Thursday 30 December 2010

Companies Making Money

Remember when double and even triple inverse leveraged ETFs were all the rage? That all occurred in the brief period of time before it became clear that Bernanke would first take down the global financial system before he let Citi get back to $1/share again. Apparently one reader recalls it all too well: "In 2008 at the bottom of the market I sold positions I owned in physical
gold and banks stocks such as Bank of America (BAC), Citigroup (C) and
also non financial companies such as Ford (F). I used these proceeds to
purchased inverse ETF’s such as NYSE: FAZ (Direxion Financial 3x Short)
and NYSE:SRS (Proshares Real Estate 2x Short). Since making these purchases, these ETF’s have suffered significant
drops in value as reflected in their price. In fact NYSE: FAZ has
plummeted from $1100 per share to $11 per share and SRS has reduced in
price from $1000 per share to $19.50 per share. It is now apparent that
the Fed spent trillions of dollars to raise the price of bank stocks and
to inversely suppress the price of these inverse ETFs." Yet is this nothing but a case of fippers' remorse? Is there legal precedent for an actual claim? Was the Fed in breach of duty "by allowing investors to make investments into funds such as FAZ and SRS
and other inverse ETF’s, while the Fed was performing transactions that
the Fed knew or should have known would severely harm the investors in
these publicly traded fund." Will Bernanke cave and make whole everyone who dared to put money into the market, even if it meant betting on a broad market decline? After all the whole purposes of the latest propaganda campaign is to get people to put money in the market with no fear of loss whatsoever: whether one is bullish or bearish (and as the lack of participation shows, most are certainly still bearish). Which is where it gets interesting: "Therefore, I appeal to your office
to make due and just compensation in treble damages amounting to $__
million dollars for a full and good faith settlement of this matter. If
this is agreeable, I am prepared to enter into a confidential good faith
settlement." In our ridiculous bizarro world, in which nothing makes sense following each recurring Fed intervention, perhaps the Fed making whole those who lose money regardless of their bias, is just what is needed to break the 33 weeks of outflows...

Full letter submitted by Bill Pitts:

December 7, 2010
 
 
Mr. Ben Bernanke
Chairman
Federal Reserve Bank
20th Street and Constitution Avenue NW
Washington, DC 20551-0001
 
Re: Financial Loss Suffered By Owners of Inverse ETF’s
 
Dear Chairman Bernanke:

On or about March of 2009, the Federal Reserve Bank (The “Fed”) commenced in actions that involved making loans to banks, financial institutions, wholly owned Fed companies (i.e. Maiden Lane), lenders and publicly traded companies. Additionally evidence suggest that the Fed through these firms and at the direction of the Fed made direct purchases of equities in publicly traded companies for the purpose of raising stock prices. These transactions were undisclosed to the public and investors. Neither the Fed nor the recipient companies disclosed these material transactions to the investing public. Ostensibly, this assistance from the Fed was conducted with the objective of increasing the stock value of many troubled companies and banks. Additionally, under the plan by the Fed and U.S. Treasury, these banks and financial institutions used the Fed supplied funds to purchase each other’s stock. This was conducted to allow each bank to raise each other’s stock values to improve the assets values on one another’s balance sheets. These actions were supported encouraged, known about and assisted through actions of the Fed and the United States Treasury.

While these actions may have been helpful to those firms to abate the systemic problems within the market, assisted in working to make recipient banks more solvent and may have prevented additional bank failure, these actions resulted in severe detrimental damage to many individual  investors.

As you are keenly aware, most every market transaction has two sides to a trade. As a stock or asset class increases in value, some investors realize gain while simultaneously others who concluded that the stocks would NOT improve in price and made investments accordingly known as taking a “short” position would loose money. The inverse of this scenario is also true.
 
As stock prices decrease, those investors who purchased inverse Exchange Traded Funds (“ETF’s’) would gain value in their investments.

As I understand it, between the Fed and the SEC you all are charged with ensuring fairness, honesty and integrity in our markets and monetary system. It is also my understanding that the Fed professes to never intervene in the markets unless it is to prevent crisis.
 
I attempted to understand current events, market conditions and the fundamentals of financial and cash flow statements prior to making personal direct investments. I have always assumed that significant transactions with companies being publicly traded would be conducted in the open and that significant transactions would be disclosed to all investors to make informed decisions. Unfortunately, it appears that as a result of the Feds efforts to correct the current financial crisis these rules of disclosure and openness were set aside.
 
After the September 2008 market crash I took a much more active role in managing my investments. Based upon reading financial data and analyst reports it was very obvious to me that there many commercial property REITS, banks and lending institutions were severely impaired, would suffer significant cash shortfalls and were insolvent or would go bankrupt. It appears that your office arrived at the same conclusion as evidenced by the subsequent injection of hundreds of billions of dollars of cash directed to these institutions by the Fed.

In 2008 at the bottom of the market I sold positions I owned in physical gold and banks stocks such as Bank of America (BAC), Citigroup (C) and also non financial companies such as Ford (F). I used these proceeds to purchased inverse ETF’s such as NYSE: FAZ (Direxion Financial 3x Short)  and NYSE:SRS (Proshares Real Estate 2x Short).
 
Since making these purchases, these ETF’s have suffered significant drops in value as reflected in their price. In fact NYSE: FAZ has plummeted from $1100 per share to $11 per share and SRS has reduced in price from $1000 per share to $19.50 per share. It is now apparent that the Fed spent trillions of dollars to raise the price of bank stocks and to inversely suppress the price of these inverse ETFs.
 
Now 20 months after these investments were originally made, your office disclosed that it had directly and indirectly injected hundreds of billions of dollars into numerous publicly traded companies. However, this information was not made public to investors by either the Fed or the institutions receiving these cash injections as these significant material transactions were occurring.
 
As a result, investors could not make informed investment decisions. By allowing investors to make investments into funds such as FAZ and SRS and other inverse ETF’s, while the Fed was performing transactions that the Fed knew or should have known would severely harm the investors in these publicly traded fund.
 
My damages had I continued to hold onto my shares of Ford and physical gold are in excess of $__ million.  Therefore, I appeal to your office to make due and just compensation in treble damages amounting to $__ million dollars for a full and good faith settlement of this matter. If this is agreeable, I am prepared to enter into a confidential good faith settlement. I would also be prepared to drop action in attempting to raise public awareness to prepare for a class action lawsuit against the Fed regarding this matter.
 
Should we not be able to resolve this matter I will be forced to file a claim in the Federal District Court and work to initiate a Class Action Lawsuits to represent all owners of these inverse ETF’s that suffered economic loss. Enclosed please find a few of the reports relied upon to arrive at the conclusions. I would seek to further explore this through depositions and discovery of the many recipients of funds from the Fed.
 
I do not envy your position and the challenges you face during these very difficult times. Had I been on the other side of these trades I may very well hold a higher opinion of the Fed and its actions. Unfortunately I have been damaged as a result of your decisions.

Should your office desire to discuss this, I can be reached at my office at XXX-XXX-XXXX or my mobile at XXX-XXX-XXXX
 
Regards,
 
 
William G. Pitts
 
Enclosures
 
Totally Busted: The Truth About Goldman's Bailout by the Fed

"Secret bailouts do not merely benefit recipients; they also deceive investors into mistaking fantasy for fact. Such deceptions often punish honest investors, like the honest investors who sold short the shares of insolvent financial institutions early in 2009.Based on all available public disclosures, the story remained fairly grim into the spring of 2009. Accordingly, the short interest – i.e., number of shares sold short – on Goldman Sachs common stock hit a record 16.3 million shares on May... 15, 2009 – about 3.3% of the public float. But over the ensuing six months, Goldman’s stock soared more than 30% – producing roughly $500 million in losses for those investors who had sold short its stock. Not surprisingly, the total short interest during that timeframe plummeted to less than 6 million shares, as short-sellers closed out their losing positions."

http://www.economicpolicyjournal.com/2010/12/totally-busted-truth-about-goldmans.html
 
 
12/1/10 Fed aid in financial crisis went beyond U.S. banks to industry, foreign firms

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/12/01/AR2010120106870.html 
 
12/1/10 Fed gave $3.3 Trillion to banks

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rTPa1hGtpJs
 
12/1/10 Fed made $9 trillion in emergency overnight loans

http://money.cnn.com/2010/12/01/news/economy/fed_reserve_data_release/index.htm?hpt=T1
 
12/1/10 Meet The 35 Foreign Banks That Got Bailed Out By The Fed (And This Is Just The CPFF Banks)

http://www.zerohedge.com/article/meet-35-foreign-banks-got-bailed-out-fed-and-just-cpff-banks
 
12/2/10 Federal Reserve May Be `Central Bank of the World' After UBS, Barclays Aid

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-12-02/federal-reserve-may-be-central-bank-of-the-world-after-ubs-barclays-aid.html
 
Fed Releases Details on Bear Stearns, AIG Portfolios

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=aymTlczlMmpA&pos=1
 
Fed in hot water over secret bailouts

http://www.csmonitor.com/Money/Robert-Reich-s-Blog/2010/0401/Fed-in-hot-water-over-secret-bailouts
 
The Fed Admits To Breaking The Law

http://networkedblogs.com/21Xqv
 
Fed Opens Books, Revealing European Megabanks Were Biggest Beneficiaries

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/12/01/fed-opens-books-revealing_n_790529.html
 
Paulson/Goldman/Center for Responsible Lending

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E10bHAI7U68&feature=player_embedded
 
Goldman CEO Visited WH 4 Times During SEC Investigation

http://www.thefoxnation.com/business/2010/04/22/goldman-ceo-visited-wh-4-times-during-sec-investigation
 
Goldman's White House connections raise eyebrows

http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2010/04/21/92637/goldmans-connections-to-white.html
 
Indymac Boys Get Sweetheart Deal

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ssl5yb7FewA
 
Obama’s $6.3 Trillion Scam Is America’s Shame:

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=newsarchive&sid=a.G6KFfaDdSc
 
Congress threatened with Martial Law if they do not give hundreds of billions to Bankers

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HaG9d_4zij8
 
Alan Grayson: "Which Foreigners Got the Fed's $500,000,000,000?" Bernanke: "I Don't Know."

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n0NYBTkE1yQ&feature=player_embedded
 
BoE Secretly Loaned $102.9 Billion to RBS

http://www.cnbc.com/id/34126826
 
Bank of England tells of secret £62bn loan to save RBS and HBOS

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/banksandfinance/6646923/Bank-of-England-tells-of-secret-62bn-loan-to-save-RBS-and-HBOS.html
 
Bank of England advisers not told about secret £62bn loan to HBOS

http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2009/dec/03/bank-england-secret-loan-hbos
 
Federal Reserve refuses to tell the US Senate to Whom they have given $2.2 Trillion

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2EQDrVKYWmc
 

Bailouts could cost U.S. $23 trillion

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0709/25164.html

 
Sticker Shock: $23.7 Trillion Bailout?

http://abcnews.go.com/Business/Politics/story?id=814
 
Tracking the $19 Trillion Bailout Funds

http://blog.newsweek.com/blogs/wealthofnations/archive/2009/09/22/tracking-the-19-trillion-bailout-funds.aspx
 
Fed Lends Two Trillion Without Oversight

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oxuqmPyKqcs&feature=player_embedded
 
How Lehman, With The Fed's Complicity, Created Another Illegal Precedent In Abusing The Primary Dealer Credit Facility

http://www.zerohedge.com/article/how-lehman-feds-complicity-created-another-illegal-precedent-abusing-primary-dealer-credit-f
 
Access to fed Money - One of few naked Short Sellers who destroyed Bear Stearns and Lehamn Bothers

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q48eSoTNByQ&feature=related
 
Geithner: Pickpocketing Trillions from the People to Give to the Oligarchy Was "Deeply Unfair", But We ... Um ... WE Had To

http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2010/04/geithner-looting-country-for-trillions.html
 
Why Is The Fed Actively Managing A $25 Billion Maiden Lane MBS Portfolio When Its $2.4 Trillion SOMA Holdings Have A $1 Billion DV01? (And Are Unhedged)

http://www.zerohedge.com/article/why-fed-actively-managing-25-billion-maiden-lane-mbs-portfolio-when-its-24-trillion-soma-hol
 
Did The Fed Just (Surreptitiously) Bail Out Europe?

http://www.themarketguardian.com/2010/04/did-the-fed-just-surreptitiously-bail-out-europe/
 
Goldman Sachs pay out $111million in bonuses despite taking billions in bailout money

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1339220/Goldman-Sachs-pay-111million-bonuses-despite-taking-billions-bailout-money.html#ixzz18NTzHyqF
 
Goldman's White House connections raise eyebrows

http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2010/04/21/92637/goldmans-connections-to-white.html
 
Israeli made partner at Goldman Sachs

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3320118,00.html
 
Goldman Sachs was top Obama donor

http://articles.cnn.com/2010-04-20/politics/obama.goldman.donations_1_obama-campaign-presidential-campaign-federal-election-commission-figures?_s=PM%3APOLITICS
 
Israel OKs US ‘Gift’ of Billions of Dollars in Warplanes

http://news.antiwar.com/2010/09/16/following-fierce-debate-israel-decides-to-buy-f-35-warplanes/

h/t Will






President Obama spent much of Wednesday huddled with a group of business executives, an effort The New York Times said afterward "went a long way to reset the tone of the relationship between Mr. Obama and corporate America" in the eyes of the corporate chieftains who attended.


That's all well and good, if the problems with today's economy were rooted in a lack of warmth and fuzziness between President Obama and corporate CEOs. But they aren't. For decades, the interests of corporate lobbyists—the people acting on behalf of many of the executives at the White House meeting—have been at odds with the interests of working people. The White House "making peace" with corporate CEOs, to use The Washington Post's description of the meeting, is one thing. But Wall Street needs to make peace with those of us who have been forced, as a result of the conservative policies they promoted, to live through a decade of stagnant wages, unemployment and underemployment. Wall Street needs a reset with working America.


Unfortunately, it's not at all clear that this meeting delivered much for working-class people. The Post reported that "after the meeting, several chief executives said their conversation with the president was constructive and open as they discussed education, trade, taxes and jobs. But the executives and Obama remained vague about specific outcomes they expected from the meeting."


And one of the few specifics reported from the meeting is highly disturbing. Bloomberg reported that the CEOs had their hands out for yet another tax cut:


While Obama has called on the CEOs to spend the $2 trillion in cash their companies have accumulated on job creation, the executives said much of that is earnings from overseas sales that are retained abroad to avoid paying U.S. corporate income tax. U.S.-based multinational corporations pay corporate income tax on earnings when they are brought back to the U.S. If the revenue remains abroad, either in cash or investment in overseas facilities, the money isn’t taxed.


Obama said he would consider the issue and asked what the executives would be willing to give up in other corporate tax rates to make sure it remains revenue neutral.


Actually, in many cases the earnings involved are not necessarily from "overseas sales." Many multinational corporations have created elaborate schemes to ensure that domestic sales are credited as foreign ones in order to avoid paying corporate income tax. It's how Google avoids paying billions in corporate income taxes to the United States and the United Kingdom.


President Obama has rightly pledged to go after this tax dodge and sent some proposals to Congress last year that Citizens for Tax Justice said were "steps in the right direction." Businesses have countered with demands for a "tax holiday," The Financial Times reported in October. Again, at least until now, the Obama administration has resisted. One reason, as the FT notes, is that there is no guarantee that the money coaxed back into the U.S. will actually be used for investment and job creation.


We've been here before. In 2004 the Bush administration and the Republican Congress gave corporations a tax amnesty on profits sheltered overseas. The benefits for workers were negligible. Gannett News Service reported earlier this year in a story about Sen. Barbara Boxer's support for an offshore tax break:



A Congressional Research Service analysis published in January 2009 found that 10 of the top dozen companies that took advantage of the 2004 break cut jobs. Hewlett-Packard repatriated $14.5 billion and laid off 14,500. Pfizer repatriated $37 billion and cut 9,000 jobs in 2005.


California-based Oracle and Intel also repatriated foreign earnings. The money helped Oracle acquire two U.S. companies and helped Intel build a new factory


.


The Business Roundtable, a champion of the tax amnesty idea, says of the money that came back to the U.S. as a result of 2004 holiday, 25 percent went to capital investments and 23 percent to hiring and training new workers. Even that positive spin suggests the country doesn't get very much for coaxing businesses to do less than what they should be dong as corporate citizens.


Corporations succeed in the United States not simply because of what they do on their own. Their success depends on the quality of public schools that prepare their workers, transportation networks that move goods and people, agencies that help keep people healthy and safe, and efforts to ensure that each American is able to maintain at least a minimal standard of living. All of these are government functions that corporations undercut when they engage in schemes to avoid paying taxes, leaving the rest of us to struggle with the consequences.


The businesses that profit as a result of the public commons that We the People provide should not have to be given special inducements to pay their fair share toward supporting that commons. (As it stands now, contrary to conservative claims to the contrary, the truth is U.S. corporations pay some of the lowest tax rates of major industrial powers.) That is the starting point from which President Obama should begin in building a new tax framework in which businesses and Main Street can profit together in a new economy.


Even as corporations are seeking a tax holiday, these same corporations spent hundreds of millions of dollars electing congressional candidates opposed to government initiatives that would stimulate the economy and stoke the demand that would coax their hoarded cash off the sidelines. Instead of egging on, tacitly or otherwise, the anti-spending crowd, these CEOs could still choose to back a real economic stimulus—not just cross-your-fingers-and-hope-they-trickle-down tax cuts, but real investment in the economy's future.


Lew Prince, a small business owner in St. Louis, recently penned an op-ed that offered a more Main Street perspective on what businesses need to prosper:



We shouldn’t borrow billions more dollars from China and Saudi Arabia to give to the wealthy. Instead the wealthy should pay their fair share. We need adequate tax revenue to invest in our economy. More tax cuts at the top won’t create jobs. But we will create jobs and strengthen our economy by rebuilding our crumbling roads, bridges, public transit, levees and water and gas pipelines. We will save and create jobs by investing in education and clean energy research and manufacturing now growing much more rapidly in other countries.


Now that Obama has met with business executives, his next step should be a summit meeting with the unemployed. And then let's have a real debate in which business executives and their conservative benefactors are called to account on whether they are really interested in the fates of American workers or just in their own balance sheets.



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The year's worst ads get honored with a very dubious award: a Tracy Award.


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Tuesday 28 December 2010

personal finance programs


Republicans Were For Prevention Before They Were Against It


Sarah Kliff previews the GOP’s big box of ideas for how to force Democrats to vote against their own health care law come January. Last week, House Republicans wanted to attach repeal to next month’s doc fix, now they’re considering taking a page from Sen. Mike Johanns’ (R-NE) original 1099 repeal proposal and using prevention dollars to pay for the impending reimbursement cuts:



Republican Senate aides familiar with the issue told POLITICO they are seriously looking at the new law’s $15 billion public health commitment to finance a one-year doc fix in the next session of Congress.


One aide said health reform’s preventive health spending is one of the “top three” offsets in the law that congressional Republican staffers are eyeing, with the idea that a few moderate Democrats facing tough races in 2012 could eventually be brought on board.


As for which part of the health reform law to pull funds from, Republicans have long derided the multibillion Prevention and Public Health Fund as wasteful spending, scoffing at its investment in bike paths and farmers’ markets. One Republican Senate aide quipped that it was a “slush fund for jungle gyms.”


The fund, which began this year with $500 million, will grow to a $2 billion per year allocation by 2015. Totaling $15 billion over the next 10 years, the fund would be nearly enough to offset an entire, yearlong doc fix.


This is fairly galling, not only because a long-term investment in prevention is exactly the kind of thing that might save dollars over the long term, but also because Republicans themselves encourage Americans to take personal responsibility for their health and catch diseases before they turn into costly, chronic conditions. The “slush” fund aspect they’re referring to — as far as I can tell — is a recent HHS decision to use $250 million to expand the primary work force — the very kind of investment that would help build the infrastructure and make sure there were people to help with screenings, immunizations and other needs.


And this, is something Republicans presumably support. In July, Sen. Jon Kyl (R-AZ) tried to take credit for the prevention funds in the Affordable Care Act, something Republicans had long advocated for:



- Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA) said the law’s emphasis on preventive care is good “because it costs less to keep people well than to treat them when they’re sick.”


- Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-KY): “Congress should be able to work together on our practical ideas that the American people support, such as reforming our medical liability laws to discourage junk lawsuits…encouraging wellness and prevention programs that have proved to be effective in cutting costs and improving care.”


- Sen. Saxby Chambliss (R-GA): “I am an original cosponsor of S. 1099, the “Patients’ Choice Act,” …. The legislation would make health care coverage accessible and affordable for all Americans through private insurance coverage, while also promoting prevention and wellness which can improve lives and lower long-term medical costs.


Kliff reports that “the idea of tying the doc fix to a partial health reform repeal has legs because it comes with a clear rhetorical message: Congress should not start creating new entitlements without the necessary funding to uphold existing ones.” I would argue that that the opposite argument can be even more persuasive — pulling money out of prevention should be dead in the water since it’s one of the handful of ideas Republicans presented as consensus areas when they urged Democrats to scrap the big bill and rally around just a few popular policies.












Mesoloan



Now, as for today's entrepreneurs, first up today was Hardika Shah presenting Mesoloan, a small enterprise loan program for Indian entrepreneurs in the $2,000-$20,000 loan size bracket. This is a segment that is well beyond traditional micro-finance, but also somewhat below the scope of the regular financial institutions. Hardika intends to build a financial institution focused on this segment with financing from social entrepreneurship oriented venture funds like Unitus.



It turns out that in my Vision India 2020 book, I have a similar project called FDBI. My personal analysis is that to make a financial institution successful by catering to the said segment will require a tight control of the types of businesses that are financed. This is why I have focused on micro-franchise oriented businesses where a tightly controlled structure is replicated across a large number of small businesses. My recommendation to Hardika is to study the FDBI project



DaisyClip



Next Annette McClellan presented DaisyClip, a non-surgical contraception device for women that she is in the process of syndicating a $1.8 million financing round for. Her market penetration plan is to start with India, and she wanted to know what kinds of options/connections we could provide. Well, there are some government and NGO contacts that I have in mind for her to explore. However, she will, of course, need to clear the clinical trials and get the proper regulatory approvals.



Voices.com



Our next presenter was David Ciccarelli discussing Voices.com, an interesting niche marketplace for freelance voice talent used by businesses and entertainment companies. David has 25,000 freelancers of which about 20% are paying subscribers (a very good number). He also has 120,000 companies using the talent from his marketplace.



David asked how to convert more of his users to paying users. I pointed him to the oDesk case study in which I have discussed the strategy for a marketplace in great detail. David is also struggling with the notion of his community taking the transactions offline.



Well, eLance has experienced similar problems, and I asked David to concentrate on communicating to his user base of service providers the value of building a reputation through references and reviews/customer feedback. Taking the transaction offline would mean the service provider would not get any feedback from the transaction. Nor will she or he get any assistance with dispute resolution, for example. Overall, I felt that making the reputation-building features available only to the premium members would be a good way to convert more free users to paying customers.



Marketing Green Products and Services to Indian Consumers



Then Tarini Kinkar discussed a media concept for marketing green products and services to Indian consumers. The business idea was not very well fleshed out, and needs a lot of work still. One of my key concerns is that the level of awareness about green and environmentally conscious issues is very, very low in India. Also, the business model for the business is unclear.



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2010 produced many weird, far-out, bizarre photos of people. But let's not forget all of the animals that made headlines over the past 12 months: from a rhino cow, penguin santas and lip-syncing monkey, we offer some of the best.

Fair &amp; Balanced? Fox <b>News</b>&#39; Big Year (VIDEOS) | TPM LiveWire

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bench craft company scam

Thursday 23 December 2010

Kids Making Money

I like it when the mainstream media drops by to take a look at the student debt crisis. I’d like to think that, unlike the housing bubble, this impending crisis can be avoided with sensible government regulation and individual actors making smart decisions about their own financial futures.

The government regulation is, strangely, the easy part — Congress will care that younger Americans are being crushed under their own debt load, or it won’t. This seems to me like a non-partisan problem. So if our elected officials get a clue (a pretty big “if”), then perhaps something positive will happen.

Getting individual actors to behave in their own economic self-interest is the hard part. Trust me, I talk to students thinking about going to law school almost every day. These kids seem to be allergic to facts and figures. But maybe with enough media spotlight, families will actually start thinking about how their kids are going to pay off their debts, and behaving rationally.

There was a big article on MSNBC.com yesterday showing just how far we have to go, as a country, to get the student loan crisis under control…

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When I rail against the educational racket being practiced by so many law schools, readers remind me that the problem really starts in college. Parents pay and kids borrow exorbitant amounts of money to get degrees that seem to confer no practical economic benefit. And we all know that so many people who go to law school end up there only after they realize their undergraduate degrees were functionally useless.

The MSNBC article focuses on one family and their choices:

The Kuipers’ nest is already half-empty. Chris is a college freshman, studying engineering at Calvin College, a private school in Grand Rapids, Mich. Kaylee is a junior, also at Calvin, where she recently switched her major to international development after a trip to Africa left her with a keen interest in travel.

Hold that thought in your head: family struggling to send their two kids to college (and they have two more on the way), daughter is majoring in… “international development.” Got that? Okay, let’s continue:

“We went around and we visited a bunch of different tribes and villages and just learned about what they were doing for development,” said. “We got to do some fun things, like a safari. And we just, like, studied the land.”

It hasn’t been easy for the Kuipers to save for college, especially after putting their kids through parochial school. Rick drives a garbage truck, at work every day before dawn. Tami commutes an hour each way to a law office in downtown Chicago, where she’s a paralegal.

Your dad drives a garbage truck and your mom busts her ass as a paralegal and you, you are majoring in international development? Because you went to Africa once? I went to Europe once. It was pretty neat. I particularly enjoyed seeing all the castles. But I didn’t come home and change my major to Folklore and Mythology (an actual major at Harvard College) because I’m not a freaking trust fund baby. I had to pay some minimal attention to my financial future.

Kaylee, a daughter of working-class Americans, apparently feels no such pressure:

“I don’t really know how much (debt) I have,” said. “My mom handles a lot of it for me. … I just feel like I’m in the career field that I love, so it’ll somehow work out.”

Ladies and gentlemen, meet future law school student Kaylee Kuiper. Let’s see how much she loves this career field when she’s the one trying to put food on her table on a dollar a day. Maybe she’ll try it for a year and then somebody, probably her paralegal mother, will tell her that becoming a lawyer will allow her to pursue a career “international law.” It won’t be her mother’s fault — from her perspective, the lawyers in her office are doing a lot better than she is. So Kaylee will go to law school and she and/or her family will end up doubling down on the educational bet. Three years later, Kaylee’s debt will be approaching $200,000, and she’ll be trying to get firms to offer her an “international” law job… whatever the hell that means. Of course, even if she gets a job, she won’t “love” her career field anymore. And we’ll have another bitter associate who is in the profession only for the money but feels like she’s serving a term of indentured servitude until she can get out and do what she really wants to do with her life. And partners will wonder why she looks like she’s about to slit her wrists when they tell her about her crappy, crappy bonus.

(I wrote that entire paragraph without taking a breath.)

And that’s why we have figures like these:

Americans now owe more on their student loans than they do on their credit cards — a debt fast approaching $1 trillion with no end in sight…

America’s student debt at the end of 2010 is nearly $880 billion. That number is growing by more than $2,800 dollars per second.

And to my mind that whole process starts with some 20-year-old taking a trip or having an experience and going back to school with no economic plan whatsoever. When did American parents lose the ability to tell their kids: “No. That’s stupid. You’re going to be an engineer like your brother, and that’s that.”

The process ends, of course, with a debt that is non-dischargeable in bankruptcy (absent a showing of undue hardship):

Alan Collinge, an activist and author, who drew on his own student loan default to found the group StudentLoanJustice.org, says the student loan crisis is potentially far worse than the mortgage crisis.

“A defaulted home mortgage borrower — and don’t get me wrong, it’s a horrible outcome — they walk away from their house wearing a barrel and not much else,” he said. “In the case of student loans, there is no walking away.”

Unlike most other forms of debt, student loans carry almost no consumer protections and little ability to refinance. By law, they can’t be wiped out in bankruptcy. Those laws were passed in response to the last student loan crisis in the 1980s. But Collinge believes it created a system he calls predatory.

Is it a predatory system? Absolutely. But there are way too many students and families eager to put themselves in the position of being “prey.”

You can’t help people who won’t help themselves. Kaylee Kuiper has working-class parents and is a college junior majoring in international development at Calvin College in Grand Rapids, Michigan. The next economist who tells me people can be expected to act in their own rational self-interest is getting punched in the mouth.

Student loans leave crushing debt burden




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Pooper-Scooper-in-Chief Reads His Children’s Book to Kids


December 17, 2010 1:26 PM








ABC News' Sunlen Miller reports:


President Obama made a surprise visit to an elementary school today in Alexandria, Virginia to read his newly published children’s book, and the holiday classic “The Night before Christmas” to children.


But in a room with 90 second graders, naturally some more interesting moments would ensue, such as the president telling the children, sitting cross-legged on the floor of the library around him, that even he has to scoop his dog’s poop.


“Sometimes I run around with Bo at night,” Obama told the children, “although sometimes I have to scoop up his poop because I don’t just want to leave it on the lawn.”


The second graders didn’t respond too favorably to that idea.


“If you guys have a dog, you've got to walk your dog, too. And clean up after him,” the presidential pooper-scooper added.




While reading the book “The Night before Christmas” the president remarked that one of illustrations of a snow-covered house looked like Washington, DC right now, the nation’s capital now covered in light snow. And then there was the inevitable, yet toned-down from years past, dig at the DC school system’s penchant for shutting down schools even with just a little snow, that followed.


“I’m surprised you guys are in school because a lot of time in Washington people don’t go to school when there’s even an inch of snow,” Obama said with a wide smile, knowing he was skating on some thin ice. You may recall that just weeks after his inauguration Mr. Obama quipped that when it comes to weather, “folks in Washington don’t seem to be able to handle things,” joking that “We are going to have to apply some toughness to this town.”


The purpose of the visit today was to read his new book, “Of Thee I Sing: A Letter to My Daughters,” to the children, published just this November.


“My girls are getting older now so they don’t always let me read to them. So I want to borrow you guys and read to you,” Obama said, “I wrote this book to my daughters.”


After reading, the president left a signed copy of his book to the library and spoke briefly about the meaning of Christmas to him – making sure you’re “not just getting something from somebody,” but that “you’re also giving back,” he said.


“One of the things about Christmas, obviously it’s presents and stockings full and spending time with your family and eating good stuff, but part of the Christmas spirit is also making sure that we are kind to each other and we are thinking about people who aren’t as lucky as we are.”


The president said that even though they are having a lot of fun during the holidays, he wants to make sure they are thinking about “how can you guys be nicer to each other and think about people who have less than you.”


Obama says there are a lot of kids out there who may not get a lot of presents because, “their parents don’t have a lot of money,” and that many people are away from their families fighting overseas right now. The elementary school is filled willed with children from military families, very near Fort Myer, a US Army Post.


“So they can’t be home for Christmas or the holidays so I hope you guys think about them too,” Obama said.


--Sunlen Miller






December 17, 2010
in Political Punch, President Obama, Sunlen Miller, Weblogs, White House
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Julian Assange | Sarah Palin | Fox <b>News</b> | Mike Huckabee | Mediaite

In an exclusive interview with Cenk Uygur on MSNBC's Dylan Ratigan Show, Julian Assange described criticism in Washington and elsewhere of WikiLeaks as nothing short of attacks on journalism and the first amendment.

Facebook Makes <b>News</b> Feed Filters Available To All

It looks like Facebook has made its revived news feed filters available to all users, after initially made them available selectively last week.

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bench craft company scam

Julian Assange | Sarah Palin | Fox <b>News</b> | Mike Huckabee | Mediaite

In an exclusive interview with Cenk Uygur on MSNBC's Dylan Ratigan Show, Julian Assange described criticism in Washington and elsewhere of WikiLeaks as nothing short of attacks on journalism and the first amendment.

Facebook Makes <b>News</b> Feed Filters Available To All

It looks like Facebook has made its revived news feed filters available to all users, after initially made them available selectively last week.

<b>News</b> Corp. Sells Fox Mobile Group To Investment Firm Jesta

It looks like News Corp. has unloaded its Fox Mobile Group division. According to a release, investment company Jesta Group has acquired Fox Mobile Group (FMG) from News Corporation. Terms of the deal were not disclosed in the release.


bench craft company scam

Julian Assange | Sarah Palin | Fox <b>News</b> | Mike Huckabee | Mediaite

In an exclusive interview with Cenk Uygur on MSNBC's Dylan Ratigan Show, Julian Assange described criticism in Washington and elsewhere of WikiLeaks as nothing short of attacks on journalism and the first amendment.

Facebook Makes <b>News</b> Feed Filters Available To All

It looks like Facebook has made its revived news feed filters available to all users, after initially made them available selectively last week.

<b>News</b> Corp. Sells Fox Mobile Group To Investment Firm Jesta

It looks like News Corp. has unloaded its Fox Mobile Group division. According to a release, investment company Jesta Group has acquired Fox Mobile Group (FMG) from News Corporation. Terms of the deal were not disclosed in the release.


bench craft company scam

Julian Assange | Sarah Palin | Fox <b>News</b> | Mike Huckabee | Mediaite

In an exclusive interview with Cenk Uygur on MSNBC's Dylan Ratigan Show, Julian Assange described criticism in Washington and elsewhere of WikiLeaks as nothing short of attacks on journalism and the first amendment.

Facebook Makes <b>News</b> Feed Filters Available To All

It looks like Facebook has made its revived news feed filters available to all users, after initially made them available selectively last week.

<b>News</b> Corp. Sells Fox Mobile Group To Investment Firm Jesta

It looks like News Corp. has unloaded its Fox Mobile Group division. According to a release, investment company Jesta Group has acquired Fox Mobile Group (FMG) from News Corporation. Terms of the deal were not disclosed in the release.


bench craft company scam

Julian Assange | Sarah Palin | Fox <b>News</b> | Mike Huckabee | Mediaite

In an exclusive interview with Cenk Uygur on MSNBC's Dylan Ratigan Show, Julian Assange described criticism in Washington and elsewhere of WikiLeaks as nothing short of attacks on journalism and the first amendment.

Facebook Makes <b>News</b> Feed Filters Available To All

It looks like Facebook has made its revived news feed filters available to all users, after initially made them available selectively last week.

<b>News</b> Corp. Sells Fox Mobile Group To Investment Firm Jesta

It looks like News Corp. has unloaded its Fox Mobile Group division. According to a release, investment company Jesta Group has acquired Fox Mobile Group (FMG) from News Corporation. Terms of the deal were not disclosed in the release.


bench craft company scam

Julian Assange | Sarah Palin | Fox <b>News</b> | Mike Huckabee | Mediaite

In an exclusive interview with Cenk Uygur on MSNBC's Dylan Ratigan Show, Julian Assange described criticism in Washington and elsewhere of WikiLeaks as nothing short of attacks on journalism and the first amendment.

Facebook Makes <b>News</b> Feed Filters Available To All

It looks like Facebook has made its revived news feed filters available to all users, after initially made them available selectively last week.

<b>News</b> Corp. Sells Fox Mobile Group To Investment Firm Jesta

It looks like News Corp. has unloaded its Fox Mobile Group division. According to a release, investment company Jesta Group has acquired Fox Mobile Group (FMG) from News Corporation. Terms of the deal were not disclosed in the release.


bench craft company scam

Julian Assange | Sarah Palin | Fox <b>News</b> | Mike Huckabee | Mediaite

In an exclusive interview with Cenk Uygur on MSNBC's Dylan Ratigan Show, Julian Assange described criticism in Washington and elsewhere of WikiLeaks as nothing short of attacks on journalism and the first amendment.

Facebook Makes <b>News</b> Feed Filters Available To All

It looks like Facebook has made its revived news feed filters available to all users, after initially made them available selectively last week.

<b>News</b> Corp. Sells Fox Mobile Group To Investment Firm Jesta

It looks like News Corp. has unloaded its Fox Mobile Group division. According to a release, investment company Jesta Group has acquired Fox Mobile Group (FMG) from News Corporation. Terms of the deal were not disclosed in the release.


bench craft company scam

Julian Assange | Sarah Palin | Fox <b>News</b> | Mike Huckabee | Mediaite

In an exclusive interview with Cenk Uygur on MSNBC's Dylan Ratigan Show, Julian Assange described criticism in Washington and elsewhere of WikiLeaks as nothing short of attacks on journalism and the first amendment.

Facebook Makes <b>News</b> Feed Filters Available To All

It looks like Facebook has made its revived news feed filters available to all users, after initially made them available selectively last week.

<b>News</b> Corp. Sells Fox Mobile Group To Investment Firm Jesta

It looks like News Corp. has unloaded its Fox Mobile Group division. According to a release, investment company Jesta Group has acquired Fox Mobile Group (FMG) from News Corporation. Terms of the deal were not disclosed in the release.


bench craft company scam

Julian Assange | Sarah Palin | Fox <b>News</b> | Mike Huckabee | Mediaite

In an exclusive interview with Cenk Uygur on MSNBC's Dylan Ratigan Show, Julian Assange described criticism in Washington and elsewhere of WikiLeaks as nothing short of attacks on journalism and the first amendment.

Facebook Makes <b>News</b> Feed Filters Available To All

It looks like Facebook has made its revived news feed filters available to all users, after initially made them available selectively last week.

<b>News</b> Corp. Sells Fox Mobile Group To Investment Firm Jesta

It looks like News Corp. has unloaded its Fox Mobile Group division. According to a release, investment company Jesta Group has acquired Fox Mobile Group (FMG) from News Corporation. Terms of the deal were not disclosed in the release.


bench craft company scam

Julian Assange | Sarah Palin | Fox <b>News</b> | Mike Huckabee | Mediaite

In an exclusive interview with Cenk Uygur on MSNBC's Dylan Ratigan Show, Julian Assange described criticism in Washington and elsewhere of WikiLeaks as nothing short of attacks on journalism and the first amendment.

Facebook Makes <b>News</b> Feed Filters Available To All

It looks like Facebook has made its revived news feed filters available to all users, after initially made them available selectively last week.

<b>News</b> Corp. Sells Fox Mobile Group To Investment Firm Jesta

It looks like News Corp. has unloaded its Fox Mobile Group division. According to a release, investment company Jesta Group has acquired Fox Mobile Group (FMG) from News Corporation. Terms of the deal were not disclosed in the release.


bench craft company scam

Julian Assange | Sarah Palin | Fox <b>News</b> | Mike Huckabee | Mediaite

In an exclusive interview with Cenk Uygur on MSNBC's Dylan Ratigan Show, Julian Assange described criticism in Washington and elsewhere of WikiLeaks as nothing short of attacks on journalism and the first amendment.

Facebook Makes <b>News</b> Feed Filters Available To All

It looks like Facebook has made its revived news feed filters available to all users, after initially made them available selectively last week.

<b>News</b> Corp. Sells Fox Mobile Group To Investment Firm Jesta

It looks like News Corp. has unloaded its Fox Mobile Group division. According to a release, investment company Jesta Group has acquired Fox Mobile Group (FMG) from News Corporation. Terms of the deal were not disclosed in the release.


bench craft company scam

Wednesday 22 December 2010

People Making Money Online



Welcome to this week’s edition of the SlashGear Week in Review! This is the last edition before Christmas; I hope you have your shopping done! Last Sunday we went hands on with the LG VL600 LTE modem and it was really cool. We like the service, but the scant data limits of 5GB and 10GB will keep many from adopting if they plan to use it as a broadband alternative. Monday some really cool cases for the iPhone 4 surfaced from Gear 4 that fans of Angry Birds will like. The cases come in three styles with colors and characters from the Angry Birds game.




More rumors swirled about a half-size iPad that suggest Apple may be working on a smaller version of the iPad. That would be no surprise even if Jobs did already say 7-inch tablets are DOA. A geek took some sticky notes and a string of Christmas lights and hacked them into a way to show which of his pals were online. The lights the geek used are the GE Color Effects GE-35 LED sting and the LED data bus was hacked to create the IM status device.


Coloud has been making headphones that are sports and super hero branded for a while now and those were cool. The company has now rolled out an epic R2-D2 themed set that is really cool and sell for a tick under $50. The rumor that will not die made another round this week with the Verizon iPhone said to be coming right after Christmas. The device is also said to be an LTE handset.


A phone design concept popped up by researcher Fabian Hemmert that has tactile feedback. The phone could hold your hand, blow on you, and kiss you. This will single handedly bring new meaning to phone sex me thinks. One analyst is saying that a new HP webOS tablet is set to hit the market in March 2011. BMO Capital Markets analyst Keith Bachman cites sources in Asia for the tip.


A group of Japanese guys got together and created cool skydiving simulation using Google Earth, a projector, and some fans. The result looks pretty fun and more realistic than you might expect. German doctors made a claim this week that the world has been waiting to hear for decades. The doctors claim to have cured a patient of AIDS using stem cells and other techniques.


GNU Founder Richard Stallman stated this week that the Google Chrome OS is careless computing. He points out that when your data is stored on a company machine rather than your own machine you lose some of your legal rights. An awesome DIY Tron Skatecycle was spied early in the week and the thing has glowing wheels that look like the new lightcycles. The device started out as a device skate cycle called the Freerider.


A cool map of the world that highlights Facebook relationships shows just how connected we are globally. The map shows 10 million pairs of friends out of the 500 million people on the social network. Analysts said this week that they think a Verizon iPhone will gain users mostly at AT&T’s expense. That would mean that the number of new users to the iPhone with Verizon offering one would be less than some might expect.


Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg was named the Time Person of the Year for 2010. The magazine says that the site founded by Zuckerberg has changed the way people relate to each other. Tablet sales in the business world are predicted to double according to a ChangeWave survey of businesses. Most of the businesses want to use the iPad and 7% of the businesses surveyed say they already give employees iPads.


A cool new way to raise money for charity has been unveiled by Google. Money for each opened tab on the Chrome browser will be given to charity with a new “Chrome for Cause” program. A wild looking stringless guitar from Misa Kitara has surfaced. The guitar uses a touch screen for strings and can be pre-ordered now for $849 on a normal plastic version of $2899 for an aluminum version.


A crazy self-sterilizing door handle won a Concept Design Award. The thing is really cool and kills off germs on its own. Door handles transmit more germs and illness than I care to think about. Geeks and Lego never fail to impress and this cool T-800 bust made from Lego is no exception. The statue even has glowing red eyes and base has tiny Lego skeletons inside.


For most of us, the largest utility bill is electricity. A concept home has debuted that is square and covered in solar panels to generate electricity. The panels power the hot water, lights, AC and all else in the concept and might even have power to sell back to the electric company. I have never seen a house key that was cool until the Keybrid turned up. The key has a ring integrated into the design and can be used as a money clip or clipped to other things. You can pick up a pair of the things for about $17.


Word Lens for the iPhone is an app that can translate signs in a foreign language so you can read them. The app is cool and it only works for printed text (naturally). PDP is showing off its cool Tron: Legacy controller that is licensed by Microsoft for the Xbox 360. The controller has glowing orange lines and sells for about $50.


EA has some of its coolest iPhone and iPad games on sale right now for the holidays at 99 cents. There are a bunch of different games available from Tetris to Madden NFL and more. A live video demo of the Notion Ink Adam tablet surfaced from the company for us all to drool over. The tablet looks pretty cool to me, check out the video for yourself here. Thanks for reading this week’s edition and have a Merry Christmas!














Funding



In May of this year, Tomio Geron at the Wall Street Journal summed up the funding story thusly:

Etacts, which completed the Y Combinator incubator program in March, has just closed a $700,000 seed round from prominent angels including Ron Conway's SV Angel; Eric Hahn, former chief technology officer at Netscape; Joshua Schachter, founder of Delicious; Jim Young, co-founder of HotOrNot; Barney Pell and Lorenzo Thione, co-founders of Powerset; Jawed Karim, co-founder of Youtube; Ashton Kutcher, actor and now angel investor; Robby Walker and Wayne Crosby, former Y Combinator participants; and Irene Pedrazza, founder of CheetahMail.



Etacts raised the funding quickly - in just over a month - and had intended to raise $500,000 but decided to let in more investors because of the strong interest, said Liu, who co-founded the company with classmate Evan Beard after the two graduated from Duke University last year.



You don't take Ron Conway money and then just give up in six months.



Rapportive raised a small round from other impressive funders 3 months later. Gist raised $4 million in between those two announcements, in July.



Etacts hasn't replied to our request for comment, but an acquisition certainly seems the most likely explanation for the service's decision to shut down.



Email as a Platform



We wrote about email as a platform for application development most recently in August. Yahoo's Eran Hammer-Lahav, then working on developer relations for Yahoo Mail, explained why so many companies are interested in this space.



"It's pretty clear that email provides a huge potential for extensibility, given the wide range of ways people use it. The inbox is much more than just a place for incoming mail, it is the primary dashboard for many web users - it is how they manage their lives. So when looking at email as a platform, the opportunity of making it more useful and productive reaches most areas of online activities.

So far the focus has been on taking social information to help better manage email overflow, but the platform has much more potential beyond that."



What will its likely acquirer do with Etacts? Presumably displaying the social networking profiles and past conversations we've had with the people who sent us emails is just the beginning. How will other email providers respond, lest they fall behind in richness of user experience? That's where things will get really interesting.



Personal Data as a Platform



Perhaps even more interesting is the way that all of these services use data about the people who have sent you email that they have acquired through services like Rapleaf. Services that scoop up and wholesale personal profile data ("the person attached to this email uses this LinkedIn profile, this Twitter profile, owns a home, has kids and loves short videos about kittens") are wildly controversial but also very useful. Nowhere is that usefulness more clearly demonstrated than in the email CRM services like Etacts, Rapportive and Gist.



Perhaps if Etacts' feature-set goes mainstream in some big email program, the story of value built for everyday people (not just marketers) from aggregate online personal data as a development platform would become easier to tell.



That would be very good news.












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Obama <b>news</b> conference: liveblog – CNN Political Ticker - CNN.com Blogs

Washington (CNN) -- President Barack Obama held a news conference Wednesday to discuss the lame duck session of Congress and plans for the upcoming year.

Technolog - Facebook&#39;s new filters let you control <b>news</b> feed

Sometimes when Facebook comes out with something new, it immediately attracts the ire of its users, like when it made the News Feed font smaller or when the News Feed morphed to the oft-times confusing "Top News" vs.


bench craft company scam

<b>News</b> Corp. Digital Sell-Off Continues With Fox Mobile Group <b>...</b>

The latest in News Corp.'s yearlong divestitures in its digital unit is Fox Mobile Group, which the conglomerate announced Wednesday was sold to Jesta Group. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed. ...

Obama <b>news</b> conference: liveblog – CNN Political Ticker - CNN.com Blogs

Washington (CNN) -- President Barack Obama held a news conference Wednesday to discuss the lame duck session of Congress and plans for the upcoming year.

Technolog - Facebook&#39;s new filters let you control <b>news</b> feed

Sometimes when Facebook comes out with something new, it immediately attracts the ire of its users, like when it made the News Feed font smaller or when the News Feed morphed to the oft-times confusing "Top News" vs.


bench craft company scam

<b>News</b> Corp. Digital Sell-Off Continues With Fox Mobile Group <b>...</b>

The latest in News Corp.'s yearlong divestitures in its digital unit is Fox Mobile Group, which the conglomerate announced Wednesday was sold to Jesta Group. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed. ...

Obama <b>news</b> conference: liveblog – CNN Political Ticker - CNN.com Blogs

Washington (CNN) -- President Barack Obama held a news conference Wednesday to discuss the lame duck session of Congress and plans for the upcoming year.

Technolog - Facebook&#39;s new filters let you control <b>news</b> feed

Sometimes when Facebook comes out with something new, it immediately attracts the ire of its users, like when it made the News Feed font smaller or when the News Feed morphed to the oft-times confusing "Top News" vs.


bench craft company scam

<b>News</b> Corp. Digital Sell-Off Continues With Fox Mobile Group <b>...</b>

The latest in News Corp.'s yearlong divestitures in its digital unit is Fox Mobile Group, which the conglomerate announced Wednesday was sold to Jesta Group. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed. ...

Obama <b>news</b> conference: liveblog – CNN Political Ticker - CNN.com Blogs

Washington (CNN) -- President Barack Obama held a news conference Wednesday to discuss the lame duck session of Congress and plans for the upcoming year.

Technolog - Facebook&#39;s new filters let you control <b>news</b> feed

Sometimes when Facebook comes out with something new, it immediately attracts the ire of its users, like when it made the News Feed font smaller or when the News Feed morphed to the oft-times confusing "Top News" vs.


bench craft company scam

<b>News</b> Corp. Digital Sell-Off Continues With Fox Mobile Group <b>...</b>

The latest in News Corp.'s yearlong divestitures in its digital unit is Fox Mobile Group, which the conglomerate announced Wednesday was sold to Jesta Group. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed. ...

Obama <b>news</b> conference: liveblog – CNN Political Ticker - CNN.com Blogs

Washington (CNN) -- President Barack Obama held a news conference Wednesday to discuss the lame duck session of Congress and plans for the upcoming year.

Technolog - Facebook&#39;s new filters let you control <b>news</b> feed

Sometimes when Facebook comes out with something new, it immediately attracts the ire of its users, like when it made the News Feed font smaller or when the News Feed morphed to the oft-times confusing "Top News" vs.


bench craft company scam

<b>News</b> Corp. Digital Sell-Off Continues With Fox Mobile Group <b>...</b>

The latest in News Corp.'s yearlong divestitures in its digital unit is Fox Mobile Group, which the conglomerate announced Wednesday was sold to Jesta Group. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed. ...

Obama <b>news</b> conference: liveblog – CNN Political Ticker - CNN.com Blogs

Washington (CNN) -- President Barack Obama held a news conference Wednesday to discuss the lame duck session of Congress and plans for the upcoming year.

Technolog - Facebook&#39;s new filters let you control <b>news</b> feed

Sometimes when Facebook comes out with something new, it immediately attracts the ire of its users, like when it made the News Feed font smaller or when the News Feed morphed to the oft-times confusing "Top News" vs.


bench craft company scam

<b>News</b> Corp. Digital Sell-Off Continues With Fox Mobile Group <b>...</b>

The latest in News Corp.'s yearlong divestitures in its digital unit is Fox Mobile Group, which the conglomerate announced Wednesday was sold to Jesta Group. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed. ...

Obama <b>news</b> conference: liveblog – CNN Political Ticker - CNN.com Blogs

Washington (CNN) -- President Barack Obama held a news conference Wednesday to discuss the lame duck session of Congress and plans for the upcoming year.

Technolog - Facebook&#39;s new filters let you control <b>news</b> feed

Sometimes when Facebook comes out with something new, it immediately attracts the ire of its users, like when it made the News Feed font smaller or when the News Feed morphed to the oft-times confusing "Top News" vs.


bench craft company scam

<b>News</b> Corp. Digital Sell-Off Continues With Fox Mobile Group <b>...</b>

The latest in News Corp.'s yearlong divestitures in its digital unit is Fox Mobile Group, which the conglomerate announced Wednesday was sold to Jesta Group. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed. ...

Obama <b>news</b> conference: liveblog – CNN Political Ticker - CNN.com Blogs

Washington (CNN) -- President Barack Obama held a news conference Wednesday to discuss the lame duck session of Congress and plans for the upcoming year.

Technolog - Facebook&#39;s new filters let you control <b>news</b> feed

Sometimes when Facebook comes out with something new, it immediately attracts the ire of its users, like when it made the News Feed font smaller or when the News Feed morphed to the oft-times confusing "Top News" vs.


bench craft company scam

<b>News</b> Corp. Digital Sell-Off Continues With Fox Mobile Group <b>...</b>

The latest in News Corp.'s yearlong divestitures in its digital unit is Fox Mobile Group, which the conglomerate announced Wednesday was sold to Jesta Group. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed. ...

Obama <b>news</b> conference: liveblog – CNN Political Ticker - CNN.com Blogs

Washington (CNN) -- President Barack Obama held a news conference Wednesday to discuss the lame duck session of Congress and plans for the upcoming year.

Technolog - Facebook&#39;s new filters let you control <b>news</b> feed

Sometimes when Facebook comes out with something new, it immediately attracts the ire of its users, like when it made the News Feed font smaller or when the News Feed morphed to the oft-times confusing "Top News" vs.


bench craft company scam