Tuesday, February 26, 2013

Oscars 2013: Seth MacFarlane Opens With 'We Saw Your Boobs'

Oscars host performs a risqué song and dance, despite warnings from William Shatner as Captain James T. Kirk.
By Brett White


Seth MacFarlane at the 2013 Oscars
Photo: Kevin Winter/ Getty Images

Source: http://www.mtv.com/news/articles/1702510/seth-macfarlane-boobs-lyrics-oscars-2013.jhtml

Yunel Escobar Irish Daily Star Black Mesa matt ryan matt ryan att wireless Mother Jones

Monday, February 25, 2013

Editor's desk: What's next

Editor's desk: What's next

Winter is still here, I'm still buried in snow, but March is at last on the horizon. Unlike the last few years, however, I'm not sure exactly what that means, though I have some ideas. Here's what we have to look forward to -- or not, as the case may be -- for Apple, Mobile Nations, the iMore app, and iMore in general this spring.

March un-madness

January has come and gone without a 2011-style Verizon iPhone event, or a 2012-style education event and -- so far -- OS X preview. Now March approaches. For the last 3 years, Apple's held iPad events in March. This year the iPad and iPad mini were both updated not 4 months ago, and the logical next steps -- a thinner and lighter casing for the iPad, and a Retina display for the iPad mini -- both look like they might take a little more time. If the iPad has been even semi-permamently switched to the lucrative holiday quarter for release, what does that mean for Apple's spring event? For a while, Apple was doing iOS SDK events in April, but they were also doing new iPhone debuts at WWDC in June. We have iWatch, iTV, and Apple TV SDK rumors -- we've been over most of them more than once -- but very little when it comes to imminent product release plans. Forget "winter is coming", I want to know what spring is bringing...

Podcast makeover

If you subscribe to our Mobile Nations podcasts -- and you really should -- you may have noticed the big makeover they got yesterday. So far reaction has been overwhelmingly positive, so thanks again to Marc Edwards for the template, and all of you for digging it. Earlier today we started pushing out the new look across our Twitter accounts as well. Nothing like some spring cleaning!

Wallpapers with those designs, for the many of you who've asked, are now available for Retina iPad in 2048x2048 in our iMore Wallpaper Forum. I'll add iPhone optimized versions later this week.

We're also trying to solidify the podcast schedule, so here's where it stands right now:

  • iMore show: Live Sunday night, posts Monday morning.
  • [MacBreak Weekly: Live Tuesday afternoon, posts Tuesday evening.] (Not a Mobile Nations show, but you can find me on it every week so we need to schedule around it as well.)
  • Debug/Iterate: Posts Wednesday mornings (alternate weeks, not recorded live).
  • Windows Phone Central: Live Wednesday afternoon, posts Thursday morning (every second week).
  • ZEN & TECH: Live Wednesday night, posts Thursday morning (every second week).
  • Android Central: Live Thursday night, posts Friday morning.
  • CrackBerry: We're going to get Kevin and crew on a schedule. They've been warned.
  • Adhoc: As the name implies, posts whenever we do it (not recorded live).
  • Mobile Nations: Live whenever we're all around and not traveling, posts later that day.

If we move anything around, I'll be sure to let you know!

iMore app 2.0

We're in late stage beta on iMore app 2.0. We couldn't get everything we wanted into it, but we've gotten a lot. Here's a teaser. We'll be submitting it soon, and then it'll be out as soon as it gets approved. Fingers crossed.

iMore app 2.0 teaser

iMore next

If the above didn't quite get the point across -- Mobile Nations is going through some fairly explosive growth at the moment, and iMore along with it. And running a site like iMore takes an enormous amount of time and energy, including as much if not more behind the scenes. Kevin has Adam helping him out full time on CrackBerry, Phil has Jerry and Alex full time on Android Central, and Chris and Simon, our full-time cross-site editors, help out a ton on both those sites as well (and iMore as well, when time allows).

But we need more. So I'm looking for someone to help out in a similar capacity full time on iMore. I'm not in a rush by any means, and I'll take as much time as I need to to find the right person, but to take iMore to the next level is going to take a lot of work, and more effort than even our current team of amazing part-timers and free-lancers can muster what with their real lives and all.

More on that, and on everything else, in the coming weeks...



Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/TheIphoneBlog/~3/PcZmk47O-xs/story01.htm

andy williams andy williams Lady Gaga New Girl Avalanna Gigi Chao Jimmy Hoffa

After election win, Anastasiades tackles Cyprus bailout

NICOSIA (Reuters) - Cypriot president-elect Nicos Anastasiades, armed with a clear mandate from voters to spare the island from insolvency, said on Monday he was committed to reforms in return for a financial bailout.

The Conservative Anastasiades won decisive backing in a presidential election on Sunday for an aggressive approach to resolving the island's worst financial crisis in four decades.

Less than 24 hours after his resounding victory on Sunday, Anastasiades said he would appoint Michael Sarris, a former World Bank economist who enjoys broad respect at home and abroad, as his finance minister.

Anastasiades has promised a quick deal with foreign lenders and to bring Cyprus closer to Europe, in a shift from the policies of the outgoing Communist government that first sought aid from Russia before turning to the European Union.

"Long-term prospects for Cyprus are excellent as we are committed to carrying out necessary structural reforms. We only need a helping hand now," Anastasiades told Germany's Bild newspaper, according to advance excerpts of an interview to be published in Tuesday's edition.

Christopher Pissarides, a Nobel laureate for economics in 2010, was appointed head of a group of consultants to the government on the economy.

Sarris, a soft-spoken and down-to-earth economist known to many Cypriots by his first name, successfully ushered Cyprus into the euro zone during a stint as finance minister between 2005 and March 2008 under a previous center-left government.

He had refused a ministerial appointment by the outgoing Communist-led government in mid-2011, saying he needed a clear mandate to handle a then-looming financial crisis.

"I think it is a very strong choice, he is clearly respected in the EU but also in the U.S., which could be important for getting IMF support for a bailout." economist Fiona Mullen said, referring to Sarris's appointment.

SMALL ISLAND, BIG PROBLEM

Eight months of talks on a bailout package have turned Cyprus, one of the euro zone's smallest economies, into a big headache for the currency bloc, triggering fears of a financial collapse that could reignite the European debt crisis.

Anastasiades will be sworn in on February 28, and fully assume duties on March 1. With state funds depleting rapidly and a 1.4 billion euro ($1.9 billion) debt maturing in June, he has little time.

In a joint statement on Monday, the French and German finance ministers said talks must begin with prospective lenders soon so a deal can be reached by the end of March.

Cyprus sought aid from the EU and the IMF last June, after a Greek sovereign debt restructuring saddled Cypriot banks with losses. It is expected to need up to 17 billion euros in aid - about the size of its entire economy.

"There is a pressing need to recapitalise our banking sector," Anastasiades told Bild. "I agree with Germany and France that we should reach an agreement by March."

Virtually all rescue options - from a bailout loan to a debt writedown or slapping losses on bank depositors - are proving unpalatable because they push Cypriot debt to unmanageable levels or risk hurting investor sentiment elsewhere in the bloc.

Although a draft bailout deal says banks may need "up to" 10 billion euros to recapitalise, a banking source said an asset review still under wraps has earmarked between 5.98 billion and 8.86 billion euros for banks.

With Cyprus's fiscal needs at 7.0 to 7.5 billion over the next four years, the final bailout could reach 16 billion euros.

GERMAN WORRIES

German misgivings about Cyprus's commitment to fighting money laundering and its strong financial ties with Russia - which has already extended a 2.5-billion-euro loan to the nation - have further complicated negotiations.

Known for his no-nonsense style and impressive access to European policymakers such as German Chancellor Angela Merkel, Anastasiades took 57.5 percent of the vote in the run-off election, 15 points ahead of his anti-austerity Communist-backed rival Stavros Malas.

"Money laundering is a global problem and no country can remain immune to this problem. However I believe the comments about Cyprus are wrong and exaggerated. We have gone through proper checks," Anastasiades said.

The island was ready to agree to further inspections by international or European committees and take on board proposals for improvement, he said.

Cyprus has been shut out of international capital markets for almost two years, with the outgoing administration resorting to heavy borrowing from state-owned corporations to pay public sector salaries.

Yet prices on the island's internationally traded bonds have rallied in recent weeks. The quoted yield on a Cypriot 10-year benchmark bond has fallen to an 18-month low of 9.45 percent, according to Thomson Reuters data.

(Editing by Michael Roddy)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/election-win-anastasiades-faces-cyprus-bailout-quagmire-072512732.html

stevie wonder new orleans weather new orleans weather sparkle sacagawea new hope baptist church associated press

Saturday, February 2, 2013

'Girls' Star Zosia Mamet Taps Into 'Darkness' of 20-Somethings in 'Really Really'

LOS ANGELES (TheWrap.com) - Zosia Mamet could have spent her hiatus from "Girls," shooting a movie, racking up guest spots on TV or doing commercials. Something lucrative that would have helped push her rising star farther into the stratosphere.

But Mamet, whose father David Mamet lobbed lit sticks of dynamite at American theater more than three decades ago with his profane portraits of battered male egos in dramas like "American Buffalo" and "Glengarry Glen Ross," decided that the time was right to make her own mark on stage. Theatergoers will find out next Thursday if another Mamet is ready to take her place in the theatrical firmament next week when 24-year-old Zosia debuts as a member of the cast of "Really Really."

"It's something I grew up loving out of the womb," Mamet told TheWrap. "I think a theater is one of the most magical places on earth."

Mamet was in one of those magical places recently, albeit one that has been made to look like a tattered dorm room replete with empty beer bottles, discussing gluten-free diets with the rest of the play's cast of twenty-somethings. Yes, the press was on hand, so all of the actors were necessarily on good behavior. But Mamet's body language, the way she patted a castmember on the arm or draped herself on a piece of furniture made her appear perfectly at ease with blending into the youthful ensemble.

Hers is the biggest name in the play, which will run at the 200-seat Lucille Lortel Theatre in Greenwich Village until early March and co-stars Matt Lauria of "Friday Night Lights" and "Parenthood." However, her work as the virginal and bubbly Shoshanna Shapiro on Lena Dunham's much buzzed about HBO show didn't guarantee her a spot in "Really Really." Mamet had to fight for the role of a college student who exploits sexual politics after a boozy party.

David Cromer, who oversaw a critically acclaimed off-Broadway revival of "Our Town" in 2009, confessed that he was not certain Mamet was right for the part until he witnessed her determination to persuade him otherwise.

"She wanted the part, she worked really really hard to get it and she earned it," Cromer said. "I think she's exciting on ?Girls,' but I didn't watch her and immediately think, ?Oh she should play this.'"

Yet after she read for the role, he became convinced that there was a brutal and calculating underside underneath Mamet's wide-eyed exterior on the show.

"She is completely idiosyncratic," Cromer said. "She seems like a lost, beautiful, sad wounded little girl, and she also can turn on a dime into this very steely, very confidant, very fierce, very tough, very together person. We've got to be able to watch her in scenes and think that poor little girl and then watch her in other scenes and go wow, wow, who is that?"

The character may be more duplicitous than the one Mamet is currently playing on television, but the play is also steeped in generational drift and the diminished opportunities that have greeted recent college graduates in the wake of the economic collapse.

Playwright Paul Downs Colaizzo, who is 27, said he was very eager to capture how his contemporaries were promised everything and offered nothing.

"It was very much write what you know," he said. "It was very much the fear that I had for my friends and myself after we were suddenly deemed the lost generation and the idea that some people will not take that lying down. I wanted to examine the lengths they will go to protect their future."

For her part, Mamet welcomes the opportunity to once again dramatize the experience of twenty-somethings, particularly as "Really Really" is hitting many of the same notes as her TV show but in a different key. After all, the stakes for Mamet's character this time are much higher than whether or not Shoshanna will go all the way with a guy.

"I feel lucky to make something about that period of someone's life that is so unabashedly real," Mamet said. "The lighthearted moments of ?Girls' are really not speckled throughout and that to me is just super exciting, to be able to delve into the darkness that you are greeted with in your early 20s and the fear and what that makes you do, the places that you can potentially go with that."

It is also a play written, performed and speaking to a demographic that is different from typical theater audiences, which often skew older. Colaizzo and Mamet, however, argue that could change if there are more plays like "Really Really" that try to capture the often painful transition into full-blown adulthood.

"I think every artistic realm needs to take a look at itself right now and the way that it's doing things," Mamet said, "because I think the times are a changing, and we have to change with them."

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/girls-star-zosia-mamet-taps-darkness-20-somethings-235837022.html

game change own stacy francis tournament brackets 2012 ncaa basketball tournament walt what time is it

Columbia recalls Omni-Heat electric jackets due to burn hazard (or, for working too well)

Columbia recalls OmniHeat electric jackets due to burn hazard or, for working too well

Sure, we may have internet in the skies and refrigerators with Evernote integration, but here's one thing that science can't do: deliver a trouble-free heated jacket. A few years after Ardica hung up the dream due to a battery recall, Columbia is doing likewise. The sportswear company has issued a recall for seven Omni-Heat electric jacket models, citing an issue with the rechargeable batteries within. Reportedly, these cells "have a defect which may cause them to overheat and pose a fire hazard." The company has received just a single report of an overheating battery from its distribution center in France, but evidently that's enough. According to the company's own statement on the matter, a "small number of the 2012 Columbia heated jackets may contain a heated inner wrist cuff component with a manufacturing flaw that may cause an electrical short to occur, giving rise to a potential burn risk."

If you'll recall, the Circuit Breaker was actually one of our favorite gadgets of 2011, but curiously, we never could pinpoint when and where these were set to go on sale. We were independently contacted by a company that claimed Columbia was using its technology in breach of contract, but never could verify if that was the reason sales seemed to be on hiatus. Evidently, a few hundred of these finally made their way into the warm embrace of consumers, but considering that "Refund" looks to be the only remedy here, we sort of doubt a second generation will emerge. It's important to note, however, that Columbia's non-electric Omni-Heat offerings aren't included in the recall -- and, for the record, that stuff does a stellar job of keeping one warm without any whiz-bang circuitry. Hit up the links below if you're thinking of sending yours back; personally, we'd recommend saving it for eBay. Calling this stuff "rare" is quite the understatement.

Filed under:

Comments

Via: @itsmescotty (Twitter)

Source: CPSC, Columbia

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2013/02/01/columbia-recall-omni-heat-electric-jackets-due-to-burn-hazard/

leah messer freedom riders 9th circuit court of appeals gisele bundchen tom brady randy travis arrested dickens greg kelly

Friday, February 1, 2013

Check Out Facebook's NFL Fan Loyalty Map


If you're an NFL fan in Nassau County, chances are you support the New York Jets. The bad news is that the western tip of Long Island is the only strip of turf in the country where you make up the majority and you're surrounded on all sides by a sea of Giants, Patriots, Steelers, and Eagles fans.

The other bad news is that Mark Sanchez is still your quarterback.

That information?well, except for the Mark Sanchez part?comes courtesy of fascinating new metrics on football fan allegiances put out by Facebook's Data Science team this week. Basically, the social network patched together a fan loyalty map by cross-referencing the site's 32 U.S. million users who've liked a particular NFL team page with their county location.

It's fascinating to look at, so let's cut to the chase?click on the image created by Data Science intern Sean Taylor below to enlarge it. You might start by marveling over the fact that the Oakland Raiders somehow own Idaho's Clark County but don't have fan majorities in any county within 300 miles of the city of Oakland itself. Take your time, we'll wait.

Facebook NFL Fan Loyalty Map

Back? So what did we learn? For starters, it sure looks like the Dallas Cowboys really are America's Team, as painful as it is to admit it. Not only do Cowboys fans dominate in several states surrounding Texas, but they appear to have also infected vast parts of Arizona, Utah, Nevada, Wyoming, Idaho, and Oregon.

The Denver Broncos and Green Bay Packers fan bases also each boast impressive reach, but the Cowboys' real competition is Pittsburgh. The Steelers easily have the most far-flung fan base, per the Facebook data. In addition to Pittsburgh's natural Rust Belt fandom, the Steelers own the country's northernmost support base in Alaska's North Slope, the westernmost, by dint of ruling Hawaii, and even have pockets of fans in the Pacific Northwest, Rockies, Midwest, and Deep South.

So what does it all mean? We're not sure, but as some commenters on Deadspin have pointed out, Facebook skews young and thus possibly more fickle in team allegiances. For example, Hawaii's love of Pittsburgh seems as likely as not to be tied to the popularity of Steelers safety Troy Polamalu?if you went back a decade to the era when the late Junior Seau was stuffing running backs for San Diego, we bet you'd have seen the Aloha State draped in Chargers blue.

Or maybe there's just something in the makeup of Steelers and Cowboys fans that causes them to hit Like for their teams more readily than say, a typical Cleveland Browns supporter who's still boycotting Facebook until it installs an Unlike button for LeBron James.

You also have to consider the population density of the various counties, parishes, and boroughs represented on the map. We could theoretically replicate the team page like numbers by hand, but Facebook isn't dishing on its user location data so it's hard to say how many fan likes it took to win a county/parish/borough for a given team.

Do the Kansas City Chiefs really have a bizarre fan stronghold in Montana's Wibaux County? Or does the county have like, seven Chiefs fans who happen to be big Facebookers?

We'll never know. In the meantime, Taylor also put together some additional maps that track the fan bases of teams in this year's NFL playoffs, eliminating teams as they were eliminated in each round so the final map only shows the country in terms of whether the San Francisco 49ers or Baltimore Ravens, Sunday's Super Bowl foes, are more popular in a given area.

You can check those maps out on the Facebook Data Science page or for larger versions, in the aforementioned Deadspin post.

For more from Damon, follow him on Twitter @dpoeter.

Source: http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2414939,00.asp?kc=PCRSS05079TX1K0000993

frank martin pink slime eagle cam trayvon martin case affordable care act the line us soccer

Jones says?Garrett has strong say in changes

By SCHUYLER DIXON

AP Sports Writer

Associated Press Sports

updated 2:11 p.m. ET Feb. 1, 2013

IRVING, Texas (AP) - Dallas owner Jerry Jones apparently hears the criticism that he's calling all the shots for the Cowboys again and undermining coach Jason Garrett as a result.

In an interview for the team's website, Jones said Garrett has a strong voice in an overhaul of the coaching staff and that his third-year coach is "the right man putting this together."

Jones, the team's general manager, also said Garrett will decide who calls the offensive plays in 2013. Jones indicated during Senior Bowl workouts that Garrett would no longer run the offense on game days, leading to speculation that the coach was being stripped of those duties at the same time his staff was being dismantled.

As assistants were fired and replacements announced, even former Dallas quarterback Troy Aikman, a three-time Super Bowl winner, joined a chorus saying it looked like Jones was making the decisions after the owner vowed to make things "uncomfortable" following consecutive 8-8 seasons with losses in playoffs-or-bust finales under Garrett.

While there's still a strong chance Dallas will have a new play-caller, Jones insists that all the changes come with Garrett's blessing.

"However he comes up with how he wants to design how the offense runs, coupled with the fact that we've made the changes defensively and with special teams, I'm going to be excited about it," Jones said. "We've got the right man putting this together in Jason Garrett."

Jones has dealt with the perception that his ownership style came at the expense of his head coach's authority since Jimmy Johnson left nearly 20 years ago after consecutive Super Bowl titles in a public spat over who should get credit. The only exception was Bill Parcells, a two-time Super Bowl winner who stayed four years but quit coaching without a playoff win in Dallas after a painful wild-card loss in Seattle.

So far this offseason, the Cowboys have fired defensive coordinator Rob Ryan and running backs coach Skip Peete. They let special teams coach Joe DeCamillis go to Chicago a year after not granting him permission to talk to another team. Garrett's brother, John Garrett, is headed to Tampa Bay as receivers coach after six years with the Cowboys.

The status of receivers coach Jimmy Robinson has been unclear since the team's website reported last week that former Tennessee coach Derek Dooley was taking that job with the Cowboys. Dallas has not announced coaching hires for running backs, tight ends or receivers.

Jones told the team's website there's no rush to complete the offensive staff because of the "safety net" with Garrett as head coach.

"Jason is putting together, as he should be, a staff and philosophy on every phase of the team, and allocating his time, relative to allocating the time of his staff, to helping us win a football game now and in the future," Jones said.

Former Tampa Bay defensive coordinator Monte Kiffin is replacing Ryan, and two members of his staff there are in Dallas now in defensive line coach Rod Marinelli and special teams coach Rich Bisaccia.

Garrett "certainly is excited about the changes we've made on defense, relative to how that affects the whole game plan," Jones said. "One of the things I'm happiest about is who we've got putting this together in Jason Garrett."

---

Online: http://pro32.ap.org/poll and http://twitter.com/AP-NFL

---

Follow Schuyler Dixon on Twitter at https://twitter.com/lschuylerd

? 2012 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.


advertisement

Source: http://nbcsports.msnbc.com/id/47620622/ns/sports-nfl/

albert pujols the shining mariano rivera mariano rivera jobs report tiger woods masters 2012 nikki haley

Mercedes Super Bowl Ad: Kate Upton! Usher! Willem Dafoe!

Source: http://www.thehollywoodgossip.com/2013/01/mercedes-super-bowl-ad-kate-upton-usher-willem-dafoe/

2013 Calendar chris christie sofia vergara American Horror Story Patti Page anonymous texas chainsaw massacre