Source: http://news.feedzilla.com/en_us/stories/politics/top-stories/193557032?client_source=feed&format=rss
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Tuesday, January 31, 2012
The Benefit of Investing in Assets | ArticleGoes - Free Dofollow ...
If you have been looking for a way to cushion both you and your family from a dire financial situation then you should consider making investments.
If you have been looking for a way to cushion both you and your family from a dire financial situation then you should consider making investments. With the current economic state, several people are opting not to invest in company shares; well there is good news for such people and that is investing in assets. Investing in assets will guarantee you safe investments. Therefore you will be at peace knowing that your investment is fully secure. There are guidelines to follow in order to guarantee that your asset investment gives you good returns or profits in the long run.
When investing in assets, you should ensure that the asset you are investing in is an asset that is in high demand. It would be pointless to spend your money purchasing an item that nobody needs and that is why demand should be high, that way the asset will never lack a ready market. The higher the demand then the higher you can charge for it and once you feel you are ready to move on; you can sell the asset at a higher price than you bought it. All in all investing in assets is a productive path to go down on.
There are several benefits that come along with this venture one of them being a predictable investment return. Let us take for example shipping containers, the demand for them is quite high since there are several items being traded across seas each and every day and you can be sure that their demand will never run out. By closely looking at the market, you can be able to predict the average return you will get from shipping containers investment. This will give you the chance to clearly review all your options before making the investment.
Investing in assets is a good path to follow and more so when the assets are shipping containers. To begin with, the asset is not that hard to acquire; you can make your purchase directly via the manufactures or you can opt to make your purchase via a company that leases containers. The latter would be a better option because you can go back to the leasing company to provide you with hard asset management. This basically means that once you have your shipping containers, you can entrust them to lease it on your behalf at a cost.
This would be a good option because they have an endless supply of clients waiting to lease a shipping container. This will eliminate the burden of having to look for the clients yourself and that is in itself the beauty of hard asset management. The only thing left for you to do would be to go home and wait for your returns or benefits to come in. A payment system is formed depending on the number of shipping crates you own and your personal interest. If you have been looking for high yield investments then shipping containers investment is definitely worth your consideration. Try the venture today and you will never regret your decision.
Resources:
Pacific Tycoon is the author of this article on High Yield Investments.
Find more information on Predictable Investment Return here.
Source: http://articlegoes.com/the-benefit-of-investing-in-assets.html
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Monday, January 30, 2012
Climate of intolerance in West Bank, activists say (AP)
RAMALLAH, West Bank ? A Palestinian atheist who was jailed and beaten last year for expressing anti-Muslim views on Facebook and in blogs says Palestinian security forces are harassing him again, despite government pledges to respect human rights.
The blogger's renewed ordeal is part of a persistent climate of intolerance of dissent in the territories controlled by Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, say human rights activists. They say they've seen improvements, including a marked decrease in the mistreatment of detainees, but that Abbas' security forces, who are partially funded by the West, must halt harassment and arbitrary detention.
Government spokesman Ghassan Khatib acknowledged occasional lapses, but said that in the past two years, "there's been great progress and success in reducing abuses."
Such promises mean little to atheist blogger Walid Husayin, who has lived in fear of the security forces since being released from a nine-month prison stint last summer.
"I'm sick and tired. My life has come to a halt," the 28-year-old Husayin said in a phone interview from his home in the northern West Bank town of Qalqiliya.
Since his release on bail, he has been picked up several times by security agents and held for days at a time. In one of those detentions, he was beaten with cables and forced to stand in a painful position on empty cans, said Husayin, the son of a Muslim preacher. Interrogators smashed his two computers and demanded that he stop expressing his views, he said.
Activists from three rights organizations said they witnessed an increase in arbitrary detentions in recent months, including calling in "troublemakers" for repeated interrogation, but said they hadn't yet collated 2011 figures.
Those targeted include loyalists of the Islamic militant Hamas, Abbas' political rival, and supporters of Hezb al-Tahrir, or the "Liberation Party," a puritan Islamic movement considered apolitical.
The increased pressure on dissent coincides with pro-democracy uprisings of the Mideast Arab Spring, but it's not clear if there is a direct link. Anti-government demonstrations in the West Bank usually draw just a few dozen or few hundred people, tiny compared to protests that toppled rulers in Egypt, Libya and Tunisia over the past year.
There appears to be little popular sympathy for those targeted in the crackdown, said Jamil Rabah, an independent Palestinian pollster.
In Gaza, ruled by the Islamic Hamas since a violent takeover in 2007, the Islamists appear to dealing even more harshly with critics, particularly on religious matters.
In both territories, those who violate social norms find themselves in the crosshairs. In Gaza, Hamas recently banned a televised amateur singing contest on modesty grounds because it included female contestants.
In the West Bank, Palestinian-American comedian Maysoon Zayid said her husband was roughed up and lightly hurt last fall after she mocked Palestinian officials in a skit. Witnesses identified the assailants as plainclothes security men, said Zayid, a contributor to "Countdown with Keith Olbermann" on Current TV, a U.S. cable show.
She said it was the first attempt at intimidation after years of West Bank performances.
"I feel like the Palestinian Authority is going backward," said Zayid, a resident of Cliffside Park, New Jersey. "That is not the state I am fighting for."
Blogger Husayin, who got his start with anonymous Facebook posts, caused an uproar in the Arab world in 2010 by mocking Islam's Prophet Muhammad, dismissing Islam as a primitive religion and sarcastically referring to himself as God.
In November 2010, he was caught in a sting that used Facebook to find him. In the West Bank, it's against the law to defame Islam or Christianity.
He was initially held without charges, but eventually he was accused of blasphemy and insulting people's beliefs. For four of the nine months of his initial detention, he was kept in solitary confinement. He told the New York-based Human Rights Watch that he was shackled for long periods and so harshly beaten that he vomited blood. After his release on bail in August, a court gave him a three-year suspended sentence.
Husayin returned home to his conservative Muslim family, rarely venturing out. He said his family is ashamed of what people might say about him, because of his unorthodox views. Husayin said he doesn't want people to see him either ? he still fears vigilante retribution.
The blogger wouldn't allow reporters to visit, saying he feared it would inflame family tensions.
Adnan Damiri, a spokesman for the Palestinian security forces, said he was not aware of harassment against Husayin.
"It isn't acceptable to summon somebody for ideological reasons. I am prepared to deal with this case," he said.
Khatib, the government spokesman, portrayed attempts to stifle dissent as growing pains. "We can promise that in 2012, we will have progress from last year. We are building a state, and there are difficulties in doing that," he said.
While the blogger's "crime" is unusual in the West Bank, his arbitrary detention fits a pattern, activists from three human rights groups said. Shawan Jabarin of the rights group al-Haq said he was aware of hundreds of arbitrary detentions in the past few months.
The bulk of those detained are Hamas supporters.
"We haven't seen tremendous improvement in rights and freedoms," said Randa Siniora of the Independent Commission for Human Rights.
The worst abuses receded over the past two years, like torture of political activists and lengthy detentions, the activists said, and the practice of trying civilians in military courts has largely stopped, they said.
Damiri, the police spokesman, said lessons have been learned.
"There are individual cases of abuse, but we don't have a culture of revenge," he said.
Rights activists say it's too soon to speak of a major shift in attitude.
"There's a lack of accountability, a lack of laws enshrining rights," said Jabarin. "We can't talk about a culture of institutions and the rule of law."
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Belichick, Brady in cheerful mood at arrival (AP)
INDIANAPOLIS ? Even the usually dour Bill Belichick was joking around as the New England Patriots arrived in Indianapolis for Super Bowl week.
At his opening news conference Sunday night, Belichick was asked if he expected some Hoosier hospitality.
"I never had too much hospitality here," he said, noting that the Patriots aren't exactly popular in Colts country, "until I went for it on fourth-and-2."
His gamble on that play at the New England 28 with 2:08 to go failed and led to the Colts' winning field goal in a 2009 regular-season game.
"Fans greeted us lots more and were awfully friendly" after that, he added.
All-Pro receiver Wes Welker wasn't familiar with the term when asked the same question.
"What is Hoosier hospitality? What does that consist of?" Welker asked to laughs before getting a full explanation from a local television reporter. "I think it will be a little strange practicing at the Colts' facility. I don't know how many people like that, but we'll be calm and polite and not try to rub it in, so I hope everyone is appreciative of it."
Belichick, dressed in a suit ? no hoodie for the coach this time ? also said All-Pro tight end Rob Gronkowski is "day to day" with a high left ankle sprain for next Sunday's NFL title game against the New York Giants. Gronkowski has been wearing a walking boot since being injured in the AFC title game.
"You've got to prepare for every one of these situations that come up," quarterback Tom Brady said of the possibility Gronkowski will be limited for sidelined. "You always have to have some contingency plans."
Brady knows the Giants will bring lots of heat with their pass rush, but for now he was more comforted by not having to face a local rival who frequently has put Brady on his back.
"I see Dwight Freeney's picture up there (on the stadium)," Brady said. "When you come to Indy and don't have to play him, we are very fortunate for that."
The Patriots drew about 25,000 fans to Gillette Stadium earlier Sunday for what Brady termed "a pep rally." Team owner Robert Kraft, who has had an emotional year ? his wife passed away last July and he was instrumental in resolving the NFL's lockout of the players ? was thrilled by the turnout.
"We had 25,000 people come to our stadium today to send the team off," Kraft said. "At the stadium today it was so special, the time we are in now, to have 25,000 of our fans cheer our team is a very emotional experience."
This is Kraft's sixth Super Bowl as owner, and he vividly recalled the days when the team was lucky to draw 25,000 for a game.
"I sat with those crowds. I sat in the stands for 34 years and we had one home playoff game, in 1978, which we lost to Houston," Kraft said. "And last Sunday, we were privileged to host our 15th playoff game."
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Sunday, January 29, 2012
Why exotic animal trade grows in Asia
Rising wealth?lifts demand for exotic pets and delicacies in Asia. Meahwhile, enforcers are stretched thin.
On a traffic-snarled Jakarta roadside, a market trader thrusts out a forearm with a terrified looking primate clasping tightly to his skin.
Skip to next paragraph"You can have it for 300,000 rupiah [$30]," he says of the slow loris, a protected species whose sluggish movement makes it easy prey for poachers. The destruction of its habitat and its low reproduction rate are why the loris is classified as facing extinction under the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species, which bans their trade.
But here at the Jatinegara market, there is no attempt to conceal the sale of loris or many other endangered species. Orangutans, Sumatran tigers, and Javan eagles are just a few of the threatened species in Indonesia's animal markets.
It is a scenario that has been playing out across Southeast Asia for centuries, but with increased speed in the past decade, as a burgeoning class of wealthy Asians who cherish rare creatures as exotic pets, delicacies, or for supposed medicinal qualities fuel a booming and illegal trade.
The plunder ? a small piece of the greater challenge of environmental conservation in Indonesia ? is happening in conjunction with habitat depletion, and conservationists fear some species will soon disappear while new ones tumble onto the endangered list.
"Rare animals have become status symbols. They are trophies for people to demonstrate their wealth and the collateral damage of Asia's economic rise," says James Compton, senior director for Asia-Pacific at Traffic, a conservation group that monitors wildlife trade.
"We will see some local populations of endemic species disappear very quickly. Look at what happened to the tiger population over the past 100 years," he says.
The Association of Southeast Asian Nations Wildlife Enforcement Network predicts that between 13 and 42 percent of the region's animal and plant species will be wiped out this century, mostly due to logging and loss of habitat.
The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organi?za?tion estimates that Indonesia loses 6.2 million acres of forest ? equivalent to the size of Vermont ? every year. By 2008, Indonesia had lost 72 percent of its ancient forests, and what remains is threatened by commercial logging, forest fires, and clearing for palm oil plantations, according to Green?peace.
Source: http://rss.csmonitor.com/~r/feeds/csm/~3/R1JCakEFUpA/Why-exotic-animal-trade-grows-in-Asia
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Saturday, January 28, 2012
Thousands of Tunisians denounce Islamist extremism (AP)
TUNIS, Tunisia ? More than 8,000 Tunisians marched Saturday through the capital denouncing violence committed by ultraconservative Islamist groups in recent months.
Since the fall of Zine El Abidine Ben Ali's secular dictatorship in a popular uprising a year ago, small groups of ultraconservative Muslims known as Salafists have risen in Tunisia calling for greater piety, attacking unveiled women and secular intellectuals and occupying universities.
Organized by two leftist opposition parties, the demonstration was one of the largest marches in the country since a moderate Islamist party swept elections last year. Not far away, several hundred Islamists held a counter-protest.
"Make a common front against fanaticism," read one of the posters carried by demonstrators in the main rally, many of whom were women. "We got rid of totalitarianism, and we don't want it back," read another banner.
Tunisia's long-oppressed moderate Islamist party, Ennahda, won October's elections and formed a government with two secular parties. Ennahda has taken pains to calm the fears of Tunisia's secular elite that it would turn the country into an Islamic state.
The party has been repeatedly embarrassed by the actions of the Salafists, who appear to be justifying the warnings of secular parties such as the Progressive Democratic Party that radical Islamists are trying to change the country.
PDP leader Maya Jribi attended the demonstration and called for a "tolerant and pluralistic Tunisia where the citizens are respected in face of the death threats we hear these days."
Critics of the government say it is not doing enough in the face of the Salafi actions, which included occupying a university and preventing students from taking exams because of the institution's policy against the religious face veil.
"I came to denounce the violence and say that the government has to take responsibility for applying the law against those who are violent," said demonstrator Aicha Naboltane, 29.
The incident that appeared to have really galvanized people was an attack on secular intellectual Hamadi Rendissi and newspaper editor Zied Krichen by Salafis outside a courthouse Monday.
The two men were attending a civil trial against a television station owner for airing the award-winning Iranian animated film Persepolis on charges he "violated sacred values."
The three-kilometer long march passed through Avenue Bourguiba in the heart of Tunis, where demonstrators brought down the dictatorship a year earlier.
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Following genetic footprints out of Africa: First modern humans settled in Arabia
ScienceDaily (Jan. 26, 2012) ? A new study, using genetic analysis to look for clues about human migration over sixty thousand years ago, suggests that the first modern humans settled in Arabia on their way from the Horn of Africa to the rest of the world.
Led by the University of Leeds and the University of Porto in Portugal, the study is recently published in American Journal of Human Genetics and provides intriguing insight into the earliest stages of modern human migration, say the researchers.
"A major unanswered question regarding the dispersal of modern humans around the world concerns the geographical site of the first steps out of Africa," explains Dr Lu?sa Pereira from the Institute of Molecular Pathology and Immunology of the University of Porto (IPATIMUP). "One popular model predicts that the early stages of the dispersal took place across the Red Sea to southern Arabia, but direct genetic evidence has been thin on the ground."
The international research team, which included colleagues from across Europe, Arabia and North Africa, analysed three of the earliest non-African maternal lineages. These early branches are associated with the time period when modern humans first successfully moved out of Africa.
Using mitochondrial DNA analysis, which traces the female line of descent and is useful for comparing relatedness between different populations, the researchers compared complete genomes from Arabia and the Near East with a database of hundreds more samples from Europe. They found evidence for an ancient ancestry within Arabia.
Professor Martin Richards of the University of Leeds' Faculty of Biological Sciences, said: "The timing and pattern of the migration of early modern humans has been a source of much debate and research. Our new results suggest that Arabia, rather than North Africa or the Near East, was the first staging-post in the spread of modern humans around the world."
The research was funded by the Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology, the Leverhulme Trust, and the DeLaszlo Foundation.
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Journal Reference:
- Ver?nica Fernandes, Farida Alshamali, Marco Alves, Marta D. Costa, Joana B. Pereira, Nuno M. Silva, Lotfi Cherni, Nourdin Harich, Viktor Cerny, Pedro Soares et al. The Arabian Cradle: Mitochondrial Relicts of the First Steps along the Southern Route out of Africa. The American Journal of Human Genetics, 26 January 2012 DOI: 10.1016/j.ajhg.2011.12.010
Note: If no author is given, the source is cited instead.
Disclaimer: Views expressed in this article do not necessarily reflect those of ScienceDaily or its staff.
Source: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/01/120126123705.htm
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Friday, January 27, 2012
Pay Chen: Why I'll Live-Tweet The Bachelor Canada
"Ugh, why do you watch that?"
You've likely asked someone this before, or you've been caught watching something so trivial and trashy that you can only sputter a partial excuse.
"It's funny!"
"It's entertaining!"
"I think he's really on the show to find true love."
For many years I was able to use the excuse, "Oh, I have to watch it for work." It was true. I've worked for several television stations that air popular reality shows that people just love to hate. Some of the shows I truly hated. I hated them so much I wanted to punch my fist through the TV. I wanted to pull the girls' cheap extensions and pluck their bad gel nails off their fingers one by one. I wanted people to believe I watched the History Channel to unwind and not New York Goes to Work. Go ahead, judge me.
As someone said to me the other day, "I follow the shows so I'm not left out of the conversation." This is even more important if you're one who likes to follow live tweets of your favourite reality shows. I watched The Bachelor on my PVR once and it felt lonely. The only way to watch the show is live with my laptop and iPhone in hand. The community of like-minded women (and a few men) meet up online to collectively tear a strip into the weakest contestant. The one we pinpoint as "not there for the right reasons" or "too much drama" or "doesn't know how to match her lip liner." Because we are smarter than the guy or girl who has to filter through the spray-tanned crowd and find their soul mate. We see what they don't see and we want to call them out on their shenanigans. "DON'T PICK THAT ONE! IT WILL NEVER LAST!"
When I was in junior high, my friend and I would call each other and watch Another World together over the phone. It was just so much better than talking about it the next day as we teased our hair between classes.
Think you can watch your show a week later and not come across a spoiler telling you who was voted off, didn't lose enough weight or who was sent home during the most dramatic rose ceremony ever? Good luck. Being online during my favourite reality shows is the only way I'll watch them.
A good friend of mine (who is not on Twitter) couldn't understand why I would do this. "You tweet during the show?!" Yes! And some shows know how badly we want in and you can interact with the contestants, the judges, the hair and makeup person LIVE! Include us! Make us feel a part of the show! Make me feel my 140 characters really, really matters.
Most of these shows are American, so will more people jump online when the future of a fellow Canadian is at stake? When the Canadian version of The Bachelor hits the air this fall and your hairdresser's cousin's co-worker's son's teacher is on the show, will you be watching? I will. And with my team of real and pretend online friends, we'll have plenty to say.
?
Follow Pay Chen on Twitter: www.twitter.com/PayChen
Source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/pay-chen/the-bachelor-canada_b_1236812.html
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Thursday, January 26, 2012
DMCA jailbreak exemption set to expire, EFF asks for your help to get it renewed and expanded
The EFF (Electronic Frontier Foundation) notes that jailbreaking your iPhone or iPad may soon become illegal under the DMCA, and lend suggestions on how you can prevent it.
 |  |
Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/TheIphoneBlog/~3/foY1jtnwjFI/story01.htm
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Boeing 4Q profit up as plane deliveries take off (AP)
MINNEAPOLIS ? Quicker deliveries of Boeing's commercial airplanes helped it report a 20-percent jump in fourth-quarter profits, and offset sluggish growth in its defense business.
However, its shares fell because of a weaker 2012 earnings outlook than analysts expected.
Boeing Co. posted net income of $1.39 billion Wednesday, or $1.84 per share. That didn't include a tax benefit of 52 cents per share. Analysts surveyed by FactSet expected $1 per share. Revenue was $19.56 billion, also better than expected.
Boeing delivered 128 commercial planes during the quarter, up from 116 a year ago. Profits from commercial planes jumped 56 percent. Revenue rose 31 percent.
Profits from defense rose 6 percent. Revenue rose 4 percent. Defense contractors are just beginning to see what is expected to be a major slowdown in military spending in the U.S. and Europe. Boeing says defense revenue will fall roughly 5 percent in 2012.
Boeing predicted a 2012 profit of $4.05 to $4.25 per share. Analysts had been expecting a profit of $4.90 per share. Not counting 83 cents per share in higher-than-expected pension expense and other one-time items, Boeing expects an adjusted profit of $5.06 to $5.26 per share.
The company forecast revenue of $78 billion to $80 billion. Analysts were expecting $78.45 billion.
Boeing, based in Chicago, says it plans to deliver 585 to 600 commercial planes this year, up from 477 last year. It delivered three of its new 787s last year, and nine of its new 747-8 superjumbo jets. Boeing says revenue from commercial planes will grow at least 31 percent this year.
Shares fell $1.94, or 2.6 percent, to $73.42 in morning trading.
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Wednesday, January 25, 2012
76ers dominate early and rout Wizards 103-83 (AP)
PHILADELPHIA ? Elton Brand had 17 points and nine rebounds, and Jrue Holiday also scored 17 to lead the Philadelphia 76ers to 103-83 win over the Washington Wizards on Monday night.
Jodie Meeks added 15 points and Andre Iguodala had 11 assists. The Sixers led by 30 in the first half and easily cruised to their third win of the season against the hapless Wizards.
Jordan Crawford led the Wizards with 17 points. They lost their third straight game and remained the NBA's only winless road team at 0-7.
The Sixers are one of the league's early-season surprises and are counting on this week's slate of home games to fatten their record. After the Wizards, they play New Jersey, Charlotte and Detroit, four of the five worst teams in the Eastern Conference.
Playing without starting center Spencer Hawes (left Achilles strain) and forward Nik Vucevic (quadriceps strain), the Sixers improved to 8-1 at home.
The Sixers must wish they could play the Wizards (2-15) every night. They beat them by 31 points and 13 points on consecutive nights earlier this month, and this game was never competitive.
Brand was sent home from the morning shootaround with a stomach ailment. He dunked for Philadelphia's first basket off Iguodala's steal. It was the start of big first quarters for each of them. Iguodala had seven assists and Brand 11 points ? both numbers above their season averages.
Meeks hit consecutive 3s for a 17-10 lead, and the rout was on. The Sixers made nine of their first 14 shots, setting the pace for a torrid first half.
The Wizards, who lost Sunday at Boston, played with little passion in the first half. They walked down the court for offensive possessions, never hustled after loose balls and couldn't convert the easiest of buckets, missing eight of nine shots in the paint in the first quarter. Washington coach Flip Saunders took a knee in front of the scorer's table, bowed his head and rubbed his temples after a string of sloppy plays.
About 45 minutes before the opening tip, Sixers coach Doug Collins said he wanted to see if his team had "mental toughness" heading into a game without two of its best big men. Hawes averages 10.4 points and 8.8 rebounds, and Vucevic has had a promising rookie season off the bench.
"My feeling is, when everything is good and things are going well, that's one thing," Collins said. "But when you start facing adversity, are we all going to pull together? I know one thing, there won't be any excuses from my standpoint. I think our players know that. We're not going to go out with the idea that because we're hurt, it gives us an excuse to lose games."
No excuses needed.
Pick any stat and the Sixers dominated. They went 4 of 9 on 3s in the first half; the Wizards were 0 for 5. At one point in the first half, the entire Wizards team had only outscored the Sixers' bench 30-27.
With Hawes out, Collins turned to 13-year veteran Tony Battie to guard JaVale McGee. McGee, averaging 11.8 points, took only two shots in the first half. McGee finished with two points.
Sixers rookie Lavoy Allen, who starred at nearby Temple, made all five shots from the floor and scored 10 points. Lou Williams and Thaddeus Young each scored 14.
The Sixers had 62 points in the first half, topping their previous season high for a half (54) set against, yup, Washington on Jan. 13.
Led by Brand and Holiday, the Sixers shot 65 percent in the half (26 of 40) and the Wizards never threatened to rally.
A year ago, the Sixers were a slumping team trying to find their way. In Collins' first season, they started 4-13 before a strong finish put them at 41-41 and in the playoffs.
After this blowout, the Sixers are 12-5 and rolling toward their first winning season since 2004-05.
Notes: The Sixers won their fifth straight over Washington. ... The Sixers opened a seven-game homestand. ... The Wizards led the NBA in blocks with 7.2 per game. They had five Monday night.
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Fresh iPhone Apps for Jan. 24: Oscars, Mobile MORE Field Guide to Life, Time of Heroes, Puzzlejuice (Appolicious)
Oscar season kicks of this week, so be ready with Oscars, today?s leading Fresh iPhone App and a great way to get info on all things Academy Awards. Following that is Mobile MORE Field Guide to Life, an app for those recovering from alcoholism that can help them stay on the path to recovery. Time of Heroes, a turn-based strategy game, heads up our games offering, followed by puzzler hybrid Puzzlejuice, which combines elements of Tetris, word searches and match-3 titles.
Oscars (iPhone, iPad) Free
The nominees for the 84th Academy Awards are due out today, and if you?re a movie fanatic you?re going to want to be at the ready with the official app of the awards show, Oscars. The app makes it easy to keep up to speed on all that?s going on with the famed award show, from the nominees this week to seeing Academy Awards through the last 100 years of cinema.
Oscars gives you the ability to watch trailers of nominated films, view specials on the people who have received nominations, learn about stars? fashion and more. And during the actual show on Feb. 26, you?ll get a unique perspective on the proceedings by choosing which camera angle you want to see as the awards are taking place and getting exclusive footage from the Governor?s ball after the show.
There are a lot of apps in the iTunes App Store that can help you when drinking by teaching you to recognize when you?ve had too many or stopping you from making a bad decision with your text-messaging powers, but there are a lot fewer for those trying to recover from alcoholism. But there is the Mobile MORE Field Guide to Life, which helps those in recovery stay on their path with tools and inspiration on the go.
The Field Guide to Life provides quite a few useful features to help with recovery, including a sober counter, a daily inspirational message and sobriety challenges to help get you through small increments of time like days and weeks. There are also social features like a 12-Step Meeting Finder and a community support system that lets you program important people into your app like a sponsor, who can be instantly notified with the app?s ?Get Help Now? button.
Turn-based strategy title Time of Heroes gives you an army and sends you into battle. As you work through the game?s story, you?ll command two kinds of forces, heroes and units. While units can be any kind of soldier, like melee, infantry, flying and mounted (each with their own strengths and weaknesses), heroes command those groups and give them special abilities. They also are highly powerful and give you an advantage on the battlefield.
In each Time of Heroes fight, you?ll move your forces around the field, taking into account terrain, unit type and other factors to win your victories. It?s a slow and deliberate game, perfect for classic strategy fans, and it has a solid art style and interesting story as well.
Puzzler Puzzlejuice combines multiple puzzle games to create a title with a slick look and a lot of interesting ideas. Part of it is similar to Tetris, in which you arrange falling blocks to form rows. Part of it has you matching colors to make larger groups, and part of it is a word search ? because forming words out of the letters that appear on your falling blocks is the only way to clear them and score points.
Puzzlejuice contains three game modes. An easy mode, a ?core? mode that has you surviving as long as possible, and an ?extreme? mode that amps up the difficulty. It?s also a great game to play with a friend because it allows you to separate the tasks, with one person handling blocks and the other letters. Puzzlejuice includes Game Center support to bring online leaderboards and achievements to the title, and it has an on-board dictionary to help you with the word portions.
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Tuesday, January 24, 2012
UN rights chief: Charge or release Gitmo detainees
By msnbc.com news services
The United States is still flouting international law at Guantanamo Bay, despite President Barack Obama's election pledge to shut the facility, the United Nations human rights chief Navi Pillay said Monday.
"It is ten years since the U.S. Government opened the prison at Guantanamo, and now three years since 22 January 2009, when the President ordered its closure within twelve months. Yet the facility continues to exist and individuals remain arbitrarily detained -- indefinitely -- in clear breach of international law," Pillay said in a statement, ahead of Obama's next annual speech Tuesday.
Pillay said that she is deeply disappointed the U.S. government has "entrenched a system of arbitrary detention."
She?said she also was "disturbed at the failure to ensure accountability for serious human rights violations, including torture, that took place."
Six trials in 10 years
Former President George W. Bush set up the camp at a U.S. naval base in Cuba after U.S.-led forces invaded Afghanistan to expel al-Qaida?following the Sept. 11 attacks.
Eight prisoners have died at Guantanamo, two deaths ascribed to natural causes and the rest classified as suicides, and many detainees have said they were tortured.
Only six trials have been completed in 10 years.
"While fully recognizing the right and duty of states to protect their people and territory from terrorist acts, I remind all branches of the U.S. government of their obligation under international human rights law to ensure that individuals deprived of their liberty can have the lawfulness of their detention reviewed before a court," Pillay said.
"Where credible evidence exists against Guantanamo detainees, they should be charged and prosecuted. Otherwise, they must be released," she added.
Obama had planned to move some detainees to the United States, but Congress blocked funding for that plan and tightly restricted all transfers out, demanding his administration must notify congressional intelligence committees and guarantee the prisoner will not engage in terrorism.
Pillay urged Congress to enable the administration to close the camp.
Reuters and The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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'Prometheus' International Poster Looks Very Familiar
A new international poster for "Prometheus" has been released, but for those of you hoping it would give some insights into the movie's many mysteries, it's a little bit of a letdown. This is pretty much the same poster as the one released in the United States, albeit showing a bit more of that giant [...]
Source: http://moviesblog.mtv.com/2012/01/23/prometheus-international-poster/
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Monday, January 23, 2012
Not-so-special special teams can lose an NFL game (AP)
If it's true, as the saying goes, that "defense wins championships," the NFL's conference title games offered ample evidence that special teams can lose them.
"You're going to need special teams. A kick will win a game more often than a run or pass will win the game, and a special teams tackle can make a big difference," former Minnesota Vikings and Arizona Cardinals coach Dennis Green said in a telephone interview Monday.
"There's nothing like it when it all works," added Green, now an NFL Network analyst. "And there's nothing worse when it doesn't work."
The Baltimore Ravens and San Francisco 49ers found that out the hard way Sunday.
First, the Ravens wasted an easy opportunity to force overtime in the AFC championship game when Billy Cundiff pushed a 32-yard field-goal attempt wide left, letting the New England Patriots escape with a 23-20 victory.
Then, in a windy and rainy NFC championship game a few hours later, the 49ers handed the Giants the football and great field position in overtime when fill-in returner Kyle Williams fumbled a punt ? his second turnover of the game on a return ? and New York soon was celebrating its 20-17 victory on Lawrence Tynes' 31-yard kick.
"Those games were even. The teams were even. Baltimore was going to win with the run game and defense, and that was the way San Francisco was going to win, too. When you have that as your way to win, you have to have special teams play a role, because it means a low-scoring game," Green said. "Everyone always says you win with the three phases ? offense, defense, special teams ? but rarely do they mention special teams when it comes to what is the most significant thing."
After the Patriots and Giants set up their Super Bowl rematch, though, that was the main thing everyone wanted to talk about.
"This was a game of field position, a game of turnovers. We needed for special teams to help us, No. 1, with the field position aspect of it, but secondly, in contributing turnovers," Giants coach Tom Coughlin said. "And certainly we got two big ones."
Indeed.
Williams' first miscue, allowing the ball to bounce off the turf and scrape his right knee, gave New York the ball at San Francisco's 29 early in the fourth quarter and led to Eli Manning's 17-yard touchdown pass to Mario Manningham, putting the Giants ahead 17-14. On Monday, Williams said he didn't think the ball touched him.
The second error by Williams ? the son of Chicago White Sox general manager Kenny Williams and the subject of angry, and sometimes threatening, tweets after the game ? set up the Giants at the 49ers' 24. On that play, he was stripped by New York's Jacquian Williams, a backup linebacker, while trying to shift the football from one hand to the other.
The Giants player who recovered both botched punts, Devin Thomas, is also hardly a household name. Thomas was drafted in the second round of the 2008 draft by the Washington Redskins, but he was released in October 2010, after being dogged by questions about his work ethic and route-running ability.
"My position as a fourth or fifth wide receiver and special teams player ? I take pride in that and do anything to help this team win," Thomas said.
Describing the overtime play, Thomas recounted: "It was like, `I can't believe he just fumbled.' Then I'm like, `OK. I'm right here.' So I just made sure I secured it."
Special teams players sometimes are the last men on an NFL roster, young or fringe players who get their best chance to make an impact on the kicking units (although starting 49ers linebacker NaVorro Bowman made at least one particularly impressive tackle on punt coverage Sunday).
Kyle Williams, actually, was handling returns against the Giants because he replaced the injured Ted Ginn Jr.
"When you're out there, you want to make a play. You want to make a play for your team. We weren't exactly moving forward. It was one of those things where we needed something to spark us. I feel comfortable. I wouldn't go back and change it; 10 times out of 10, I wouldn't change it," San Francisco's Williams said. "It was one of those things where I was just trying to make something happen ? and the other guy on the other team made something happen."
It must have been particularly galling for Ravens coach John Harbaugh to see his team flub a kick, given that part of his preparation for becoming an NFL coach was serving as a special teams assistant. He had a timeout left at the end Sunday, but didn't use it, and it appeared Baltimore might have been rushing just a bit before taking that missed kick.
Harbaugh ? whose brother Jim coaches the 49ers ? wasn't available to reporters Monday, but Cundiff was.
"It's tough to disappoint your teammates," the kicker said, "and it's tough to go out there and fail."
There were, to be sure, other reasons his team lost Sunday, including Lee Evans' drop of a pass in the end zone moments earlier. Plus, even if Cundiff did make that seemingly automatic kick, there still was overtime to be played, and who knows what would have happened then?
The 49ers, meanwhile, could point to plenty of other problems, including going 1 for 13 on third downs.
And let's not pretend the Patriots and Giants were absolutely perfect on special teams, either. New England's Danny Woodhead fumbled a kickoff return in the second half, leading to a field goal by Cundiff. The Giants, meanwhile, got pushed back 5 yards by a sloppy delay-of-game penalty before Tynes' game-ending kick.
"You can never take for granted the ability to hit a field goal at the end of a game," Green said. "Every now and then, you can have a disaster."
___
AP Sports Writers Janie McCauley in San Francisco, David Ginsburg in Baltimore, Josh Dubow in San Francisco and Howard Ulman in Boston contributed to this report.
___
Follow Howard Fendrich on Twitter at http://twitter.com/HowardFendrich
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Arianna Addresses U.S. Mayors: Country's Solutions To 'Come At Local Level'
Arianna and House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi addressed the U.S. Conference of Mayors on Jan 18, challenging the nation's local leaders to become a voice for the people they represent.
In her speech, Arianna called on American mayors to become active members of their communities and address the growing gaps between the nation's rich and poor. She hit at the heart of what many consider to be an astounding trend in the US: the increasing downward-mobility of the American middle-class.
With an emphasis on Aol's Patch network of hyper-local sites, Arianna also told the conference of the growing need to address and cover the nation's often neglected poorest citizens.
In her blog post prior to the conference, Arianna explained why she feels the recovery of America's economy begins at the local level.
That's why I believe the solutions the country is so desperately looking for are going to come at the local level -- from our mayors and engaged citizens working with their communities. It's our cities, not the nation's capital, that are the real idea factory of our country. It's the Mayor's Mansion not the White House from which bold decision-making is likely to originate. It's from any house on your street not the House of Representatives where projects that will make your community a better place to live in are more likely to surface.
You can read her post in full, here.
Source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/01/21/arianna-huffington-nancy-pelosi-mayors_n_1221594.html
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Sunday, January 22, 2012
2 men sentenced for attack at Boswell's farm (AP)
DES MOINES, Iowa ? Two men who pleaded guilty to breaking into U.S. Rep. Leonard Boswell's southern Iowa farmhouse armed with a BB gun last summer have been sentenced to prison.
The judge in Decatur County sentenced David Dewberry, of Fremont, Neb., to 25 years in prison for first-degree robbery. Cody Rollins, of Lamoni, was sentenced to 10 years for aiding and abetting an attempted burglary.
Dewberry entered Boswell's farmhouse near Leon July 19 armed with a BB gun. As the 78-year-old Boswell scuffled with him, his adult grandson pointed a shotgun at Dewberry, chasing him off. Prosecutors say Rollins helped plan the burglary and drove Dewberry to Boswell's house.
In a statement read in court, Boswell called the attack "sinister ... and ... appalling" and said Dewberry was lucky he wasn't killed.
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Saturday, January 21, 2012
In SC, Romney says he'll win some, lose some (AP)
GREENVILLE, S.C. ? Mitt Romney is heading into primary day conceding that he'll win some and lose some.
Romney on Friday acknowledged the contest here is "neck-and-neck" and said he expects to lose "some primaries" to rival Newt Gingrich, the former House speaker.
As voters head to the polls Saturday, Romney and Gingrich both planned to appear at the same breakfast restaurant in the morning. Both campaigns refused to change their schedules Friday night, potentially setting up a face-off between the two men ahead of the polls closing.
The past week has been an abrupt reversal of fortune for the former Massachusetts governor, who landed here last Wednesday after a big victory in New Hampshire and what was then a narrow win in Iowa.
But this week the Iowa GOP reversed his win there after problems with the vote count, and he's been dogged by questions about releasing his tax returns. And instead of emerging from South Carolina with three wins and a seeming lock on the GOP nomination, Romney and his team are now acknowledging they could lose here. That would leave the putative front-runner with just one early state win heading into Florida's Jan. 31 primary.
Romney's campaign planned at least two campaign stops Saturday ahead of polls closing. He planned to visit his campaign headquarters and Tommy's Country Ham House, where Gingrich also planned to stop. Romney was to end the day in Columbia, the state capital.
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Friday, January 20, 2012
Colbert: 'Herman Cain is me' (Politico)
CHARLESTON, S.C. ? If Herman Cain could attract the crowd that came to see Stephen Colbert here, he might still be running for president.
But the former pizza executive didn?t seem to mind playing second fiddle before the hundreds of students and onlookers that packed into a college courtyard to watch the Comedy Central star turned faux presidential candidate lampoon the political process.
Continue Reading
Scenes ahead of Colbert rally
Even if the joke appeared to be on Cain.
The event had all the trappings of a real political rally: A peppy marching band, a large ?Vote Cain? banner as the backdrop and a stirring rendition of the ?Star-Spangled Banner.?
Yet it was clear the man at Colbert?s side was not the star attraction.
?Before I introduce the man, we?re all gathered here to see introduce me,? Colbert said to laughs during his seven-minute introduction of Cain, which was not surprisingly peppered with jokes about the ex-candidate. ?Herman Cain is an outsider. In fact, he is such an outsider he?s not even running for president anymore.?
?I want you to vote for Herman Cain, because Herman Cain is me,? Colbert said to hoots and hollers. ?We both flout convention when it comes to things like taxes and debt and how many Ubekis there are in Ubeki-beki-beki-stan-stan.?
With Colbert?s urging, Cain received a rousing welcome to the stage, where a gospel choir stood to greet him.
?Mr. Colbert could not get on the ballot. I could not get off the ballot,? he said, explaining how the two personalities came together for the event.
But it was apparent that the further Cain dove into his message ? that Washington is broken and only people from the outside can steer it back on track ? the more he lost the electricity in an audience that came primarily for Colbert.
When he leveled his common charge that ?Washington is broken,? a smattering of students shouted back ?occupy.?
As Cain meandered through his decision to endorse ?the people? rather than a particular candidate and plugged his website, someone yelled, ?bring back Colbert!?
A final gratuitous reference to his 9-9-9 plan prompted a student to chide, ?stop it.?
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Review: Thunderbird innovates, but Web mail wins (AP)
NEW YORK ? The last time I relied on email software for personal messaging, George W. Bush was starting his second term, Pluto was still a planet and the Motorola Razr was America's most popular mobile phone.
I embraced Web email a year after Google's Gmail came along in 2004. Until then, Web email had been inferior to stand-alone desktop programs. Gmail's revolutionary approach to email prompted rivals to innovate. As a result, Web email now surpasses desktop software in many ways, particularly as people want their digital lives to travel with them as they connect from multiple devices and locations.
So I was skeptical when a new version of Mozilla's Thunderbird came along. I had all but abandoned it years ago. I was surprised to see how much had changed and improved when I gave Thunderbird a fresh look.
Although it took me a while to get used to, I'm a big fan of Gmail's way of grouping related messages into conversations. Before, you could group related messages into threads, an approach Thunderbird still uses. But messages you receive end up in one folder, and your replies are in another. With Gmail's conversations, it's all together in one stream, arranged chronologically regardless of who wrote what.
I've found that I can stay on top of communications more easily with Gmail's approach, because I can see at a glance which messages I still need to read and reply to. The old way seems cluttered and awkward.
I can also dispose of entire conversations I'm bored with more quickly ? with a single click of the trash icon. Deleting messages one by one seems so last century.
Thunderbird doesn't support conversations, but it offers many other features that make it better than Web mail. Made by the same organization behind the popular Firefox browser, Thunderbird makes checking email almost as simple as surfing the Web.
One of my favorite features is the use of tabs. When you click to read a message, it opens in a new tab, just as new Web pages do in a Web browser. I can have several messages open at once and easily switch from one to another. I can copy juicy gossip from one message and paste it in another, for instance. Sure, you can open Gmail in a new browser tab, but that gets you the inbox, not the message you just opened.
And when you close Thunderbird, it remembers the messages you have open, so that you can continue where you left off the next time. Again, your starting point with Gmail is the inbox, whether you like it or not.
Thunderbird also has more options than Gmail for searching old messages. With Gmail, I'm largely limited to searching by keywords and a few attributes, such as whether the message has an attachment and what appears in the subject line. Even those options are hard to find ? I didn't discover them until I went looking for them for this review.
With Thunderbird, I can narrow my search more easily. I can specify that all messages coming from Bob Smith be excluded rather than included, for instance. I can also have results sorted by relevance; with Gmail, search results come back with the most recent messages on top.
Thunderbird also does away with one of the most annoying aspects of desktop software ? configuring the email account by entering the names of your service provider's servers for sending and receiving email. Thunderbird has information for the major providers built-in. All you have to do is enter your email address, and the software figures out the rest.
But Thunderbird falls short in a few ways.
One of Gmail's major innovations was to ditch folders in favor of labels. An e-mail from Dad about an upcoming football game might be properly filed away under "family," "sports" or "events." With folders, you had to choose one or create multiple copies of the message. With labels, you can choose them all. Thunderbird has a system for tagging messages with multiple attributes, but it is clunky and won't always move with you when you access the account from another computer.
I also wish Thunderbird would use tabs for composing messages and not just reading them. To write messages, you have to open a new window, which clutters your computer desktop.
That's one way innovation spurred by Gmail kicks in.
Yahoo's Web mail service offers tabs just like Thunderbird, and it works with messages you compose, too. That feature came in 2005, a year after Gmail's debut.
While I'm at it, Microsoft's Hotmail has a few neat features I recently discovered. There's a folder that's automatically created containing any message with a photo attachment or a link to an online photo album. There's a similar one for messages containing tracking numbers for FedEx and other shipping companies ? a convenient way to automatically organize your online shopping receipts.
With so many advantages, Web mail wins for day-to-day use.
Nonetheless, I can see Thunderbird being useful when I travel and don't have continuous access to the Internet. Having desktop software allows me to read and write messages offline; replies get sent the next time I connect. A few months ago, I wrote about Gmail's offline email effort and some kinks it still needed to work out. Thunderbird is more reliable for now.
Thunderbird is also good for those times when you need to find some tidbit of information buried in a message from 2007. Searching through Gmail returns too many messages that you'd have to sort through.
I'll keep Thunderbird on my laptop for when I need it, but I won't need to run it routinely.
___
Online:
The most recent version of Thunderbird, released Dec. 20, is available for free at:
http://getthunderbird.com
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Thursday, January 19, 2012
Unemployment claims at 352,000, fewest since 2008 (AP)
WASHINGTON ? The number of people seeking unemployment benefits plummeted last week to 352,000, the fewest since April 2008. The decline added to evidence that the job market is strengthening.
Applications fell 50,000, the biggest drop in the seasonally adjusted figure in more than six years, the Labor Department said Thursday. The four-week average, which smooths out fluctuations, dropped to 379,000. That's the second-lowest such figure in more than three years.
A department spokesman cautioned that volatility at this time of year is common. Applications had jumped two weeks ago, largely because companies laid off thousands of temporary workers hired for the holidays.
Still, when weekly applications fall consistently below 375,000, it usually signals that hiring is strong enough to push down the unemployment rate.
"This continues a clear downshift in claims," said Ian Shepherdson, an economist at High Frequency Economics.
Shepherdson suggested that stronger hiring should follow.
Hiring improved in the second half of 2011. In December, employers added 200,000 jobs. That marked the sixth straight month in which the economy added at least 100,000 jobs. And the unemployment rate fell to 8.5 percent, a three-year low.
For all of 2011, the economy added 1.6 million jobs. That was up sharply from 940,000 in 2010. Economists say they expect roughly 1.9 million more jobs to be added this year, according to a survey by The Associated Press.
Still, the job market has a long way to go before it fully recovers from the damage of the Great Recession, which wiped out 8.7 million jobs. More than 13 million people remain unemployed. Millions more have given up looking for work and so are no longer counted as unemployed.
The overall number of people receiving benefits, which isn't seasonally adjusted, rose. More than 7.8 million people received benefits in the final week of last year. They include about 3.6 million people covered by extended-benefit programs begun during the recession.
The manufacturing sector remains a bright spot. Factory output jumped 0.9 percent in December, the Federal Reserve said this week. That was the sharpest monthly gain in a year. Manufacturing gained 225,000 jobs last year, the most since 1997.
The pickup in hiring reflects stronger economic growth. The economy likely grew at an annual rate of about 3 percent in the final three months of last year, economists estimate.
That would be a sharp improvement over the 1.8 percent annual growth rate in the July-September quarter. Rising consumer spending is thought to be fueling much of the gain in the current quarter.
Even so, economists worry that growth could slow in the first half of 2012. Europe is almost certain to fall into recession because of its financial troubles.
And wages aren't keeping up with inflation. The department said in a separate report that average inflation-adjusted hourly earnings dropped 0.9 percent last year.
Without more jobs and higher pay, consumers might have to cut back on spending. That would weigh down growth next year. Consumer spending accounts for about 70 percent of the economy.
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Inventory lists 19,232 newly discovered species during latest count
ScienceDaily (Jan. 18, 2012) ? More than half of the 19,232 species newly known to science in 2009, the most recent calendar year of compilation, were insects -- 9,738 or 50.6 percent -- according to the 2011 State of Observed Species (SOS) report released Jan. 18 by the International Institute for Species Exploration at Arizona State University.
The second largest group in the 2009 numbers was vascular plants, totaling 2,184 or 11.3 percent. Of the 19,232 in the total count, seven were birds, 41 were mammals and 1,487 were arachnids -- spiders and mites.
And, according to this latest report, there was a 5.6 percent increase in new living species discovered in 2009, compared to 2008.
The annual SOS report card on the status of human knowledge of Earth's species summarizes what is known about global flora and fauna. The 19,232 species described as "new" or newly discovered during calendar year 2009 represent about twice as many species as were known in the lifetime of Carolus Linnaeus, the Swedish botanist who initiated the modern system of plant and animal names and classifications more than 250 years ago, said the report's author, Quentin Wheeler, an ASU entomologist and founding director of the species institute.
"The cumulative knowledge of species since 1758 when Linnaeus was alive is nearly 2 million, but much remains to be done," Wheeler said. "A reasonable guess is that 10 million additional plant and animal species await discovery by scientists and amateur species explorers."
Additionally, recent macrogenomic surveys of DNA from terrestrial and marine environments have revealed "enormous and previously unsuspected levels of genetic diversity that corresponds in some not-yet-understood way to species diversity," explained Wheeler.
"It has been speculated, for example, that marine microbial species alone could number 20 million," he said.
With those staggering numbers as a backdrop, statistics, or "species bites," from the latest report note that:
- Almost 24 percent of the new vascular plant species discovered in 2009 were in the monocot order Asparagales, which includes orchids, hyacinths, irises, daffodils, amaryllis, allium, aloe and, of course, asparagus.
- Year to year, the largest order of newly discovered insects is the beetles, and, 2009 was no exception. Overall, 3,485 new beetle species (Coleoptera) were officially described including rove beetles (568), ground beetles (421), long-horned beetles (369), leaf beetles (356) and scarabs (288).
- Only 41 new living mammal species were officially described in 2009 and of those, 83 percent were either bats (44 percent) or rodents (39 percent).
- Almost 90 percent (133) of the new living amphibian species described in 2009 were frogs.
- There was almost five times more fossil bird species (34) newly described in 2009 than living birds (seven).
- Typical of most years, the largest number of new fish species was in the order Perciformes and 29 percent of those were in the families Gobiidaw (22) and Cichlidae (11). Gobies include some of the tiniest fish on Earth, and the cichlids include some of the most popular aquarium fish, including the angelfish and damselfish.
- Of the 626 newly described living crustacean species, 224 (31.8 percent) were in the order Decapoda, which includes crayfish, crabs, lobsters, prawns and shrimp.
- The Colubridae is the largest family of snakes and in 2009, almost 65 percent of the newly described living snakes were colubrids. In addition to 31 new snakes, new reptile species (living) included 38 lizards, 29 geckos, 12 iguanas, five chameleons and two turtles.
- More than 13 percent of the new fungus species (living) described in 2009 were gilled mushrooms in the order Agaricales (178). Of the mushrooms, more than one-fifth (21.3 percent) were in the family Marasmiaceae, which includes shiitake mushrooms.
In addition to the living species discovered during 2009, there were 1,905 fossil species, with insects and spiders accounting for 25.6 percent.
"As the number of species increases, so too does our understanding of the biosphere," said Wheeler, a professor in the School of Sustainability and a Senior Sustainability Scientist in the Global Institute of Sustainability at ASU. "It is through knowledge of the unique attributes of species that we illuminate the origin and evolutionary history of life on our planet. As we find out where species live and how they interact, we increase our ability to understand the function of ecosystems and make effective, fact-based decisions regarding conservation."
This is the fourth year for the annual State of Observed Species report compiled by the International Institute for Species Exploration. In addition to the 2011 report, the institute is also releasing a Retro SOS -- a decade of species discovery in review -- 2000-2009. The Retro SOS notes that from 2000 through 2009, there were 176,311 newly discovered species.
"It is particularly instructive to understand the tempo and patterns of discovery in recent years," said Wheeler, adding, "Given this data, it is interesting to ponder underlying causes of trends."
The "obvious lesson" from compiling this data, according to Wheeler, is that all nomenclatural acts, including descriptions of new species, must be mandatorily registered going forward. "In the animal world it takes about two years to mine the international literature for evidence of newly named species. The current lack of registration requirements simply compounds the problem of an already massive backlog," he said.
The report notes there are increasing calls for more aggressive and visionary approaches to mapping the species of the biosphere. "The adaptation of cyberinfrastructure to eliminate bottlenecks in the practice of taxonomy has created an opportunity to vastly accelerate species exploration," said Wheeler, who uses the SOS report and the annual naming of the top 10 new species each May, as ways to draw attention to this mission.
The SOS report and the Retro SOS are filled with statistics and charts, including a colorful word cloud. Sara Pennak, assistant director for partnerships and public outreach at the institute, prepared the data synthesis and analysis for the reports, which are available online at http://species.asu.edu.
Partners in this effort include: Algae Base. MycoBank, International Journal of Systematic and Evolutionary Microbiology, World Register of Marine Species (WoRMS), Thomson Reuters Zoological Record, International Plant Names Index, UniProt and Taxatoy.
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Source: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/01/120118173248.htm
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