FDA: New rules will make food safer


WASHINGTON (AP) — The Food and Drug Administration says its new guidelines would make the food Americans eat safer and help prevent the kinds of foodborne disease outbreaks that sicken or kill thousands of consumers each year.


The rules, the most sweeping food safety guidelines in decades, would require farmers to take new precautions against contamination, to include making sure workers' hands are washed, irrigation water is clean, and that animals stay out of fields. Food manufacturers will have to submit food safety plans to the government to show they are keeping their operations clean.


The long-overdue regulations could cost businesses close to half a billion dollars a year to implement, but are expected to reduce the estimated 3,000 deaths a year from foodborne illness. The new guidelines were announced Friday.


Just since last summer, outbreaks of listeria in cheese and salmonella in peanut butter, mangoes and cantaloupe have been linked to more than 400 illnesses and as many as seven deaths, according to the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The actual number of those sickened is likely much higher.


Many responsible food companies and farmers are already following the steps that the FDA would now require them to take. But officials say the requirements could have saved lives and prevented illnesses in several of the large-scale outbreaks that have hit the country in recent years.


In a 2011 outbreak of listeria in cantaloupe that claimed 33 lives, for example, FDA inspectors found pools of dirty water on the floor and old, dirty processing equipment at Jensen Farms in Colorado where the cantaloupes were grown. In a peanut butter outbreak this year linked to 42 salmonella illnesses, inspectors found samples of salmonella throughout Sunland Inc.'s peanut processing plant in New Mexico and multiple obvious safety problems, such as birds flying over uncovered trailers of peanuts and employees not washing their hands.


Under the new rules, companies would have to lay out plans for preventing those sorts of problems, monitor their own progress and explain to the FDA how they would correct them.


"The rules go very directly to preventing the types of outbreaks we have seen," said Michael Taylor, FDA's deputy commissioner for foods.


The FDA estimates the new rules could prevent almost 2 million illnesses annually, but it could be several years before the rules are actually preventing outbreaks. Taylor said it could take the agency another year to craft the rules after a four-month comment period, and farms would have at least two years to comply — meaning the farm rules are at least three years away from taking effect. Smaller farms would have even longer to comply.


The new rules, which come exactly two years to the day President Barack Obama's signed food safety legislation passed by Congress, were already delayed. The 2011 law required the agency to propose a first installment of the rules a year ago, but the Obama administration held them until after the election. Food safety advocates sued the administration to win their release.


The produce rule would mark the first time the FDA has had real authority to regulate food on farms. In an effort to stave off protests from farmers, the farm rules are tailored to apply only to certain fruits and vegetables that pose the greatest risk, like berries, melons, leafy greens and other foods that are usually eaten raw. A farm that produces green beans that will be canned and cooked, for example, would not be regulated.


Such flexibility, along with the growing realization that outbreaks are bad for business, has brought the produce industry and much of the rest of the food industry on board as Congress and FDA has worked to make food safer.


In a statement Friday, Pamela Bailey, president of the Grocery Manufacturers Association, which represents the country's biggest food companies, said the food safety law "can serve as a role model for what can be achieved when the private and public sectors work together to achieve a common goal."


The new rules could cost large farms $30,000 a year, according to the FDA. The agency did not break down the costs for individual processing plants, but said the rules could cost manufacturers up to $475 million annually.


FDA Commissioner Margaret Hamburg said the success of the rules will also depend on how much money Congress gives the chronically underfunded agency to put them in place. "Resources remain an ongoing concern," she said.


The farm and manufacturing rules are only one part of the food safety law. The bill also authorized more surprise inspections by the FDA and gave the agency additional powers to shut down food facilities. In addition, the law required stricter standards on imported foods. The agency said it will soon propose other overdue rules to ensure that importers verify overseas food is safe and to improve food safety audits overseas.


Food safety advocates frustrated over the last year as the rules stalled praised the proposed action.


"The new law should transform the FDA from an agency that tracks down outbreaks after the fact, to an agency focused on preventing food contamination in the first place," said Caroline Smith DeWaal of the Center for Science in the Public Interest.


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"Cliff" concerns give way to earnings focus

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Investors' "fiscal cliff" worries are likely to give way to more fundamental concerns, like earnings, as fourth-quarter reports get under way next week.


Financial results, which begin after the market closes on Tuesday with aluminum company Alcoa , are expected to be only slightly better than the third-quarter's lackluster results. As a warning sign, analyst current estimates are down sharply from what they were in October.


That could set stocks up for more volatility following a week of sharp gains that put the Standard & Poor's 500 index <.spx> on Friday at the highest close since December 31, 2007. The index also registered its biggest weekly percentage gain in more than a year.


Based on a Reuters analysis, Europe ranks among the chief concerns cited by companies that warned on fourth-quarter results. Uncertainty about the region and its weak economic outlook were cited by more than half of the 25 largest S&P 500 companies that issued warnings.


In the most recent earnings conference calls, macroeconomic worries were cited by 10 companies while the U.S. "fiscal cliff" was cited by at least nine as reasons for their earnings warnings.


"The number of things that could go wrong isn't so high, but the magnitude of how wrong they could go is what's worrisome," said Kurt Winters, senior portfolio manager for Whitebox Mutual Funds in Minneapolis.


Negative-to-positive guidance by S&P 500 companies for the fourth quarter was 3.6 to 1, the second worst since the third quarter of 2001, according to Thomson Reuters data.


U.S. lawmakers narrowly averted the "fiscal cliff" by coming to a last-minute agreement on a bill to avoid steep tax hikes this weeks -- driving the rally in stocks -- but the battle over further spending cuts is expected to resume in two months.


Investors also have seen a revival of worries about Europe's sovereign debt problems, with Moody's in November downgrading France's credit rating and debt crises looming for Spain and other countries.


"You have a recession in Europe as a base case. Europe is still the biggest trading partner with a lot of U.S. companies, and it's still a big chunk of global capital spending," said Adam Parker, chief U.S. equity strategist at Morgan Stanley in New York.


Among companies citing worries about Europe was eBay , whose chief financial officer, Bob Swan, spoke of "macro pressures from Europe" in the company's October earnings conference call.


REVENUE WORRIES


One of the biggest worries voiced about earnings has been whether companies will be able to continue to boost profit growth despite relatively weak revenue growth.


S&P 500 revenue fell 0.8 percent in the third quarter for the first decline since the third quarter of 2009, Thomson Reuters data showed. Earnings growth for the quarter was a paltry 0.1 percent after briefly dipping into negative territory.


On top of that, just 40 percent of S&P 500 companies beat revenue expectations in the third quarter, while 64.2 percent beat earnings estimates, the Thomson Reuters data showed.


For the fourth quarter, estimates are slightly better but are well off estimates for the quarter from just a few months earlier. S&P 500 earnings are expected to have risen 2.8 percent while revenue is expected to have gone up 1.9 percent.


Back in October, earnings growth for the fourth quarter was forecast up 9.9 percent.


In spite of the cautious outlooks, some analysts still see a good chance for earnings beats this reporting period.


"The thinking is you need top line growth for earnings to continue to expand, and we've seen the market defy that," said Mike Jackson, founder of Denver-based investment firm T3 Equity Labs.


Based on his analysis, energy, industrials and consumer discretionary are the S&P sectors most likely to beat earnings expectations in the upcoming season, while consumer staples, materials and utilities are the least likely to beat, Jackson said.


Sounding a positive note on Friday, drugmaker Eli Lilly and Co said it expects profit in 2013 to increase by more than Wall Street had been forecasting, primarily due to cost controls and improved productivity.


(Reporting By Caroline Valetkevitch; Editing by Kenneth Barry)



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Venezuela lawmakers elect Chavez ally as Assembly chief


CARACAS (Reuters) - Venezuelan lawmakers re-elected a staunch ally of Hugo Chavez to head the National Assembly on Saturday, putting him in line to be caretaker president if the socialist leader does not recover from cancer surgery.


By choosing the incumbent, Diosdado Cabello, the "Chavista"-dominated legislature cemented the combative ex-soldier's position as the third most powerful figure in the government, after Chavez and Vice President Nicolas Maduro.


"As a patriot ... I swear to be supremely loyal in everything I do, to defend the fatherland, its institutions, and this beautiful revolution led by our Comandante Hugo Chavez," Cabello said as he took the oath, his hand on the constitution.


He had earlier warned opposition politicians against attempting to use the National Assembly to "conspire" against the people, saying they would be "destroyed" if they tried.


Thousands of the president's red-clad supporters gathered outside parliament hours before the vote, many chanting: "We are all Chavez! Our comandante will be well! He will return!"


If Chavez had to step down, or died, Cabello would take over the running of the country as Assembly president and a new election would be organized within 30 days. Chavez's heir apparent, Maduro, would be the ruling Socialist Party candidate.


Chavez, who was diagnosed with an undisclosed form of cancer in his pelvic area in mid-2011, has not been seen in public nor heard from in more than three weeks.


Officials say the 58-year-old is in delicate condition and has suffered multiple complications since the December 11 surgery, including unexpected bleeding and severe respiratory problems.


Late on Friday, Maduro gave the clearest indication yet that the government was preparing to delay Chavez's inauguration for a new six-year term, which is scheduled for Thursday.


'CHAVEZ IS PRESIDENT'


Maduro said the ceremony was a "formality" and that Chavez could be sworn in by the Supreme Court at a later date.


The opposition says Chavez's absence would be just the latest sign that he is no longer fit to govern, and that new elections should be held in the South American OPEC nation.


Brandishing a copy of the constitution after his win in the Assembly, Cabello slammed opposition leaders for writing a letter to foreign embassies in which they accused the government of employing a "twisted reading" of the charter.


"Get this into your heads: Hugo Chavez was elected president and he will continue to be president beyond January 10. No one should have any doubt ... this is the constitutional route," he said as fellow Socialist Party lawmakers cheered.


The opposition sat stony-faced. One of their legislators had earlier told the session that it was not just the head of state who was ill, "the republic is sick."


Last year, Chavez staged what appeared to be a remarkable comeback from the disease to win re-election in October, despite being weakened by radiation therapy. He returned to Cuba for more treatment within weeks of his victory.


Should the president have to step down after 14 years in office, a new vote would probably pit Maduro, a 50-year-old former bus driver and union leader, against opposition leader Henrique Capriles, the 40-year-old governor of Miranda state.


Capriles lost to Chavez in October's presidential election.


"I don't think Maduro would last many rounds in a presidential race. He's not fit for the responsibility they have given him," Capriles said after the vice president's appearance on state television.


Chavez's condition is being watched closely by leftist allies around Latin American who have benefited from his oil-funded generosity, as well as investors attracted by Venezuela's lucrative and widely traded debt.


The country boasts the world's biggest crude reserves. Despite the huge political upheaval Chavez's exit would cause, the oil industry is not likely to be affected much in the short term, with an extension of "Chavismo" keeping projects on track, while a change in parties could usher in more foreign capital.


(Additional reporting by Deisy Buitrago; Editing by Vicki Allen)



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Ohio sheriff confronts protesters in football rape case






STEUBENVILLE, Ohio (Reuters) – A county sheriff under fire for how he has handled a high school rape investigation faced down a raucous crowd of protesters on Saturday and said no further suspects would be charged in a case that has rattled Ohio football country.


Ma’lik Richmond and Trenton Mays, both 16 and members of the Steubenville High School football team, are charged with raping a 16-year-old fellow student at a party last August, according to statements from their attorneys.






Jefferson County Sheriff Fred Abdalla, accused of shielding the popular football program from a more rigorous investigation, told reporters no one else would be charged in the case, just moments after he addressed about 1,000 protesters gathered in front of the Jefferson County Courthouse.


“I’m not going to stand here and try to convince you that I’m not the bad guy,” he said to a chorus of boos. “You’ve already made your minds up.”


The “Occupy Steubenville” rally was organized by the online activist group Anonymous.


Abdalla declined to take the investigation over from Steubenville police, sparking more public outrage. Anonymous and community leaders say police are avoiding charging more of those involved to protect the school’s beloved football program.


The two students will be tried as juveniles in February in Steubenville, a close-knit city of 19,000 about 40 miles west of Pittsburgh.


The case shot to national prominence this week when Anonymous made public a picture of the purported rape victim being carried by her wrists and ankles by two young men. Anonymous also released a video that showed several other young men joking about an assault.


Abdalla, who said he first saw the video three days ago, said on Saturday that it provided no new evidence of any crimes.


“It’s a disgusting video,” he said. “It’s stupidity. But you can’t arrest somebody for being stupid.”


The protest’s masked leader, standing atop a set of stairs outside the courthouse doors, invited up to the makeshift stage anyone who was a victim of sexual assault. Protesters immediately flooded the platform, which was slightly smaller than a boxing ring.


Victims passed around a microphone, taking turns telling their stories. Some called for Abdalla and other local officials to step down from office for not charging more of the people and for what they called a cover-up by athletes, coaches and local officials.


Abdalla then climbed the stairs himself and addressed the protest over a microphone.


Abdalla said he had dedicated his 28-year career to combating sexual assault, overseeing the arrest of more than 200 suspects.


Clad in a teal ribbon symbolizing support for sexual assault victims, Abdalla later told Reuters that he stood by his decision to leave the investigation with local police. He would have had to question all 59 people that the Steubenville Police Department had already interviewed in its original investigation, he said.


“People have got their minds made up,” he said. “A case like this, who would want to cover any of it up?”


(Editing by Daniel Trotta and Eric Walsh)


Internet News Headlines – Yahoo! News





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Bethenny Frankel Divorcing Jason Hoppy















01/05/2013 at 05:00 PM EST







Bethenny Frankel and Jason Hoppy


Albert Michael/Startraks


It's official – Bethenny Frankel and Jason Hoppy's marriage is over.

Having announced a separation over the holidays, the reality star began the divorce process by filing earlier this week in New York, TMZ reports.

"It brings me great sadness to say that Jason and I are separating," Frankel, 42, had said in a statement Dec. 23. "This was an extremely difficult decision that as a woman and a mother, I have to accept as the best choice for our family."

The split comes after months of rumors that the pair – who married in 2010 and are parents to daughter Bryn, 2½ – were on the rocks.

"Bethenny is devastated," a friend tells PEOPLE.

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FDA proposes sweeping new food safety rules


WASHINGTON (AP) — The Food and Drug Administration on Friday proposed the most sweeping food safety rules in decades, requiring farmers and food companies to be more vigilant in the wake of deadly outbreaks in peanuts, cantaloupe and leafy greens.


The long-overdue regulations are aimed at reducing the estimated 3,000 deaths a year from foodborne illness. Just since last summer, outbreaks of listeria in cheese and salmonella in peanut butter, mangoes and cantaloupe have been linked to more than 400 illnesses and as many as seven deaths, according to the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The actual number of those sickened is likely much higher.


The FDA's proposed rules would require farmers to take new precautions against contamination, to include making sure workers' hands are washed, irrigation water is clean, and that animals stay out of fields. Food manufacturers will have to submit food safety plans to the government to show they are keeping their operations clean.


Many responsible food companies and farmers are already following the steps that the FDA would now require them to take. But officials say the requirements could have saved lives and prevented illnesses in several of the large-scale outbreaks that have hit the country in recent years.


In a 2011 outbreak of listeria in cantaloupe that claimed 33 lives, for example, FDA inspectors found pools of dirty water on the floor and old, dirty processing equipment at Jensen Farms in Colorado where the cantaloupes were grown. In a peanut butter outbreak this year linked to 42 salmonella illnesses, inspectors found samples of salmonella throughout Sunland Inc.'s peanut processing plant in New Mexico and multiple obvious safety problems, such as birds flying over uncovered trailers of peanuts and employees not washing their hands.


Under the new rules, companies would have to lay out plans for preventing those sorts of problems, monitor their own progress and explain to the FDA how they would correct them.


"The rules go very directly to preventing the types of outbreaks we have seen," said Michael Taylor, FDA's deputy commissioner for foods.


The FDA estimates the new rules could prevent almost 2 million illnesses annually, but it could be several years before the rules are actually preventing outbreaks. Taylor said it could take the agency another year to craft the rules after a four-month comment period, and farms would have at least two years to comply — meaning the farm rules are at least three years away from taking effect. Smaller farms would have even longer to comply.


The new rules, which come exactly two years to the day President Barack Obama's signed food safety legislation passed by Congress, were already delayed. The 2011 law required the agency to propose a first installment of the rules a year ago, but the Obama administration held them until after the election. Food safety advocates sued the administration to win their release.


The produce rule would mark the first time the FDA has had real authority to regulate food on farms. In an effort to stave off protests from farmers, the farm rules are tailored to apply only to certain fruits and vegetables that pose the greatest risk, like berries, melons, leafy greens and other foods that are usually eaten raw. A farm that produces green beans that will be canned and cooked, for example, would not be regulated.


Such flexibility, along with the growing realization that outbreaks are bad for business, has brought the produce industry and much of the rest of the food industry on board as Congress and FDA has worked to make food safer.


In a statement Friday, Pamela Bailey, president of the Grocery Manufacturers Association, which represents the country's biggest food companies, said the food safety law "can serve as a role model for what can be achieved when the private and public sectors work together to achieve a common goal."


The new rules could cost large farms $30,000 a year, according to the FDA. The agency did not break down the costs for individual processing plants, but said the rules could cost manufacturers up to $475 million annually.


FDA Commissioner Margaret Hamburg said the success of the rules will also depend on how much money Congress gives the chronically underfunded agency to put them in place. "Resources remain an ongoing concern," she said.


The farm and manufacturing rules are only one part of the food safety law. The bill also authorized more surprise inspections by the FDA and gave the agency additional powers to shut down food facilities. In addition, the law required stricter standards on imported foods. The agency said it will soon propose other overdue rules to ensure that importers verify overseas food is safe and to improve food safety audits overseas.


Food safety advocates frustrated over the last year as the rules stalled praised the proposed action.


"The new law should transform the FDA from an agency that tracks down outbreaks after the fact, to an agency focused on preventing food contamination in the first place," said Caroline Smith DeWaal of the Center for Science in the Public Interest.


Read More..

S&P 500 finishes at 5-year high on economic data

NEW YORK (Reuters) - The benchmark Standard & Poor's 500 index ended at a five-year high on Friday, lifted by reports showing employers kept up a steady pace of hiring workers and the vast services sector expanded at a brisk rate.


The gains on the S&P 500 pushed the index to its highest close since December 2007 and its biggest weekly gain since December 2011.


Most of the gains came early in the holiday-shortened week, including the largest one-day rise for the index in more than a year on Wednesday after politicians struck a deal to avert the "fiscal cliff."


The Dow Jones industrial average <.dji> gained 43.85 points, or 0.33 percent, to 13,435.21. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index <.spx> rose 7.10 points, or 0.49 percent, to 1,466.47. The Nasdaq Composite Index <.ixic> edged up 1.09 points, or 0.04 percent, to 3,101.66.


For the week, the S&P gained 4.6 percent, the Dow rose 3.8 percent and the Nasdaq jumped 4.8 percent to post their largest weekly percentage gains in more than a year.


The CBOE Volatility index <.vix>, a measure of investor anxiety, dropped for a fourth straight session, giving the index a weekly decline of nearly 40 percent, its biggest weekly fall ever. The close of 13.83 on the VIX marks its lowest level since August.


In Friday's economic reports, the Labor Department said non-farm payrolls grew by 155,000 jobs last month, slightly below November's level. Gains were distributed broadly throughout the economy, from manufacturing and construction to healthcare.


Also serving to boost equities was data from the Institute for Supply Management showing U.S. service sector activity expanding the most in 10 months.


With the S&P 500 index at a five-year closing high, analysts said any gains above the index's intraday high near 1,475 in September may be harder to come by.


"We are getting to a point where we need a strong catalyst, which could be earnings, it could be three months of good economic data, it could be a variety of things," said Adam Thurgood, managing director at HighTower Advisors in Las Vegas, Nevada.


"What is going on right now is this conflicting view of fundamentals look pretty good and improving, and then you've got these negative tail risks that could blow everything up," Thurgood said.


He referred to "a fiscal superstorm brewing" of issues still left unresolved in Washington, including tough federal budget cuts and the need to raise the government's debt ceiling all within a couple of months.


The rise in payrolls shown by the jobs data did not make a dent in the U.S. unemployment rate still at 7.8 percent.


A Reuters poll on Friday of economists at Wall Street's top financial institutions showed that most expect the Fed in 2013 to end the program with which it bought Treasury debt in an effort to stimulate the economy.


A drop in Apple Inc shares of 2.6 percent to $528.36 kept pressure on the Nasdaq.


Adding to concerns about Apple's ability to produce more innovative products, rival Samsung Electronics Co Ltd is expected to widen its lead over Apple in global smartphone sales this year with growth of 35 percent. Market researcher Strategy Analytics said Samsung had a broad product lineup.


Eli Lilly and Co was among the biggest boost's to the S&P, up 3.7 percent to $51.56 after the pharmaceuticals maker said it expects its 2013 earnings to increase to $3.75 to $3.90 per share, excluding items, from $3.30 to $3.40 per share in 2012.


Fellow drugmaker Johnson & Johnson rose 1.2 percent to $71.55 after Deutsche Bank upgraded the Dow component to a "Buy" from a "Hold" rating. The NYSEArca pharmaceutical index <.drg> climbed 0.6 percent.


Shares of Mosaic Co gained 3.3 percent to $58.62. Excluding items, the fertilizer producer's quarterly earnings beat analysts' expectations, according to Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S.


Volume was modest with about 6.07 billion shares traded on the New York Stock Exchange, NYSE MKT and Nasdaq, slightly below the 2012 daily average of 6.42 billion.


Advancing stocks outnumbered declining ones on the NYSE by 2,287 to 701, while on the Nasdaq, advancers beat decliners 1,599 to 866.


(Reporting by Chuck Mikolajczak; Editing by Nick Zieminski and Kenneth Barry)



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Abbas sees Palestinian unity as Fatah rallies in Gaza


GAZA (Reuters) - President Mahmoud Abbas predicted the end of a five-year split between the two big Palestinian factions as his Fatah movement staged its first mass rally in Gaza with the blessing of Hamas Islamists who rule the enclave.


"Soon we will regain our unity," Abbas, whose authority has been limited to the Israeli-occupied West Bank since the 2007 civil war between the two factions, said in a televised address to hundreds of thousands of followers marching in Gaza on Friday, with yellow Fatah flags instead of the green of Hamas.


The hardline Hamas movement, which does not recognize Israel's right to exist, expelled secular Fatah from Gaza during the war. It gave permission for the rally after the deadlock in peace talks between Abbas's administration and Israel narrowed the two factions' ideological differences.


The Palestinian rivals have drawn closer since Israel's assault on Gaza assault in November, in which Hamas, though battered, claimed victory.


Egypt has long tried to broker Hamas-Fatah reconciliation, but past efforts have foundered over questions of power-sharing, control of weaponry, and to what extent Israel and other powers would accept a Palestinian administration including Hamas.


An Egyptian official told Reuters Cairo was preparing to invite the factions for new negotiations within two weeks.


Israel fears grassroots support for Hamas could eventually topple Abbas's Palestinian Authority (PA) in the West Bank.


"Hamas could seize control of the PA any day," Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Thursday.


The demonstration marked 48 years since Fatah's founding as the spearhead of the Palestinians' fight against Israel. Its longtime leader Yasser Arafat signed an interim 1993 peace accord that won Palestinians a measure of self rule.


Hamas, which rejected the 1993 deal, fought and won a Palestinian parliamentary election in 2006. It formed an uneasy coalition with Fatah until their violent split a year later.


Though shunned by the West, Hamas feels bolstered by electoral gains for Islamist movements in neighboring Egypt and elsewhere in the region - a confidence reflected in the fact Friday's Fatah demonstration was allowed to take place.


"The success of the rally is a success for Fatah, and for Hamas too," said Hamas spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri. "The positive atmosphere is a step on the way to regain national unity."


Fatah, meanwhile, has been riven by dissent about the credibility of Abbas's statesmanship, especially given Israel's continued settlement-building on West Bank land. The Israelis quit Gaza unilaterally in 2005 after 38 years of occupation.


"The message today is that Fatah cannot be wiped out," said Amal Hamad, a member of the group's ruling body, referring to the demonstration attended by several Abbas advisers. "Fatah lives, no one can exclude it and it seeks to end the division."


In his speech, Abbas promised to return to Gaza soon and said Palestinian unification would be "a step on the way to ending the (Israeli) occupation".


(Editing by Dan Williams, Alistair Lyon and Jason Webb)



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“GameStick” Will Be the Size of a USB Memory Stick, Plug into Your TV






When the Ouya game console (scheduled to launch in April) made headlines last year, it was for three reasons. One, its size and price — the $ 99 box, which plugs into a TV, is the size of a Rubik’s cube. Two, its choice of operating system — it runs the same Android OS which powers smartphones and tablets. And three — its rise to fame on Kickstarter, where it shattered records and received millions of dollars in funding not from venture capitalists, but from gamers who wanted to see it made.


Now GameStick, “The Most Portable TV Games Console Ever Created,” is preparing to make a name for itself in exactly the same ways. Except that in some of them, it surpasses the Ouya.






Not even a set-top box


Up to this point, pretty much all home game consoles have been a box that sits on your shelf and plugs in to your TV. (Some PCs even do this these days.)


The GameStick, on the other hand, is about the size of a USB memory stick or a tube of lip balm. It plugs into a TV’s HDMI port, and connects to a wireless controller (or even a mouse and keyboard) via Bluetooth. It “works with any Bluetooth controller supporting HID,” and will come with its own small gamepad, which features twin analog sticks and a slot to put the GameStick itself inside when not in use.


Do we know if it works yet?


GameStick’s creators showed off pictures of a nonworking “Mark 1 Prototype Model,” and posted video of a “Reference Board” actually playing games while plugged into a television. This was a roughly USB-stick-sized circuit board, which lacked an outer case.


The reference unit had wires coming out of it, but the GameStick FAQ explains that on new, “MHL compliant TVs” it can draw power straight from the HDMI port, in much the same way that many USB devices are powered by a USB connection. A USB connector cable will be supplied with GameStick just in case, and “there will also be a power adapter.”


What about the games?


The GameStick reference unit was playing an Android game called Shadowgun, an over-the-shoulder third-person shooter which is considered technically demanding by Android device standards.


GameStick’s creators say “We have some great games lined up already,” and AFP Relax confirms that it has roughly the same internal specs as the Ouya, plus a lineup at launch of about a dozen games including several AAA Android titles.


How much will it cost, and when will it be out?


GameStick is available for preorder now from its Kickstarter page for $ 79. (The price includes the controller as well.) It has an estimated delivery date of April if the project is fully funded — and with 28 days to go, it had more than reached its $ 100,000 goal.


Jared Spurbeck is an open-source software enthusiast, who uses an Android phone and an Ubuntu laptop PC. He has been writing about technology and electronics since 2008.


Linux/Open Source News Headlines – Yahoo! News





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Aww! Ava Totes Tennessee While Reese Witherspoon Snaps a Picture




Celebrity Baby Blog





01/04/2013 at 05:00 PM ET



Life’s a beach for Reese Witherspoon, who spend New Year’s in the sand with her family.


The actress was spotted in Hawaii with husband Jim Toth, their newborn son Tennessee James, 3 months, and her elder children Deacon, 9, and Ava, 13.


Witherspoon, who recently said she was “crawling back” to her pre-baby body, topped her ruched navy one-piece with a cover-up for the day in the sun.


Lending a helping hand was big sister Ava, whom Witherspoon calls “so awesome” with the baby. The teen carried her little brother around the beach while Witherspoon snapped photos of the pair.


Reese Witherspoon Snaps a Family Shot
FameFlynet



Reese Witherspoon Snaps a Family Shot
FameFlynet


Bonus: Witherspoon talks to Chelsea Handler about her son’s “redneck name”



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CDC: 1 in 24 admit nodding off while driving


NEW YORK (AP) — This could give you nightmares: 1 in 24 U.S. adults say they recently fell asleep while driving.


And health officials behind the study think the number is probably higher. That's because some people don't realize it when they nod off for a second or two behind the wheel.


"If I'm on the road, I'd be a little worried about the other drivers," said the study's lead author, Anne Wheaton of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.


In the CDC study released Thursday, about 4 percent of U.S. adults said they nodded off or fell asleep at least once while driving in the previous month. Some earlier studies reached a similar conclusion, but the CDC telephone survey of 147,000 adults was far larger. It was conducted in 19 states and the District of Columbia in 2009 and 2010.


CDC researchers found drowsy driving was more common in men, people ages 25 to 34, those who averaged less than six hours of sleep each night, and — for some unexplained reason — Texans.


Wheaton said it's possible the Texas survey sample included larger numbers of sleep-deprived young adults or apnea-suffering overweight people.


Most of the CDC findings are not surprising to those who study this problem.


"A lot of people are getting insufficient sleep," said Dr. Gregory Belenky, director of Washington State University's Sleep and Performance Research Center in Spokane.


The government estimates that about 3 percent of fatal traffic crashes involve drowsy drivers, but other estimates have put that number as high as 33 percent.


Warning signs of drowsy driving: Feeling very tired, not remembering the last mile or two, or drifting onto rumble strips on the side of the road. That signals a driver should get off the road and rest, Wheaton said.


Even a brief moment nodding off can be extremely dangerous, she noted. At 60 mph, a single second translates to speeding along for 88 feet — the length of two school buses.


To prevent drowsy driving, health officials recommend getting 7 to 9 hours of sleep each night, treating any sleep disorders and not drinking alcohol before getting behind the wheel.


__


Online:


CDC report: http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr


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Fed minutes short-circuit Wall Street rally

NEW YORK (Reuters) - U.S. stocks dipped on Thursday after signs the Federal Reserve has growing concern about its highly stimulative monetary policy, giving investors reason to pull back after a two-day rally.


The minutes from the Fed's December policy meeting, released on Thursday, showed increasing reticence about adding to the central bank's $2.9 trillion balance sheet, which it expanded sharply in response to the financial crisis and recession of 2007-2009.


Some policymakers thought asset buying should be slowed or stopped before the end of 2013 while others highlighted the need for further stimulus. The Fed's policy of easy credit has helped push the S&P 500 to a 13.4 percent gain in 2012. Ending that policy would remove an incentive for investors to purchase riskier assets like stocks.


"The surprise was the changes to duration and extent of that program in 2013, but given the tone in previous Fed meeting minutes, it should not have been an entire surprise," said Fred Dickson, chief market strategist at D.A. Davidson & Co. in Lake Oswego, Oregon.


Despite the concerns about the effects of its asset purchases, the Fed look set to continue its open-ended stimulus program for now.


Stocks pushed the S&P 500 index 4.3 percent higher in the previous two sessions. On Thursday investors turned their focus to coming battles in Congress, including the likelihood of bitter fights over budget cuts and raising the federal debt ceiling.


"We were definitely technically extended and ripe for a little bit of a consolidation and today is very orderly - traders and investors are still trying to digest the language and the details from the 2012 taxpayer act," Dickson said.


The Dow Jones industrial average <.dji> dropped 21.19 points, or 0.16 percent, to 13,391.36. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index <.spx> shed 3.05 points, or 0.21 percent, to 1,459.37. The Nasdaq Composite Index <.ixic> lost 11.70 points, or 0.38 percent, to 3,100.57.


Economic data showed U.S. private-sector employers shrugged off a looming budget crisis and stepped up hiring in December, offering further evidence of underlying strength in the economy as 2012 ended.


The government's broader monthly payrolls report, due on Friday, is expected to show the economy created 150,000 jobs compared with 146,000 in November, according to a Reuters poll. The U.S. unemployment rate is seen holding steady at 7.7 percent.


Retailers advanced after several major companies in the sector beat expectations of modest sales increases in December, with the S&P retail index <.spxrt> up 0.4 percent.


Shares in Costco Wholesale Corp rose 1 percent to $102.49 after the company reported a better-than-expected 9 percent rise in December sales at stores open at least a year.


Gap Inc stock climbed 2.3 percent to $32.09 following news that the retailer will buy women's fashion boutique Intermix Inc, the Wall Street Journal reported.


Family Dollar Stores Inc stumbled 13 percent to $55.74 on the company's report of lower-than-expected quarterly profit.


Volume was relatively strong, with about 6.68 billion shares traded on the New York Stock Exchange, NYSE MKT and Nasdaq, slightly above the 2012 daily average of 6.42 billion.


Advancing stocks outnumbered declining ones on the NYSE by 1,692 to 1,321, while on the Nasdaq, decliners beat advancers 1,287 to 1,187.


(Reporting by Chuck Mikolajczak; Editing by Kenneth Barry)



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Eleven dead in Damascus gas station blast


AZAZ, Syria (Reuters) - At least 11 people were killed and 40 wounded when a car bomb exploded at a crowded petrol station in the Syrian capital Damascus on Thursday, opposition activists said.


The station was packed with people queuing for fuel that has become increasingly scarce during the country's 21-month-long insurgency aimed at overthrowing President Bashar al-Assad.


The semi-official al-Ikhbariya television station showed footage of 10 burnt bodies and Red Crescent workers searching for victims at the site.


The opposition Revolution Leadership Council in Damascus said the explosion was caused by a booby-trapped car.


There was no immediate indication of who was responsible for the bombing in the Barzeh al-Balad district, whose residents include members of the Sunni Muslim majority and other religious and ethnic minorities.


"The station is usually packed even when it has no fuel," said an opposition activist who did not want to be named. "There are lots of people who sleep there overnight, waiting for early morning fuel consignments."


It was the second time that a petrol station has been hit in Damascus this week. Dozens of people were incinerated in an air strike as they waited for fuel on Wednesday, according to opposition sources.


In northern Syria, rebels were battling to seize an air base in their campaign against the air power that Assad has used to bomb rebel-held towns.


More than 60,000 people have been killed in the uprising and civil war, the United Nations said this week, a much higher death toll than previously thought.


DRAMATIC ADVANCES


After dramatic advances over the second half of 2012, the rebels now hold wide swathes of territory in the north and east, but they cannot protect towns and villages from Assad's helicopters and jets.


Hundreds of rebel fighters were attempting to storm the Taftanaz air base, near the highway that links Syria's two main cities, Aleppo and Damascus.


A rebel fighter speaking from near the Taftanaz base overnight said much of the base was still in loyalist hands but insurgents had managed to destroy a helicopter and a fighter jet on the ground.


The northern rebel Idlib Coordination Committee said the rebels had detonated a car bomb inside the base.


The government's SANA news agency said the base had not fallen and that the military had "strongly confronted an attempt by the terrorists to attack the airport from several axes, inflicting heavy losses among them and destroying their weapons and munitions".


Rami Abdulrahman, head of the opposition-aligned Syrian Observatory for Human Rights which monitors the conflict from Britain, said as many as 800 fighters were involved in the assault, including Islamists from Jabhat al-Nusra, a powerful group that Washington considers terrorists.


Taftanaz is mainly a helicopter base, used for missions to resupply army positions cut off by the rebels, as well as for dropping crude "barrel bombs" on rebel-controlled areas.


Near Minakh, another northern air base that rebels have surrounded, government forces have retaliated by shelling and bombing nearby towns.


NIGHTLY BOMBARDMENTS


In the town of Azaz, where the bombardment has become a near nightly occurrence, shells hit a family house overnight. Zeinab Hammadi said her two wounded daughters, aged 10 and 12, had been rushed across the border to Turkey, one with her brain exposed.


"We were sleeping and it just landed on us in the blink of an eye," she said, weeping as she surveyed the damage.


Family members tried to salvage possessions from the wreckage, men lifting out furniture and children carrying out their belongings in tubs.


"He (Assad) wants revenge against the people," said Abu Hassan, 33, working at a garage near the destroyed house. "What is the fault of the children? Are they the ones fighting?"


Opposition activists said warplanes struck a residential building in another rebel-held northern town, Hayyan, killing at least eight civilians.


Video footage showed men carrying dismembered bodies of children and dozens of people searching for victims in the rubble. The provenance of the video could not be independently confirmed.


In addition to their tenuous grip on the north, the rebels also hold a crescent of suburbs on the edge of Damascus, which have come under bombardment by government forces that control the center of the capital.


On Wednesday, according to opposition activists, dozens of people died in an inferno caused by an air strike on a petrol station in a Damascus suburb where residents were lining up for fuel.


The civil war in Syria has become the longest and bloodiest of the conflicts that rose out of uprisings across the Arab world in the past two years.


Assad's family has ruled for 42 years since his father seized power in a coup. The war pits rebels, mainly from the Sunni Muslim majority, against a government supported by members of Assad's Shi'ite-derived Alawite minority sect and some members of other minorities who fear revenge if he falls.


The West, most Sunni-ruled Arab states and Turkey have called for Assad to step down. He is supported by Russia and Shi'ite Iran.


(Additional reporting by Khaled Yacoub Oweis in Amman and Dominic Evans in Beirut; Writing by Peter Graff; Editing by Ruth Pitchford and Giles Elgood)



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Samsung and Apple are still the only winners in the mobile market






The duopoly of the U.S. mobile market intensified dramatically in 2012. Despite increased efforts from Motorola, LG (066570), HTC (2498), Nokia (NOK) and Microsoft (MSFT) to gain market share, Samsung (005930) and Apple (AAPL) continue to steal customers away from every other company. During a three-month period ending in November, comScore found that Samsung’s lead in the U.S. smartphone market increased 1.2 percentage points for a controlling 26.9% share. Apple’s smartphone market share grew from 17.1% to 18.5%, gaining 1.4 points following the launch of the iPhone 5. Rounding out the top-five were LG, Motorola and HTC, all of which saw their market shares decrease from August. LG fell 0.7 points to 17.5%, Motorola dropped 0.8 points to 10.4% and HTC’s market share decreased from 6.3% to 5.9%.


[More from BGR: Samsung confirms plan to begin inching away from Android]






[More from BGR: ‘iPhone 5S’ to reportedly launch by June with multiple color options and two different display sizes]


The research firm found that 123.3 million people in the U.S. owned smartphones during the period, an increase of 6% since August. A majority of devices, 53.7%, were powered by Google’s (GOOG) Android operating system, which saw growth of 1.1 percentage points. Apple’s iOS market share increased 0.7 percentage points to 35%.


2012 was a transitional year for Research in Motion (RIMM) and Microsoft. Both companies spent most of the year preparing new operating systems. RIM will unveil its BlackBerry 10 operating system later this month and devices powered by Windows Phone 8 launched this past November. As a result, both companies saw lost share toward the end of 2012; RIM’s BlackBerry platform ranked third with a 7.3% share, down from 8.3% in August, and Microsoft’s operating system dropped 0.6 percentage points to a 3% share of the market.


This article was originally published by BGR


Wireless News Headlines – Yahoo! News





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Anne Hathaway Says Falling Fast for Adam Shulman Was 'Scary'















01/03/2013 at 05:45 PM EST







Adam Shulman and Anne Hathaway


Dave Allocca/Startraks


Anne Hathaway believes in love at first sight – in fact, she experienced it with her husband, Adam Shulman.

"I knew from the second I met him that he was the love of my life," the Les Miserables star says in an interview with Harper's Bazaar UK. "I also knew that I couldn't have met him at a worse time."

Hathaway says the timing was bad because she found it difficult to trust after a previous breakup.

"I took my trust out for a ridiculous joyride with him," Hathaway, 30, told the magazine for its February issue of falling for Shulman, 31. "It was scary. But as the days wore on it kept getting better and better. I found that the love I found for him made me more trusting of everyone, and the more I started to see who I had become."

Since marrying in Big Sur, Calif., in September, Hathaway says she's as happy as ever.

"He walks into a room, and I light up. I can't help it," says the Golden Globe nominee. "A few days into [filming Les Miserables], I said, 'I'm having too much fun, I just want to play with you and I need to be really sad right now.' "

Hathaway, who looks sexy in a strapless gown on the cover of Harper's Bazaar UK, says she never loved her good-girl image.

"I'm not Rihanna; I'm not cool," she says. "I was seen as this bizarre-world, good-girl cartoon that I in no way identified with – very vanilla, very sweet, very accessible and not interesting. I had no grit, no sex appeal."

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Brain image study: Fructose may spur overeating


This is your brain on sugar — for real. Scientists have used imaging tests to show for the first time that fructose, a sugar that saturates the American diet, can trigger brain changes that may lead to overeating.


After drinking a fructose beverage, the brain doesn't register the feeling of being full as it does when simple glucose is consumed, researchers found.


It's a small study and does not prove that fructose or its relative, high-fructose corn syrup, can cause obesity, but experts say it adds evidence they may play a role. These sugars often are added to processed foods and beverages, and consumption has risen dramatically since the 1970s along with obesity. A third of U.S. children and teens and more than two-thirds of adults are obese or overweight.


All sugars are not equal — even though they contain the same amount of calories — because they are metabolized differently in the body. Table sugar is sucrose, which is half fructose, half glucose. High-fructose corn syrup is 55 percent fructose and 45 percent glucose. Some nutrition experts say this sweetener may pose special risks, but others and the industry reject that claim. And doctors say we eat too much sugar in all forms.


For the study, scientists used magnetic resonance imaging, or MRI, scans to track blood flow in the brain in 20 young, normal-weight people before and after they had drinks containing glucose or fructose in two sessions several weeks apart.


Scans showed that drinking glucose "turns off or suppresses the activity of areas of the brain that are critical for reward and desire for food," said one study leader, Yale University endocrinologist Dr. Robert Sherwin. With fructose, "we don't see those changes," he said. "As a result, the desire to eat continues — it isn't turned off."


What's convincing, said Dr. Jonathan Purnell, an endocrinologist at Oregon Health & Science University, is that the imaging results mirrored how hungry the people said they felt, as well as what earlier studies found in animals.


"It implies that fructose, at least with regards to promoting food intake and weight gain, is a bad actor compared to glucose," said Purnell. He wrote a commentary that appears with the federally funded study in Wednesday's Journal of the American Medical Association.


Researchers now are testing obese people to see if they react the same way to fructose and glucose as the normal-weight people in this study did.


What to do? Cook more at home and limit processed foods containing fructose and high-fructose corn syrup, Purnell suggested. "Try to avoid the sugar-sweetened beverages. It doesn't mean you can't ever have them," but control their size and how often they are consumed, he said.


A second study in the journal suggests that only severe obesity carries a high death risk — and that a few extra pounds might even provide a survival advantage. However, independent experts say the methods are too flawed to make those claims.


The study comes from a federal researcher who drew controversy in 2005 with a report that found thin and normal-weight people had a slightly higher risk of death than those who were overweight. Many experts criticized that work, saying the researcher — Katherine Flegal of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention — painted a misleading picture by including smokers and people with health problems ranging from cancer to heart disease. Those people tend to weigh less and therefore make pudgy people look healthy by comparison.


Flegal's new analysis bolsters her original one, by assessing nearly 100 other studies covering almost 2.9 million people around the world. She again concludes that very obese people had the highest risk of death but that overweight people had a 6 percent lower mortality rate than thinner people. She also concludes that mildly obese people had a death risk similar to that of normal-weight people.


Critics again have focused on her methods. This time, she included people too thin to fit what some consider to be normal weight, which could have taken in people emaciated by cancer or other diseases, as well as smokers with elevated risks of heart disease and cancer.


"Some portion of those thin people are actually sick, and sick people tend to die sooner," said Donald Berry, a biostatistician at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston.


The problems created by the study's inclusion of smokers and people with pre-existing illness "cannot be ignored," said Susan Gapstur, vice president of epidemiology for the American Cancer Society.


A third critic, Dr. Walter Willett of the Harvard School of Public Health, was blunter: "This is an even greater pile of rubbish" than the 2005 study, he said. Willett and others have done research since the 2005 study that found higher death risks from being overweight or obese.


Flegal defended her work. She noted that she used standard categories for weight classes. She said statistical adjustments were made for smokers, who were included to give a more real-world sample. She also said study participants were not in hospitals or hospices, making it unlikely that large numbers of sick people skewed the results.


"We still have to learn about obesity, including how best to measure it," Flegal's boss, CDC Director Dr. Thomas Frieden, said in a written statement. "However, it's clear that being obese is not healthy - it increases the risk of diabetes, heart disease, cancer, and many other health problems. Small, sustainable increases in physical activity and improvements in nutrition can lead to significant health improvements."


___


Online:


Obesity info: http://www.cdc.gov/obesity/data/trends.html


___


Marilynn Marchione can be followed at http://twitter.com/MMarchioneAP


Mike Stobbe can be followed at http://twitter.com/MikeStobbe


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Wall Street starts new year with a bang after "cliff" deal

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Stocks kicked off the new year with their best day in over a year on Wednesday, sparked by relief over a last-minute deal in Washington to avert the "fiscal cliff" of tax hikes and spending cuts that threatened to derail the economy's growth.


In 2013's first trading session, the S&P 500 achieved its biggest one-day gain since December 20, 2011, pushing the benchmark index to its highest close since September 14.


Concerns over Washington's ability to sidestep the cliff had driven the S&P 500 down for five straight sessions, before signs that a resolution was near sent the benchmark index higher on the final trading session of 2012.


The CBOE Volatility Index or the VIX <.vix>, Wall Street's favorite gauge of investor anxiety, dropped 18.5 percent to 14.68 at the close. The VIX has fallen 35.4 percent over the past two sessions, the biggest 2-day percentage drop in the history of the index.


The Dow Jones industrial average <.dji> jumped 308.41 points, or 2.35 percent, to 13,412.55 at the close. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index <.spx> gained 36.23 points, or 2.54 percent, to finish at 1,462.42. The Nasdaq Composite Index <.ixic> climbed 92.75 points, or 3.07 percent, to end at 3,112.26.


U.S. markets were closed on Tuesday for New Year's Day.


Market breadth reflected the strong rally, with 10 stocks rising for every one that fell on the New York Stock Exchange. All 10 of the S&P 500 industry sector indexes gained at least 1 percent. The S&P financial index <.gspf> shot up 2.9 percent.


The S&P Information Technology index <.gspt> gained 3.2 percent, including Hewlett-Packard , which climbed 5.4 percent to $15.02. HP's gain followed a miserable 2012 when the stock fell nearly 45 percent as one of the S&P 500's worst performers for 2012.


On Tuesday, Congress passed a bill to prevent huge tax hikes and delay spending cuts that would have pushed the world's largest economy off a "fiscal cliff" and possibly into recession.


The vote avoided steep income-tax increases for a majority of Americans, but failed to resolve a major showdown over cutting the budget deficit, leaving investors and businesses with only limited clarity about the outlook for the economy. Spending cuts of $109 billion in military and domestic programs were temporarily delayed, and another fight over raising the U.S. debt limit also looms.


"We got through the fiscal cliff. The next big thing, and probably more contentious thing, is negotiating the debt ceiling and possibly entitlement reform in early 2013," said Jim Russell, senior equity strategist for U.S. Bank Wealth Management in Cincinnati.


Hard choices about budget cuts and the critical need to raise the debt ceiling will confront Congress about the same time in two months "so the fur will be flying," Russell said.


U.S. stocks ended 2012 with the S&P 500 up 13.4 percent for the year, as investors largely shrugged off worries about the fiscal cliff. For the year, the Dow gained 7.3 percent and the Nasdaq jumped 15.9 percent.


Bank shares rose following news that U.S. regulators are close to securing another multibillion-dollar settlement with the largest banks to resolve allegations that they unlawfully cut corners when foreclosing on delinquent borrowers.


Bank of America Corp rose 3.7 percent to $12.03 and Citigroup Inc gained 4.3 percent to $41.25. The KBW bank index <.bkx> rose 3.2 percent.


Shares of Zipcar Inc surged 47.8 percent to $12.18 after Avis Budget Group Inc said it would buy Zipcar for about $500 million in cash to compete with larger rivals Hertz and Enterprise Holdings Inc. Avis advanced 4.8 percent to $20.77.


Shares of Apple rose 3.2 percent to $549.03, helping to lift the S&P information technology index <.gspt> up 3.2 percent following a report that the most valuable tech company has started testing a new iPhone and a new version of its iOS software.


Economic data from the Institute for Supply Management showed U.S. manufacturing ended 2012 on an upswing despite fears about the fiscal cliff, but the Commerce Department reported that construction spending fell in November for the first time in eight months.


Volume was heavy, with about 7.8 billion shares traded on the New York Stock Exchange, the NYSE MKT and the Nasdaq, well above the 2012 daily average of 6.42 billion.


(Reporting by Chuck Mikolajczak; Editing by Jan Paschal)



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Central African Republic rebels halt advance, agree to peace talks


DAMARA, Central African Republic (Reuters) - Rebels in Central African Republic said they had halted their advance on the capital on Wednesday and agreed to start peace talks, averting a clash with regionally backed troops.


The Seleka rebels had pushed to within striking distance of Bangui after a three-week onslaught and threatened to oust President Francois Bozize, accusing him of reneging on a previous peace deal and cracking down on dissidents.


Their announcement on Wednesday gave the leader only a limited reprieve as the fighters told Reuters they might insist on his removal in the negotiations.


"I have asked our forces not to move their positions starting today because we want to enter talks in (Gabon's capital) Libreville for a political solution," said Seleka spokesman Eric Massi, speaking by telephone from Paris.


"I am in discussion with our partners to come up with proposals to end the crisis, but one solution could be a political transition that excludes Bozize," he said.


Bozize on Wednesday sacked his Army Chief of Staff and took over the defense minister's role from his son, Jean Francis Bozize, according to a decree read on national radio, a day after publicly criticizing the military for failing to repel the rebels.


The advance by Seleka, an alliance of mostly northeastern rebel groups, was the latest in a series of revolts in a country at the heart of one of Africa's most turbulent regions - and the most serious since the Chad-backed insurgency that swept Bozize to power in 2003.


Diplomatic sources have said talks organized by central African regional bloc ECCAS could start on January 10. The United States, the European Union and France have called on both sides to negotiate and spare civilians.


Central African Republic is one of the least developed countries in the world despite its deposits of gold, diamonds and other minerals. French nuclear energy group Areva mines the country's Bakouma uranium deposit - France's biggest commercial interest in its former colony.


RELIEF IN BANGUI


News of the rebel halt eased tension in Bangui, where residents had been stockpiling food and water and staying indoors after dark.


"They say they are no longer going to attack Bangui, and that's great news for us," said Jaqueline Loza in the crumbling riverside city.


ECCAS members Chad, Congo Republic, Gabon and Cameroon have sent hundreds of soldiers to reinforce CAR's army after a string of rebel victories since early December.


Gabonese General Jean Felix Akaga, commander of the regional force, said his troops were defending the town of Damara, 75 km (45 miles) north of Bangui and close to the rebel front.


"Damara is a red line not to be crossed ... Damara is in our control and Bangui is secure," he told Reuters. "If the rebellion decides to approach Damara, they know they will encounter a force that will react."


Soldiers armed with Kalashnikovs, rocket propelled grenade launchers and truck-mounted machineguns had taken up positions across the town, which was otherwise nearly-abandoned.


Some of the fighters wore turbans that covered their faces and had charms strung around their necks and arms meant to protect them against enemy bullets.


Chad's President Idriss Deby, one of Bozize's closest allies, had warned the rebels the regional force would confront them if they approached the town.


Chad provided training and equipment to the rebellion that brought Bozize to power by ousting then-president Ange Felix Patasse, who Chad accused of supporting Chadian dissidents.


Chad is also keen to keep a lid on instability in the territory close to its main oil export pipeline and has stepped in to defend Bozize against insurgents in the past.


A CAR government minister told Reuters the foreign troop presence strengthened Bozize's bargaining position ahead of the Libreville peace talks.


"The rebels are now in a position of weakness," the minister said, asking not to be named. "They should therefore stop imposing conditions like the departure of the president."


Central African Republic is one of a number of countries in the region where U.S. Special Forces are helping local soldiers track down the Lord's Resistance Army, a rebel group which has killed thousands of civilians across four nations.


France has a 600-strong force in CAR to defend about 1,200 of its citizens who live there.


Paris used air strikes to defend Bozize against a rebellion in 2006. But French President Francois Hollande turned down a request for more help, saying the days of intervening in other countries' affairs were over.


(Additional reporting by Paul-Marin Ngoupana in Bangui and Jon Herskovitz in Johannesburg; Writing by Richard Valdmanis; Editing by Andrew Heavens and Janet Lawrence)



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Ubuntu se mete en los celulares con un sistema operativo propio






Al igual que otras plataformas que buscan una convergencia entre el mundo móvil y la PC, Canonical confirmó el arribo de su sistema operativo Ubuntu a los dispositivos móviles. Disponible en una primera instancia como una instalación no oficial para la línea de smartphones Nexus 3, la versión de Linux utilizada en más de 20 millones busca posicionarse como una alternativa ante un mercado dominado por compañías como Apple y Google, junto a las propuestas de Microsoft con Windows Phone y Research in Motion con sus teléfonos BlackBerry.


La compañía dio un primer paso en febrero de 2012 con Ubuntu for Android , una distribución para “mejorar” el Android convencional.






La versión actual es un sistema operativo que sólo comparte con Android el uso de sus drivers (ambos están basados en Linux), pero no usa una máquina virtual Java, por lo que los 700.000 programas con las que cuenta Android no estarán disponibles directamente. Ubuntu tendrá su propia suite de aplicaciones, y permitirá la suma de nuevas que estén programadas en HTML5 o sean nativas.


Canonical también planea lanzar un teléfono de diseño propio que llegaría al mercado en 2014, pero no brindó mayores detalles sobre el fabricante involucrado. Los recientes cambios en la interfaz de Ubuntu, denominada Unity, marcaron una tendencia en la distribución hacia la interacción en pantallas sensibles al tacto, y este lanzamiento representa un primer paso de la distribución para ingresar en el mundo móvil de los smartphones y las tabletas.


Las prestaciones de una PC, en un dispositivo de bolsillo


Según Mark Shuttleworth, CEO de Canonical, en un principio esta versión de Ubuntu apunta a los entusiastas de la plataforma, pero con una rápida expansión hacia el resto de los usuarios. “Por primera vez en la historia los usuarios de los teléfonos celulares pueden tener las prestaciones completas que tiene en una PC, y tenemos una ventaja en esto”, dijo el ejecutivo.


Así lo explica Mark Shuttleworth en video, mostrando los gestos que permiten controlar Ubuntu móvil:


El concepto se asemeja a la modalidad presentada por Motorola con su teléfono Atrix , que se convertía en una PC al ser conectado en una base que servía de conexión con un monitor. A su vez, el móvil también podía ser utilizado como una notebook mediante un dispositivo denominado lapdock.


Aún no disponible para su descarga, la presentación formal de Ubuntu para teléfonos ante el público será en la feria Consumer Electronic Show de Las Vegas, en donde LA NACION estará presente para la cobertura de los primeros lanzamientos del año que realizará la industria.


En busca del podio móvil


Con los dispositivos basados en iOS y Android, varias compañías disputan ser la alternativa a las plataformas dominantes. Microsoft busca de la mano de Nokia posicionar a Windows Phone junto a fabricantes como HTC y Samsung. La compañía de Redmond también desea aprovechar la integración con Windows 8 para sacar provecho de su dominio en el mundo de las PC, un segmento en lento retroceso frente a los teléfonos inteligentes y tabletas.


En este punto, la integración entre las PC y los dispositivos móviles también forman parte de los objetivos de Apple, que replicó el exitoso modelo App Store en su línea de computadoras con Mac OS X, utilizado en el iPhone y la tableta iPad, mientras que Google mantiene su apuesta en su plataforma basada en la nube con servicios como Gmail y Drive, entre otros.


Por su parte, Research in Motion presentará su nueva plataforma BB10 , un demorado lanzamiento que tendrá lugar a fines de este mes y con el que busca recuperar el terreno perdido en los últimos años con un renovado teléfono móvil tactil basado en el sistema operativo QNX, utilizado en su tableta Playbook.


Dentro de este pelotón de contendientes también se encuentra Firefox OS , un competidor que más se asemeja a la filosofía de la plataforma de Canonical y que ofrece un sistema operativo basado en el navegador web de la fundación Mozilla. Cuenta con el apoyo de las principales operadoras de telecomunicaciones y apunta a contar con un teléfono de costo accesible para mercados emergentes.


Por su parte, un grupo de desarrolladores responsables de Meego, la plataforma utilizada por Nokia para el N9, se reunieron para presentar a Sailfish OS , un sistema operativo basado en Linux que se encuentra en una incipiente etapa de desarrollo y que planea tener también, al igual que Firefox OS y Ubuntu, un teléfono para mediados de este año.


Linux/Open Source News Headlines – Yahoo! News





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Julianne Hough: I Was Physically Abused as a Child















01/02/2013 at 04:45 PM EST



When Julianne Hough was 10 years old, she lived in London, away from her parents in Utah, studying dance.

That's when the abuse began, she says.

"I was abused, mentally, physically, everything," she says in Cosmopolitan's February issue, on newsstands Jan. 8.

While attending the prestigious Italia Conti Academy of Arts, she says the adults around her took advantage of her being without parental supervision: "I was 10 years old looking like I was 28, being a very sensual dancer."

"I was a tormented little kid who had to put on this sexy façade because that was my job and my life," she adds. "But my heart was the same, and I was this innocent little girl. I wanted so much love."

The actress, now 24, says the abuse became worse "when I started hitting puberty, when I started becoming a woman and stopped being a little girl."

Her classmates included future Dancing with the Stars pros Mark Ballas and Julianne's brother Derek Hough, both also children at the time. They had formed their own pop music group when Julianne was 12 performing in the U.S. and the U.K.

Hough declines to say who abused her or provide other details.

"I'm a very forgiving person, and I don't want to hurt anybody," she says. "What's past is past."

But the painful emotions surfaced during filming of her latest movie, Safe Haven, opening Feb. 14, about a girl who survives an abusive ex-boyfriend and accepts the love of a widower, played by Josh Duhamel.

During one particularly difficult scene, she says, "I went from bawling to containing to laughing to crying again. Josh was crying. I think it was the most therapeutic moment of my life."

As for her own love life, Hough says that she and boyfriend Ryan Seacrest work to find time for each other around their busy schedules.

"We love what we do," she says. "We take pride in giving it our all, but then when we're alone, we really focus in on going to dinners and being extra-romantic and affectionate and just being there for each other."

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Brain image study: Fructose may spur overeating


This is your brain on sugar — for real. Scientists have used imaging tests to show for the first time that fructose, a sugar that saturates the American diet, can trigger brain changes that may lead to overeating.


After drinking a fructose beverage, the brain doesn't register the feeling of being full as it does when simple glucose is consumed, researchers found.


It's a small study and does not prove that fructose or its relative, high-fructose corn syrup, can cause obesity, but experts say it adds evidence they may play a role. These sugars often are added to processed foods and beverages, and consumption has risen dramatically since the 1970s along with obesity. A third of U.S. children and teens and more than two-thirds of adults are obese or overweight.


All sugars are not equal — even though they contain the same amount of calories — because they are metabolized differently in the body. Table sugar is sucrose, which is half fructose, half glucose. High-fructose corn syrup is 55 percent fructose and 45 percent glucose. Some nutrition experts say this sweetener may pose special risks, but others and the industry reject that claim. And doctors say we eat too much sugar in all forms.


For the study, scientists used magnetic resonance imaging, or MRI, scans to track blood flow in the brain in 20 young, normal-weight people before and after they had drinks containing glucose or fructose in two sessions several weeks apart.


Scans showed that drinking glucose "turns off or suppresses the activity of areas of the brain that are critical for reward and desire for food," said one study leader, Yale University endocrinologist Dr. Robert Sherwin. With fructose, "we don't see those changes," he said. "As a result, the desire to eat continues — it isn't turned off."


What's convincing, said Dr. Jonathan Purnell, an endocrinologist at Oregon Health & Science University, is that the imaging results mirrored how hungry the people said they felt, as well as what earlier studies found in animals.


"It implies that fructose, at least with regards to promoting food intake and weight gain, is a bad actor compared to glucose," said Purnell. He wrote a commentary that appears with the federally funded study in Wednesday's Journal of the American Medical Association.


Researchers now are testing obese people to see if they react the same way to fructose and glucose as the normal-weight people in this study did.


What to do? Cook more at home and limit processed foods containing fructose and high-fructose corn syrup, Purnell suggested. "Try to avoid the sugar-sweetened beverages. It doesn't mean you can't ever have them," but control their size and how often they are consumed, he said.


A second study in the journal suggests that only severe obesity carries a high death risk — and that a few extra pounds might even provide a survival advantage. However, independent experts say the methods are too flawed to make those claims.


The study comes from a federal researcher who drew controversy in 2005 with a report that found thin and normal-weight people had a slightly higher risk of death than those who were overweight. Many experts criticized that work, saying the researcher — Katherine Flegal of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention — painted a misleading picture by including smokers and people with health problems ranging from cancer to heart disease. Those people tend to weigh less and therefore make pudgy people look healthy by comparison.


Flegal's new analysis bolsters her original one, by assessing nearly 100 other studies covering almost 2.9 million people around the world. She again concludes that very obese people had the highest risk of death but that overweight people had a 6 percent lower mortality rate than thinner people. She also concludes that mildly obese people had a death risk similar to that of normal-weight people.


Critics again have focused on her methods. This time, she included people too thin to fit what some consider to be normal weight, which could have taken in people emaciated by cancer or other diseases, as well as smokers with elevated risks of heart disease and cancer.


"Some portion of those thin people are actually sick, and sick people tend to die sooner," said Donald Berry, a biostatistician at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston.


The problems created by the study's inclusion of smokers and people with pre-existing illness "cannot be ignored," said Susan Gapstur, vice president of epidemiology for the American Cancer Society.


A third critic, Dr. Walter Willett of the Harvard School of Public Health, was blunter: "This is an even greater pile of rubbish" than the 2005 study, he said. Willett and others have done research since the 2005 study that found higher death risks from being overweight or obese.


Flegal defended her work. She noted that she used standard categories for weight classes. She said statistical adjustments were made for smokers, who were included to give a more real-world sample. She also said study participants were not in hospitals or hospices, making it unlikely that large numbers of sick people skewed the results.


"We still have to learn about obesity, including how best to measure it," Flegal's boss, CDC Director Dr. Thomas Frieden, said in a written statement. "However, it's clear that being obese is not healthy - it increases the risk of diabetes, heart disease, cancer, and many other health problems. Small, sustainable increases in physical activity and improvements in nutrition can lead to significant health improvements."


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Online:


Obesity info: http://www.cdc.gov/obesity/data/trends.html


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Marilynn Marchione can be followed at http://twitter.com/MMarchioneAP


Mike Stobbe can be followed at http://twitter.com/MikeStobbe


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House Republicans balk at "fiscal cliff" deal


WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Last-minute efforts to step back from the "fiscal cliff" ran into trouble on Tuesday as Republicans in the House of Representatives balked at a deal that would prevent Washington from pushing the world's biggest economy into a recession.


House Republicans complained that a bill passed by the Senate in a late-night show of unity to prevent a budget crisis contained tax hikes for the wealthiest Americans but no spending cuts. Some conservatives sought to change the bill to add cuts.


That would set up a high-stakes showdown between the two chambers and risk a stinging rebuke from financial markets that are due to open in Asia in a few hours.


The Senate would refuse to accept any changes to the bill, a Senate aide said, and it appeared increasingly possible that Congress could push the country over the fiscal cliff after all, despite months of effort.


Strictly speaking, the United States went over the cliff in the first minutes of the New Year because Congress failed to produce legislation to halt $600 billion of tax hikes and spending cuts that start kicking in on January 1.


But with financial markets and federal government offices closed for the New Year's Day holiday, lawmakers had a little more time to work out a compromise without real-world consequences.


The Senate bill drew overwhelming support from Republicans and Democrats alike when it passed by a vote of 89 to 8.


But Republicans who control the House expressed wide dismay with the measure, which includes only $12 billion in spending cuts along with $620 billion in tax increases on top earners.


Majority Leader Eric Cantor, the No. 2 Republican in the House, told reporters after huddling with other Republicans that he does not support the Senate's bill.


"The lack of spending cuts in the Senate bill was a universal concern amongst members in today's meeting. Conversations with members will continue throughout the afternoon on the path forward," said Cantor spokesman Rory Cooper.


Republicans returned for a second meeting at 5:15 p.m. EST (2215 GMT).


Republicans could face a backlash if they scuttle the deal. Income tax rates rose back to 1990s levels for all Americans at midnight, and across-the-board spending cuts on defense and domestic programs would begin to kick in on Wednesday.


Economists say the combination of tax cuts and spending cuts could cause the economy to shrink, and public opinion polls show Republicans would shoulder the blame.


MARKET DISCIPLINE?


Lingering uncertainty over U.S. fiscal policy has unnerved investors and depressed business activity for months.


Financial markets have staved off a steep plunge on the assumption that Washington would ultimately avoid pushing the country off the fiscal cliff into a recession.


Several Republicans said the fight could spill over until Wednesday, at which point they could be pressured by financial markets to accept the Senate bill.


"Everyone knows once the markets open tomorrow our courage drops in direct proportion to the market fall," said one Republican lawmaker who spoke on condition of anonymity.


The bill passed by the Democratic-led Senate at around 2 a.m. would raise income taxes on families earning more than $450,000 per year and limit the amount of deductions they can take to lower their tax bill.


Low temporary rates that have been in place for less-affluent taxpayers for the past decade would be made permanent, along with a range of targeted tax breaks put in place to fight the 2009 economic downturn.


However, workers would see up to $2,000 more taken out of their paychecks annually as a temporary payroll tax cut was set to expire.


The non-partisan Congressional Budget Office said the Senate bill would increase budget deficits by nearly $4 trillion over the coming 10 years, compared to the budget savings that would occur if the extreme measures of the cliff were to kick in.


But the bill would actually save $650 billion during that time period when measured against the tax and spending policies that were in effect on Monday, according to the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, an independent group that has pushed for more aggressive deficit savings.


(Additional reporting by Richard Cowan; Writing by Andy Sullivan; Editing by Alistair Bell and Eric Beech)



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