the sales mode that also says, ?I don?t need you, but I might let you be involved.??

Gates also said that he found Jobs ?fundamentally odd,? and ?weirdly flawed as a human being? because of his practice of either ?saying you were shit or trying to seduce you.?

3. Jobs and Obama didn?t get along, at first

Steve Jobs almost refused to meet with President Obama in 2010 because he insisted that the president invite Jobs himself. The high-powered pair did eventually meet, at a hotel in San Francisco. And Jobs immediately gave President Obama a piece of his mind.

?You?re headed for a one-term presidency,? Jobs told Obama when the meeting began. He insisted that Obama have more pro-business initiatives, like they do in China where companies aren?t met with ?regulations and unnecessary costs.? Jobs also complained about the restrictions on the US education system imposed by unions.

Despite the cold reception, Jobs and Obama stayed in touch, says Isaacson, and Jobs later offered to help create ads for Obama?s 2012 re-election campaign, an offer he extended in 2008, but didn?t follow through with because he didn?t like the way campaign manager David Axelrod handled the relationship.

?Read more

4. Jobs didn?t want any third-party apps on the iPhone

Third-party apps may be one of the most compelling reasons to buy an iPhone, but they almost weren?t allowed on the device at all. Isaacson reports that Jobs was reluctant to allow third-party apps on the original iPhone after it debuted in 2007.

?When it first came out in early 2007, there were no apps you could buy from outside developers, and Jobs initially resisted allowing them,? writes Isaacson. ?He didn?t want outsiders to create applications for the iPhone that could mess it up, infect it with viruses, or pollute its integrity.?

Apple board member Art Levinson and Apple senior vice president of worldwide marketing Phil Schiller later talked Jobs into allowing third-party apps.

?I couldn?t imagine that we would create something as powerful as the iPhone and not empower developers to make lots of apps. I knew customers would love them,? said Schiller.

5. Jobs felt ?annoyed and depressed? after iPad announcement due to customer complaints

Following the launch of the original iPad in 2010, Jobs became ?annoyed and depressed,? says Isaacson, when his personal email address became flooded with complaints about the new device.

??There?s no USB cord! There?s no this, no that,?? Jobs told Isaacson. ?Some of them are like, ?F**k you, how can you do that?? I don?t usually write people back, but I replied, ?Your parents would be so proud of how you turned out.? And some don?t like the iPad name, and on and on. I kind of got depressed today. It knocks you back a bit.?

?Read more

This article was originally posted on Digital Trends