Category: News

Elia Freedman used to have it made. He was a mobile app developer in the days of the Palm Pilot and he scored bundling deals that got his sophisticated calculator software into the hands of more than 15 million people. Differentiating his product from competitors “wasn’t something we had to deal with for years,” he says, because of the favored position his app got in pre-loaded bundles.

Now those days are gone. Today Freedman’s PowerOne Professional Calculator ($5.99 in iTunes) was accepted into the very crowded iTunes App Store, where competition for visibility is fierce. Freedman’s strategy: PowerOne now focuses on being a tool-building app. Template creation for complex custom calculators in sales, medical, real estate and other markets is what the app is all about. He says he wants to solve the “there’s not an App for that” problem that many professionals experience when they try to use their iPhones at work.

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Calculators: Not Just For Nerds Anymore

Our phones are becoming increasingly capable of finding meaning from and adding value to more types of data than most of us could have imagined just a few years ago. Our physical location, the direction we’re facing, our proximity to other peoples’ phones and soon the temperature our phone finds itself in are all fields of data that have become platforms for developers to build usable tools on top of.

Now imagine training your phone to perform the complex calculations that you need while out in the field for your unique occupation, just by entering new spreadsheet-style functions into a program and saving them as a template.

Freedman says he’s talked with a crash-test engineer who finds the custom calculator he’s built with PowerOne far more useful than carrying a clip board. Commercial real-estate agents in the field with clients have standard operations they can perform, but often have to pull out and enter printed formulae that slow them down and introduce a risk of error. There are millions of equations used in the medical industry, and miscalculation by nurses, doctors and pharmacists cost a shocking number of people their lives. Put the particular equations they need into their hands along with the ability to easily run equations on the fly in the field, and it could be a changed experience for all kinds of people. A phone you can train to perform the specific calculations you need in the field is a smart phone. A calculator app that helps you build calculator apps is very meta.

Possible Next Steps

Freedman says he’s working on developing a more robust Web-based back end where users can share the templates. (Right now he’s making-do with a GetSatisfaction page for sharing.)

He’s hoping to enable a feature where organizations can push out formulae and updates to multiple users. These kinds of social features and network effects could increase the value of the service substantially, but remain a separate challenge to implement effectively. A marketplace for reselling custom-developed equation templates? Freedman says he’s been contacted by multiple people inquiring about just that.

Could PowerOne function like a social, mobile, customizable version of Wolfram|Alpha? That seems like one possibility as well.

The app comes today with more than 50 pre-built templates, some quite sophisticated. Calculation results can easily be emailed to yourself or a client.

A customizable, mobile, computation application is a great example of the kind of lightweight platform that will come in handy in an increasingly data-centric future. That’s the kind of development that makes this era of mobile applications so much more exciting than the old days of bundled incumbents, no matter how good that period was for Elia Freedman. You’ve got to hand it to him, though – his new iPhone app is thought provoking relative to the challenges of the day.

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Studies and surveys, such as the National Survey of Student Engagement (NSSE), show college students who participate in co-curricular activities on campus, are more immersed in college and have better rates of success than other students. 

Harper students can find a way to become more involved by attending the Club Expo from noon until 1 p.m. on Wednesday, January 27 in the Student Center Lounge, Building A, 1200 W. Algonquin Road, Palatine.

 Representatives from more than 30 clubs, such as Astronomy, Environmental, Dance Team, Latinos Unidos, Literature and Creative Writing, and Math, will be available to answer questions.    One new club, the Veterans Club for military veterans will be looking for new members at the Club Expo. 

Bobby Summers, assistant professor, Political Science, is recruiting members for the Harper Veterans Club.  “The club is a forum for Harper vets to have a voice and to share experiences that are unique to the men and women who have served their country,” says Summers, who is also a military veteran. 

The number of Illinois veterans going to Harper has increased over 22% from fall 2009 to fall 2009 due to the Post-9/11 Veteran’s Educational Assistance Act of 2008, according to Thomas Warfield, financial aid assistant, Veteran’s Services, Office of Student Financial Assistance.

For more information, call the Harper College Student Activities Office at 847.925.6242 or go online harpercollege.edu

by Eric Roston

First things first: The White House,
senators, businesses, environmental NGOs, lobbying groups, and the
international community conspired this week to shred any discernible
central narrative in the climate story. While this situation might be
easily recognized as a normal state of affairs—coming after the
singular focus on Copenhagen, and then the singular focus on the
holiday break—the diversity and scale of disagreements over how to
respond to climate risk are striking. (Caveat: News media are biased
toward reporting conflict).

China, India, Brazil, and South Africa (the BASIC bloc) plan to meet in New Delhi this month, ahead of the Jan. 31 deadline to submit their “mitigating actions” to the U.N. climate change secretariat. The Obama
administration and key senators reiterated their support for comprehensive legislation to set a market price for
industrial dumping of carbon dioxide emissions. The Environmental
Protection Agency found itself the target of criticism from the American Farm Bureau Federation over its new carbon-dioxide regulations. North Dakota is threatening to sue Minnesota over the latter’s new climate policy.

Looking forward to Copenhagen was more fun than looking back is. And
looking forward to Cancun (!) isn’t necessarily something everyone is
looking forward to. Oh, how to make sense of it all?

“Strategy” session: Good questions came in
after last week’s ruminations, none more fundamental than this: What
does “climate strategy” mean after Copenhagen? Let’s take a look.

Abroad: Judging by the proliferation of
tactical and other variety disputes this week, it’s clear that there is
no dominant strategy at the moment. The UNFCC process had the veneer of
dominance, but behind that it seems like it’s just every
carbon-polluting entity for itself. What we’re looking at now is
something of a reversion to (or progression toward!) the marketplace of
ideas, where plans to address climate change will compete for attention
from the politicians and policymakers who decide on courses of action.

Say what you want about the Copenhagen Accord hammered out by the BASIC countries
and the U.S.: It’s organic and lays bare observations whispered about
for some time. Robert Stavins of Harvard’s Belfer Center for Science
and International Affairs writes, “The two weeks of COP-15 illustrated four specific problems, most of which were apparent long before the Copenhagen meetings.”

A snub to the European Union, the Accord was produced by a small group of
nations self-selecting, on the spot, based on geopolitics and economic
scale and perceived vulnerability. Perhaps this is a signal that the
new strategy is “anyone who can work together should work together.”
Perhaps this is a signal that China has enough influence to almost
unilaterally dictate the terms of international agreement. The confusion is epitomized by
U.S. deputy special envoy Jonathan Pershing and U.K. Energy and Climate
Change Secretary Ed Miliband:

Pershing: “It is impossible to imagine a global agreement in place that doesn’t
essentially have a global buy-in. There aren’t other institutions
beside the U.N. that have that … We are going to have a very, very
difficult time moving forward and it will be a combination of small and
larger processes.”

Miliband: “I am confident we can get an agreement as we have made a lot of
progress over the last year … We are trying to get consensus from 192
countries from very different places to be part of an agreement. That
is tough and that’s what Copenhagen showed.”

At home: ­­ This week’s Senate intrigue
concerned whether legislators might scoop the cap-and-trade system out
of climate legislation and run with a scaled-down energy bill.
Conflict-monger Politico glazes over the dispute and the Wall Street Journal‘s Environmental Capital blog concludes its “Scrap-and-Trade” post by saying that “[t]here’s reason to think a
clean-energy future could still be in the offing even if Congress does
take the path of least resistance and scraps plans for cap-and-trade
this year.”

The WSJ article looks at the Senate, but just down the street the EPA advances its plans to regulate carbon dioxide and other
heat-trapping gases. The farm lobby’s vocal opposition was met by the
U.S. Chamber of Commerce, which is threatening a lawsuit in language less incendiary than its call for climate science hearings last August. States are asking for more time and small businesses are opposing the policy. Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska). put off introduction of an
amendment that would nix the EPA’s regulation of carbon dioxide under
the Clean Air Act. The move came after the Washington Post reported that two lobbyists “helped craft” the measure.

Conventional wisdom holds that failure in the U.N. arena and
potential failure on Capitol Hill will push market-based program out to
the states. But if cash-strapped California is any indication, a cold
economy can cool interest in climate policy. The LA Times reports a decline in public interest in air pollution and related issues.
Republican gubernatorial candidate Meg Whitman has suggested the state
hold off on implementing its new rules on the emission of heat-trapping
gases. So much for carbon-credit auctions on eBay …

The first big legal skirmish over a climate law could come between
North Dakota and Minnesota. The latter has put in place regulations
that could raise the cost of electricity in that state—even electrons
transmitted from neighboring North Dakota. N.D. Attorney General Wayne
Stenehjem threatened in late December to file a lawsuit, probably over
the U.S. Constitution’s commerce clause. [Nicholas Institute Director
Tim Profeta has written about the issues [PDF] involved in the Environmental Law Reporter.]

Mailbag (Send your questions here!):
Another reader asked last week, Can the USCAP model apply to the global
climate framework? How do boundary-spanning entities like leading NGOs,
global business, and religious communities engage in a meaningful,
constructive way?

Respondents essentially answered the question with another
question: How has USCAP’s position emerged and evolved in the domestic
debate? The U.S. Climate Action Partnership is the group of more than two dozen companies and several environmental
NGOs. A year ago USCAP released an influential blueprint for climate
legislation, which was largely adopted by Energy and Commerce Chairman
Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) in what became the House climate bill. However,
as debate over legislative details has become higher-pitched, there’s
no public indication that USCAP ever re-reached its initial escape
velocity.

A USCAP-like group focused on an international climate agreement
would likely experience similar pressures. The big ideas are hard, but
easier than the fine print. Another issue appears to be the structure
of the UNFCC events itself, which makes it difficult or impossible for
corporations to register and take part. The Major Economies Forum may
be a more receptive place for businesses who want to register their
voices.

The Haitian earthquake: There’s no direct
tie-in to this week’s tragedy, except this: The climate debates are
largely driven by our drives for lasting security and prosperity, and
the avoidance of human suffering.

Duke University President Richard H. Brodhead addressed students, faculty, and staff in a public letter, and directed attention to relief efforts posted here and here.

Eric Roston is Senior Associate at the Nicholas Institute and author of The Carbon Age: How Life’s Core Element Has Become Civilization’s Greatest Threat. Prologue available at here.

Related Links:

Coal ash first real test of Obama commitment to health and safety regulation

Copenhagen Accord is the priority, says U.S. climate envoy. But what about a binding treaty?

Stopping the Murkowski Amendment

Remember Vevo, the “Hulu for music video” service that launched with a lot of fanfare, then earned a ton of lousy press for an error-filled launch?

It’s fixed its tech problems, and is doing just fine, thank you very much. Vevo says it is generating around 20 million video views a day, which puts it on track generate some 600 million views a month.

Some context for that: Comscore (SCOR) says that Hulu itself  generates some 900,000 video views in the U.S, making it the second biggest video site after YouTube. And Viacom, the current #3, generates 500,000 views.

If you want to compare apples to apples, though, you’d have to cut Vevo’s 600 million down to 300 million, since about half of its views come from outside the U.S. Still, that would be enough to qualify Vevo for 8th place on Comscore’s rankings, placing it above AOL and CBS.

And when Comscore’s December video numbers are released at the end of this month, Vevo’s numbers will come in below 300 million, since it didn’t launch until December 9, and because Comscore’s numbers are usually lower than any site’s internal numbers.

Still. It’s a lot of eyeballs, and it’s more than the joint venture between Sony (SNE), Vivendi’s Universal Music Group and Abu Dhabi Media Company had expected. But the fact that Vevo started off with a huge audience, rocky start and all, shouldn’t be a surprise.

If fact, I said so last month. No need to type it twice:

While everyone has rightly been flocking to Vevo.com itself for a look-see, it’s not the most important Web site for the joint venture. That would be YouTube, where most Vevo users are actually going to encounter–and watch–Vevo videos, without even knowing that they’re watching a Vevo video.

To be clear: When Google’s (GOOG) video site agreed to help Universal Music Group (and later Sony) launch a new hub for music videos, it didn’t mean it would be sending its users away from YouTube.

When you read about Vevo launching with 400 million video views in the first month, understand that the majority of those aren’t coming from the new site but from YouTubers who are watching music clips the same way they always do, on YouTube. But Vevo will get credit for those eyeballs and any ad dollars they generate.

That is: If you’re watching a Ke$ha video on YouTube, there’s a good chance you’re watching a Vevo video.

So. Next question. Can Vevo turn all those views into dollars?

We’ll see. CEO Rio Caraeff tells me his sales group continues to bring in high-profile advertisers — the latest, last week, was Procter & Gamble (PG) –  and has been able to get between $25 and $30 for every 1,000 impressions. That’s a whole lot better than videos traditionally got on YouTube, and as good as some TV shows do.

But it’s relatively easy to announce that you’re selling your initial batch of inventory at a high rate. It’s much harder to sustain that over time. So it’s hard to read too much into those numbers just yet.

In the meantime, the site is going to get much bigger in the near future.

For one thing, it should start showing videos from EMI Music Group within the next few weeks, which will mean that it has clips from three of the four big music labels. Warner Music Group (WMG) , the lone holdout, has its own deal with YouTube.

And in March, Vevo should start syndicating its clips to other big properties, starting with CBS (CBS) and AOL (AOL). Which means plenty more eyeballs to sell. The challenge will be proving that the JV’s thesis — that music videos alone are attractive to advertisers — was worth the effort.

Meanwhile, here’s a primer on Ke$ha, who I didn’t know about until the other day. She is apparently big with the kids these days. Gawker’s Doree Shafrir explains this to the rest of us. And if you don’t like words, here’s the clip:

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Academy Award-nominated actor George Clooney, rap star Wyclef Jean, and a host of other decorated entertainers are putting together an all-star benefit with MTV Networks to help the victims of Tuesday’s horrific Haitian earthquake.

Hope For Haiti, a bi-coastal telethon, will be broadcast worldwide next Friday, Jan. 22, on MTV channels around the Globe as well as ABC, NBC, HBO, and CNN, the network announced in a press statement Friday afternoon. The live show will air at 8 PM EST. All proceeds will be split evenly among five relief organizations currently operating in Haiti: Oxfam America, Partners in Health, the Red Cross, UNICEF, and Yele Haiti Foundation.

“In response to the devastating earthquake in Haiti, MTV Networks is presenting “Hope for Haiti,” a global telethon to air commercial-free across ABC, CBS, NBC, FOX, CNN, BET, The CW, HBO, MTV, VH1 and CMT on Friday, January 22, 2010 at 8:00 p.m. ET/PT and 7:00 p.m. CT. “Hope for Haiti” will also be made available to MTV Networks International, CNN International and National Geographic channels worldwide,” the release reads.

“Leading the charge for “Hope for Haiti” will be George Clooney in Los Angeles, Wyclef Jean in New York City and CNN’s Anderson Cooper from Haiti,” MTV continues. “The two-hour telethon will be broadcast from New York City and Los Angeles, and will feature musical performances and celebrity appearances to be announced prior to the event, as well as live news reports from CNN. “Hope for Haiti” will be produced by Joel Gallen, Tenth Planet Productions, in collaboration with MTV Networks and George Clooney.”

Since Microsoft’s Bing search engine launched last summer, it has gained market share at the expense of Yahoo. If the trends stay consistent, Bing could pass Yahoo in the U.S. by the end of November.

To be sure, some (most?) of Microsoft’s gains have come with an expense: The company is buying up toolbar deals to become the default search engine for more users — less-valuable, paid traffic that Yahoo seems happy to give up. And Microsoft has spent a lot of money advertising Bing.

But there’s no doubt that Yahoo’s declining search business, long term, is bad news for the company. Especially because its deal to farm out its search technology to Bing will only generate revenue for searches conducted through Yahoo, not through Bing, even though Yahoo is selling the ads on Bing.

Mentalist Christopher Carter and his ability to read peoples’ minds will be the focal point of Welcome Week activities at Harper College.  The kick off for the spring 2010 semester will begin at 12 p.m. on Wednesday, January 20 in the Student Center Lounge, Building A, Algonquin and Roselle Roads, Palatine.

As a youngster at a family Poker game Carter noticed that people revealed their cards by facial and other expressions.   Later in high school he became interested in hypnosis and magic, in addition to mindreading.  “I’m not a hypnotist exactly, but I do use a lot of hypnotic techniques in my show,” says Carter, who will “get audience members in the Harper show to see something that doesn’t exist.”   One of Carter’s more popular tricks is having students hold fluorescent bulbs and lighting the bulbs at his command.

Other Welcome Week activities include: information tables with Harper staff on Tuesday and Wednesday, January 19 and 20, from 8 a.m. until 1 p.m. in Buildings L, J, and Avanté; and from 5:30 p.m. to 6:45 p.m. on Tuesday and Wednesday, January 19 and 20, in Buildings L and Avanté. 

There will be  a PACE bus table with information on how students can take public transportation to campus and route maps; a Harper Hawks pep rally, free hot chocolate, and live remote broadcast by the student-run radio station WHCM 88.3 FM,  all at 12 p.m. Thursday, January 21 in the Student Center Lounge, Building A.  Students can also sign-up for emergency text alerts.  All of the Welcome Week events are free.  For more information, call the Harper College Student Activities Office at 847.925.6242 or go online harpercollege.edu

Jay-Z sat down with Interview Magazine and talked about the Kanye vs. Taylor drama that happened last September during the MTV Video Music Awards.

JAY-Z: I just think the timing of what he did was wrong, and that, of course, overshadowed everything. He believed that “Single Ladies” was a better video. I believed that. I think a lot of people believed that. You can’t give someone Video of the Year if they don’t win Best Female Video. I thought Best Female Video was something you won on the way to Video of the Year. But, hey, I guess it wasn’t—and that’s a whole other conversation about awards shows and artists.

You seem to stay away from that awards show stuff for the most part.

JAY-Z: Yeah, because it ain’t about nothing. It’s cool. It’s acknowledgment. The fans get to see you, and you can do great by your record if you have a great performance or a great night there. That’s all part of the business. But at their core, awards shows are not really a sincere thing. You know, for a lot of years, the artists had to pay to play their own set.

Click here to read the complete interview!

Just two weeks into the new year, California government authorities are helping to bolster one of our four green building trends to watch in 2010: the tightening of green building regulations. Earlier this week, a California state commission voted unanimously to approve the nation’s first mandatory statewide green building code that, according to a statement by […]

Filed under: Etc., GM, Nissan

Both General Motors and Nissan North America have announced they will be donating over $100,000 each to aid the earthquake relief effort in Haiti. If you haven’t seen the news lately, a magnitude 7.0 earthquake struck Haiti on January 12 near Port-au-Pince, killing tens of thousands of people (maybe over 100,000) and destroying the country’s infrastructure. Governments and companies from all over the world have pledged aid for the victims and this broken nation, but so far GM and Nissan’s American arm are the lone representatives of the U.S. auto industry.

GM pledged $100,000 straight up to the American Red Cross relief fund through its General Motors Foundation and has also added a direct link on employees’ computer desktops to the Red Cross disaster fund. Nissan is giving a $25,000 cash donation, another $5,000 from Nissan Canada, matching employee contributions up to $25,000 for another $50,000 and giving $52,000 to Habitat for Humanity to help rebuild 13 homes in Haiti.

Just as some cynics did when automakers pledged money and supplies after Hurricane Katrina and the Indian Ocean tsunami, one could argue there’s an ulterior motive to these gifts of charity, but we’re quite sure the Haitians could care less and just appreciate the life-changing money. If you’d like to donate to the American Red Cross, click here.

[Sources: General Motors, Nissan | Image: Angel Valentin/Getty]

GM and Nissan each donate $100k+ to Haiti relief effort originally appeared on Autoblog on Fri, 15 Jan 2010 16:01:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Filed under: Classics, Convertible, Coupe, Auctions, Ferrari

Crockett and Tubbs sure looked pimpin’ cruising the streets of Miami in their Ferrari Daytona Spyder. Thing is, as big a Ferrari nut as producer Michael Mann is, he wasn’t man enough to get hold of a real drop-top Daytona: the one featured in Miami Vice was a replica. But Mann wasn’t the only American executive trying to get his hands on one. Though his great grandfather may have lost the opportunity to buy Enzo Ferrari’s outfit outright, Edsel Ford II managed to acquire this very rare and highly sought-after Daytona Spyder on his own.

Only 121 examples were officially produced by Maranello – supplemented by a wealth of chop-jobs perpetrated on the more common Daytona coupe – and this one was once owned, among its three pink-slip holders – by Edsel Ford II. One of only 22 made in yellow, this example has recently undergone a full restoration and comes certified by the rigorous Ferrari Classiche program. It’s anticipated to fetch upwards of $1 million when it crosses RM’s auction block on Amelia Island in March.

The Daytona isn’t the only rare, million-dollar Ferrari classic among the early consignments lined up for Amelia Island, though. The RM Auction event will also feature a rare four-cam, alloy-bodied 275 GTB/4. The car was acquired by Luigi Chinetti, the official importer of Ferraris to the United States, and displayed at the 1967 New York Auto Show. The fully restored show car, in a rather striking copper paint scheme, is estimated to fetch between $1,350,000 and $1,750,000. The auction is stillstill several months away, so stay tuned for more key consignments as they’re announced. In the meantime, you can check out these particularly stunning stallions in the galleries below.

[Source: RM Auctions]

Edsel’s Ferrari Daytona Spyder, Chinetti’s 275 up for auction at RM Amelia Island originally appeared on Autoblog on Fri, 15 Jan 2010 15:31:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Jessica Simpson’s return to the world of reality is set to premiere this spring.

Jessica Simpson’s The Price of Beauty will premiere March 15 @ 10 PM on VH1, the cable network announced on Friday.

“Jessica has been followed, studied and scrutinized since she released her first hit single at the age og 19. Now, Jessica turns the tables on our culture and cultures all over the world,” VH1 said of the series produced by the group behind Wife Swap and Secret Millionaire – in a press release.

The series will see Jessica traveling the world and visiting countries including Japan, Thailand, France, Brazil, Uganda, Morocco and India to find out what “constitutes beauty” in foreign cultures. Fans may log on to VH1.com for a sneak peek of the first episode March 8.

Depending on the size of a woman’s breasts, the desired post-operative size and the technique used, a breast reduction procedure may take anywhere from two to five hours. Reduction mammoplasty is performed in office-based ambulatory facilities or in a hospital setting. There are some insurance companies that require a minimum volume of tissue to be removed to cover the surgery. This needs to be pre-determined by your plastic surgeon and a letter for pre-determination should be sent to the insurance carrier along with photographs of your condition in order to demonstrate the necessity for a breast reduction. There are various techniques available to alleviate the problem which will likely be discussed with you when you meet your plastic surgeon. The most often performed technique involves an inverted T-shaped incision similar to the most common incision used in breast lift surgery. There are several new techniques that are available, but most of these techniques don’t apply to many patients.

Today was a rough day for everyone, but no doubt financials got hit the hardest. Shares of banks plummeted after JP Morgan’s (JPM) earnings report.

In the end, the Dow shed 100 points, the S&P 12, and the NASDAQ Composite 28.

Commodities also took a beating, with oil ending at $78 a barrel, down $1.39.

Gold shaved off 1% to close at 1131.60/ounce and even silver dropped 1% to 18.46/ounce.

Join the conversation about this story »

See Also:

• Retail Sales Unexpectedly Tank In December
• New York Manufacturing Tanks In December After Four Months Of Recovery
• Fed Governor: Commercial Real Estate Is On The Precipice Of A Meltdown

Filed under: Etc., GM, Nissan

Both General Motors and Nissan North America have announced they will be donating over $100,000 each to aid the earthquake relief effort in Haiti. If you haven’t seen the news lately, a magnitude 7.0 earthquake struck Haiti on January 12 near Port-au-Pince, killing tens of thousands of people (maybe over 100,000) and destroying the country’s infrastructure. Governments and companies from all over the world have pledged aid for the victims and this broken nation, but so far GM and Nissan’s American arm are the lone representatives of the U.S. auto industry.

GM pledged $100,000 straight up to the American Red Cross relief fund through its General Motors Foundation and has also added a direct link on employees’ computer desktops to the Red Cross disaster fund. Nissan is giving a $25,000 cash donation, another $5,000 from Nissan Canada, matching employee contributions up to $25,000 for another $50,000 and giving $52,000 to Habitat for Humanity to help rebuild 13 homes in Haiti.

Just as some cynics did when automakers pledged money and supplies after Hurricane Katrina and the Indian Ocean tsunami, one could argue there’s an ulterior motive to these gifts of charity, but we’re quite sure the Haitians could care less and just appreciate the life-changing money. If you’d like to donate to the American Red Cross, click here.

*UPDATE – Toyota announced just today that its companies operating in the Americas will donate a total of $500,000 to be divided among the American Red Cross, Save the Children and Doctors Without Borders.

[Sources: General Motors, Nissan | Image: Angel Valentin/Getty]

GM and Nissan each donate $100k+ to Haiti relief effort *UPDATE originally appeared on Autoblog on Fri, 15 Jan 2010 16:01:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Beginning next fall, Harvard College will resume enrolling a small number of undergraduate transfer students from other colleges and universities.  The College’s transfer program was temporarily suspended in 2008.

In a statement posted on the Admissions Office Web site, Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences Michael D. Smith and Dean of Harvard College Evelynn Hammonds announced that a recent review has determined that adequate residential space is now available to accommodate a small number of students in the coming academic year.

“Over the years, the transfer program has been a source of superb students who have gone on to make important contributions to the nation and the world,” Smith and Hammonds wrote.  “The College looks forward to welcoming a new class of transfer students this coming fall.”

“Residential space is essential to our ability to support a successful transfer program,” they noted.  “Harvard does not admit transfer students to nonresidential status because, in important respects, undergraduate education at Harvard College is residential in character. Students learn a great deal from the House experience, which complements activities in our classrooms and laboratories.”

In general, students who have completed at least one year, but not more than two years, of full-time study at another college or university are eligible to apply for transfer admission.  Harvard’s generous financial aid policies will apply to transfer students.

“Harvard seeks students with clearly developing academic interests that can be well served by Harvard,” said Marlene Vergara Rotner, director of transfer admissions.  “Students who apply should be enrolled in a challenging liberal arts curriculum that includes mathematics, science, and a foreign language.”

“Transfer admission closely mirrors that of freshman admissions, insofar as it looks beyond good grades and test scores and considers the qualities of creativity, intellectual curiosity, and independent thinking,” Rotner said.  “Other factors weighed in the evaluation of transfer candidates include significant nonacademic talents and personal qualities such as a capacity for leadership, energy, character, motivation, and a sense of responsibility.”

Additional information about the program is available online.

I’m probably the last person to mention this, but there is an interesting article on Gizmodo about the physics of space battles. It goes over some of the basics of how to think about such events, discussing attacks, maneuvering, defense, and so on.

I’ve been thinking of writing something similar for a long time. The problem is, the more I think about it, the more stuff I think of! That means writing, essentially, an infinitely long essay, and I don’t have the time for that. Seriously, there is so much fascinating material here that it’s hard to know what to leave in and what to leave out.

Still, it would be fun. Just navigating in space is a whole science fiction topic with such depth and complexity that it would take weeks to write it up… but those would be fun weeks. And there are other topics I’ve thought about as well. Someday, someday.

Growing up in upstate New York, I know something about ice, snow and struggling through waist high drifts piled up by the city snow plows with a woefully inadequate Toro snowblower. God, I wish I had some of this crap back then.

This is how Russians melt snow and ice during their intense winters—by strapping a Klimov VK-1 engine from Mig-15 onto a truck. I think one of these would have taken care of the snow at the end of my driveway (and probably my entire lawn, neighbors lawn, and the woods behind my house) no problem. [Link]
This homemade flamethrower was designed to kill mosquitoes in the home, but I think it’s safer to use one of these outside on the ice covering your front steps. Then again, maybe not. [Link]
Now THIS is what I really needed for my driveway—and autonomous Roomba-esque show shovel. The I-Shovel can automatically detect snowfall accumulation and clear the driveway when it determines that the depth is significant enough for action. [I-Shovel via Link]
I remember icicles the size of swords hanging from my gutters during the winter. Needless to say, that is some dangerous shit—and all that ice is hard on the gutters themselves. The solution could be to install Guttergloves to melt the ice before it accumulates. [Gutterglove via Link]
I’ve never used one of these before, but an electric ice scraper with a heating element makes sense. Although, I doubt that most of these things really crank out enough heat to be practical. [Amazon]
It doesn’t get any simpler than this guys—if you don’t have a garage, put a windshield cover on your car to prevent that situation where you’re late for work, and you frantically scrape out just enough of a spot on the windshield to see, but your peephole kind of fogs up going down the road and you wind up in a ditch. Yeah, we’ve all been there. [Amazon]
Dealing with chains and snow tires is a pain in the ass. Supposedly, these fabric and rubber Snowbootz are easier to install and provide great traction in the snow and ice. Consumer Reports didn’t agree with that assessment completely, but they did find that the system worked well on ice and packed snow—but not so well on soft snow. So, at the very least, it should prevent this type of situation. [Snowbootz]
If you can’t beat the ice, you might as well make it work for you. The Eternal Ice Drop is basically a spherical glass bulb with frozen water inside that you use to chill cognac. The idea is to perfectly chill the drink without watering it down. [5.5 Designers via Link]
Remember that scene in National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation where Chevy Chase blazes down a hill on a greased-up sled? Well, Ky Michaelson is living that with his homemade rocket sled. This thing should eliminate snow and ice, leaving nothing but a flaming streak of Earth in your wake. [Rocketman via Link]
Have you ever busted your ass slipping on ice in the driveway? It’s painful and embarrassing. One way to conveniently prevent that problem is to wear a pair of boots with reversible cleats. When you’re outside, the cleats can be turned to reveal steel studs that provide traction. When heading back indoors, the cleats can be turned around to a flat, rubber side. [Hammacher via Link]

With the wide array of hair loss treatments available to individuals these days, one may wonder just which treatment is right for them. Some are short-term in nature whereas others are more permanent. There are a few ways to determine which types of lost hair treatments are right for you and which ones are best left to others who may be battling hair loss.

One consideration to keep in mind is whether you want a quick fix or a long-term solution. Some items such as hairpieces and hair creams will provide a quick fix however they may not work as well for the long term. On the other hand, certain lost hair treatments such as
hair transplant surgeries and oral medications may prevent the loss of hair or cover up a bald area on your head for the long haul. When considering the different options, it is best to determine whether you want it to last a lifetime or be a temporary solution to the hair loss problem.

Another factor to consider in order to determine which type of treatment is best for you is in the case of what you want the treatment to accomplish. Certain treatments for loss of hair will only prevent future loss of hair whereas others will aid in re-growing the hair that was initially lost. By determining what outcome you are searching for you will better be able to select the best type of hair treatment product or surgical intervention.

There may also be certain risks involved with treatments for loss of hair, all depending on what type of treatment you obtain. For example, treatments such as oral medications and hair transplant surgeries always have the possibility of side effects occurring. Although the chance of side effects will vary depending on the individual and treatment sought, the risk is always there. However, for other types of treatments such as hairpieces or cover up creams, the risks may be much less. It is important to review all of the possible risks to determine if this is the right treatment to pursue.

Lastly, cost is an additional factor to keep in mind when perusing the available treatments for loss of hair. You may find that obtaining a hair transplant procedure is well out of your financial means but acquiring a hairpiece may be possible. In addition, consider whether the treatment products will need to be purchased a few times or on a frequent basis as this too may add up in price. Since many of us live on a budget these days, it is important to inquire about the cost of the various treatment methods. This is simply another factor which must be addressed when reviewing your various hair loss treatment options and trying to choose one which will work best for you.