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OnePlus will hold an event tomorrow where the manufacturer will showcase the new OnePlus 7 series. Now the manufacturer has released a new teaser for the next flagship 7 Pro.
The Teaser indicates that the OnePlus 7 Pro will have an edge panel, but the image tells you that the phone will have a function that will cause long sides to light up when a new note is received. As with OnePlus 6T, OnePlus 7 will not have a notebook because the device will have too much space on the screen at the front.
We already know that the OnePlus 7 Pro will have a 6.67 inch screen along with the Snapdragon 855 processor.
You – ✅
Everything is revealed tomorrow! Discover the # OnePlus7Series at 11:00 AM EDT.
– OnePlus (@oneplus) May 13, 2019
Rasmus Hellmyrs is the leading writer and CEO of Mobile News. The site that is always the first with news on mobile phones! In addition to writing about mobile phones, Rasmus likes planes, buses and trains. He has tested many phones during his two years, but mostly prefers Android.
Find all posts by Rasmus


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FORT WORTH, TEXAS, (February 26, 2015) — The City of Castle Pines, Colorado announced today that it has entered into a partnership with analytics firm Buxton to strengthen the City’s retail economic development program. Buxton’s household-level customer analytics and retail expertise will identify the most promising potential retailers for the area, based on consumer demand.
While retail economic development programs have traditionally relied on basic demographic information, Castle Pines will utilize customer insights that go beyond demographics, presenting a convincing case to retailers seeking growth opportunities. Buxton’s proprietary web-based real estate platform SCOUT® will give local leaders the ability to analyze retail matches and provide market intelligence to existing local businesses.
“Retail recruitment and retention is an important part of Castle Pine’s economic development strategy,” said Don Van Wormer, city manager for the City of Castle Pines. “We look forward to welcoming new businesses to our community.”
“Buxton is excited to begin working with the City of Castle Pines,” said Lisa McCay, vice president of Buxton’s public sector division. “We will provide the analytical support needed to make important development decisions.”
Buxton has worked with more than 650 cities nationwide to implement retail development strategies. Client cities include Durango, Colorado; Indian Wells, California; Oak Park, Illinois and many others.
About Castle Pines, Colorado
Incorporated on February 12, 2008, Castle Pines is a city of about 10,000 located approximately 20 miles south of Denver in Douglas County, Colorado. Our city's stated vision is to "Enhance our community's unique character by ensuring excellent infrastructure, safe neighborhoods, maximum citizen participation and conscientious development that balances open space, residential and commercial uses."
For more information, visit www.castlepinesgov.com.
Buxton is the industry leader in customer analytics. We help businesses understand who their customers are, where their customers are located, and how to grow the value of each customer. More than 3,000 clients in the retail, restaurant, healthcare, private equity, and public sectors have relied on our insights to guide their growth strategies. Clients include GNC, Anthropologie and Marriott.
For more information, visit www.buxtonco.com.
City of Castle Pines

domain: news


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After months of wrangling by lawmakers in Washington, a silver lining may be on the horizon for consumers across the United States in the wake of the Equifax data breach
If the Senate approves it next week, a banking bill will include a provision for credit-reporting bureaus to allow consumers to freeze their credit for free. The legislation, as reported by the Wall Street Journal, has bipartisan support and would be the first real national response to the massive hack.
Bill giving all consumers free credit freezes enjoys partisan support
Credit freezes are one of the safeguards consumers can utilize to protect themselves from identity fraud and theft.
In September, Equifax disclosed that criminals hacked into their system and stole the personal information of as many as 148 million Americans.
Equifax, TransUnion and Experian all typically charge a fee for credit freezes, ranging from $3 to $10 per person per bureau (in some states, it may be a bit more) so you can imagine that the money adds up when you think about the millions of people affected by the hack.
Money expert Clark Howard says freezing your credit is the #1 way to protect your financial information. He even recently testified about the issue before a legislative committee in Georgia, Equifax’s home state.
Here are the numbers to the major credit agencies.
- Equifax: 1-800-349-9960
- Experian: 1-888-397-3742
- TransUnion: 1-888-909-8872
Equifax breach: 5 things to expect when freezing your credit


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The American Institute for International Steel (AIIS) has filed a lawsuit disputing the constitutionality of the statute under which the United States' Section 232 tariff on steel imports was issued, the trade group said on Wednesday June 27.
Two of AIIS’ member companies – Waller, Texas-based Sim-Tex LP, and Burlingame, California-based Kurt Orban Partners – also joined in the lawsuit, which was filed in the US Court of International Trade in New York.
The AIIS and the two companies allege that the statute, Section 232 of the Trade Expansion Act of 1962, violates the constitutional prohibition against Congress delegating its legislative powers to the president because it does not contain any “intelligible principle” to limit the president’s decisions.
The lawsuit is seeking both a declaration that the statute used by President Donald Trump is unconstitutional and a court order stopping further enforcement of the tariff, the AIIS said.
“In addition to the totally open-ended choice of how to counter any threat that imports may present, Section 232 allows the president to consider virtually any effect on the US economy as part of ‘national security,'” AIIS president Richard Chriss said in a statement.
The AIIS also noted that the steel tariff has had a number of negative consequences on US businesses, including soaring steel prices. American Metal Market's hot-rolled coil index stands at $45.52 per hundredweight ($910.40 per ton), up by 39.5% from $32.63 per cwt at the start of this year.
But another trade group asserts that AIIS’ legal challenge lacks merit. “Congress acted within its constitutional authority when it authorized the president to take action to adjust imports when the secretary of commerce has determined that such imports threaten to impact the national security,” American Iron and Steel Institute president and chief executive officer Thomas J. Gibson said in a statement.


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For the second consecutive year, the Honda Civic was Canada’s second-best-selling vehicle. For the ninth consecutive year, the Civic was Canada’s best-selling passenger car. It was the lone Honda on this list of Canada’s 10 best-selling cars. The Accord ranked 11th.
Toyotas landed in the third, fourth, sixth, and ninth positions. Mazda grabbed the second spot for the second consecutive year. The highest-ranked Detroit brand model was the seventh-ranked Ford Focus.


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October 11, 2013
Taobao to Crack Down on Fake Louis Vuitton Goods
The world’s biggest online marketplace is teaming up with the world’s largest luxury brand.
August 22, 2013
Modern Mongolia: From Genghis Khan to Traffic Jams
Mongolia shed its one-party system in 1990. Now both its economy and its traditional culture are booming.
June 19, 2013
Thai Monks Living Large: Private Jets and Bling
A number of signs suggest Buddhism is at a crossroads in the kingdom of Thailand.
Page 1 of 1


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New EU tariffs on US products have gone into effect. The trade dispute is escalating. Here’s what you need to know about what is happening and how the skirmish could worsen.
Global trade tensions have been brewing for months with tariffs and counter-tariffs flying between the US, China and several other countries. The US government has now challenged some of the tariffs at WTO level.
"Berlin is the city of freedom," a business agency in the German capital has contacted Harley-Davidson's CEO. The iconic US company is looking to move some production abroad to avoid the fallout of an EU-US trade spat.
The US said it would impose "unprecedented financial pressure on Iran." The refusal to grant EU businesses an exemption for Iran sanctions pushes Europe and the US further down a collision course over ties to Tehran.
China's economic growth slowed in the second quarter, adding to the many challenges Beijing faces amid a mounting tariff battle with Washington and weakened global demand for its exports.
© 2018 Deutsche Welle |
Legal notice |
| Mobile version


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A senior at Washington High School has received an Outstanding Performance Award from the Iowa High School Music Association.
Keywords: IHSMA, Oustanding Performance Award, WHS Vocal Dept. Brian Langr
Should online retailers be required to pay taxes like brick and mortar retailers do?
call: (319) 653-2113


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This is a sponsored post written in collaboration with Cheeky Little Media.
The news all Kazoops fans have been waiting for…Kazoops toys have been released! The full toy range includes plush toys, figurines, play sets and games and we here in the Kids Gifts and Toys household are super pumped to see them available.
The plush toys were released last month by Tomy in Australia and feature Monty, Lily the Alien, Suzy the Dinosaur, Otis the Warthog and our household fave Jimmy Jones. This month they have also launched in the UK via Toys “R” US and Amazon.
We blogged about our fave TV show Kazoops back in August last year and let you know about the release of their fab music. We even got to visit their studios in Manly to see how the magic happens. As you can imagine, then we are super excited to announce that the merchandising is just about to start! YAY!
We have been patiently waiting and waiting and finally it is here. First up are the books, yes beautiful story books and activity-sticker books. Kazoops books will be available on shelves at Big W, Target and Dymocks in Australia on Monday 3rd July.
And yes you guessed it, the plush toys range will be released by TOMY this November, both in Australia and the UK! Yippee!!
But back to the fab books, and yes we may have a sneaky preview of them for you. Also if you keep reading, a chance to win a set of story and sticker-activity books too! Yippee.
Super excited to have found out that the music behind Kazoops has been released with the album ” Just imagine!”, the perfect name of course!!
And as it’s Volume 1, which is awesome as that that means there is going to be more to come!!
Is anyone else’s kids hooked on Kazoops? The brilliant new pre-school TV show on ABC KIDS that started on August 1st in Australia by the amazingly talented Cheeky Little Media.
Naturally of course, I limit the amount of television and screen time the kids watch each week, however there are a few TV shows the kids adore and well ok I admit, I secretly like watching too. The newest one of them is Kazoops!


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For those of you whose task it is to build, market or sell vehicles to the mainstream consumer, there is little doubt that buyers differ by geographic location. What's hot in trendy Orange County may hardly register as a faint blip on the Midwest's radar.
In recognition of differing tastes and needs, regional press groups bestow awards upon vehicles that appeal to and best serve their local readers. The New England Motor Press Association* (NEMPA) is one such group, and recently announced its 2012 best-in-class winners, as well as top models for the Northeast's foul winters and those offering the greatest value.
*The author is a member of NEMPA.
Best-In-Class All-Weather Sedan/Wagon $25,000-$35,000
© Photo courtesy of Dodge
Talk about a turnaround. It wasn't long ago that the thought of any Chrysler
product earning a best-in-class award would've been greeted with a chuckle and a look of disbelief. However, Sergio Marchionne
has raised a sinking ship with products like the recently updated Dodge Charger
. Though last winter was one of the warmest and dryest on record in the Northeast, NEMPA has recognized the all-wheel-drive 2012 Charger variant for its four-season suitability.
Best-In-Class Premium All-Weather Sedan/Wagon
© Photo courtesy of Lexus
For the Best-In-Class Premium All-Weather Sedan/Wagon Award, NEMPA members' votes resulted in a tie between the 2012 Audi A6
and the redesigned 2013 Lexus GS 350
all-wheel-drive models. Accolades for the German four-door focused on its sure-footed and luxurious ride, as well as its MMI central command system with Google Earth technology
. Japan's Lexus
contender earned praise for its aggressive new styling, powerful engine and expansive LCD screen.
Best Luxury Winter Vehicle
© Photo courtesy of Mercedes-Benz
According to NEMPA, the ideal luxury vehicle for winter driving is the 2012 Mercedes-Benz
S-Class, specifically the S350 BlueTEC
sedan with 4MATIC all-wheel drive. In addition to its foul-weather capability, the big Benz was applauded for its efficient diesel and hybrid
powertrains and a bounty of safety features.
Best-In-Class SUV/Crossover Over $25,000
© Photo courtesy of Jeep
With a starting price of about $22,000, it seems a bit odd to hear that the 2012 Jeep Wrangler
was named the Best-In-Class SUV/Crossover Over $25,000. The confusion lies in the fact that NEMPA evaluated several Wranglers, including Rubicons and Unlimiteds, all of which carried as-tested prices well above $22,000. Well equipped or not, the venerable Jeep drew praise for its off-roading capabilities, solid resale value and updated powertrain.


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At long last—after considerable customer criticism—AT&T said Wednesday it will let even more customers use the FaceTime video chatting service over its cellular networks.Mark Collins, the company’s senior vice president of voice and data products, made the announcement in a blog post. “As a result of ongoing testing, we’re announcing AT&T will enable FaceTime over Cellular at no extra charge for customers with any tiered data plan using a compatible iOS device.”
Previously, FaceTime over cellular was available to customers with the company’s “Mobile Share” plan, or those with an LTE device (like the iPhone 5) on the company’s tiered plans. Wednesday’s announcement benefits those customers using the iPhone 4S.
But those customers may have to wait yet. Collins said that the rollout of the service “will be applied automatically over the next few months.” He didn’t indicate which regions might receive the service first, nor which ones will have to wait to the end of that period. AT&T took a similar approach when it started rolling out FaceTime over cellular to its LTE customers last fall.
AT&T spent much of the previous year rebuffing criticism from customers and net neutrality groups about its slow rollout of FaceTime over cellular, even though it had seemingly hastened the process.
Now, Collins said, AT&T is assured the service won’t overwhelm its data networks.“We wanted to roll it out gradually,” he said, “to ensure the service had minimal impact on the mobile experience for all of our customers.”
Sprint and Verizon both already offered all iPhone customers the ability to place FaceTime calls over their cellular networks.


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Some chip pioneers from the 1980s are raising the ante in modern chip design with new opportunities provided by artificial intelligence and the open-source RISC-V architecture.
Untether AI, which was co-founded by an analog and mixed signal chip pioneer Martin Snelgrove, released a new AI inferencing chip called Boqueria, which has more than 1,400 optimized RISC-V processors.
That chip will compete with Esperanto’s ET-SoC-1 AI inferencing chip, which has over 1,088 cores, and started sampling earlier this year. Esperanto’s co-founder is Dave Ditzel, who is known for pioneering work on RISC chips, which includes the development of Sun’s SPARC processors.
Tenstorrent is also building a RISC-V chip for AI under the guidance of CTO Jim Keller, who is known for his breakthroughs in mobile and PC chips through stints with Apple, AMD and Intel.
These companies are among many chip startups focusing on AI. The RISC-V instruction set architecture, which is free to license and customize, has spawned low-cost chip development opportunities for a host of new applications that include AI.
Untether announced the Boqueria chip at the Hot Chips conference this week. The company claimed the performance crown in AI inferencing performance, with 2 petaflops of performance on the FP8 data type. The chip also performs 30 teraflops per watt.
That’s an overall improvement from the company’s predecessor AI chip, RunAI, which was released in 2020 and delivered 500 teraflops of performance, and an efficiency of 8 teraflops per watt.
“In inference, you want to make sure that you’re doing things as efficiently as possible and using the right data types to ensure the necessary accuracy, but at the same standpoint, providing energy efficiency,” said Robert Beachler, vice president of product and hardware engineering, during a presentation at Hot Chips.
The company said its benchmarks on performance and performance-per-watt outperformed comparable chips on MLPerf, which is emerging as an industry standard AI benchmark.
But the company hasn’t opened its benchmarks to MLPerf, and plans to do so when it has the resources available.
Untether AI took a new design approach to ensure efficiency in data movement by putting more compute resources where data exists. For example, a computing element is directly attached to memory cells.
“When we sat down to architect for AI inference acceleration, the first thing we saw is that 90% of the energy in doing neural network computing is in movement of data, either from external memory or on internal caches. And only 10% is really done in the computer,” Beachler said.
The chip has 729 memory banks, with two RISC-V CPU cores running at 1.3GHz for each memory bank.
“Because the processing elements have their own dedicated memory, we have tremendous memory bandwidth on the order of a petabyte of memory bandwidth,” Beachler said.
Boqueria supports the PCI-Express interconnect. The company can plug in up to six chips in a single PCI-Express card to run large natural language processing networks. A six-chip PCI card will consume 400 watts of power, but typical workloads will run at the 200- to 300-watt range.
Boqueria can also be scaled down to fewer memory banks for customers who don’t run large-scale inferencing applications. The family of AI will scale from sub-one watt all the way up to the new chip described at Hot Chips.
“This allows us to address multiple different price performance points and form factors,” which includes integration in chiplets with direct die-to-die interconnects to other chips in a system-on-chip package, Beachler said.
The chip supports many data types, from INT4 to FP16, for better accuracy. The company researched different data types, and concluded that the 16-bit data types, like BF16, provide as much as accuracy as FP32, but using lesser power and compute resources.
“We’ve also found that we’ve developed a new FP8 data type that quadruples the efficiency from BF16, but at the same time preserves the accuracy necessary for today’s AI workloads,” Beachler said.
The RISC-V CPU in Boqueria is a standard architecture with more than twenty custom instructions to take advantage of the design and inference workloads.


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‘VAT to be Paid on Payment of Invoice from 1 January 2015’
- by croatiaweek
- in Business
“Prime Minister Zoran Milanović has accepted my proposal and announced that all businesses and tradesmen with annual revenues of up to 3 million kuna (395,000 euros) will from January 1, 2015 pay VAT on the paid invoices and not on issued invoice,” Minister of Entrepreneurship Gordan Maras announced on Facebook….
Currently businesses and tradesmen were obliged to pay VAT when an invoice was issued, drawing criticism from the sector.
“This possibility will affect a little more than 150,000 Croatian entrepreneurs and tradesmen. I believe that this is the most important measure for small and medium entrepreneurs and small businesses over the past decade,” said Maras.


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Guest post by Robert Habeeb president and chief operating officer, First Hospitality Group, Inc.
When we look at the current state of the Midwest hotel market, we see a region that is transitioning in some important ways from a state of slow recovery to something closer to genuine momentum. Whether that momentum is sustainable remains an open question, but there is no doubt that—despite significant market-to-market variation—on the whole, hotel development activity in the Midwest is on the uptick.
Across the region, a number of interesting trends are emerging. Some of those trends mirror similar trend lines in the national hotel market, and some are specific to the Midwest, but all of them contribute new data points and perspectives that can help give us a better sense of where the Midwest hotel industry is headed in the months and years ahead.
The Windy City goes international
The general industry consensus used to be that the Midwest, specifically Chicago, was unlikely to ever really become a major destination for international travelers. Recently, however, major hotel brands, together with the City of Chicago, have been engaged in a concerted effort to change that impression. Their efforts are working. A recent article in the Chicago Tribune points out that while “Chicago might not be a top-of-mind city for overseas travelers, apparently word of its virtue is getting out.” Mayor Rahm Emanuel just announced that the city welcomed a record 1.369 million overseas visitors in 2012. This represents a 14 percent increase from 2012, a spike which moved the city into ninth place (ahead of Boston) in overall city rankings for international travel by the U.S. Department of Commerce. Chicago hoteliers and civic leaders have set themselves an informal goal of boosting international travel up to 15 percent of business—and if recent trends continue, that might not be so farfetched.
Overbuilding on the horizon?
Anecdotally, the strength of demand across many major markets in the Midwest continues to make for favorable conditions: particularly in Chicago where our hotels have all been at 90-percent-plus capacity this summer, with the leisure segment performing particularly well. During the last decade or so, leisure business has been a leading driver of hotel growth and success in Chicago. During that time, business travel is up slightly, but leisure travel is way up, and continues to be a major post-recessionary driver.
Despite these recent numbers and continued strong performance, there is some reason to worry that Chicago—and a few other markets in the Midwest—might be in danger of overbuilding. With a number of new hotels coming online in the next couple of years, a major question looms: How much new product can be sustained without having an impact on existing product? This ebbs and flow, as there is always somewhat of a horse race between supply and demand, and the extent to which overbuilding becomes a problem will depend largely on how fast demand can continue to rally. The current best guess from those in the know? Any serious overbuilding impact is likely about two years or so away: We will be fine for 2014, but with an abundance of new hotels coming online after that, I suspect that we will reach a tipping point.
When it comes to choosing the “right” spot for a new hotel, it is just as important to weigh the pros and cons of the larger marketplace as it is to select a great site. That is something that sometimes gets forgotten, and, as hotel development professionals “vet” markets in the Midwest, it is important to remember the old cliché about all real estate being local. It is essential to always look for hot spots in a particular market, areas where hotels are underrepresented but there is plenty of sustainable long-term demand. Great hotels will work anywhere; it is the marginal hotels that will suffer if the larger market sags.
That said, experienced professionals are always looking for new and emerging markets with plenty of diverse employers and industries to provide a strong and sustainable economic base. While some larger markets have become less enticing in recent years, we are seeing some smaller markets present more promising hotel development opportunities. Columbus, Ohio, falls into that category. Columbus has all the tangible and intangible positives developers like to see, including a strong corporate business base, its location as the seat of the state government and a massive state university in The Ohio State University. Omaha is another city that could be considered a “sleeper” market. Omaha has a solid corporate base with brands like Union Pacific, Berkshire Hathaway and Godfather’s Pizza, as well a regional military presence and a good stable demand environment. One cautionary note: Omaha might be somewhat susceptible to overbuilding—while it is a strong market, it is not necessarily a deep market.
In addition to increased ground-up development, we are seeing a lot of large-scale renovations at Midwestern hotels. The reason for this is two-fold: first, major hotel brands, which were being relatively deferential and understanding with regard to delays on capital improvements and brand standards during the recession, are now enforcing the required upgrades. Second, hoteliers have caught on to the fact that the key to attracting the leisure travelers is to give them more than a product, but to give them an experience. This is true at any point in the food chain, from five-star boutiques to economy lodging.
Consumers these days—especially millennial consumers—get bored very quickly, and they are demanding more. Essentially every hotel in our development pipeline right now has some kind of experiential element. Whether that is a historic building, a signature restaurant, unique amenities or some other kind of distinguishing feature, guests today are demanding spaces and places with a memorable and defining sense of place.
If I have a “big picture” thought, it is this: everything is cyclical. We are once again building back to the peak of a development cycle. The hotel development industry in the Midwest is a little more modulated and a lot more cautious than during the last run-up. Nonetheless, there is a definite sense that development is accelerating beyond the point at which it is sustainable. It seems like developers are announcing new projects every day. While some of this is likely the result of years of pent-up demand, it is still a real phenomenon and worth paying attention to going forward.
First Hospitality Group, Inc., is a national hospitality management, and development company serving the investment and real estate industries. The company has developed, marketed and managed more than 16 brands and 50 properties throughout the Midwest.


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Tobacco is a product that kills more than 13 lakh Indians every year. The annual economic burden from tobacco use is estimated to be ₹177,340 crore which is more than 1% of India’s GDP. About 27 crore people above the age of 15 years and 8.5% of school-going children in the age group 13-15 years use tobacco in some form in India. There is no doubt that tobacco use is highly detrimental to public health. We have to find the ways and the means to reduce the demand for tobacco among existing as well as aspiring users.
Impact of tax
A large body of literature shows price and tax measures to be one of the most cost-effective measures to reduce demand for tobacco products. When tobacco products become more expensive, people either quit using them or use them less, and it incentivises many to not initiate the habit. Because it hurts both revenue and profits, the tobacco industry, globally, is always devising tactics and narratives that will pre-empt any kind of tax increases on tobacco products. The narrative of “increasing illicit trade” is something the tobacco industry has historically used to pre-empt potential tax increases on tobacco products in most countries around the world. The story is no different in India. The tobacco industry, led by ITC Limited, has maintained that the illegal cigarette trade accounts for as much as 25% of the cigarette market in India. In a recent report by the Tobacco Institute of India, a representative body of the cigarette industry, it was said that the illicit cigarette volume in India has grown by 44% from 2011 to 2019 while adding that high and increasing tax rates provide a profitable opportunity for tax evasion and encourage growth in illegal trade.
Estimates by two studies
In the interest of regulating tobacco use and protecting public health, it is important to examine whether there is any truth in these industry claims. When one takes a deeper look, however, it is easy to see that neither the estimates nor the methods used to derive them are backed by any transparent studies. On the other hand, there are two studies published in peer-reviewed scientific journals in recent years that estimate the percentage of illicit cigarettes in the Indian market using widely accepted best practice methodology to estimate the same. The first study published in 2018 which used a survey of empty cigarette packs collected from retail outlets across different cities in India estimated that illicit cigarettes constitute 2.7% of the market. The second study published in 2020 used tax-gap analysis to estimate that the percentage of illicit cigarettes was 5.1% in 2009-10 and 6.6% in 2016-17. Both these studies used transparent and replicable methods and their estimates of the illicit market were nowhere near the 25% figure that the tobacco industry in India has been using to influence the public discourse on tobacco taxation.
The economic burden from tobacco use in India has increased by 22% in real terms over the period 2011 to 2017. There has been a 3% real decline in Goods and Services Tax (GST) revenues from tobacco products in the past two financial years. On the other hand, the annual reports of ITC show their profits after tax in real terms have increased, on average, 3% every year for the past 10 years. One must also note that despite all the business diversification ITC has undertaken over the years, close to 85% of its profits still come from the cigarette business alone.
Exaggerating both the scale and the extent of illicit trade has been a means the tobacco industry has used historically to advocate against tobacco tax increases. However, it is to be noted that taxes and prices are not the key determinants of illicit trade. There is sufficient evidence in the literature on illicit trade in cigarettes that shows tax increases only have a minimal impact, if at all, on illicit trade. There are several countries where tobacco taxes are quite high and yet have low levels of illicit trade, while there are also countries with high levels of illicit trade despite having relatively low tax rates. Several factors such as the quality of tax administration, the strength of the regulatory framework, government commitment to control illicit trade, the strength of governance, social acceptance, and the presence of informal distribution networks are known to play a larger role in determining the scale and the extent of an illicit market.
The estimated percentage of the illicit market for cigarettes in India is far lower than most countries out there and well below the world average at 11.2% as estimated in a recent study (https://bit.ly/32SGhwI) on the illicit cigarette market across 36 countries. Eliminating all forms of illicit trade in tobacco products through a package of measures is one of the major objectives of the Protocol to Eliminate Illicit Trade in Tobacco Products under the World Health Organization’s Framework Convention on Tobacco Control. The Protocol provides the tools and the measures to eliminate or minimise illicit trade which includes strong governance, establishing an international track and trace system, and securing supply chains. India has already ratified the World Health Organization Protocol and it should now show leadership in implementing these measures to effectively address even the relatively lower levels of illicit trade.
India had no significant tax increases on any of the tobacco products for the past four years since the introduction of GST in 2017 because of which tobacco products have become more affordable as shown in recent studies. There is no scientific or public health rationale not to increase tax on tobacco products for unfounded fear of increasing illicit trade.
Rijo M. John is a health economist and Adjuct Professor at the Rajagiri College of Social Sciences, Kochi, Kerala


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People who love sports and hate technology might want to sit down for this one because your worst nightmares are coming true:
Select MLB and NFL games will only be available to stream for the 2022 season and beyond.
To keep tabs on your top teams, you’ll need to donate Apple and Amazon subscription dollars, own a device which is compatible with their streaming services, and pray (whatever deity you worship) that your home internet connection lasts three and a half hours.
If that sounds scary to you, we understand. Gone are the days of wiggling bunny ears over the nice old square TV to get a clearer picture. But if you just let us explain what’s going on in live sports and why, you’ll be ready for this new streaming world order.
Wait, I can’t watch my team on TV anymore?
Thursday Night Football will no longer be on the NFL Network.
Credit: Ian Johnson/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images
The good news is that, for now, your viewing habits won’t have to change that much. If you watch sports on cable, it will still work. It just won’t work for all game once baseball season starts in April and football season starts in September.
When the 2022 NFL season kicks off this fall, Thursday night football games will be broadcast exclusively on Amazon’s Prime Video app. It’s an 11-year deal between Amazon and the NFL that sees the Bezos empire shell out $1 billion a year for the privilege of showing just 15 regular season games per season. Thursday Night Football has been simulcast on Fox, NFL Network, and Prime Video since 2017, so the infrastructure is there. Now it’s just an Amazon exclusive.
As for baseball, the American pastime, you’ll have to turn to the streaming home of Ted Lasso. Starting in April, two MLB games will be broadcast every Friday night exclusively on Apple TV+. Apple would have paid $85 million for the rights to just two games a week. MLB’s media device will produce the broadcasts, so all Apple has to do is make sure the stream is working. Apple TV+ has yet to be used to broadcast live events of this magnitude, so it remains to be seen how the quality and performance of the broadcast will compare to regular TV.
Apple and Amazon are also considered favorites to secure the rights to NFL Sunday Ticket, according to the Sports Business Journal. It’s a nifty little package run by DirecTV (with rights expiring after the 2022 season) that lets you stream any NFL game on Sundays except those in the market you live in. very handy for, say, a Kansas City Chiefs fan living in New York, but it also costs $300 a year if you live in an area without DirecTV service, and is otherwise part of satellite packages that cost $80/month or more. Hopefully Apple or Amazon can find a way to reduce that number.
Why is this happening now?
Apple wants it to be more than just a “Ted Lasso” box.
Credit: Neil Godwin/Edge Magazine/Future via Getty Images)
Simply put, it’s a sign of the times. According to Research bench. It’s no secret that streaming is cheaper and more convenient. Even the most basic cable package is more expensive than Netflix’s most expensive tier, and only 39% of Americans said they preferred live TV over on-demand content in a 2018 Hub Entertainment Research study. as reported by Deadline. However, sport is not really consumed in the same way as stranger things. There’s just not much juice in watching a game on demand hours or even days after the outcome has been decided.
Dan Ives, an analyst with market research firm Wedbush, said Apple and Amazon are getting into sports because it’s the most important thing in media that they’re not doing. again control.
“Sport really is the goose that lays the golden egg,” Ives said. “Amazon and Apple are in a unique position because of their stacks of cash, which…give them the ability to bid on live sports content, which will ultimately be the magnet to attract more and more subscribers.”
“Sport really is the goose that lays the golden egg.”
information reported that Apple TV+ only had around 20 million paying subscribers last year, which is tiny compared to Netflix’s 222 million. Adding baseball and football would almost certainly increase that number. The same could be said for Amazon’s Prime subscription, which crossed the threshold of 200 million members Last year. This number of subscriptions is staggering, but obviously Amazon will always want more people to pay for Prime.
It’s reasonable for these companies to think that live sports will drive new streaming subscriptions. Even with the caveat that Thursday Night Football is generally considered by fans to be one of the least important games each week (because teams only play a few days off), it still draws a large following – a Thursday game reached 20 million viewers Last year. Baseball is harder to plot because a large majority of games aren’t nationally broadcast (and there’s no pre-existing national double-header on Friday nights), but for context, the World Series from last year 11.7 million viewers on average in six games.
Could this make life harder (or easier) for sports fans?
Improving rural internet access has been a talking point for the Biden administration, and it would greatly help rural sports fans moving forward.
Credit: Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images
If all of this sounds ominous, don’t worry too much. These sports leagues negotiate TV rights deals that last decades, so the way it works now is the way it will work for many years to come. For example, the current NFL arrangement short until 2033.
Still, there are opportunities to visualize the downside with what Eric Schmitt, an analyst at market research firm Gartner, calls the “streaming” of sports right now. Most obvious is the lack of reliable home internet in rural areas. Last year the The Biden administration said 30 million Americans lived in places with unacceptable broadband infrastructure.
“It seems…potentially to further deprive those of us who don’t have reliable broadband access because of where we live or our economic circumstances,” Schmitt said.
And while many of our dear seniors can get by with modern technology, it’s no secret that older people tend to acclimate poorly to these kinds of changes. Apple getting into bed with baseball to begin its streaming journey is fascinating as the sport has the oldest audience of any major team sport. Sports Business Journal estimated the median baseball viewership was 57 in 2016. Obviously, six years have passed since then, so baseball viewership isn’t getting any younger.
Watching live sports online is a pain, but these 4 apps make it easier
The biggest potential benefit of sports streamlining is simply more user-friendly pricing. Apple TV+ probably won’t just cost $5/month forever, but it almost certainly won’t cost north of $100/month like a premium cable subscription currently does.
Despite the cost savings, the gradual shift of live sports from traditional TV to streaming is a great example of how the march of technological progress isn’t always a universal good thing. Fans will inevitably be shut out of sports as they are increasingly locked behind streaming platforms. On the other hand, this presents an opportunity as new fans could consist of people lazily scrolling through Prime Video on a Thursday night.
But whether this decision makes our favorite teams more or less accessible, we can all agree on at least one thing: streams work better.


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DETROIT – Today, Buick was recognized as the highest-ranking mass-market brand for customer satisfaction with dealer service, according to the J.D. Power 2014 U.S. Customer Service Index (CSI) StudySM.
Surveying service satisfaction among owners and lessees of one- to five-year-old vehicles in the United States, the CSI focuses on five service areas. Weighted the most is service quality, followed by service initiation, service advisor, service facility and vehicle pick-up. Buick ranked highest among 19 mass-market brands.
“Our dealers have an excellent focus on putting our customers first,” said Duncan Aldred, U.S. vice president of Buick and GMC. “Not only have Buick dealers committed to or completed overhauling their facilities, but they’ve shown that continuing a positive customer experience is a top priority.”
Buick continues to focus not only on customer satisfaction, but also quality and reliability of its vehicles. Recently, Buick was recognized as one of the most reliable brands in America.


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Soma has a new campaign and a new bra.
The intimate apparel brand, which is under the Chico’s FAS umbrella, will release a 15-second TV spot that will begin airing March 2. It features model Hannah Ferguson, who recently appeared in Sports Illustrated’s Swimsuit issue, wearing Soma’s new Enticing Lift bra, which is a lace push-up bra that’s free from padding.
“We created Soma’s Enticing Lift bra because we listened to the customer,” said Laurie Van Brunt, Soma’s brand president. “We heard over and over how much she wants an unlined bra that doesn’t add volume but still lifts and supports. It was a challenge that set us on a two-year journey of research and development.”
The bra, which comes in sizes 32D-DDD, 34-36B-G, 38B-DDD and 40C-DD, retails for $58. The Enticing collection also includes no-show underwear available in bikini, boy short, high-leg brief, hipster and thong, a fragrance, and sleepwear with soft support cups.


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Star Athletes Often Endorse Junk Food, Study Says
Sugar-packed 'sports drinks' among products hawked in lucrative ad campaigns
LeBron James of the Miami Heat (National Basketball Association), Peyton Manning of the Denver Broncos (National Football League) and tennis star Serena Williams were the "highest contributors to the marketing of unhealthy foods," Bragg's team reported.
Perhaps not surprisingly, athletes most commonly promoted sports drinks like Gatorade and Powerade. But the researchers considered any drink that gets 100 percent of its calories from sugar as unhealthy -- and sports beverages fall into that category.
"Sports drinks are basically soda," Rich said. But consumers, particularly kids, may view them as health foods, he noted.
The American Beverage Association, which represents the industry, said its members have been careful to avoid targeting young children.
"This study, in fact, reaffirms that children younger than 12 are not the age group primarily viewing food- and beverage-related advertisements that include professional athletes," the group said in a statement. "Our industry offers consumers a variety of choices to help make informed decisions and we respect parents' roles as the primary decision makers in choosing what their children consume."
Rich agreed, saying parents need to be savvy consumers and teach their kids to do the same. He suggested that when an athlete endorsement pops up on your TV screen, talk to your kids about it. "Let them know, just because Peyton Manning is sitting by a jug of Gatorade, that doesn't mean Gatorade made him what he is today," Rich said.
Bragg agreed, but "just being aware isn't enough," she added.
"Ideally, athletes would stop promoting unhealthy foods," Bragg said. And if parents are really concerned, she noted, they could "find ways to be vocal about it" -- such as supporting nutrition advocacy groups.
What this study cannot say is whether kids, or adults, actually eat more junk food because of athletes' endorsements. Both Rich and Bragg pointed to the millions of dollars that companies are willing to pay athletes: NBA star Kobe Bryant earned an estimated $12 million per year from his contract with McDonald's, Bragg's team wrote.
"If companies are investing that much," Bragg said, "I think it's safe to assume there's a reason."


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After Facebook announced its plans to release Libra, China began working harder on its state-backed cryptocurrency project known as the DCEP (digital currency electronic payment) and in the fall of last year announced that it would be released in the near future.
Currently, while several states are toying with the idea of launching their own crypto, China stands closest to actually releasing a digital version of the yuan.
Now, Reuters reports, Japan has started moving in the same direction.
A proposal to issue its own crypto
The news agency has reported that lawmakers from the ruling party in the Japanese government are about to present a proposal that Japan should issue its own CBDC (central bank digital currency) – a digital version of the yen.
Reuters got this information from the parliamentary vice minister of foreign affairs, Norihiro Nakayama. He said:
“The first step would be to look into the idea of issuing a digital yen. China is moving toward issuing digital yuan, so we’d like to propose measures to counter such attempts.”
Japan unlikely to issue digital currency anytime soon
Since certain technical and legal issues are likely to prevent Japan from issuing digital yen in the near future, the local central bank has teamed with several other banks to issue a digital currency together when the time is right.


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BW3 plans updating project
By Karl Henkel
Buffalo Wild Wings, 7401 Market St., is set to undergo a massive renovation project next month.
Doug Esenwein, regional manager for the four local BW3s — in Niles, Austintown, Boardman and Youngstown — said the project will take place in mid- to late July and cause the restaurant, in its current location since 1996, to close temporarily for about a week.
“We’ll change everything from the exterior — a brand new facade — patio and all new TVs,” he said. “There will also be new floor coverings, wall coverings and new audio-visual equipment.”
The patio will have a new shutter system that will allow use in the fall and winter.
Esenwein said when finished, the establishment will look similar to the Austintown location, which recently was remodeled. The restaurant will go from its third-generation blue-and-yellow logo look to the fourth-generation yellow-and-black appearance.
Esenwein said one of the more-popular features in other BW3 locations — TVs in the restrooms — isn’t slated as part of the renovation, but he didn’t discount the idea entirely.
“We’re investing more in product out on the floor,” he said. “But you never know, we could always throw that detail in.”


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If you are not familiar with NSO Group, nGuard released a Security Advisory in August detailing the history of the NSO Group and their spyware platform, Pegasus. If you haven’t read the advisory, check it out here, or you can watch the summary video below:
In late November, Apple announced that it is suing the Israeli spyware firm NSO Group and its parent company OSY Technologies for targeting its users with their spyware. This is the second lawsuit against NSO Group with the first coming from Facebook, now owned by Meta, for targeting its users on the message application WhatsApp.
In addition to the lawsuit, which is seeking unspecified damages, Apple is requesting the NSO Group be banned from using Apple software, services, or devices. NSO Group created over 100 fake Apple IDs used to deploy their spyware Pegasus, which violates the iCloud terms of service. NSO Group still states they only sell spyware to government for lawful interceptions and says, “Thousands of lives were saved around the world thanks to NSO Group’s technologies used by its customers.” Although the NSO group states it has ethical purposes, evidence has shown otherwise and has led to the United States implementing sanctions and a blacklist on them for enabling “transnational repression.”
Apple did release software updates to patch the vulnerabilities exploited by NSO Group and has not seen any indications of Pegasus or any other NSO tools being used against their latest software, iOS 15. Apple has strongly urged iOS users to upgrade to the latest version of software to protect themselves from these types of attacks.


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U.K. antitrust organization the Competition and Markets Authority has submitted a request to the European Commission for the proposed merger in the U.K. of broadband and mobile-phone operators Virgin Media and Virgin Mobile with cell-phone company O2 to be referred to the CMA for investigation.
The European Commission was notified about the proposed merger by Liberty Global, which owns Virgin Media and Virgin Mobile, and Telefónica, which owns O2 on Sept. 30.
The proposed merger falls under the remit of the EC to review but can, subject to the agreement of the EC, be transferred to the CMA.
The CMA believes that the case should be transferred given its potential impact on competition in several retail and wholesale telecommunication markets in the U.K.
CMA said Thursday that the legal requirements for the case to be transferred to the CMA have been met, and any impact on competition will be limited solely to U.K. consumers.
Andrea Coscelli, chief executive at the CMA, said: “We’ve sent a formal request to the European Commission to review the proposed deal between Virgin and O2.
“Ultimately, this is a decision for the EC, but as the merger will only impact U.K. consumers – and any effects would only be felt after the end of the transition period (after which the U.K. leaves the EU) – it is only right for the CMA to request it back.”
The initial deadline for the EC to respond to the request is Nov. 19.
Source: Read Full Article


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Operating a big cryptocurrency trade is a profitable industry. Coinbase is reported to have remodeled $1 billion remaining 12 months, and Binance is heading in the right direction to tug in $850 million yearly. Whilst the majority of those income come from buying and selling charges, they’re now not the one income flow: exchanges also are pocketing tens of millions from the costs ICOs and altcoin builders should pay to have their token indexed.
Additionally learn: ‘Cryptomatoes’ The use of Extra Mining Warmth to Develop Produce
Exchanges Are Creating a Lovely Penny
Maximum cryptocurrency exchanges don’t publicly put it up for sale their list charges, despite the fact that those are recognized to run into the loads of hundreds of bucks, and the tens of millions in some instances. The larger the trade, the upper the cost that should be paid for tapping into its liquidity pool and armed forces of present customers. Trade Insider stories on ICO founders who declare to were requested for between $50,000 and $1 million for having their token indexed. Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao puzzled those numbers, and likewise defended list charges, tweeting “maximum funding banks rate 7% for simply underwriting an IPO deal”, by means of comparability.
It’s now not simply centralized exchanges that may hang ICOs hostage with hefty list charges: the similar is right of primary cryptocurrency cellular wallets too. One altcoin developer instructed information.Bitcoin.com that they have been quoted a rate of $three.five million for being built-in with a well-liked cellular pockets. They declined. Exchanges equivalent to Bittrex and Bitfinex assert that they don’t rate an inventory rate, despite the fact that some other people query this. With exchanges requiring ICOs to signal extremely restrictive NDAs sooner than token list will even be mentioned, company figures are laborious to return via.
A License to Print Cash
It’s rumored to price as much as $1 million for an inventory on Binance, with the one exception being the neighborhood coin of the month that’s voted in via platform customers. (One supply has positioned Binance’s list rate at nearer to $350,000, however expresses uncertainty over whether or not this can be a one-off or annual rate.) For lots of altcoins and ICOs, the price of a price ticket to the prime liquidity league is just too a lot, restricting those tasks to smaller exchanges equivalent to Gate.io and Tradesatoshi. Viacoin developer Romano wouldn’t verify how a lot he paid to get VIA on Binance, however conceded that had it now not been for a a hit crypto buying and selling occupation, he would were not able to come up with the money for it.
For all their associations with decentralization, cryptocurrencies are nonetheless closely reliant on centralized platforms. Securing give a boost to from large exchanges and primary and device wallets isn’t very important, however with out such adoption, altcoins possibility being marginalized and inaccessible to the loads. It’s one of the paradoxes throughout the crypto area: for crypto to move mainstream, it must be on mainstream platforms. Exchanges like Binance and Coinbase are the Facebooks of the cryptoverse; digital monopolies with the ability to make or destroy tasks.
Do you suppose cryptocurrency trade list charges are over the top or immoral? Tell us within the feedback segment underneath.
Photographs courtesy of Shutterstock.
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The put up Cryptocurrency Exchanges Are Making Tens of millions from Simply List Cash seemed first on Bitcoin Information.


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Bitcoin (BTC) is dealing with a brand new menace within the close to future as customers of the Mt. Gox change are about to get their BTC again. In a brand new letter dated July 6, lawyer Nobuaki Kobayashi, who was appointed trustee within the Mt. Gox, confirmed that he’s “making ready to repay” the change’s account holders.
We frequently go to seek out out who MT. Gox is and whether or not the discharge of $3 billion in Bitcoin from Mt. Gox created a market backside in August?
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- Why hasn’t the Bitcoin price risen again yet?
- Honduras Will Undertake Bitcoin As Authorized Tender In The Coming Days.
- Brief Bitcoin Now Is The Proper Determination?
- The EU might ban Bitcoin and PoW cryptocurrencies by 2025
- Ukraine Has Made Bitcoin And Cryptocurrency Authorized.
- Cryptocurrency Market January 28, 2022: Bitcoin and Ethereum Attempt to Get well
- Actual Imaginative and prescient CEO predicts $100,000 Bitcoin and $10,000 ETH by the top of 2022
- The IMF asks El Salvador not to recognize the digital currency Bitcoin


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Rob Rymond played Need for Speed: Pro Street and shares his impressions. This installment in the series breaks from it's familiar roots and takes a different path more similar to Gran Tourismo, except with more customization options. Using a legal track racing system, as opposed to the illegal street racing, the game does away with the open-city roaming.
Read the Pro Street review.
The French rating company, PEGI has updated its website with three listing that could reveal which PlayStation one games will be appearing on the PlayStation Network next.
The three games that have been listed are Rollcage, Omega Boost and Devil Dice. Each of these titles have a rating of 3+ on the PEGI website.
Mike Jennings played Juiced 2: Hot Import Nights
, the sequel to 2005's Juiced
developed by Juice Games. Thought to be worth the price, the game boasts an excellent single player campaign, a plethora of customization options for cars - the main difference from the previous title - and solid controls.
Read the Juiced 2 review.
Empire have revealed that their latest FlatOut expedition, which was exclusive to Xbox360 and released last June, is now being retuned by Bugbear studios for release on PC.
This port is said to have all the same trimmings and carnage as the original and will hopefully see retail shelves sometime this Summer.
Burnout Paradise has been played. Govan Roberts gives his opinion on this the latest edition to the Burnout series from developer Criterion Games. Found to be an excellent representative of the series and genre, his view is that, combined with hundreds of potential hours of single player content and an excellent online experience, the game is worth the price of admission.
Read the Burnout Paradise review.
SouthPeak Games has announced that it will be publishing Things on Wheels, an upcoming arcade racing game for the Xbox Live Arcade. Players will control radio-controlled vehicles as they complete tracts set within a gigantic house; doesn't this sound familiar?... Micro Machines!!
Developed by Load Inc, they promise that gamers will have plenty of radio-controlled racing fun when it's released in Summer 2008.
Sony Computer Entertainment America revealed today that Gran Turismo 5: Prologue will be released on April 17th in North America exclusive to the PlayStation 3. It'll also be available for download on the PlayStation Store for $39.99.
We've published 8 new screenshots for Midnight Club: Los Angeles, which is in development by Rockstar Games and is currently set for release on the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360.
Empire Interactive announced this morning that FlatOut: Head On is going to be released for the PSP on 14th March 2008.
FlatOut: Head On is ready to drop the hammer on the PSP extreme racing genre, bringing high speed destruction and leaving more broken bones and wrecked cars in its wake, than a Richard Hammond Top Gear stunt. From rock-smashing dust ups in arid desert landscapes to down and dirty races through rubbish-strewn city streets, FlatOut’s PSP debut is yet another gritty excursion into racing carnage.
System 3 announced this morning that its upcoming racing simulation, Ferrari Challenge Trofeo Pirelli, will also be released for the PlayStation 2 this spring.
Ferrari Challenge is a re-creation of Ferrari's own racing series, which sees both both professional and amateur drivers taking to the world’s most famous race tracks in 430 Challenge race cars Developed by racing game specialists Eutechnyx, Ferrari Challenge Trofeo Pirelli draws upon the developer’s years of experience with racing titles and includes a uniquely magical touch from GP2 driver Bruno Senna, nephew of F1 legend Ayrton and technical consultant on the game’s handling.
Sony Computer Entertainment Europe revealed a release date for the PAL version of Gran Turismo 5 Prologue, which is now set for release on March 28th.
Reports suggest that the SCCE website was updated with release date information that has since been taken down, although adverts for the game have started to appear online and at other media locations which would suggest a release is upcoming.
We've got more news from Financial documents today, but this one bring some sour news to the gaming industry. THQ has decided to scrap a few of its titles, and two franchises will also be wiped out of the development line.
Stuntman Ignition was released towards the end of last year and received average reviews from the media, for this reason THQ has scraped the series.
The second review
that we have for today is of Pursuit Force: Extreme Justice, an action pumped driving madness for your PSP.
Activision's recently released Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare has knocked Halo 3 right out of the top spot for this weeks most played Xbox Live titles. Halo 3 is now in second position, with Guitar Hero 3 being 3rd and Gears of War coming in 4th position.
Microsoft is celebrating the release of 112 games on the Xbox Live Arcade by announcing a reward program that will allow gamers to vote for their favorite games on the service. Voting begins Tuesday, 22nd January at 10:00 a.m. and runs until Wednesday, 30th January at 07:59 a.m.
The finalists in each category were selected by a panel of consumer and video game industry journalists and the winners will be determined by popular vote. Microsoft will announce the winners at the Game Developer Conference in February.
Zavvi has told MCV that they'll be increasing their games area by 15 percent, taking shelf space from the music section.
The reason for this increase is because during the Christmas season the store saw a big increase in the amount of game products that got sold. This will mark the second time its increased its range of gaming products.
Nintendo of America has released a huge list that contains release dates for their upcoming Wii and DS games as well as some third party ones that are currently in development. These dates aren't for the European version, unfortunately for us they are US dates but they should give us a good idea of when they are nearing release in the UK.
We would like to point out some of our favorite ones on this list for the Wii, Alone in the Dark is coming in March from Atari, Mario Kart Wii with Wii Wheel from Nintendo are set to arrive in spring and LucasArts LEGO: Indiana Jones is also set for a release in spring whilst Star Wars: The Force Unleashed will be hitting stores in the summer.
The Competition Commission has confirmed that Game's acquisition of Gamestation is almost set and that the market shouldn't expect to see any substantial lessening of competition for the supply of gaming software, consoles and related accessories in the UK.
Game said: "The board of The GAME Group is pleased to note that the Competition Commission, in its final report published today, has unconditionally cleared the completed acquisition of Gamestation,"
Blasting through the dirt and snow comes 38 screenshots of Ford and Land Rover's officially licensed 4x4 racer Off Road, set for release this mid to late March.
SouthPeak Games informed us this morning that Iridium Runners, an arcade racing title for the PS2, will hit retail shelves on February 22nd at a price point of about £20.


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Flag, GTS moves will aid global bandwidth
Internet users accessing sites in the Far East from Europe have often found that their efforts fail for no apparent reason, with no readily available information as to whether the site is down (and "no response from server" may not mean that the server has been reached). Apart from the known problem that Windows can only cope with 32 hops, unless you feel like poking the registry, the alternatives have been to try again and hope for a shorter routing with fewer hops, or to use Unix which usually allows 64 hops. Another problem that is increasingly being noted is the difficulty of using Java in India, because applets are liable to time out because of inadequate telecoms – although this is not directly apparent to users. There are some significant telecoms infrastructure improvements now coming into being, but users will need to know just what deals their ISP has done with telecoms carriers if they are to benefit. It may seem strange that cables are providing significant extra capacity, but there are still significant limitations with satellite bandwidth – 90Megabits/second for a transponder, compared with some 600 Megabits/second for fibre optic cables. Also significant is the delay with satellites – 350 milliseconds by satellite compared with 127 milliseconds for cable from London to Japan. The result is less echo in telephone conversations, and some advantages in data transmission. One of the more important new developments is the rise of a new class of "carrier's carriers" – companies that sell capacity to carriers, but do not themselves operate what may be thought of as a retail service. Two of these are Flag Telecom and its recent partner Global TeleSystems (GTS). Flag (fibreoptic link around the globe) has a submarine cable from London via Spain, Italy, Egypt, UAE, India, Malaysia, Thailand, China, and South Korea to Japan, which links some 75 percent of the world's population. It is the first intercontinental cable to land in China. The London to Tokyo link went live in November 1997, with spurs to Jordan and Saudi Arabia are being added this year. Flag says this has increased capacity by a factor of eight from Europe to Asia. Flag notes that 20 of the top 30 telecom carriers are customers, including more recently BT, to give a total of more than 60 customers. It will have taken some ten years from conception to completion of the New York to Tokyo link, but no plans to complete a global ring from New York to Tokyo have been announced yet. Australia and New Zealand are noticeably absent from this system, although there are other cables from Europa and the US of course. It's also a bit tough on Africa and South America. Flag's main shareholders are Bell Atlantic and a group of Middle East banks, each with around 40 per cent. Flag had its origins in the Middle East's desire to have better telecoms connections to Europe. Flag also signed a 50-50 deal with GTS in January to run two fibreoptic cables (known as FLAG Atlantic-1, or FA-1) across the Atlantic, with the first expected to become operational later this year, and the other in Q1 2000. This will give an additional 1.28 Terabits/second, which equates to a hundred hours of digital video/second if that excites you, or 600,000 simultaneous telephone conversations. There are two ring loops at each end, the London-Paris ring that links to cables coming ashore in Cornwall and Brittany, and a New York ring. Barclays Capital underwrote a $550 million construction commitment for seven years. GTS has its origins in the Russian telecoms arena, and was called San Francisco Moscow Teleport. It evolved to take advantage of European telecoms deregulation in 1998 and PTT privatisation to create a fibre optic network in Europe, crossing 16 countries and operating in more than 30 cities. GTS' Hermes Europe Railtel division is building its network using rights of way held by railways, motorways, pipeline companies, waterways and power companies. London is connected to Belgium and the Netherlands by cables that became operational in 1997. GTS is quoted on Nasdaq, and is 6.9 per cent owned by Belgian railways. GTS announced a few days ago that it plans a second offering of 10 million shares. Meanwhile, the corrupt European Commission has approved the AT&T-BT joint venture to combine international operations in certain industry sectors. Although the duo carry more than 50 percent of the trans-Atlantic traffic, this represents less than 20 percent of the capacity. Globally, the Commission decided that the pair has a 30 to 50 percent share, and that there are competitors – a rather obvious conclusion if they have less than half of the market – but that's the Brussels mind for you.®
Rise mP6 266 chips on sale in Japan
Japanese stores are beginning to sell Rise processors in Japan, with an mP6 266 (200MHz) processor costing ¥5,800, not much more than $50 or so. The evidence, together with pictures is available here At the same time, PC 133 SDRAM sales have started in Japan, according to the same site, with motherboard support. A 128Mb module costs ¥26,800, according to the pictures. The modules are made by Princeton, Samsung, Micron and Toshiba, the text suggests. Those pictures can be found here, together with other information relating to USB CD-RW drives just out, and Gigabyte dual bios motherboards.
Celeron Slot One dead
As first reported here early this year, the Celeron Slot One platform will be dead in the water by June. That is the preparatory move by Intel for other Slot One platforms to disappear too, as we reported from February's Intel Developer Forum. The move is partly to do with new designs and the end of legacy systems that Intel and its customers are planning. Again, at IDF, senior VP Paul Otellini confirmed that Intel was moving to a socket design. Last week, we reported that a 100MHz FSB Celeron will arrive early next year with Streaming SIMD and that the 815 chipset has been replaced by the 810E chipset. ® Related Stories Faster Celerons released faster Celeron to go 100MHz FSB Intel to slash Pentium III prices on 11 April Intel Celeron 433 to arrive Monday Complete Intel Developer Forum coverage


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The annual NewFronts returned Monday, May 2, to put publishers' digital video pitches in front of ad buyers once again. This year the series of presentations, from companies spanning YouTube to Playboy, comes as TV shows renewed traction with advertisers and digital remains dogged by concerns over ad fraud. But marketers' appetite for digital video is still strong -- just as strong as publishers' interest in feeding it.
We'll be updating this page throughout the NewFronts, so come back often.
The final presentation of the 2016 NewFronts came courtesy of Mashable, which talked up the proprietary technology it uses to help decide what to publish, its plans for live video and its desire to incorporate marketers. Jeremy Barr
Once called NowThis News, Nowthis was early on several trends that have since taken over the digital media industry: mobile, mobile video and distributed, off-site publishing. The company, which began in 2012, and would probably like to capitalize on its prescience in the form of ad dollars.
"We're not in the hit-driven business," said Athan Stephanopoulos, the company's president, at its first NewFronts presentation May 12. "We're not looking for viral videos." That being said, NowThis brings in 1.6 billion video views a month, a big number.
Former BuzzFeed CRO Andy Wiedlin also spoke at the presentation, held at the New Museum in SoHo. "You have an opportunity to tell great stories, to pimp less, and to not suck so much," he told the crowd. Tina Exarhos, who recently joined NowThis as CMO, compared the company to her former employer, MTV. "It really reminds me of the early days of MTV, which I can tell you about later over drinks," she said. J.B.
Still glowing from its recent acquisition by Verizon and Hearst, Complex Media presented to advertisers and agency folks in a slightly humid room on the 39th floor of the Time-Life Building. The big news was the announcement of a two-day-long festival called ComplexCon, to be held in California in November. The singer Pharrell will chair the event's host committee.
Complex CEO Rich Antoniello said the company is pursuing an aggressive expansion in video, including live video. "If anyone does it, we're going to fucking do it bigger and better than any of them," he said, calling the company "a gloriously beautiful work in progress." Complex founder and fashion designer Marc Ecko, assessing the company's recent progress, said: "Everything we said we were going to do last year, we did and more." J.B.
The popular YouTube network majority owned by AT&T and the Chernin Group helped kick of week two of the 2016 NewFronts on Monday, May 9, by announcing a slight rebranding, to Fullscreen Media, and a reorganization into three groups: a video-creator network, where the company began; Fullscreen Entertainment, to house its new streaming-video subscription service and other operations; and Fullscreen Brandworks, to work for marketers seeking a "post-TV audience," as the company put it. Nat Ives
National Geographic Partners
Making its first NewFronts presentation since 21st Century Fox and National Geographic formed the joint venture last fall, National Geographic Partners announced 10 digital short series such as "Before Mars," a warm-up to the scripted TV series "Mars" that's scheduled for November; an Instagram series called "Moving Pictures" featuring photographers on shoots; and plans for a virtual reality studio, whose activities will also help promote "Mars." N.I.
Last year's Vice NewFront was a must-attend affair. The big question was whether Vice would finally announce the TV network that had been rumored for many months. It didn't, but that non-announcement was news in and of itself. Since last year's presentation, of course, Vice did start a cable channel, Viceland, taking over the H2 Network.
The 2016 Vice NewFront on Friday, May 6, was all about the success of that channel in attracting far younger viewers than before (albeit with a track record only a few months long and small audience numbers). "We are bringing millennials back to TV," CEO Shane Smith told the crowd, before adding: "I don't know why I'm so excited about that."
Vice, he said, will create up to 20 TV channels around the world. He also announced plans for six new areas on the Vice website for subjects such as health and money. Then, in true Vice fashion, he switched from media executive to rocker, and sang lead vocals on the Sham 69 song "If The Kids Are United." J.B.
During its event on day four of the 2016 Digital Content NewFronts, YouTube pitched a new product to advertisers designed to meet the challenge of identifying viral videos before they take off. Breakout Videos packages the hottest and fastest-rising videos on YouTube, CEO Susan Wojcicki told ad buyers. The event also featured news and appearances from more than 100 YouTube stars, NBA commissioner Adam Silver and Big Bird, on hand to promote the new Sesame Studios channel on YouTube.
This being the 2016 NewFronts, there were also big promises about virtual reality. "We have more 360-degree and VR content than any platform in the world and in fact you can watch every single video on YouTube with a VR headset," Ms. Wojcicki said. Jeanine Poggi
There was a line down the block for PopSugar's Wednesday presentation, which was vibrant and colorful, and featured an even mix of sizzle reels and quick talks by the female-focused digital media company's show hosts and talent. "Our core beliefs are the same today as they were in our first year," said founder Lisa Sugar.
The company announced a bunch of new shows and partnerships, and a documentary series called "PopDocs" sponsored by Chevrolet.
David Grant, PopSugar Studios president, acknowledged that a lot of media companies use the NewFronts every year to tout shows that either don't get made or don't get renewed, and was sure to mention that PopSugar is renewing its entire slate of existing franchise shows.
On the content marketing side, the company announced PopSugar Motion, which will make available the company's editorial tool kit to brands for the first time. J.B.
Hearst Magazines Digital Media
Hearst closed out day 3 of the NewFronts on Wednesday with promises of Facebook Live video series, Snapchat expertise and a performance by Channing Tatum and his "Magic Mike Live" Vegas revue. Photos and other details important to ad buyers here. J.B.
So what if Ellen DeGeneres wasn't part of the Interactive Advertising Bureau's official agenda for the Digital Content NewFronts? She's already got Ellentube, her YouTube page, "The Ellen DeGeneres Show" website, a big social media following and the digital game "Heads Up!" -- not to mention the visibility of a daytime TV show every weekday. So she showed up with her own pitch on Wednesday, announcing Ellen Digital Network, backed by Warner Bros. TV Group and enlisting talent from the likes of social media star Tyler Oakley. Here's the full story. J.P.
As a streaming service owned by the old-school TV powers, Hulu has always stood out at the NewFronts, as both a premium player and something quite distinct from a YouTube network or magazine publisher trying to move into digital video. At its NewFront presentation at the Theater at Madison Square Garden on Tuesday, executives described plans to improve the ad experience and help marketers better measure the effectiveness of their media buys on over-the-top devices.
It also said it has partnered with BrightLine to deliver the first interactive advertising built specifically for connected TVs. Havas Media will be the exclusive charter agency for the new product, which will debut this summer. J.P.
In a NewFronts year where it was hard to find an event that didn't mention virtual reality, Yahoo wasn't going there. Instead the company is focusing on a "simplified" video agenda that includes live video (another favorite of everyone in 2016) and fourt subjects: sports, finance, news and lifestyle. Yahoo made its case to ad buyers in a private meeting, departing from the big show of 2015 as well as big promises like 18 new original series, the most prominent of which never arrived.
Yahoo Live will be a focal point moving forward for the company, said Lisa Utzschneider, chief revenue officer at Yahoo, ahead of the no-press-allowed pitch. "It's an important bet we're making," she said. "And the ability to stream that content, whether on the smartphone or on the desktop, is equally important."
What the company gives up in complexity, however, it aims to add in volume, promising more video than ever. George Slefo


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The automaker is investing heavily in electric vehicle manufacturing, but American infrastructure and consumer wants may get in the way.
Fiat Chrysler and the maker of Peugeot agreed to a $50 billion merger designed to drive investment in electronics and computing.
Detroit officials have been trying to prepare residents to get jobs at the new plant.
A team-up between the two companies could lead to a huge boost in production, but a decrease in demand for new cars is expected.
Fiat Chrysler is following the lead of GM and Ford and moving to quarterly sales reports.
He was credited with turning around both Fiat and Chrysler.
Fiat Chrysler is recalling 4.8 million vehicles in the U.S. because of the risk that drivers may not be able to turn off the cruise control. The recall includes 15 Jeep, Dodge, Chrysler and Ram models from six model years. Fiat Chrysler says it can fix the issue with a software update. Earlier this week […]
Close, but no cigar.
Reports come after a dealer lawsuit alleges racketeering.


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Good morning gamers on this South African public holiday – and for most, the start of the holiday period. We will be around, keeping you updated on all things gaming, but we certainly will be doing it in a more lazy and relaxed manner.
Call of Duty Ghosts has received a new title update. If you’re wondering what it was about, the update brought the usual bug and stability fixes, as well as balancing the MSBS. Full details here.
A new Forza 5 update is available and adds new multiplayer modes, as well as cutting the in-game price of cars by as much as 45%. [More on IGN]
An Xbox One update for Battlefield 4 is now available. The patch focuses on improving stability and fixing crashes.
Coming to the EU PlayStation Plus Instant Game Collection from 24 December: DmC Devil May Cry (PS3), Borderlands 2 (PS3), Soul Sacrifice (Vita) and Blazblue Continuum Shift Extend (Vita). On 8 January Don’t Starve arrives for the PS4.
The details of the first bit of DLC for Dead Rising 3 has emerged. ‘Operation Eagle’ is the first of four pieces of DLC planned, and introduces Adam Kane, a spec ops commander on a mission to track down the President of the United States. The DLC will also bring five new unannounced weapons, an additional combo weapon, vehicle, and clothing outfit, as well as new achievements. There is no release date announced, but the expansion will cost $9.99 standalone, or $29.99 as part of the season pass. [via Game Informer]
A free trial of Dead Rising 3 is now also available.
Where’s the next Rainbow Six game? It’s being remade. Ubisoft says Rainbow 6: Patriots “wasn’t working” so it has “had to be remade”. [More on IGN]
Fireproof Studios have announced that their BAFTA winning gaming The Room is now available for free on iOS devices. The studio have decided to do this to help promote the sequel which arrives on iPhone, iPod Touch or Android devices early next year.
Valve has altered its user video policies in response to the recent YouTube copyright cull. Valve has stipulated that users are “free to monetize your videos via the YouTube partner program and similar programs on other video sharing sites.” [More on Valve’s Website]
NBA 2K14 is the best-selling sports title on the PS4 and Xbox One and the fourth best-selling title overall according to NPD statistics.
According to a report, the creator of the Leisure Suit Larry series, Al Lowe, says he has quit publisher Replay Games. The reason for his departure is due to a sex scandal involving Replay CEO Paul Trowe. [More on CVG]
Oculus VR has raised $75 million in funding to help bring the Rift to the consumer. Andreessen Horowitz led the funding round, and was joined by previous backers Spark Capital, Matrix Partners and Formation|8. [More on CVG]
The PS4 launched in 16 more countries this past Friday (including South Africa). This brings the total number of countries where the console has launched to 48.
A new trailer for Ultra Street Fighter IV has been released and reveals a number of new features, including 3v3 matches and an online training mode. [Screens and details here]
A story trailer for Bound by Flame. The Spiders Studios developed RPG is due in “spring” 2014 on PC, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 3, Xbox One and Xbox 360.
Razer has announced the launch of the Android version of Razer Comms – “the world’s first VoIP solution to allow gamers to make VoIP calls or instant message with their friends on the road from in-game and vice versa.” The app is available for free download and the iOS version is expected in the first quarter of 2014.


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Yahoo is adding an RSS reader to its new Web mail service, which is in test, or beta, version and available to a limited number of users. The Sunnyvale, California company plans to announce the new feature on Wednesday.
Yahoo's new Web mail service, which has a radically redesigned user interface that works more like a typical desktop e-mail application, has been in beta testing since September.
The RSS reader will not be added to Yahoo's current Web mail service, which will be replaced at an unspecified time with the new service, company executives said. The company wouldn't say how many users are testing the new Web mail service, so it's impossible to establish how many people will get access to the new RSS (Really Simple Syndication) reader on Wednesday. There is no RSS functionality right now in the Yahoo Mail, which is used by the vast majority of Yahoo's users.
RSS technology lets users subscribe to content feeds from their favorite Web sites and have them delivered to RSS readers such as Ask Jeeves' Bloglines.
RSS feeds have become very popular because they save users from having to visit Web sites to find out if new content has been posted to them. As RSS feeds flow into an RSS reader, a user sees summaries or the full text of postings.
E-mail has become the hub of people's Internet activities, so it makes sense to embed an RSS reader into Yahoo's new Web mail service, said Ethan Diamond, Yahoo Mail's director of product development.
This is the case for Chaim Danzinger, a New York freelance video editor who uses Yahoo Mail for personal and work communications.
"I like having everything I read on a regular basis accessible from within my mail interface. I believe that in the future, e-mail providers will offer more and more services from within their own interface and I'm happy that Yahoo is leading the way," he said in an interview conducted via e-mail.
Danzinger, who subscribes to about 15 RSS feeds, has been beta testing the new Yahoo Mail service since it was made available to him about two months ago. In fact, prior to that, he had stopped using his Yahoo Mail account as his primary address, although he has had it for several years.
Danzinger would like Yahoo to continue folding other of its services into the Web mail interface. "That [way] with one login and on one page, I'll have access to all their services," he wrote.
The RSS reader included with Yahoo's beta Web mail service is designed to appeal to the average RSS user, which according to Yahoo's internal research subscribes to about six or seven feeds.
Later, Yahoo plans to enhance the Yahoo Mail RSS reader with features such as the ability to organize feeds into sub-folders that will appeal to heavy RSS users who subscribe to many feeds, Diamond said.
Currently, users can drop feed postings into folders, but they can't create sub-folders.
However, some beta testers, such as Gregory Devine, a consulting software engineer from New Jersey, are already wishing for this ability to categorize feed postings more granularly.
Devine, who has been using Yahoo Mail for about six years for personal communications, said in an e-mail interview that the integrated RSS reader is "very useful" and "a great first step."
Until now, Devine has been using Yahoo's My Yahoo personal home page service to manage his RSS feeds, but plans to switch to the Yahoo Mail reader.
But he regularly monitors more than 30 RSS feeds, and he foresees adding more, because of the convenience of having the integrated Yahoo Mail RSS reader. Consequently, he's looking forward to a more robust capability to file feed postings into folders and sub-folders.
The Web mail beta's RSS reader is a "full post" reader, meaning it can deliver the full-text of a Web posting, including pictures, said Scott Gatz, Yahoo's director of personalization products.
Yahoo's move is one of the first major steps in the industry to make RSS accessible to the mass market, said Allen Weiner, a Gartner analyst.
"It brings RSS to the masses and it lets people take advantage of the strength of RSS as a content distribution platform without them having to even know what RSS stands for," Weiner said. "It behooves Yahoo to get this out to all Yahoo Mail users pretty quickly."
Also on Wednesday, Yahoo plans to announce that its Yahoo Alerts service can now notify users when an RSS feed they subscribe to has been updated.
Yahoo Alerts (http://alerts.yahoo.com) can notify users via e-mail, the Yahoo Messenger instant messaging service or text messages sent to mobile devices.


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When the Covid-19 pandemic hit , global trade ground to a halt. Around the world people were scrambling to buy essentials as supermarket shelves emptied. But in the UAE, a country that relies on imports for more than 90 per cent of its food supermarkets appeared to have more than enough.
The government repeatedly assured people there would be no shortages. We hear from Maximo Torero Cullen, the chief economist of the Food and Agriculture Organization at the UN, and Kyle Wagner, Head of Operations at Madar Farms, about how the UAE began preparing for a food crisis over a decade ago.
We also hear from Nicole Rogers, founder and CEO of Agripocity, a UAE based company that connects farmers directly to the international marketplace.


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|Bid||2.5150 x 0|
|Ask||2.5850 x 0|
|Day's Range||2.5350 - 2.6000|
|52 Week Range||2.1900 - 3.3250|
|Beta (3Y Monthly)||N/A|
|PE Ratio (TTM)||N/A|
|Forward Dividend & Yield||N/A (N/A)|
|1y Target Est||N/A|
HELSINKI , Feb 21, 2019 /PRNewswire/ -- F-Secure has won its sixth and seventh AV-TEST Institute's Best Protection Award. The accolades re-affirm that businesses and consumers can continue to place their ...
The direct benefit for F-Secure Oyj (HEL:FSC1V), which sports a zero-debt capital structure, to include debt in its capital structure is the reduced cost of capital. However, the trade-off isRead More...
Most modern computers, even devices with disk encryption, are vulnerable to a new attack that can steal sensitive data in a matter of minutes, new research says. In new findings published Wednesday, F-Secure said that none of the existing firmware security measures in every laptop it tested "does a good enough job" of preventing data theft. F-Secure principal security consultant Olle Segerdahl told TechCrunch that the vulnerabilities put "nearly all" laptops and desktops — both Windows and Mac users — at risk.


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Visa has approved Research In Motion’s Secure Element Manager (SEM), a backend solution for carriers that can securely manage credentials on SIM cards installed in all types of NFC-capable mobile devices. SEM is being used by Canadian carrier joint venture EnStream to manage secure credentials on NFC phones.
- Rambus publishes quick guide to Apple Pay
- Chinese banks roll out face recognition at the ATM
- Germany’s central bank reports on potential of blockchain for payments
- NXP releases NFC tag toolkit for iOS
- Banks back government-led Taiwan Pay QR payments service


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The Peasant Farmers Association of Ghana is calling for government and public support for farmers in Dormaa in the Brong Region.
The farmers say they are struggling to sell their eggs and other poultry products as schools which were their main consumers hesitate to buy from them.
According to the farmers, this is their worst year in more than a decade.
One farmer who works with GI Farms said that they produce about 3,500 crates of egg daily. However, they currently have about 10,000 crates of eggs in store following the drastic fall in sales.
He stated that they have reduced the prices of the eggs from ¢21 to ¢13, ¢15 and ¢18 and yet they have not been able to sell as much as they used to.
He added that with an increase in interest on loans they are also struggling to pay back the money loaned them by the bank. To cut cost, he stated that they have laid off workers in the past.
The Head of Programs at the Peasant Farmers Association, Dr. Charles Nyaaba said that many of the farmers affected are looking to the Ivorians to buy the excess eggs they have.
The head of programs, Peasant Farmers Association Dr Charles Nyaaba
“This is the worst year according to them that they have ever experienced. They produce the eggs and no one is buying.”
The administrator of GI Farms, Matthew Frimpong urged the government to create avenues to help them sell their eggs.
“When you go to the eggs room today you find more than 15,000 eggs there and no one is buying. Previously we learned that when they introduced the school feeding program, the school children were eating the eggs. But I’m told that they are no longer eating, so, right now nobody is coming to buy.”
The workers at GI Farms said that they have been working there for years but are struggling to make ends meet after the fall in sales.
They called on government to intervene so they could increase sales.


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Adweek is out with its Digital Hot List 2010. One article in the special edition features five “key execs under 30 who are setting the pace.”
Of the five trailblazers listed, I’m most interested in Ben Lerer, Co-founder of Thrillist. Actually, I’m interested in his business model, which relies heavily on the email platform.
Thrillist was born as a new-school digital publishing venture that used the decidedly old-school approach of an e-mail newsletter. The thinking was that e-mail is ubiquitous, and a subscriber is much more valuable than a random passerby on the Web.
There was a handy model for success: DailyCandy, which had blazed the trail with a successful e-mail-driven curated guide for urban woman. “If someone welcomes us into their inbox, it’s a meaningful connection,” Lerer says.
Thrillist is on course to generate $10 million in revenue in 2010, according to the report, which is not bad for an email newsletter to dudes.
Let’s watch Lerer discuss his firm on camera…


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With the New South Wales Government’s ban on lightweight single-use plastic bags coming into effect from today, the NSW EPA is stepping up efforts to educate retailers on how best to comply.
The new ban means businesses will no longer be able to either supply customers with lightweight plastic bags or keep stock of them – including stock purchased prior to the ban.
The Government has partnered with the National Retail Association (NRA) to run an education campaign to aid small businesses with the transition, including strategies for phasing out and replacing single-use plastics.
The EPA is also offering assistance to small businesses with managing excess stock of banned plastic bags, including identifying avenues for recycling.
“We are committed to a fair and considered approach to regulation and that’s why we are focussed firstly on awareness and education,” the EPA said in a statement.
“We understand there may be different circumstances for different businesses and there is no ‘one size fits all’ response.”
The NRA has made a dedicated hotline available (1800 844 946) for retailers, suppliers, community groups and not-for-profit organisations for advice on how to navigate the ban.
Fines for non-compliance will range from $11,000 for individuals to $55,000 for corporations, with penalties doubling for manufacturers, wholesalers and distributors.
Further single-use plastics will be banned in New South Wales from 1 November 2022, including plastic straws, cutlery, plates, bowls, expanded polystyrene food containers and cosmetic products containing plastic microbeads.
An exception for food and drink vendors will allow them to provide single-use straws for a person with a disability or medical need, though these must not be displayed or accessible to customers.
For more information, visit: www.dpie.nsw.gov.au


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9th February 2017
Rebecca Robyns, joint franchise owner of InXpress Hull, is founder of the charity EYESeeMe. Last year, InXpress revealed that EYESeeMe would be their chosen charity as part of their Gives Back programme. Franchisees have been raising and donating money and, this month, Rebecca flew back out to Thailand in order to find out more about the results of the months of donations.
"Whilst out in Thailand, I have been very busy in the office at Sarnelli House which is a home for disadvantaged children and was one of the homes that played a huge part in the exhibition we held last year. I have been adding up the numbers for 50 children to go to school however, I am delighted to report that we can now afford to help 71 children, exceeding our original target at the launch of the campaign! I will shortly be transferring the money in time for the start of the new term in May. I’m extremely proud of what we’ve achieved and would like to thank InXpress Head Office and the network for their support. It will mean so much to the children here!"
InXpress partnered with EYESeeMe in order to raise the funding needed to get 50 children in Thailand into full-time education and to fund them in their schooling until graduation. It’s a great cause and something that InXpress are proud to be backing. Since September, franchisees have been donating money through various charity events and donating a penny per shipment throughout the month of November, and it’s clear from these results that they have succeeded in their efforts. So many more children will benefit from an education and it will greatly impact their future. InXpress are proud to back Rebecca with this great cause and will continue to raise money to support even more children.
Melanie Spencer, Global Head of Marketing at InXpress, explains:
"These are such great results from the EYESeeMe campaign. In just a few months we’ve managed to raise enough money to help 71 children into full-time education! We’ve been so proud of the response from franchisees for Rebecca’s charity. They’ve all participated as much as possible by taking part in events. Craig Atkins from Reading is currently training for the Manchester marathon and is putting himself through the pain of sore legs every day. We’re looking forward to seeing more photos from Rebecca’s latest trip and hope even more children will benefit from our donations."
InXpress is one of the world’s largest franchisors of worldwide express parcel delivery and transportation services. They are the number one reseller of express courier services offering solutions for internal and domestic express services. Franchisees offer express, freight and mail services through world-class carriers that customers know and trust. InXpress gives those with business or management experience the chance to develop their existing skillsets to build scalable and flexible businesses with high earning potential.
10th January 2018
From supplying the demands of InXpress, to meeting the demands of a growing franchise network, new MD Jon White, has exciting plans for a New Year, and a new season.
13th December 2017
Investing in people is an important part of business development. Neil Hatt, InXpress Birmingham South, is expanding his team by investing in the next generation.
17th November 2017
InXpress releases a new advert highlighting the multiple ways franchisees offer excellent service and value to their customers.
10th November 2017
On Friday 10th November InXpress released their brand new advert worldwide.
7th August 2017
InXpress have been named winners of the bfa HSBC Brand Innovation award at the 2017 Awards event.
1st June 2017
The InXpress convention shines its light on past achievements, present inspirations and future goals.
25th April 2017
Craig Atkins, franchise owner of InXpress Reading, completed the Manchester Marathon on Sunday 2nd April.
20th March 2017
The overriding reason that customers are turning to InXpress for their shipping requirements is all about the overall service that is provided.
InXpress gives you a business concept and plan that you can run with. All you need is the right work ethic to deliver and make the business successful. There’s a model in place so you don’t have to reinvent the wheel – that was the biggest attraction for me.Lendy Mazur, Salisbury franchisee since February 2013
I chose to franchise with InXpress because it’s like someone’s got their arm around you. I also liked the fact that you didn’t need a lot to run the business. You can run it from home, an office or anywhere in the world as long as you’ve got an internet connection.Kully Sahota, Peterborough franchisee since October 2012
With InXpress you don’t buy or sell stock so the business has low overheads and you don’t lose money on damaged stock. You’re selling the services of world branded products and it’s much easier to sell DHL services than white van. E-commerce is booming at the moment because more and more people are now buying online.Craig Atkins, Reading franchisee since 2007
No inventory, no warehousing, minimum overheads
Low entry cost
High income potential