text:
PHNOM PENH: The Prime Minister of Cambodia and Chairman of ASEAN in 2022, Hun Sen, has announced that he will continue to strive for better ASEAN cooperation with the People's Republic of China (PRC) to ensure the sustainability and resilience of socioeconomic development in the region.
At the Opening of the 19th China-ASEAN Expo 2022 held on Friday morning, 16 September, Prime Minister Hun Sen stated that ASEAN-China economic cooperation has accomplished many achievements since the signing of the ASEAN-China Framework Agreement on Comprehensive Economic Cooperation in 2002, as well as other subsequent signings of ASEAN-China free trade and investment agreements.
As the Chair of ASEAN, Cambodia supports the initiative to promote the ASEAN-China Free Trade Agreement to a new level and believes that we must pay more attention to further expanding and deepening the scope of ASEAN-China economic cooperation, particularly focusing on minimizing barriers to trade in goods, services and investment, as well as promoting the development of digital economy, green growth and capacity building of small and medium enterprises (SMEs).
"I am confident that the implementation of the RCEP agreement, starting this year, will not only create and bring more trade and investment opportunities for countries in the region, but will also significantly contribute to the growth of the mentioned sectors, and especially will act as the 'core framework' for building a version 3.0 ASEAN-China Free Trade Area in the future," said the Prime Minister.
Taking this opportunity, the ASEAN Chair also thanked the Chinese government for always giving high priority to supporting the development and progress of ASEAN.
He announced that Cambodia will continue to work towards strengthening ASEAN cooperation with the PRC to ensure the sustainability and resilience of socioeconomic development in both regions.
China was recognized as an ASEAN dialogue partner in July 1996 in Jakarta, Indonesia.
China has retained its position as ASEAN’s largest trading partner since 2009. Trade between ASEAN and China has more than doubled since 2010, from US $235.5 billion to US 507.9 billion in 2019.


text:
GamePro has a great article that gets to the heart of an issue that I have been stewing about for quite some time: the quality of games journalism. Oftentimes, it seems that it consists of previews, reviews and industry news. There is very little investigative reporting, unless you count interviewing a voice actor as investigating and almost no follow-up once a game has been released, unless it is a buggy mess.
Publishers use journalists to get the story they want out there and if you don’t cooperate, they will just limit your access and all of sudden you will find yourself being the only website in the world not having a preview or early review of the latest and hottest game.
This article goes into details about a few issues facing reporters these days and I think it is worth reading. Reporters are not there to cheer or advocate for their favorite games or consoles, that should be clear.
What do you think can be done to improve the state of gaming journalism? Do you even think there is a problem?

domain: news


text:
The National Bureau of Statistics on Monday released the merchandise trade statistics report for the first quarter of 2013 with a claim that the country recorded a N2.08tn drop in total trade from N7.185tn in the last quarter of 2012 to N5.098tn in the period under review.
In the report, which was signed by the Statistician-General of the Federation, Dr. Yemi Kale, the bureau stated that the N2.08tn represented a 29 per cent drop over the figure recorded in the fourth quarter of 2012.
The NBS noted in the report that declining exports and rising imports led to the country’s weak trade imbalance.
For instance, it said while the value of exports dropped by 41.4 per cent from N5.892tn in the fourth quarter of 2012 to N3.452tn in the first quarter of this year, a marginal increase of 27.4 per cent from N1.292tn in the fourth quarter 2012 to N1.646tn in the first quarter 2013 was recorded for imports.
It said, “Nigeria’s external merchandise trade totalled N5.098tn in the first quarter of 2013, a decrease of N2.086tn or 29 per cent from the N7.185tn recorded in the previous quarter. The decrease emanated mainly from the fall in the value of exports from N5.892tn in the fourth quarter of 2012 to N3.452tn in the first quarter of 2013, a 41.4 per cent decline.
“Furthermore, a 27.4 per cent increase in imports from N1.292tn in the fourth quarter of 2012 to N1.646tn in the first quarter of 2013, in combination with a decrease in exports, created a decline in the trade balance by N2.794tn or 60.8 per cent during the period.”
Year-on-year, the report stated that the value of the nation’s total merchandise trade decreased by N1.523tn or 23.0 per cent as a result of decreasing imports and exports.
“A drop in exports compared to imports also led to a decline in the trade balance by 45.6 per cent during this period as well,” it said.


text:
Necessary commodities such as food and fuel have become significantly more expensive in the last five years. But, car prices have remained steady or seen a moderate rise.
The Wholesale Price Index (WPI) for all commodities (Base: 2004-05 = 100) rose 42.44 per cent between April 2012 (163.1) and April 2007 (114.5).
In the same period, the WPI for motor (passenger) vehicles rose 13.94 per cent, while for the whole automotive sector it was up 19.86 per cent.
Fear larger than reality
There are many reasons for this. Firstly, there has been a sharp rise in volumes helping carmakers absorb the higher input costs.
Between 2006-07 and 2011-2012, passenger vehicle sales went up 90 per cent (1.37 million to 2.61 million). Thus, the increased scale of production has helped by getting in economies of scale.
“The fear that car prices are up is larger than the reality, especially because they are highly dependent on fuel costs and interest rates. OEMs are trying to deflate costs while being aggressive on the pricing front,” said Mr Abdul Majeed, auto practice leader at PwC India.
Added an industry executive, “The model portfolio of companies has significantly widened in the last few years, especially towards the premium segments. This has put less pressure on the lower margin mass segment models, helping them maintain the lower prices.”
The larger volumes have helped push up aggregate profits, even if the per-unit margins have declined.
A highly price-sensitive Indian customer and increased competition from new players has also made incumbents adopt a more aggressive pricing strategy.
“A tight watch on costs has led to higher automation in the factory. So, the production efficiency has gone up, while wastages have reduced,” another industry source said.
Another factor helping carmakers contain input costs is the increased localisation, which today is as high as over 95 per cent for players such as Maruti Suzuki, Tata Motors and Hyundai.
The domestic sourcing of components and raw materials, such as steel, has made companies less vulnerable to rupee depreciation.
The negative forex impact on the bottom line has also been offset through an increased focus on exports to markets such as Europe, South America, Africa and South-East Asia.
Exports are usually a higher margin business.


text:
Louis Vuitton has debuted “Generation V,” a campaign highlighting Virgil Abloh‘s final collection with the label. Shot by Tyrone Lebon, the campaign features some of Alboh’s collaborative partners including Solange Knowles, Yasiin Bey, Nigo, Kai-Isaiah Jamal and Yusef Dayes.
In a visual accompanying the photographs, Abloh’s voice can be heard delivering one of his many uplifting quotes: “You can’t waste even a day subscribing to what someone thinks you can do. The goal is to open up doors for others. The young generation realize that you are what you make yourself to be.”
Responding to the campaign, Solange took to Instagram where she published a text conversation between herself and Abloh just four days before his passing on November 28,2021. In the text he writes about “recalibrating and looking at 2022 like a blank canvas…”
Check out the campaign below and Solange’s Instagram post.
Presenting Generation “V”. #LouisVuitton’s new campaign brings together friends, talents and familiar faces in a tribute to Virgil Abloh’s lasting legacy of unity and inclusivity. Discover the #LVMenFW22 campaign at https://t.co/u1UCQyZXxw pic.twitter.com/3IZIrosdzK— Louis Vuitton (@LouisVuitton) July 15, 2022


text:
ShopCadeaux has discounted consumer merchandise 50% as it transitions to a corporate focus, leaving holiday shoppers and business owners the winners
WEST BLOOMFIELD, MICHIGAN, UNITED STATES, December 2, 2021 /EINPresswire.com/ — Known for cultivating relationships through beautifully curated and specially packaged luxurious gift collections, ShopCadeaux is bringing its online storefront to life in West Bloomfield, Mich., just in time to help consumers and corporations deliver the best gifts for the 2021 holiday season.
“We’ve recently begun to transition from an online consumer company to one with a focus on corporate gift giving and had already purchased tremendous amounts of high-quality inventory that’s sitting in our warehouse,” said Robert Shekell, president, ShopCadeaux. “With supply chain issues wreaking holiday havoc, we decided now was the time to liquidate these first-run consumer products for the whole family at 50 percent off retail pricing – awarding consumers some exceptional buys and corporate retail buyers an opportunity to boost their inventories and meet their own consumer demand.”
Shoppers may visit the pop-up store during business hours or visit ShopCadeaux.com and click on the “Sale” tab to browse merchandise discounted 50 percent. Products include singular gift items available for purchase, as well as curated and specially packaged gift collections.
Visitors to the pop-up shop in West Bloomfield can work directly with a ShopCadeaux representative in-store to create their own special holiday curated collections ranging from the container to the contents within, all personalized for the recipient.
All products offered by ShopCadeaux are brand new and of high quality and span several categories to provide something for everyone, including cashmere throws, candles, confections, tech video conferencing packages, gratitude boards, cutting boards, children’s toys, wine, home and garden items, apparel and more.
Businesses of all sizes can purchase products from ShopCadeaux in limited quantity or bulk and have those products shipped to their location in time to restock shelves and then sell for the 2021 holiday. Consumers are also welcomed to participate in the savings online or in the store.
The ShopCadeaux pop-up shop is located at 3160 Haggerty Rd., Ste. C/D, in West Bloomfield, Mich. Through the end of the year, hours are 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. on Thursday and Friday and 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. on Saturday and Sunday. ShopCadeaux books private shopping events at no cost at times convenient for organizations such as first responders, teachers and senior groups. Contact ShopCadeaux at (248) 242-6921 to schedule a private group shopping experience.
A high-quality curated gift company that offers corporations and individuals an opportunity to express their gratitude for employees and clients at those special milestones, including retirements, birthdays and holidays, as well as providing corporate incentives and loyalty programs throughout the year.
These individualized, custom gifts are beautifully packaged with wax seals ribbons, luxurious paper, creative messaging and artwork. Learn more www.ShopCadeaux.com.
Catalyst Media Factory


text:
For delivery startup Postmates to be effective long-term, its courier network needs to be busy all day, not just during peak meal times. A new partnership with e-commerce software company Shopify may help.
Shopify announced today that businesses that use its software to run their online shops can now give their customers a same-day delivery option through Postmates. The delivery option will be available to the more than 21,000 Shopify businesses based in the 40 metro areas where Postmates couriers are currently operating.
The move underscores the growing appeal of express delivery options among businesses and shoppers in urban centers. It also highlights Postmates’ attempt to add delivery volume to its network and be known for more than food and beverage delivery. The highly funded startup has delivery partnerships with Starbucks, Chipotle and McDonald’s, among others.
But, on average, online shops that use Shopify software only do about 10 percent of their business locally. So this delivery option will only be available for those transactions.
Customers shopping on these small business websites will pay anywhere from $5 to $20 for the same-day delivery option. Postmates keeps all of that fee.
This article originally appeared on Recode.net.


text:
Next phase of economic development under way
Helga van Eckert's last day before leaving New Jersey for her new post as director of the Flagler County Department of Economic Opportunity was cold and rainy.
While the area enjoys unseasonably warm temperatures, Van Eckert knows that things could get a lot hotter as the county's economic development effort heats up.
Before she joined members of the Economic Opportunity Advisory Council earlier this week for a tour of the Whitney Laboratory for Marine Bioscience in Marineland, Van Eckert talked about the challenges and opportunities for economic development in Flagler County.
"I think one of the biggest assets is the airport and the existing businesses," she said. "Then, of course, bringing new business in is always a little more of a challenge."
Van Eckert said the first step is to get a good foundation in place to make the county competitive in attracting new business development.
"It kind of falls into place," she said.
The biggest challenge she sees is the economy itself.
"There's no secret that the economy is the real challenge today," Van Eckert said.
As conditions improve and businesses begin to move forward with expansion or relocation plans, Van Eckert said it's important for the county to position itself properly.
"You want to make your county stand out," she said.
One of the big issues facing Van Eckert and the county's economic development team is the hefty expectations of officials, residents and the business community.
But Van Eckert said success can be measured in different ways.
"I don't believe you can measure success by number of jobs," she said. "What you have to look at is opportunities."
Van Eckert said getting the county to stand out and attract interest from prospective businesses is a main ingredient for a successful economic development effort.
"If there's a chance to have something and you put in the effort and it pays off, great," she said.
Fed reports stronger expansion in Southeast
The Federal Reserve Board's latest Beige Book report described economic activity in the Sixth District -- which includes Florida -- as "expanding at a somewhat stronger pace" in the first several weeks of 2012.
While still hewing to the mantra of cautious optimism, Fed staff said retailers reported increased sales compared with the same period in 2011 and categorized automobile sales as "robust."
District-wide construction activity increased, according to the Beige Book report, though Florida contacts were more cautious.
"Over the next several months, homebuilders anticipate new home sales and construction to be flat to slightly up compared with a year earlier," the report said.
As has been the pattern through much of the economic downturn, the travel and tourism sector continued to be an economic bright spot, according to the Fed report.
"Hospitality contacts reported that tourism activity remained strong and most were optimistic regarding the outlook for leisure and hospitality spending in 2012," the report said.


text:
The analytics group Lightstone released a study showing that there were 375 electric vehicles that had been sold in South Africa as of January 2018.
The minister of transport, Blade Nzimande, updated that information in March 2019 and said that there are a total of 867 EVs registered in the country. The sudden rise in the number of electrically powered vehicles in South Africa can be the result of several trends that are currently taking place –and may keep the number of EVs growing.
Gauteng accounts for half of this total with 390 of the 867 registered vehicles, while in Western Cape there are 252. The rest is made up by the country’s remaining provinces with fewer than 100 vehicles in each of them.
This distribution is probably the result of the concentration of infrastructure needed for this type of transportation. As even though there are charging facilities are available in each province, Gauteng is the front runner with over 90 stations.
More Charging Stations
However, the adoption of electric transportation is bound to increase even more in the following years since public charging stations will become more available. These charging stations are said to be located along National Routes. Jaguar Land Rover is in charge of this ambitious plan.
The company has made a huge investment into “Jaguar Powerway”, a network of chargers which are developed together with EV charging service and Equipment Company GridCards.
The R30-million initiative will include 90 charging points, some of which will be located at shopping centres.
The installation of new charging points aims at closing the gap between South African cities.
South Africa’s city centres will soon be connected by a series of charging stations along the N3 between Gauteng and Durban and the N1 between Gauteng and Cape Town. Cape Town will also be connected to the Garden Route with more charging stations along the N2 all the way to East London.
Most of these stations on the public network will be 60kWh fast chargers, which means that a charge from 0 to 80% will take around 72 minutes.
Similarly, Nissan South Africa says that the company will start working on a focused pilot programmed this year to establish the necessary environment for the complete introduction of EVs and related technologies from 2020.
BMW has 57 ChargeNow charging stations in South Africa, six of which are shared with Nissan, and the groups are hoping to expand the base by adding an additional 30 ChargeNow stations to the South African charging network by the end of this year.
New Electric Vehicles Entering the Market
Infrastructure is important to accelerate the adoption of EVs, but a wide variety of electric cars available in the market is also necessary.
The first manufacturers to introduce electric vehicles in South Africa were Nissan and BMW with the Leaf and the i3 respectively. The Nissan Leaf was introduced to South Africa in 2013 and the company has confirmed that it is planning to roll out a brand new Nissan Leaf soon.
Two years later, the launch of the BMW i3 brought about a renewed interest in electric cars, so the sales of the Leaf experienced a sudden rise.
Even though the South African market already offers these two all-electric cars, the introduction of the entire electric car industry is on the way. More car manufacturers have announced their intention to enter the industry in response to global trends. In 2018, around 1.6M EVs were sold in the US, Europe and China. Manufacturers believe that South Africa has the potential to become a globally competitive EV market as well.
A brand new all-electric car has entered the local market early in March. After its global launch of electric cars last year, Jaguar Land Rover announced that it would be launching its own electric vehicle to the South African market in March 2019. And so it did.
Drivers will soon see more and more Jaguar I-Paces, the company’s first all-electric cars, on the South African streets.
Voted “Car of the Year” at the European Car of the Year Awards 2019, the Jaguar I-Pace has a Lithium-ion battery which can be topped-up with a range of flexible charging types like 7.4kW wall box units installed in homes, public chargers along the “Jaguar Powerway” and even regular household sockets, making charging the car more accessible to everyone.
A new car in the local market may cause another renewed interest in electrically powered vehicles, as it happened in 2015 with the introduction of the BMW i3. The I-Pace represents a new era of motoring in South Africa and, coupled with the company’s investment in the infrastructure, they have certainly paved the way for wider adoption of zero-emission vehicles.
As Christian Rennella, CEO of the online service QuotesAdvisor.com that compares car insurance prices, expressed electrically powered vehicles are in themselves an indispensible and natural development of the auto industry in the 21st century and the car insurance industry keeps up with this development. Christian estimates that the car insurance prices for EVs in South Africa will decline of 20% by 2020, as EVs will become less of a rarity, which causes prices to go down.
Moreover, there are some local government initiatives that foster the adoption of electric vehicles. These include the Automotive Production and Development Programme and the Green Transport Strategy. Whereas the former seeks to open up discussions related to EV imports and more infrastructure developments, the latter outlines efforts to contribute towards a 5% reduction of emissions in the transport sector by 2050. These two initiatives are part of the government’s plan to lower carbon emissions and reduce their dependency on fossil fuels. They considered that a switch to EVs is inevitable and essential.
The number of electric cars in the country has doubled over the last year and now, with development of infrastructure grid, new cars entering the market and government intervention, the uptake of EVs is only set to increase in the next five to 10 years.


text:
For the first time in six years, U.S. vid game sales dropped slightly from the year before, according to the Interactive Digital Software Assn. Sales totaled $6.02 billion in 2000, compared with $6.1…
The magazine trend that began years ago with Yahoo! and eBay is still going strong.
F/x mag Cinefex has been one of the top chroniclers of the advancements in the visual effects industry over the past 20 years. The web component of the publication, which comes out four times a year…
Domestic Film WEEKEND OF
PROVIDED BY: Box Office
The Maze Runner
The Maze Runner1Weekend:$32.5M
A Walk Among the Tombstones
A Walk Among the Tombstones2Weekend:$13.1M
This Is Where I Leave You
This Is Where I Leave You3Weekend:$11.9M
When the producers of "The West Wing" recently asked Samsung to place 25 of its sleek new silver flatscreen computer monitors in an episode of the hit NBC show, the electronics retailer wasn't…
Name: Digital Media OnlineWeb address: www.digitalmedianet.com Founded: 1999Launch date: Digital Media Online launched first groups of sites in May of 1999. Number of employees: 40CEO: Lou Wallace…
Punk is alive and well. Just go to Blank TV.com and feast your eyes on some totally out-there videos by bands that hardly get rotation on MTV.
Day 1: I decide to make a movie.Day 2: Depression sets in. This is going to be more difficult than I had anticipated. I hadn't even thought about things like, well, I don't have a camera, for…
Is Hollywood warming up to brick-and-mortar companies bankrolling advertainment on the Internet?
Hitplay Media has upped Brian Newton to chief financial officer, Matt Graczyk as general manager of operations and Kent Samoorian as controller, as the former entertainment Netcaster focuses more on…
CenterSpan Communications, the company that bought Scour and its assets for $9 million in cash and common stock late last year in bankruptcy court, is beta testing the new file-swapping site.


text:
|By Business Wire||
|April 29, 2014 06:00 PM EDT||
ShareThis today released the “Return on a Share Report,” a groundbreaking study that is the first to quantify the monetary value of online recommendations. The report, which will be presented at the Return on Sharing Summit to be held tomorrow in New York City in partnership with the Paley Center for Media, shows that shared online content, such as recommendations shared between friends, now influences consumer purchases more than price and brand, carries nearly as much weight as in-person recommendations and can motivate buyers to spend 9.5 percent more for a product. ShareThis and the Paley Center will convene a high-level group of media and marketing executives for conversations inspired by the report, which is available for free at www.sharethismoment.com.
“There’s no question consumers are actively looking online for recommendations and content to help them decide what to buy,” said Kurt Abrahamson, CEO of ShareThis. “We’ve all known that social sharing is important, but it’s been difficult to measure its impact on consumer spending -- until now. For the first time, this report offers a guide for brands to determine the value of social content, and to make informed decisions about where and how they need to invest to engage their customers.”
The study used two different methodologies to survey more than 6,000 consumers buying in three different industries: automotive, technology and consumer packaged goods (CPG). Some of the key findings include:
- Across all three categories, the value of a positive online share is 9.5 percent, which means that shared reviews or recommendations over social networks increase the value and desirability of products, whether it’s store brands in a supermarket, personal electronics or an automobile.
- A positive recommendation is more important to consumers than price and brand combined, with a relative importance of 57 percent for a recommendation, compared to 28 percent for price and 16 percent for brand across all three categories.
- Positive recommendations can also enable manufacturers and retailers to charge more for products. In fact, a strong positive recommendation, on average, can motivate a consumer to pay 8.8 percent more. That translates to adding, on average, $3,700 to the price that a consumer is willing to pay for a vehicle, $27 to the price of a mini-tablet and $0.75 to the price of a typical supermarket item.
- Conversely, negative recommendations can deter consumers from purchasing by an average of 11.0 percent across all categories.
- The value of online sharing consistently outperforms both consumer ratings and reviews, and an online share carries essentially the same value as in-person recommendation.
- The monetary value and influence of a recommendation or share is also related to the source -- where professionals and close friends and family members have the greatest impact, and strangers the least.
“The Paley Center’s mission is to provide the various stakeholders in the media industry with an independent forum to discuss important topics like this,” said Pat Mitchell, president and CEO, The Paley Center for Media. “We are proud to partner with ShareThis to present their original research and convene a dialogue that will advance our understanding of the sharing economy.”
This research is a crucial milestone for product marketers and publishers who no longer have to guess at the value of their social campaigns, and instead can use the evidence-based model and findings presented in this report. For product marketers, this report offers recommendations for engaging current customers as partners and brand evangelists, incentivizing online sharing, creating shareable experiences, monitoring social media, addressing negative reviews, using paid media to convert new customers, and using social insights to determine where and when to invest in media buys. The Return on a Share study is also a valuable resource for publishers who can use the results to guide content development, drive traffic, understand social metrics, and turn data into action for their developers to engage readers in new and innovative ways.
“We are seeing a fundamental shift in consumer purchasing behavior,” said Lisa Weinstein, President, Global Digital, Data and Analytics at Starcom MediaVest Group. “The explosion of social content like recommendations is having a real impact in people's day-to-day lives, including what we buy and how much we are willing to pay. While we’ve known intrinsically that online engagement is important, being able to quantify the monetary value of online recommendations and sharing, as these findings do, is incredibly important for brands.”
The Return on Sharing study was developed by Beresford Research of Westport, Conn., and conducted in two phases during late 2013 and early 2014. It is the first study of its kind to apply scientific, statistical methodology to the problem of determining the actual monetary value of a social share.
ShareThis uses large-scale social data to deliver breakthrough insights, audience building and advertising solutions across mobile and desktop environments. Every day millions of consumers use ShareThis to share content across more than 120+ social channels including Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and Pinterest -- giving the company unrivaled Web Wide Visibility. The company works with half of the Fortune 500 companies and is based in Palo Alto, Calif. To learn more visit http://www.sharethis.com.
About The Paley Center for Media:
The Paley Center for Media seeks to preserve the past, illuminate the present, and envision the future through the lens of media. With the nation’s foremost public archive of television, radio, and Internet programming, the Paley Center produces programs and forums for the public, industry professionals, thought leaders, and the creative community to explore the evolving ways in which we create, consume, and share news and entertainment. In an era of unprecedented change, the Paley Center advances the understanding of media and its impact on our lives. The Paley Center for Media was founded in 1975 by William S. Paley, a pioneering innovator in the industry. For more information, please visit www.paleycenter.org.
About Beresford Research:
Beresford Research helps companies seize market opportunities through thoughtful research based on innovative methodologies and rigorous execution. We create initiatives that are tightly aligned to our clients’ strategic needs, and provide unique industry insights. Founded in 1991 as a marketing and consulting firm, Beresford Research brings a strategic focus to every project. We partner with our clients to provide creative, customized solutions that deliver unprecedented value without the overhead. Clients include Booz & Co., Novartis, Oxford Economics, PhoCusWright, The Week and Towers Watson. For more information, please visit www.beresfordresearch.com.
Between 2005 and 2020, data volumes will grow by a factor of 300 – enough data to stack CDs from the earth to the moon 162 times. This has come to be known as the ‘big data’ phenomenon. Unfortunately, traditional approaches to handling, storing and analyzing data aren’t adequate at this scale: they’re too costly, slow and physically cumbersome to keep up. Fortunately, in response a new breed of technology has emerged that is cheaper, faster and more scalable. Yet, in meeting these new needs they...
Dec. 10, 2016 02:00 AM EST Reads: 1,981
Complete Internet of Things (IoT) embedded device security is not just about the device but involves the entire product’s identity, data and control integrity, and services traversing the cloud. A device can no longer be looked at as an island; it is a part of a system. In fact, given the cross-domain interactions enabled by IoT it could be a part of many systems. Also, depending on where the device is deployed, for example, in the office building versus a factory floor or oil field, security ha...
Dec. 10, 2016 02:00 AM EST Reads: 540
An IoT product’s log files speak volumes about what’s happening with your products in the field, pinpointing current and potential issues, and enabling you to predict failures and save millions of dollars in inventory. But until recently, no one knew how to listen. In his session at @ThingsExpo, Dan Gettens, Chief Research Officer at OnProcess, discussed recent research by Massachusetts Institute of Technology and OnProcess Technology, where MIT created a new, breakthrough analytics model for s...
Dec. 10, 2016 01:30 AM EST Reads: 748
When it comes to cloud computing, the ability to turn massive amounts of compute cores on and off on demand sounds attractive to IT staff, who need to manage peaks and valleys in user activity. With cloud bursting, the majority of the data can stay on premises while tapping into compute from public cloud providers, reducing risk and minimizing need to move large files. In his session at 18th Cloud Expo, Scott Jeschonek, Director of Product Management at Avere Systems, discussed the IT and busin...
Dec. 10, 2016 01:30 AM EST Reads: 3,993
"We are the public cloud providers. We are currently providing 50% of the resources they need for doing e-commerce business in China and we are hosting about 60% of mobile gaming in China," explained Yi Zheng, CPO and VP of Engineering at CDS Global Cloud, in this SYS-CON.tv interview at 19th Cloud Expo, held November 1-3, 2016, at the Santa Clara Convention Center in Santa Clara, CA.
Dec. 10, 2016 01:15 AM EST Reads: 1,212
In his general session at 19th Cloud Expo, Manish Dixit, VP of Product and Engineering at Dice, discussed how Dice leverages data insights and tools to help both tech professionals and recruiters better understand how skills relate to each other and which skills are in high demand using interactive visualizations and salary indicator tools to maximize earning potential. Manish Dixit is VP of Product and Engineering at Dice. As the leader of the Product, Engineering and Data Sciences team at D...
Dec. 10, 2016 01:00 AM EST Reads: 1,257
Keeping pace with advancements in software delivery processes and tooling is taxing even for the most proficient organizations. Point tools, platforms, open source and the increasing adoption of private and public cloud services requires strong engineering rigor - all in the face of developer demands to use the tools of choice. As Agile has settled in as a mainstream practice, now DevOps has emerged as the next wave to improve software delivery speed and output. To make DevOps work, organization...
Dec. 10, 2016 12:45 AM EST Reads: 455
"We are a custom software development, engineering firm. We specialize in cloud applications from helping customers that have on-premise applications migrating to the cloud, to helping customers design brand new apps in the cloud. And we specialize in mobile apps," explained Peter Di Stefano, Vice President of Marketing at Impiger Technologies, in this SYS-CON.tv interview at 19th Cloud Expo, held November 1-3, 2016, at the Santa Clara Convention Center in Santa Clara, CA.
Dec. 10, 2016 12:30 AM EST Reads: 606
"We're a cybersecurity firm that specializes in engineering security solutions both at the software and hardware level. Security cannot be an after-the-fact afterthought, which is what it's become," stated Richard Blech, Chief Executive Officer at Secure Channels, in this SYS-CON.tv interview at @ThingsExpo, held November 1-3, 2016, at the Santa Clara Convention Center in Santa Clara, CA.
Dec. 9, 2016 11:30 PM EST Reads: 1,150
In this strange new world where more and more power is drawn from business technology, companies are effectively straddling two paths on the road to innovation and transformation into digital enterprises. The first path is the heritage trail – with “legacy” technology forming the background. Here, extant technologies are transformed by core IT teams to provide more API-driven approaches. Legacy systems can restrict companies that are transitioning into digital enterprises. To truly become a lead...
Dec. 9, 2016 10:45 PM EST Reads: 538
In IT, we sometimes coin terms for things before we know exactly what they are and how they’ll be used. The resulting terms may capture a common set of aspirations and goals – as “cloud” did broadly for on-demand, self-service, and flexible computing. But such a term can also lump together diverse and even competing practices, technologies, and priorities to the point where important distinctions are glossed over and lost.
Dec. 9, 2016 10:30 PM EST Reads: 1,727
Video experiences should be unique and exciting! But that doesn’t mean you need to patch all the pieces yourself. Users demand rich and engaging experiences and new ways to connect with you. But creating robust video applications at scale can be complicated, time-consuming and expensive. In his session at @ThingsExpo, Zohar Babin, Vice President of Platform, Ecosystem and Community at Kaltura, discussed how VPaaS enables you to move fast, creating scalable video experiences that reach your aud...
Dec. 9, 2016 10:00 PM EST Reads: 312
All clouds are not equal. To succeed in a DevOps context, organizations should plan to develop/deploy apps across a choice of on-premise and public clouds simultaneously depending on the business needs. This is where the concept of the Lean Cloud comes in - resting on the idea that you often need to relocate your app modules over their life cycles for both innovation and operational efficiency in the cloud. In his session at @DevOpsSummit at19th Cloud Expo, Valentin (Val) Bercovici, CTO of Soli...
Dec. 9, 2016 09:45 PM EST Reads: 2,009
"Once customers get a year into their IoT deployments, they start to realize that they may have been shortsighted in the ways they built out their deployment and the key thing I see a lot of people looking at is - how can I take equipment data, pull it back in an IoT solution and show it in a dashboard," stated Dave McCarthy, Director of Products at Bsquare Corporation, in this SYS-CON.tv interview at @ThingsExpo, held November 1-3, 2016, at the Santa Clara Convention Center in Santa Clara, CA.
Dec. 9, 2016 09:30 PM EST Reads: 1,284
What happens when the different parts of a vehicle become smarter than the vehicle itself? As we move toward the era of smart everything, hundreds of entities in a vehicle that communicate with each other, the vehicle and external systems create a need for identity orchestration so that all entities work as a conglomerate. Much like an orchestra without a conductor, without the ability to secure, control, and connect the link between a vehicle’s head unit, devices, and systems and to manage the ...
Dec. 9, 2016 08:00 PM EST Reads: 1,025


text:
The Fort Frances-International Falls border continues to be one of the busiest in terms of trans-border trade.
Almost $1.3 million in goods passed through the border in November.
That is a 3.9 per cent increase over the previous year.
A total of 73 per cent went into the U.S., with the other 27 per cent delivered to Canada.
Nearly all of the goods came by rail.
The numbers put the area border as the third busiest northern border, behind Detroit-Windsor and Port Huron-Sarnia.


text:
A Sydney small business owner has been left reeling after claiming that Cotton On’s brand Typo had “ripped off” her product.
A small business owner has been left “heartbroken” after claiming a big Aussie brand “ripped off” a product she put hundreds of hours into creating, with the retailer selling it for a much cheaper price.
Nakisah Williams set up her brand Craft Club last year and in June launched her rug making kit, which she said received a “mind-blowing” response, selling thousands since it was released.
But the 26-year-old said she was shocked to discover that Typo, a stationary brand owned by Cotton On, had this week launched a rug making kit that she claimed is “near identical in product and packaging and incredibly similar in design”.
She said the form of crafting called latch hooking had been popular back in the 1970s but had died down until recently where she had seen it grow in popularity on TikTok and Instagram.
The Sydneysider claims Craft Club is the first modern brand to bring the crafting style back to life, after releasing the rug making kits in the middle of last year priced at $89.95.
But this week an Instagram follower alerted her to Typo’s new product with the brand’s kit priced $30 lower, selling for $59.99
“They had launched it with a reel on social media showing someone creating the rug kit and I felt very heartbroken because that so clearly looked like our product and with our really distinct brand and styling,” she told news.com.au.
At first she said she didn’t know what to do but then decided to make her heartbreak public on social media.
“I felt a little nervous bringing it up on as social media as it’s always been a really positive place and I wanted to create a community that was warm and uplifting, but a few hours after discovering it and people messaging me, I thought I have to acknowledge it,” she said.
“I wrote a short story post explaining what had happened and how I had noticed the incredible similarities between the design, style and even the box of packaging, and had never seen it anywhere else but Craft Club.
“I shared the TikTok reel and after that I noticed hundreds of people responding to me and responding to Typo saying it was not OK.”
It resulted in Typo turning off comments on social media and deleting the original post on Instagram in the following days, said Ms Williams.
Since then the brand has reached out to Ms Williams via a direct message on Instagram to enter discussions to resolve the issue, but she said the product is still being sold online.
“It’s still on the website and for $59 they are selling it for significantly cheaper to what we can mark our prices and with the cost of inflation its crazy to see a product that is so complicated for that much,” she explained.
“I’ve spent hundreds of hours on the product. Just to make the rug takes maybe 20 plus hours of my time – just to create the one sample and not to mention the testing of designs and samples – and changing sizes so it’s big enough for someone to love but small enough to make, as well as creating tutorials for customers.”
She said she’s “disappointed” and claims huge companies “take advantage” of small business who “don’t have power to stop them in any way”, adding other creators have reached out to share their horror copycat stories.
Ms Williams had pumped around $30,000 of her own savings into the business, she added.
“The story is (a) David versus Goliath situation – we’ve had so much growth in the last year and we are launching in the US and Canada next month as we’ve seen so much demand but it sucks to see a big company taking advantage,” she said.
“It sucks for female founders especially as Typo claim to be really into activism and to empower women, so that kind of hypocrisy sucks.”
Typo did not respond to news.com.au’s questions but on a post on Instagram said: “We’re a bunch of creatives that are working to make life anything but ordinary. We may have a big presence but we’re a small team that wants to have a positive impact on the world.
“Over the past few days we’ve been listening to the feedback from the @craft_club_co and out community. We have reached out to @craft_club_co directly to continue the conversation.”
A number of other female founders have recently complained about copycats.
Back in February, a Byron Bay business owner also expressed her “heartbreak” at Aldi, after the German grocery giant released a new range of picnic rugs that look almost identical to those offered by her lifestyle brand.
Sharnee Thorpe, who launched Wandering Folk in December 2015, said she was on the verge of tears when she noticed Aldi had “taken inspiration” from $190 best-selling printed picnic rugs – which feature hand drawn artworks of vintage-inspired florals – to create its own versions for just $49.99.
A bitter feud between rival vitamin companies JSHealth and Life Botanics has also ramped up after the two brands exchanged words over social media. Jessica Sepel, the founder of the $798 million company, once again accused Life Botanics of copying her brand in several story posts on Instagram.


text:
The North Sydney-based marketing communication company, which includes digital print, design and photography, took delivery of the press last week from reseller Currie Group.
Installation of the Ipex-launched press further cements the company’s position as an early adopter – the 7500 replaces an HP Indigo 5500, which was also the first in the country.
“We have been an avid adopter of new technology,” managing director David Minnett told ProPrint.
He said the 7500’s colour management was “fundamentally different” to the 5500.
“You have a strong consistency of colour across different runs and different stocks,” he added.
Minnett also talked up the higher productivity of the 7500.
“In an era when deadlines seem to get shorter and shorter, and we have got busier, throughput has been an issue.
“We did more work on this machine in the first two days than we would have done in two weeks two years ago. That is quite profound,” said Minnett.
Currie Group general manager Phillip Rennell said Group Momentum “has always been at the forefront of the marketplace”.
“They are a true marketing service provider – the kind of organisation that everyone looks to be. Photography, graphic design, a complete service business. It is a model lots of people aspire to, but not a lot of people get to,” said Rennell.
The HP Indigo produces up to 120 A4 pages per minute in full colour or 240ppm in monochrome or two-colour mode.
Comment below to have your say on this story.
If you have a news story or tip-off, get in touch at firstname.lastname@example.org.
Sign up to the Sprinter newsletter


text:
Samsung is expected to introduce new software features of its own on the Galaxy S5, as it did with previous Galaxy S generations, and information about one of the company’s new mobile apps has seemingly been leaked. Sam Mobile, which has shared many details about unreleased Samsung products in the past, has received screenshots for a Samsung Android application that will reportedly be able to log the user’s life, and which has been found on an SM-G900H device, believed to be part of the Galaxy S5 family of handsets.
Called Samsung Life Times, the app is “kind of a diary,” the publication writes, which is able to collect information from various apps and phone events and create a log that could be accessed in the future. According to the available screenshots, the user will be able to customize the logging experience by including or excluding certain information.
Life Times will be able to collect data from social networks including Facebook, Instagram, Google+, FourSquare, LinkedIn but also from phone apps including Camera, Email, Memo, Phone or Messages. Additionally, location information and even S Health details could also be logged.
The app’s welcome screen shows certain similarities with Samsung’s rumored new TouchWiz interface that will bring a Google Now and Metro-like UI to users. However, it’ll be interesting to see how much bloatware features Samsung will include in its upcoming Galaxy S5 version considering that Google is not too happy with how the South Korean giant has customized its Android experience recently.
While Sam Mobile has screenshots of the app, the application itself has not been leaked, and it’s not available for unofficial installation on existing Android devices.


text:
Li-Cycle, which is focused on providing customer-centric, end-of-life solutions for lithium-ion batteries while also creating a secondary supply of critical battery materials, has announced a partnership with Helbiz. Helbiz focuses on micro-mobility, and together, the two companies are partnering up to create a safe and sustainable recycling solution for end-of-life lithium-ion batteries used in e-scooters and e-bikes.
Helbiz is developing the infrastructure to create greener cities that have less congestion, noise, and pollution while giving riders faster and a more affordable way to get to and from their destinations. The company has fleets of e-scooters and e-bikes and noted that the transportation shift is continuing to accelerate.
Li-Cycle will bring its Spoke & Hub Technologies™ to efficiently, safely, and sustainably recover end-of-life batteries from Helbiz’s fleets and recover the valuable materials within the batteries and bring the back into the supply chain.
Li-Cycle expects to recycle 500 lithium-ion batteries from Helbiz e-bikes and e-scooters in the coming months. The company also noted that the volume is set to increase heading into 2022 as it supports Helbiz’s operations in the U.S. and abroad.
The company also plans to support Helbiz’s 2022 net-zero emission targets while facilitating its ability to achieve a 100% recycling target. Helbiz aims to advance sustainability efforts in the micro-mobility sector while minimizing the environmental footprint of shared scooters and e-bikes.
Kunal Phalpher, Chief Commercial Officer of Li-Cycle, shared his thoughts on this partnership. “We believe Li-Cycle and Helbiz are ideal partners as we are two innovative companies working toward the same vision for a sustainable electric mobility sector,” said Phalpher. “This partnership represents a critical first step for our collaboration as we seek to create a closed lithium-ion battery recycling loop on a global scale. Together, we intend to recover valuable materials from old scooters and e-bikes to be reused in new ones in cities around the world via a truly sustainable, fit-for-purpose pathway.”
Helbiz’s Chief Marketing Officer, Ruggero Cipriani Foresio, shared some thoughts on the new collaboration with Li-Cycle as well. “We are proud to partner with Li-Cycle and look forward to working closely with their team to develop and implement a safe and sustainable recycling solution for the batteries used in our e-scooters and e-bikes.
“This collaboration further supports our commitment to worldwide sustainability and our dedication to lead each city we operate in towards a greener future.”
Earlier this year, I had the pleasure of interviewing Li-Cycle’s Chief Commercial Officer, Kunal Phalpher. He shared with me some goals of going public and how North America’s largest lithium-ion battery recycling company plans to take on battery recycling. You can listen to that interview here.
Li-Cycle × Peridot
I asked Phalpher about going public, but at the time, he couldn’t share details. However, a press release from Li-Cycle and Peridot was recently emailed to me following movement on that.
Li-Cycle and Peridot Acquisition Corporation received approval to combine forces from the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). Peridot’s shareholders just have to officially approve.
Ajay Kochhar, cofounder and CEO of Li-Cycle, said: “Our mission is to solve the global battery manufacturing scrap and end-of-life battery problem and simultaneously create a secondary supply of critical battery metals, while also ensuring a sustainable future for our planet.
‘We have made significant commercial progress since announcing the transaction with Peridot: we partnered with Ultium, LLC, a joint venture of General Motors and LG Energy Solutions, to recycle up to 100% of the scrap generated by battery cell manufacturing at Ultium’s Lordstown, Ohio megafactory; we announced our next Spoke facility in the Phoenix, Arizona area, which when complete will be capable of processing up to 10,000 tonnes of end-of-life batteries and battery manufacturing scrap per year; and we further bolstered our technological moat, with the USPTO granting us two utility patents.
“The completion of the business combination with Peridot will enable Li-Cycle to capitalize on significant growth opportunities, expand globally, and continue to advance our patented Spoke & Hub Technologies.”
Don't want to miss a cleantech story? Sign up for daily news updates from CleanTechnica on email. Or follow us on Google News!
Have a tip for CleanTechnica, want to advertise, or want to suggest a guest for our CleanTech Talk podcast? Contact us here.


text:
The pharmaceutical industry has responded extremely well to the coronavirus pandemic. At the same time, the industry is changing before our eyes. To put it in simple terms, there will be no more “business-as-usual” in pharmaceutical manufacturing after COVID-19, explains Andrew Badrot, CEO, C2 PHARMA
Considering the unprecedented scope of the current pandemic, all aspects of pharmaceutical supply chain contingency planning have, so far, delivered as expected. To date, only a single drug shortage has been reported (except for COVID-19-driven demand for hydroxychloroquine, for example).
Safety stocks across the pharmaceutical manufacturing network and warehouses have kicked in and supply to pharmacies remains uninterrupted. This will not be indefinite and, should the lockdown extend further, one can expect a cascade of drug shortages. Nonetheless, to this date, the system has proven to be resilient and able to cope with a severe healthcare crisis.
The pandemic has, however, laid bare the limits of the current pharmaceutical manufacturing model and its heavy reliance on China for starting materials and, to a lesser extent, on active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs) and finished drug products. This reliance has become both a strategic and an operational challenge for Western societies.
Strategically, the US, the European Union and Japan have changed their approach to China and now consider it to be a competitor. This new “cold war” will play out on the economic front and, most importantly, on the ideological front.
Whereas the one-time USSR was economically weak and ideologically corrupt, China has a humming economy. In addition, some fringe Western thinkers are now debating the value of authoritarianism as an efficient form of government, especially in moments of crisis.
Operationally, as collaboration between Western allied countries has broken down, exposing what limited solidarity states can expect from more affluent neighbours, questions about self-reliance have become ubiquitous.
In combination with pharmaceutical export restrictions from China and India — which the pharma industry viewed as inconceivable prior to this crisis — we have to face a new reality. We now know that countries will prioritise their own domestic demand and will not hesitate to restrict the export of essential drugs, medical devices and protective medical gear needed by healthcare professionals during a crisis.
How do we rebuild a reliable pharmaceutical supply chain that can cope with even more severe strains than the ones imposed by the current pandemic? What does a supply chain that can secure and support the needs of individual countries without the risk of nationalism taking over and causing unnecessarily loss of lives across the globe look like?
Until now, the pharmaceutical supply chain was shaped to meet the requirements imposed by government policies around the world to aggressively seek savings on drug prices. Those policies were so successful that drug manufacturers were only able to maintain slim margins by pushing as much manufacturing as possible to China and India.
It is estimated that, today, 80% of all drugs sold in the West contain some form of precursor, whether basic or advanced, come from either country. In addition, tax considerations also led some innovative pharmaceutical companies to select exotic manufacturing locations such as Puerto Rico or Malta.
The concept of pharmaceutical manufacturing as a “strategic national asset” is the new reality. The US is leading the charge with White House trade adviser, Peter Navarro, advocating for an executive order requiring to “Buy American.” France’s President Macron, on the other side of the Atlantic, is pushing a narrative of “European Sovereignty” and the reshoring of strategic health industries.
The current model of pharmaceutical manufacturing certainly leads to cheaper drugs and creates short-term cost savings in national healthcare systems. Nonetheless, the current model becomes catastrophic in a severe pandemic situation and may lead to systemic societal breakdowns if large segments of the population were no longer able to access essential drugs.
Reshoring pharmaceutical manufacturing has been a recurring subject and is fiercely debated within the industry. Some have argued for a straightforward stockpiling strategy. Unfortunately, stockpiling cannot address extreme events and can only tackle short-term needs.
Others have advocated a reduction of environmental regulations to allow a more cost competitive manufacturing set-up in countries such as in the US or Japan or across Europe. This is another short-sighted solution that will cause more damage in the long-term. I do not believe that relaxing environmental regulations or quality standards is an ethical legislative pathway … nor a sustainable long-term solution.
Quite the contrary, manufacturing drugs in Western countries while retaining high environmental standards will drive innovation in green chemistry, which will benefit our societies in the future.
First and foremost, I advocate focusing on creating government-funded financial incentives to manufacture essential drugs domestically and/or establish economical barriers to importing them. This could be in the form of preferred access regulations, mandates for domestic supply, financial grants or import duties.
Regulations could also be established such as those in effect for the military and mandate the use of locally made ingredients and domestic manufacturing for essential drugs. A combination of any of those approaches can be targeted and simple to implement. The difficult part is gathering the political will to drive the change.
One key aspect of any domestic manufacturing strategy is to establish a supply chain from cradle to grave. All starting materials, ingredients and excipients necessary for the production of an essential drug would need to be made locally, removing the need for any import.
This way, by creating a stable economic environment and a comprehensive policy to build innovative and flexible manufacturing assets, countries can quickly establish a sustainable and independent pipeline for essential APIs and drug products.
Additionally, I advocate strengthening the global quality standards for medicine by allowing the US FDA and its equivalent European, Japanese and other regulatory authorities to audit foreign manufacturing facilities without prior notice.
This will lead to better quality compliance across the globe and raise the stakes for companies who currently use their notification periods to put in place audit preparedness programmes that are nothing but “dressing the bride” prior to an audit.
Still, audits from regulatory authorities can become a double-edged sword. We see a disturbing trend emerging with some governments actively abusing such powers in order to provide preferential treatment to local production.
A recent example came when China’s National Medical Products Administration (NMPA) suspended the import of Bristol Myers Squibb’s blockbuster drug, Abraxane opened the door to two local Chinese manufacturers to fill the gap. Finally, we should create transparency on the label of the drug product by displaying the “country of origin” for both the pharmaceutical ingredients as well as the drug itself.
John Micklethwait and Adrian Wooldridge recently argued: “If Western governments respond creatively to the [COVID-19] crisis, they will have a chance of reversing decades of decline.”
It is a fact that, according to every available performance and governance metric for the past 30 years, our Western governments have been in decline to the point that countries such as the US and Italy are struggling to deliver the expected standard of care for their populations in the face of COVID-19.
Regardless of government inefficiencies and crippling ideological and political weakness in the Western world, the pharmaceutical industry needs to lead the way and react to the lessons learned from COVID-19.
With the help of our respective governments, we can establish a renewed sense of security in our societies by creating sustainable domestic pharmaceutical manufacturing capabilities that will meet the next healthcare crisis head on.


text:
What you need to know before getting a drone this holiday season
PORTAGE, Mich. (NEWSCHANNEL 3) -- This holiday season lots of families in West Michigan could be finding a drone under their Christmas tree.
It's the hottest tech toy of the season, but drones also come with a lot of responsibility.
You must learn the rules of the airways, and depending how big your drone is, register it with the feds.
They're literally flying off the shelves of Hobby Sports in Portage.
"The price point has fallen so much on them, they're affordable to the everyday person now," said John Rosselott, the store's manager.
At their location on Portage Road they sell everything from stocking stuffers to full sized drones.
With each sale, employees educate shoppers on the rules of the sky.
First, be careful where you fly it.
When on private property, make sure you have permission.
Also stay five miles away from airports and military bases.
"Nothing over 400 feet, you always have to have it in view, even if there's a camera on it," Rosselott said.
Starting Monday Dec. 21, the Federal Aviation Administration wants all drones weighing over 8 oz. to be registered online.
"It's $5 to register. It's going to ask you to put a registration number on the inside of your drone as well," Rosselott said.
Current drone owners have two months to register with the government.
New drones need to be registered before taking flight.
This is so the government can keep tabs on drone owners that violate air space.
A new report shows that in the past two years, there have more than 300 close encounters between drones and airplanes.
The FAA says drone registration will be free for the first two weeks.
As drones become more popular, expect to see more laws flying in with them.
Michigan lawmakers have already banned drones in the use of hunting.
They're currently considering proposals that would make it illegal to fly drones near the Mackinaw Bridge, prisons, the state capitol building, and police investigations.
"I think it's just the allure of it, you can get a new vantage point. It's just a new hobby out there that people are enjoying," Rosselott said.
Most smaller drones are under 8 oz., so you won't need to register them.
But if you need to register your drone, visit this link: http://www.faa.gov/uas/registration/
For more information on Hobby Sports, here's their website: http://hobby-sports.com/


text:
Some experts say food delivery falls under the ambit of e-commerce guidelines
Regulators have unofficially exempted food apps from policy for marketplaces, say those privy to talks
Amid the ongoing tussle between the restaurant association and food aggregators, the spotlight is back on the grey area on whether or not the country’s revised foreign direct investment (FDI) e-commerce guidelines govern the food aggregator business.
Last year, India revised its FDI policy for e-commerce marketplaces to bring more clarity on the way they function.
While, some experts said that services such as food delivery are likely to fall under the ambit of e-commerce guidelines, others privy to the discussions maintained that regulators have unofficially exempted food aggregators from the policy that is applicable to marketplaces such as Flipkart and Amazon. However, no formal communication has been made on the same.
“The department should issue a clarification to settle the water on this particular issue because there has been too much back and forth within the industry. Everybody has been raising the issue and there has been no guidance given by the government on this particular thing," said Rishi Anand, partner, DSK Legal.
Last year the government clarified norms that govern foreign investment and the functioning of an e-commerce marketplace in its Press Note 2. While it did not explicitly state the sectors these new rules apply to, some were of the view that food aggregators that are tech-enabled platforms helping with the delivery and payment of food orders, are likely to be covered under the rules.
The new guidelines which came into effect from 1 February, prohibit marketplaces from directly or indirectly influencing sale price of goods and services and instruct them on maintaining a level playing field. The new norms also bar exclusive tie-ups between e-commerce firms that follow the marketplace model and vendors using their platform.
Food aggregators have been in the news as India’s restaurants have been at loggerheads with some membership driven dining platforms that they say are distorting the food services market by hefty discounting. The move against reservation- and membership-driven dining apps like EazyDiner (Prime), Zomato Gold, Dineout, Nearbuy and Magicpin is being led by the NRAI that represents half a million restaurants.
Earlier this year NRAI approached the Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade claiming that food aggregators were indulging in discriminatory practices and were therefore not in compliance of some of the new policies articulated in the updated Press Note 2.
Several food aggregators had also met DPIIT officials and a person privy to the meeting said that these companies have for now been exempted from the e-commerce policy or Press Note 2. “Going back to the revised Press Note 2, is intended for products and trading of products and not trading of services, which is what these food aggregators are engaged in," said this person declining to be named.
Questions emailed to Swiggy, Zomato and UberEats did not elicit a reply. NRAI maintained that since these apps list restaurants, they also facilitate buying of food by consumers from these restaurants and are therefore unambiguously e-commerce entities and come under the ambit of the FDI policy. It further raised concerns on the lack of compliances by aggregators to some of the clauses.
Subscribe to Mint Newsletters
* Enter a valid email
* Thank you for subscribing to our newsletter.
Never miss a story! Stay connected and informed with Mint.
our App Now!!


text:
Huawei had to apologize recently when it became evident that the company wasn’t using the faster UFS 2.1 standard mobile storage in all models of the P10 despite claiming that it had the faster memory chip. Even Samsung claimed that all models of the Galaxy S8 had UFS 2.1 storage but quietly removed that mention from its website. HTC is promoting its new flagship smartphone at their expense by pointing out that the all models of the HTC U11 have UFS 2.1 storage.
The UFS 2.1 internal memory standard is better than its predecessors as it boasts faster read and write speeds. However, due to a shortage of UFS 2.1 chips, Huawei found itself ensnared in a controversy when users discovered that not all P10 models had the faster standard even though Huawei had claimed that to be the case.
HTC wants its customers to know that they don’t have to worry about being caught in the dark, so to speak. The company claims that all models of the HTC U11 have 4GB of RAM and 64GB of onboard UFS 2.1 storage. Customers will feel the difference as the device will be faster and more responsive compared to one that doesn’t have UFS 2.1 storage.
Whether or not that’s going to be enough to get customers to purchase the HTC U11 remains to be seen. The handset does have a couple of unique features but HTC has been finding it hard to sell a lot of premium devices. The company will certainly be hoping that those who are enthusiastic about the specs will see this is an advantage and opt for the U11.
Filed in. Read more about HTC and HTC U11.
Ff/1.7 Aperture Size
Snapdragon 835 + MicroSD


text:
By Megha Merani
Malabar's executives share the secrets to their rare business model that lives the talk and walks the walk
It’s not everyday you hear executives of a multi-billion dollar company casually mention that one of their organisation’s drivers is also a shareholder in the company.
That, in essence, is the philosophy of what has taken jewellery retailer Malabar Gold & Diamonds from its small start in 1993, in the city of Calicut, Kerala, in the Southern part of India, to 250 outlets in 10 countries across India, the Middle East, Southeast Asia and America.
As the company celebrates 25 years in the business, Shamlal Ahamed MP, Managing Director, International Operations, Malabar Gold & Diamonds, and KP Abdul Salam, Group Executive Director, Malabar Group, tell CEO Middle East that, in fact, 19.4 percent of the company’s 2,752 investors are full-time employees across different levels of the organisation.
Its business model has been based on “the association of many people”, Salam, 59, explains.
“We started as a small operation in Kerala with eight investors, friends and family. From day one, our chairman, Mr MP Ahammed, tried to involve more people in the business at different levels as investors and as employees. It’s like a family business in a corporate structure, which is very rare.”
The ideology helps in two ways: first, employees remain committed and care about the business that they are working for because they have ownership; and second, to a consumer or outsider entering a Malabar store, he or she is meeting a stakeholder.
Front-end operations and store management are run by an inner-circle store head, who is an investor in the company, Ahamed, 37, adds.
“That (system) has really worked for the company.” he says, especially in terms of employee retention and culture, which in turn of course has impacted productivity and growth.
“In comparison (to other firms), our employee turnover is very less for the retail industry.
“Many employees who have worked with us since we started are still working with us. Our first employee who joined us is both an investor and still works with us. Our driver in our Dubai office for 10 years is also a shareholder.”
Equity is open to anyone in the company, but the allotment isn’t automatic. “You don’t get the share just because you work here,” Ahamed goes on to clarifiy, “you should have something to bring to the table.”
“Our chairman famously said: ‘Ours is an empire built on trust, teamwork and goodwill. We derive our strength from many. Time from those who have time, talents from the talented, resources from the resourceful, and investment from the people who have the money; some from all our team, and all from some of our driving forces.’”
And for those who have put in their bit so far the investment is set to further multiply.
The Indian-born international jewellery brand’s global expansion plan hopes to see the company triple its retail network from 250 showrooms to 750 outlets in the next five years. The Malabar Group has said it aims to achieve an annual turnover of more than $6.85 billion by 2023. About 40 percent of the group turnover is expected to be generated from the company’s operations outside India. It’s plans in the US market include targeting South Asian customers in Chicago, New Jersey, Dallas, Houston and Los Angeles.
“We always wanted to expand our reach to become global,” Ahamed says. “With 53 stores in the UAE, we are the largest shareholder here so we don’t want to grow further (here). We hold more than 20 percent - the largest share - of the market in the 22 carat jewellery segment.”
So far the plans have seen the group pursue interests well beyond jewellery: from real estate to retail, including hypermarkets, as well as IT services and farming – Ahamed told us in a previous interview that farming was where the Malabar Group’s chairman first started honing his business skills.
However, gold jewellery for the masses is where Malabar reaps most from what it sows, something in which Ahamed admits the Group is having to weather a softening market. Market conditions following a plummet in crude prices have affected the business but he is optimistic because currency fluctuations have driven up investment in gold. Malabar has seen a “single digit” decline in sales in comparison to last year, he says.
“Consumer confidence is weak. The money is there... it’s not vanished from the market... (but) everyone is cautious and they’re not spending like before. People have reduced their spend.”
However, the retailer’s market share grew from 17 percent to 20 percent. And with the influx of tourists this Dubai Shopping Festival (DSF), the implementation of the tourist VAT refund scheme, and attractive promotions, Salam is optimistic about 2019.
“Last year we had a very good DSF because of the pre-VAT sale (in 2016),” Salam, also a member of the board at Dubai’s Gold & Jewellery Group, says. “This year it is also (looking) positive because the market is almost recovered. It will not be as good as last year but it will be like back-to-normal conditions.”
This year’s promotions include special coupons for diamond jewellery purchases, with weekly raffle draws for a chance to drive away in a BMW.
Meanwhile, the company plans to double its headcount from 13,000 to 25,000 employees within the next five years, in order to manage its growth – but while staying true to its original culture and philosophy that has earned the trust and loyalty of customers across the globe.
“In each and every shop, we have a person who has invested in the business, representing the owners,” Salam says. “Jewellery is traditionally a business in which you need a lot of trust. Customers don’t want to the know the product, they want to know who is selling it, and a guarantee that they can come back if there’s an issue. Because at the end of the day, they are buying an investment.”
Ahamed adds: “You hear about this sort of thing in textbooks, but here we live it.”


text:
NEW YORK (CNNfn) - Americans' incomes grew modestly while they throttled back on spending, the Commerce Department said Monday.
Personal income rose 0.6 percent in August to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of $6.919 trillion, slightly higher than Wall Street's expectations of a 0.5 percent gain.
Spending didn't keep pace, however, rising 0.3 percent to a rate of $5.521 trillion, just under economists' predictions of a 0.4 percent gain.
The disparity resulted in a rise to 3.6 percent in the U.S. savings rate last month from a revised 3.7 percent in July.
The Commerce Department also revised July figures, which showed a 0.2 percent rise in personal income from an earlier figure of 0.1 percent. Spending pushed 1 percent higher from a 0.8 percent increase.
Income growth is an important component to inflation watchers since consumer spending makes up about two-thirds of the nation's economic activity. But Rosanne Cahn, chief economist at CS First Boston, said the August increase is manageable.
"Wage gains, while healthy, are not accelerating at any particularly noticeable speed," she said. "It's the acceleration you have to watch out for."
The income increase occurred despite the United Parcel Service strike during part of August. Commerce said the strike reduced wages and salaries in the transportation industry by about $2.5 billion.
-- Randy Schultz


text:
Student-run coffee shop on campus, Cultivate Coffee, bridges the gap between cultures by purchasing fair and direct trade coffee and teas and being missions-driven.
Cultivate Coffee purchases their coffee from Coffee Labs Roasters, a roasting company in Tarrytown. The family-based company sources their coffee from fair and direct trade, which means it buys directly from the growers and seeks equity in international trade.
Co-founder, business major Benjamin Tse says that purchasing fair and direct trade coffee not only benefits the student body but creates a global impact for farmers.
Tse says: “It’s a sustainable business and missions. We want to provide quality coffee to the student body and at the same time engage in a market where the farmers will benefit.”
While Cultivate Coffee is based in New York and not directly involved with the international farmers, it impacts the farmers’ lives by supporting a transparent market.
“By buying fair trade, we are improving lives from West Africa and South Africa,” says co-founder, business major Wiktor Lasota.
The money Cultivate Coffee earns buys coffee and teas and equipment, and whenever there is a surplus, it is donated to missions.
Co-founder, intercultural studies major Peter Nehlsen says that studying other religions has helped him understand the diverse cultures and backgrounds of people groups, and it has inspired him to create a missions-driven coffee shop.
Nehlsen says: “Having the chance to grow up in Africa, I know there are families at the poverty line and those just above. There is a difference between a few dollars. We knew it was okay to sacrifice a few dollars for profit to help out the farmers.”
Though the owners do not earn money for themselves, their reward is serving the campus community, international farmers and mission organizations.
“It’s a cool way to bless someone,” says co-founder, intercultural studies major Joseph Girard.
Lasota says that their mission fulfills their ultimate goal to develop a community on campus.
Lasota says: “[We want to] create a place where people can share their testimonies and even for international students to share where they’re from. It’s all about growing the community and seeing each other grow.”
In valuing missions and supporting fair and direct trade, Cultivate Coffee creates a community beyond the college campus. The coffee shop connects the small campus community to a larger, global community.
“[By] building a community, serving people, we discover the meaning of serving,” says Lasota.


text:
BuzzFeed sells Complex as its digital empire shrinks and slashes 16% of staff
BuzzFeed on Wednesday sold Complex to NTWRK, an e-commerce company specializing in collectible items rooted in street culture, in a deal that further shrinks the struggling Jonah Peretti-led digital media empire that was once synonymous with virality and the social media age.
Buzzfeed slashes 16% of its workforce, sells Complex
HuffPost parent company Buzzfeed said Wednesday that it is slashing 16% of its workforce — the latest in a wave of layoffs by financially-strapped media companies — and will sell music and culture-focused site Complex The digital media company — once an advertising revenue juggernaut — said the cuts are “designed to reduce centralized costs...
BuzzFeed sells Complex for $108.6 million, will lay off some staff
BuzzFeed has sold Complex Networks to NTWRK, a livestreaming video commerce platform, at a significantly discounted price tag, and it will cut another 16 percent of its remaining staff, the company announced Wednesday. The $108.6 million all-cash deal comes just more than two years since BuzzFeed acquired pop culture media startup Complex in December 2021…
BuzzFeed Sells Complex to Ntwrk for $108.6 Million, Will Lay Off 16% of Remaining Workforce
BuzzFeed has sold Complex — the youth-culture media company it bought three years ago — and will pink-slip another 16% of BuzzFeed’s remaining staffers in a restructuring designed to get back on financial track. BuzzFeed announced Wednesday that it closed the sale of Complex to ecommerce platform Ntwrk in a $108.6 million all-cash deal. L.A.-based […]


text:
Jo-Ann Stores Inc.
News about Jo-Ann Stores Inc., including commentary and archival articles published in The New York Times.
ARTICLES ABOUT JO-ANN STORES INC.
Jo-Ann Stores agreed to a $1.6 billion buyout offer on Thursday from Leonard Green & Partners, the latest private equity deal for a retail company. The $61-a-share bid for Jo-Ann Stores, which sells fabric and crafts, represents a 34 percent...
December 24, 2010, Friday
What happened to all the lead-tainted products that have been recalled recently? Most, it turns out, may still be in consumers’ hands.
December 22, 2007, Saturday
WHILE much of the rest of the retailing industry faltered, art-and-crafts retailers enjoyed double-digit sales gains last fall, and their shares moved up as well. Crafts are not recession-proof, but stores have been busy for the three retailers...


text:
SOUTHPORT, CONN. — In March, Earth Animal expanded its Dr. Bob Goldstein’s WISDOM® dog food line with a new catfish formula. The new Catfish WISDOM product is formulated with Chesapeake Bay catfish and premium ingredients to offer balanced nutrition.
Chesapeake Bay catfish is a non-native, invasive species threatening the Chesapeake Bay area, and is also recognized as a “best choice” in sustainable seafood by Seafood Watch. With sustainability top of mind, Earth Animal uses wild-caught, sustainably sourced Chesapeake Bay catfish from supplier NORPEL to help control the invasive species’ spread.
“Introducing Catfish to our WISDOM Dog Food™ line offers an outstanding choice for animals with poultry sensitivities, or prefer an alternative to salmon,” said Bob, Ph.D., and Susan Goldstein, co-founders and chief executive officers, Earth Animal. “We have introduced another exceptionally nutritious food choice for pet parents while also helping to restore one of our country’s vital waterways.”
The new Catfish WISDOM dog food is formulated with marine microalgae to offer a concentrated form of Omega 3 fatty acids, which helps support healthy heart, joints, skin and coat, and brain development in dogs. The food includes fermented postbiotic TruMune™, a functional ingredient by Cargill’s Diamond V business, to support health and wellbeing. Postbiotics combine the nutrition of both prebiotics and probiotics to help dogs maintain a healthy digestive system and gut. Earth Animal plans to add TruMune postbiotics to its other products within the WISDOM line.
Catfish WISDOM is produced and air-dried in an SQF-certified human-grade facility in the United States. The food is also formulated with fresh, organic fruits and vegetables and includes Dr. Bob’s Vitality Cubes™ made with protein, sprouted seeds, fruit and vegetable extracts, and vitamins and minerals.
“WISDOM is the food we dreamed about making for years,” the Goldsteins said. “We know firsthand the power of proper nutrition and its positive impact on an animal’s life. WISDOM represents over 35 years of our life's work, both personally with generations of our own animals and professionally with thousands of patients.”
The dog food contains no grain, gluten, soy, corn, rice, iodized salt, sugar or artificial ingredients. Catfish WISDOM is available in 1-lb, 3-lb and 10-lb bags at independent pet retailers and on Earth Animal’s e-commerce site.
Read more about new pet food and treat products.


text:
Lebanos restaurant turns up the heat with new Washington location
The owners of an authentic Lebanese restaurant say they’ve been given a “warm Washington welcome” at the business’ new home.
Despite opening during the pandemic in summer 2020, Lebanos managed to build up a firm following and has now relocated to a bigger and better spot at The Galleries.
Owned by brothers Mohsen and Mahmoud Beydoun, who hail from Lebanon, the restaurant and takeaway originally opened in Market Village but has now moved to a more central position at The Galleries, opposite Wilko’s.
They relocated to the former Chopstix site three weeks ago and Mohsen said it’s been a great success.
"Being offered this site was too good an offer to turn down,” he said. “This is such a great location, around 35,000 people come through this shopping centre daily, and we’ve been seeing lots of our regulars as well as some new faces.
"We built up a really good reputation, especially with deliveries in lockdown. People have been trying a lot of new foods and we pride ourselves on being the only authentic Lebanese in the area. It’s a big weight on our shoulders but the response has been great, we’ve had a really warm Washington welcome.
“Some of the dishes people hadn’t really heard of before, but they’ve been enjoying trying new dishes.”
Spices are imported from Lebanon for the dishes, which include vegetarian and meat-based options, such as mousakka, kibbeh, hummus, vine leaves, Lebanos mix grill, chicken shawarma and lamb shawarma.
Even though the shopping centre closes at 6pm, Lebanos are able to keep their kitchen open later to fulfil delivery orders, which Mohsen says are a popular side to the business.
The increase in hours has created more jobs at the site, which has 25 seats for those wanting to dine in.
Mohsen said: “Delivery has been really popular, we get some massive orders from nearby factories and Amazon. There’s a lot happening in Washington at the minute and we’re proud to be a part of it.
"Our spices really set us apart from the crowd and our food is really great quality, you can’t have a location like this in The Galleries unless you have that standard.”
*Lebanos is open daily for sit in or takeaway at 30c The Galleries or you can order online at https://lebanostakeaway.co.uk/


text:
Star Wars Battlefront 3 never saw the light of day, it was canned back in 2008 disappointing many a Star Wars fans.
Over the years bits of footage of Free Radical Design’s keeps resurfacing and another couple of videos have appeared courtesy of FuZaH. The footage shows an unfinished alpha version of the training mission.
The graphics look dated now but this was cutting edge back in 2008, and from what we can tell, this is from the PC version. It’s great to see old footage like this surface, it shows how far PC gaming has come in eight years.
It’s such a shame that the fan made Galaxy in Turmoil from Frontfire Studios had to be pulled, it was aiming to be the next Star Wars Battlefront 3.


text:
Grundfos takes its ‘Sustainability on Wheels’ roadshow to Abu Dhabi | Plumbing
As part of broader water conservation and climate change efforts, Grundfos has taken its ‘Sustainability on Wheels’ roadshow to Abu Dhabi. During the roadshow, Grundfos showcased innovative water solutions, including the Scala range for domestic use, which offers residents the opportunity to make sustainable choices.
The roadshow visited selected outlets in Musaffah from March 28-30, offering residents, plumbers and retailers the opportunity to gain hands-on experience using the interactive live demonstrations and taking part in a series of sustainability-focused games and quizzes.
Sikander Ejaz, Regional Marketing Director for Grundfos said: “The Grundfos Sustainability on Wheels roadshow is a great opportunity for homeowners and residents, along with retailers and plumbers to understand the many benefits of our unique smart pumps – which not only help save energy, but also water by detecting leaks or open taps. ”
Grundfos is committed to creating innovative solutions in products, including household pumps that incorporate the latest technology and enable users to make sustainable choices, save water and energy, while combating climate change and helping the planet.
The roadshow ‘Sustainability on wheels’ featured a premier showcase of the SCALA1, a smart and fully integrated all-in-one compact water pipe. The Bluetooth solution allows residents to monitor, control and schedule water usage from their smartphone, and includes a calendar function designed to boost homes and gardens.
More than 7,000 villas in the UAE have taken up the deployment of the SCALA2, a breakthrough smart device for the water supply and pressure boosting of homes that can deliver energy savings of 80%.


text:
Command Alkon will exhibit at this year’s AGG1 Aggregates Academy & Expo in Houston, March 6-8. The show gives leading manufacturers and service providers in the aggregates, asphalt, pavement maintenance and traffic safety industry sectors the opportunity to come together and showcase their latest products and technologies, learn new techniques through education courses, and network with more than 9,000 industry professionals.
“We are proud to showcase our products again this year at the World of Asphalt/AGG1 Show and Conference,” said Scott Dugan, manager of operations at Command Alkon. “This is a can’t-miss, high quality event. It’s the one place where you can interact with most every leading company and learn all the latest industry expertise.”
Command Alkon will feature these products at the show:
- Apex – Automation for the Aggregates and Asphalt industry.
- TrackIT – GPS/Telematics.
- HaulIt – Quoting, dispatching, and billing solution for aggregate Haulers.
- MOBILEsales – Create and manage quotes in any remote location for Producers and Supplier.
- MOBILEticket – Paperless ticketing solution for Producers and Suppliers.
- BuildIt – Supply chain management solution for Contractors.
Make sure to stop by and see Command Alkon at Booth #2039 to see any of its solutions in action.
Command Alkon, www.commandalkon.com


text:
It’s not unusual for new smartphones to get a teardown at one point or another, but the speed at which they happen is somewhat unprecedented. The Samsung Galaxy S7 and Galaxy S7 edge were just announced, not even launched, Sunday and now someone in Russia has already torn it apart piece by piece. But before you can go through a smartphone, you have to go through its box first. And what better way to unbox a waterproof device than under water, which is exactly what T-Mobile just did.
This isn’t the first underwater unboxing we’ve seen and definitely not the last, especially thanks to this. It is, however, probably one of the few performed by a big name like T-Mobile. It’s a marketing stunt you would have expected from someone like Sony, back when their Xperia smartphones were advertised to be waterproof and not just water resistant. The Samsung Galaxy S7, on the other hand, might just have the highest IP rating in the smartphone market today, with a score of IP68. That means it can still survive, even operate, in water up to 5 feet and 30 minutes. Which is why T-Mobile’s unboxing was done in a pool and rather quickly.
But while the smartphone itself might be waterproof, it isn’t actually advised to use the smartphone underwater that long. Also, the accessories, especially the wall charger, aren’t waterproof. So yeah, don’t try this at home.
With the box out of the way, it’s time to turn the smartphone itself. Or rather, its innards. We will undoubtedly get to see a lot more of it in the coming days, especially when iFixit gets their hands on theirs, but already a few secrets are being revealed. For example, the back plate is held in place by a lot of adhesive, which contributes to the waterproofing of the device. The teardown engineer, however, theorizes that long exposure to direct sunlight could weaken the adhesive, which, in turn, could lower its waterproof properties.
What about internal heat, then? Wouldn’t that have the same effect as external heat sources? Perhaps, but apparently Samsung employed the same copper heat-conducting tube cooling system that the Lumia 950 has to keep that from happening as much as possible.
And when water does come in, certain white boxes will turn to red to tell service centers and repair crew of the fact, even if the owner tries to lie about it.
The teardown claims that the CPU used in this particular model was indeed the Exynos 8890, something we have to confirm considering how Samsung has been pretty coy about that detail. The Samsung Galaxy S7 and Galaxy S7 edge will hit key markets starting March 11.


text:
Aliso Viejo resident Jeff McEachern last week launched a new business, Aging in Place Advisors, which combines his two passions: technology and helping people.
The company helps seniors master home-health technologies and online social platforms and teaches them how to find in-home care specialists.
McEachern, 49, hopes his business will help people adopt technologies that allow them to live at home independently for as long as possible.
His experience in technology includes 25 years with companies like Microsoft, Oracle and Cisco. McEachern started volunteering with seniors in 2001. Since then, he has become a Certified Aging in Place Specialist – a designation given by the National Association of Home Builders.
“To go out and help people at the computer or track their blood pressure, at the end of the day it’s so much more interesting than working with networking equipment,” he said.
Most companies that manufacture affordable home devices and programs for seniors do not offer in-person or online consultations to help people use them, McEachern said.
“If people start Googling something, they are overwhelmed,” McEachern said. “It’s just a plethora of choices.”
For now, McEachern alone is taking calls for his business. He does in-person consultations for the Orange County area and is working with four or five families. He also offers phone and online consultations to anyone across the nation.
He hopes to soon have a team of eight that can offer in-person consultations in Orange County, San Diego and Los Angeles. His long-term plan is to offer in-person services nationwide.
“I think there’s challenges as with any new company,” McEachern said. “There’s a lot of people who love their job, there’s a lot of people who don’t love their job.
“If I can say, ‘wow I’ve really helped someone today,’ that would be the goal.”
Contact the writer: firstname.lastname@example.org


text:
You Helped a Veteran in NeedJanuary 24, 2023
Esther is Staying Healthy and Well-FedJanuary 24, 2023
Without You, Jessica’s Children May Have Gone Hungry
The pandemic devastated this family. Just as they were beginning to rebuild, inflation went through the roof ...
Jessica and her husband have always been hard workers, putting in long hours to provide for their children. He’s a mechanic and she worked at a grocery store … until the pandemic cost Jessica her job. Then, like tens of millions of other Americans, the family’s finances were turned upside down almost overnight.
Thankfully, friends like you were there for them.
Good neighbors across Arizona rallied in support of St. Mary’s Food Bank, providing much-needed food for Jessica’s family (and many others). In their hour of need, they received meat and dairy, healthy grains, fresh produce and more. “We were just so grateful,” Jessica remembered. “The food helped us so much.”
As the pandemic eased, the family began rebuilding. Jessica’s husband was gaining new clients and their finances were solidifying …
Then, crisis struck a second time. Just as life was looking up, the rug was pulled out from under them a second time when inflation went through the roof. Their rent was raised, the price of food, gas and other necessities spiked, and Jessica once again faced an overwhelming mountain of bills that left no reserve for food.
Thankfully, she already knew where to turn: St. Mary’s Food Bank. And once again, because of kind neighbors like you, Jessica received the nutritious food her family urgently needed. “They love when we get vegetables,” Jessica said, "I really like when we get rice and pasta because I can make bigger meals out of those, especially when there are so many of us.”


text:
Welcome to a brand new episode of AI Daily, where we explore the world of artificial intelligence and its impact on businesses. Today, we delve into three transformative stories.
1⃣ OpenAI & Shutterstock
OpenAI and Shutterstock are expanding their partnership, providing training data for generative AI and potentially exploring the creation of Shutterstock's own generative AI, setting a potential trend for future partnerships.
The partnership seeks to proactively address potential legal concerns around content usage, shifting the responsibility of AI's guidelines and risk to Shutterstock, which may face repercussions if AI model training based on its data is contested.
Despite potential legal challenges, this partnership is seen as beneficial for Shutterstock, offering them access to generative tools and possible remuneration for their data usage, although the specifics of the payment model are yet unclear.
2⃣ Shopify Sidekick
Shopify has launched "Sidekick", an AI tool within their platform, which helps entrepreneurs with tasks like changing images, adding text to images, and answering business-related questions.
The new tool streamlines the Shopify user experience by automating adjustments, such as changing header pictures, color themes, or adding new product banners, replacing manual fine-tuning with AI-assisted operations.
Sidekick's ability to handle abstract questions provides a valuable tool for e-commerce beginners, while experienced users may find it more gimmicky; however, it could potentially reduce costs associated with data analysis or consulting services.
Elon Musk's new project, xAI, comprises top minds from companies like Google and DeepMind, aiming to use AI to understand the universe, possibly launching a competitor to OpenAI.
The team plans to work closely with Twitter and Tesla, harnessing Twitter's extensive data and Tesla's advanced AI and multimodal work to create innovative multimodal models.
Rather than focusing on current AI tasks, xAI might aim at fundamental questions, like understanding the physical nature of the universe, potentially aiding research efforts at Twitter, Tesla, and beyond.
🔗 Episode Links
Connect With Us:
Follow us on Threads
Subscribe to our Substack
Follow us on Twitter: