Category: News

Verizon and Nokia jointly announced on Friday the availability for Nokia’s Lumia 928, a Windows Phone 8 handset with LTE support. Customers can purchase the smartphone online or in Verizon stores for $99.99 with a two-year contract and after a mail-in rebate. For a limited time, buyers will also receive a $25 credit for Windows Phone applications.

Although neither company released many specification details of phone, the Lumia 928 is very likely an improved Lumia 920. That phone launched last year as an AT&T exclusive and is considered to be a flagship, high-end model. Here’s a first look at the new Lumia:

Like that phone, the Lumia 928 offers a 4.5-inch OLED screen with Gorilla Glass for protection. It also features an 8.7 megapixel PureView camera with Carl Zeiss optics, Xenon flash and optical image stabilization; something Nokia showed off earlier this week on video. The new Lumia also supports wireless charging.

I think the pricing on this device is quite aggressive when compared to flagship phones running on other platforms. Then again, it probably needs to be. While having a high-end Lumia on one of the largest U.S. carriers can only help Nokia — and Windows Phone 8 sales, for that matter — the price point can help the Lumia 928 stand out from the flagship crowd.

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Wrigley has announced they will be pulling their Alert gum off the shelves pending an investigation by the FDA on what the effects of caffeine are on children.

“After discussions with the FDA, we have a greater appreciation for its concern about the proliferation of caffeine in the nation’s food supply,” Wrigley President Casey Keller said. “There is a need for changes in the regulatory framework to better guide the consumers and the industry about the appropriate level and use of caffeinated products.”

In a world where everyone is constantly moving, food and beverage companies have hit it big with products featuring extra caffeine. Many soda makers have introduced “energy” drinks, and super-caffeinated shots like 5 Hour Energy claim to give the consumer a boost when they’ve hit the 3:00 slump. But it’s also a time when parents are concerned about the effects of extra caffeine and sugar on their children, and the Food and Drug Administration says they want to look further into it before they can give their stamp of approval.

Though the gum has always been marketed with similar energy products rather than with candy, the company says they will comply with any regulations set forth. Each stick of gum contains around 40 milligrams of caffeine, which is the equivalent of half a cup of coffee.

Last month, rapper/producer Jay-Z began selling off his share of the NBA’s Brooklyn Nets. The move was part of the artist’s launch of his Roc Nation Sports venture, a new sports representation company. Jay-Z is reportedly looking to becoming a certified sports agent, and an ownership stake in an NBA team would be a conflict of intrest.

Other sports agents have worried that Jay-Z’s name and media experience could lure away big clients, and it appears they were right to worry. A report on NBC Sports this week stated that New York Jets quarterback Geno Smith has taken a meeting with Roc Nation, in addition to other agencies.

Citing “a source with knowledge of the situation,” the NBC report states that Smith, who is looking for new representation, met with Joel Segal, Priority Sports, Eugene Parker, Fletcher Smith, and Roc Nation. Jay-Z is not yet a certified sports agent, and was not the Roc Nation representative who gave the company’s presentation to Smith.

Smith has not publicly commented on his agent shopping. Unless, that is, his latest (bizarre) tweet is some sort of code and not simply a mistake:

(Image courtesy Talltodd66/Wikimedia Commons)

Vikings is proving to be a hot TV show this season, since March 3rd premiere on the History channel. It has finished its nine episode season one run, but remains in demand. Now Amazon, through its LOVEFiLM service brings the famed barbarians back to jolly old England, where the Vikings landed near the end of the eighth century.

The drama portrays the world of these Dark Age raiders, traders and explorers — not from an outsider’s view, but, through the eyes of Viking society.

This time around residents have nothing to fear and folks in Germany will also be able meet Ragnar and his crew. “From May 24th, 2013, members of LOVEFiLM Instant in the UK will be able to feast on all nine episodes of the Norse action-drama at once in full high-definition” Amazon announces.

Chris Bird, Director of Film Strategy at LOVEFiLM, also points out that this release is a milestone. “As the first time a TV series has arrived on LOVEFiLM Instant before airing on traditional broadcasting platforms, this is an incredibly exciting landmark in our history”, Bird says.

Residents of the United Kingdom and Germany can access LOVEFiLM Instant on PC, Mac or via Nintendo Wii and Wii U, Microsoft Xbox 360, Sony PlayStation 3, Kindle Fire HD and Kindle Fire, Apple iPad and a growing number of Internet-connected TV sets and Blu-ray players. Prices for content vary, but begin at £4.99.

Sprouts Farmers Markets LLC, an organic grocer backed by private equity firm Apollo Global Management LLC, filed to raise up to $300 million in an initial public offering of its common stock, Reuters is reporting.

(Reuters) – Sprouts Farmers Markets LLC, an organic grocer backed by private equity firm Apollo Global Management LLC, filed to raise up to $300 million in an initial public offering of its common stock.

The retailer was acquired by the private equity firm in 2011 and merged with Henry’s Farmers Market, another Apollo holding. Sprouts was again merged with grocer Sunflower Farmers Market last year.

Goldman Sachs and Credit Suisse Securities are the lead underwriters to the offering, the company said in a filing with U.S. regulators on Thursday.

Reuters reported in April that Sprouts had selected Goldman Sachs and Credit Suisse as underwriters.

Sprouts, which operates more than 150 stores across the United States, plans to use the proceeds to repay debt and for general corporate purposes.

The Phoenix-based company intends to list on the Nasdaq under the symbol “SFM”.

The filing did not reveal how many shares the company planned to sell or their expected price.

Another Apollo-backed company — jewelry and accessories retailer Claire’s Inc — filed to raise up to $100 million in an initial public offering last week.

The amount of money a company says it plans to raise in its first IPO filings is used to calculate registration fees. The final size of the IPO could be different.

The post Apollo-backed Sprouts Files for IPO of Up to $300 mln appeared first on peHUB.

Earlier in the week the Samsung Galaxy S 4 Zoom was revealed to be a smartphone that will be all about the camera.  The specs of the device will be more like the S 4 Mini, but the camera will be better than the Galaxy S 4 based on the fact that it will be 16-megapixels. What about optical zoom? That’s something we have all been dying for in a smartphone. Turns out the Galaxy S 4 Zoom will sport a 10x optical zoom according to Russian analyst Dmitry Ryabinin. It’s not up there with the 21x zoom that was in the Galaxy Camera, but this one is going to be an actual smartphone.

The S4 Zoom is rumored to be released in mid-June and further evidence supporting that is the fact that it appeared at Bluetooth SIG already. We could see an announcement in the next couple of weeks.

sources: [email protected] / Bluetooth.org
via: PhoneArena

Come comment on this article: Samsung Galaxy S 4 Zoom confirmed to have 10X optical zoom, spotted in Bluetooth SIG

Smart home and security company Alarm.com plans to announce on Friday that it has acquired energy efficiency startup EnergyHub. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

The move shows how energy efficiency services sold to utilities and energy providers are becoming an increasingly attractive business. The news follows the announcement earlier this week that smart thermostat company Nest acquired an energy data company called MyEnergy.

Alarm.com is a Virginia-based 13-year-old company that makes wireless security and energy management systems that use cellular networks and mobile apps to enable customers to manage their homes. The security systems have connected video cameras, and door, window and cabinet sensors, while the home management system has connected thermostats and controllable lighting.

Alarm.com says it has at least 1 million subscribers for its services, and has a partnership with Verizon Wireless to use its network. Verizon is interested in renting space on its network for so-called machine-to-machine services.

EnergyHub, founded in 2007 and based in Brooklyn, sells software that powers the management of connected thermostats and helps utilities conduct energy efficiency services like demand response. Demand response is when power companies collectively turn down heating and cooling during peak energy times, like a hot summer afternoon. EnergyHub says it expects to have over 200,000 thermostats under management by the end of the year (the company said it had 100,000 under management back in January 2012).

EnergyHub pivoted a couple years ago and previously the company sold a line of connected energy gadgets, including a high-end energy dashboard product. Stand-alone energy dashboards haven’t taken off, particularly high-end ones. EnergyHub raised at least $18 million from investors including Acadia Woods, New York City Investment Fund, .406 Ventures and Physic Ventures.

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Yesterday, First Lady Michelle Obama and Dr. Jill Biden hosted a special Mother's Day tea to honor military mothers and show their appreciation and thanks for all the important work they do as well as the sacrifices their families have made in service of our country.

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One of the dilemmas of firms in rapidly transforming environments is that their ownership structure may get in the way of making tough decisions. Investors in publicly traded companies are understood to desire stable, predictable earnings and growth. But such expectations are unrealistic in many industries. As noted management expert Geoffrey Moore told me with respect to high-velocity competition, “I’m not sure you ever want to be in the public markets.” The problems with public markets and quarter-by-quarter thinking are many, but for companies in fast-changing environments the biggest issue is that public markets are not patient — miss a quarter and the punishment can be severe.

Take Motorola, for instance. Its RAZR thin phone was a huge success in the mid-2000’s, and the market raved. The next few product launches were not nearly as successful and Ed Zander, a CEO who came in during the successful period, was unable to come up with any more hits. The pressure on the company by the investing community (among others) was so severe that it eventually split into two, Motorola Mobility and Motorola Solutions in January of 2011.

One interesting consequence of the indigestion experienced by the public markets over the volatility of strategy in rapidly changing businesses is that we are beginning to see evidence of a sort of division of labor, as it were, between different kinds of investors at different stages of a firm’s lifecycle.

In the early stages, incubation and launch, historically venture capitalists and angels (in addition to the “friends, families and fools” beloved of the entrepreneurship literature) have provided seed funds for organizations to develop an idea. The venture capital industry has now become fairly large and robust. Moreover, firms are often investing in venture capital-type organizations with the hope of striking it lucky with a new technology or offer. We are also increasingly seeing large firms partnering with small ones to provide the resources essential to launch and ramp up. Such a pattern is well established in the pharmaceutical industry as large established firms partner with smaller biotech firms. Such investors are not too concerned with stable earnings. Rather, they invest with an options-oriented motivation, looking for a large payout at some uncertain point in the future.

As a company matures and enters a period of exploiting a competitive advantage, it makes sense for the firm to be publicly traded if it requires the capital. The danger, of course, is that the pressure placed upon management by the drumbeat of investors looking for steady gains can lead to an unwillingness to make the tough calls required to disengage from businesses with declining value. Remember the pillorying Ivan Seidenberg got from the public markets when he moved Verizon out of cash-generating but slow-growing businesses like phone books?

It is far more likely that the hard work of restructuring will be the task of private equity firms, leveraged buyout firms or hedge funds, all of whom have a financial motivation to make whatever disengagement decisions are necessary to profit from the eventual re-sale of a healthier company. Of course, all is not joy and sunshine in this world as sometimes over-leveraged companies fail to create or sustain the capabilities they need to be successful, but in theory it makes sense for a single investor with a reasonably long-term perspective to take on the difficult work of restructuring. Even better would be for management to have done that work without needing a savior to come and do it, but, as we have seen over and over again, being a publicly listed company can make a firm prone to short-termism, which can put off the tough decisions — until it’s too late.

Take the case of Dell, whose attempts to go private have been hotly contested by its investors. As some observers have noted, Michael Dell believes that the massive changes required in the company to bring it back to health and growth would be poorly received by investors. He plans to make significant R&D investments, hire lots of sales people to approach enterprise customers, expand in emerging markets and develop entirely new product categories. As Dell’s public statements have pronounced, these changes will reduce near-term profitability, raise operating and capital expenditures and involve a lot of risk.

So we are left with a quandary. As the pace of competition intensifies, it is going to be harder and harder for companies like Dell to keep a leadership position. And yet, the hunger of public markets for stability and steady profits can prevent leaders from making the very changes that would ensure a firm’s long-term viability. So, how does this get resolved? Do we depend on private equity to help companies clean up obsolete activities? Do we hope that analysts will learn to use different metrics to judge management teams — metrics that realize that with fast-moving markets and short-lived competitive advantages a different set of criteria should be used to gauge performance?

In the video game industry as in many popular video games themselves, a fierce rivalry has taken center stage. Sony took a commanding early lead and its PlayStation and PlayStation 2 systems are both among best-selling video game consoles of all time at No.4 and No.1, respectively. Then the tide turned and Microsoft’s Xbox 360 edged out the PlayStation 3 in the current generation console wars, having recently posted its 27th consecutive month as the top-selling console in the U.S. But we may soon see this rivalry fade as the missions of Microsoft’s next-generation “Xbox Infinity” and Sony’s PlayStation 4 begin to diverge.

Continue reading…

TowerBrook Capital Partners has agreed to buy True Religion Apparel in a deal valued at about $835 million. Terms of the deal call for TowerBrook to pay $32 for each share of TrueReligion, the U.S. denim brand. The $32 represents a roughly 52% premium to TrueReligion’s share price on Oct. 9., the day before the company announced it was exploring strategic alternatives. Deutsche Bank, Jefferies, UBS Investment Bank and Macquarie Capital are providing committed financing. Guggenheim Securities advised True Religion. Deutsche Bank, Jefferies and UBS advised TowerBrook.

PRESS RELEASE

VERNON, Calif. – May 10, 2013 – True Religion Apparel, Inc. (Nasdaq: TRLG) today announced that it has entered into a definitive merger agreement with TowerBrook Capital Partners L.P. (“TowerBrook”), the New York and London-based investment management firm, in a transaction valued at approximately $835 million.

Under the terms of the merger agreement, TowerBrook will acquire all of the outstanding shares of True Religion common stock for $32.00 per share in cash. This represents a premium of approximately 52% to True Religion’s share price on October 9, 2012, the day before the Company announced that it had begun to explore strategic alternatives. The Board of Directors of True Religion unanimously approved the merger agreement and recommends that True Religion shareholders vote in favor of the transaction.

Seth Johnson, Lead Director of True Religion said, “After a thorough review of strategic alternatives to enhance shareholder value, we are pleased to reach this agreement, which provides our shareholders with immediate and substantial cash value representing a significant premium.  The Special Committee has engaged in a thorough review of the state of the business, its outlook and opportunities.  Having considered alternatives over a seven month period, the Special Committee believes TowerBrook’s $32.00 per share cash offer for the Company is in the best interest of our shareholders.”

Lynne Koplin, Interim Chief Executive Officer and President of True Religion said, “I am pleased to announce this agreement as it offers significant value to our shareholders. TowerBrook’s investment is an important endorsement of the True Religion brand, its prospects and the hard work and commitment of our team. At this critical inflection point in our business, global growth and product development effort, TowerBrook’s support and experience will be a true differentiator.  TowerBrook’s long-term approach toward investment and brand stewardship will best enable True Religion to maintain its leadership position in the marketplace. We are confident the next chapter for True Religion will be a successful one for our employees, customers and all other stakeholders.”

Andrew Rolfe, Managing Director of TowerBrook commented, “True Religion is an established, high-end brand with a strong retail network and a loyal following. We are excited to combine our retail and apparel expertise with Lynne and the True Religion team to help the company with brand building and international opportunities.”

TowerBrook has significant experience in the consumer retail and luxury space and has made control-oriented investments in companies such as Jimmy Choo, Odlo, BevMo! and Phase Eight.

The merger is subject to approval from True Religion’s shareholders, regulatory approvals and other customary closing conditions.  The transaction is expected to close in the third quarter of 2013.

Guggenheim Securities, LLC is serving as financial advisor and Greenberg Traurig, LLP is serving as legal advisor to True Religion and the Special Committee of the Board.  Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld is legal advisor to the Company.  Deutsche Bank, Jefferies and its affiliates, UBS Investment Bank and Macquarie Capital have provided committed financing to TowerBrook in support of the transaction. Deutsche Bank, Jefferies and UBS Investment Bank acted as financial advisors to TowerBrook, and Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz is serving as legal advisor.

About True Religion Apparel, Inc.

True Religion Apparel, Inc. is a growing, design-based jeans and jeans-related sportswear brand. The Company designs, manufactures and markets True Religion Apparel products, including its premium True Religion Brand Jeans. Its expanding product line, which includes high-quality, distinctive styling and fit in denim, sportswear, and licensed products, may be found in the Company’s branded retail and outlet stores as well as contemporary department stores and boutiques in 50 countries on six continents. As of March 31, 2013, the Company operated 124 stores in the U.S. and 31 international stores.  For more information, please visit www.truereligionbrandjeans.com.
About TowerBrook Capital Partners

TowerBrook Capital Partners L.P. is an investment management firm with in excess of US$8 billion under management and a track record of creating value for investors. The firm is based in Europe and the USA and focuses on making investments in European and North American companies. TowerBrook primarily pursues control-oriented investments in large and middle market companies, partnering with highly capable management teams and seeking situations characterized by complexity.

Forward Looking Information

Statements contained herein that relate to future results and events are forward-looking statements based on the Company’s current expectations. Actual results and events in future periods may differ materially from those expressed or implied by these forward-looking statements because of a number of risks, uncertainties and other factors. All statements other than statements of historical fact are statements that could be deemed forward-looking statements. Risks, uncertainties and assumptions include, but are not limited to: (1) the occurrence of any event, change or other circumstances that could give rise to the termination of the Merger Agreement; (2) the inability to complete the proposed Merger due to the failure to obtain stockholder approval for the proposed Merger or the failure to satisfy other conditions to completion of the proposed Merger, including that a governmental entity may prohibit, delay or refuse to grant approval for the consummation of the transaction; (3) the failure to obtain the necessary financing arrangements set forth in the debt and equity commitment letters delivered pursuant to the Merger Agreement; (4) risks related to disruption of management’s attention from the Company’s ongoing business operations due to the transaction; and (5) the effect of the announcement of the proposed Merger on the Company’s relationships with its customers, suppliers, operating results and business generally.
Actual results may differ materially from those indicated by such forward-looking statements. In addition, the forward-looking statements represent the Company’s views as of the date on which such statements were made. The Company anticipates that subsequent events and developments will cause its views to change. However, although the Company may elect to update these forward-looking statements at some point in the future, it specifically disclaims any obligation to do so. These forward-looking statements should not be relied upon as representing the Company’s views as of any date subsequent to the date hereof. Additional factors that may cause results to differ materially from those described in the forward-looking statements are set forth in the Company’s Annual Report on Form 10–K for the fiscal year ended December 31, 2013 under the heading “Item 1A—Risk Factors,” and in subsequent reports on Forms 10–Q and 8–K filed with the SEC by the Company.

The post TowerBrook Capital to Buy True Religion in $835 Mln Deal appeared first on peHUB.

On Friday, Finnish handset maker Nokia announced that the Play To app for Windows Phone 8 made the grade from experimental to stable version and is now publicly available to download from the Store. Previously, the DLNA app could only be installed through Nokia’ Beta Labs.

According to the company, Play To brings DLNA to all of Nokia’s Windows Phone 8 handsets available today like Lumia 920, 720 and 520, among others. Compared to the experimental version that I detailed little over two weeks ago, the stable Play To app ships with a number of bug fixes but without any new features onboard.

What Can It Do?

Play To can be used to share different types of multimedia content, including music, pictures and videos from a Lumia Windows Phone 8 smartphone, via Wi-Fi, to a DLNA-compatible device such as Microsoft’s Xbox gaming console on certain TVs.

Nokia says that, at least at the moment, the app does not support the Sony PlayStation 3 gaming console, the “Denon AVR and some other music receivers”. Judging by the comments from the app’s Store reviews, it doesn’t seem to work even with Microsoft’s or Nokia’s homebrew apps.

Mixed Feedback

Reviewer Henry, who gives the app a two-star rating, says: “Useless until it supports Xbox music or Nokia music. Two stars for effort”. Another user, Timothy, says that Play To is more constrictive: “Doesn’t work with most of my media”, although the reviewer gave the app a three-star rating.

Others appear to enjoy the app. Anthony says: “Super easy setup. Works on my Dish Hopper. It found it right away, connected and started playing videos, pics”. “A little buggy but my God this awesome. Please keep developing and improving this!”, says another reviewer.

Nokia encourages users to continue to provide feedback via a Beta Labs forum for Play To. Within the last 24 hours, a large part of the topics created by users are related to compatibility issues with various devices.

“However, we want to be open and frank in the communication and some issues are such that we haven’t been able to fix in the application side and will require a future firmware update”, Nokia says.

Download

Play To is available to download from the Windows Phone Store. The app only supports Lumia Windows Phone 8 devices.

Nick Offerman, who plays the ever charming Ron Swanson on Parks & Recreation, has brought joy to many people with his reading of inane celebrity tweets on Conan. He’s now back with more tweets from Katy Perry, Amanda Bynes and others.

 

Perhaps we shouldn’t think that the mysterious “X” phone by Motorola we’ve been hearing more and more about lately is just limited to one model after all. If you recall, we casually mentioned the possibility of Google introducing the “X” phone as potentially a new line of smartphones– not just one smartphone. Well, it appears that particular rumor may hold up more weight than we thought before. According to an anonymous tipster, at least two versions of the Motorola X two versions are being developed behind closed doors: a main “X” phone and an “M” model— similar to the DROID RAZR M variant from the DROID RAZR line of smartphones. Specs-wise, the main phone will feature a 4.8-inch HD display, 2 GB of RAM and feature Android 4.2.2 (as of now).

While the hardware specs are interesting enough, it’s some cool technology called “Droid Blast” that is being implemented on the “X” phone, courtesy of Google. This technology effectively allows the upcoming smartphone to feature gestures, account sharing and other niceties, similar to technology seen in devices like the Samsung Galaxy S 4.

There’s still no word yet on when the smartphone could possibly arrive, but here’s hoping we see it at a certain event next week.

source: Hot Hardware
via: Phone Arena

Come comment on this article: More details of the upcoming Google “X” phone surfaces including a smaller variant and the inclusion of “Droid Blast” technology

MediaTek jumped into the quad-core game a couple of months ago with the announcement of the MT6589. MediaTek has always been known to be in lesser known brands in China, but the likes of Sony are realizing the potential that MediaTek offers. For instance, the turbo version of the MT6589 (MT6589T) was just benchmarked with some very positive results. Now you guys know I am not a fan of benchmarks because they don’t translate to everyday use, but they do give you a good idea for comparing one chip to another.

The latest AnTuTu result was 14,525, which isn’t Snapdragon 600 levels, but then again this is isn’t for high-end phones. It’s right on par with the Snapdragon S4 Pro, which makes this chip a worthy contender in the budget game.

source: GizChina

Come comment on this article: MediaTek quad-core MT6589T benchmark yields positive results

Gold medalist Andrew Simpson died on Thursday after being trapped beneath a capsized boat.

Simpson won a gold medal at the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing and a silver medial in the 2012 Olympics in London, both in the Star class of sailboats. He was in San Francisco training with the Artemis Racing team for the upcoming America’s Cup when the boat, which had a crew of 11 men, capsized. Andrew was trapped beneath the platform for more than ten minutes, and was unable to be revived when he was finally pulled out.

Artemis CEO Paul Cayard released a statement on the group’s website, saying:

“Our prayers are with Andrew Simpson’s family, his wife and kids, and also the rest of my teammates. It’s a shocking experience to go through, and we have a lot to deal with in the next few days in terms of assuring everybody’s well being. The boat’s under control, but that’s not the first of our concerns. We’re focused on the people. That’s what we’re working with and on and we’ll give you more information when we’re able to.”

As of now, it’s not known what caused the boat to tip over. At least one other person was injured in the accident.

Gold medalist Andrew Simpson found dead as his yacht capsized … Very sad news xx thinking of his family xx

— Selena Mary-Anne (@SELENA_P2012) May 10, 2013

So tragic.RT @theatlanticwire: An Olympic Gold Medalist Is Dead After His Boat Capsized During America’s Cup Training flip.it/OWnfA

— Kerry W Cooper (@kerrywcooper) May 10, 2013

“@foxnews: Sailor killed after sailboat capsized identified as Olympic gold medalist Andrew ‘Bart’ Simpson: fxn.ws/147AauJ” SO SAD.

— Joan Berry (@joanwberry) May 9, 2013

Like many people on the Internet, Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales is a fan of Game of Thrones. He’s not the biggest fan of how the show is distributed, however.

Wales is frequently active on Quora, where someone asked him if he likes the show. His response was:

Read Quote of Jimmy Wales’ answer to Jimmy Wales: Does Jimmy Wales like Game of Thrones? on Quora

Apparently HBO Go is not sufficient for all fans of HBO shows. Even the founder of one of the biggest sites on the web.

Teachers across the U.S. have been fired for a variety of reasons, but modeling is not usually one of them.

This week, 26-year-old Olivia Sprauer told the Huffington Post that she was fired for her modeling bikini pics. She stated that she was called into the principal’s office on April 29, was shown one of her modeling photos, and was asked for her resignation.

Sprauer isn’t broken up about the firing, however, as she had planned to stop teaching at the end of the year and attend graduate school. She also stated that she will attend the high school’s graduation ceremony to see her students off.

Sprauer hasn’t performed in porn, though a few of her modeling photos are a bit more risque than just bikini pics. Her modeling page on the Model Mayhem website states that she loves being in front of the camera and loves being photographed. It also states that she is ok with a bit of nudity:

I am more than comfortable shooting TASTEFUL nudes for the right projects and look forward to hearing from photographers interested in capturing the perfect photograph!

Sprauer also has a Facebook page for her modeling persona filled with photos no one would expect from a high school teacher. She seems to be taking the job loss in stride, though, using her Twitter feed to have a laugh at all the attention she is now getting:

(Image courtesy Victoria Valentine James Facebook page)

The Lake County News Chronicle reports…

At the end of April, an official from the Rural Utilities Service paid a visit to Lake County. RUS is the entity that awarded grant and loan monies to the county to install its broadband network. According to County Administrator Matt Huddleston, an auditor spent a few days in the courthouse, reviewing the financial records for the broadband installation. At Tuesday’s county board meeting, Huddleston said RUS returned a clean bill of health for the project’s finances and found no oversights—a rare result after a RUS audit, Huddleston added.

And there’s more good news that seems to speak to the primary purpose of the idea of the ARRA stimulus funding…

Lake Connections, the brand under which Lake County is building and will operate the broadband network, has begun advertising for jobs as well. Contractors are currently renovating the Two Harbors headquarters, work that is expected to be complete by July.