'Hip Hop Squares': New Game Show Coming To MTV2!

Nick Cannon, Mac Miller and Fat Joe will help put fresh spin on iconic 'Hollywood Squares' with new show, set to premiere May 22.
By Rob Markman

Photo: MTV2

Hip-hop is going Hollywood — or is it the other way around? On May 22, MTV2 will premiere "Hip Hop Squares", a fresh new take on the iconic tic-tac-toe game show "Hollywood Squares."

Nick Cannon, DJ Khaled, Fat Joe, Mac Miller and Machine Gun Kelly will be featured as contestants. "Jackass" crewmember Bam Margera, Pittsburgh Steelers linebacker LaMarr Woodley and Wu-Tang's Ghostface Killah also will appear on the show, hosted by New York radio DJ Peter Rosenberg.

" 'Hip Hop Squares' is a great representation of MTV2's new brand filter to deliver smart, funny and relevant content that speaks directly to male Millennials, or 'Malennials,' as we call them," said Paul Ricci, head of programming for MTV2. "The show will refresh an iconic format and create a fun, dynamic series that's unpredictable, heavy on personality and much more 'party' than 'game show.' "

If the new incarnation of "Squares" stays true to the original, two contestants (one representing "X," and the other representing "O") will compete for prizes in a trivia-styled game where the show's stars are situated on a giant tic-tac-toe board.

The contestants strategically select which square they wish to capture and ask the star seated there a trivia question. After the question is answered, the contestant can choose whether to agree or disagree. If the contestant is right, they capture the square; if he or she is wrong, their opponent wins the square. The first contestant to line up three squares in a row wins the game.

"They cross the spectrum from musicians and celebrities to athletes and casual fans of hip-hop," Paul Ricci, MTV2′s programming chief told Entertainment Weekly. "The show will refresh an iconic format and create a fun, dynamic series that's unpredictable, heavy on personality and much more 'party' than 'game show'."

Sounds like a ball.

Tune into the premiere of "Hip Hop Squares" at 11 p.m. ET/PT on Tuesday, May 22, on MTV2!

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Youth Sports Baseball Coaching Ideas - Dish Washer

The fascination in the game of baseball has not captured the imagination of the folks across the globe like professional basketball and American football. The BatAction Machine has a huge circle of ball movements ? This big path of ball movement allows the batter to see, hit and track the ball prior to and right after every swing. It really is not necessary to be looking for some particular occasion in purchase to give them a bone or some other deal with.

The extremely 1st factor you will need to do to greatly enhance your diet regime will be to eradicate all junk foodstuff. This could truly help individuals youngsters who are obviously gifted in the activity but who do not have the help to nurture their talent. All the opposing business could hook a hover ball, which is certainly one that batter hits on the air as effectively as the mixture strike specifically what is known as any line generate as well as a grounder.? More on Cheap Baseball Equipment

If you might be pronouncing O.K what does that suggest, let us evaluate this quantity to the no one ranked fantasy pitcher in baseball for 2010, Tim Lincecum, he had a BAA of .206 previous 12 months. I hoped my son would not get jealous with regards to the two softball bats, but I believed I would simply tell him the 2nd 1 was my personal considering that I was training as nicely. What I?ll try to do in this report is give a rundown of the most notable baseball bat makers and also convey to light some of the lesser known companies.

In this article on baseball batting lessons I am going to go more than ?The Artwork of Studying the Pitcher? that many hitting coaches and baseball camps fall short to educate in their baseball batting lessons. If you want to get imaginative what you can do is you can purchase a basic baseball shirt and glue rhinestones on it in a routine that you want. Most men will uncover that dressing up is fully unpleasant and they would not fell like them self when they are dressed up.

It is 5 months following the previous baseball year concluded, which is the purpose bettors are acquiring prepared for that 1st pitch of the new year. Undoubtedly, the style and color of baseball bags must be picked by you individually, however, team baseball bags are designed for all players with the identical group shades and brand. Tyler Morris, A firefighter from Corinth, Texas fell thirty ft very last July from the second deck, leaving him with a fractured skull and sprained ankle.

If you want to try out it out, try Ebay or sort the keywords and phrases price reduction baseball gloves and you will be surprised at what you will uncover. If you happen to be making baseball cards of the little league staff, consider a photograph of each of the members of the staff. To complete Figure Eights, just stand in the commencing placement by keeping the medication ball with your arms extended over you appropriate shoulder.

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In the 1970?s attendance had been growing quickly and in 1994, ahead of the strike, baseball was at a record higher for attendance. Built of nylon, which is noble in baseball hats a bucket hat test pattern tones, a high-quality leather belt created for the traits of the Crown.

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Video: Victoria Beckham 'average?' Not!

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Hackers target Mac users

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Suzanne Choney

The smartphone juggernaut continues?in the U.S. According to a new Nielsen report,?49.7 percent of mobile subscribers owned smartphones as ... Read more

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Rosa Golijan

Uh oh! Mac users who occasionally dip their toes into the sea of Microsoft products are at risk of becoming the victims of targeted security attacks, thanks to a security hole in Microsoft Office for Mac.

Dennis Fisher of the Kaspersky Lab Security News Service reports that?researchers recently discovered a new security attack which relies on "two separate pieces of malware, a malicious Word document and some techniques for maintaining persistence on compromised machines." These attacks are specifically?targeting Mac users, he explains.

(Msnbc.com is a joint venture of Microsoft and NBC Universal.)

Despite the attack method being rather new, it actually relies on a three-year-old vulnerability in the way Microsoft Office for Mac deals with certain types of Microsoft Word Files. According to Jaime Blasco of AlienVault Labs, an attacker needs to send a "specially crafted Word file" to a user and have some patience. Once that individual opens the malicious file, the attacker could take complete control of his or her system:

An attacker could then install programs; view, change, or delete data; or create new accounts with full user rights. Users whose accounts are configured to have fewer user rights on the system could be less impacted than users who operate with administrative user rights.

As usual, extreme vigilance is the best way to avoid becoming a victim to?a security attack such as this one. Be careful when opening files you've received. Are they from individuals you trust? Are they files you've been expecting? Use common sense and don't immediately peek at every random file.

Updated at 8:15 pm ET: ?Yunsun Wee, director of Microsoft Trustworthy Computing, said the company?released a security update in 2009 "to address an issue affecting Microsoft Office for Mac, and we encourage customers to apply this update to ensure that they are fully protected."

Want more tech news, silly puns, or amusing links? You'll get plenty of all three if you keep up with Rosa Golijan, the writer of this post, by following her on?Twitter, subscribing to her?Facebook?posts, or circling her?on?Google+.

Source: http://www.technolog.msnbc.msn.com/technology/technolog/hackers-use-microsoft-office-security-hole-target-mac-users-594415

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14 Famous People Who Were Philosophy Majors ? 2eyeswatching

Umberto Eco

It makes perfect sense that one of the most prestigious living philosophers received a degree in the subject ? in 1954 from the University of Turin, actually. Humberto Eco?s focus lay largely with medieval philosophy, and he penned his bachelor?s thesis on Thomas Aquinas before eventually sloughing off religious doctrine entirely. The avant-garde scene, with which he grew intimately acquainted while working at Radiotelevisione Italiana, holds considerable influence over his provocative, mind-melting fiction and nonfiction works alike.

Aung San Suu Kyi

Nobel Peace Prize winner Aung San Suu Kyi hold a bachelor?s degree in philosophy and economics from Oxford, alongside a University of Delhi B.A. in politics and Ph.D. from University of London. Currently, she serves as the General Secretary of the National League for Democracy, a political party in Burma dedicated to overthrowing the military junta and installing policies for the peoples. Geopolitics followers know her as a human rights activist who finally saw freedom in 2010 after multiple house arrest sentences for promoting subversive principles and philosophies.

Peter Thiel

If Peter Thiel?s name doesn?t conjure up recognition, perhaps some of his technological creations and investments do. The co-founder and former CEO of Paypal also assisted in the development of Facebook, Yelp, Spotify, Yammer, LinkedIn, and plenty of other familiar and not-so-familiar online ventures.The hedge fund leader, venture capitalist, philanthropist, and all-around money-haver launched his billion-dollar career after a stint at Stanford, where he completed work on a B.A. in philosophy as well as a J.D. at the law school.

Ethan Coen

Along with brother Joel, Ethan Coen has produced some of modern cinema?s most beloved masterpieces, such as Fargo, The Big Lebowski, O Brother, Where Art Thou?, No Country for Old Men, and plenty more. In 1979, he earned himself a philosophy degree from Princeton University, where his senior thesis dealt with language theorist (among other things) Ludwig Wittgenstein. Fans of the pair?s trademark quirky, occasionally staccato dialogue probably won?t find this at all surprising.

Angela Davis

As a proud feminist, Black Panther, and communist, this prominent social activist and retired University of California philosophy professor garners a veritable monsoon of controversy. Angela Davis? higher education career started at Brandeis University, where she switched her major from French to philosophy and worked under Marxist Herbert Marcuse. These studies left a gargantuan influence on her later campaigns against racism, capitalist inequalities (obviously), sexism, and anti-LGBTQ sentiment.

Steve Martin

California State University, Long Beach holds popular comedian, musician, writer, and general entertainer Steve Martin amongst its alumni. By then, he already managed to channel his own emotions and experiences into performing, leading one to understandably assume he probably pursued a degree path involving drama or theatre. Philosophy piqued his fascination most of all, however, particularly when it came to ideologies regarding logic and language.

Alex Trebek

For $400. This Jeopardy host majored in philosophy at University of Ottawa. *Ding* Who is Alex Trebek? That is correct! He completed his diploma in 1961, then launched a television career two years later as the face of Canadian game show High Rollers. Other stints on different programs followed before he finally landed his most famous and long-standing gig in 1984.

George Soros

?The Man Who Broke the Bank of England? started off at London School of Economics and completed his Bachelor of Science degree in philosophy in 1952. Just about the only job he could score after graduation was an entry-level slot at Singer & Friedlander, a bank. Turns out ol? George Soros possessed a knack for all things fiscal, seeing as how he kind of sort of ended up a billionaire. Launching his own hedge fund and investment firm proved quite profitable indeed, and the business mogul receives almost as much attention as his charitable efforts.

Bruce Lee

Bruce Lee?s real emphasis at University of Washington dredges up quite the dispute! His official records state ?drama,? but the martial arts superstar always claims philosophy ? as do many of his followers and fellow(?) majors. Regardless of how things actually went down, he did in fact study the subject quite extensively, and frequently touted its role in shaping both his acting and his athletics.

Phil Jackson

Legendary Chicago Bulls and Los Angeles Lakers coach Phil Jackson accomplished much more than just sharpening his basketball (and track and field!) acumen while attending University of North Dakota. Players, contemporaries, administrators, and fans don?t call him ?The Zen Master? because he just loves getting his Bobby Knight on. Inquiries into ?Eastern? thought and Robert M. Pirsig?s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance won him 11 championships as a coach, added to the two earned as a player. He even published a book, Sacred Hoops, about how sport and philosophy interplay in his mind.

Gene Siskel

Philosophy lends itself quite well to film criticism for obvious reasons, and this famed commentator actually started off as doing just that with The Chicago Tribune. John Hersey, the Pulitzer recipient for A Bell for Adano served as Gene Siskel?s mentor during his studies while at Yale, even hooking him up with the aforementioned maiden voyage into the aforementioned career path. From there, he grew into a household name after hooking up with The Chicago Sun-Times? Roger Ebert and earning a lauded television program.

Susan Sontag

Filmmaker, author, activist, photographer and all around Renaissance woman Susan Sontag is frequently said to have received her B.A. from University of Chicago in philosophy, which she then followed up with graduate studies in the subject ? along with religious studies and literature ? at Harvard and Oxford. Considering her creative and intellectual oeuvre intended to shed light on social and political ills, this rigorous educational regimen served her well indeed. And by ?indeed,? we mean she earned a MacArthur Fellowship, National Book Critics Circle Award, and litany of other national and international honors.

David Foster Wallace

While attending Amherst as an undergraduate, renowned American postmodernist novelist and essayist double majored in philosophy and English. After graduating, he pursued a master?s in creative writing from University of Arizona, eventually earning a MacArthur Fellowship and adjunct professorship at Emerson College. Prolific in his lifetime, with an enviable bibliography of long and short works, he is most known for the metafictional masterpiece Infinite Jest.

Ricky Gervais

This controversy-courting comedian behind beloved TV shows Extras and The Office (the original British series) majored in philosophy at the undergraduate level while attending University College London. When asked about how it helped bolster his television career, he whipped out the old saw about monkeys and typewriters. Fans, however, can certainly see the humorous benefits of devoting time, energy, and money towards the philosophical arts if pursuing an entertainment career

Source: http://2eyeswatching.wordpress.com/2012/03/30/14-famous-people-who-were-philosophy-majors/

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Three Ways to Upgrade Your PC for a Better Gaming Experience ...

Posted by on March 29th, 2012

Article by Daryl Chapman

If you are an avid computer gamer and your computers remain the customary, you might not be experiencing up till now the best of what it is in computer gaming. Playing would be more realistically amusing when you upgrade your personal computers (PC) to a level higher. So before you begin your upgrade project, let me provide you three tips on how to build your PC a high-caliber gaming computer.

Consider upgrading your different computer hardwareBecause of the expanding sophistication of computer games? features, you should also keep up your computers by improving the competence of its various parts. Inspect the competence of your processors, random access memory (RAM), your graphics processing unit (GPU) and your hard drives if it meets the requirements to administer your game programs. They are the ones principally responsible for your game to run properly on your PC. The greater they are, the faster your gaming program will work and the higher you take pleasure in your gaming experience.

Gaming computers require your processor to have at least three gigahertz or higher to accomplish the instruction sets of your computer programs faster. Your computer should also be able to hold plenty of memory like at least one gigabyte or more to operate quicker. Those who really are setting their PC for gaming get as many RAM as they can afford and use dual-core processors.

As modern day computer games endeavor to give a stunning realism

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Source: http://bluemeanieme.com/2012/03/29/three-ways-to-upgrade-your-pc-for-a-better-gaming-experience/

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Mining boom in Michigan: economic boost or environmental nuisance?

Demand for metals on the world market is prompting a mining boom in Michigan's rural Upper Peninsula, where jobs are scarce. But possible environmental damage to forests, lakes, and rivers alarms some locals.

Jeff TenEyck was glad to come home last year. He had left Michigan for a small trucking business in South Carolina but returned to work at a new mine just outside Big Bay, the little mill town where he grew up.

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"This is the biggest shot in the arm for the economy here since Henry Ford was here," says Mr. TenEyck, whose grandfather worked in a lumber mill that Ford bought in 1943.

Driven by a worldwide surge in demand for metals, mining is on the rebound in Michigan's Upper Peninsula, bringing the hope of jobs to remote and economically depressed rural communities. A dozen miles south of Big Bay, London-based mining giant Rio Tinto PLC and its subsidiary, Kennecott Eagle Minerals Co., are digging a shaft beneath a pine-covered flat called the Yellow Dog Plains. They plan to begin extracting nickel and copper early next year. Rio Tinto says the Eagle Mine will be the largest nickel mine in the country and will create as many as 700 new jobs.

Meanwhile, Orvana Minerals Corp., a Canadian mining company based in Toronto, is close to final approval for a copper mine expected to create hundreds of jobs in the sparsely populated western Upper Peninsula. Next in line, Aquila Resources Inc. and HudBay Minerals Inc. plan to apply for a permit later this year to mine zinc, gold, and silver at a small, open-pit mine along the Menominee River called the Back Forty Project.

There could be more. Mining companies have been busy prospecting for new deposits, crisscrossing the Upper Peninsula by plane and helicopter, drilling exploratory holes, leasing land, and buying up mineral rights. They've revisited old mines to see if new technology might make it profitable to reopen them.

"It's like flies to honey," says Theodore Bornhorst, professor of economic and engineering geology at Michigan Technological University in Houghton. "It's got a lot of people interested."

The prospect of jobs has also excited the hopes of residents. "It's a no-brainer for most people," says Amy Clickner, head of the Lake Superior Community Partnership, an economic development corporation in Marquette, Mich. "We do have a culture used to mining here. And the people who live up here do have to have jobs."

At the same time, many residents worry that new mining could damage the environment and threaten the natural abundance that they enjoy as hunters and anglers.

Around Big Bay, opponents of the Eagle Mine, including a local group of Ojibwa Indians, have packed hearings, gotten themselves arrested, and traveled to London to speak out at meetings of Rio Tinto shareholders. They have sued Michigan's Department of Environmental Quality for granting a mining permit in 2007. Most recently, they have been fighting the construction of a haul road through a wild area south of the mine.

"Of course we want jobs back in Baraga County," says Susan LaFernier, tribal council secretary for the Keweenaw Bay Indian Community, which lies west of the mine in a county with 18 percent unemployment. "We'd be crazy if we didn't. But we think the harm isn't worth those jobs."

Source: http://rss.csmonitor.com/~r/feeds/csm/~3/QRZUHBuY7yo/Mining-boom-in-Michigan-economic-boost-or-environmental-nuisance

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'Invisibility cloak' can serve as heat shield

Sebastien Guenneau / Institut Fresnel, CNRS/AMU

This schematic shows that the object in the center of a thermal invisibility cloak stays cold while the heat diffuses elsewheree. The source of the heat is on the left side, maintaining a temperature of 100 degrees Celsius (212 degrees Fahrenheit).

By Alan Boyle

By now, you've heard of "invisibility cloaks" that can hide objects from prying eyes, or military scouts, or sonar scopes ? but how about a cloaking device that can keep your computer circuits cool?

That's just the kind of thermal cloaking device that French researchers are proposing in the journal Optics Express, and it might not be too long before it becomes a reality.

"We expect to have the first prototype ready in a few months, since as usual there are a few fabrication constraints which need to be fixed, but nothing really serious," lead researcher Sebastien Guenneau told me in an email. "All seems to be under control."

Most of the invisibility cloaks under development work by using metamaterials to bend light waves or sound waves around a shielded object, making the object undetectable in those wavelengths. Guenneau, who is affiliated with the University of Aix-Marseille and France's Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, decided to work with his CNRS colleagues to adapt the wave-bending approach to thermal diffusion.

"Our key goal with this research was to control the way heat diffuses in a manner similar to those that have already been achieved for waves ... by using the tools of transformation optics," Guenneau said in a news release issued by the Optical Society, which publishes the open-access Optics Express.

Instead of controlling wave propagation, the thermal cloak would control the flow of heat. "The mathematics and the physics at play are much different," Guenneau explained. "For instance, a wave can travel long distances with little attenuation, whereas temperature usually diffuses over smaller distances."

The basic design of the thermal invisibility shield is similar, however: Rings of specially shaped material guide the heat flow along the desired path.

"We can design a cloak so that heat diffuses around an invisibility region, which is then protected from heat. Or we can force heat to concentrate in a small volume, which will then heat up very rapidly," Guenneau said.

The thermal protection arrangement could be used to channel the heat created by microelectronics away from sensitive areas ? an issue that's familiar to owners of the new iPad, for instance. The heat concentrator arrangement, meanwhile, could increase the efficiency of thermal photovoltaic cells or solar thermal power generators.

There are already lots of other methods available for thermal protection ? ranging from the plastic-foam insulation used in a cheap beer cooler, to the high-tech aerogel used on NASA's Mars rovers, to the reinforced carbon-carbon panels and protective tiles that were used on the space shuttles. But Guenneau told me that the system he and his colleagues have proposed is "much different" from any existing thermal protection method.

"The flow of heat follows the direction of highest diffusivity, which in our case is around the invisibility zone," he wrote. "Earlier thermal protections require you to basically surround the region to protect with a coating with low diffusivity (e.g., air or polymer, just like your double-glazed windows). To use an analogy with optics, it's just like putting Harry Potter in a box and saying, 'Look, you cannot see Harry anymore, he has been made invisible.' Our approach is to really make Harry invisible, so we should not see the box either."

So what's this cloak going to be made of? In the paper, Guenneau and his colleagues say the materials that go into a concentric multilayered cloak could range from PVC-type polymers to metals such as silver and gold. Production of the prototype cloak is currently under way at the University of Lille, Guenneau said, "but I cannot reveal exactly what it is made of at this stage."

In the next few months, we should be hearing a lot more about the thermal invisibility cloak from Guenneau and his French colleagues ... provided they don't disappear.

More about invisibility:

---

In addition to Guenneau, the authors of "Transformation Thermodynamics: Cloaking and Concentrating Heat Flux" include Claude Amra and Denis Veynante.

Alan Boyle is msnbc.com's science editor. Connect with the Cosmic Log community by "liking" the log's Facebook page, following @b0yle on Twitter or adding Cosmic Log's Google+ page to your circle. You can also check out "The Case for Pluto," my book about the controversial dwarf planet and the search for other worlds.

Source: http://cosmiclog.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/03/27/10892850-a-different-kind-of-invisibility-cloak-can-serve-as-heat-shield

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Stocks slump as investors get?jitters

By msnbc.com news services

U.S. stocks fell on Wednesday as weaker-than-expected data on durable goods orders and a drop in oil prices prompted selling in energy and materials shares.

The S&P energy sector index was off 1.7 percent and the materials sector index fell 1.8 percent. All 10 S&P 500 sectors were down.

The Dow Jones industrial average closed the day down about 72 points, having fallen as much as 128 points earlier in the session.

U.S. crude oil futures fell to about $105 a barrel after a French newspaper reported several governments, including the United States, were considering the release of oil reserves to ease high prices -- seen as an obstacle to an economic recovery.

Investor anxiety has been rising due to the prolonged and significant rally, and we had a catalyst event in the collapse of energy stocks," said Jim Paulsen, chief investment officer at Wells Capital Management.

"It's a combination of investor jitters, given how far the rally has come, and technical levels that we are testing, seeing if the rally can hold up."

He said holding the 1,400 level on the S&P 500 was an indication the market's uptrend was still in place.

New orders for U.S. manufactured goods rose less than expected in February and a gauge of future business investment also missed forecasts, casting a shadow on the manufacturing sector's support of the recovery.

"While today's data fell a bit short, it was still OK. But the market has raised the bar on economic numbers, which is positive because we are starting to see improvement in the sentiment," said Mike Shea, managing partner and trader at Direct Access Partners in New York.

Analysts see limited upside in the S&P 500 after gains of more than 12 percent this year. The benchmark index is on track for its best quarter since the third quarter of 2009.

Large-cap shares, many already at 52-week highs, could continue to outperform as money managers dress up their portfolios ahead of the quarter-end on Friday.

Much of the market's recent gains have come after accommodative monetary policies by central banks globally, including the U.S. Federal Reserve.

On Tuesday, Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke, asked in an ABC News interview about the potential for more quantitative easing, said the Fed wasn't taking any options off the table.

Shares of Annie's Inc surged after the organic food maker's initial public offering priced shares at $19, above its expected range.

Apple Inc will offer buyers of its new iPad in Australia a refund after it was accused of misleading advertising.

Reuters contributed to this report.

Source: http://bottomline.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/03/28/10907233-energy-company-shares-lead-stocks-lower

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KIRF Notes are the Slankets of the phablet world (video)

Today we've got a special treat for you: not one, but two knockoff Galaxy Notes from across the Pacific. Both lack the raw power of Sammy's 5.3-inch device, and even knock the resolution down to a paltry 800 x 480. Our first contestant is rockin' only a 1GHz single-core processor and 512MB of RAM, but it's using those rather pedestrian components to push ICS through its little 9.7mm thick body. The second of today's players certainly wins the audacity contest -- brandishing its clearly unearned Samsung logos. It also wins the spec war here by jumping up to 768MB of RAM and a dual-core CPU, even if the later is an asymmetrical design with a 650MHz ARM7 and a 250MHz ARM9 inside. It also trades up in the camera department going with an eight-megapixel sensor, though, it does settle for Gingerbread. Now all we have to do is think up a new name for the segment, it seems wrong to bless these KIRFs with the phablet name. We were thinking slone or phlate... either way, check out the bonus hands-on vid after the break.

Continue reading KIRF Notes are the Slankets of the phablet world (video)

KIRF Notes are the Slankets of the phablet world (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 27 Mar 2012 16:44:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Source: http://www.engadget.com/2012/03/27/kirf-notes-are-the-slankets-of-the-phablet-world-video/

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Blog interview no.321 with writer Cynthia Haggard ? Morgen ...

Welcome to the three hundred and twenty-first of my blog interviews with novelists, poets, short story authors, biographers, agents, publishers and more. Today?s is with historical novelist Cynthia Haggard. A list of interviewees (blogged and scheduled) can be found here. If you like what you read, please do go and investigate further.

Morgen: Hello, Cynthia. Please tell us something about yourself, where you?re based, and how you came to be a writer.

Cynthia: I?ve had four careers: violinist, cognitive scientist, medical writer and novelist. I was born and raised in the UK, but have been living in the US for 30 years. I currently live in Washington DC. I came to novel writing eight years ago, when I was taking a creative writing course to improve my prose style as I made the adjustment from being an academic to a medical writer. On the first day of the Intro to Novel class, the Stegner fellow who was teaching us asked for the first five pages of our new novel. I gulped, but ever the good student complied. That is how Thwarted Queen began in the Fall of 2004.

Morgen: Oh wow. It?s funny how we fall into things. I got the bug when I went to a college?s creative writing workshop because I?d brushed up on my languages and computer skills. It was very much a case of ?OK, what?s next?? and that?s been ?it? ever since. What genre do you generally write and have you considered other genres?

Cynthia: I write historical fiction, because I have this annoying tendency to float around in the past. I don?t think I could write any other kind of genre. Fortunately, historical fiction is a large umbrella, which includes romance, mystery, fantasy and thriller.

Morgen: It does and it?s all very popular. What have you had published to-date?

Cynthia: I published my first novel Thwarted Queen in October 2011 as an e-book. TQ is also available as a 4 e-volume set (The Bride Price, One Seed Sown, The Gilded Cage, Two Murders Reaped) and as a 3 volume paperback set (Rose of Raby, The Gilded Cage, Two Murders Reaped). All of these versions are available on Amazon.

Morgen: Have you had any rejections? If so, how do you deal with them?

Cynthia: During 2010, I sent out the manuscript of TQ to 45 agents. Though I got some nibbles, ultimately it was rejected. Like everyone else, I don?t like have my work rejected. However, I also see it as an opportunity to learn. My problem with the agent system as it currently stands is that when agents pass on something ? even if they?ve demanded an exclusive that lingers on for three months ? they don?t feel obliged to give you feedback. In my book, that is worse than a waste of time. Subsequently, I went to a couple of writer?s conferences in the spring of 2011 (Unicorn and Maryland) and paid extra to talk one-on-one with professional agents and editors. Finally, I learned what I needed to know. Armed with this knowledge I sat down and worked on it until it was right. So my attitude to rejection is to try and use it as an opportunity to learn.

Morgen: The trouble with sending work anywhere is that there is invariably one person doing two people?s jobs so even a tick-box reply is time-consuming with the amount of submissions they get, although I do think that?s the least they should do. Not replying at all is mean. I presume therefore that you don?t currently have an agent? Do you think they?re vital to an author?s success?

Cynthia: No, not currently. I obtained an agent for a short time in 2010, and didn?t find her particularly helpful. Are agents vital to an author?s success? That depends on the agent and where the author is in their career. For an emerging writer like me, the most useful thing an agent could do (apart from getting good contracts) would be to help manage my career.

Morgen: I certainly think when you get a good one that they do earn their keep. You mentioned Amazon earlier, are your books available as eBooks? Were you involved in that process at all? Do you read eBooks or is it paper all the way?

Cynthia: My books are available as eBooks. I was heavily involved. I created the cover. I did the interior design. I uploaded it onto Amazon. I did hire a professional editor to copyedit the manuscript. And I hired a professional to transform my files into MOBI and Epub. My preference is to read fiction as an e-book, and non-fiction in paperback. This is because when I?m reading non-fiction, it is typically a ?how-to? book and I need to flip back and forth. For fiction, I prefer e-format because it prevents me from cheating and reading the end!

Morgen: How much of the marketing do you?

Cynthia: I do all the marketing, and have given myself the goal this year of becoming thoroughly acquainted with it.

Morgen: It can be a slow process. You obvious had a lot of input into your books and you mentioned the covers, how important do you think they (and the titles) are?

Cynthia: I think that titles and covers are tremendously important, and yes I had full control over their design. I used various French chateaux as backdrops, both because the culture of my protagonist Cecylee Neville was so heavily French-identified, and also because I wanted to give these books an almost fairy-tale like quality. After all, many of the illustrations for Fairy Tales show people dressed in the garb of the 1400s, when Cecylee was alive.

Morgen: What are you working on at the moment / next?

Cynthia: I am working on another family saga called Family Splinters. Set in 1920s Washington DC and Berlin Germany, it is a tale of identity, forbidden love and family secrets. I hope it will be published next year, 2013.

Morgen: Do you manage to write every day? Do you ever suffer from writer?s block?

Cynthia: I try very hard to write every day, and don?t always succeed. However, I have got into the habit of reserving my mornings for writing as it is my best time of day. Like everyone else, I suffer from writer?s block. But I don?t let it ruin my life. If I get stumped, I simply put the MSS down and work on something else. Then I return to it the next day, knowing that that wonderful machine we have in the brain called the mind, will be working away at it underground while I get on with other things.

Morgen: That?s the trick ? have some variety and your brain will keep fresh. Do you plot your stories or do you just get an idea and run with it?

Cynthia: I do a bit of both. I get an idea and start out doing research. Then I just write for a while. When I?ve got to the part of the novel which I think of as the end of Act I, I stop and organize. That way I can have the best of both worlds: I can have the magic of writing on inspiration, without writing pages of stuff I don?t need. I very rarely write something I don?t re-use.

Morgen: That?s a very good plan. My heart sinks when I hear / read of writers who have deleted x,000s of words because they didn?t think it worked. That?s what copy / paste or File / Save As is for. Do you have a method for creating your characters, their names and what do you think makes them believable?

Cynthia: Yes. I spend a lot of time getting to know them. This is why it takes me some time to write a novel, because I like to take the time and trouble to get to know my characters. I create documents for them, in which I interview them. After the interview, I write in a sort of free-form fashion trying to get their voice.

Morgen: That sounds like fun. I think the characters are the most important aspect of a book ? however good a plot is if we don?t like the characters (the ones we?re supposed to like anyway), we?re bound to lose interest in what?s happening around them. Do you write any non-fiction, poetry or short stories?

Cynthia: I?ve written a lot of non-fiction in my life as an academic and medical writer. I love writing poetry, and have even tried my hand at the occasional short story.

Morgen: I love short stories. Do you do a lot of editing or do you find that as time goes on your writing is more fully-formed?

Cynthia: I always edit as I go along, working scene by scene. In the earlier drafts, I don?t worry much about copy-editing because I?m doing all the structural editing. By the fifth draft, I?m polishing the text.

Morgen: I do about four or five drafts (usually no more than that). Do you have to do much research?

Cynthia: As a historical novelist, I have to do a tremendous amount of research. Then I have to endure throwing most of it away so that the novel doesn?t read like a history book and bore the reader!

Morgen: I read only today in a back-copy of a writing magazine where a top historical author was criticised for overusing his research. I guess it?s very tempting to impress but it often backfires. What point of view do you find most to your liking: first person or third person?

Cynthia: In my experience, the material dictates POV. Generally speaking, I don?t care for first person present as I find it pallid and unemotional. There is one exception to this, when writing in the voice of a child. In my novels, I tend to write in close third, because I like to have more than one POV. In Thwarted Queen, this POV issue was quite a challenge because it is a very long novel, mostly about one person. In the end I split it into four books, using different POVs for each book. I wrote the first book of the novel, The Bride Price, in first person present, to capture the freshness of a nine-year-old girl. I wrote the second book, One Seed Sown in first person past, to convey the more mature voice of a young woman in her twenties. The third book, The Gilded Cage, is the story of Richard of York?s political career (Richard of York was Cecylee?s husband) and the opening salvos of the Wars of the Roses. To capture the complexity of the material, and the different voices used to tell it, I wrote that book in third person. The fourth book, Two Murders Reaped, is the story of the last 35 years of Cecylee?s life after the death of her husband, I wrote that in first person past.

Morgen: What?s your favourite / least favourite aspect of your writing life? Has anything surprised you?

Cynthia: I love writing. And I don?t mind marketing or thinking like a business person. I guess this is because I?ve been running my own business for the past five years. It surprises me that I find it possible to go from being an artist to being a business person.

Morgen: What advice would you give aspiring writers?

Cynthia: Understand that this is an endeavor that takes a lot of work, and set about learning how to do it as systematically as you can. You don?t have to go for an expensive MFA to learn how to write. On the other hand, you do need to develop a community of people who will read your work. Feedback is the most precious commodity in a writer?s life, and it becomes in increasingly short supply as a writer becomes more advanced at writing. So even if you are a recluse like me, you still need to think about how you are going to find that valuable feedback that all writers need in order to grow and develop at their craft. The saddest thing is to see talented writers wither because they aren?t given enough time to write their novels and they aren?t given the feedback that they need.

Morgen: I would definitely agree about feedback. I run two writing groups and belong to three others and I?m often alerted to things in my writing that had not occurred to me. Is there a word, phrase or quote you like?

Cynthia: ?Once upon a time there lived in Berlin, Germany, a man called Albinus. He was rich, respectable, happy; one day he abandoned his wife for the sake of a youthful mistress; he loved; was not loved; and his life ended in disaster.? This is the whole of the story and we might have left it at that had there not been profit and pleasure in the telling; and although there is plenty of space on a gravestone to contain, bound in moss, the abridged version of a man?s life, detail is always welcome.?
? Vladimir Nabokov, Laughter in the Dark

Morgen: I like that. What do you do when you?re not writing?

Cynthia: I love to dance, I?ll dance to anything. I love music, and play violin and piano. I walk a lot (I don?t have a car and live in the city). I enjoy hiking. And I go to my favorite yoga studio 3-4 times a week.

Morgen: And you find time to write? Are there any writing-related websites and/or books that you find useful? (please include links where you can)

Cynthia: For the craft of writing, I recommend James N. Frey?s books and a series of books on craft put out by Writer?s Digest.

For marketing books, you can?t do any better than Dan Poynter?s volume.

Morgen: Where can we find out about you and your work?

Cynthia: To find out more my novels, please visit http://spunstories.com.

Morgen: Thank you, Cynthia.

I then invited Cynthia to include an excerpt of her writing and this is from ?Two Murder?s Reaped?:

I glared. ?I would have ensured they had your best interests at heart.?

There was silence.

I had said everything I could. Was there any way of annulling this ridiculous marriage?

But Edward said nothing.

?It is wholly inappropriate,? I remarked, staring at his downcast eyes and shut-in face, ?for a monarch to marry his own subject where no honor or lands can be gained by it. A rich man marries his maid only for a little easy pleasure. In such marriages, folk admire the maid?s good fortune, but think her master lacks judgment. And in this matter, there is no difference so great between any master and maid in this land as between you and this widow.?

I paused.

Edward did not react.

?And the fact that she is a widow makes everything much worse.?

Edward lifted his chin and stared at me.

I gazed back. There was a long silence. Finally I snapped, ?This marriage is a blemish and a disparagement to the majesty of a prince!?

I swept out.

Born and raised in Surrey, England, CYNTHIA SALLY HAGGARD has lived in the United States for twenty-nine years. She has had four careers: violinist, cognitive scientist, medical writer and novelist. Yes, she is related to H. Rider Haggard, the author of SHE and KING SOLOMONS?S MINES. (H. Rider Haggard was a younger brother of the author?s great-grandfather.) Cynthia Sally Haggard is a member of the Historical Novel Society. You can visit her website at: http://spunstories.com.

If you are reading this and you write, in whatever genre, and are thinking ?ooh, I?d like to do this? then you can? just email me and I?ll send you the questions. You complete them, I tweak them where appropriate (if necessary to reflect the blog ?clean and light? rating) and then they get posted. When that?s done, I email you with the link so you can share it with your corner of the literary world. And if you have a writing-related blog / podcast and would like to interview me? let me know. You can sign up to receive these blog posts daily or weekly so you don?t miss anything? and follow me on Twitter?where each new posting is automatically announced. You can also read / download my eBooks and free eShorts at Smashwords, Sony Reader Store, Barnes & Noble, iTunes Bookstore and Kobo. And I have a new forum at http://morgenbailey.freeforums.org.

Unfortunately, as I post an interview a day (amongst other things) I can?t review books but I have a feature called ?Short Story Saturdays? where I review stories of up to 2,500 words. Alternatively if you have a short story or self-contained novel extract / short chapter (ideally up to 1000 words) that you?d like critiqued and don?t mind me reading it / talking about and critiquing it (I send you the transcription afterwards so you can use the comments or ignore them) on my ?Bailey?s Writing Tips? podcast,?then do email me. They are weekly episodes, usually released Monday mornings UK time, interweaving the recordings between the red pen sessions with the hints & tips episodes. I am now also looking for flash fiction (<1000 words) for Flash Fiction Fridays and poetry for Post-weekend?Poetry.

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Source: http://morgenbailey.wordpress.com/2012/03/27/blog-interview-no-321-with-writer-cynthia-haggard/

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Creating collapsible structures with no moving parts

Jacob Aron, technology reporter

Buckling buildings are normally bad news, but a new a 3D shape dubbed the "buckliball", created by researchers at MIT and Harvard University, could allow architects to create structures with collapsible ceilings or walls without the need for moving parts.

The buckliball is a 3D-printed hollow rubber sphere whose surface is covered with 24 evenly spaced dimples. The name comes from the shape's resemblance to the spherical carbon molecules, known as buckyballs.Sucking out the air from the buckliball causes the spaces between the dimples to collapse, buckling under an even load and closing the dimples to create a 26-sided shape - called a rhombicuboctahedron - which is about half the size of the original sphere.

Reinflating the buckliball returns it to its original shape, opening up a wide range of applications. The researchers say buckliballs could be used to design buildings that collapse and reform, create microscopic drug-delivery capsules or even find their way into a new kind of Transformer toy. Inspiration for the buckliballs themselves actually came from a toy known as the Hoberman Twist-O, which undergoes similar deformations.

The team have calculated that the dimples can be arranged in five different ways across a sphere and still share the buckliball's collapsing properties. And it turns out that viruses already use a similar 60-sided design to inject DNA into a host by opening or closing in reaction to the surrounding chemical environment. Buckliballs could potentially mimic this behaviour, triggering a collapse in response to electrical, thermal or chemical changes.

Journal reference: Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences doi: 10.1073/pnas.1115674109

Source: http://feeds.newscientist.com/c/749/f/10897/s/1dd69a5f/l/0L0Snewscientist0N0Cblogs0Conepercent0C20A120C0A30Cbuckliball0Emeans0Ecollapsible0Es0Bhtml0DDCMP0FOTC0Erss0Gnsref0Fonline0Enews/story01.htm

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WWE.com Exclusive: Lord Tensai's message decoded

All WWE programming, talent names, images, likenesses, slogans, wrestling moves, trademarks, logos and copyrights are the exclusive property of WWE, Inc. and its subsidiaries. All other trademarks, logos and copyrights are the property of their respective owners. ? 2012 WWE, Inc. All Rights Reserved. This website is based in the United States. By submitting personal information to this website you consent to your information being maintained in the U.S., subject to applicable U.S. laws. U.S. law may be different than the law of your home country. WrestleMania XXIX (NY/NJ) logo TM & ? 2012 WWE. All Rights Reserved. The Empire State Building design is a registered trademark and used with permission by ESBC.

Source: http://www.wwe.com/shows/raw/2012-03-26/lord-tensai-message-translated

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Computer Forensics Finding Away Exactly what the Criminals Did ...

Pc forensics is similar to the particular CSI exploration packages within the tv. Using sophisticated approaches as well as systems your personal computer forensic scientist will reconstruct any criminal offense utilizing the details any particular one computers. This details might include electronic mail paths documents disguised . internet directories and other connected signs.

Pc Forensics could be the study of personal computers or perhaps pc linked details regarding an investigation by a police agency for use in the courtroom. While this technologies may be as old as personal computers the innovations throughout technologies are generally continually studying that technology.

While many pc different languages are made together with ones as well as 0?s it?s much better to course that which was done when despite the fact that simply by whom may be difficult. Forensic technology did well to take care of the job of following as well as searching what?s done as well as development of a period in an effort to reconstruct any criminal offense. Although its likely to scrub and take away details from your harddrive many people just think that a new get rid of essential truly taken off the information. In truth the particular get rid of essential just taken off the particular file area by an index file plus the actual information is however properly within the program. Its around the information retrieval skills from the forensic pc workers to record as well as reestablish that details without changes.

Pc forensics could be used to course emails instant messaging and just concerning any other form of pc linked emails. This can be essential particularly in the globe where personal computers as well as details traveling around the globe in seconds. Packet sniffers can easily virtually go inside a details stream and offer info on things that are working through the multilevel instantly. This is actually exceptional considering the thousands and thousands upon numerous details packets transferring by means of anyone area of the multilevel.

Pc forensic technology is undoubtedly an useful area of interest inside the police field that may be don?t often regarded as work. As it?s relatively this line of business is recognized as by a lot of being spacious for everyone while using motivation to know the skill sets. Unlike numerous pc linked employment your personal computer forensic specialist will not be contracted with a nation on the opposite side on the planet. The privacy from the information is way too sensitive to allow it travel all over the world just to save a little funds.

Source: http://www.auxmarine.com/computer-forensics-finding-away-exactly-what-the-criminals-did-using-their-computers/

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WHY IS IT IMPORTANT TO Enhance your SELF? @ Simple Online ...

Sometimes, when all our doubts, worries and insecurities wrapping ourselves up, people always come up with the thought of I wish I was another individual. More often than not, the world thinks and believe that someone or rather, most people are a lot better than us.- a lot more reality, the fact is, you are more scared in comparison with us.

You location a totally eye-catching girl seated by herself at a bash, casually sipping on the glass of Asti Spumanti. You feel to yourself, she looks so perfectly calm and confident. But when you could read into her transparent mind, you would see a couple of clouds of thought processes and you might just be stunned that shes thinking are folks talking about why Now i?m seated here on their own?? Why dont guys come across me things to do in melbourne attractive? I dont for instance my ankles, they are too skinny I wish I?d been as intelligent as my best friend.

We look at the young business businessman and say Wooh exactly what else could this individual ask for? He stares at himself on the mirror and murmur so that you can himself, I hate this big eyes I wonder exactly why my friends wont talk to me I am hoping mom and dad would nevertheless work things out and about.

Isnt it funny? We glance at other people, be jealous of them for seeking so outrageously wonderful and wish we could buy and sell places with them, as they definitely look at us together with thinks of the same thing. We?re also insecure of people who themselves are insecure of people. We suffer from lower self-esteem, lack of self-confidence and lose hope in self improvement since we are enveloped within quiet desperation.

In some cases, you notice that you have an irritating habit like biting at off your nails, having a foul jaws, and you of all folks, is the last to be familiar with.

I have a friend exactly who never gets fed up of talking. And in many conversations, she is the only one who seems to be enthusiastic about the things she has to say. So all of our various other friends tend to cut circles whenever shes about, and she doesnt notices the way in which badly she turned out to be socially handicapped little by little affecting the people in her own environment.

Amongst Whitney Houston songs says earning to like yourself is the greatest passion for all. True more than enough. In order to love people, you must love oneself too. Remember, you can not give what you don?t have.

Before telling people some ways on how to raise themselves, let them note that you yourself is a things to do in phoenix portrayal and a product associated with self improvement. Self improvement makes us better people, only then do we inspire other people, therefore the rest of the world will follow.

Halt thinking of yourselves as second-rate beings. Forget the recurring thought ofIf only I?d been richer if only I was thinner for example. Accepting your true home is the first step so that you can self improvement. We need to prevent comparing ourselves so that you can others only to find out afterwards that weve got 10 much more reasons to envy them all.

We all have our insecurities. Noone is perfect. We normally wish we had better things, better things to do in sydney attributes, better body parts, etc. But life should not to be perfect for visitors to be happy about ourselves.Self improvement and adoring yourself is not a question of shouting to the whole world that you are perfect and you are also the best. Its the advantage of acceptance together with contentment. When we learn to improve ourselves, only then do we begin to feel pleased and happy.

Source: http://www.executrainonline.com/home-repair/why-is-it-important-to-enhance-your-self/

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History of racial tension for Fla. city and blacks

SANFORD, Fla. (AP) ? Before the charges that police botched the investigation of the shooting of an unarmed black teen, there were complaints that they went easy on an officer's son who beat a black homeless man, or that officers pull over black kids for wearing the wrong color hat because they suspect gang associations.

The furor over the failure to charge a neighborhood watch captain for shooting Trayvon Martin to death is the latest episode to inflame racial tensions that have simmered between police and blacks in this Orlando suburb for years. And on Thursday, the department's chief temporarily stepped aside.

Stanford City Manager Norton Bonaparte Jr. acknowledged the problems on Friday.

"The issues that have been brought to my attention regarding the black community and the Sanford police department go back 10 years," he said. "There's a lot of work that needs to be done there."

Bonaparte noted Police Chief Bill Lee Jr. took over the department less than a year ago and said he had made improvements but added, "Certainly that has changed as of right now in terms of the relationship between the black community and the Sanford police department."

Turner Clayton Jr., president of the Seminole County's NAACP, agreed.

"There is no trust," he said. "There is no confidence."

Clayton spoke before Lee and a local prosecutor stepped aside Thursday. The chief was accused by critics of mishandling the investigation of 17-year-old Martin's death.

"I do this in the hopes of restoring some semblance of calm to a city which has been in turmoil for several weeks," Jr. said.

The U.S. Department of Justice has launched a civil rights probe and a special prosecutor appointed by the governor is examining the Feb. 26 shooting by watch captain George Zimmerman, 28. Police questioned but never charged Zimmerman in the shooting of the teen who was returning to a friend's home after getting Skittles and an iced tea at a convenience store.

The failure to arrest Zimmerman ? who said he shot in self-defense after Martin attacked him ? and a delay in releasing 911 calls related to the shooting outraged Sanford residents who called it the latest example of bias against blacks.

"They're as crooked as a barrel of fishhooks," said black resident Lula King. She told a town hall meeting this week that her teenage grandson is regularly pulled over by officers who think he is in a gang because of the red-and-black hats he wears.

"There are two sides to every story, but they don't get but one side," said King, 75.

Florida is among 21 states with a "Stand Your Ground Law," which gives people wide latitude to use deadly force rather than retreat during a fight. It lets police on the scene decide whether they believe the self-defense claim. In many cases, the officers make an arrest and leave it to the courts to work out whether the deadly force is justified.

In this case, however, police have said they are confident they did the right thing by not charging Zimmerman.

Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush signed the 2005 "Stand Your Ground" law, but said Friday that he didn't think it cleared Zimmerman in Martin's shooting.

"This law does not apply to this particular circumstance," Bush said after an appearance in North Texas. "Stand your ground means stand your ground. It doesn't mean chase after somebody who's turned their back."

Lee said he would step aside temporarily to let passions cool, saying he had become a "distraction" in the investigation. Hours later, the prosecutor recused himself from the case. Norman Wolfinger said in a letter to Gov. Rick Scott that his departure was aimed at "toning down the rhetoric" in the case.

Residents had demanded that Lee be fired before he stepped down; afterward, protesters gathering early for a rally chanted "The chief is gone. Zimmerman is next." Others sold T-shirts that read, "Arrest Zimmerman."

Lee has said police officers didn't arrest Zimmerman immediately because there was no evidence to contradict his assertion that the shooting was in self-defense.

Lee's predecessor, Brian Tooley, retired early when faced with criticism that Sanford police dragged its feet in arresting Justin Collison on charges of knocking out a homeless black man.

It took a month for Collison, the son of a police lieutenant, to be arrested and charged in 2010 with battery, even though the attack was captured on video. Collison eventually pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor and was sentenced to probation late last year.

The department was also criticized for delaying the arrest of two security guards with close ties to the department who shot a 16-year-old boy to death in 2005. The guards were arrested several months after the shooting and were eventually cleared.

One of the two guards who shot Travares McGill was a police volunteer and the other was the son of a former police officer. Bryan Ansley and William Swofford claimed they feared for their lives when they shot the teen through a car window.

Of Sanford's 53,000 residents, 57 percent are white and 30 percent are black. Zimmerman's father is white and his mother is Hispanic.

Some residents have proposed boycotting the Sanford Police Department by asking 911 dispatchers to send county sheriff's officers rather than the Sanford police.

And Martin's family said the resignations don't' go nearly far enough. They repeated demands Thursday that Zimmerman be charged.

"We want an arrest, we want a conviction and we want him sentenced for the murder of my son," said Martin's father, Tracy.

___

Associated Press writer Kyle Hightower contributed to this report.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/history-racial-tension-fla-city-blacks-073406601.html

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Republican underdog looks to Louisiana

Underdog Rick Santorum looked set for a big win in Louisiana Saturday as he struggled to dent the commanding lead of rival Mitt Romney in the race for the Republican presidential nod.

Written off early on in the campaign, Santorum has steadily notched up wins -- 10 out of 33 contests -- largely with the help of evangelical Christians and the party's most conservative members.

That support was expected to propel the former Pennsylvania senator to a knock-out win in the southern state of Louisiana, where he had a 14-point lead over Romney in a Public Policy polling survey released Friday.

But his failure to win over more moderate voters -- and his focus on divisive culture war issues like abortion and birth control -- has called into question Santorum's ability to beat President Barack Obama in the November 6 election.

"We liked Santorum for a while, but lately he has gotten too radical," Betty Harper, 76, told AFP after casting a ballot for Romney at a New Orleans polling station.

"Obama is out of control... I really think he is a closet Muslim," she added, echoing conspiracy theories that have dogged Obama ever since his 2008 White House run.

Her husband, Dick Harper, said Romney is the "best man for the job" because he's a "good businessman and he won't embarrass us."

Pressure is mounting from the Republican establishment to rally behind Romney, whose 21 wins include Florida, Ohio and Michigan -- all key battlegrounds in the general election.

Obama had an eight-point lead over Santorum in a hypotethical matchup that had him in a statistical tie with Romney, according to Rasmussen national survey.

But Santorum insists the only way to beat Obama is to pick a conservative candidate who can energize the party's base rather than tapping an "Obama-Lite" in the hopes of winning over moderates and independents.

"Romney is a nice man, but I prefer Santorum because I felt he is better than the rest, morally for one thing," Dianne Cannelle, 79, said after casting a ballot in New Orleans.

"You don't just have to have brains to be president; you have to have moral values as well."

Turnout has been low in the hotly contested, topsy-turvy Republican nominating race, but Romney has dismissed any concerns about an enthusiasm gap as he amasses an increasingly insurmountable lead.

Santorum has vowed to take the fight all the way to the Republican convention in August if Romney fails to win the 1,144 delegates needed to clinch the nomination.

Romney currently has an estimated 560 delegates, while Santorum has won 246, according to the website Real Clear Politics.

Gingrich, who has won two states, has 141 delegates, while Texas Representative Ron Paul, who has not won a single contest, has 66 thanks to the proportional distribution of delegates in some states.

While Santorum's expected win in Louisiana ought to provide him with some momentum, the race next shifts to states where Romney has the advantage.

The former Massachusetts governor was ahead by 13 points in a Rasmussen survey of voters in the midwestern state of Wisconsin, which heads to the polls on April 3 along with Maryland and the US capital Washington.

Santorum is expected to carry his home state of Pennsylvania in the following contest on April 24, but the victory will be overshadowed if Romney is able to sweep New York, Connecticut, Delaware and Rhode Island, which also vote that day.

Santorum's campaign says it is looking ahead to May, when the southern states of North Carolina, West Virginia, Kentucky, Arkansas and Texas will vote.

But if enough of the party's "super-delegates" throw their weight behind Romney, the race could be essentially over long before then.

Since many states award delegates at state conventions, the results of nominating events do not translate easily into an exact delegate count.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/santorum-looks-louisiana-revive-campaign-092433800.html

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Coach on Thin Ice? Should the Clippers Replace Vinny Del Negro?

Basketball is a complex game. Yet, I'm constantly amazed at how simple it seems to be to some people. Some people seem to know (or at least think they know) immediately exactly what is right or wrong with a team. Especially when it comes to coaches, fans frequently seem completely convinced that their coach is the worst possible coach in the world and that the team would be infinitely better with anyone else sitting in the first chair.

Look, I've never been a big fan of Vinny Del Negro. I didn't like this hire at the time, and I'm sorry to say it looks like I was right, especially when you consider what has happened in Chicago since Vinny's departure. Not to mention what's been happening to the Clippers the last few weeks. But here's the thing -- I'm a pretty thoughtful guy and a pretty smart guy and I watch a lot of basketball, and I'd be hard-pressed to tell you the exact reasons that VDN is a bad coach. We can certainly observe some poor results from the team over the past month or so. The coach can take some of that blame; but how much? I mean, the coach can't make the shots, right? The Clippers were 4 for 23 in the fourth quarter against the Hornets. I'll allow that some of that falls on Vinny -- the offense isn't creative enough to generate good looks against an energized defense, the players aren't bought in enough to execute better, that sort of thing -- but some of that is people just plain missing shots as well, right?

The funny thing is, VDN was never presented as, and doesn't claim to be, an 'Xs and Os' guy. Which is great, because we can all just accept it as a given that he's weak in that area -- we don't have to debate it. If the guy's supposed strengths are as a motivator and developer of young talent, then having a team visibly unmotivated and a 23 year old superstar stagnating before our eyes would seem to be indicative of a problem.

What are the specific issues? It may not even matter any more. It's not a sophisticated offense by any means -- there's a lot of pick and roll and some Blake Griffin isos, and not a lot else. But when the team was doing well early in the season, that simplicity was seen as a good thing. I've said many times that just because you know a Chris Paul pick and roll is coming, doesn't mean you can stop it. Besides, aren't Clippers fans the same ones who hated Mike Dunleavy Sr. because his playbook was too thick? Now VDN is a huge problem because his is too thin. There's just no satisfying us I guess.

Like I said, it may no longer matter what the reality is. Because in the NBA, as in many other things, perception is reality. And Vinny Del Negro is certainly perceived as a bad coach. I've been doing Q&As with rival bloggers for months now, and EVERY TIME I get asked some variation on the following: "Do you think the Clippers can be successful despite how bad a coach VDN is?"

Of course, the perception of SBNation NBA bloggers is one problem -- the perception of the players on the team is quite another. The "Fire VDN" drumbeat has been going for awhile in the FanPosts and comments on Clips Nation -- but until yesterday, there had been no hint in the national media that he was in any sort of trouble. That all changed with at the speed of twitter.

Bill Simmons, who may or may not be plugged into the Clipper organization enough to actually know something, tweeted after Wednesday night's loss to Oklahoma City "Heard today that Vinny Del Negro is on super-thin, could-go-any-day ice. A blowout loss in OKC tonight won't exactly help."

That tweet bounced around the media echo chamber some on Thursday -- Kurt Helin at NBC and Matt Moore at CBS both wrote their obligatory and appropriately vague "Is VDN in trouble?" posts citing circumstantial evidence like the team's poor recent play and of course Simmons' tweet to fuel the discussion.

Then late in the day Thursday, Chris Broussard dropped the bombshell: Del Negro has lost the locker room! That's the secret code. That's what the front office says when they need to make a move. Because once a coach losing the locker room, there's no getting it back. Oh, and lest we forget, it was a Broussard "D'Antoni has lost the locker room" piece that precipitated a coaching change in New York. Broussard's piece seems awfully fluffy upon closer inspection. It goes through all the same issues of predictable offense, poor play and inconsistent rotations. But really, are VDN's rotations any less consistent than those of any other coach in the league? Besides, if the team is playing poorly, wouldn't we expect the coach to tweak his rotation? Wouldn't that make sense?

Broussard's piece features all of two quotes:

Vinny has lost the team. They don't want to play hard for him - a source.

and

That [VDN's refusal to criticize Chris Paul or Blake Griffin] is a big problem. The best coaches jump on whoever deserves it, no matter who it is - a player (presumably a Clipper, though it doesn't actually specify).

That's not a lot as smoking guns go. But it may not matter. He's "lost the team." He's "lost the locker room." That's the point of no return.

After the Clippers lost their third game in three night's against the last place Hornets on Thursday night, the writers covering the team were more or less obliged to chime in on the "VDN on the hot seat" theme. As per usual, the most thoughtful piece came from Kevin Arnovitz, and J.A. Adande addressed the subject as well. The echo chamber is getting louder and louder.

So what will the Clippers do? What should they do? Del Negro is in the last year of a two year contract with a team option for next season. He'll clearly not be back next year. But what about this season?

Generally speaking, teams in the thick of a playoff race do not change coaches with five weeks remaining in the season. The Knicks, who made their move just over a week ago and have since won five straight under new coach Mike Woodson, are honestly the best example of a (so far) successful late season change I can think of. The Nuggets hired George Karl very near the midpoint of the season back in 2005, and he proceeded to take a 17-25 team and finish the season winning 32 out of 40 games, a remarkable turnaround. But in each of those firings, the team was well below .500 at the time so there was little to lose, and the fact of the matter is that teams rarely play better under a new coach.

A big part of the problem is simply the lack of practice time. If the point of making a change is because the existing coach's system is inadequate or flawed, well how is the new coach going to be able to affect significant change when there's a game every other night? A new coach can supply a new voice and possibly instill a new attitude, but it's difficult to make major changes.

The other big problem in most cases is the availability of upgrades at the coaching position. Simply moving the top assistant over a chair is unlikely to pay big dividends. The "interim" coach as a placeholder until you can conduct a coaching search in the off-season is not really who you want in charge in the playoffs.

That's where the current situation may be different. I tend to be of the opinion that most coaches have little impact on the game. Replace one with another, and it's not going to make a huge difference. There are however a handful of coaches who seem to have consistently overachieved with their teams over the years, a small number of coaches who, in may opinion, are actually difference-makers. Gregg Popovich and Rick Adelman are in that category for me. As are Phil Jackson and Jerry Sloan. As it happens, Jackson and Sloan are theoretically available right now -- but each is officially retired and may want to stay that way.

There happen to be two other coaches who I consider in the upper echelon who have very recently come onto the job market: Mike D'Antoni and Nate McMillan. D'Antoni's Phoenix teams played beautiful attacking basketball -- some of that was Steve Nash of course, but a lot of it was D'Antoni's schemes as well. Besides, who better to do a Nash imitation that Chris Paul. Meanwhile, McMillan, in both Seattle and Portland, consistently had his teams in playoff contention, even when they didn't have the greatest talent, even when they were wracked by injury.

Both D'Antoni and McMillan were fired last week. Would either of them be interested in the Clippers' job? I don't know, but if so, it mitigates the problem of finding an available upgrade.

There could conceivably be a problem with D'Antoni: Simmons, who kind of started this whole thing, says that Paul would not want D'Antoni because of what happened in New York. He tweeted:

FYI: D'Antoni/Clippers will never happen. No way CP3 ever allows that. He's friends with 'Melo/Chandler and knows what went down in NY.

So there's that. It seems more than a little vague and conspiratorial, but there could be some truth to it. Still, there could be an advantage in going with D'Antoni as regards the transition -- current Clippers Assistant Coach Mark Iavaroni was D'Antoni's top assistant in Phoenix.

Will the Clippers make a move? If they're going to do it, now is the time. As crazy as it is to make a coaching change just five weeks before the playoffs start, it's even crazier to do so four weeks before the playoffs start. If there's any truth to the "Vinny has lost the locker room" chatter (and the body language of the team seems to support the notion) then there's plenty of justification, and the situation is unlikely to get better. Interestingly, VDN has been here before -- his final season in Chicago the hot seat talk started in December and dogged him the rest of the way. Not only did he keep his job, but he also got the Bulls to run off 10 wins in their final 14 games to make the playoffs. And then he got fired after the season.

Money will be an issue in hiring a new coach, as it tends to be with Donald Sterling. But hopefully he's smart enough to realize that although keeping Chris Paul and Blake Griffin will not be cheap, it's still a bargain in the long run. And part of keeping Chris Paul and Blake Griffin is spending the money to build a winner around them. Coach's salaries don't count against the cap, so this doesn't even come with a tax attached. Getting the right coach is also a bargain in the long run.

If the right coach is available now and is interested now, then now is the time to make a move.

Source: http://www.clipsnation.com/2012/3/23/2895969/la-clippers-coach-thin-ice-replace-vinny-del-negro

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