শুক্রবার, ৩১ আগস্ট, ২০১২

The beat goes on: Research yields two 'firsts' regarding protein crucial to human cardiac function

ScienceDaily (Aug. 31, 2012) ? Florida State University researchers led by physics doctoral student Campion Loong have achieved significant benchmarks in a study of the human cardiac protein alpha-tropomyosin, which is an essential, molecular-level component that controls the heart's contraction on every beat.

Using an imaging method called atomic force microscopy, Loong achieved two "firsts": the first direct imaging of individual alpha-tropomyosin molecules, which are very small -- roughly 40 nanometers long -- and the first demonstrated examples of a measure of the human cardiac protein's flexibility. From there, he established a baseline of how flexible a normal version of the protein is supposed to be in a healthy human heart.

"This basic research is important to broadening our understanding of how the human heart functions normally at the molecular level," Loong said. "The flexibility of alpha-tropomyosin dictates how effectively or properly the heart muscle will contract on each beat and has implications for keeping the heart free of cardiovascular disease.

"Before this study, we did not know how flexible this protein was," Loong said. "Using these results, now we can conduct subsequent studies to compare disease-related mutants of this protein to see how much they deviate from normal versions."

Loong served as the lead author of the paper "Persistence Length of Human Cardiac a-Tropomyosin Measured by Single Molecule Direct Probe Microscopy," which was published in the journal PLoS ONE. He conducted the research with physics Professor Huan-Xiang Zhou and biological science Professor P. Bryant Chase, both of Florida State.

When an electrical signal is generated in the heart to make it contract, calcium is released inside each heart muscle cell. The calcium then binds to a protein called troponin, and that triggers the "flexing movement" of alpha-tropomyosin, which allows another protein called myosin -- the motor protein -- to interact with the troponin/tropomyosin actin filaments. This series of events is what generates the heart's contraction that pumps blood. A subsequent removal of calcium inside each heart cell is what relaxes the heart, which allows the heart to fill with blood to be pumped on the next beat.

"Alpha-tropomyosin is a key element that makes the calcium signal either turn the heart on, making it contract, or turn it off, making it relax," Chase said. "There is an optimal range of flexibility of alpha-tropomyosin for the normal heart to function properly. The molecule can be too stiff or it can be too flexible, either of which could lead to cardiovascular disease. What we ultimately think is that evolution has tuned the mechanical properties of these proteins for optimal function in the heart."

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The above story is reprinted from materials provided by Florida State University.

Note: Materials may be edited for content and length. For further information, please contact the source cited above.


Journal Reference:

  1. Campion K. P. Loong, Huan-Xiang Zhou, P. Bryant Chase. Persistence Length of Human Cardiac ?-Tropomyosin Measured by Single Molecule Direct Probe Microscopy. PLoS ONE, 2012; 7 (6): e39676 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0039676

Note: If no author is given, the source is cited instead.

Disclaimer: This article is not intended to provide medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. Views expressed here do not necessarily reflect those of ScienceDaily or its staff.

Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/top_news/top_health/~3/UK6yNC4vlgE/120831103830.htm

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Intel opens up about its 'Knights Corner' supercomputer co-processor

Intel opens up about its Knights Corner supercomputer offering

HotChips is the show where chip makers come to show off their latest slices of silicon, and Knights Corner architect George Chrysos spilled the beans on Santa Clara's Xeon Phi co-processor. The unit's designed to bolt onto Xeon chips to help supercomputers crunch the numbers faster, by handling the "highly parallel" grunt work necessary for genetic and climate modeling, among other things. Chrysos has lofty goals for the hardware, hoping that it'll contribute to "scientific and technical progress," while we're just excited to see if it can help the company reclaim its Top 500 crown from IBM.

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Intel opens up about its 'Knights Corner' supercomputer co-processor originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 31 Aug 2012 15:46:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Source: http://feeds.engadget.com/~r/weblogsinc/engadget/~3/1k3YIjn8L1c/

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Bun B Day's 'First Priority' Is Feeding Houston Children

'They're focusing on getting the kids good, healthy meals on the weekend," Bun D said about Houston Food Bank during his namesake event.
By Maurice Bobb


Bun B
Photo: MTV News

Source: http://www.mtv.com/news/articles/1693015/bun-b-food-bank-houston.jhtml

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বৃহস্পতিবার, ৩০ আগস্ট, ২০১২

Half of workers would take pay cut for more flextime

By Eve Tahmincioglu

Give me more workplace flexibility, or give me death.

Well, maybe not death. But it turns out employees are willing to sacrifice a lot in exchange for more flexibility at work.

A survey by staffing company Mom Corps released Thursday found that so-called "workflex opportunities" are worth more than money for some employees.

Here are some of the findings from Mom Corps? second annual Labor Day poll, conducted by Harris Interactive:

  • Nearly half of working adults surveyed (45 percent) are willing to give up some percentage of their salary for more flexibility at work.
  • And they?re willing to give back nearly 9 percent of their wages on average, an uptick from the amount they would be willing to fork over in last year's survey (5.8 percent).

?We are beginning to see significant patterns in the value professionals of all ages place on workplace flexibility,? said?Allison O?Kelly, founder and CEO of Mom Corps. ?More and more, we feel challenged by the collective pressures of a demanding work life, a hectic personal life and a desire to find fulfillment in both.?

Unfortunately, according to Families and Work Institute (FWI) data, workflex arrangements aren?t exactly exploding in the workplace to meet the demand.

Only 3 percent of wage and salary employees work mainly from home, said Ken Matos, senior director of employment research and practice at the Institute, and co-author of the forthcoming book ?WORKFLEX: The Essential Guide to Effective and Flexible Workplaces.?

And of those employees who do not get to work part of their regular paid hours at home, 50 percent would like to.

Employees are so serious about finding the right flexible options at work that nearly 90 percent of the workers FWI surveyed said that when they look for a new job workflex will be ?extremely? or ?very important? in their decision process, according to Matos, who will be taking questions about workflex options and how to get them from NBCNews.com readers during a live web chat Thursday at noon ET.

Mom Corps? survey results bolstered FWI?s findings that flex time is a high priority.

Their poll found many employees, 52 percent, would consider starting their own business in order to find the flexibility they crave, with men age 35 to 44 the most anxious to do this at 75 percent.

Despite the gloomy work-flex landscape today, however, 67 percent of employees agree it is possible to "have it all" when it comes to work-life fit.

Who says American workers aren?t optimistic?

Eve Tahmincioglu is a career blogger and director of communications at the Families and Work Institute.

Is workplace flexibility more important to you than your salary?

Source: http://lifeinc.today.com/_news/2012/08/30/13567119-workers-willing-to-give-up-a-lot-for-flextime?lite

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Amazon says Kindle Fire completely 'sold out'; successor's announcement expected next week

Amazon Kindle Fire

Amazon today announced that it has completely sold out of the Kindle Fire, which quickly rose to prominence as the 7-inch tablet to have in late 2011 before being overtaken (in prestige, at least) by the $199 7-inch Google Nexus 7 this summer.

Amazon, still without citing any actual sales numbers, said that the Kindle Fire has "captured 22 percent of tablet sales in the U.S." It didn't give a source for that percentage either. Regardless, there's no denying that the Kindle Fire has been a hot device, even in the sales figures, opaque at best, remain disputed.

Last week we ran an unscientific poll in our sidebar, asking readers the simple question: Kindle Fire, Nook Tablet or Nexus 7. Out of more than 3,100 responses, the message about where attention currently is directed was clear, at least from our readers:

Kindle Fire poll

And so that brings us to the present. Amazon has an event scheduled for Sept. 6 in Los Angeles, presumably to announce a new version of the Kindle Fire, which is all but certain now that it's no longer selling the original. The question now is whether whatever it brings to the table will continue to compete both in specs, features and, most important, price, particularly with the expectation that Apple will release a smaller iPad this fall.

Tune in next week as we find out, folks.

Source: Amazon



Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/androidcentral/~3/9IcEEJGh8nc/story01.htm

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Cauldron lit for 'inspirational' Games

The Paralympic cauldron was lit in London on Wednesday to burn for 11 days of sport at the biggest and most high-profile Games that organisers hope will transform ideas about disability the world over.

The flame arrived in spectacular fashion, brought down a zip wire from the 115-metre (377-feet) high observation tower overlooking the Olympic Stadium in east London by a British soldier wounded on a tour of duty in Afghanistan.

Royal Marine commando Joe Townsend, who lost both legs when he stepped on a homemade bomb, is now an aspiring Paralympic triathlete who hopes to compete in Rio de Janeiro in 2016 when the sport makes its debut.

He handed the torch to Britain's five-a-side football team captain Dave Clarke, who passed it to Margaret Maughan, Britain's first Paralympic gold medallist at the inaugural Paralympics in Rome in 1960.

She then lit the petals of the cauldron inscribed with the names of all participating countries, triggering a firework display in the skies overhead.

Queen Elizabeth II earlier officially opened the Games at the showpiece ceremony involving more than 3,000 volunteer and professional performers, many of them with a disability, combining music, dance and aerial acrobatics.

London 2012 chief Sebastian Coe said hoped the Games "would be a landmark for people with a disability everywhere, a landmark in the progress of mankind towards the light, towards seeing immense capability and possibility".

The president of the International Paralympic Committee, Philip Craven, added that the Games were "a celebration of the human spirit" that had "the energy to change each and every one of us".

The show began with a fly-past over the stadium by a former serviceman who was helped by a charity that trains disabled pilots and a rare public appearance by Britain's most-famous living scientist Stephen Hawking.

The theoretical physicist, author of "A Brief History of Time" who has motor neuron disease and has been paralysed most of his life, was described by organisers as "the most famous disabled person anywhere on the planet".

He guided a central character on a journey of discovery in a story inspired by William Shakespeare's "The Tempest", taking in the "Big Bang" theory on the creation of the universe about which he has written extensively, to the 18th century "Enlightment" period and scientific discoveries of the modern era.

The 70-year-old said through a voice synthesiser: "The Paralympic Games is about transforming our perception of the world.

"We are all different, there is no such thing as a standard or run-of-the-mill human being but we share the same human spirit. What is important is that we have the ability to create.

"This creativity can take many forms, from physical achievement to theoretical physics. However difficult life may seem there is always something you can do and succeed at."

On Thursday, a record 4,200 athletes, including an unprecedented number of women, from 165 countries will compete for 503 medals in 20 sports in front of a near-sell-out crowd for the first time in the Games' 52-year history.

A total of 166 countries had been due to take part but the IPC said Malawi's team had not travelled to London for what would have been the country's first Paralympics.

Organisers believe much of the increased domestic interest in the event comes after a successful Olympics for British athletes, which saw the host nation finish third in the overall medal table behind the United States and China.

Britain is considered the "spiritual home" of the Games, as the first recognised sports events for athletes with disabilities was held in Stoke Mandeville, southern England, in 1948, 12 years before the first Paralympics.

The Paralympic flame was lit at Stoke Mandeville on Tuesday evening and brought to London in an overnight relay.

Shooting is set to provide the first gold of the Games on Thursday in the women's 10m standing air rifle.

Medals are also up for grabs in the velodrome with the finals of the men and women's individual pursuit, in four weight categories in judo at the ExCeL Arena and at the Aquatics Centre, where 15 swimming finals are to be held.

The showpiece athletics programme gets under way on Friday with the spotlight on South Africa's Oscar Pistorius, who is seeking to defend his T44 100m, 200m and 400m titles from Beijing four years ago.

Pistorius, dubbed the "Blade Runner" because he runs on carbon fibre blades, made history this month by becoming the first double-amputee athlete to compete in the Olympics 400m and 4x400m relay final.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/inspirational-paralympics-open-london-065857668--oly.html

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মঙ্গলবার, ২৮ আগস্ট, ২০১২

Thousands of Kuwaitis protest electoral law move

KUWAIT (Reuters) - Thousands of Kuwaitis took part in a rally late on Monday to protest any changes to the electoral law which they said could harm the prospects of opposition lawmakers in upcoming elections.

While the major oil exporter has not experienced the kind of mass popular uprisings that have swept the Arab region since last year, tensions have grown between the cabinet, opposition lawmakers and youth activists.

Around 3,000 people, mainly men in traditional Kuwaiti dress, gathered opposite parliament at Erada Square, the scene of several anti-government protests including one in November when protesters stormed the chamber.

At the height of frequent demonstrations last year, tens of thousands of youth activists, opposition MPs and their followers took part in such rallies in the regional U.S. ally.

The government asked the country's top court earlier this month to rule on a law that divides Kuwait into five constituencies, saying this was necessary to protect against legal challenges to future elections.

Some opposition politicians and activists have accused the government of wanting to alter electoral districts to prevent another opposition majority in the next parliamentary election.

Kuwait changed its election law in 2006, reducing the number of constituencies to five from 25 as part of efforts to reduce the possibility vote-buying and to cut tribal influence at the polls. Political parties are banned so lawmakers rely on forming blocs in parliament with tribal ties playing a major role.

The infighting has held up legislation and investment in the OPEC member state which has seen eight governments come and go in just six years.

"The government has been trying to break this opposition but it can't stop it now," economic consultant Anwar al-Sharhan said at the rally, where there was a minimal police presence.

"The government didn't have any other options so it went for the judicial system. This is the worst thing that could happen."

COURT RULING

Sharhan said Kuwaitis were tired of the political deadlock and felt the country's massive oil wealth was being squandered.

"We can't build a proper airport, we can't build a proper port, we can't even build proper roads," he said, as men sat under palm trees on carpets in the 45C (113 F) heat.

Speakers on Monday also criticized a court ruling from earlier this year that effectively dissolved a parliament dominated by opposition lawmakers and reinstated the previous, more government-friendly, assembly.

The reinstated parliament, originally elected in 2009, has been unable to meet to swear in the new government. Protesters held signs reading "Out with the 2009 assembly".

Around 4,000 Kuwaitis protested in June against the court ruling, calling it a coup against the constitution.

"We need more justice. Democracy is not complete in Kuwait," poet Faisal al-Hamlan said after addressing the audience.

Since they were elected in February, opposition lawmakers sought to grill senior cabinet members in parliament, forcing the resignation of two.

Kuwait, with its elected legislature and lively political debate, stands out in a region governed by autocrats who tolerate little dissent. However the al-Sabah family still holds a firm grip on state affairs.

The most important cabinet posts are held by al-Sabah family members and the 83-year-old emir, Sheikh Sabah al-Ahmad al-Sabah, who has the last say in politics, reserves the right to dissolve parliament at will.

He is widely expected to do this and call new elections by the end of the year in an attempt to break the deadlock.

(Editing by Michael Roddy)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/thousands-kuwaitis-protest-electoral-law-move-204219556.html

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Goal of united Syrian opposition still elusive

AZAZ, Syria (AP) ? In the foreign halls of power, the strategy is clear: Syria's opposition should unite to present an alternative to Bashar Assad's rule ? a step France's president says would lead to diplomatic recognition.

As a move toward unity, Syrian exiles from the main opposition Syrian National Council and other groups unveiled a blueprint Tuesday in the German capital of Berlin for transition to a democratic, transparent society free of religious and ethnic favoritism.

But rebels and civilians in the bomb-shattered Syrian town of Azaz near the Turkish border view such talk as hollow. They are deeply skeptical of all exiled leaders and believe what really matters is their fight on the ground to overthrow the regime.

"They have never come up with a united position that will save the people," said Fadi Hajji, 25, who had been camped out along the Syrian border with Turkey with his wife and two infant daughters for five days. "All they are good at is arguing. They don't represent anyone here and they don't help."

There was more bloodshed Tuesday as a car bomb ripped through a Damascus suburb, killing 12 people, according to the state news agency. Activists also said an airstrike in the town of Kfar Nabl killed at least 13 people as fighting raged nationwide.

With no end to the carnage in sight, French President Francois Hollande called on the Syrian opposition Monday to form a provisional government, saying France would recognize and support it.

Hollande's statement, believed to be the first of its kind, was quickly shot down by U.S. officials who said talk of a provisional government was premature given the deep divisions within the opposition movement.

The head of the main Syrian opposition group, the Syrian National Council, criticized the U.S. stand, saying that efforts were under way to forge a united front but that the process takes time ? especially in the midst of a raging civil war.

"It seems to me as if the international community is not prepared to take decisive decisions and blames the Syrian opposition for its own shortcomings," Abdelbaset Sieda told The Associated Press by telephone Tuesday from Switzerland.

"Yes, there are differences within the Syrian opposition, and this is normal in any country. But as long as we are agreed on a common vision, these differences can be overcome," he added. "The international community must make a move before it's too late."

Those comments were echoed in Berlin by opposition exiles who drafted the 122-page transition blueprint during six months of consultations funded by governments of the United States, Germany, Switzerland and private groups in Norway and the Netherlands.

"It is quite easy to say the opposition is fragmented and the opposition has not done enough," said Murhaf Jouejati, a U.S.-based professor and SNC member. "But we really should start facing realities ... to get the international community behind this national uprising against a totalitarian, authoritarian, brutal regime."

Although neither expressed a concrete demand, many in the SNC have been hoping the world community would impose a safe zone along the Turkish border, possibly extending to a no-fly zone over at least some areas, and would more openly supply weapons and ammunition to rebels. The disparate groups are also each hoping for support in any power struggle that might follow a collapse of the Assad regime.

Since the uprising began in March last year, Syria's opposition has been plagued by divisions and infighting. In addition to the SNC, several other opposition groups are known to be making similar plans for a provisional government, including a new alliance headed by veteran opposition figure Haitham Maleh.

The strains within the opposition were also evident on Tuesday when the Paris-based SNC spokeswoman Bassma Kodmani, a founding member of the group, resigned. She said the SNC had veered off course.

"The project has not achieved its goals and the council has not earned the required credibility and did not safeguard the trust placed in it by the Syrian people when it was first created. It steered away from the course that we wanted for it when we created it. "

She said she would continue to work for the opposition, just from outside the council.

"I see more space than inside it."

Sieda said his group has been contacting other opposition figures and the Free Syrian Army rebels to consult over a transitional government, but admits they have not started discussing names yet.

Even if the opposition were to unite, there are serious questions whether the disparate groups have enough popular legitimacy to take control of a revolution and rebuild the nation. The men with guns inside Syria have little use for the political figures or even for Free Syria Army commanders who live in the safety and comfort of Paris and Istanbul.

"The SNC is a naive group of people who consider themselves politicians," said Ahmed al-Ghazali, commander of rebels who control Azaz, the town in northern Syria. "To this day, the SNC hasn't done anything ... Count how many people you see here from the SNC. People here are taking their rights for themselves."

Abu Hassan, a bus driver who fled the nearly deserted town of Anadan in northern Syria because of frequent government shelling and airstrikes, complained that "we hear promises" from exiled leaders "but we're not seeing anything on the ground."

"The only people who do anything are the people inside, the officers and the fighters who are in the front lines. The SNC and the Free Army who are abroad, we've never seen anything from them, not aid, not weapons, not ammunition."

As the war inside Syria appears to be grinding to a stalemate, so too is the political struggle. Most foreign powers want to see unity before giving support but the opposition is unable or unwilling to put aside their differences and unite.

Absent a united opposition, the dilemma facing the United States and its Western allies is uncertainty over who inside Syria might emerge with real power after Assad.

Their fear is that the collapse of the four-decade regime ruled by the Assads ? Bashar succeeded his father Hafez 12 years ago ? could unleash a fierce power struggle in which al-Qaida and other Islamic extremists could gain a foothold. With Syria bordering NATO member Turkey, combustible Lebanon with its powerful Hezbollah militia, unstable Iraq, and a nervous Israel with which it has a territorial dispute over the Golan Heights, that is a daunting prospect.

Repeated efforts to unite the opposition have fallen short.

An opposition conference in Cairo last month broke down in shouting and shoving matches over such key questions as whether to ask for foreign military intervention and what role religion would play in a post-Assad Syria.

Some activists complain that SNC is little more than a front for the Muslim Brotherhood, seeking a comeback after the Islamist movement was largely crushed by Hafez Assad in the 1980s.

News reports of bearded fighters inside Syria demanding an Islamist state and the increasing number of car bombs have led to fears in the West that the new Syria would follow the model of Iran or Taliban-run Afghanistan.

At the Berlin news conference, activists took pains to minimize the Islamist character of the revolt. Amr al-Azm, a professor who lives in the U.S., said fears of Islamist influence were widespread during the Libyan uprising but most voters gave their support to secularist leaders in the July election.

Afra Jalabi, a political scientist who lives in Montreal, said the increase in religious symbolism in Syria was "actually a silent protest against a regime that presented itself through its own propaganda as a secular system when it was a macho military system."

__

Reid reported from Berlin. Associated Press correspondent Zeina Karam contributed to this report from Beirut, Lebanon.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/goal-united-syrian-opposition-still-elusive-191310672.html

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The Ouya Games Console | RoflTime

August 28, 2012 Entertainment, Games

Another Kickstarter success story is the Ouya games console. This inexpensive, little open-source machine raised more than nine times the developer?s initial target bringing in close to $8.6 Million Dollars; also making it the second highest grossing project on the site. Backers who donated $95 will receive a free Ouya console that is projected to be delivered sometime in March, 2013.

The Ouya Games Console

People are getting so excited about Ouya because it is open source. That means games can be downloaded for free, developers will be given access to the console?s source code and money can be made through in-app purchases and subscription based models ? so you only have to pay if you?re looking for vanity items or on-going content. Gamers will even be given easy access to the machines hardware where they can make modifications to their heart?s desire and all of this in a minute little package.

When it finally ships the Ouya will be no larger than a Rubik?s Cube, meaning you can easily sling it in a bag and take it wherever you go. It has space for up to four controllers and will output graphics at 1080p using a modified NVIDIA ULP GeForce GPU. The operating system is an Android 4.0, more commonly known as Ice Cream Sandwich.

The Ouya Games Console

This mixture of software and hardware is typically found in modern tablets and smartphones and for that reason you should expect graphics to be within the same ballpark. They certainly won?t be as powerful as the current generation of consoles. That said, if you take a look at the Wii, clever design and enjoyable gameplay will always overcome any graphical limitation. You?ve just got to decide whether you trust the developers to do so.

Perhaps one way to overcome its limitations is with the cloud gaming service OnLive which will be available from launch. For those of you familiar OnLive you?ll know it lets you stream AAA games on machines that don?t have the processing power to handle the demand.

The Ouya will also support the open-source media portal XBMC, and many people are expecting there to be support for TV and movie streaming services like Netflix. So whilst the Ouya is being touted as a gaming console it?s safe to say there will be a large number of media services that will make it a lot more versatile than just a games console.

The Ouya Games Console

With over 63, 400 backers we can assume the Ouya will find its self a little niche. For 70 odd pounds it?s a completely inexpensive games console that will double up as a media portal and web browser, streaming services like BBC iPlayer. And of course all the Android apps that are already available can be ported over.
All in all, it?s difficult to say whether the Ouya will be any good. The open source nature of the thing is certainly alluring, but then again, isn?t it just the innards of a mobile phone stuck into a box. I guess we?ll find out in time.

If you?re still not sold on the Ouya yet, and still have an Xbox 360 or PS3, then check out?Grainger Games?for all the lastest games. Take a look at?this?site where you can get computer games characters and logos onto t-shirts.

Tags: Console, Gaming, hardware, Kickstarter, March, money, Ouya, story, subscription, vanity

Source: http://www.rofltime.com/the-ouya-games-console/

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Beats By Dre Beats By Dre The best way to do Advertising for the House Business

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Weblogs are a newer source for advertising an online enterprise. They have a tendency to rank nicely, and buyers like them. Use your blog to talk about your market and deliver links to your internet site. Blogs add a good deal for your promoting program and may be fun to write.

Certainly one of the best methods is to write articles and to submit them to write-up directories. Right here are just some of the positive aspects you?ll get by submitting articles to report directories:

=> Improve the incoming links pointing to your web page ? Search engines like google use links as a gauge for determining how ?important? your site is. Search engines view every link pointing for your web site as a ?vote? along with the much more votes your web site receives, the greater the rankings!

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=> Gain ?expert? status and turn out to be recognized as an authority within your field ? By publishing superior info packed articles, you are going to soon appreciate the status of becoming observed as an authority on your topic. This can result in joint ventures and lots of other thrilling possibilities which you would have never enjoyed otherwise!

Promoting a web based enterprise is important for success. Use each of the marketing and advertising approaches at your disposal and watch your targeted traffic grow.

Source: http://www.sendyougift.com/activity/p/111711/

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Dining at Sea: Drink Up! Non-Alcoholic Beverage Options Aboard ...

Sorry, Readability was unable to parse this page for content.

Source: http://andreabroomfield.blogspot.com/2012/08/drink-up-non-alcoholic-beverage-options.html

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deadweight bourke: Self Improvement & Memory Training: How to ...

The human mind is perhaps the most powerful force on earth yet we only use 10% of our minds. It seems crazy when you think about it, only 10%. When you think of how powerful the human mind is, and all of the great technology and conveniences we have created, it is hard to imagine that all that was done by only using 10% of our minds. Imagine if we could use 90%!

The mind is a powerful tool and can be used for your own personal development towards success. However, if you do not use your mind properly it can have the opposite effect. People who think negative thoughts all the time often have bad or negative things happen to them but those who can get in the habit of thinking positive thoughts will reap the rewards of this type of thinking.

One way to tap into your mind power is to try to be aware of what you are thinking. Most of us go through the day just letting our mind go about its business recording memories and spewing up thoughts about what is happening. Very few people actually think about what they are thinking about.

However, controlling your thoughts is key to your personal development and success. In fact, many of the most successful people have great control over what they were thinking. Perhaps you have seen the movie the secret. The basis of this, the Universal law of attraction, has a lot to do with choosing and controlling your thoughts.

The thing is that your thoughts are pure energy and they attract like energy so what you are thinking and what you believe in your mind is what you attract into your life. Therefore, you can use the power of your mind to make your life the way you want it to be. In fact, many believe that you can use this mind power to bring you money, relationships and even to lose weight and heal illness. Surely you must have heard of people who miraculously recovered from a terminal illness simply by their faith or belief that they could?

What you think on the surface, or your conscious mind, is eventually changed into beliefs or truths in your subconscious mind. It is simply by thinking the same thing repeatedly that this happens. You might have been programmed since you were a small child to think that you will never succeed at work. All these years of thinking this have turned into a belief in your subconscious mind. However, simply by starting to think differently - by changing your thoughts from a negative to positive you will start to change your beliefs and thoughts and see positive changes in your life.

One thing you can start to do right away is be aware of your thoughts - are you thinking a negative thought right now? Stop thinking in the negative and start thinking in the positive especially when it comes to things about yourself and your life - just try it and you may be surprised at the changes you see.

Article Source:http://EzineArticles.com/?expert

Source: http://selfimprovementandmemorytraining.blogspot.com/2012/08/how-to-activate-your-subconscious-mind.html

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Source: http://deadweight-bourke.blogspot.com/2012/08/self-improvement-memory-training-how-to.html

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রবিবার, ২৬ আগস্ট, ২০১২

Ovarian Cervical: What Are the Symptoms of Uterine Cancer?

What Are the Symptoms of Uterine Cancer?

Uterine Cancer - treatment for ovarian cancer

Cancer is one of the most dreaded diseases in the world. The body cells start functioning in an abnormal way in the person suffering from cancer and the tumors are formed in the affected area of the body. Breast, ovarian, cervical and uterine cancers are those types of cancers that target only the women as these are related to the female body organs.

If we talk about the uterine cancer, it is in fact related to the very important organ of the female reproductive system called the uterus and usually occurs in the women between the ages of 50 to 70 years. This cancer has different types including uterine sarcomas, endometrial cancer and cervical cancer. Each type affects different parts and tissues of the female uterus e.g. endometrial cancer (also called endometrial carcinoma) is related to the uterus lining or endometrium. The uterine sarcoma (also called leiomyosarcomas) affects the muscular layer of the uterus and cervical cancer is related to the lower portion of the uterus.

Among these types, the endometrial cancer is one that is generally referred to as the uterine cancer. The endometrial cancer is so deadly that it is believed to be the third most common gynecologic cancer (after ovarian and cervical cancers) that causes death to the women.

This cancer usually affects the women after the occurrence of the menopause (the phase in a woman's life when menstrual cycle gets stopped). There are some common symptoms of this cancer though these may differ to some extent from person to person.

The most general symptom of this cancer in a woman is the abnormal vaginal bleeding even after her menopause. However the excessive menstrual bleeding in a woman in her premenopausal period shouldn't be ignored too. The other symptoms include the unusual non-bloody vaginal discharge, lower abdominal pain, abnormal weight loss, difficult and painful urination and an extreme pain during intercourse.

Every woman is needed to kno w about the basic symptoms of the uterine cancer so that if she finds any of them in herself, she may urgently contact her physician. The importance of seeking the timely medical advice after finding some of these symptoms is very high as it may help to diagnose the uterine cancer at some early stage and you must know that this cancer can be treated effectively at the early stages. Besides, if the endometrial cancer is diagnosed after the full medical check up of a woman, the proper measure can be taken at the right time in order to avoid further complications.

Learn more about health information, please visit the useful site of Shields Comptois: http://www.megaarticle.com/category/health/

Source

Source: http://ovariancervicaluterineblog.blogspot.com/2012/08/what-are-symptoms-of-uterine-cancer.html

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Network Marketing Articles Are Available Free So Don't Spend Another

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Posted by Administrator on Aug 25, 2012 in Uncategorized | Comments Off

Researching the methods required to succeed in network marketing is essential. These tips can help you to spread the message of your network marketing.

When you have learned from your mistakes, you are in an excellent position to move forward to success. It is crucial to admit to your failures and understand how to correct them. A better understanding of how and why you failed lets you know which methods are not working, so you can focus on using the ones that do.

There are lots of people who have the desire to share the things that they?ve learned in network marketing, that is why it is important that you are always ready to listen to what they have to say. One of the best ways to do this nowadays is through podcasts. You are likely to find some interesting and applicable advice if you sample a few of the different casts available.

TIP! Be honest with yourself about your intentions. Perhaps you are only interested in approaching network marketing in a casual, informal way.

When researching the network marketing company options, choose one with products that are of personal interest to you. Your own personal like or dislike for a product will show to potential customers, and affect your selling ability.

Create a monthly budget. If you want your business to be running to the best of its ability, then you need to know what sort of monetary investment is going to be required on your part. Remember that you cannot skimp on the budget if you want to see a profit. If you cannot invest money into your business or you are not willing to, you will not get far as a business owner.

Make it a point to find out how popular your users are in their networks. When presenting your products, make it so they would be happy to let their friends in on your products. If you?re fairly certain that someone isn?t going to purchase any of your products, don?t bother talking to him or her unless that person has his own extensive network.

TIP! Help from Internet sources like blogs and network marketing forums can be a smart way to keep yourself up-to-date and informed about the industry. Forums are a great place to start as you will find field experts, as well as beginners like yourself, who will be looking to share their real life network marketing experiences.

Keep your meeting to 60 minutes or less. The length of a business meeting often indicates how complicated the topic approached will be. By abbreviating your meeting, you can show your interested client that your system is straightforward.

Patience is required at first but you will see result grow exponentially when success does occur. A lot of amateurs allow themselves to become discouraged if they do not meet their goals early in the game. When you first begin your network marketing campaign, it will be slow; however, this is the most crucial time so don?t give up. The networking builds slowly over time and will eventually gather speed over the long term.

If you have decided to embark upon a network marketing campaign, it is important to consider the overall compensation package that is available to you and whom ever you have partnered or teamed up with. Being aware of the compensation that is included in your agreement will help you figure out if it is worth the time you are investing or if you should look into other opportunities.

TIP! If you truly want to be a successful network marketer, you really must want to help others succeed, as well. If your efforts at marketing are geared towards helping people with your offerings, your profits will rise.

The most important thing you can do in network marketing is to remember that it is a business, and it should be treated like one. If you expect to work just a few hours a week and earn a lot of money, you will not be successful. Network marketing, like any other field, requires a significant time and work investment. Keep a promise to yourself of working hard everyday, and that will make you a successful network marketer.

Consistently use a ongoing email database to achieve success with network marketing. It is possible to build or purchase a marketing list, and you want it to be as large as possible to ensure the success of your business.

TIP! Follow what others are doing to succeed. Look to the organization?s leaders for inspiration and motivation.

To succeed in network marketing, you must learn the most effective methods and then apply them to your business. If you know how to market by networking, you will see a rise in your profits. Use this advice to make your network marketing message more far-reaching

Are you ready to have success in the home based business industry and build it on autopilot? Click below to register for free today. See how it works here. Also check out our team benefits here

Source: http://leucabiz.com/blog/network-marketing-articles-are-available-free-so-dont-spend-another-penny/

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Syria arrests filmmaker, actor who helped crackdown victims

AMMAN (Reuters) - Security forces in Syria have arrested a filmmaker and an actor who helped people made homeless or jobless by President Bashar al-Assad's forces, their friends said on Friday, part of an apparent crackdown on the country's secular intelligentsia.

Arwa Nairabiya - who founded the "Damascus Dox Box" documentary film festival - was arrested at Damascus airport on Thursday evening before boarding a plane to Cairo, fellow filmmakers and relatives said.

Secret police agents also raided the home of Mohammad Omar Oso, an actor who had starred in several popular television series, and took him to an unknown destination, the Damascus Media Centre activists' group said in a statement.

Thirty-five year-old Nairabiya was part of a new generation of Syrian filmmakers who had defied a state ban on independent film production even before the revolt against Assad began 17 months ago.

"It seems it is a crime to establish an independent cinema movement in Syria," said fellow Syrian director Ahmad Malas, in a video statement recorded at an undisclosed location outside Syria. "We call for freedom for Arwa Nairabiya, actor, producer and graduate of the Syrian Higher Cinema Institute who is always smiling."

One of Nairabiya's friends, speaking from Damascus on condition of anonymity, said he feared for his safety. "We pray that Arwa gets off lightly. The regime has been brutal toward Syria's intellectuals," the friend said.

The Syrian state has a Soviet-like monopoly on cinema and television production. The establishment shunned Oso, who is also in his 30s, when he refused to join the state-controlled actors' guild and sign statements declaring support for Assad at the start of the revolt, his friends said.

Nairabiya has championed the cause of human rights and freedom of expression in the face of state attempts to control culture through institutions that monopolize teaching of art, film and dance to support the personality cult of Assad.

ARTISTIC EXPRESSION REPRESSED

Syrian security forces, who have arrested tens of thousands of people since the uprising began, do not comment on detentions, which human rights groups say are arbitrary.

Assad has claimed to have introduced what he regards as far-reaching political reforms in response to pro-democracy street demonstrations, yet strict state restrictions on freedom of speech and artistic expression have remained in place.

Three months ago, Assad's forces shot dead Bassel Shehadeh, another young filmmaker who had abandoned a Fulbright scholarship in the United States to document a military crackdown on the central city of Homs.

In another incident, authorities blamed "treacherous hands" for the killing earlier this month of director Bassem Mohiedine in a Damascus suburb rocked by clashes between the military and rebels. No one has claimed responsibility for his death.

In a third case, the relatives of sculptor Wael Qastoum said he died last month after being tortured in a Damascus prison.

Qastoum, a Christian from Homs, had spoken out against state repression, said a relative who asked not to be named.

Other leading cultural figures have been badly beaten. Secret police agents last year assaulted Ali Farzat, the country's best known cartoonist, and broke both of his hands.

Witnesses said pro-Assad militiamen, known as shabbiha (ghosts) beat novelist Khaled Khalifa earlier this year after he attended a funeral for Rabih Ghaza, an activist who was found shot and stuffed in the trunk of his car near a security branch in Damascus.

Many of the new generation of filmmakers have been inspired by French-educated Syrian director Omar Amiralay, who made international award-winning films that chronicled what he regarded as Syria's demise under the Assad family's rule.

Amiralay died of natural causes at age 66 one month before the uprising broke out, having famously warned Assad that Syria "is marching steadfastly on its hooves to its own demise, after being betrayed by its rulers."

(Editing by Andrew Osborn and Todd Eastham)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/syria-arrests-filmmaker-actor-helped-crackdown-victims-043355953.html

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শনিবার, ২৫ আগস্ট, ২০১২

Family Finance: A flight too far | Family Finance | Personal Finance ...

Situation: Couple wants to retire but is weighed down by impulsive deal

Strategy: Cut price on vacation home and take a loss to free up cash

Solution: Reduced risk, increased cash flow after work ends

A couple we?ll call Herb, 66, and Margaret, 55, thought they were buying into a tropical paradise when they plunked down $150,000 for a beachfront property in Indonesia 15 years ago. Instead it turned out to be a financial nightmare, picturesque but remote and hard to rent.

In retrospect, buying a place that took hours of driving from the nearest airport was, as Herb says, ?a case of enthusiasm exceeding realism.

With a cost of $3,600 a year for maintenance fees and taxes, it is a white elephant. They are trying to sell it for $100,000 but there hasn?t been a decent offer in the three years it has been on the market and it is so remote, renting is impossible. Though the house is only a fraction of their total assets, continued maintenance will be a drain on their income.

?It has to go,? Herb says. The question is how much are they willing to cut the price to make a sale.

The couple has about $2-million in assets and a portfolio of mostly large-cap stocks that pay dependable dividends and senior bonds of reputable companies. Herb, a management consultant with an international practice, and Margaret, an officer with a large non-profit organization, bring home a total of $130,000 a year. There are no debts apart from credit card bills, which they pay off immediately.

To get ready for retirement, they plan to sell their $550,000 suburban Toronto condo within a few years and move to somewhere less expensive on the Prairies. ?Should we work another few years to add to our reserves or can we retire now?? Herb asks.

Family Finance asked Graeme Egan, a financial planner and portfolio manager at KCM Wealth Management Inc. in Vancouver, to work with the couple.

?Their position is enviable, but they see the problems of harvesting equity from their Toronto house and foreign property as reasons to wait,? he says. ?My job is to test the two scenarios ? retire very soon or wait a few years.?

Strategies

If they downsize, sell the foreign property for $100,000, extract $100,000 equity from their Toronto condo and bank the proceeds, they could supplement their non-registered assets, $622,000 in stocks and bonds and $100,000 in a GIC. That would give them $922,000, not including a $40,000 bank balance they would use for the costs of setting up a new home.

If they can get an average of 5% from this portfolio ? 3% dividends and 2% capital growth ? and if Margaret?s pension is transferred to a locked-in retirement account, they would have annual pre-tax non-registered income of $46,100, including Canada Pension Plan benefits of $420 a month that Herb already receives.

His OAS benefits, reduced by the clawback that starts at an annual income of $69,562, total $320 a month. Those benefits total $8,880 a year and make total annual pre-tax income about $55,000.

In retirement, their expenses, inflating at 2% a year, would be about $6,000. They could pay the $2,000 monthly gap between costs and their $4,812 monthly income by tapping Herb?s corporate investments or RRSPs. Either way, they would be running down capital at nearly $20,000 a year, Mr. Egan estimates.

Working longer

If Herb and Margaret work another three years, they could add $88,000 to their RRSPs. Their non-registered assets could grow by 5% a year to $836,000 and they could add $100,000 from downsizing their home and, ideally, another $100,000 from selling the Indonesian property. The two sales would push non-RRSP investments to $1,036,000. Their RRSPs, Margaret?s company pension and their TFSAs would grow to $560,000, plus the $88,000 of continuing contributions, for a total of $648,000, the planner says.

If they choose to exhaust their non-registered capital by Margaret?s age 90, they would have $77,000 a year, or $6,417 a month, before tax. Assuming a 20% tax rate, they would have $5,133 to spend each month. They would be short $867 a month, but they could cover the difference out of their cash balances or by tapping investments that are now in Herb?s company and that will, after he shuts the business and pays any accrued taxes, be an emergency account.

When Margaret turns 65, she could receive CPP benefits of $6,000 a year and $6,540 OAS, pushing total income to about $89,500 before tax. At that time, Herb will be 71 and will have to start taking $24,000 a year of RRSP benefits through registered retirement income fund. At this point, the couple?s total income would be about $113,500 before tax. After 20% tax, they would have approximately $7,565 a month to spend. They will have covered their estimated future expenses and have a cushion of savings for emergencies, gifts or perhaps good causes, Mr. Egan says.

There remain risks. The largest is the $100,000 tied up in their Indonesian house. It ties up capital that could earn several thousand dollars a year plus the $3,600 annual upkeep cost. Cutting the offering price by 20% to 30% to liberate capital and cut expenses may be wise.

Herb and Margaret can retire soon, but only at the cost of erosion of capital or cutting back expenses, Mr. Egan says.

?Delaying retirement would give them time to sell the foreign house and to downsize their Toronto home. Then they would have a more secure retirement.?

?Need help getting out of a financial fix? Email andrewallentuck@mts.net for? a free Family Finance analysis.

Like FP Personal Finance on Facebook

Source: http://business.financialpost.com/2012/08/24/family-finance-a-flight-too-far/

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PPC Advertising - Effective Online Marketing Tool

PPC Advertising - Effective Online Marketing Tool
by Brainwork India
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Request Reprint | Print | About Author | Report Problem | Tweet This The use of proper marketing strategies can help an online business achieve the goals and targets that are set. Such methods can also help the company get ahead of the competition and make itself visible before the online audience. One of the effective and reliable techniques used is PPC Advertising. PPC or Pay Per Click can be described as a promotional tool, which requires the advertiser to pay every time the advertisement is clicked. PPC can significantly increase the online traffic visiting the website. There are several points to be considered when implementing PPC promotion.

The use of the right keywords is essential for PPC. This ensures that the target audience is routed to the website, which can boost the profits of the online company. PPC offers extensive benefits as well. It helps control the expenditure, as the cost is dependent on the number of users visiting the website. This helps filter the online users as only the target traffic interested in the business visit the website. PPC also helps build the popularity of the company. It is extremely result oriented and one can view significant improvements in the sales with the proper usage of PPC. Many online businesses hire PPC professionals for their expert solutions.

Online marketing companies are knowledgeable about the current promotional strategies and techniques. The expertise of a reliable SEO Internet Marketing company can give an online business an added advantage. These companies understand the importance of proper advertising and the impact that it can have on the sales of the business. This enables them to plan and come up with effective marketing techniques that can make the online business popular among the online audience. They also lay emphasis on the SEO aspect of the website. As a result, the website can secure higher rankings in the result listings of the search engines and thus, build its online presence.

The marketing firms use a variety of marketing techniques to deliver the desired business results to the clients. One of the commonly used methods is Social Network Marketing. It is extremely effective and can add to the sales of the online business significantly. The social media sites are extremely popular among all age groups and are essentially platforms used by online audience globally. Marketing using social network can enable the company to make itself visible to a larger audience base. This can also help the company create a reliable network of online users, as the positive comments and responses provided by some users are read by other users, which further expands the network.

The author is an experienced Content writer and publisher for Business Development. Visit at http://www.brainworkindia.net/ to know more about PPC Advertising.

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PPC Advertising - Effective Online Marketing Tool

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Successful Sales Management: Your MBA in Selling and Sales ...

Congratulations. ?Your ticket to career long excellence in sales has just come up. You'll always be top of the achievers list. ?Every target will be exceeded. Every overrider hit. Every day your phone will ring with a new job offer.

"The sales tool kit has advanced dramatically: It now includes sophisticated analytics to identify opportunities, software to discipline processes and produce forecasts, and negotiation expertise to broker complex deals."

"professional sales has entered a new era, requiring skills that aren scarce but teachable?and best taught in a collegiate setting"

We all know?that a well-staffed sales function is vital to business success. Consider, for example, the findings of a series of studies conducted since 1988 by the sales force consultancy Chally Group. Analyzing data from more than 100,000 business decision makers, Chally discovered that 39% of B2B buyers select a vendor according to the skills of the salesperson rather than price, quality, or service features. So business schools must spend a lot of time teaching sales skills, right?

Wrong. Take a look at the curricula of the world?s top-ranked business schools, and you might come away with the impression that sales is unimportant. Most MBA programs offer no sales-related courses at all, and those that do offer only a single course in sales management. Even at the undergraduate level of business instruction, sales courses are sparse.

To put a finer point on it, of the 479 U.S. business programs accredited by the Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business, only 101 have a sales curriculum, and a mere 15 offer either an MBA in sales or some sort of sales-oriented graduate curriculum. Sales may be vital to businesses, but of the 350,000 students a year who earn bachelor?s degrees in business from American universities, and the 170,000 who earn MBAs, only a tiny fraction have been taught anything about it. The news isn?t all bad, however. As we will show, signs point to an increasing awareness among universities that they should invest in sales education. There is a growing consensus that professional sales has entered a new era, requiring skills that are scarce but teachable?and best taught in a collegiate setting. We will share what we?ve learned from building the Center for Sales Leadership at DePaul University and suggest how it might guide the establishment of other such programs in the future. But first let?s explore why sales hasn?t been central to business education in the past. Old-School Sales

Until quite recently, business education might have been perfectly justified in skipping over sales. Time was, the model salesperson was two parts personality and one part product knowledge. The job was to carry a bag, get a foot in the door, and talk up your offering?s features and benefits. Perhaps a formal sales education couldn?t add much to that. Product knowledge was unique to a company and therefore handled by internal training. People skills weren?t considered teachable in any conventional sense. Selling was something to be learned by doing. As with riding a bicycle, you could read about it, but real knowledge came from trying, failing, and trying again.

Meanwhile, it was also true that many people enrolling in MBA programs had already proved they could sell. Graduate schools of business, back when they were fewer, favored applicants with work experience, and much of that experience had been won on the front lines of revenue generation. In seeking a master?s degree, these go-getters wanted to acquire the general management skills their day-to-day jobs didn?t teach. The boom in MBA programs coincided with the rise of marketing as a discipline, and mass producers relied on heavy advertising and strong brands to control the sale and distribution of goods. Sales, in contrast, got little respect.

To the extent that instruction on how to sell was needed, the demand was met by a sales-training industry that included companies such as Axiom, FranklinCovey, and Miller Heiman. Within universities sales was at best a stepchild of marketing. Old-school sales was no-school sales. A Profession Transformed
Selling and sales management have come a long way since the days when most business school curricula were designed?so far that the term Sales 2.0 is now commonly used by people (such as the editors of?Selling Power?magazine) who have spent their careers watching the world of revenue generation. That term borrows from Web 2.0, or the idea that the real power of the internet is not to enable traditional content producers to publish more cheaply but to give users a hand in creating content. In the realm of selling, it?s the buyer who is newly empowered. Customers no longer need a salesperson to learn about a company?s offering, much less to place an order. As a result, sales has become more about helping customers define the problem they are trying to solve and assemble a complete solution. The sales tool kit has advanced dramatically: It now includes sophisticated analytics to identify opportunities, software to discipline processes and produce forecasts, and negotiation expertise to broker complex deals.

Source: http://successfulsalesmanagement.stevensreeves.com/2012/08/your-mba-in-selling-and-sales-management.html

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শুক্রবার, ২৪ আগস্ট, ২০১২

To help clean up sport, NCAA should ban unofficial visits

The unofficial visit would seem to be one of the more innocuous elements of the college basketball recruiting process, about as threatening as a cafeteria lunch and as boring as taking a walk through an empty weight room.

And that is pretty much what an unofficial visit is.

Through the past decade, however, as scouting became more sophisticated and the identification of elite prospects accelerated, the unofficial visit became the reserve currency of the basketball recruiting process. Only seniors could make ?official visits,? and programs hardly could afford to wait that long to show off their assets with so many great talents choosing their college destination as sophomores and juniors.

So, as often happens with recruiting, the unofficial visit became a dubious enterprise.

The NCAA suspended Kentucky?s John Wall two games of his freshman season over the financing of his unofficial visits. Unofficial visits were part of the package that got Kansas? Josh Selby suspended for nine. Now, you?re hearing the same rumbling regarding Shabazz Muhammad, who has already missed UCLA?s trip to China, and the NCAA?s decision to visit the high school Kentucky freshman Nerlens Noel attended.

Given all of that, it is depressing that it took so long for the NCAA membership to figure out the best way to put an end to the nonsense was to allow players to make official visits -- paid for the school, with each athlete allowed to make only five total -- as high school juniors.

More: Even without Shabazz Muhammad, UCLA can learn from China

From the time college basketball adopted the early letter-of-intent period, which occurred more than a quarter-century ago, the rules restricting official visits to athletes in their senior years of high school began to decay toward obsolescence. It was virtually impossible for a high school senior to squeeze in five officials before the November signing date. A large percentage of recruits made their college choices long before they were allowed to make an official.

However, the rule change that will allow basketball players to make official visits after Jan. 1 of their junior years only went into effect just three weeks ago.

It is a significant step in cleaning up another part of the business that had been corrupted.

It?s not enough, though.

The next advance in this department: ?Get rid of all unofficial visits,? Kentucky coach John Calipari told Sporting News on Thursday. ?It?s not fair to the kid who doesn?t have the means to make all these trips.?

Obviously, it would be impossible and undesirable to declare that athletes are not allowed to visit campuses that are open to the general public. An athlete shouldn?t lose a bit of his freedom merely because he?s a targeted recruit.

It would not be at all complicated, however, to declare that coaches no longer could arrange to have a recruit visit campus unofficially and could not have contact with him during a campus tour. The recruit would not be allowed to see the areas that typically are reserved for varsity athletes: Locker rooms, training areas, video suites.

If an athlete wanted to visit a campus in the same manner as a prospective journalism major or pre-med student, he could contact the admissions office and arrange the same tour as everyone else. I?ve been on a few of those with my nephews. They were all to universities with significant Division I basketball programs, and none of them showed off the players? lounge.

As it stands now, the college basketball prospect whose family has money can travel in grand style -- being hosted by famous coaches, comparing every school?s practice facility to the one he just saw and the one he?ll see next. The prospect of limited means might be able to see the schools in his immediate area, but if he is being pursued by out-of-state programs he might be stuck in the dilemma of either accepting a virtual ?visit? through the school?s web site or receiving assistance from a ?third party? to make an unofficial.

Exactly how much of the investigation of Muhammad and Noel is focused on the issue of unofficial visits is impossible to say because the NCAA rarely issues precise comments regarding ongoing investigations.

Noel never made an unofficial visit to Kentucky but did travel to other campuses. The unofficial visits in question with Muhammad reportedly were to Duke and North Carolina, not UCLA, where he plans to play.

If the change in the official visit rule had been in place, however, it?s possible none of this would be an issue. It has taken far too long for the NCAA to see clearly on this matter. Unofficially, Jan. 1 can?t come soon enough.

Source: http://aol.sportingnews.com/ncaa-basketball/story/2012-08-24/to-help-clean-up-sport-ncaa-should-ban-unofficial-visits

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