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Folio Professional and Folio Tools
08 Março 2010
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Printing, binding, filing, organizing.
Summary - Moleskine® introduces two new collections dedicated to the office environment: Folio Professional and Folio Tools. Designed for organizing and filing, the Folio Professional collection includes printable paper, a soft document folder, a tabbed index book, a ring binder, and a set of binder filing accessories. Folio Tools include adhesive "StickNotes", and a set of professional memo cards. All paper is certified by the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) and planned for launch in April.
Moleskine unbound. The Folio collection owes its name to a classic definition that has been commonly used in the printing and binding industry since the Gutenberg Bible and Shakespeare's plays.
Folio Professional marks the first time Moleskine® has moved into the territory of unbound objects. Until now, Moleskine has always been synonymous with notebooks and planners. The new collections include diverse formats such as small cards, detachable papers, ring binders and loose printable papers for printing important documents on thick, ivory color, rounded corner paper.
Designed for the office environment and focused on high quality materials and a contemporary design aesthetic, the two new collections complement the existing Moleskine Folio Art collection, specifically designed for artists and designers who enjoy top-quality paper.
All Folio items retain the classic mood of the Moleskine brand: ivory color pages, smooth black cover, thick paper, rounded corners, elastic band closure, inner expandable pocket, when applicable, and the signature interior leaflet narrating the history of Moleskine legendary notebooks. Each of these features has become an icon of the Moleskine brand.
The new collections will be available starting from April in selected bookstores, design stores, stationery and art supply stores worldwide. Starting from March 23 a global preview will take place at ITOYA, the legendary stationery shop in Tokyo.
All paper used in the Folio collection is certified by the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC), an international non-profit organization established in 1993 to promote socially and environmentally responsible management of the world's forests.
For further information on the Folio Collection: Folio Catalogue
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Moleskine® is the heir of the legendary notebook used for the past two centuries by artists and thinkers, from Vincent Van Gogh to Pablo Picasso, from Ernest Hemingway to Bruce Chatwin. The anonymous and essential little black notebook, with its unique rounded corners, elastic closure, and expandable inner pocket, was originally produced for more than a century by a small French bookbinder that supplied Parisian stationery shops frequented by the international literary and artistic avant-garde. This trusty, pocket-sized travel companion held their sketches, notes, stories, and ideas before they became famous images or beloved books.
The Moleskine® Notebook
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Universal Periodic Review Working Group – 12th Session
Universal Period Review of Moldova
Statement by Australia
12 October 2011
Australia welcomes the delegation from Moldova and appreciates its constructive engagement in the Universal Periodic Review process. Noting Moldova's inability to exert governmental authority over Transnistria, this intervention excludes reporting on this region.
We are pleased to note Moldova's timely reporting under international treaty bodies and its facilitation of visits by Special Rapporteurs on torture and violence against women. Australia welcomes the Moldovan Government's ratification of the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court.
Australia commends the government-supported education efforts to increase public awareness of domestic violence and to instruct the public and law enforcement officials on how to address the problem. We note with concern that the legal remedies for domestic violence are often limited to fines and brief detentions.
We welcome the improvement in Moldova's prison conditions and the reduction in time served during pre-trial detention. However Australia notes that prisons and pre trial facilities around the country continue to fall short of international standards.
We note the continued reports of harassment and violence towards the Roma population in Moldova. We are particularly concerned about reports of cases of Roma peoples being subject to discrimination when looking for employment, education, health care and social services.
We urge Moldova to encourage respect for people of all sexual orientations, particularly the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender communities, noting that these communities are currently denied some of their rights to freedom of expression and assembly, and are prevented from engaging in public demonstrations.
Australia recommends Moldova:
1. Continue public awareness campaigns on domestic violence and increase the penalties for this crime;
2. Continue efforts to improve conditions in prisons and pre-trial facilities;
3. Promote greater public appreciation for the importance of according equal rights for the Roma, including freedom from abuse and discrimination; and
4. Allow members of the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender communities their rights to freedom of expression and assembly.

subset: commoncrawl


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Gaza: Siege's end?
In the aftermath of the botched May 31 takeover of the Mavi Marama, the Netanyahu government has repeatedly been yelling "terrorist" in a crowded theater, trying to link the nine activists killed—including a 19-year old America—and 60 or so wounded as dupes of Al Qaeda, if not outright operatives of the terror network with little conclusive evidence of such a connection.
If they were al Qaeda (and if so, it's exceeding odd that Israel elected to release all the survivors within days of the ship's seizure in international waters), they must have been members of the keystone cop brigade, judging by the way they armed themselves and otherwise prepped for the arrival of Israeli paratroopers, several of whom had been captured and were being treated for injuries below deck when the IDF began its final, fatal assault on the ship. (The IDF did little better preparation apparently, arriving armed for either a tea party or deadly force but not with any intermediate suppression capacity.)
But however poorly the shipmates aboard the Mavi Marama prepared tactically, after yesterday's turnabout on the Gaza siege [1], no one can argue with the strategy of the humanitarian flotilla's organizers. Their goal was to break the Gaza blockade by steaming through it and forcing a confrontation that would draw international attention to the plight of Gaza's civilians, now facing widespread hunger and illness because of the degraded shelter and sanitary conditions in the refugee camps. They succeeded too well, but at great cost.
The continuing controversey over the deadly takeover of the Mavi Marama has apparently led to a heightened sense of isolation and victimhood among Israel's general population, who believe the IDF was set up by Islamic radicals who have fooled the world into feeling sorry for Gaza, (where by the way, many leading Israeli military and political leaders insist no humanitarian crisis is unfolding). Nonetheless, while denying that Israel did anything wrong in the killing of the Gaza activists, Prime Minister Netanyahu, retreating before widespread international condemnation that included a direct call to end the Gaza siege from President Obama, has decided to essentially end the blockade.
For years only a handful of items have passed Israeli screening, now thousands are being allowed in, including badly need building supplies to restore housing and infrastructure in Gaza. Netanyahu has apparently elected to accept the inevitable, particularly since the Egyptians have basically ended their cooperation with the blockade after the slaughter on the deck of the Mavi Marama.
President Obama has already rewarded Netanyahu with a rescheduled meeting between the two heads of state on July 6. Lest anyone get too excited that the decision represents a significant breakthrough on the broader goals of the Middle East peace process, Israel authorites were quick to announce the scheduled demolition of more Palestinian homes [2] in East Jerusalem, and Hamas was quick to condemn Netanyahu's gesture as insufficient.
And so it doesn't go.


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I agree, I have a Phenom x2 and my whole system cost me a mere €300, - including sound, HDD and good enough video to have a 3d gnome desktop.
Wow, tell us more about the stupid sheeple, oh insightful one!
Actually, the new AMD's are also very valid options if you are interested in bang for the watt. 65 W TDP for a pretty fast quad core is awesome if you're doing number crunching.
I can't say anything about your comments on the use patterns of the "standard pleb" but I do quite a lot of structural engineering work, which involves extensively using commercial structural analysis software on a daily basis and even developing my own programs, and I do all that on a "cheap and disposable" Athlon X2 4000+ system which cost me around 250 euros three years ago.
The thing is, you may have far more powerful CPUs in the market but the truth is that, although they can cost huge amounts of money,
It's fast enough for any usual non-gaming usage...and also for most games, if you're fine with mostly ignoring latest gen ones (and really, with so many great older ones that's easy). Plus it is consistantly passively cooled.
Also, if the majority of the public has these slower CPUs, what sane game maker is going to make games that do not at least run on these machines? That sounds like a good way to lose 90% of your profit.
Games almost never require high end systems. There are a few that come along that won't run on anything less than the latest greatest but it is extremely rare. Most games will run on mid rangish hardware, and not have a problem with things a couple generations out of date. They won't let you max all the detail in that case, but they'll run just fine.
Most people do not have high end systems. Many systems are older, after all not everyone upgrades all the time, and even when they do they often don't buy the high end parts. As such game makers support that. They usually also have higher detail settings for people with higher end systems, since those people often also spend more money, but they don't usually cut out the more mid range market.
Right now most games run quite well on a dual core in the 2GHz+ range with a $100ish current graphics card or a $200ish older graphics card. By well I mean with details turned up a reasonable amount and smooth gameplay.
Details on medium-low, and on lower resolution (1280 by 1024 or 1440 by 900 seems to be the limit spot, 800 by 600 is better, and usually 1680 by 1050 not very good. Higher resolutions need not apply).
Usually "smooth gameplay" means decent minimum frame rates
I get good frame rate on 16x10 (>40fps) and decent frame rate on 19x12 (~30fps) with 5 year old Athlon 64 X2 4200+ (2x2.2GHz) and Radeon 4850. Recent games I have played were Dragon Age and Torchlight - and all settings were at least on medium, most on high.
IMO, level of details in most games already exceeds by a huge margin whatever normal human being can perceive. Pushing for more details is pointless.
"High details" are usually shown in super-zoomed images in games reviews.
30 fps is absolutely enough in minimum frame rate (depends on game, though - less might be enough in some titles).
Lol. Depends on what you call "run".
If you call 18 fps with medium graphics settings an medium resolution "running", then yes.
But if you want your game to not look like the previous generation, or even worse, you PC has to be new too.
I play Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2 just fine with a Geforce 8800 GTS 320MB
That is high quality settings and 1920x1200 resolution
Framerate? Dont know, its smooth enough which should be around 30-40 frames per second on average.
Spending more than $100 on a graphics card today is just waste of money. Except if you would like to play a game like Crysis on Linux where you need the extra power to get decent performance. Then again,
people buy sportscars to show off, so why not buy "sports-computers" to show off?
I would also be glad to see the term "console port" go away. It's nonsensical, implies there was some amount of "porting" being done...while that's not really true nowadays, not after efforts of MS. Same dev tools, same team, same engine, similar art assets; there's no porting taking place, only two parallel and largely common efforts. Not exploiting the strenghts of both platforms (do you think console side of such game is really optimised for hardware?)
But the term must be convenient for publishers, with players pointing fingers at those "evil consoles" instead of pointing them at...publishers.
And no main menu option for "quit". And an uncontrollable third-person camera. And a game mechanic only workable on an analogue movement controller. and so on, and so on.
First, as other posters have pointed out, there are other consoles besides the XBox.
Second, we do have different processor architectures between the XBox 360 and the PC. Now, if your coders are competent that won't be a problem, but at a game company you'll likely find some relatively young guy who's absolutely sure that his assembly is faster than what the C compiler can produce so he codes something in ASM. Or he assumes pointers are 4-bytes. Or that numbers are big-endian*. Or any one of the
But while saying this you should have in mind, say, PC version of Quake and port of it on PS1...
Wii is largery out of scope here, it's very different, with large portion of exclusive games (which also require vastly different coding practices) and those games aren't the ones people think about when saying "console port". PS3 seems to invalidate my point...but, when you look closer, multiplatform titles present also on PS3 are sometimes built on middleware engine; and often simply end up not very good on eit
With that price, I wonder if AMD can compete on the performance pre price scale.
E.g. I bet you get a ton of AMD CPUs for the price of one high-powerful Core i7.
What we need, is 4-8 socket mainboards!
Yes, something with an intel processor. Save yourself the headaches, its not worth the savings.
Totally agree. Hackintoshes just don't play nicely with AMD CPUs.
The Hackintosh has to look as much like a real Mac as you can manage.
Of course that means Intel only for the CPU.
An alternate ATI or Nvidia GPU (beyond what's in actual shipping Macs) might even be a problem.
So, would there really be any difference if Nvidia board similar to Intel 9300 ones was the variant...for AMD?
Please visit the OSx86project wiki page to have those questions answered. I'll tell you off the bat that you will have to patch the kernel, which already puts you at risk for a world of hurt if your other components don't play nicely either.
Like you I need a Linux machine for work-related computing-intensive work, so I assembled one last fall. I use a decent quality MicroATX case with the Gigabyte MA785GPMT motherboard and the Phenom 2 X4 955. Add 8Gb of memory, a drive and you're set. I was going to add a separate graphics card at one point but so far I actually use the on-board graphics, with the 2d-only free drivers. I don't need speedy graphics for showing terminal output and static graphs after all.
The system came in cheap, it's really quiet and it's surprisingly speedy. True, it's barely half the speed of the 8-core Xeon machine I have at work - but at only an eighth of the cost.
My only advice is, don't go too cheap on the case. That's the single most important part for determining the noise level, and there's nothing so irritating as having a constant high-pitched whine from under your desk all day long.
You're modded up, so I'll just add a +1 comment to your observation on the case. For the last decade or so, the most expensive part of my systems has usually been the case. Of course, there were only about 3 of them in that decade. A good case is a must.
So far, I've been a loyal Antec fan. Roomy, rolled edges, rails for everything, good ventilation...I have no complaints about their cases. They are damn well built.
A half-height discreet card will fit in that case just fine, and you'd see a nice graphics boost if you like your HTPC to do double duty.
The lower-power Phenom II chips have the lowest TDP around; functional units and whole cores can be powered down when not in use. You're not likely to see the latter while using your machine, except that the Phenom II X3 processors make use of it so that the disabled core doesn't even cost you any power.
I build new boxes every 6-8 months or so and rotate them into production boxes to make room for the next set. Until recently the Intel chipsets were ahead of the game vs the AMD chipsets with regards to things like E-SATA, AHCI, and PCI-e. AMD has caught up in the last 8 months, though. High-end Intel cpus tend to be a bit faster than high-end AMD cpus and you can also stuff more memory into small form-factor Intel boxes vs small form-factor AMD boxes.
On the flip-side, AMD boxes tend to be cheaper all-around and aren't quite so gimicky when it comes to managing cpu speed vs heat dissipation. Whole systems based on AMD seem to eat less power and from a cost standpoint when running systems 24x7. Power is getting to be quite important.
If you are trying to create the fastest, highest-performance box in the world Intel is probably your game (and for graphics you are going to be buying a 16x PCI-e card anyway with that sort of setup).
If you ratchet down your expectations just a bit, however, you can slap together a very good box with AMD at its core for half the price and 85% of the performance, and that is going to be plenty good enough for just about anything considering how overpowered machines have gotten in the last few years vs what people actually run on them.
Personally speaking I see no point purchasing the absolute bleeding edge when it is just going to become non-bleeding edge in 8-months when I can instead purchase two of something just slightly behind the bleeding edge at a much lower price.
These are just my observations.
Is that AMD chipsets have been buggy in my experience. Well, for the most part it seems like there haven't been actual chipsets made by AMD, they've always been third party like nVidia, VIA or ATi. At any rate they seem to have bugs, sometimes minor, sometimes severe. The worst was back with the original Athlons, I got one and could not make it work with my GeForce 256. I found out this was because the AGP bus was out of spec and didn't work the GFs at all.
That is one of the main reasons I've stuck with Int
Well, if you want to go that far, to Athlon and GF256 days, Intel had their share of problems too... (unstable P3 Coppermines just above 1GHz mark? Flaky motherboards with Rambus chipset & bridge?)
That said, yes, many chipsets for AMD had problems - but you could always find something solid. SiS chipsets which you don't seem to even remember were particularly impressive - perhaps slightly slower than Via, Nv or ATI alternatives, but absolutelly rock-solid and troublefree, on par with Intel (for example,
It's a pretty decent/entertaining review. He also speaks about over clocking.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CNcE3GND3sQ&feature=sub [youtube.com]
You know, 1 core, 2 cores, 3 cores, 1,000000 cores I have realize means exactly jack if the data they need to crunch is still sitting on frigen hard drive.
My processors and I would do flips and flops, if we could just get some dam data off our drives. Come on? We have basically not had a real leap in hardrive speeds or technology in how many years?
I mean solid states and all are great, but they still have a long way to go. What happens when we need to start pushing terabytes like megabytes?
We got a ram and catch arms race going on because, the hard drives suck and no one seems to be doing anything about it.
The best we can do are raid tricks to get any more performance (or reliability for that matter), and that has well known limits and problems.
+...when video processing is no longer a highly CPU bound activity, you will have a point there.
Until then... not so much.
You may be hard pressed to stress the network with a number of clustered multi-core machines. Nevermind overwhelming disks or HBAs.
You know that there is this technology called RAM, right?
Also, there is cache. And nowadays, opimization consists of fitting your algorithm in the cache. Then when it's done, you take the next block. So what back in the days was swapping (to disk) is nowadays swapping (to RAM).
I recommend you buy yourself as much RAM as you can fit into your mainboard. That should help.
If nothing else AMD serves to counterpoint Intel from being a monopoly. Further they actually make some pretty good chips.
I support AMD because they keep Intel in check. And as a bonus their chips aren't that bad.
Wish I had some mod points today...
Someone please mod the parent up as insightful!
For everything else, AMD's price/performance ratio can't be beat, Intel's superior marketing notwithstanding. It would cost me twice as much money to get an Intel processor and a decent Intel chipset mobo for the desktop I'm running right now. Quite frankly, I think this price differential is much better spent on a 128GB solid state drive.
"The number of Unix installations has grown to 10, with more expected." -- The Unix Programmer's Manual, 2nd Edition, June, 1972


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Sidney Coleman
Sidney Coleman (7 March 1937 – 18 November 2007) was an eminent theoretical physicist who studied under Murray Gell-Mann.
|This article about a physicist is a stub. You can help Wikiquote by expanding it.
- Not only God knows, I know, and by the end of the semester, you will know.
- Said during one of his lectures at Harvard University [1].
- People get a lot of confusion, because they keep trying to think of quantum mechanics as classical mechanics
- Quantum Mechanics in Your Face, a lecture given by Sidney Coleman at the New England sectional meeting of the American Physical Society (Apr. 9, 1994)
- The career of a young theoretical physicist consists of treating the harmonic oscillator in ever-increasing levels of abstraction.
- Said during one of his lectures at Harvard University [2].


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Did it never occurred to you to be bored at work, at school, at home or getting a creative block? Well, it happens! This is some videos I've found on the Web and I'd love to share with you all.
Hey it's Friday and time for some inspiration, a chuckle, or being wowed! I found this collection of very neat videos to share with you. All are stories. Some are about business, some are funny, thrilling, touching, or total eye-candy. Each one is awesome in its own way.
Regardless, they are good Friday and weekend candy to enjoy -- virtual chocolate if you'd like!
Which one is your favorite? Have fun!
This review was written by Karen Dietz for her curated content on business storytelling at www.scoop.it/t/just-story-it


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Pac-Man Championship Edition DX +
PAC-MAN CE DX + upgrades one of 2010's most celebrated downloadable titles with improved leaderboard functionality, in-game achievements and medals, as well as access to additional DLC mazes, music and graphics including classic DIG DUG and RALLY-X sprites. Players will chomp through bright neon mazes at blistering speeds in this modern update to the classic PAC-MAN gameplay.
Release Date: September 25, 2013


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Principal Investigator(s):
Climate change and the invasion of exotic insects and disease are two of the most urgent problems facing environmental sciences today, as both have the potential to disrupt Earth's ecosystems on large scales. Researchers predict that these two problems may even interact, as climate change will likely exacerbate invasive species by creating host habitats more suitable to invasion by exotic pests. Although this problem is clearly interdisciplinary in nature, to date communication between climatologists and ecologists has been mostly one way. As an environmental scientist with expertise in forest-atmosphere interactions, I plan to facilitate collaboration among ecologists and atmospheric scientists towards developing fully coupled models of climate change and invasive species. I am interested in understanding and describing the interaction of physical and biological processes between pests, forests, and climate (e.g. the lower atmosphere) and the feedbacks between them that potentially contribute to controlling the distribution of pests. Example mechanisms of interest include: pest stresses on forest carbon dioxide and water vapor exchange, their interaction with precipitation frequency and soil moisture, and changes to the surface energy balance.


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|Photo: HBO
In the episode, titled "Don't You Feel Me?," Bill (Stephen Moyer) decides to seek out Lillith (Jessica Clark) for advice on handling the escalating human-vampire crisis. Eric (Alexander Skarsgård), Pam (Kristin Bauer van Straten), Nora (Lucy Griffiths), Jason (Ryan Kwanten) and Jessica (Deborah Ann Woll) get up-close-and-personal looks at the perverse perils of Vamp Camp. Sam (Sam Trammell) comes to a decision he hopes will be in Emma's (Chloe Noelle) best interest. Andy (Chris Bauer) gives his faerie daughter a name, or two or three or four. Arlene (Carrie Preston) has a solution to Terry's (Todd Lowe) malaise, and Eric makes a startling discovery.
Check out a sneak peek video below:
Based on the popular Sookie Stackhouse books by Charlaine Harris, the Emmy and Golden Globe-winning hit series was created by Alan Ball, creator of HBO's Emmy-winning series Six Feet Under. The show follows waitress and part-faerie Sookie Stackhouse (Anna Paquin), who can hear people's thoughts, vampire Bill Compton (Stephen Moyer) and vampire Eric Northman (Alexander Skarsgard).
- Valarie Pettiford Joins TRUE BLOOD, Debuts July 28
- TRUE BLOOD Season 7 Coming Summer 2014


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HOLDEN — Saturday afternoon featured a pitchers' duel between St. John's southpaw P.J. Browne and Wachusett Regional's Connor Gill, yet Browne's heroics at the plate delivered the Pioneers an extra-innings win.
After tossing seven innings of one-hit baseball, the Merrimack-bound senior took advantage of a tiring Gill to launch a two-run double in the top of the ninth for the go-ahead runs in St. John's 3-0 victory.
"Connor Gill did a great job, but P.J. Browne matched him," St. John's coach Charlie Eppinger said. "Being the visiting pitcher is tough because when your team puts up a zero (at the plate), there's a lot of pressure on you to match it."
Catcher Scott Manea said Browne's four-pitch repertoire kept Wachusett off-balance all game.
And it showed in the numbers as he struck out 10 and didn't give up a hit until two outs into the seventh inning.
Junior flamethrower Danny Barlok came on for the final two innings to combine on a two-hit shutout.
"We're lucky to have Danny Barlok to come in and know that, as good as P.J. was, I didn't have to overextend him, because we have the luxury of Danny Barlok to come in and pitch the eighth and ninth innings for us," Eppinger said.
The top-ranked Pioneers (13-7) bounced back after having lost four out of five.
They'll look to keep the momentum going when they play Westboro High at 1 p.m. today in the fifth annual Greg Montalbano Classic.
St. John's will finish its regular season at 11 a.m. Monday at sixth-ranked Shrewsbury.
Gill, a junior, did all he could for the Mountaineers (10-9), who came in hot off impressive wins over No. 7 Algonquin, Shrewsbury and Marlboro.
He painted the corners, striking out eight and scattering three hits in a nine-inning complete game. He also reached base in the fourth and ninth innings.
"He hits his spots really well," Browne said. "In that last at-bat, he kept the ball low again, and I just put a good swing on it, and that was that."
Browne also scored the third run, coming in as senior first baseman David Monahan (1 for 2) reached after a throwing error on a grounder to short.
"Put the ball in play, and good things are going to happen," Eppinger said. "Popups are easy, but ground balls to the hole are tough. In the bottom of the ninth, you're happy to have that third run."
Gill and his batterymate Cam Ruziak reached base with two outs in the fourth — Gill off a comebacker Browne couldn't handle and Ruziak on a walk.
Browne regained himself, though, striking out the next batter to end the threat.
"You definitely want to keep your team in the game, you don't want to get behind," Browne said. "It's a big adrenaline situation, and it's definitely tough."
Kevin Quinlivan broke up Gill's no-hit bid with a single to right field in the fifth inning, Eric Seaver did the same to Browne, singling in the seventh.
Barlok faced peril with one out in the bottom of the eighth as Matt Maypother singled and Kevin Wittmer reached on an error.
Wachusett's walk-off aspirations were foiled, though, as Cam Murphy and Jake Rosen turned a 4-6-3 double play.
Browne supplied the go-ahead runs in the next frame, taking Gill to left-center to bring around Jake Rosen and Manea with the double.
Gill singled and Ruziak was hit by a pitch, putting both on with one out in the bottom of the ninth, but Barlok got a groundout and a fly ball to end the game.
Contact Carl Setterlund at email@example.com. Follow him on Twitter @tgsports.


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Read the original story in The Oregonian here.
Come fall, students will be able to earn a bachelor's degree in business administration from Portland State University online.
The program is part of a larger effort to expand online offerings at PSU, the school said in a news release Wednesday.
"Having more online offerings is part of our effort to meet students where they are -- to be more responsive to the consumer," Scott Dawson, dean of PSU's School of Business Administration, said in the news release.
The business degree will be aimed at working students, Dawson said. Now, about half of the business school's students work full time, he said.
The business school is also looking to add, this fall, an online master's degree in supply-chain management and to shift a partly online MBA program to fully online.
The undergraduate program will be the only one of its kind in Oregon, PSU said. Generally, students will take two classes a term over three years. Work will include video conferences and streamed lectures.
Registration began last week. Learn more at pdx.edu/sba/online-bachelors-degree-program.
-- The Oregonian


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Did you read today's front page stories & breaking news?
From the Wires
Nationwide to Help Three Quarters of A Million People Into A Home of Their Own and One Million to Start Saving by 2017
Major long-term drive to boost home occupation and help savers
By: Marketwired .
Nov. 7, 2012 07:01 PM
LONDON, UNITED KINGDOM -- (Marketwire) -- 11/08/12 -- Today, Nationwide Building Society is launching a major initiative to boost the nation's capabilities in housing, money management skills and communities with support from a number of charitable partners including Shelter and National Numeracy.
Over the next five years, under the pillars of Your Home, Your Money and Your Community, Nationwide will:
-- Help 750,000 people into a home of their own (Your Home) -- Empower one million people to start saving (Your Money) -- Strengthen local communities by investing and unlocking GBP 15 million directed by its customers and employees (Your Community)
Graham Beale, Chief Executive at Nationwide, said: "I believe Nationwide is ideally placed to take a lead on tackling the serious issues of housing, money management and communities. Our mutual status enables us to meet the needs of our members, rather than chase short-term profit for shareholders, and that means we can focus on addressing the issues that really matter to our customers, their families and the communities where they live. We look forward to working with our partners and, where possible, with MPs and the Government in our Citizenship activities."
Nationwide conducted extensive research with its customers, employees and wider stakeholders that highlighted housing, financial guidance and community investment as their three main areas of concern. With 232,000 new homes needed each year(1), 28% of households having no savings(2) and community charities seeing levels of giving fall by 10% since 2008(3), it is easy to understand why.
Nationwide has a strong heritage of tackling social issues such as housing and financial education. For example, since 2009 over 200,000 people have been given financial skills training by over 1,700 new volunteers trained through our MoneyActive Programme with Citizens Advice Bureau.
Living On Your Side will initially focus on creating offerings specifically designed to enable people to access homes and savings for the first time, mobilising Nationwide's 16,000 employees to engage with community projects and supporting housing and personal finance charities such as Shelter, MoneyAdvice Trust and National Numeracy.
For Your Home, the Society will explore further how it can support affordable housing and develop new innovative products for the housing market as it did with Save to Buy. Nationwide is also launching a new GBP 1 million partnership with Shelter, aimed at helping 16,000 people who are either at risk of losing their homes or vulnerable people with no housing at all. For Your Money, Nationwide has launched a new four-year partnership with National Numeracy. For Your Community, the Society is launching its new Community Match programme giving customers the chance to choose the local charities they want Nationwide to support when in-branch, online and at member events.
Campbell Robb, Shelter CEO, said: "It's good to see a financial services organisation like Nationwide Building Society really putting effort into making a difference to the lives of those in housing need. Shelter is a lifeline for anyone who is homeless or suffering bad housing and we're proud to join forces with Nationwide to share our ideas and develop creative ways of tackling these difficulties."
Mike Ellicock, CEO at National Numeracy, said: "We are really pleased that Nationwide is showing its support by helping people learn how to manage their money. Everyone needs to have decent numeracy skills so they can plan their spending and saving wisely, and the backing of Nationwide in our campaign to improve the UK's numeracy is invaluable."
Launch photographs are available to download via this link: http://www.nationwide.co.uk/mediacentre/photolibrary/citizenship.htm.
An online video of the photo-shoot taking place is available via this link: http://youtu.be/5LPiADNzVfs.
Notes to editors:
Living On Your Side
The report is available online here and PDF is available here.
Your Home: help 750,000 people into a home of their own by 2017
-- 232,000 new homes need to be built each year to meet demand in England alone, yet only 102,830 were built in 2010 (Government Housing Strategy).
First time buyers
-- In 2011 one in four of all our mortgages helped a first-time buyer into a home, the result of providing innovative products such as Save to Buy and an independent First-Time Buyers' Guide. -- We will explore developing new product offers for first-time buyers and holding/attending education events that assist first-time buyers in the process of buying their first home.
Affordable & social housing
-- Nationwide has been one of the major lenders to social housing associations over the last 20 years. -- We will explore if we can finance Community Land Trusts, non-profit community-based organisations that develop housing at permanently affordable levels.
Rental market
-- Our subsidiary, The Mortgage Works, offers specialist Buy to Let products for both experienced and first time landlords. -- We will also explore developing a Guide to Renting for tenants and setting up a Buy to Let hub to support our intermediaries.
Homeless & people at risk of losing their home
-- Our Triage team supports customers in financial difficulties - our residential arrears rate is around a third of the industry average and our repossession rates are very low. -- Launching a new GBP 1 million partnership with Shelter, aimed at helping 16,000 people who are either at risk of losing their homes or vulnerable people with no housing at all.
Your Money: help one million people to start saving by 2017
-- 28% of households in the UK have no savings at all (DWP).
Championing saving
-- We have championed consumer issues such as the order of payments on credit cards and provide products for young savers such as the Junior Cash ISA & Smart Accounts. -- We will explore developing new savings products for young people to help them be money savvy before going into adult life.
Improving financial education
-- We have also produced a suite of independent Money Guides on borrowing, savings and investment, debt and spending wisely. -- Launching a new partnership with National Numeracy in 2012, a new charity created to develop and support numeracy skills in the population at large.
Helping people out of debt
-- Our MoneyActive programme with Citizens Advice Bureau saw 200,000 people given financial skills training by 1,700 new MoneyActive volunteers. -- We plan to undertake research to find out why some people seem able to save despite their circumstances and use the findings to develop new programmes.
Your Community: investing and unlocking GBP 15 million in local communities by 2017, as directed by customers and employees
-- Giving levels to charity have fallen by 10% since 2008 (NCVO).
Employee involvement
-- Our 16,000 employees have 14 hours per year to volunteer in the local community and our 100+ Community Champions drive employee involvement at a local level. -- Volunteering will be part of personal development of employees, including our Senior Executive Development Programme.
Empowering our customers
-- Nationwide donates 1% of pre tax profits to charity following a member vote in 2007 and our member vote at our AGMs has raised over GBP 1 million for charity. -- We will give customers the opportunity to nominate and vote on local charities in-branch, online and at our member events.
Schools and young people
-- Nationwide Education, our award winning educational resource for 2-18 year-olds, has attracted over 35 million hits and downloads since it was launched in 2007. -- Launching our Schoolslink programme where our employees will deliver financial education and employability sessions in schools using our Nationwide Education platform.
Background on Targets
Your Home
We define 'home of your own' as covering the support we give to four key groups: a) first-time buyers; b) people in affordable and social housing; c) landlords and tenants in the important rental market; d) helping the homeless and those at risk of losing their home. Our target is based on the number of people we help, rather than the number of families or number of homes.
Nationwide supports other forms of home ownership in addition to our 750,000 home of your own target. For example, we help around 100,000 people per year to move into a new home. This has a positive social and economic impact on the UK, but we have excluded that activity from our Your Home target to focus on those groups where we feel we can make the biggest impact from a citizenship perspective.
How will we get to our 750,000 goal?
-- 33% through first-time buyers -- 12% through affordable and social housing -- 55% through other initiatives to get and keep people in a home
Your Money
We define 'start saving' by those people who are not currently saving and this includes young people opening their first savings account. Our aim is to help people save on a regular basis and our primary focus is going to be on young people. The form of saving is multiple, so includes ISAs, young people's savings accounts and other saving vehicles.
How will we get to our one million goal?
-- 88% through new young people's savings accounts -- 12% through helping customers become regular savers for the first time
Your Community
We define 'investments' as donations made by Nationwide and 'unlocking' as support through employee and customer fundraising, employee volunteering and funding from our suppliers, government and other stakeholders. Critically, the charities and causes we support through the GBP 15 million will be determined by our customers and employees.
Nationwide will make other charitable contributions in addition to our GBP 15 million commitment. Nationwide is the sole funder of The Nationwide Foundation, which has distributed GBP 29 million of grants to charities and good causes since it was established in 1997. Our strategic national charity partnerships with Shelter, National Numeracy and Money Advice Trust will also be in addition to the GBP 15 million, as the investment will not be directed by our customers or employees.
How will we get to our GBP 15 million goal?
-- 41% through Nationwide donations -- 37% through employee and customer fundraising -- 14% through employee volunteering -- 8% through unlocking funding from suppliers, government and other stakeholders
Link to Nationwide Education and money guides: http://www.nationwideeducation.co.uk/www/index.php
Link to Your Nationwide: http://your.nationwide.co.uk/Pages/your-nationwide-home.aspx
Link to Nationwide Foundation: http://www.nationwidefoundation.org.uk/default.asp#
(1) Source: DCLG
(2) Source: Department for Work & Pensions (2010)
( 3 ) Source: NCVO
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Short-Term Rehabilitation: You Have a Choice
You may have noticed that the region has many billboards and other advertisements that promote "short-term rehabilitation." What the advertisements don't tell you is that you have a choice when it comes to picking your rehabilitation provider.
When you need rehabilitation care for a stroke, traumatic brain injury, spinal cord injury, orthopedic injury, amputation or multiple trauma, you have the right to choose the facility that is right for you.
What's the difference? Why should you choose Good Shepherd Rehabilitation Hospital for your short-term rehab? At Good Shepherd, we have:
- More experience. You want a rehabilitation hospital that has a long, successful history of providing rehabilitation care as its core business. Good Shepherd has provided care for more than 100 years and has operated an inpatient rehabilitation hospital since 1967.
- Specialized clinical teams. You want a hospital to have coordinated clinical teams that specialize in specific conditions. Good Shepherd is the only rehabilitation hospital in the region with specialized clinical teams for stroke, brain injury and spinal cord injury.
- Specially trained nursing staff. You want a hospital to be staffed with nurses who specialize in caring for patients undergoing rehabilitation. Some rehabilitation units pull nurses from other hospital floors to care for rehabilitation patients. Good Shepherd's certified rehabilitation nurses (CRRNs) are specially trained to provide care to patients undergoing rehabilitation.
- Leading edge technology. You want a hospital to use the very latest assistive and rehabilitation technology. Good Shepherd is a national leader in the use of technology to increase, maintain or improve the functional capability of people with injury or disability. No other hospital in the region has comparable technology – like the AlterG Bionic Leg (formerly Tibion Bionic Leg), Ekso Bionics exoskeleton and more.
- Focused rehabilitation care. You want a hospital that is focused only on rehabilitation care and has the full range of expertise needed to diagnose and treat patients with various types of physical disabilities. Thousands of patients a year receive inpatient care at Good Shepherd because physical rehabilitation is our core business.
- Outstanding outcomes. You want a rehabilitation hospital that has a proven record of positive outcomes for its patients. Unbiased national outcomes prove that many of Good Shepherd's patients go home – not to a nursing home – sooner than other rehab facilities in the region and nation.
- Esteemed accreditation. You want a rehabilitation hospital that holds the highest level of rehabilitation accreditation possible so that you are assured of high standards and outstanding outcomes. Good Shepherd is accredited by CARF (Commission on Accreditation on Rehabilitation Facilities).
- Compassionate, quality care. Good Shepherd's commitment to compassionate care has been our trademark for more than 100 years.
For all of these reasons, insist on Good Shepherd for your short-term rehabilitation. Inform your doctor that Good Shepherd is your rehabilitation choice.


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By John Speer
Central Iowa Press
Volunteers are being sought to serve as court-appointed special advocates (CASA volunteers) for children involved in juvenile court matters in Tama County. The call for volunteers has been an ongoing process over the course of years and is not directly connected to the recent closing of the Child Advocacy Board office in Toledo.
"The volunteers are appointed by the court to work for the best interest of abused or neglected children under the court's jurisdiction," an Iowa Child Advocacy Board news release explains.
The request says there is a "particular need for men and people of various racial and ethnic backgrounds." In addition, "volunteers from all cultures, professions, and socio-economic, ethnic and cultural backgrounds" are welcomed.
To volunteer or obtain more information contact Charlotte Brandvig, toll-free 866-295-5424 or email firstname.lastname@example.com
The Toledo office was closed in response to state budget cuts according to Brandvig of rural Traer, the Child Advocacy Board coordinator. She responded to a Chronicle inquiry about the Toledo office which had been located in the Wobeters Associates Building at 221 West High St.:
"With State budget cuts the decision was made to close two of the physical offices (Toledo and Dubuque) and several support staff were laid off. Several of the more rural offices which serve CASA (Court Appointed Special Advocates) only (not Foster Care Review Board) have always been home-based.
"The decision was made to close these two offices and the two Coordinators were moved to home-based offices and the support staff were laid off. The CASA program continues to be supported in all areas of the state.
"The Foster Care Review Board (FCRB) has been redesigned to some extent in all areas and there are now fewer boards than there previously were. Some of them have been combined to serve a larger geographical area with one board rather than having several boards that might have only met for a partial day."


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Own Every SNES Game Ever Made For $24,999 199
An anonymous reader writes "BSNES author and game collector Byuu has decided to put his entire collection of SNES games up for sale — at the low price of 24,999USD. The collection covers *every* game ever made for SNES, all in the original covers. From the article: 'The seller, who goes by the name "Byuu" on Reddit, says that every single game in the collection comes with its original box and approximately 85 percent of the games come with their original manuals. The collection does not include unlicensed games, and every game has been professionally cleaned and tested. "They all work perfectly," Byuu says.'"


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As shop owners and even schools on the tech-level, time and space can become a premium. Furthermore, when it comes to servicing the aftermarket, a dynomometer can make or break claims of power numbers and even allow tuners to fine-point exactly what the engine is doing under load. However, not every shop has the ability to tune both engine and chassis applications.
For Mustang Dyno, the theory was simple, however, and created a dyno system, which would allow the user to split the work duty between both. For shops that are looking for a flexible solution to their engine and chassis dyno testing needs, the Crossover Series provides a complete all-in-one solution. Mustang's new Crossover will offer up the ability to literally switch between engine or chassis dyno tuning.
The system includes the following:
Engine Dyno
- Portable ED-140-20 Engine Dynamometer with dual PAUs, load cell and speed sensor
- Electric starter
- EDtCell Engine Dyno Controller, Software, PC, Monitor
- Data Acquisition Module
- Engine docking cart
- Drive Shaft
- Guards
Chassis Dyno
- Above-Ground MD-1100 Chassis Dynamometer
- PowerDyne Controller, Software, PC, Monitor
- Smartach RPM Module
- Inductive & Optical RPM Pickups
- Weather Station
- Dual AFR Sensors
- OBD-II Interface
- Roll Around Shop Cart
We sat down at the PRI 2011 Show with Steve Englemen who told us, "If you've got a limited budged but service more than just engines or vehicles, the Crossover Series is the best bang-for-the-buck and offers a savings of about $20,000 between purchasing both of them seperatly."
The new engine and chassis dynamometer combo dyno, is another first from Mustang and features a 2WD MD-1100 chassis dyno with a detachable dual eddy current docking module that converts into a fully-functional ED-140-20 eddy current engine dynamometer.
The 2 in 1 system is equipped with both an ED-140-20 air-cooled eddy current engine dynamometer and a standard MD-1100 chassis dynamometer. The twin eddy current engine dyno operates as a standard engine dynamometer when directly coupled to an engine utilizing an included engine docking cart and stand alone control system and Mustang EDtCell Control Software.
While the engine dyno is in use, the chassis dyno is capable of being operated as an inertia-based dyno with a separate controller and Mustang PowerDyne Software included with the system. Attaching the dual eddy current PAU module to the chassis dyne via an included u-joint drive shaft allows the chassis dyno to take advantage of the powerful twin PAUs for loaded mode and vehicle simulation loaded testing.


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TV Fanatic Mid-Season Report Card: 90210Matt Richenthal at . Comments
With every primetime series on hiatus until 2010, it's time to take a look back.
When will your favorite show return? Consult with the TV Fanatic television calendar now.
Until then, our staff will gather and report on the status of various sitcoms and dramas. Up now: 90210.
Best Character: Adrianna and Naomi (tie). We couldn't choose just one. As we lauded in our previous Round Table, the show could easily have sent Adrianna down another drug-induced spiral. But it avoided that cliche and has created a mature, realistic character that truly depicts the struggles and pressures of a young addict.
Naomi, meanwhile, is simply hilarious. AnnaLynne McCord was given the opportunity to give this character more than one, bitchy dimension and she's run with it brilliantly.
Worst Character: Teddy. He looks 37, let's start with that. But he also comes across as a complete jackass. Granted, he showed a sensitive side when Silver's mom got sick. But it takes more than just hitting a few tennis balls on a roof for us to believe Silver would actually go for him, as 90210 spoilers have revealed she will.
We can't think of any way Teddy has been a good friend to anyone else on the show and, unlike Naomi, his jerky comments don't come across as humorous, just as... jerk-like.
Best Storyline: Jackie's cancer and subsequent death. Jessica Stroup was outstanding throughout this plot development, while it managed to combine the sentiment of the old show with the remade version. It also kick-started a relationship between Silver and Teddy, as mentioned above, while helped to provide a catalyst for Adrianna's eventual recovery and Silver and Dixon's reconciliation.
A solid storyline brings numerous characters together and creates building blocks for future developments. This qualified in every way possible.
Grade so far: B Plus.
Hopes for 2010: More Ivy, she's growing on us (pun... intended!); A new, less crazy love interest for Dixon; Dire consequences for Annie as a result of her hit-and-run; More shots of Liam shirtless; Adrianna and Navid back together.
What about you, readers? What grade would you give the show so far this season?
Matt Richenthal is the Editor in Chief of TV Fanatic. Follow him on Twitter and on Google+.


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University of Texas System Chancellor Francisco G. Cigarroa, M.D., participated in a roundtable discussion at The White House about the transparency of college and university costs to students and their families. Cigarroa was one of ten leaders of colleges and universities invited to attend the event, which was hosted by Vice President Joe Biden, Secretary of Education Arne Duncan, Director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau Richard Cordray and Domestic Policy Council Director Cecilia Muñoz.
"I am honored to have had the opportunity to participate in a discussion about the importance of cost transparency with Vice President Biden, Education Secretary Duncan, senior White House officials and colleagues at other universities and colleges," Cigarroa said. "Undergraduate student access and success is an integral part of my Framework for Advancing Excellence Across The University of Texas System, which the Board of Regents unanimously approved last August. Providing students and their families with clear and concise information regarding the cost to earn a college degree is a top priority for all our universities. The UT System already provides students with access to information regarding cost of attendance, financial aid options and net costs after grants and scholarships through a variety of communication mediums," Cigarroa added.


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nope "Settlers 7 players have encountered difficulties playing the game over the [Easter] holiday weekend due to issues with servers that do matchmaking in multiplayer mode and that keep track of profiles, campaign progression and stats in both solo and multi modes," said Ubisoft to Eurogamer.
Though issues are not completely resolved, Ubisoft says it is making progress. A patch for the game, separate from the DRM issues, was released on Monday, which you can grab here.


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Do they just spontaneously combust, or are people abusing a piece of electronics until they break? My G1 is still working and it's taken a beating, but I upgraded long ago.
While on the flip side, I dropped my first gen iPhone into a puddle of water and it broke immediately.
I bought a Nexus One from Google and had to return it to an HTC service center twice in the first year of ownership. The main board needed to be replaced the first time. The second time I had to return it for a bad power switch. Apparently when the service center installed the board, a faulty switch was used, or they crimped the ribbon. Either way, it's bad QC on the board, the switch and the labor.
I really like my N1 and I find FY to be a pretty snappy OS, but I'm not supper impressed with the longevity of the devices. There are no plans to roll the next major OS version for the N1 which doesn't speak too highly of Google or HTC's expectations of longevity. The iPhone line [theunderstatement.com] on the other hand has all the products on the latest version of the OS even if every phone doesn't support the latest and greatest features. It would be nice to see a greater commitment to lasting hardware from Google and the various phone makers. I expect a mobile to last around 3 years of normal use; perhaps I'm being too optimistic in the current age of accelerated obsoleteness.
The iPhone line on the other hand has all the products on the latest version of the OS even if every phone doesn't support the latest and greatest features. It would be nice to see a greater commitment to lasting hardware from Google and the various phone makers. I expect a mobile to last around 3 years of normal use; perhaps I'm being too optimistic in the current age of accelerated obsoleteness.
That's a reasonable expectation, but not a true statement about the iPhone line. My family has iPhones, still on the original contract, which didn't handle the rollout of iOS 4 very well and are never going to get iOS5.
On the other hand, Apple has always been good to me about replacing defective hardware fairly quickly, but with mobile OS development still happening very rapidly (read: demanding more resources as we try to cram 30 years of desktop development into our handsets), it's no surprise that long-t
The iPhone line [theunderstatement.com] on the other hand has all the products on the latest version of the OS even if every phone doesn't support the latest and greatest features.
That link is a little bit misleading.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_iOS_devices [wikipedia.org]
The original IPhone is only supported up to IOS 3.1.3
The IPhone 3G is only supported up to IOS 4.2.1
Correct, however the minimum you can take from the correct data is that Apple has support EACH model with OS updates for up to 3 years, your typical longest cellular contract, and each device launch with its latest available OS.
Android phones regularly launch with software 1 version behind and support drops as early as 6 months after launch.
Interesting, I never had a problem with my Nexus One. I only switched phones about a month ago when I got a Nexus S for the NFC support (I'm a developer writing an app against that functionality). I gave my NexOne to my wife who uses it to great success. My one-year old daughter even got it and chewed on it a bunch (very little cosmetic damage, but enough drool got inside to trip the moisture sensor - the trackball glows red). A night in a rice bowl later, and it's still going strong.
The closest thing I
The iPhone line on the other hand has all the products on the latest version of the OS even if every phone doesn't support the latest and greatest features
i don't feel like this is a super valid comparison, unless you mention that the iPhone ran like horseshit on iOS 2 onward, and the iPhone 3G always ran poorly. now my wife's 3GS runs like butt on iOS 5. further, all the products are not on the latest version of the OS: the iPhone caps out at version iOS 3, and the 3G caps out at version 4. history suggests that iOS5 is the last straw for the 3GS.
if, perhaps, you mean that all the iPhones currently for sale are on the latest OS, i would point out that all the Nexus phones currently for sale are on the latest OS, and that will be true when ICS is released, also.
a more accurate comparison of HTC and Google's upgrade path to iOS:
the original iPhone used the current OS until it didn't get iOS 4, so from 2007-06 to 2010-06, three years, half of which it ran poorly. you have no options for upgrading for new features even if you wanted to.
the iPhone 3G used the current OS until it didn't get iOS 5, so from 2008-06 to 2011-10, three years and some change, all of which it ran poorly. you have no options for upgrading for new features even if you wanted to.
the Nexus One is using the current Android phone OS until it doesn't get ICS, so from 2010-01 to ~2011-11 or 12, just under two years, all of which ran excellently. you will have the option of installing custom ROMs with ICS features if you choose to.
anecdotal, my nexus one also had the defective power button, but since it had previously been dropped onto the highway from my motorcycle (whoops), it was in too ugly a condition for me to send back to the manu for a repair: i figured repair center drones would return it to me as user abuse, and that they'd be right to do so. since i have the option of rooting the phone and installing a custom ROM, i did so and use an app to power down the phone, and the volume buttons to wake it up.
considering it survived a 75mph bounce and skid on the highway (i had to file down burrs on the metal face), i forgave HTC for the eventual failure of the power button. it is my first HTC phone, but they've sold me on their build quality. my first-gen iPhone was had an unusable crack on the screen that needed replacing after a three-foot drop, and once i repaired that, i found that the impact had also killed the battery, as it wouldn't last longer than half an hour idle, or a few minutes in call.
HTC's build quality despite my abuse, and their vow to not stop hobbyists from rooting Android phones has guaranteed that my next phone will be an HTC again; probably their first ICS phone that supports NFC. my wife's next phone was looking to be an Apple, but now she's frustrated with how poorly it has been performing this last month so we'll see.
last thing, i don't agree with Synerg1y's take, "Ya but u can do more on any build of android than any ios build so the comparison isn't really that fair." while the capabilities of the OS are pretty similar, the fine details is pretty objective: i definitely respect that some people (my wife) just want a simple, option-less phone that also connects to the internet. what i mean is, the feature set does not need be mentioned in the same conversation as build quality (though build quality perhaps need be mentioned in the conversation about feature set).
Honestly the headline is downright misleading and the summary is almost as bad. I read this article yesterday, and they're not saying that Android phones are inherently worse than iOS or BB devices. The difference is that while iPhones are all produced by Apple (or at least under direct contract for Apple) and Blackberries are all produced by RIM, Android phones come from a number of manufacturers. Some are good phones of good quality (Most of HTC and Motorola's stuff along with several other "main" brands), others are produced on a shoe string by no-name manufacturers and given away free with a contract. On average Android phones fail more often, but the article doesn't really go into a like for like comparison. It seems likely that Droids, Heroes, and Transformers fail at a rate comparable to iPhones.
The no name Android white boxes are the problem. They fail at a much higher rate than either iDevices, BBs, or their higher quality Android cousins and drag down the averages. They're costing the carriers a lot, because they were "free" to the consumer to begin with, and they have to be replaced quite often. Frankly I'm not feeling too bad for the carriers. They use cheap ass rap to lure people in to sign contracts, it's their problem that the crap predictably breaks and costs them money to replace. A nice phone flame war is always fun, but the title and summary of this otherwise interesting article are complete flamebait.
The no name Android white boxes are the problem. They fail at a much higher rate than either iDevices, BBs, or their higher quality Android cousins and drag down the averages. They're costing the carriers a lot, because they were "free" to the consumer to begin with, and they have to be replaced quite often. Frankly I'm not feeling too bad for the carriers. They use cheap ass rap to lure people in to sign contracts, it's their problem that the crap predictably breaks and costs them money to replace. A nice phone flame war is always fun, but the title and summary of this otherwise interesting article are complete flamebait.
It's not flamebait at all. Android advocates are always counting every single Android phone against the iPhone when looking at marketshare. And I would bet that cheap Android phones make up more than half of Android's mobile market share.
So if the "cheap-ass crap" phones running Android are counted against iPhone numbers, then too bad if they're also dragging the overall Android hardware failure rate up. You can't have it both ways.
I'm trying to think of what app might be causing more android users to accidentally drop their phones.
Real Life Angry Birds!
You gotta try the Hot Potato (tm) game. When the game makes a sizzling sound you have to drop it like it's hot. Good fun for the whole family.
In my experience working in a phone shop, peopoe just tolerated more from their beloved Apple-emblazoned brick than they would of Android devices. I had people returning perfectly good (and to my eye perfectly healthy and fast) Android phones for being a bit slow. They'd also claim the reception was bad on the Galaxy S and that "a friend with an iPhone gets better reception". Right, Galaxy S tested best on the network for network speed and reception, waste of another courier bag sending that one away. P
Yep, that's right, your anecdote carries far more weight than properly researched stats.
It couldn't be someone who has an axe to grind on Android phones, no?
It couldn't be someone who has an axe to grind on Android phones, no?
The axe-grinding app is awesommer in iPhone than in android. Why, just last week for Halloween I needed to grind an axe to do some serial killing for more realistic blood spatters. The Android could not even get a two bars on the 3G network. Before it could even find and down load an app, iPhone had an axe grinding app going at full tilt. It was a close call, whether to use the iGrind to grind the axe or directly use iGrind itself on the victim. Anyway iGrind rules!
There is an app for it.
Or more likely many of the Android phones are poorly made. ZTE, LG, and every other no name chinese flyby night has an android phone. No surprise they break a lot.
Add to that they are often free with contact and you get these poorly made phones ending up in the abusive little hands of children.
Indeed I do. They claim it means "Life's Good", but it really stands for "Lucky Goldstar" the old company name. They still make garbage low end phones.
LG isn't a "no name chinese flyby night" company, it's a major player in almost every electronics category and Samsung's primary competitor - not to mention it's Korean. I have used a few different Android phones made from LG and my primary handset is an LG Revolution. They made good hardware. Also name me a single phone - or piece of electronics for that matter - that isn't manufactured by some Chinese company most people haven't heard of, including the iPhone. Oh you can't? Shut the fuck up.
I never suggested they were Chinese, I mentioned them because they make low end phones and midrange phones like the one you have. Samsung, HTC and Moto are the ones making high end phones, while LG is making single cpu phones using last years hardware.
It couldn't be someone who has an axe to grind on Android phones, no?
Contrary to troll belief, that is an excellent question; TFA states that the study was done by "WDS" - however, it never specifies what "WDS" stands for.
A Google search [google.com] yields no useful result.
Seems I'm better at the google search game!!!!
From TFA: "WDS vice president of Marketing Tim Deluca-Smith said"
That makes it easy to google up the company, WDS Global: http://www.wds.co/ [www.wds.co]
Heck, link to their original press release:
http://www.wds.co/news/archive/2011/20111103/20111103.asp [www.wds.co]
If not in the mood to go into the link, here is their company description:
Since 1995, WDS has been dedicated to helping both service providers and end-users get the most from their wireless products and services. Today, by optimizing the entire process of launching and managing wireless products and services, the company enlightens its customers with the knowledge and efficiency needed to deliver the best possible user experience.
To us, the wireless user experience is more than just the latest touchscreen or user interface; it's an appreciation of the device, network, service and the journey that the end-user passes through as they interact with their service provider.
By focusing attention away from 'managing' user experience problems and towards resolving the cause of an issue, and by sharing business critical intelligence through a common platform, WDS achieves the continued savings and improvements that naturally lower the support burden and improve end-user profitability. It's this ability to help customers identify preventable issues, improve future products and services and build long-term, profitable relationships with end-users that means many of the world's most recognizable mobile brands now trust the outsourcing of their user experience to WDS.
Funny that a study like this would come out at the same time as Apple's battery problems were exposed. Finding out who sponsored the study could be significant.
It couldn't be someone who has an axe to grind on Android phones, no?
Who would use an Android phone to grind an axe?
No, it's someone who doesn't understand the difference between hardware and operating system.
Of course Android has more repairs than Apple or Blackberry. Everyone and his dog can make an Android device. Only Apple and RIM can make the iPhone and Blackberry. So assuming that Apple and RIM maintain high hardware quality standards (manufacturing, not design - to differentiate between quality-of-build and the antenna debacle) then it's a given that an open OS is going to end up getting installed on cheap pieces
It couldn't be someone who has an axe to grind on Android phones, no?
Why would you think that? The findings don't seem to be that negative on Android (despite the negative spin being given in many outlets.) I mean, even the part quoted in TFS notes that the higher failure rates on Android phones are due to the fact that there are more low-cost Android phones available.
Its not really surprising that the failure rate across all devices of an OS that is available on lower-end devices as well as high-end device
It couldn't be someone who has an axe to grind on Android phones, no?
Gee, why would a polarizing story like that make it to Slashdot? Hmmmmmmmmm
Not necessarily. Google can't be faulted for the myriad of shitty handsets on the market. It's up to the device manufacturers to properly design and test their device.
Everyone I've ever known that has bought an Android phone has been happy with it. In my not-scientific-in-any-way observations, it's pretty much on par with those satisfied with their iPhone. I'll admit, though, that nobody I know buys the el-cheapo crap when they upgrade, it's skewed more towards Droid, Galaxy, etc. I'm still rolling wit
How dare they.
They are saying a Linux based and a Google Product is having more issues then a Closed source Evil Companies.
I mean you can re-bring up the argument that Linux isn't any more secure and reliable then windows, Windows just got a bad rap because it more widely used. Thus more of a target towards Malware. and the fact that there are drivers made for Cheap ass hardware for the more popular OS can cause a lot of extra stability problems.
Nah... Somehow attaching a text file stating that it falls un
Yeah. It couldn't possibly be that in their race to gain market share and push out the latest and greatest iPhone killer with slightly better specs & performance, the phone manufacturers are using cheaper hardware, and spending less time testing & QC'ing the hardware and software in an effort to maintain a reasonable (i.e., sustainable) profit margin, and thus are producing hardware that is slightly more likely to break or malfunction.
That would just be inconceivable.
If you dig into the stats, you'
Cheap stuff breaks, who knew?
Cheap stuff breaks. Overpriced stuff is held wrong. Therein lies the difference.
I have a friend who does this.
When he gets tired of his phone, he starts slamming it against the shop floor (concrete) until it breaks.
He feels entitled to one because he pays the insurance and it means an updated phone.
Customers fight back against being nickel-and-dimed.
What a garbage article.
An Android phone is not the same as an Apple or Blackberry phone. Google just makes the software. Apple and Blackberry make their own hardware.
Therefore you can't really say "Android phones have a high rate of defect". More accurately, you could say "Low-end no-name brand Android phones for that cost under $100 have a high rate of defect". High-end Samsung or HTC Android phones are just as good as their Apple or Blackberry counterparts.
Low-end phones have existed forever, and they've always had more technical issues. They just never had a high-end operating system. Since Android is free you can get it on even the cheaper phones. This is a good thing because it allows cheaper phones to have top-of-the-line software on a budget price.
It's no wonder that if you search for the study all you find is links to this and similar articles about this bogus study, but no references to the company or the studies themselves. Obviously a paid interest study.
I won't argue with your premise - but for some anicdotal comment: I don't know a single person who has a Samsung Galaxy phone (old version or new) that hasn't had to replace it at least once for DOA type problems (died out of the box or within 2 months). I know one who had to replace it three times.
I've had my SGS2 for about half a year now, and while it feels a bit light, thin and cheap, it has held up pretty well.
Two youtube vids:
First, battery cover, which is paper thin, and very many are afraid to break somehow when they get the phone:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ErXqnQKs-tA [youtube.com]
Second is a drop test (vs iPhone 4S), where the light plastic seem to hold up pretty well:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=elKxgsrJFhw [youtube.com]
So.. This far, the only problem I've had is that the power button doesn't bounce back as much
My Samsung Galaxy S (Vibrant on T-Mobile) has been the toughest phone I own. I even managed to drop it in a pool, let it dry out and it is still working today. The gorilla glass on this phone is amazing. It lives in my pocket with no screen protect and with change, pens and sometimes keys and doesn't have any noticeable scratches. About the only thing that bothers me is that the GPS is crap, but that isn't high on my list of priorities. I will definitely go with the SGS II or the SGS 3 if that is out b
I don't know a single person who has a Samsung Galaxy phone
I call bullshit, I think you know exactly one person with a Galaxy. I say this because the few people I have known with one have never had a problem, nor have I really heard of too many problems with the Galaxy specifically. Of course, you don't have to take my word for it, I know you won't anyway.
I suspect the bigger problem a lot of people have with Android is that it isn't made by Apple and called iOS...
An Android phone is not the same as an Apple or Blackberry phone. Google just makes the software. Apple and Blackberry make their own hardware.
By the same token how many of the BSoDs blamed on Microsoft was really Microsoft's fault and how many were due to crappy hardware bought to save money? (Lest some one accuse me of a being a microsoft shill, my anti-MS credentials [slashdot.org] (Sep 2007) have been well established. )
Google doesn't make the hardware, but they certainly endorse some of it. In particular, the Nexus line. One would think that Google would choose to endorse only the best those manufacturers have to offer. It certainly doesn't do them any good to endorse crap. My N1 hasn't been too stellar so far having broken twice in the first year. While HTC did a pretty speedy job at replacing it, I wasn't super impressed with a device that craps out in less than a year of gentle ownership.
It's like saying that PC hardware running Linux breaks more often.
There is one problem with that: Google certifies every single Android phone.
They have the ability to prevent manufacturers from releasing disposable garbage, but instead they just certify it as long as the maker does not dare remove google tracking services.
So, although the manufacturer of the specific phones should be listed, Google is the one that opens the door for manufacturers to create and sell said garbage.
Seriously, I recently bought a new Huawei U8300 for $29, no contract. Not as a phone (though it works fine), but as a dirt-cheap, networked GPS & IP camera that'll run any Android app - for $29. How awesome is that?
This is the advantage of real diversity (that you want to block) - there is something for everyone. Thank Christ Google saved us from Jobsian monoculture.
I agree. I'm a huge iOS fanboy but this is just unfair. By their logic WinMo 6 also has a higher failure rate just because ZTE, Huawei, etc shipped crummy WinMo devices.
Besides, RIM and Apple should be compared to HTC, Moto, etc. Not google.
An Android phone is not the same as an Apple or Blackberry phone. Google just makes the software. Apple and Blackberry make their own hardware. Therefore you can't really say "Android phones have a high rate of defect".
So that means an end to the stories and claims and general nerd mirth about how 'Android phones are now the largest market segment'?
For instance Google is not even going to take responsibility for bad software. This i worse than MS blaming everyone on the hardware people, and the hardware people blaming everything on MS. With apple if the softwar
A wide variety of manufacturers will tend to include some of lower quality.
Buyer beware, or just pay extra and get the Apple. (Apple hardware ain't perfect either.)
cheaper devices (designed cheaper) with otherwise similar performance specs fail more often.
What would be interesting would be how high-end android devices from brands with a brand image compare to the iphone.
>Repairs to Android smartphones cost wireless carriers $2 billion per year
Since when did wireless carriers repair smartphones? They just send them back in gross to the hardware maker for a refund on the next batch. $2 billion seems really high for mailing costs.
Hardware running android? Isn't that a rather broad category? I mean Apple and RIM make their own hardware so comparing them makes sense. But comparing two hardware companies to a dozen or more companies that all use the same software? That seems like a rather useless statistic. Name brands vs generic brands, was there ever any doubt?
Does reading about a vast army of cheaply produced, fault-prone commodity hardware from multiple OEM vendors running an OS from a single software vendor competing against Apple's solely owned and closed product line give anyone else a sense of deja vu?
If all you offer is one model at a time (Apple, no capacity differences don't truly count as a different model - radio differences may) it's really easy to make a tried and true hardened product. That being said Apple has been screwing up it's one product last couple of generations, granted not in a way that can't be handled.
Blackberry OS products, though more diverse than Apple's product line, are still very narrow in offerings.
Anyone who can slap together a few components can make an Android phone.
Android is truly a buyers market. It is up the the buyer to do all the research required to buy an Android device. Sticking with a few vendors is usually a safe way to do it. Sure you can probably find a really cheap phone from China from a manufacturer you've never heard of that looks like an iPhone, runs Android, and advertises 1,000 features, but you know deep down in your heart you probably should go with something by HTC instead. The difference between the compared groups is that Android, being free, allows the last guy to exist. In a true unencumbered market you're always going to have your sleeze bag bottom of the barrel stuff, then you're going to have your sexy Cadillac stuff. My EVO is over a year old and I don't see myself giving it up for a different model for at least six months, probably more, however if I were to have bought the budget "free" phone from any carrier at the same time, Android or not, there's a pretty good chance I would be growing tired of it by now, if it still worked at all.
This is no different than the way I always buy Wrangler Carpenter pants for work even though I could just as easily go to a discount store and buy random generic brands. I've done the latter, and sometimes I've gotten really good pants that last, and sometimes I got trash. Apple only sells the "Wrangler" product and wont allow anyone else to produce the equivalent. Blackberry only allows the Wrangler and a couple of others like Levi and Carhart. Android says "Make em all!".
These findings don't detract from Android. In my book it actually uplifts Android. What if all I wanted was a cheap but descent phone, not for making phone calls but for my kid to play Angry Birds on and listen to her Chipmunk albums? Chances are she's going to drop anything I get her in the toilet eventually so quality isn't the highest priority. I can get a bargain basement Android phone that doesn't break the bank. With Apple I have to mortgage her bicycle and LPS collection to buy an iPhone and lets face it, Blackberry isn't the best choice for Angry Birds. (Truth is I gave my kid my old iPhone 3G, but I seriously considered getting her an Android phone from Cowboom.com instead)
Articles like this that intentionally overlook the obvious are mostly FUD.
This one is simple, guys. Google will sell an Android license to anyone. Apple and RIM make their own hardware. They have a stake in the reputation of their company. Consumers are smart enough to realize that a Google phone failing is not Google's fault, it's the fault of the manufacturer of the hardware. It's giving the manufacturer's a bad name, not Google.
There's plenty of junky Android phones with junky hardware on the market. That being said, there's some bleeding edge Android phones out there wi
My brother in law when through four or so Motorola Droids before finally giving up. I suspect that when your first unit fails, the ones the carriers replace it with are refurbs, leading to a common death spiral. (He may have went with a refurb to start with, to save $$) Yes, he switched to an iPhone, and it has worked ever since.
Also, if you lump all Android phones into the same category, there's some real garbage in there. It's unfair to categorize a device from Samsung or Motorola with something from Firs
My brother in law when through
This phonetic typo and visual typo is quite interesting. Many pronounce "went" without the 't' and the somehow the brain directs the fingers to type "when" because the user is thinking "wen". Many of my typos go to the other end. I have seen my finger type 2 when I meant Z or 0 when I mean O, even g when I meant 9. As we start typing faster and faster something is happening when typing becomes half-reflexive. Looks like the brain imagines a shape and directs the finger to the key that will produce that sh
Generally speaking, when your market share increases, so do the amount of devices you have in service. The more devices you have in service, the higher the percentage of failed devices. It's math, not magic.
http://www.eurodroid.com/2011/04/26/stats-android-now-10-ahead-of-iphone-in-us-smartphone-market-share/ [eurodroid.com]
http://www.techi.com/2011/08/android-ios-approach-70-combined-smartphone-market-share/ [techi.com]
The volume of calls and number of devices is needed for those numbers to mean anything.
Sure a higher percentage of Android calls involve hardware issues. That could be the case if:
1. The hardware does fail more.
2. The hardware fails less but there are also even fewer calls about software issues.
This is what happens when you compete on the basis of cost.
When it comes right down to it, there's not a lot to differentiate one Android phone from another. It's becoming a commodity market, and a phone buyer would be satisfied with any of several options. What would make someone choose one phone over another? Leaving out the fucktards who reflexively hate on Apple just because Apple doesn't place virgin tech-nerds on a pedestal, someone will choose one phone over another based upon:
That's about all there is.
If you have two phones with similar features, and one is cheaper than the other, you buy the cheaper phone. If you, the seller, want to not go out of business by losing money on every sale you have to reduce your cost of goods. Therefore, your build quality will suffer, and you end up with the situation the article describes.
If you have two phones with the same price, you'll buy the one with a better feature set. If you're packing more features into the same sale price, you're spending less on each feature. Therefore, to meet the price point, you're sacrificing quality. Once again, you end up with the described situation.
If you're choosing based upon carrier, and you're not buying the phone outright (i.e. you have a contract and a subsidized phone price) you have a limited selection. Since the carrier wants to maximize profit on a phone, they'll offer the models with the lowest wholesale cost. To meet that lower cost, the phone makers will cut corners. And... surprise, reliability suffers.
Therefore, as long as the phones are pretty much interchangeable from the user's point of view, price will loom large... and the price-race to the bottom will dominate everything else. Phone manufacturers aren't charities; they have to show a profit to stay in business. Therefore to meet lower prices, cost cutting must occur. This is what it means to exist in a commodity market with paper-thin margins, and to operate in a market where people are willing to buy crap.
Premium Android phones are just fine. The problem is that there are a lot of non-premium Android phones, and they get lumped in with the Nexus and Droid product lines. There's a bunch of no-name crap out there that is being pushed solely on the basis of the Android name, and it's ruining things for everybody involved.
Does everyone understand now why Apple doesn't participate in the market segments dominated by commodity items? Does everybody understand now why cheap Android phones break? Does everybody understand now why cheap Android phones exist at all? If you want quality, you MUST open your wallet. It costs money to make a good phone, and therefore it costs money to buy a good phone. Complaining at the top of your lungs doesn't make a good phone cheaper or a cheap phone better.
Q: How many IBM CPU's does it take to execute a job? A: Four; three to hold it down, and one to rip its head off.