The Army National Guard’s “Drive the Guard†program is putting Soldiers behind
the wheel while they are in uniform and helping them to qualify for fulltime
civilian employment as a truck driver…
Blog
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‘Drive the Guard’ merges military, civilian careers
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Aggressors train Hawaii Guard pilots
A mobile training team from the 18th Aggressor Squadron spent a week here providing
unit-level training for Hawaii Air National Guard pilots… -
Tennessee Guard maintains, operates critical northern Iraq aviation asset
Nestled in a remote location, by design, is a special aviation operation in
northwest Iraq… -
Shooters take aim at inter-service sniper exercise
The National Guard Marksmanship Training Center’s (NGMTC) Sniper School hosted 30
sniper and sharpshooting competitors at the second annual Inter-Service Sniper
Sustainment Exercise (ISSTE) here at the Fort Chaffee Maneuver Training Center Nov.
7-13… -
Alaska Guardsman honored as “Top Forty Under 40”
An Alaska Army National Guard member currently deployed to Afghanistan has been
named a national and state top 40 under 40 honoree… -
Georgia Soldiers engage Afghan tribal leaders
U.S. soldiers and their Afghan partners bedded down for the night at the Afghan
National Police Achin District Center here Nov. 18 in preparation for a meeting with
Shinwari tribal elders and Afghan security personnel… -
Vermont continues to train for Afghanistan mission
The 86th Infantry Brigade Combat Team of the Vermont National Guard was notified in
June that they would deploy to Afghanistan early next year… -
National Guard executes President’s Afghan agriculture initiative
The National Guard continues to make a significant contribution to one of the
Afghanistan initiatives that President Obama discussed in his Tuesday speech to the
nation… -
True Visual Voicemail: PhoneTag, Google Voice and AT&T’s New Voicemail to Text Service
In case you didn’t realize it, listening to voicemail is a colossal waste of time. Humans read much faster than they can listen, so AT&T’s entry into the Voicemail to Text field is welcome, but it’s a bit late to the party. Other services have been quietly providing this for years; some less expensive and some more expensive.
PhoneTag
Personally, I’ve been a PhoneTag (formerly Simulscribe) subscriber since June 2007 and love the service. PhoneTag replaces your carrier’s voicemail service with its own. PhoneTag will text and/or email you a transcription of your phone messages along with optionally attaching an electronic copy of the voicemail in a variety of formats.
iPhone users who use PhoneTag will lose the ability to use AT&T’s Visual Voicemail, since PhoneTag supersedes the built-in voicemail. Because I can read all my voicemails via email and text, I don’t really mind not having Visual Voicemail.
PhoneTag costs $30 a month (free 1 week trial and other pricing plans available) for unlimited transcriptions and you can forward any number of phones to their service for transcription and the transcriptions go to any number of phones you specify. For example, I have multiple phone numbers for my business and they all forward to that same unified voicemail. When I’m out of town or otherwise inaccessible, the transcriptions go to one of my technicians. Best of all, since the voicemails come in as attachments, I can save every voicemail I’ve ever received right to my computer for daily backup. The transcriptions are nearly flawless, especially if you upload your contacts to the system so you can help it recognize proper names.
Google Voice
On the other end of the spectrum is Google’s free Google Voice service. If you can get an invite, the entire service is free and it also provides transcription of voicemails. Similar to PhoneTag, you’ll need to forward your busy or no answer calls to Google’s phone number.
The transcriptions Google Voice provides border on the ridiculous and I found the service too unreliable for serious business use. Forwarding the messages to multiple phones was difficult and archiving the messages to my computer required manual download of each message. PhoneTag was simply a more elegant and scalable solution when compared to Google Voice. However being free, Google Voice makes a great way to find out if a voicemail to text service is right for you.
AT&T’s New Service
AT&T’s new service costs $9.99 per month — priced squarely in the middle between PhoneTag and Google Voice. Nuance, maker of well-known transcription software Dragon Naturally Speaking, provides the transcription services. Because Nuance is a well-known provider of voice to text services, I suspect it will be much better than Google Voice’s option. While I haven’t tried the service, AT&T claims you can still use your existing voicemail system and similar to PhoneTag and GoogleVoice, makes it easy to archive old messages. Obviously, the service will only work with your AT&T phone.
I’ll stick with PhoneTag due to the quality of its transcriptions and the flexbility of working with multiple phone systems. AT&T’s service is an attractive option for those that don’t need all of PhoneTag’s features.
Now iPhone customers have three options in three different price ranges to avoid listening to voicemail messages and get “true” visual voicemail; voicemails they can read and see without putting their phone up to their ear.
Why are you still actually listening to your voicemails?
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Political Science Professor’s Research Analyzes Poverty, Economic Inequality
Ready for the World: Our World in Need
Nathan Kelly
KNOXVILLE — Nathan Kelly is not telling you to vote Democrat or Republican. But he can tell you what will happen economically either way.
Your decision, he said, will have a significant impact on poverty and economic inequality.
Kelly is an assistant professor of political science at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville.
To him, poverty focuses on those who are poor and inequality has to do with the gap between the rich and the poor. Also, inequality examines the well-being of the poor relative to the rich. He says fighting poverty directly combats inequality, although fighting inequality does not always lead to reductions in poverty.
“In reality, poverty and inequality are often intertwined,” Kelly said. “Usually, when there are many people living in poverty, the gap between the rich and the poor is also large.
“The core of my research examines the causes and consequences of economic inequality.”
Kelly’s work fits well into Ready for the World, the campus’ international and intercultural initiative, which this year is focusing on “Our World in Need” with an emphasis on poverty.
His book “The Politics of Income Inequality in the United States,” printed by Cambridge University Press, tries to
zero in on the relationship between poverty and economic inequality.“Many economists argue that inequality is essentially an inevitable result of a market-driven system,” Kelly said, “and government action is impotent to influence inequality. My research fundamentally contradicts this assessment.”
Kelly’s research shows that differences in economic equality depend on whether a Republican or Democrat is in office.
“When Democrats control the White House and liberal policies are enacted, inequality declines,” Kelly said. “The evidence on this point is quite solid and consistent. To be completely clear, electing Republicans and pursuing conservative policies generally increases inequality, while electing Democrats and pursuing liberal policies decreases inequality.
“I hope that this message makes it out to both liberals and conservatives, in the hopes that some common ground might be found by learning about the empirical realities of American politics.”
Kelly, in his research, also analyzes the distribution of wealth and the government’s involvement.
Teaching a First Year Studies course for freshmen, Kelly said he and his students can explore how politics, poverty and inequality are interconnected. The course involves a lot of discussion and challenges students to confront any biased perceptions of poverty and economic inequality.
“So many of my students have absolutely no idea what it would be like to be poor,” Kelly said. “I’m not sure I even fully understand. It is important for students to see and understand poverty, in part to understand how privileged they are, but also to see the poor as fully human. Sometimes, it’s too easy to … dehumanize the poor. Having direct interactions with economically diverse populations makes it harder to view the poor only as an ‘other’ and perhaps even another that is not deserving of full respect.”
Kelly hopes to make his students not only more conscious of poverty and economic inequality, but also make them more politically aware.
“Individuals matter, but so does government,” Kelly said, “and I hope that I can convince students that governments at least have the potential to be a very powerful actor for the good in this context. Governments also can act very badly. If I can show students that our government somehow represents the values of our society, I hope they will get involved to push government to represent our best values rather than our worst.”
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C O N T A C T :
Bridget Hardy (865-974-2225, [email protected])
Amy Blakely (865-974-5034, [email protected])
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Vikram Pandit’s Old Hedge Fund Restarts
Vikram Pandit’s dead Citi hedge fund, Old Lane Partners, is back from the grave.
Reincarnated as the private firm Meru Capital, it’s already raised $300 million.
It will include all of the founding partners of Old Lane, minus two:
1) Vikram Pandit
2) The head of Citi’s institutional clients group John Havens.
At what point will Mr. Pandit become sick of all the flak he takes at Citi and settle down for a cushy money management job where he can make all the money he wants without politicians breathing down his neck?
At the very least, this surely qualifies as a Pandit Plan B.
FinAlternatives: Citigroup closed Old Lane in September of last year after the hedge fund, which managed $4.5 billion when Citigroup bought it in July 2007 for more than $800 million, posted hundreds of millions in losses and saw all of its outside investors flee.
Join the conversation about this story »
See Also:
- Pandit Says He’s Embarrassed By Andrew Hall’s $100 Million Bonus (C)
- Citi’s New Dumb Ad Campaign Will Defend Vikram Pandit
- VIDEO: Erin Burnett Stabs Vikram Pandit
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What Are The Best Advent Calendars?
December is a great month. There’s Christmas and presents and TV. And every morning you get a chocolate just for waking up. If you haven’t bought your advent calendar yet then what are you doing? Advent has started and the days are running out. Still, before you zip out to the shops and make a disastrous buy, read this. Don’t worry. December is going to be OK.
Lego Pirates Advent Calendar
What could be more Christmasy than the Lego Pirates Advent Calendar? Every day of December you get a new pirate treat, plus a play mat and eight mini-figures. It’s a bit expensive but then it’s a bit more than an advent calendar. Ooh argh!
Price: £15.79 or $60Star Wars Advent Calendar
Star Wars doesn’t stop for Christmas in fact it gets even bigger. This is not so much an advent calendar as a whole world. The pack includes model spaceships, a 3D landscape of the planet Mustafar, six mountains for painting, stickers, paints and an original Star Wars Top Trumps game.
Price: £20Playmobil Advent Calendars – Police and Unicorn In Fairy World
So long as your child is over three years old then the people at Playmobil have something special for them this Christmas. For boys what could be better than the Police Playmobil Calendar complete with a mini village, police station, motorbike, policeman and all kinds of accessories. For girls how about Unicorn in Fairy World complete with flowers, oyster, trees, rainbows, fairies and unicorns! For more traditional children there’s a very Christmas calendar. Check them out yourself.
Price: $17Tea Advent Calendar
What’s the first thing you do when you wake up? If it’s not drink tea then to be honest I don’t want to know about it. The Sonnentor Tea Advent Calendar comes with 24 bags of flavoured tea the like you will never have even imagined. We have energy tea, guardian angel tea, sunshine tea, advent fruit tea, chinese green tea, ginger-lemon tea and rooibos-chocolate tea. Each bag comes in a decorated envelope.
Price: £5.5024 Penguins Before Christmas
This was a big hit last year, so if you missed out you have another chance. It’s simple and beautifully designed. There are 24 penguins and your child has to find them. The calendar is a pop-up and comes with a little booklet which walks kids through December. It’s nicely made but might actually appeal more to an adult market.
Price: $8Make Your Own
Christmas might be tight this year. Plus we are all supposed to be environmental. So why bother paying someone else to make your advent calendar? Get your kids to make theirs. It’s simple. A bit of card. Some Christmas drawings. Tin foil. Glitter. Of course if the kids make them they won’t have any surprises. So you might have to do it yourself.
Price: FREE!Peanuts Advent Calendar
No not peanuts Peanuts. Snoopy Peanuts. Snoopy loves Christmas and everyone loves Snoopy. Or they used to. Maybe this is for yesterday’s children. Still it looks great, there’s chocolate, a tree and a very funny beagle.
Price: $30Haba Advent Calendar
Here’s a very designer little number. A model Christmas Tree with slide out drawers full of sweet wooden figures. While it will look great on the mantelpiece the sweet figures are not confectionery. And that may be the calendar’s problem.
Price: $30My Little Pony Advent Calendar
The wonder of My Little Pony continues with a Ponyville December. 24 doors, three ponyville size ponies and over 40 accessories. Your little girl will love it. Yee-hah!
Price: Prices varyLittlest Pet Shop Advent Calendar
You may struggle to get hold of this one because it’s been a little bit popular. The calendar includes three pets – a miniature mouse, bunny and dog – plus lots of accessories like beds, blankets, scarves, earmuffs, sleds, collars, cups, bowls, food, blankets, sleds, collars, earmuffs, bowls, cups, food, scarves, blankets, sleds, collars, AGGHHHHHHHH!!!!
Price: $17 -
Renewables Engineer – Solar PV
Brighton, Project Design Services (East Anglia) Limited
Our client, an internationally renowned engineering consultancy and world leader in renewable energy technologies are recruiting for a Renewables Engineer – Solar PV. Their Renewables/Low Carbon team in the Renewables & Environment Division requires a new technical specialist to play a prominent role in the growth of the renewable business. The new staff member will have project management responsibilities as well as assist in business development. S/he will provide technical strength in solar PV technologies and will support junior members of the team.
They are particularly interested in candidates from a consultancy background. A background working with solar PV technologies will be essential.
Candidate Specification:
MSc, preferably in a renewables discipline.
A good understanding of consultancy services is desirable.
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RichmondBizSense
**RichmondBizSense.com is offering a print journalism reporting internship for the Spring semester.
**Richmond BizSense is an online business journal delivering daily news stories about Richmond area companies, commercial real estate, banking, startups, and the economy. RBS is an independently-owned media company.
Interns will be expected to write at least three original news stories each week. They will cover assigned stories and beats as well as pitch their own story ideas. Interns will also complete small research assignments for staff reporters.
Interns must be in their senior or junior year and planning to major in journalism. An interest in writing for the web is preferred.
The spring intern must be able to commit to about 18 hours a week, for six to eight weeks. Interns will also be paid an hourly rate to be determined. The RBS newsroom is located at 23 W. Broad St. BizSense is also accepting applications for a summer intern.
Interested students should send an e-mail to:
[email protected]
Please apply by Dec. 15 for the spring internship. For the summer internship please apply by Feb. 15.
–Al Harris
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LA 2009: Maximum Bob, Maximum Live Blog
Click above to view the live blog after the jumpWe’re here in the City of Angels to watch Fritz Henderson deliver GM’s keynote address to the all us media types here at LA Auto Show. Only thing is, Fritz resigned yesterday, and for some reason interim CEO Ed Whitacre will not be delivering the keynote. Which can only mean one thing — GM’s Vice Chairman of Marketing and Communications Bob Lutz will be delivering the opening address. Are you as excited as we are? We kinda doubt it. Make the jump to read our live blog.
Continue reading LA 2009: Maximum Bob, Maximum Live Blog
LA 2009: Maximum Bob, Maximum Live Blog originally appeared on Autoblog on Wed, 02 Dec 2009 11:40:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Islands of Tonga Using Deep Water Buoys to Produce Hydrogen
Maetec LLC on behalf of the tiny South Pacific islands of Tonga has created a deep water wind turbine and buoy combination for producing hydrogen through electrolysis of seawater. The hydrogen will then be piped underwater along the seabed to a power generation station where it will replace diesel fuel for producing electricity for the grid.The hydrogen will be used inside internal combustion engines at the power plants. The hydrogen may also be used as a future transportation fuel for vehicles on the island. Hydrogen is seen as a clean storage alternative for wind and solar rather than lead acid batteries that are not as efficient and not as environmentally friendly as hydrogen.
Officially known as the Kingdom of Tonga, the islands like many other places around the world struggles with how to produce clean energy. Tonga is just north of New Zealand and just east of Australia about one-third of the way to Hawaii.
According to a letter to the editor from Johnny Kraczek, Director of Engineering at Maetec LLC who speaks of hydrogen safety, “Personally I have made hydrogen not only in the lab but even in large quantities in my garage at home. There is an acquaintance of mine, an author, who has run his car on homemade hydrogen for nearly twenty years. He even generates hydrogen off of his treadmill for use in his lawn mower or car.”
So, to sum up, it’s not just the large first world nations like the U. S., Japan and Germany who are turning to hydrogen as a clean energy resource, but also second and third world nations are wise to the need for hydrogen as well. If Tonga can do it, this gives hope for many other countries big and small.
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Rumor Has It: iTunes LP Authoring and Submission Coming to iDVD
When Apple revealed its documents and templates detailing the process of creating iTunes LP and Extras for small studios and indie artists to take advantage of, it also noted that for the time being, submission would be manual, but that automated electronic submission was on its way. A new report suggests the vehicle of delivery for that submission could be none other than Apple’s own iDVD media authoring program, part of the iLife suite.The new ability would be part of a major update to the program, which in turn would be one of a series of updates planned across the iLife catalog for the 2010 version of the software bundle. iDVD hasn’t had a significant refresh in quite a while, and honestly, even the title of the application shows its age. Perhaps a rename will be in order as it transitions to a means of digital publication.
Boy Genius Report is the source of the rumors about the transition for Apple’s standby DVD authoring program:
We’ve been informed that Apple plans to completely redo their iDVD application (in addition to others in iLife 2010), and besides iDVD not being refreshed in a pretty long time, one of the reasons appears to be the inclusion of iTunes LP creation. This will allow artists (indie and major) to create a custom iTunes LP and submit it directly to Apple right from the new application that will be a part of iLife 2010.
BGR goes on to say that the rumor, while unconfirmed, comes from an industry source that has been fairly reliable in past instances, though it doesn’t cite any specific examples. The Report itself has a fairly good track record regarding Apple-related rumors, and this one in particular isn’t that far-fetched or hard to believe.
There’s still no word on a time line for the release of iLife ‘10, but if past practice is any indication, pricing for an upgrade for existing ‘09 users will be somewhere around the $79 mark — which is not a very high barrier of entry for access to iTunes LP authoring and creation tools, meaning that anyone who can get their music in the iTunes Store should be able to create enhanced content. It’s a win-win, since Apple gets to flesh out its enhanced content library, and artists get to expand their oeuvre and provide more incentive to paying customers.
No word yet on whether iTunes Extras authoring and submission will also be included. Considering that iDVD was designed at least partially with home movie DVD enhancement in mind, I’d say there’s a very strong possibility we’ll see Extras support, too.
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LA 2009 LIVE VIDEO: Bob Lutz Keynote address
Filed under: LA Auto Show, Videos
Click above to view the live video feed after the jumpWith Fritz Henderson’s
resignationtermination as General Motor’s CEO, the General’s generals had to pull a last-minute swap with today’s keynote speaker at the LA Auto Show. None other than Maximum Bob Lutz will be manning the podium in a few minutes and in addition to live-blogging the proceedings (coming in 5…4…3…), we’ve got streaming video of the address after the jump.Continue reading LA 2009 LIVE VIDEO: Bob Lutz Keynote address
LA 2009 LIVE VIDEO: Bob Lutz Keynote address originally appeared on Autoblog on Wed, 02 Dec 2009 11:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Google Street View Now Live in Singapore
Google is pushing ahead with Street View despite the numerous controversies surrounding the product. Some countries are more welcoming than others though and it looks like the latest venture is getting a warmer reception. Google has just launched the service in Singapore making it the first country in South Asia to get Street View and one of the first in the region after Japan, Australia, New Zealand and Taiwan. While countries like Japan or Germany had more than a few issues with the service, in Singapore the local government is excited about the image and tourism opportunities it opens up. “STB is very excited by Street View’s marketing potential as it will further raise Singapore’s prominence and reach through the Internet. People unfamiliar with Singapore can now get a first look at our city,” Mr Ken Low, assistant chief executive of Marketing, with the Singapore Tourism Board (STB), said.
“The convenience of Google Maps, and the Street View feature, will give people from anywhere in the world a much better idea and picture of what Singapore looks like, and what it has to offer and we welcome private sector initiatives such as these which help us add value to our visitors’ experiences,” he added.
The feature is now live on Google Maps and can be accessed… (read more)
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Light Bulb Santa
I am always looking for easy to make unique ornaments to make and share with you. Here is one cute ornament you can make and hang on your tree. It takes very little time and material to complete. I don’t think I have ever seen a project like this, working with light bulbs. Now that is a very different idea.
Kathy Zengolewicz
Here is what you will need to get started:
- One lightbulb, using a burned out bulb will work
- Acrylic paints in red, white, flesh toned, black and blue (you can use paint markers or plain markers for the blue eyes, black eye shape and beard highlights
- paint brushes
- rubbing alcohol or an ammonia window cleaner
- white or red chenille stem or pipe cleaner for the hanger
- scrap material for the hat
- A jingle bell or pom pom for the end of the hat
- scrap white material for hat trim
- hot glue or craft glue
First, clean the lightbulb thoroughly with the alcohol or window cleaner. This will take off any grease or fingerprints and help the paint to adhere to the bulb.
Pain the bulb white, let it dry and give it a second coat. When the second coat dries, paint an oval for the face area with the flesh toned paint. Let it dry thoroughly.
When that’s dry, paint the facial features by copying for the photo. Add white whiskers around the face to create a large mustache. Add a thin red line right below the mustache to form the lips. Add two red circle shape for the cheeks.
Use either black paint, paint marker or plain marker to make an outline of the eyes. Also, add some faint black lines in the mustache and beard to define the shape.
Next, take a scrap of red felt and cut in a triangle to make the hat. You can get 12 x 12 pieces of felt in the craft store for about 75 cents. Stitch up the felt and sew a jingle bell or glue a pom pom on the pointed end of the hat, then trim with a piece of white material.
Twist the chenille stem around the bottom of the metal base, on the bulb, above the face then twist the two ends together to form a hanger. Push the hat down and glue in place.
Once the glue is dry you can hang your Santa on your tree. Enjoy!
Post from: Blisstree
