Friday, January 02, 2009

Bad month for Microsoft and Google



Written by Iain Thomson in San Francisco
vnunet.com, 02 Jan 2009
The latest data on browser market share indicates that Mozilla has broken the 20 per cent barrier in worldwide adoption.
Data collected by Net Applications showed Firefox’s November market share was 20.78 per cent, with
Microsoft’s Internet explorer falling below 70 per cent fore the first time. Google’s Chrome browser was used by less than one per cent of the internet population.
Mozilla's chief executive John Lilly said: “Reaching 20 percent worldwide market share is a significant milestone for Firefox and Mozilla.”
“It's a huge achievement by the global Mozilla community, one that just a few years ago most would have considered impossible. The open web is more vibrant than ever, and the thousands of Mozilla contributors around the world have played a major role in making it that way.”
Apple’s Safari browser was used by over seven per cent of internet sessions....

An Escalating Revolution - Bare Feet


Thousands of shoes litter Palmetto Expressway (click title to entry - thank you)
...A mountain of those thousands of used shoes is now somewhere in northern Miami-Dade County, and Florida Highway Patrol officials are distributing them to local and national nonprofits that promise to give them to the poor.
No witnesses have yet come forward to explain just how thousands of shoes appeared at 7:42 a.m. on the southbound lanes of the busy highway between the Bird Road and Miller Drive exits.
Some think a truck's doors simply burst open, allowing its massive shipment to scatter across the concrete. Others suggest an intricate prank, much like the one pulled off by thieves who returned a statue stolen from the West Palm Beach home of Bernard Madoff.
And others consider it a protest against President Bush, a reference to his recent shoe-dodging experience in Iraq.
Whatever the case, several nonprofits were invited to pick up as many shoes as they could carry from the stack that the Florida Highway Patrol was keeping in northern Miami-Dade....

Wikipedia reaches 6-million-dollar fundraising target


...Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales said more than 125,000 people had donated a total of four million dollars since he made an appeal for funds on July 1....

The FDIC is the only agency that knows what they are doing. They always have. Forget US Treasury.


Mnuchin, Paulson & Co. in Group Buying IndyMac Bank (Update1) (click title to entry - thank you)
By Zachary R. Mider and Ian Katz
Jan. 2 (Bloomberg) -- A group including Steven Mnuchin of Dune Capital Management LP and firms run by hedge-fund manager John Paulson and J. Christopher Flowers agreed to acquire IndyMac Bank from the U.S. and inject $1.3 billion in cash into the failed lender, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. said.
Mnuchin’s group controls IMB Management Holdings LP, a thrift holding company that includes J.C. Flowers & Co., Paulson & Co., MSD Capital LP and Stone Point Capital, the FDIC said in a statement today. The FDIC agreed a month ago to let private investor groups without bank charters bid for failing lenders after a financial crisis wiped out 25 institutions in 2008 and may threaten at least 171 more.
“This is really in some respects, the first step toward finding a bottom for a lot of these assets,” Michael Yoshikami, the president of YCMNet Advisors in Walnut Creek, California, said in an interview Dec. 30.
Mnuchin, 46, a former Goldman Sachs Group Inc. executive vice president who worked on the purchase, will become chairman and chief executive officer of IndyMac’s new holding company, the agency said. Mnuchin founded Dune with former colleagues from Goldman Sachs Group Inc., David Neidich and Chip Seelig after a stint at billionaire George Soros’ hedge fund. Dune’s investments included stakes in Viacom Inc.’s DreamWorks LLC film library, and the 802-room Hyatt Regency hotel in San Francisco....

Will Obama 'sell out' his administration to others completely?



When people smell 'easy money' they just go 'on vacation' thinking they can resurrect a destroyed economy all by themselves.

A $1 trillion dollar 'bailout' for stated, called a stimulus?

No.

...A group of influential Democratic governors (click title to entry - thank you) that includes Deval Patrick is pressing the federal government for a $1 trillion stimulus package for the states over the next two years that would contain $250 billion for education in an effort to avoid inflicting irreversible damage to schools during a fiscal crisis....

There is no fixing a country destroyed by decades of Republican Conservative influence and eight years of complete destruction of the USA infrastructure.

The 'influence' of Governors can't be 'catered to' in the face of REAL CHANGE in the country. If Barak Obama doesn't deliver change to this country while providing mass transit, alternate energies and 'carbon dioxide free' cars then what good is any stimulus to a dying planet? The fact of the matter is that while Governors have their own ideas for 'their own change' selling out to them to allow them to 'lead' the way isn't leadership at all.

There is nothing wrong with assisting states to change their infrastructure while building high speed magnetic rail to link the country. In doing same, jobs will be created and long term employment can be assured. Changing the infrastructure of the USA to stop its carbon dioxide emissions can't be sacrificed for ideas that simply 'seem' like a good idea.

Everyone is asking for too many concessions to rebuilding the country. The USA Dollar has to be supported along the way. Additionally, the jobs that are created/saved have to prove to be establishing a wider and widening tax base for the federal and state systems.


If the education system of the USA is in grossly neglected status, then blame it on the former administration and find a way to 'return' it to its former splender. But, to simply 'spend, spend, spend' to reach for an 'ideology' without a complete plan and vision would prove to be as bad as the administration that destroyed the system in the first place.

I do believe the electorate of the USA knows there is a NEW Secretary of Education at the FEDERAL level, right? A Secretary of State that will be happy to take any complaints, concerns and suggestions from Governors. The Governors weren't elected to Federal office, Barak Obama was.

I sincerely believe this 'feeding frenzy' is simply Democrats acting badly. They need to prove they have a SUSTAINABLE plan that will actually prove its performance before the country completely throws the baby out with the bath water.

Honestly !


I don't find it appropriate that Governors are simply going to 'take over' the USA Federal Treasury for their own purposes. IT'S NOT THEIR MONEY !!!!!

I'm really becoming disillusioned if this administration proves to be unable to sculpt real change in this country and simply 'sells out' federal programs to states for the sake of 'doing something.' States need to formulate their own infrastructure changes with verifiable guarantees of long term job growth and increasing tax bases.

The Governors need to DO THEIR HOMEWORK and present verifiable results to any request for monies. This is ridiculous. It all sounds like 'flash in the pan ideologues' that see 'easy rides' to their administrative responsibilites. We don't need a blasted Gas Pipeline from Alaska through Canada either.

They all need to 'get over' themselves and go to work !

All residents need relief from this mess, NOW. They need to evacuate. This is ridiculous.

This reminds me of the EPA at Ground Zero.

'Too Little, Too Late.'


A Tennessee Valley Authority employee surveyed damage caused by the Monday failure of a retention pond. (J. Miles Cary/knoxville news sentinel/Associated Press)

...Chen and her team were curious to learn how arsenic and mercury, two toxic environmental metals, moved through the food web in a freshwater ecosystem known to be polluted and contaminated. In a process called bioaccumulation, mercury and arsenic were found throughout the food web, from the water, into the algae, through the tiny algae-eating zooplankton, to the fish. As expected, the researchers found that more nutrient-rich environments supported larger algal blooms, which resulted in lower concentrations of mercury and arsenic in the water due to uptake by the algae....

Long-term exposure (click here) to inorganic arsenic in drinking water in Taiwan has caused blackfoot disease, in which the blood vessels in the lower limbs are severely damaged, resulting eventually in progressive gangrene. Its occurrence in Taiwan may be influenced by factors such as poor nutrition. However, arsenic exposure has caused other forms of blood vessel disease in the limbs in several other countries.

...Regrettably, this new source of drinking water was not tested for toxic metals. In 1993, Dhaka Community Hospital first diagnosed chronic arsenic poisoning caused by drinking Bangladesh's groundwater [British Geological Survey (BGS) 1999a]. In 1997, our team produced the first national-scale map of As concentration in Bangladesh's groundwater [Frisbie et al. 1999; U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) 1997]. This map showed that 45% of Bangladesh's area had groundwater with As concentrations greater than the 50 µg/L national standard (Frisbie et al. 1999; USAID 1997). In 2003, a risk assessment estimated that 28 million Bangladeshis were drinking water with As concentrations greater than this national standard (Yu et al. 2003). As a result of this exposure, skin cancer, melanosis, leukomelanosis, keratosis, hyperkeratosis, and nonpitting edema from chronic As poisoning are common in Bangladesh (BGS 1999b; Frisbie et al. 2002). In addition, the rates of bladder cancer, liver cancer, and lung cancer are expected to increase in Bangladesh based on an analysis of death certificates for As exposures in Taiwan (Morales et al. 2000)....

18 Days until Inauguration - Maybe we can stem WW III before it actually happens.

Many always assume, for political reasons, that Russia is alway wrong no matter the truth. Let's hope the new American Administration in DC will stop the demonizing of international partners.

Gazprom Plans to Use Part of Ukraine Payment to Cover Fines (click at title to entry - thank you)
By Guy Collins
Jan. 2 (Bloomberg) -- OAO Gazprom will use part of a $1.5 billion payment from Ukraine which it will receive on Jan. 11 to cover fines it says it is owed relating to gas deliveries.
Ukraine will still owe Gazprom $614 million after the $1.5 billion has been received, since the remaining funds will only cover part of the sum owed on gas deliveries, Gazprom spokesman Sergei Kupriyanov told a press conference in Moscow.
He also said Ukraine must pay for “technical” gas needed to keep pipelines flowing, and said supplies of gas to Europe through Belarus have been increased and have further capacity. He said it is not clear when Ukrainian officials will return for further gas talks. Last Updated: January 2, 2009 09:13 EST



MOSCOW, Jan 2 (Reuters) - Ukraine has not given agreement to ship the full volume of gas to Europe on Saturday that Russia has requested, Russian gas export monopoly Gazprom (GAZP.MM) said on Friday.
"The Ukrainian side for the next 24 hours has not agreed to the needed transit volume," Gazprom spokesman Sergei Kupriyanov said at a Moscow news conference.
He said Ukraine had agreed to ship 296 million cubic metres (mcm) to Europe on Jan. 3, not the 303 mcm that Russia had requested.
As Ukraine does not recognise the validity of its transit contract with Russia, the two sides are agreeing what volumes to ship to European customers on a day-by-day basis.
He said Gazprom expected to receive most of the arrears it is claiming from Ukraine by Jan. 11, though $614 million will still be outstanding.
Kupriyanov also said Ukraine had admitted stealing gas volumes intended for European customers, and said Gazprom was increasing supplies to Europe. (Reporting by Conor Humphries; Writing by Christian Lowe; Editing by William Hardy)




Defining what an 'Economic Stimulus' actually is, requries focus, NOT indulgence.


US Steel Joins BP In Polluting Lake Michigan (click at title to entry - thank you)
by
Lloyd Alter, Toronto on 10.12.07
The questionably named Indiana Department of Environmental Management, which should be still smarting from its BP Whiting Refinery scandal (TreeHugger here and here) is handing out permits to pollute again, this time to US Steel's mill in Gary, Indiana. According to the Chicago Tribune, Indiana is moving to scrap, relax or omit limits on toxic chemicals and heavy metals dumped into a Lake Michigan tributary....

There is an article today in the NYTimes stipulating US Steel is looking for a Trillion Dollar Bailout.

...The industry itself is turning to government for orders that, until the September collapse, had come from manufacturers and builders. Its executives are waiting anxiously for details of President-elect Barack Obama’s stimulus plan, and adding their voices to pleas for a huge public investment program — up to $1 trillion over two years — intended to lift demand for steel to build highways, bridges, electric power grids, schools, hospitals, water treatment plants and rapid transit....

NO !

Here is why.

Besides the obvious, in that the USA does not want to make the same environmental mistakes twice, the safety of our environmental policies have to be assessed to know exactly how much damage was done over the past eight years WHILE the Earth has still been rotating and changing due to Human Induced Global Warming. To DUMP huge amounts of money into industries with grossly damaging environmental records without sufficient restraint would only INCREASE their ability to do more damage AND add COSTS to an already deteriorating American economy with escalating National Debt.

NOT EVERY job in the American Work Force is a worthy one. And why 'create' more jobs adding to 'Superfund Costs' for the sake of an economy. Absolutely not.

Addtionally.

The Economic Stimulus of the next American Administration is to change as well as stabilize the American Infrastructure. That means that industries such as US Steel may not have the 'market share' they used to depending on the demands within the country. That demand will be known as time goes by and can be accommodated in the future. To simply 'DUMP' monies into an economy with the whim of every business interest in the country demanding huge bailouts is pure idiocy.

To 'drop' a cool $1 Trillion US in the pockets of US Steel for the sake of jobs may actually 'crash' the economy future if there is less demand for the products they produce. If the American government were to be so foolish, the industries would then have to turn to international markets that may or may not exist. THAT could lead to a return to outsourcing while seeking labor to supply foreign markets by AGAIN multi-national countries.

I am not an isolationist, but, the monies from the US Treasury is supposed to benefit the US economy and NOT a global infrastruture. The American people and their currency will not be financing the entire global market place. Sorry. The US currency and the way its value is levied according to the National Debt is an issue as well. A very cheap US Dollar as a direct effect on National Security as well.


While the steel industry in the USA has produced a superior product than any global industry can, there is still much to be desired in the knowledge to the impact a NEW American Economic Strategy will provide on the industries profits.


Also to note, it this industry UNDER predominately Republican administrations, that has lost market share. Why? Because the industries they supply have lost market share. Why? Because Republicans base their economic strategies in oil and gas fueled internal combustion engines. The more the 'market share' of US Auto Markers fell due to 'environmental preferences' of conscientious consumers seeking to save the planet for their children (no small promise to future generations) the less US Steel was required within the economy.


There has also been a trend with Republican administrations to 'cut infrastructure' and 'downsize corporations' for increased profits. That said, the hospital systems have downsized their facilities. Consolidation and mergers reduce the need for corporate headquarters and building of the same.

If the American people want to stimulate the steel industry, they need to require all government building and structures such as the 'rebuilding of Ground Zero in New York' be done exclusively with US Steel. It would be a very interesting exercise to fund the rebuilding of Lower Manhattan with 'Stimulus' monies and demand US products and labor ONLY be used in its realization.

FINALLY, $ 1 Trillion US pays for a whole heck of a lot of unemployment and re-education of the American work force. A 'need' that was caused by the lack of government commitment OVER 5 DECADES AGO and the call of American Scientists, to 'sound science' and the acceptance of the need to re-tool the US Economy to be environmentally responsible and 'set a standard' for Global Environmental Responsibility.

Why is the USA dumping its responsibilites? "Not in My Backyard?"

Other terrorists, Abdel-Rahman and Moussaoui are incarcerated at Supermax in Florence, Colorado. Padilla is there. I don't see the issue, really.

"...UK pressure (click at title to article)
The US State Department has asked about 100 countries for help clearing Guantanamo Bay over a two-year period, The Australian newspaper reported.
Australia had rejected a similar request to resettle "a small group of detainees" in early 2008, Ms Gillard said, and would probably do so again.... "



Supermax or Security Housing Unit, has been described; "In 1996, a team from the United Nations assigned to investigate torture described SHU conditions as “inhuman and degrading.” (click here). It might be that the Gitmo detainees have more 'yard time' than they will ever receive at Supermax (click here).