Microsoft's fiscal 1Q earnings hit analyst target (AP)

SAN FRANCISCO ? Microsoft's Windows franchise regained some of its vigor during the company's latest quarter, but that might not be enough to overcome the perception that the world's largest software maker is being outmaneuvered by nimble rivals whose fortunes aren't tied to the personal computer.

The results released Thursday were highlighted by a 7 percent increase in revenue that exceeded analyst estimates. The gains for the July-September period occurred throughout Microsoft's product lineup, which includes the ubiquitous Windows operating system, widely used programs such as Office, the Xbox 360 video game console and the Bing search engine.

The company's earnings for the fiscal first quarter rose 6 percent from last year to match analyst projections.

Investors weren't impressed. Microsoft shares dipped 19 cents to $26.85 in Thursday's extended trading.

Microsoft's stock price has been held back by worries that it isn't adapting quickly enough as more people use smartphones and computer tablets such as Apple's iPad instead of desktop and laptop computers that run on the Windows operating system. Three consecutive quarters in declining Windows revenue reinforced those concerns.

That slump ended in the latest quarter as revenue in the Windows division crept up nearly 2 percent to $4.87 billion. The modest gain was slightly below the 3.2 percent to 3.6 percent rise in personal computer shipments during the quarter, based on estimates by Gartner Inc. and IDC.

Meanwhile, Apple sold more than 11 million iPads during the same period, more than doubling the number from the same time last year.

Most analysts believe sales of iPad and other computer tablets are going to keep accelerating at a rapid rate for the next several years. The trend is expected to decrease demand for PCs in households and businesses. In a Thursday conference call, Microsoft executives acknowledged the growing popularity of tablets will keep the pressure on the Windows division.

Microsoft is tackling the problem with the most radical overhaul of Windows since the mid-1990s. The next version, called Windows 8, will run on touch-screen devices. The redesigned system generated a positive buzz when it was released to developers, but the software isn't expected to hit the mass market until the middle of next year, at the earliest. Microsoft, which is based in Redmond, Wash., hasn't specified a timetable.

In the most recent quarter, Microsoft Corp. earned $5.7 billion, or 68 cents per share, for its fiscal first quarter. That compared with net income of $5.4 billion, or 62 cents per share, at the same time last year. The earnings matched the average estimate among analyst surveyed by FactSet.

Revenue increased totaled $17.37 billion ? about $130 million above analyst forecasts. At the same time last year, Microsoft's revenue came in at $16.2 billion.

By surpassing Wall Street's revenue hurdle, Microsoft achieved something that eluded nemesis Apple Inc. during the same period.

Although Apple's revenue in the most recent quarter surged 39 percent from last year, the increase didn't measure up to analyst expectations. The shortfall triggered a sharp drop in Apple's stock price.

Microsoft's challenges extend beyond Windows. The company has been struggling for years to catch up to Google Inc. in the lucrative search advertising market. It's been an exercise in frustration so far, saddling Microsoft's online division with operating losses totaling $6.5 billion in the company's last three fiscal years. The division's sustained another loss of $494 million in the latest quarter, down from $558 million at the same time last year. Online revenue rose 19 percent to $625 million.

Executives assured analysts in Thursday's conference call that they're determined to keep whittling the online division's losses. To do that, Microsoft will likely have to fine tune its Internet search partnership with Yahoo Inc. Since Yahoo began relying on Microsoft's technology for search results, the alliance has not been making as much money as the companies anticipated. The problems prompted Microsoft to extend a revenue guarantee through March 2013 ? a year beyond the original deadline.

Microsoft is also counting on its just-completed $8.5 billion acquisition of video chat service Skype to make its online services more compelling in social networking and digital video.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/earnings/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20111020/ap_on_hi_te/us_earns_microsoft

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Decision-making: What you want vs. how you get it

ScienceDaily (Oct. 21, 2011) ? New research reveals how we make decisions. Birds choosing between berry bushes and investors trading stocks are faced with the same fundamental challenge -- making optimal choices in an environment featuring varying costs and benefits. A neuroeconomics study from the Montreal Neurological Institute and Hospital -- The Neuro, McGill University, shows that the brain employs two separate regions and two distinct processes in valuing 'stimuli' i.e. 'goods' (for example, berry bushes), as opposed to valuing the 'actions,' needed to obtain the desired option (for example flight paths to the berry bushes).

The findings, published in the most recent issue of the Journal of Neuroscience and funded by the Canadian Institutes of Health Research, are vital not only for improving knowledge of brain function, but also for treating and understanding the effects of frontal lobe damage, which can be a feature of common neurological conditions ranging from stroke to traumatic brain injury to dementia.

Decision making -- selecting the most valuable option, typically by taking an action -- requires value comparisons, but there has been debate about how these comparisons occur in the brain: is value linked to the object itself , or to the action required to get that object. Are choices made between the things we want, or between the actions we take? The dominant model of decision making proposes that value comparisons occur in series, with stimulus value information feeding into actions (the body's motor system). "So, in this study we wanted to understand how the brain uses value information to make decisions between different actions, and between different objects," said the study's lead investigator Dr. Lesley Fellows, neurologist and researcher at The Neuro. "The surprising and novel finding is that in fact these two mechanisms of choice are independent of one another. There are distinct processes in the brain by which value information guides decisions, depending on whether the choice is between objects or between actions." Dr. Fellows often sees patients with damage to the frontal lobe, where decision making areas of the brain are located. "This finding gives me more insight into what is happening in the brain of my patients, and may lead to new treatments and new ways to care for them and manage their symptoms."

"Despite the ubiquity and importance of decision making, we have had, until now, a limited understanding of its basis in the brain," said Fellows. "Psychologists, economists, and ecologists have studied decision making for decades, but it has only recently become a focus for neuroscientists. For clinicians, this relative neglect is surprising; neurologists and psychiatrists have long identified poor judgment as a core feature of conditions ranging from dementia to drug addiction." The bad decisions made by such patients can lead to disastrous encounters with society and the legal system, and are an important source of distress and disability for patients and their families. "This area of study represents a paradigm shift in our perspective on frontal lobe disorders. We have known for a long time that patients with frontal lobe damage have trouble getting organized and planning to reach goals but with this new research we are now seeing that frontal injury can make it hard for patients to choose their preferred goal to begin with, or to keep track of what they want. This may explain the erratic, impulsive or inappropriate choices they sometimes make."

The study examined action-value and stimulus-value learning in patients with frontal lobe damage. "Iinvestigating a damaged area of the brain provides particularly solid evidence to prove if that area is necessary for a particular function," said Dr. Fellows. Two groups of patients with damage to different parts of the frontal lobes played games where they learned to choose either between two actions (twisting movements of a joystick) or between objects (decks of cards). They won or lost play money depending on their choices, gradually learning which choices were better. In people with damage to the orbitofrontal cortex their ability to sustain the correct choice of stimulus (the better deck of cards) was disrupted but they chose normally between different actions.

On the other hand, people with damage in a separate frontal lobe region known as the dorsal anterior cingulate cortex (dACC) had the opposite deficit. They weren't as good at choosing between two actions with different values, but they could choose between objects as well as participants without brain injury. These results indicate that the orbitofrontal cortex plays an important role in linking stimuli to their subjective, relative values, and the dorsal anterior cingulate cortex plays a similar role in the selection of an action based on value. It seems the brain has at least partly separate systems for deciding between actions and objects.

"As a clinician, my patients inform the research I conduct, and as a researcher, my work informs me on ways to better treat and manage patients, as well as gain new insights into brain function." Studies of patients with frontal lobe injury that trace the neural pathways of decision making, show that cognitive neuroscience tools can be applied to understand this complex behaviour, and provide new perspectives on illnesses marked by frontal lobe dysfunction.

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Journal Reference:

  1. N. Camille, A. Tsuchida, L. K. Fellows. Double Dissociation of Stimulus-Value and Action-Value Learning in Humans with Orbitofrontal or Anterior Cingulate Cortex Damage. Journal of Neuroscience, 2011; 31 (42): 15048 DOI: 10.1523/JNEUROSCI.3164-11.2011

Note: If no author is given, the source is cited instead.

Disclaimer: This article is not intended to provide medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. Views expressed here do not necessarily reflect those of ScienceDaily or its staff.

Source: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/10/111021125707.htm

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Historic Space Shuttle Launch Pad Parts Arrive for Display in Houston (SPACE.com)

HOUSTON ? An iconic metal walkway and entrance room used for two decades by more than 50 astronaut crews to enter space shuttles atop the launch pad arrived at NASA's Johnson Space Center on Tuesday (Oct. 18), where they are to go on public display.

The 65-foot (20-meter) long orbiter access arm and its integrated "white room," an environmentally-controlled chamber, arrived here from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida by truck. The arm was detached from Launch Pad 39B in June 2009 after decades perched 147 feet (45 meters) above the pad's surface to span the gap between the fixed service structure, or launch tower, and a shuttle?s entry hatch.?

The arm and its white room was just one of two major components from Pad 39B that were removed intact and set aside prior to a demolition team removing the pad's historic service structures to prepare the facility to launch future rockets. That deconstruction work was completed last month when NASA certified the pad as "clean."?[Gallery:?Shuttle Launch Pad Parts Arrive in Houston?]

Walked this way

The arm and its white room was used for two decades between 1986 and 2006, supporting 53 shuttle missions.

Tragically, the first astronauts to use the walkway to board a shuttle for launch took their last steps on Earth while walking across it. The seven STS-51L crew members, including teacher Christa McAuliffe, were the first space shuttle crew to launch from Pad 39B on Jan. 28, 1986. Seventy-three seconds after liftoff, shuttle Challenger broke apart, ultimately claiming the astronauts' lives.

The same bridge helped support the shuttle's return to flight after the Challenger accident. The STS-26 crew used Pad 39B's orbiter access arm and white room to board shuttle Discovery for their safe trip to space two years after the tragedy.

Fifty more crews crossed the orbiter access room and climbed into their shuttles through the same white room until December 2006, when the STS-116 astronauts became the 53rd and final crew to launch from that pad.

The space shuttle program formally ended this past August after 135 missions in total. Much of the program's hardware, including the remaining three orbiters, are now in the early stages of being moved to museums, science centers and NASA visitor complexes across the nation for public display.

Delivered for display

The Pad 39B orbiter access arm and white room will be on exhibit beginning this weekend during Johnson Space Center's annual open house and Ballunar Liftoff Festival, a hot air balloon exhibition. The gantry pieces will eventually be moved to their permanent exhibit at Space Center Houston, which serves as the center's official visitor complex. [NASA's Space Shuttle Program In Pictures: A Tribute ]

Space Center Houston has confirmed it is developing an 8,000 sq. foot facility to house the access arm and white room, in addition to other key shuttle program artifacts. The center was not chosen to receive one of NASA's shuttle orbiters but the Explorer, a full-scale mockup, will be transferred from the Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex to give Houston visitors the chance to explore the inside of a full size shuttle.

A twin to 39B's orbiter access arm and white room remains installed on Kennedy Space Center's Launch Pad 39A, which may be used in support of NASA's next generation heavy-lift rocket, the partially-shuttle-hardware-derived Space Launch System.

Access arms and white rooms used during the earlier two-man Gemini and Apollo moon programs are exhibited at museums including Kennedy's Visitor Complex, the Air Force Space and Missile Museum at Cape Canaveral and at the Kansas Cosmosphere in Hutchinson, Kansas.

Continue to collectSPACE.com? to see more photographs of the Launch Pad 39B orbiter access arm and white room arriving at Johnson Space Center in Houston.

Follow collectSPACE on Facebook and Twitter @collectSPACE and editor Robert Pearlman @robertpearlman . Copyright 2011?collectSPACE.com. All rights reserved.
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Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/space/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/space/20111021/sc_space/historicspaceshuttlelaunchpadpartsarrivefordisplayinhouston

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EBay holiday forecast disappoints investors (AP)

SAN FRANCISCO ? EBay left investors unimpressed with its predictions for the holiday season even as its namesake site and PayPal online payment service showed healthy growth in the latest quarter.

The company's stock fell more than 4 percent even though eBay said net income grew 14 percent in the third quarter ? thanks partly to consumers shopping and transferring funds using the company's smartphone and tablet apps.

In a conference call with analysts, CEO John Donahoe said the company is looking for an "OK to solid" holiday season. EBay did well during the holidays over the past two years despite the weak economy. Its tempered expectations could signal a generally not-so-jolly holiday season on the horizon for all types of retailers.

For the July-September quarter, eBay said earned $491 million, or 37 cents per share. This compares with $432 million, or 33 cents per share, a year earlier.

Excluding special items, the company earned 48 cents per share, which is what analysts polled by FactSet were expecting.

Revenue increased 32 percent to $3 billion, beating analyst expectations for $2.9 billion.

In eBay Inc.'s marketplaces business, which includes eBay.com and a slew of other e-commerce sites and businesses, revenue rose 17 percent to $1.65 billion. The company has been working to improve the experiences that buyers and sellers have on the site, doing such things as tweaking its search engine and cutting the upfront fees it charges sellers.

EBay had 98.7 million registered users at the end of the quarter, up 6 percent from last year.

Marketplaces' gross merchandise volume ? an important metric that measures the value of all items sold on eBay, excluding vehicles ? rose 16 percent to $14.7 billion.

Revenue from PayPal jumped 32 percent to $1.11 billion as more buyers and sellers used it to complete transactions both on and off eBay.com: The business processed $29.3 billion worth of payments during the quarter, which is up 31 percent from last year. EBay said PayPal had 103 million active registered users by the end of September ? growth of 14 percent compared with a year ago.

For both businesses, eBay said a growth in the number of mobile users helped. Though still a small part of its business, the company's smartphone and tablet apps have been downloaded more than 50 million times since eBay began rolling them out in 2008. EBay expects the volume of merchandise sold through eBay.com using mobile devices to total nearly $5 billion this year, and the amount of money transferred through PayPal on mobile devices to be larger than $3.5 billion.

Looking at the current quarter, which includes the busy holiday shopping season, eBay predicted net income of $1.47 to $1.53 per share on $3.20 billion to $3.35 billion in revenue. Excluding items such as a gain from remaining equity in Internet phone service Skype, which eBay sold in 2009 and was recently acquired by Microsoft Corp., the San Jose, Calif.-based company expects net income of 55 cents to 58 cents per share.

The estimates raise eBay's previous full-year forecast a bit, but they aren't much different from what analysts already expected: adjusted net income of 58 cents per share on $3.31 billion in revenue.

EBay's stock fell $1.27, or 3.8 percent, to $31.91 in after-hours trading. Before the results came out, the stock finished regular trading down 69 cents, or 2 percent, at $33.18.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/internet/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20111019/ap_on_hi_te/us_earns_ebay

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European crisis summit faces high expectations

Outgoing European Central Bank (ECB) President Jean-Claude Trichet, left, talks to IMF President Christine Lagarde, center, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, second right, and President of the EU Commision Jose-Manuel Barroso prior to a farewell ceremony for Trichet at the old opera house in Frankfurt, Germany, Wednesday, Oct. 19, 2011. (AP Photo/Kai Pfaffenbach, Pool)

Outgoing European Central Bank (ECB) President Jean-Claude Trichet, left, talks to IMF President Christine Lagarde, center, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, second right, and President of the EU Commision Jose-Manuel Barroso prior to a farewell ceremony for Trichet at the old opera house in Frankfurt, Germany, Wednesday, Oct. 19, 2011. (AP Photo/Kai Pfaffenbach, Pool)

Outgoing European Central Bank (ECB) President Jean-Claude Trichet , right, talks to German Chancellor Angela Merkel prior to a farewell ceremony for Trichet at the old opera house in Frankfurt, Wednesday Oct. 19, 2011. The final year of Trichet's presidency of the ECB has been marked by controversy over a decision to buy the bonds of troubled euro zone countries, which critics say oversteps the mandate of the central bank and has led to the resignation of two of its most experienced German policymakers. (AP Photo/Kai Pfaffenbach,Pool)

German Chancellor Angela Merkel smiles during the weekly cabinet meeting at the chancellery in Berlin, Germany, Wednesday, Oct. 19, 2011. (AP Photo/Michael Sohn)

RETRANSMISSION FOR ALTERNATE CROP - French President Nicolas Sarkozy leaves the old opera house in Frankfurt, Germany, Wednesday, Oct. 19, 2011 after a meeting with German Chancellor Angela Merkel. (AP Photo/dapd, Thomas Lohnes)

(AP) ? Europe's leaders face huge expectations to come up with nothing less than a grand plan to save the euro ? and protect the global economy from another recession ? when they meet for three days of emergency talks this weekend.

Some 22 months after the crisis first exploded in Greece, investors are still criticizing European leaders for acting only when markets demand it. With markets volatile, economic growth ebbing, and social unrest rising, the heads of government and finance ministers meeting in Brussels from Friday need to show they can finally get ahead of events.

They will have to manage expectations on the one hand but also convince volatile bond and currency markets that the euro will survive the crisis.

A new plan is expected to cover three main points ? debt reduction for Greece, new capital for ailing banks that might take losses from Greek bonds, and enhanced financial firepower for the bailout fund to stabilize markets.

Heading into the talks, however, there was still disagreement over each of the measures.

After a week of cautious optimism, "the market is right to be more nervous," said analyst Jane Foley at Rabobank. "There is a huge amount of ground to be covered by euro politicians."

The meetings kick off on Friday, when eurozone finance ministers gather, with the finance ministers of the full European Union in talks on Saturday, and the heads of state and government on Sunday.

The bailout fund, the European Financial Stability Facility, needs more lending capacity to backstop big countries such as Spain and Italy by buying their bonds and holding down interest costs that threaten to their finances.

The fund was just expanded to euro440 billion ($608 billion) in lending power. But with some euro287 billion of that already committed to bailout out Greece, Ireland and Portugal, the fund is considered too small and economists say it may need effective lending power of up to $2 trillion.

Proposals to stretch its lending power ? without asking governments for more money ? include various kinds of leverage, such as having it guarantee part of the value of Italian and Spanish debt.

The eurozone crisis was caused by governments piling up too much debt, raising fears they might not pay it back. Default concerns have driven borrowing costs beyond what some countries can afford. Greece, Portugal and Ireland have been cut off from bond lending and needed bailouts from the eurozone governments and the International Monetary Fund.

The European Central Bank has been propping up Italian and Spanish bonds by buying them in the secondary market, driving down interest rates. It's a risky task it wants to hand off to the EFSF. It's not clear when that might happen, though.

ECB officials have balked at allowing the EFSF to use the bank's money to magnify its lending power. Some eurozone officials, meanwhile, want to use the EFSF to help backstop continued ECB bond purchases. The ECB's power to create new money means it in theory has almost unlimited financial firepower ? but that is a step it has so far refused to take.

German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble said Thursday that the "outlines" of how to step up the bailout had been agreed with France but fell short of a comprehensive deal to the crisis that financial markets appear to have come to expect.

"We are cautious, but think that we will be able to agree on these," he said at a news conference in Berlin. "Germany and France are in complete agreement on this question, but we know that is not the same as a European solution."

A hastily called meeting Thursday night in Frankfurt, Germany among Schaeuble, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, French President Nicolas Sarkozy and the heads of the International Monetary Fund and the European Central Bank ended without any statement.

Other complex and related questions include the extent of the losses bondholders should face to cut Greece's debt to level where it can be repaid. Since that would inflict losses on banks, officials are trying to come up with a mechanism to get banks Europe-wide to add to their financial cushions.

That's difficult because banks are mostly regulated at the national level, and because raising capital cushions is a painful process that can divert money from bonuses and dividends or mean selling riskier but more profitable assets.

A deal agreed in July would cut the value of bondholders investments by 21 percent, but economists and eurozone leaders now say that won't be enough, even with a second, euro109 billion bailout.

Managing expectations has been a key aspect of the meeting. Stocks and the euro have rising since a Group of 20 finance ministers' meeting last weekend urged eurozone leaders to quickly address its debt crisis before it derails the global economy. But the optimism from that may set up a sudden market downfall if the results of the summit disappoint.

The euro has rallied from euro1.3145 on Oct. 4 to $1.3731 on Thursday, boosted by expectations that politicians are finally ready for decisive action.

German officials tried earlier this week to dampen expectations, and on Thursday, Merkel tried to balance between reassuring markets that something will be done and not overpromising.

She said the leaders' summit on Sunday "will not be the end point of regaining trust. It will be a point at which we act, but much more will follow."

European Central Bank head Jean-Claude Trichet, who was getting a ceremonial farewell at the Frankfurt event that later turned into a platform for the meeting, was blunter. Europe needs "immediate action," he said.

___

Melissa Eddy in Berlin contributed to this report.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/f70471f764144b2fab526d39972d37b3/Article_2011-10-20-EU-Europe-Crisis-Summit/id-0e562dc574e54159845168776b2e050a

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Bahrain panel delays report on protest unrest (AP)

MANAMA, Bahrain ? An independent fact-finding commission in Bahrain says it needs more time to review thousands of personal accounts and official documents as it probes alleged abuses during unrest between Shiite-led protesters and the kingdom's Sunni rulers.

The Bahrain Independent Commission of Inquiry says its final report will be delayed from Oct. 30 to Nov. 23.

The report is highly anticipated in the Gulf kingdom, where majority Shiites began protests for greater rights in February. About 35 people have been killed.

The commission has conducted more than 5,000 interviews and said on Thursday it still awaits some responses from government officials.

The U.S. has said it will await the report before deciding on a $53 million arms sales to Bahrain.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/world/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20111020/ap_on_re_mi_ea/ml_bahrain

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Gaddafi son Saif fleeing towards Niger: NTC officer (Reuters)

LONDON (Reuters) ? Muammar Gaddafi's son Saif al-Islam is fleeing south from Sirte toward Libya's border with Niger, a senior military commander of the interim National Transitional Council (NTC) said on Friday.

Abdul Majid Mlegta told Reuters that Islam was believed to traveling in a convoy of three armored vehicles to try to escape NTC forces that overran Sirte on Thursday and killed his father, Libya's deposed former ruler.

"We are searching for him. The fighters in the region are on full alert," Mlegta said.

Gaddafi was captured alive in his hometown of Sirte on Thursday but died later while in the hands of fighters in circumstances that are still not clear. Islam is believed to have fled Sirte at about the same time.

Dozens of Gaddafi loyalists, including one of his sons Saadi, fled to Niger in September and are being sheltered in Niamey.

Niger has resisted appeals for them to be handed over to Libya's new rulers, saying Tripoli could send investigators if it wanted to question them.

Megta said that in recent days Gaddafi's security chief Abdullah al-Senussi, believed to be hiding in Niger, had been trying to organize some form of safe passage from Sirte to Niger for Gaddafi's entourage.

On Thursday Niger's foreign minister Mohammed Bazoum said he had been informed by Western countries that Senussi had fled across the border into the far north of Niger.

Senussi is wanted by the International Criminal Court for crimes against humanity.

The brother-in-law of the former Libyan leader, who was killed on Thursday, Senussi has been accused of ordering the murder and persecution of civilians throughout Libya during the collapse of Gaddafi's 42-year rule this year.

"It seems that he is in the extreme north of Niger. It is the Western countries which have informed us," Bazoum told Reuters by telephone from Niger.

International police agency Interpol on Thursday appealed for Islam to turn himself in, offering to guarantee his safe passage to The Hague to face charges of crimes against humanity.

(Reporting by Samia Nakhoul; Editing by Myra MacDonald)

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/africa/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20111021/wl_nm/us_libya_saif_niger

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US requests website censoring details from China (AP)

SAN FRANCISCO ? The U.S. government has formally asked China to turn over details of its policies for censoring websites.

U.S. Trade Representative Ron Kirk said Wednesday that the request is being pursued under World Trade Organization rules governing how member countries deal with trade issues. Kirk said the concerns center on the competitiveness of foreign websites in China.

China heavily censors its Internet, and Kirk said the U.S. wants to understand China's rules governing website blocking so that foreign websites can adopt policies to avoid being blocked.

The request also seeks information on the mechanics of Internet censorship in China, and whether it's implemented directly by the government or indirectly by Internet providers.

Some 500 million people in China use the Internet and are hotly pursued by marketers. China's censorship rules are opaque, and it's not just political sites that are blocked.

China's policies led to a rare public fight with a major U.S. company last year when Google Inc. announced it was going to stop censoring its Internet search results on its Chinese website as the result of a hacking attack believed to have originated in China. The U.S. is increasing pressure on China over its trade policies, including its currency practices, but there is broad disagreement about the appropriate strategies for ensuring fair competition.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/asia/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20111019/ap_on_hi_te/us_us_china_internet

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ASUS -- next generation Transformer will be announced Nov 9, ICS on existing hardware this year

Transformer 2

Johnny Shih, chairman at ASUS, had a few things to say of interest to Android fans about the popular ASUS Transformer tablets at the AsiaD conference in Hong Kong this morning.  When asked about the next generation Transformer (check out the teaser video here), Shih said to expect the formal announcement on November 9, and tonight was a sneak peek of what he dubbed the "Transformer Prime".  He went on to mention the quad-core NVIDIA chipset, a 10-inch display, USB and mini-HDMI ports, SD card slot, and the Transformer Prime's 8.3mm thickness.  He also let the cat out of the bag for the original Transformer and any Ice Cream Sandwich plans, when asked if ASUS would have it by the end of the year he replied "Maybe earlier than that".  Finally, he talked about the Padfone -- a combination tablet and phone that should come around early next year after carrier testing.  That's all great news, let's hope it works out that way.  In the meantime, we're all waiting patiently for a couple weeks until the Transformer 2, err Prime, gets official.

Source: All Things D


Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/androidcentral/~3/s_ik3KWqhE8/asus-next-generation-transformer-will-be-announced-nov-9-ics-existing-hardware-year

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Start of 2-day general strike shuts down Greece

Tourists check the departure board during a 12-hour work stoppage by air traffic controllers at the Athens International Airport, Eleftherios Venizelos, Wednesday, Oct. 19, 2011. Private and public sectors shut down across Greece Wednesday at the start of a 48-hour general strike that unions vowed would be the largest in years, to protest a new round of austerity measures designed to avoid a potentially catastrophic default. (AP Photo/Thanassis Stavrakis)

Tourists check the departure board during a 12-hour work stoppage by air traffic controllers at the Athens International Airport, Eleftherios Venizelos, Wednesday, Oct. 19, 2011. Private and public sectors shut down across Greece Wednesday at the start of a 48-hour general strike that unions vowed would be the largest in years, to protest a new round of austerity measures designed to avoid a potentially catastrophic default. (AP Photo/Thanassis Stavrakis)

A man throws his fishing line in front of a docked ship during a strike in the port of Piraeus, near Athens, on Wednesday, Oct. 19, 2011. A two-day general strike that unions vow will be the largest in years grounded flights, disrupted public transport and shut down everything from customs offices to shops and schools in debt-ridden Greece on Wednesday.(AP Photo/Petros Giannakouris)

A passenger takes a photograph of a departure board during a 12-hour work stoppage by air traffic controllers at the Athens International Airport, Eleftherios Venizelos, Wednesday, Oct. 19, 2011. Private and public sectors shut down across Greece Wednesday at the start of a 48-hour general strike that unions vowed would be the largest in years, to protest a new round of austerity measures designed to avoid a potentially catastrophic default. (AP Photo/Thanassis Stavrakis)

A man walks at the empty arrival terminal during a 12-hour work stoppage by air traffic controllers at the Athens International Airport, Eleftherios Venizelos, Wednesday, Oct. 19, 2011. Private and public sectors shut down across Greece Wednesday at the start of a 48-hour general strike that unions vowed would be the largest in years, to protest a new round of austerity measures designed to avoid a potentially catastrophic default. (AP Photo/Thanassis Stavrakis)

Tourists from Bolivia sit in a bench during a 12-hour work stoppage by air traffic controllers at the Athens International Airport, Eleftherios Venizelos, Wednesday, Oct. 19, 2011. Private and public sectors shut down across Greece Wednesday at the start of a 48-hour general strike that unions vowed would be the largest in years, to protest a new round of austerity measures designed to avoid a potentially catastrophic default. (AP Photo/Thanassis Stavrakis)

(AP) ? A two-day general strike that unions vow will be the largest in years grounded flights, disrupted public transport and shut down everything from shops to schools in Greece on Wednesday, as at least 50,000 protesters converged in central Athens.

All sectors, from dentists, state hospital doctors and lawyers to shop owners, tax office workers, pharmacists, teachers and dock workers walked off the job ahead of a Parliamentary vote Thursday on new austerity measures.

Flights were grounded in the morning but were to resume at noon after air traffic controllers scaled back their initial strike plan from 48 hours to 12. Ferries remained tied up in port, while public transport workers staged work stoppages but were to keep buses, trolleys and the Athens metro running for most of the day.

Several thousand police deployed in central Athens, blocking a road by Parliament and shutting down two nearby metro stations as protest marches began. Authorities estimated the crowd at 50,000, and more people were streaming into the downtown area. A small group of protesters briefly pelted police with garbage, but the rallies were mostly peaceful.

At least 15,000 demonstrators also gathered in Thessaloniki, Greece's second-largest city.

"We just can't take it any more. There is desperation, anger and bitterness," said Nikos Anastasopoulos, head of a workers' union for an Athens municipality. Other municipal workers said they had no option but to take to the streets.

"We can't make ends meet for our families," said protester Eleni Voulieri. "We've lost our salaries, we've lost everything and we're in danger of losing our jobs."

Demonstrations during a similar 48-hour strike in June left the center of Athens convulsed by violence as rioters clashed with police on both days while deputies voted on another austerity package inside Parliament.

"We expect that the strike could be the largest" in decades, said Ilias Vrettakos, deputy president of the civil servants' union ADEDY.

"The fact that other sections of society that are suffering from government policies are also participating gives a new dimension to the social resistance by workers and the people in general, and we hope that this mobilization will have an impact on political developments."

Piles of garbage continued to fester on street corners despite a civil mobilization order issued Tuesday to order garbage crews back to work after a 17-day strike. Earlier in the week, private crews were contracted to remove trash from along the planned demonstration routes, but mounds remained on side streets and in city neighborhoods.

Protesting civil servants have also staged rounds of sit-ins at government buildings, with some, including the Finance Ministry, being under occupation for days.

Prime Minister George Papandreou appealed on Tuesday for the protests to end.

"I would like to ask all those who occupy ministry buildings, choke the streets with garbage, close off ports, close off the Acropolis, if this helps us stand on our feet again ? of course it does not," Papandreou told parliament.

Most stores in the city center, including bakeries and many of the ubiquitous kiosks which sell everything from newspapers, cigarettes and chewing gum to tourist trinkets and snacks, were shut Wednesday. Several shop owners said they had received threats that their stores would be smashed if they attempted to open during the first day of the strike.

The measures to be voted on in Parliament Thursday come after more than a year and a half of repeated spending cuts and tax increases, and include tax hikes, further pension and salary cuts, the suspension on reduced pay of 30,000 public servants out of a total of more than 750,000, and the suspension of collective labor contracts.

A communist party-backed union has vowed to encircle Parliament Thursday in an attempt to prevent deputies from entering the building for the vote.

The reforms have been so unpopular that even some lawmakers from the governing Socialists have indicated they might vote against at least some of them.

But Greece must pass the bill if it is to continue receiving funds from its euro110 billion international bailout. Unless it receives the now long overdue disbursement of an euro8 billion installment, it has said it will run out of funds to pay salaries and pensions by mid-November.

Meanwhile, European countries are trying to work out a broad solution to the continent's deepening debt crisis, ahead of a weekend summit in Brussels. It became clear earlier this year that the initial bailout for Greece was not working as well as had been hoped, and European leaders agreed on a second, euro109 billion bailout. But key details of that rescue fund, including the participation of the private sector, remain to be worked out.

____

Nicholas Paphitis in Athens contributed to this report.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/3d281c11a96b4ad082fe88aa0db04305/Article_2011-10-19-EU-Greece-Financial-Crisis/id-4d9a4c206ed6462098d5233b50fb4253

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