Google?s subscription music streaming service coming to iPhone and iPad ? unofficially

A teenager from?Saratoga, California took home one of the top prizes at the Intel International Science and Engineering Fair?late last week after showing off her invention, which can fully charge a cell phone in 30 seconds or less.?Eesha Khare was given the?Intel Foundation Young Scientist Award and a $50,000 prize for being runner-up in the competition, which was won by a 19-year-old who unveiled a new spin on?self-driving car technology.?Khare?s battery technology requires a new component to be installed inside the phone battery itself, and Intel notes that it also has potential applications for car batteries.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/google-subscription-music-streaming-coming-iphone-ipad-unofficially-143044710.html

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Official: Treasury played no role in IRS targeting

Several dozen tea party activists and other concerned citizens, wave signs and small American flags as they march outside the main Internal Revenue Service office on Tuesday, May 21, 2013, in Phoenix. The rally was one of many around the country after IRS officials acknowledged that some conservative groups received inappropriate attention and questioning. (AP Photo/Ross D. Franklin)

Several dozen tea party activists and other concerned citizens, wave signs and small American flags as they march outside the main Internal Revenue Service office on Tuesday, May 21, 2013, in Phoenix. The rally was one of many around the country after IRS officials acknowledged that some conservative groups received inappropriate attention and questioning. (AP Photo/Ross D. Franklin)

Tea Party supporters gather for a rally outside the IRS headquarter in Washington, May 21, 2013. A few dozen tea party activists and their supporters have gathered outside the IRS headquarters in Washington to protest extra scrutiny of their organizations. (AP Photo/Manuel Balce Ceneta)

WASHINGTON (AP) ? The Treasury Department's No. 2 official told Congress on Wednesday that his agency played no role in the Internal Revenue Service's targeting of conservative groups.

Deputy Secretary Neal Wolin made the statement in testimony he prepared to deliver to the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee. At the same hearing, the star witness ? IRS official Lois Lerner ? was ready to invoke her constitutional right to not answer questions.

In his prepared remarks, Wolin said it was "absolutely unacceptable and inexcusable" that the IRS subjected tea party and other conservative groups seeking non-profit status to extra scrutiny from 2010 to 2012.

He said J. Russell George, the Treasury inspector general who focuses on taxes, told him last year that he was investigating IRS's targeting of the groups.

"I told him that he should follow the facts wherever they lead. I told him that our job is to stay out of the way and let him do his work," Wolin said.

"There is no indication that Treasury was involved in the inexcusable behavior at the IRS," he added.

Lawmakers are trying to learn whether the IRS targeting was politically motivated. The inspector general and IRS officials have said there is no evidence of that.

As the hearing began, Oversight panel Chairman Darrell Issa, R-Calif., repeated a frequent complaint from lawmakers in the IRS episode ? that IRS officials who knew earlier about the tartgeting didn't tell Congress about it.

"Congress was misled. The American people were misled," Issa said.

Lerner triggered the recent IRS uproar at a legal conference nearly two weeks ago, when she revealed that the agency's targeting of conservative groups and apologized for the actions.

Lerner, 62, an attorney who joined the IRS in 2001, heads the unit that decides whether groups qualify for the status. She has come under fire from members of both parties, including Maryland Rep. Elijah Cummings, top Democrat on the Oversight Committee, who said in an interview Tuesday that she should lose her job.

George, the Treasury inspector general, has said he told Wolin in mid-2012 that he was investigating the IRS' targeting of conservative groups, a report that was released last week. That means Wolin was the highest-ranking Treasury official to have known about the probe during last year's elections, making him a focus of interest for lawmakers.

"What did you know and when? Who did you tell?" Rep. Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah, a senior member of the Oversight Committee, said Tuesday of what he hopes to learn from Wolin.

Lerner's attorney, William W. Taylor III, has requested that she be excused from Wednesday's hearing, writing in the letter that forcing her to appear "would have no purpose other than to embarrass or burden her." But the committee has subpoenaed her and panel members say they expect her to attend.

"She better be there. We're planning on it," Chaffetz said.

In writing that Lerner would use her Fifth Amendment right to not incriminate herself, Taylor noted that the Justice Department has started an investigation into the IRS controversy. He also referred to a letter she received last week from Oversight Chairman Darrell Issa, R-Calif., saying she "provided false or misleading information on four separate occasions last year" to committee queries.

Staff of the Oversight Committee questioned Lerner and other IRS officials last year after receiving complaints from Ohio tea party groups that they were being mistreated by the IRS, said Meghan Snyder, spokesman for Rep. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, a member of the committee.

In responses to the committee, Lerner didn't mention that tea party groups had ever been targeted, according to documents. Her responses included 45-page letters in May 2012 to Issa and Jordan.

Lerner also met twice in early 2012 with staff from the House Ways and Means oversight subcommittee to discuss the issue, according to a timeline constructed by committee staff. The timeline said she didn't mention at either meeting that conservative groups had been targeted.

Lerner's revelation and apology at the May 10 legal conference came in response to a question that IRS officials later acknowledged they had planted with an audience member. Lerner's disclosure came days before George, the inspector general, released his report detailing the IRS' actions.

George's report found that in June 2011, Lerner discovered that her unit was searching for organizations with words like "tea party" or "patriots" in their applications and subjecting them to tougher questions. She ordered the initial tea party criteria to be scrapped, but it later evolved to include groups that promoted the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, the report said. Lawmakers are curious about why the practice didn't stop entirely.

A career civil servant who has run the division since late 2005, Lerner has not been disciplined for her role, IRS officials said. But with President Barack Obama demanding that IRS officials be held accountable for the problem, Acting Commissioner Steven Miller and another top agency official have announced their departures in recent days and many lawmakers believe more heads should roll.

George and Douglas Shulman, the former IRS commissioner who headed the agency while it was targeting conservative groups, are also scheduled to testify Wednesday.

On Tuesday, Shulman told the Senate Finance Committee that he learned in the spring of 2012 about his agency's targeting of conservatives and George's probe. He said he didn't tell lawmakers or officials at Treasury ? of which the IRS is part ? because he only had sketchy information about the situation, was told it was being handled and believed it proper to let George's office conduct its investigation.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/3d281c11a96b4ad082fe88aa0db04305/Article_2013-05-22-IRS-Political%20Groups/id-1cc1f085196f4d8ba1d116de50378327

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Burmese optimistic after historic White House visit

Burmese are celebrating an end to their long international isolation with the first state visit to the US by a Myanmar president in almost 50 years.

By Simon Roughneen,?Correspondent / May 21, 2013

US President Obama gestures toward Myanmar's President Thein Sein during their meeting in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington, Monday. Thein Sein is the first Myanmar president to be welcomed to the White House in almost 50 years.

Jacquelyn Martin/AP

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Myanmar President Thein Sein's historic Monday meeting with US President Obama has been well-received at home, with Burmese seemingly happy that the country is gaining some positive recognition on the world stage after decades of isolation.

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Myanmar and the United States signed a new trade and investment promotion agreement on Tuesday, which they hope will boost the currently-miniscule commerce between the two countries, currently valued at $90 million.?

?We are happy that our country is changing to democracy,? says Kyaw Moe Tha, an artist from Mandalay, Myanmar's second-largest city. ?And it is important for us that America and other Western countries increase contact with us.?

The last time Myanmar's top leader made a state visit to the United States, the country was called "Burma" and Lyndon Johnson was in the White House. That was in 1966. Myanmar was four years into what became five decades of military dictatorship. As repression worsened, particularly after student protests in 1988, Myanmar was deemed an ?outpost of tyranny,? prompting the US and other Western countries to impose sanctions on exports and investment.?

Now, two years into political and economic reforms that won praise from President Obama, Myanmar is seeking increased American investment and official aid, which it hopes will kick-start the country's economy and create jobs.?Though?Myanmar is rich in natural resources, only some 25 percent of the 60 million population?have regular electricity. Tens of millions of rural Burmese depend on subsistence agriculture.

Zaw Zaw, a high-profile Myanmar businessman who has faced US sanctions because of his close ties to Myanmar's former military regime, says that Mr. Thein Sein's visit to Washington is going down well at home.

?This is a very good thing for our country and I hope for both countries,? says Mr. Zaw Zaw, whose wide-ranging business interests include construction, hotels, timber, and gems.

After a transfer of power to a nominally civilian government in 2011, and reforms that included freeing hundreds of political prisoners and loosening restrictions on freedom of speech, the US responded by removing many sanctions.

Still, some remain in place,?including financial and trade restrictions on figures close to the Myanmar military ? such as Zaw Zaw.?

The Myanmar government wants the slate wiped clean, however.?Speaking in Washington on Monday, Thein Sein told students at Johns Hopkins University?s School of Advanced International Studies, ?we are trying hard to end Myanmar?s isolation, see the removal of all sanctions, and make the contributions we can to both regional and global security and development.?

Critics point out that the Myanmar government has stalled on reforms in recent months. They want the US to keep restrictive measures against the country intact ? until there?s an end to ethnic fighting and sectarian discrimination in the country.

In Washington on Monday Thein Sein pledged to work for peace -- though on the same day the US State Department published its annual review of religious freedom around the world. Buddhist-majority Myanmar appeared with eight countries where discrimination against minorities is among the worst.

In June 2011, as Myanmar undertook reforms that earned Thein Sein his White House visit this week, the military resumed a decades-old war with ethnic Kachin fighters in a mountainous, resource-rich region in the country's north.

More than 100,000 mostly Christian Kachin have been driven from their homes by the fighting, while a similar number of Muslims ? many of them from a stateless group known as the Rohingya ? sit in makeshift camps on the country's west coast, close to the border with Bangladesh.

Also in recent weeks, Buddhist mobs have attacked Muslims in the center of Myanmar.

Maung Zarni, a fellow at the London School of Economics from Burma, says the US is playing a wider strategic game in Myanmar, which has in recent decades fallen under increasing Chinese influence, something he believes the US hopes to push back against.

?The USA is pursuing what it considers its 'core interests' in and around Burma at the expense of the Rohingya, the Kachin,? he says.

Source: http://rss.csmonitor.com/~r/feeds/csm/~3/tiimqMGa_gE/Burmese-optimistic-after-historic-White-House-visit

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Syria opposition signals tough line on peace talks

BEIRUT (AP) ? Despite recent rebel setbacks in Syria's civil war, the main opposition bloc signaled a tough line Tuesday on attending possible peace talks with President Bashar Assad's regime.

Two senior members of the Syrian National Coalition said the group first wants ironclad guarantees of Assad's departure as part of any transition deal and more weapons for rebel fighters. The group's final position is to be hashed out in a three-day meeting of its General Assembly in Istanbul, Turkey, later this week.

Tuesday's comments highlighted the wide gaps between many in the Syrian opposition and the regime just weeks before the U.S. and Russia hope to bring the sides together at an international conference in Geneva.

Over the weekend, Assad also presented a hard line, challenging the idea of transition talks and saying he won't step down before elections are held. Hours after those comments, his troops launched an offensive against a rebel-held town in western Syria, the latest in a series of military gains by the regime.

"There are many obstacles facing the conference," Lakhdar Brahimi, the U.N.-Arab League envoy to Syria and lead organizer of the gathering, acknowledged Tuesday, after meeting with the Arab League chief in Cairo.

Much about the conference remains up in the air, including the date, the agenda, timetable and list of participants. Brahimi said the conference, initially envisioned for late May, should be held in June at the latest.

The goal is to launch talks between the regime and the opposition on a transitional government in Syria ? an idea that was first adopted by the international community in Geneva a year ago but never got off the ground.

Earlier this month, the U.S. and Russia decided to give diplomacy another try, even though they have been backing opposite sides in the 26-month-old conflict that has killed an estimated 70,000 people. The joint effort was quickly overshadowed by disagreements, particularly over Russian shipments of advanced missiles to Assad, deemed ill-timed and unhelpful by the U.S.

The latest signals from Assad and his Russian allies have left the Syrian National Coalition skeptical about the international conference, said Louay Safi, a member of the group's decision-making political office.

"We are serious about having negotiations that would lead to a political solution," Safi said. "But if Assad is not serious, we are not going there (to the conference) for a photo op."

One of the main sticking points is Assad's fate. At Russia's insistence, a compromise at last year's Geneva conference left open the door to Assad being part of a transitional government ? a non-starter for the SNC.

"We have been very clear that any transitional period must start with the departure of Assad and the heads of the security services," Khalid Saleh, the spokesman of the SNC, said Tuesday.

He said the Syrian opposition wants guarantees before the start of transition talks that Assad will go. Since the revival of the Geneva plan, the U.S. has remained vague, saying Assad can't be part of a transition, but stopping short of making that a condition for negotiations, as the SNC demands.

Saleh also said the Free Syrian Army, the main Western-backed umbrella group of fighters, must receive "major shipments of weapons" to counter the regime's current military gains. "The FSA must be able to control more areas of Syria before we start thinking about the conference," he said.

The West, particularly the U.S., has been reluctant to arm the rebels, amid concerns such weapons will fall into the hands of Islamic militants with ties to the al-Qaida network.

Britain and France have been breaking out of that consensus in recent weeks, arguing that Assad will only negotiate seriously if the rebels can pressure him militarily.

Arming the rebels should be considered if it becomes clear that Assad is not negotiating in good faith, British Foreign Secretary William Hague said Monday. "We must make it clear that if the regime does not negotiate seriously at the Geneva conference, no option is off the table," he said.

Another sticking point is the list of participants.

The SNC's Safi said the coalition won't attend if many other opposition representatives do as well. The opposition remains fractured among rival groups, though the coalition has been recognized by its Western and Arab sponsors as the legitimate representative of the Syrian people.

Haitham Manna, a leader of one of the rival groups, the National Coordination Body, said the coalition should not attend peace talks alone. Unlike the still largely exile-based SNC, Manna's alliance of 16 groups has roots in Syria and is more open to compromise with members of the regime, though not with Assad.

"The military way is a dead end, there can be no winners," Manna said. "And if there is a winner, he will leave behind enough hatred to turn every loser into a suicide bomber."

A senior U.S. official said Tuesday that no opposition group has definitely decided to take part. He noted that as part of the SNC's meeting in Istanbul this week, the group will also choose a new leader, and that the U.S. hopes to persuade the new leadership to attend the conference.

The U.S. official spoke with reporters traveling with Kerry in Muscat, Oman, He spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk publicly about Syria diplomacy ahead of Kerry's trip.

The U.S., Russia and several other nations will also participate in the conference, if it takes place. Obama administration officials have refused to rule out the participation of Assad's biggest military backer, Iran.

Kerry, meanwhile, will meet with 10 of America's closest Arab and European allies in Jordan on Wednesday.

One of the aims of the meeting is to find a way to change Assad's calculation, only fortified by his recent military successes, that he can win militarily, the U.S. official said.

He declined to say what the U.S. might include in its next package of nonlethal aid to the Syrian rebels, which still has to be notified to Congress. He also didn't signal any imminent move by the Obama administration to provide lethal support.

In Syria, regime troops were trying for a third day Tuesday to wrest control of the western town of Qusair from the rebels. The town lies along a strategic land corridor linking the capital Damascus with the Mediterranean coast, the heartland of Assad's Alawite sect.

UNICEF said it was "extremely concerned" about the safety of civilians in Qusair. The U.N. child protection agency said up to 20,000 civilians, many of them women and children, could be trapped there by the fighting.

Also Tuesday, Israeli and Syrian troops exchanged fire across their tense cease-fire line in the Golan Heights, prompting an Israeli threat that Syria's leader will "bear the consequences" of further escalation and raising new concerns that the civil war could explode into a region-wide conflict.

The incident marked the first time the Syrian army has acknowledged firing intentionally at Israeli troops since the civil war began. Assad's regime appears to be trying to project toughness in response to recent Israeli airstrikes near Damascus.

In Geneva, U.N. officials said the number of Syrian refugees arriving in Jordan has suddenly fallen from an average of 2,500 a day to fewer than 20.

Millions of people have been displaced in the civil war, and Jordan has taken in hundreds of thousands of them. U.N. officials said they are unsure what has led to the drop in the flow of refugees to Jordan this week. They said they lack staff on the Syrian side of the border and cannot observe the situation there.

___

Klapper reported from Muscat, Oman. Associated Press writers Zeina Karam in Beirut, Aya Batrawy in Cairo, John Heilprin in Geneva and Josef Federman in Jerusalem contributed reporting.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/syria-opposition-signals-tough-line-peace-talks-182027278.html

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Microsoft's next Xbox: The rumor roundup

It's been eight years since Microsoft and Sony announced new consoles, and tastes have changed considerably. Back then, new gaming gear was launched at E3, or using Elijah Wood-fronted MTV specials, but this time around Microsoft is pitching a tent on its Redmond campus for the world's media to huddle under. With less than 24 hours before the next Xbox is revealed, it's high time we sifted through the leaks, rumors and prognostications to see what we know, or at least, what we think we know about a little box called "Durango."

Filed under: Gaming, HD, Microsoft

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Source: http://feeds.engadget.com/~r/weblogsinc/engadget/~3/8yc0fovrPJ0/

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Web Fluent: The Faster, Easier Way to Build Your Web Business ...

Web Fluent: The Faster, Easier Way to Build Your Web Business book download

Nelson Bates, Sterling Bates and Lana Bates

Get reliable, low-cost dial-up Internet service, high-speed broadband Internet access, Web hosting & more. With OS X Mountain Lion, great new features come to your Mac. Based in. Connect with us for savings, support & satisfaction! Expect more from your money. Latest Updates. - Send Money, Pay Online or Set Up a. A free service and portal to submit. . How to Build Links Fast: 101 Tips & Strategies New to the site? Join for Free and get over $300 of free SEO software. Send iMessages. Platform Status: Facebook Platform is Healthy Connect with EarthLink, the award-winning Internet service. Apple - OS X Mountain Lion ??? Use your Mac in so many new ways. Play against iOS gamers in Game Center. Once you set up your free account you can comment on our blog, and you are eligible to receive. Steve Krug is a usability consultant who has more than 15 years of experience as a user advocate for companies like Apple, Netscape, AOL, Lexus, and others

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Source: http://fysuioyb.typepad.com/blog/2013/05/web-fluent-the-faster-easier-way-to-build-your-web-business-online.html

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The Newest 3D-Printed Gun Is Far More Dangerous For Much Cheaper

After the stir several weeks ago, the buzz surrounding Defense Distributed's 3D-printed gun has begun to (somewhat) die down. This is probably due in part to Kim Dotcom's removal of the gun's blueprint from Mega and the fact that, frankly, the gun itself isn't much of an immediate threat. But as one potential threat dissipates, just like clockwork, a new one has appeared on the horizon. And any fear creeping up on you with this newest incarnation of the 3D-printed gun might actually be warranted.

While Defense Distributed's heavy-handidly named Liberator was good for about one (highly expensive) shot before becoming effectively useless, its successor only costs about $25, can be printed on a consumer-grade printer, and is good for, as the video shows, at least nine rounds?with the potential for many more.

Designed by a Wisconsin engineer who identifies himself anonymously as "Joe" and his creation troublingly as the "Lulz Liberator," the gun is made out of generic Polylac PA-747 ABS, otherwise known as the type of plastic most commonly used in consumer-grade 3D printers. According to Joe, this cheaper material is actually stronger than the ABS plastic used in the much more expensive Stratasys pro printer that Defense Distributed used. Apparently attempts to use the Stratasys resulted in the gun's barrel exploding, which is, generally, not ideal.

Contributing to its sturdier status, the Lulz Liberator also holds a bit more metal hardware than its predecessor: traditional hardware store screws replaced the flimsy plastic printed pins. Then, to make everything good and (arguably) legal, the same piece of non-functional steel placed in the Liberator exists in the Lulz variety, allowing it to set off metal detectors and comply with the Undetectable Firearms Act.

Of course, like you'd expect with any plastic gun, it still doesn't work perfectly. Some of the screws as well as the firing pin had to be replaced over the course of the video, and after every shot, while the ammo cartridge didn't explode, it did expand enough to require some hammer pounding before it was ready to go again. But even with its flaws, the message is clear: much more threatening printed guns are possible?and they have the potential to be dirt cheap.

Unlike Defense Distributed's big coming out, though, Joe still hasn't put the plans for his Lulz Liberator online. And his hesitance thus far isn't surprising given the fact that the State Department forced Defense Distributed to remove their plans, citing export control violations.

Joe doesn't claim anarchist roots like Cody Wilson, Defense Distributed's founder. But he does believe him and Wilson are after the same ultimate goal. According to Joe, "I agree with Cody's idea that this is a perfect fusion of the first and second amendments."

The word "perfect," apparently, being a highly subjective term. [Forbes]

Source: http://gizmodo.com/the-newest-3d-printed-gun-is-far-more-dangerous-for-muc-508921619

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Can your iPhone's digital footprints reveal your physical location?

Users of iPhones may be uniquely vulnerable to a new kind of cyberstalking that can reveal their real-life whereabouts, if they leave GPS and Wi-Fi activated.

By Ben Weitzenkorn,?Tech News Daily / May 13, 2013

A man leaves an Apple store with an iPhone and an iPad in his hands in central Beijing, April 1.

Alexander F. Yuan / AP

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An Australian computer-security expert has created an application that lets anyone see the locations of the last three Wi-Fi access points used by an Apple iPhone or iPad ? information that could be used to deduce where the iOS device user lives.

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Melbourne-based researcher Hubert Seiwert's iSniff GPS, now freely available for anyone to download and use, combines three different Apple iOS features.

None of the features pose any threat to privacy on their own, but when combined could tell strangers a lot about you.

"This could be used to locate ... where people live," Seiwert told SC Magazine.

Three's a crowdsource

The first feature Seiwert used is well-known. Apple iOS devices that have both Wi-Fi and GPS turned on send the names and locations of all Wi-Fi access points they encounter back to the Apple mothership. The devices don't need to be connected to a specific access point for this to happen.

This feature helps Apple's mapping services. Google does the same thing with Android devices. Users of both kinds of devices can turn the data-sharing off.

The second feature is unique to iOS devices. Last year, security researcher Mark Wuergler of Miami-based Immunity Inc. found that iOS devices, when trying to connect to a Wi-Fi access point, will broadcast the unique network-interface IDs of the previous three Wi-Fi access points to which the devices actually did connect.

These unique network-interface IDs, called MAC addresses, can be physically located when run against online location services that keep databases of such things.

(MAC addresses differ from Wi-Fi access-point names such as "John's Wireless Router." MAC addresses are fixed, unique and used by machines to communicate with each other; Wi-Fi location names, also called SSIDs, can change at any time and exist for human convenience.)

Wuergler told the tech blog Ars Technica in March 2012 that he'd combined the Apple MAC-address feature with Google Location Services for Android to create a proof-of-concept application called "Stalker."

"I'll know where you work, I'll know where you live and know where you frequent," Wuergler said at the time. "If the last access point you connected to was your home, for example, I'll know right where to go to get to you later or get to your data."

Source: http://rss.csmonitor.com/~r/feeds/science/~3/sFOo2fE8vZA/Can-your-iPhone-s-digital-footprints-reveal-your-physical-location

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New York Times Bestseller eBook List Shifts to Online Only | The ...

From Good Ereader:

The New York Times started to include ebooks in print and online editions?back in 2011. The company announced today that it is suspending the inclusion of ebook titles in the newspaper and only posting them on the website. The prices of the ebooks will also not be included going forward, due to the shifting economic landscape of online sellers.

Pamela Paul is the current editor of the Book Review section of the New York Times, a post she only attained in April. She said in a statement, ?The ebook list has migrated online, the digital world being its natural habitat. Given the fluid variety of pricing in today?s marketplace, we have also stopped including cover prices on the lists.?

Link to the rest at Good Ereader

There?s a new term for 99-cent ebooks ? fluidly-priced. Remove them from the Sunday paper and those nasty indie ebooks will surely go away. Take the print readers on a pleasant journey back to an earlier time before the economic landscape of publishing began to shift. Why remind the New York literati about Amazon over their coffee and croissants?

The new editor knows how to make Big Publishing cheer. But can she can make them buy more advertising?

Ebooks, Pricing

Source: http://www.thepassivevoice.com/05/2013/new-york-times-bestseller-ebook-list-shifts-to-online-only/

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Greece to sell Postbank, Proton in July, stress-test big banks

ATHENS (Reuters) - Greece's bank rescue fund will aim to sell Hellenic Postbank and Proton by mid-July with big banks continuing to absorb small lenders as part of plans to revive the battered sector, the country's foreign lenders said in an inspection review.

Greece is recapitalizing its four big banks and winding down others deemed non-viable to improve the sector's capacity to fund the economy out of a deep six-year recession. Banks suffered heavy losses from debt writedowns and bad loans.

Small lenders Hellenic Postbank and Proton were split into "good" and "bad" parts and are now fully owned by the Hellenic Financial Stability Fund (HFSF), a state capital backstop funded with 50 billion euros from the country's bailout package.

The European Union and the International Monetary Fund's review said the 50 billion euro sum is enough to cover recapitalization and resolution costs and would leave enough funds for follow-up stress testing for the sector to be completed by end-2013.

The new tests will assess the adequacy of solvency buffers and loan-loss provisions as banks still face rising credit impairments because of the recession. Bad loans rose to 24.2 percent of their books last year from 16.5 percent in 2011.

The recapitalization of Greece's four core banks - National , Alpha , Piraeus and Eurobank - is expected to be wrapped up by June 14.

The four lenders need 27.5 billion euros to plug capital holes and must raise at least 10 percent from private investors via share offerings to retain management control. The bulk of the funds will be pumped in by the HFSF rescue fund.

The report said entities belonging to the general government cannot buy bank shares in the recapitalization or support third parties with loans, guarantees or subsidies, meaning cash-strapped state pension funds may not take part.

By mid-July authorities will devise a comprehensive strategy to further consolidate the banking sector and privatize banks falling under HFSF control. Any mergers among the four core banks will only be considered after the strategy is defined.

(Reporting by George Georgiopoulos; editing by Keiron Henderson)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/greece-sell-postbank-proton-july-stress-test-big-122412772.html

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After eliminating Warriors, Spurs look to Memphis

San Antonio Spurs small forward Kawhi Leonard (2) celebrates after making a three-pointer during the fourth quarter of Game 6 of a Western Conference semifinal NBA basketball playoff series against the Golden State Warriors in Oakland, Calif., Thursday, May 16, 2013. The Spurs won 94-82. (AP Photo/Jeff Chiu)

San Antonio Spurs small forward Kawhi Leonard (2) celebrates after making a three-pointer during the fourth quarter of Game 6 of a Western Conference semifinal NBA basketball playoff series against the Golden State Warriors in Oakland, Calif., Thursday, May 16, 2013. The Spurs won 94-82. (AP Photo/Jeff Chiu)

San Antonio Spurs power forward Tim Duncan, foreground, and shooting guard Tracy McGrady celebrate during the fourth quarter of Game 6 of a Western Conference semifinal NBA basketball playoff series against the Golden State Warriors in Oakland, Calif., Thursday, May 16, 2013. (AP Photo/Jeff Chiu)

San Antonio Spurs guard Tony Parker (9), of France, drives past Golden State Warriors center Festus Ezeli (31) in the first quarter of Game 6 of a Western Conference semifinal NBA basketball playoff series in Oakland, Calif., Thursday, May 16, 2013. (AP Photo/Jeff Chiu)

San Antonio Spurs center Boris Diaw (33) blocks a shot by Golden State Warriors guard Stephen Curry (30) in the second half of Game 6 of a Western Conference semifinal NBA basketball playoff series in Oakland, Calif., Thursday, May 16, 2013. (AP Photo/Jeff Chiu)

Golden State Warriors guard Stephen Curry (30) shoots around San Antonio Spurs forward Tim Duncan (21) in the first quarter of Game 6 of a Western Conference semifinal in the NBA basketball playoffs, in Oakland, Calif., Thursday, May 16, 2013. (AP Photo/Marcio Jose Sanchez)

OAKLAND, Calif. (AP) ? Tim Duncan, Tony Parker, Manu Ginobili and the San Antonio Spurs are back in the Western Conference finals for the second straight season with the same style that has carried them to four NBA titles.

Don't call these guys old just yet.

After wearing down the younger Golden State Warriors in a grueling six-game series, the Spurs look as spry as ever. And they already know what to expect when they open the conference finals at home against Memphis on Sunday.

"It's going to be a rough one," Duncan said. "If you thought this was physical, it's going to turn up about 10 notches."

San Antonio has shown it can still grind out a series.

Duncan had 19 points and six rebounds, Kawhi Leonard added 16 points and 10 rebounds and the Spurs held off a furious final rally to eliminate the Warriors with a 94-82 victory Thursday night.

Parker shook off a poor start to score 10 of his 13 points in the fourth quarter and Tiago Splitter added a career-playoff high 14 points for San Antonio, which watched a 13-point lead in the third quarter dissolve to two in the final minutes. But the Spurs stayed steady, just the way they have for nearly two decades, and avoided the perils of a decisive Game 7 against Golden State.

"They've got great character. They're competitive. They know there's not a million chances to do this sort of thing. They wanted it," Spurs coach Gregg Popovich said of his squad.

Stephen Curry shot 10 of 25 from the floor to score 22 points on a nagging left ankle, and Jarrett Jack had 15 points as the injury-saddled Warriors finally tired. Rookie forward Harrison Barnes injured his head in the second quarter, returned in the third and was sidelined in the fourth with a headache.

The Spurs outshot Golden State 45 percent to 39 percent and outrebounded the Warriors 46 to 40 to put themselves in position to make another championship run.

The fifth-seeded Grizzlies eliminated Oklahoma City in five games. Memphis and San Antonio split the season series 2-2.

"It's not going to be pretty, sorry. It's just not going to be," Duncan said.

The Spurs lost to the Thunder in the conference finals in six games last season after going ahead 2-0 at home. They haven't been to the NBA Finals since 2007, when they won their fourth title with a sweep of LeBron James and the Cleveland Cavaliers.

"I think everybody on the team, we all want to go one more time," Parker said. "It's been a long time."

The Spurs became the first team to win consecutive games in the series and hand the sixth-seeded Warriors consecutive losses in the playoffs ? and they did it at just the right time.

The Spurs quieted a standing-room-only crowd late in the third quarter and seemingly seized control for good. Instead, the Warriors roared back.

Klay Thompson, who had 10 points on 4-for-12 shooting, made a 3-pointer early in the fourth quarter that sliced San Antonio's lead to three. Then Curry's pull-up jumper brought the Warriors within 77-75 with 4:52 to play.

Parker was 1 for 13 before hitting a corner 3-pointer and Leonard followed with two free throws to put the Spurs up seven.

Jack made a jumper and two free throws to bring the Warriors back again. Then Leonard hit another shot from beyond the arc to put the Spurs ahead 85-79.

Curry and Thompson each had consecutive 3s rim out on the same possession that could've kept Golden State close. But Parker hit another 3-pointer to put San Antonio up 88-79 with 1:15 remaining and send some of the yellow-shirted crowd of 19,596 to the exits.

"I just kept believing in me," said Parker, who added eight assists and finished 3 for 16 from the floor. "My teammates, they were behind me. They would keep telling me, 'Keep shooting, they'll go in.'"

In the end, most of the Warriors' faithful still stuck around.

Fans serenaded the home team with chants of "Warr-i-ors!" in the final seconds. Curry grabbed a microphone after the game and thanked fans at half court, breaking the huddle with the crowd, "Just us!"

The Warriors had only made the playoffs once since 1994 before this season and hadn't won two games beyond the first round since 1977.

"It's inspiring to think of what we were able to accomplish this year and the foundation that has been laid," Warriors coach Mark Jackson said.

Added Curry: "It will take a minute to realize the accomplishments we have made, for a Warriors team to be in this position, it's a good thing, and we can build on this for next year."

The Spurs showed incredible ball movement and had the Warriors playing from behind most of the way. San Antonio's first 10 field goals came on an assist, going ahead by 10 points in the second quarter and maintaining that cushion until late.

Golden State stayed close despite more injury setbacks in a season full of them.

Andrew Bogut walked gingerly to the locker room with 8:31 remaining in the second quarter to get his troublesome left ankle re-taped. At one point, he told Jackson he "couldn't move."

"I was running on fumes the whole series," said Bogut, who had three points and seven rebounds in 20 minutes.

In the second quarter, Barnes fell awkwardly while leaping to contest a layup from Boris Diaw. Barnes hit the court hard and his teammates immediately called for the training staff to attend to him as the arena fell silent. He received six stitches above his right eye at halftime and ran on the court late to start the third quarter, bringing fans to their feet roaring once more.

At least for a moment.

Barnes left the game in the fourth quarter because of a headache. The team said he had passed a concussion test and followed NBA protocol before he returned. Barnes finished with nine points and four rebounds in 31 minutes.

The steady Spurs kept making the Warriors work for every shot and grinding out points on the other end. San Antonio took a 61-48 lead late in the third quarter before Golden State started its final surge.

NOTES: NBA Commissioner David Stern, Sacramento Mayor Kevin Johnson and prospective Kings owner Vivek Ranadive attended the game. ... The Spurs are 10-1 in closeout games since the start of the 2007 playoffs. ... Parker's worst shooting performance in the playoffs with more than five shot attempts came when he was 1 of 12 against New Jersey in the 2003 NBA Finals won by the Spurs. ... The Warriors fell to 4-1 after a loss in the playoffs.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/347875155d53465d95cec892aeb06419/Article_2013-05-17-BKN-Spurs-Warriors-Folo/id-ec3358bfbc8e46bb9012dd4148ffd28b

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Most scientists agree: Humans are causing climate change

Friday, May 17, 2013

Do most scientists agree that human activity is causing global climate change? Yes, they do, according to an extensive analysis of the abstracts or summaries of scientific papers published over the past 20 years, even though public perception tends to be that climate scientists disagree over the fundamental cause of climate change.

To help put a stop to the squabbling, two dozen scientists and citizen-scientists from Australia, Canada, the United Kingdom and the US?including Sarah Green, professor and chair of chemistry at Michigan Technological University in Houghton, Mich.? analyzed the abstracts of nearly 12,000 peer-reviewed scientific papers on climate change published between 1991 and 2011. They also surveyed the authors of those papers, to find out how well the analysis agreed with the authors' own views on how their papers presented the cause of climate change.

They found that more than 97 percent of the scientists who expressed any opinion in their papers about the primary cause of global climate change believed that human activity was the cause. Approximately the same percentage of authors who responded to the survey said that their papers endorsed anthropogenic (human-caused) climate change. Nine of the scientists, including Green, reported their findings today in the journal Environmental Research Letters, published by the Institute of Physics.

Green says she got involved because she was curious about the apparent disconnect between the general public's lack of concern about climate change and what she calls "the clear scientific evidence that humans are changing the planet's atmosphere." That led her to SkepticalScience.com, a web site that tracks and addresses common myths about climate change. She has since contributed several articles.

John Cook, who maintains the web site, is a climate communications fellow for the Global Change Institute at the University of Queensland in Australia. He found that one dominant myth about climate change is the idea that scientists disagree about the cause. To investigate how much disagreement there really is in the peer-reviewed scientific literature, Cook set up an on-line system that enabled a group of SkepticalScience.com authors to rate nearly 12,000 abstracts from the Web of Science database (1991-2011) on whether they report human activities as the main contributors to climate change.

"John cleverly set up the rating process so it felt like a game to me," says Green. "After I rated five abstracts, another five would quickly appear, and counters showed how many each person had done, making it like a contest."

The abstract raters were a combination of professional and citizen-scientists from Australia, Canada, the UK, Finland, the US and Germany. The group was organized through the skeptical science web site.

"I read and rated 4,146 abstracts for this study, over about 4 months in winter/spring 2012," Green explains. "This is the first time I've published a paper where all the research was accomplished sitting on my couch."

Green adds, "I found it fascinating to see the array of implications of climate change identified in the abstracts?beyond the usual ones we hear about. They examined everything from production of tea in Sri Lanka, the stripes on salamanders, child undernutrition, frequency of lightning strikes, distribution of prickly pear cactus (and pine trees, kelp beds, wild boars, penguins, arctic fishes, canine leishmaniasis, and many, many others), mitochondrial electron transport activity in clams, copper uptake by minnows, lake effect snowfall, the rotational speed of the Earth and the prevalence of naked foxes in Iceland."

Green also found a large number of papers addressing mitigation of climate change through alternative energy and other ways to limit carbon emissions.

"It is critical to raise public awareness of the scientific consensus on climate change, so the public can make policy decisions based on factual evidence," she says. "Typically, the general public thinks that only around 50 percent of climate scientists agree that humans are causing global warming. This research has shown that the reality is 97 percent."

###

Michigan Technological University: http://www.mtu.edu

Thanks to Michigan Technological University for this article.

This press release was posted to serve as a topic for discussion. Please comment below. We try our best to only post press releases that are associated with peer reviewed scientific literature. Critical discussions of the research are appreciated. If you need help finding a link to the original article, please contact us on twitter or via e-mail.

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Source: http://www.labspaces.net/128294/Most_scientists_agree__Humans_are_causing_climate_change

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How Much Would It Cost to Build the Starship Enterprise?

So you want to build the Enterprise. Don't we all! Well good news: according to some quick, messy, napkin math, it's possible. Kind of. The bad news? It's going to be stupid expensive. But not unfathomably so! Start scrounging up your space-pennies.

Read more...

Source: http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/gizmodo/full/~3/Mcls1L23Qn0/how-much-would-it-cost-to-build-the-starship-enterprise-506174071

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BET Awards 2013 Nominations: The Complete List

Drake grabs a leading 12 nods, while Chris Brown and R. Kelly are set to perform at June 30 awards show.
By Rob Markman

Drake
Photo: Getty Images

Source: http://www.mtv.com/news/articles/1707339/bet-awards-2013-nominations.jhtml

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Greek workers walk off the job to protest ban on teachers' strike

ATHENS (Reuters) - Greek state workers walked off the job on Tuesday to protest a government decision to ban a strike by high-school teachers, shutting down schools and reducing staff at hospitals to a minimum.

Invoking emergency powers under Greek law, Prime Minister Antonis Samaras has threatened teachers with arrest and dismissal if they begin a planned walkout on Friday that would disrupt university entrance exams, as he tries to show Greece's foreign lenders that Athens is sticking to unpopular reforms.

This is the latest in a string of anti-austerity strikes since the country adopted severe budget and wage cut measures as part of its international bailout in 2010.

But fewer and fewer workers have been heeding trade union calls to down tools because the strikes have failed to stop the government from implementing austerity measures and increasingly impoverished Greeks cannot afford to lose more wages.

"This is our response to the government's authoritarian policies against high-school teachers," public sector union ADEDY said in a statement, demanding a meeting with Samaras.

"These decisions are creating an explosive situation in the education sector with the victims being the teachers as well as students and their parents."

Teachers, doctors and local administration workers are to rally in central Athens around 0700 GMT (3 a.m. EDT). Municipal and local tax offices are expected to be shut during the 24-hour strike by ADEDY.

The union is also planning a four-hour work stoppage on Thursday in solidarity with protesting teachers. The country's largest private sector union, GSEE, will join the stoppage on Thursday.

The conservative-led coalition wants teachers to put in two more hours of work each week to reach the average levels of high school teachers' working hours in Europe, and transfer 4,000 of them to remote parts of Greece to plug staffing gaps.

These measures would allow the government to dismiss about 10,000 part-time teachers when their temporary contracts expire, teachers' union OLME said, calling for the 24-hour strike on Friday and rolling strikes next week.

The government invoked emergency powers on Sunday to block the teachers' strike, using a law that allows it to forcibly mobilize workers in the case of civil disorder or natural disasters.

Police started distributing the orders on Monday, forcing teachers to go to work on Friday or face arrest and dismissal.

GSEE and ADEDY represent more than half of Greece's workforce, which has been shrinking rapidly, reflecting the pain caused by the crippling recession after years of austerity.

"We are protesting against a government that continues its anti-democratic slide by implementing the usual, cruel measure of precautionary civil mobilization, with which it has replaced dialogue," GSEE said.

(Reporting by Renee Maltezou and Harry Papachristou; Editing by Mohammad Zargham)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/greek-workers-walk-off-job-protest-ban-teachers-045407496.html

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Seth Meyers taking over 'Late Night' from Jimmy Fallon

Every night will be Saturday night.

The "Saturday Night Live" takeover of NBC's late night lineup continues. With Jimmy Fallon leaving "Late Night" to host "The Tonight Show" next year, the network has tapped his former "SNL" castmate Seth Meyers to sit in his chair.

[Related: 'SNL' Recap: Kristen Wiig Brings Back Gilly, Target Lady, and Dooneese]

Meyers leaves "SNL" after 12 seasons, eight of which he served as head writer and seven of which he hosted "Weekend Update." He won't have to change bosses, however; Lorne Michaels will be the executive producer of Meyers's "Late Night."

"I only have to work for Lorne for five more years before I pay him back for the time I totaled his car," Meyers joked in a statement. "12:30 on NBC has long been incredible real estate. I hope I can do it justice."

[Related: Watch Jimmy Fallon and John Krasinski's Lip-Sync Battle]

Buzz about who would replace Fallon began even before official confirmation that he would replace Jay Leno as "Tonight Show" host. Names like Howard Stern and Chelsea Handler were thrown around, but Meyers seemed to be a frontrunner from the beginning thanks to his relationship with Michaels.

"We think Seth is one of the brightest, most insightful comedy writers and performers of his generation," said Bob Greenblatt, chairman of NBC Entertainment.

"His years at 'SNL's Weekend Update' desk, not to mention being head writer of the show for many seasons, helped him hone a topical brand of comedy that is perfect for the 'Late Night' franchise."

[Related: 'The Office' Finale: Six Surprising Ways the Series Morphed Along the Way]

Meyers's move to "Late Night" does beg the question whether he and Michaels will update the format to be more similar to "Weekend Update" and Jon Stewart's "The Daily Show."

And there are even more questions about the future of "SNL" -- who will succeed Meyers as head writer? And perhaps more importantly to fans, who will be the new "Weekend Update" host(s)?

Tell us your nominees in the comments and vote in our poll!

Watch Myers on "Weekend Update":

Source: http://tv.yahoo.com/news/seth-meyers-taking-over--late-night--from-jimmy-fallon-190411530.html

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?Hope Your Birthday Is a Blow Out!?: The Greeting Card That Has CAIR Enraged

Suicide-Bomber-Doll

The controversial birthday greeting card depicting a hijab-wearing doll as a suicide bomber (Image source: CAIR-Chicago's chicagomonitor.com)

A birthday greeting card found in a Chicago novelty shop has the Council on American-Islamic Relations fuming because of its implication that a hijab-wearing doll is a suicide bomber.

The front of the card shows a doll wearing a pink and blue dress and a pink Muslim headscarf with the words, "Pull string for message if you dare!" and "she'll love you to death! She'll blow your brains out!"

The birthday message inside reads, "Hope your birthday is a BLOW OUT!"

The Jordan-based website Albawaba reports: "It appears that the birthday card is based on an actual doll, marketed to girls in the Arab world. The Aamina Muslim doll speaks Arabic phrases when the string in her back is pulled."

According to CAIR, the birthday card is manufactured by NobleWorks Inc., whose website features multiple raunchy and expletive-filled greeting cards, including ones that might be considered offensive to devout Christians.

Ahmed Rehab, executive director of CAIR's Chicago office, is not amused by the hijab doll birthday card, which he characterizes as "bigoted."

"We missed the humor," he wrote in a post for CAIR Chicago's blog, the Chicago Monitor. "The unmistakable message behind the 'humor' is that even the most peaceful looking Muslims are synonymous and exchangeable with terrorists."

"Islamophobic generalizations and negative stereotypes often hit those who are most visibly perceived as Muslim, and women wearing the Hijab are often the group hit the hardest," Rehab wrote.

Rehab told Chicago station WGN, "It basically correlates Muslims and terrorism."

"There's nothing about that doll, other than that she's a Muslim, that caused the makers of the card to think it was funny to put blurbs on the box of the doll to say, 'Let me blow you up!,' 'Let me love you to death,'" he added.

NobleWorks could not be reached for comment over the weekend, but the company's president and creative director Ron Kanfi shared some of their philosophy on their website:

Political humor, religion and current events are among the themes to which NobleWorks gives a sick, provocative and sometimes controversial spin. In fact, our other slogan is "Dare to Laugh." I can only imagine folks and friends, who receive or read our cards, can help but wonder as to whether 'laughing' is the appropriate thing to do. But as our moto goes: "F*** 'em if they can't take a joke!" (did I mention we love using the F word wherever possible? F*** yeah!

Among the greeting cards referencing Christians, one featured on NobleWorks' website shows the pope saying, "I can see you masturbating. You show me yours, I'll show you mine!"

Another card on the site shows an image spoofing presumably the Catholic Saint Jude who holds drug paraphernalia with the caption: "Saint Dude: Patron Saint of Lost Brain Cells."

Yet another card depicts a female Catholic-attired figure named "St. Bitch the Fierce. Our Lady of Shameless Sass," and another shows a female saint-like figure with a cross above her head called "St. Coochie Galore, Our Lady of Sacred Sluts." The punchline inside reads, "Hail Mary full of grace, may someone hot sit on your face."

As for the poke at Islam, female suicide bombers are not unheard of: While the majority of suicide bombers in the Palestinian territories and elsewhere have been men, there have also been documented cases of radical Islamist women strapping on explosive belts to target innocent men, women and children, including in Chechnya, Lebanon and Afghanistan.

Suicide-Belt-Kid-FatahThe greeting card company used not only a female image but also the image of a child in the form of the doll. Palestinian terror groups and their supporters have glorified terror to children, as in a photo seen on the official Facebook page of Fatah in Lebanon, which TheBlaze reported on last year. As seen above, a Palestinian mother fits a device meant to appear as a suicide belt on her young son.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/hope-birthday-blow-greeting-card-cair-enraged-170812127.html

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Food: Does Philz Coffee offer enough to stand out? | El Estoque

On May 9, the day after its grand opening, Philz Coffee attracted a large line of customers. The cafe specializes in black coffee; its bestseller is the medium roast tesora. Photo Illustration by Alexandria Poh.

What?s the best refreshment for a sunny, 85 degree afternoon? For a huge line of people gathered at Cupertino Crossroads, the answer was apparently coffee.

Philz Coffee, which opened May 9 in the Cupertino Crossroads at the intersection of Stevens Creek Blvd. and De Anza Blvd., is eager to throw its hat into the overcrowded beverage-shop ring. The cafe?s selling point is its huge selection of light, medium and dark roast coffee, available in cups ($3 small, $4 large) and in one-pound packages of beans ($16-$120). Each order is individually brewed, which is to be expected given the steep price.

The popular Mint Mojito Iced Coffee ($4.50 large) deserves praise. Made with crushed mint leaves, coffee and cream, it tastes refreshing yet subtle, especially on a hot day. The idea of pairing beverages with the delicate flavor of mint is a great one, and Philz employs the herb with great effect in the Fresh Chai ($3 small) as well.

However, the Mocha Tesora ($3.50 small) severely disappoints. While the Tesora coffee base is strong and bold, with great balance and bright acidity, the mocha portion consists of chalky, undissolved powder. But this can be forgiven somewhat considering the cafe?s preference for unadulterated cups of joe over fancy drinks.

The Mint Mojito Iced Coffee proved to be an innovative and unique drink, while the Mocha Tesora tasted awful. Unfortunately, the pastries were terrible and drastically overpriced. Photo Illustration by Yimeng Han.

What cannot be forgiven, however, is the shockingly mediocre selection of baked goods. One would expect a $3 brownie or cookie to taste amazing, but Philz? desserts don?t even taste good. Don?t be fooled by how tempting they look under glass. The only food item worth mentioning is the small amount of baklava the cafe keeps in stock, and even this tends to be on the soggy side.

At least the decor is nice (despite resembling a Japanese fusion restaurant), and the service is friendly. Before they allowed us to walk away from the counter with our drinks, the baristas asked us to take a sip to see if it was to our taste, and offered us the mint leaves from the mojito to smell. But we were surprised that the baristas spilled part of their drinks on the ground whenever they dumped ice into a cup; investing in a pair of tongs might be a good suggestion.

As for the atmosphere, the earthy green, orange and brown color palette makes for a cozy setting that complements the coffee nicely. The small number of tables and chairs lined up against the side of the wall suggests that Philz caters more to the customer that picks up their coffee and leaves, and as a result, Philz? customer base, much like its staff, consists primarily of young adults. The cafe?s overall vibe is quirky, what with its eclectic mix of couches, benches and chairs, but all in all, it aims to please the serious coffee drinker as opposed to the the student looking for a new study spot.

Our conclusion? Philz Coffee is a great place to try different roasts and varieties. If you like your coffee with two shots of wheatgrass, a squirt of mocha, a dollop of whipped cream and served with tasty treats, there are much better places to visit ? but if you like your coffee simple, tried and true, Philz may just be your new favorite coffee stop. We give the cafe 4 stars for those who like it black and 3 stars for those who take all the fixins?, creating an average score of 3.5 out of 5.

Philz Coffee is located on 20686 Stevens Creek Blvd, Cupertino, CA 95014. Operating hours are 6 a.m. to 8:30 p.m. on weekdays, 6:30 a.m. to 8 p.m. on weekends.

Source: http://elestoque.org/2013/05/12/entertainment/food-philz-coffee-offer-stand-out/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=food-philz-coffee-offer-stand-out

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'Gatsby' gives 'Iron Man 3' a run for its money

This film publicity image released by Warner Bros. Pictures shows Leonardo DiCaprio as Jay Gatsby in a scene from "The Great Gatsby." (AP Photo/Warner Bros. Pictures)

This film publicity image released by Warner Bros. Pictures shows Leonardo DiCaprio as Jay Gatsby in a scene from "The Great Gatsby." (AP Photo/Warner Bros. Pictures)

This film publicity image released by Disney-Marvel Studios shows Robert Downey Jr., left, as Tony Stark/Iron Man and Gwyneth Paltrow as Pepper Potts in a scene from "Iron Man 3." (AP Photo/Disney, Marvel Studios)

LOS ANGELES (AP) ? Gatsby looks almost as great as a superhero at the weekend box office.

Leonard DiCaprio's "The Great Gatsby" partied like it was the Roaring Twenties with a $51.1 million debut that made it a surprisingly strong runner-up to comic-book blockbuster "Iron Man 3."

Studio estimates Sunday put "Gatsby" at No. 2 behind Robert Downey Jr.'s superhero sequel, which pulled in $72.5 million domestically to raise its total to $284.9 million after just 10 days in U.S. theaters.

With an additional $89.3 million in its third weekend overseas, "Iron Man 3" lifted its international total to $664.1 million and its worldwide haul to $949 million.

"The Great Gatsby" far exceeded expectations by distributor Warner Bros. of a $35 million to $40 million opening weekend.

Director Baz Luhrmann's 3-D adaptation of the F. Scott Fitzgerald classic was a rare box-office smash for films aimed at older adults during the youth-minded summer season. According to Warner Bros., viewers over 25 made up 69 percent of the film's audience.

"It answers the question that you and I hear all the time from people over 50, 'There's nothing for me to see,'" said Dan Fellman, the studio's head of distribution. "While every studio has the $200 million tentpoles in the marketplace, you still have those who feel that it's not directed at them, which is true. So that's why I think counterprogramming like this is very important."

The weekend's other new wide release, Lionsgate's romantic comedy "Peeples," flopped at No. 4 with just $4.9 million. Produced by Tyler Perry, the movie stars Craig Robinson and Kerry Washington in a meet-the-parents-style farce.

Getting a head start on its domestic launch Friday, "Star Trek: Into Darkness" opened with $31.7 million in seven international markets. Its overseas debut included $13.3 million in Great Britain, $7.6 million in Germany and $5.5 million in Australia.

Starring DiCaprio in the title role as 1920s mystery millionaire Jay Gatsby, the latest Fitzgerald update co-stars Carey Mulligan as his lost love and Tobey Maguire as the friend chronicling their doomed romance.

It was by far the biggest debut ever for filmmaker Luhrmann, whose previous best was $14.8 million for "Australia." In just one weekend, "The Great Gatsby" nearly matched the $57.4 million domestic haul that Luhrmann's top-grossing film, the musical "Moulin Rouge!", managed in its entire run.

"Gatsby" also gave DiCaprio his second-biggest debut, behind the $62.8 million take for "Inception."

The film's success follows a bumpy road to theaters. Originally scheduled for release last December, Warner Bros. pushed it back to summer to give Luhrmann more time to finish his elaborate visual spectacle.

How well the film holds up in coming weeks depends on word-of-mouth from fans. Reviews for "The Great Gatsby" have been so-so, with many critics saying it sacrifices drama and substance for style and dazzle, including Lurhmann's elaborate party scenes backed by a contemporary soundtrack featuring Jay-Z, Beyonce and Lana Del Rey.

"Iron Man 3" was down a steep 58 percent from its opening weekend haul, no surprise given that its $174.1 million domestic debut was the second-biggest ever. The only film to do more business was Downey and company's ensemble adventure "The Avengers," which topped $200 million in its premiere last year.

"The Avengers" held up better in its second weekend with $103.1 million, a drop of only 50 percent. But "Iron Man 3" is on its way to becoming the biggest solo superhero hit worldwide and the second-biggest comic-book adaptation, behind the $1.5 billion "Avengers" payday.

"This is on a trajectory like no other individual superhero movie we've ever seen," said Paul Dergarabedian, an analyst for box-office tracker Hollywood.com. "In less than three weeks, this thing is honing in on a billion dollars. It's just a testament to the incredible popularity of this character."

The movie already has far surpassed the franchise best of $624 million worldwide for "Iron Man 2."

Estimated ticket sales for Friday through Sunday at U.S. and Canadian theaters, according to Hollywood.com. Where available, latest international numbers are also included. Final domestic figures will be released Monday.

1. "Iron Man 3," $72.5 million ($89.3 million international).

2. "The Great Gatsby," $51.1 million.

3. "Pain & Gain," $5 million.

4. "Peeples," $4.9 million.

5. "42," $4.7 million.

6. "Oblivion," $3.9 million ($11.7 million international).

7. "The Croods," $3.6 million ($17.3 million international).

8. "The Big Wedding," $2.5 million.

9. "Mud," $2.4 million.

10. "Oz the Great and Powerful," $802,000.

___

Online:

http://www.hollywood.com

http://www.rentrak.com

___

Universal and Focus are owned by NBC Universal, a unit of Comcast Corp.; Sony, Columbia, Sony Screen Gems and Sony Pictures Classics are units of Sony Corp.; Paramount is owned by Viacom Inc.; Disney, Pixar and Marvel are owned by The Walt Disney Co.; Miramax is owned by Filmyard Holdings LLC; 20th Century Fox and Fox Searchlight are owned by News Corp.; Warner Bros. and New Line are units of Time Warner Inc.; MGM is owned by a group of former creditors including Highland Capital, Anchorage Advisors and Carl Icahn; Lionsgate is owned by Lions Gate Entertainment Corp.; IFC is owned by AMC Networks Inc.; Rogue is owned by Relativity Media LLC.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/4e67281c3f754d0696fbfdee0f3f1469/Article_2013-05-12-Box%20Office/id-306211e4bcd341069f34baad6510f051

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