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Friday, December 28, 2012
Video: Matthews: I have high hopes for Obama's second term
Will Kate Winslet become Kate Rocknroll?
So everyone knows women don't have to change their names when they get married, but come on, Kate Winslet, don't you want to be "Kate Rocknroll"? Winslet's wedding earlier this month was a surprise, but more surprising to many was the name of her groom: Ned Rocknroll.
Source: http://video.msnbc.msn.com/hardball/50307356/
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The year's top ancient mysteries (and missteps)
New questions are being raised about whether Jesus was married after Harvard historian Karen King found an ancient papyrus with words apparently referring to Jesus' wife. NBC's Anne Thompson reports.
By Alan Boyle
Long-ago lore still has the power to ignite modern-day controversies: Witness the tempests that were stirred up this year over the Maya calendar, the purported "Gospel of Jesus' Wife," a bone box linked to early Christians, a disputed dinosaur skeleton and the plan to clone a woolly mammoth.
It turned out that there was much more to each of these cases than met the eye. Or sometimes much less. Either way, we'll be hearing more about ancient mysteries in the year to come. Here's a status report on six of 2012's most controversial mysteries (and missteps) in the realms of archaeology, anthropology and paleontology.
Gospel of Jesus' Wife: Harvard historian Karen King stirred up a sensation in September with the unveiling of a papyrus that apparently quotes Jesus talking about "my wife." The claims quickly sparked questions about the murky origins of the papyrus, and the Vatican suggested that the controversial text was faked. Most other experts on textual analysis were similarly skeptical.
The Harvard Theological Review withdrew plans to publish a scholarly article about the papyrus in its January issue, and this month a spokesman for the journal said tests to authenticate the document were not yet complete. The Smithsonian Channel has delayed broadcasting a documentary on the find, pending further testing. Status: In limbo.
The Jonah box: In February, researchers announced that they used a camera-equipped robotic arm to study an ossuary, or funerary bone box, within a sealed underground tomb in Jerusalem. They said the box was engraved with a picture of a fish, as well as allusions to "Jonah" and resurrection. Their conclusion was that the inscriptions served as evidence that early Christians were buried in the tomb ? but skeptics disputed that interpretation. Did the picture really show a fish, or was it an upside-down tower, or an urn? The controversy was stoked by the fact that the "Jonah box" team was also behind the even more hotly debated "Jesus Tomb" project a couple of years earlier.
Months later, the findings are still in dispute. One of the researchers behind the find is James Tabor, a religious studies professor at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. ?He says some experts have told him privately that they agree with his interpretation, but they're reluctant to speak out because of the acrimony surrounding the original reports. One expert who has voiced cautious support for the "Jonah and the fish" interpretation is Princeton Theological Seminary's James Charlesworth. (That support, too, has come under criticism.) Tabor acknowledges that more evidence is needed. "What we really need to do is enter the tomb and bring those ossuaries out. ... But that would have to be maybe next year," he said today.?Status: In limbo.
Maya calendar: 2012's most publicized ancient mystery has to do with the Maya calendar, and the fact that Dec. 21 apparently marked the end of a series of cycles ? including the 394-year baktun cycle as well as the 5,126-year "cycle of creation." Somehow, those calendrical cycles got mixed up with worries about the end of the world. Did the ancient Maya really think the cosmos would blink out of existence when the calendar ended? And if they did, why should we believe them?
Nothing happened on Dec. 21, other than some New Age-style celebrations of the new age. But the controversy did attract some extra attention for archaeological finds???including the discovery of a calendar workshop that clearly referred to dates beyond 2012, and an inscription that refers to the end of a calendar cycle in 2012, but not the end of the world. Status: Case closed.
Heritage Auctions via Reuters
An 8-foot-tall dinosaur skeleton is tied up in federal court proceedings.
Disputed dinosaur: You could argue that the world's hottest dinosaur fossil is currently in federal custody in New York. The 24-foot-long skeleton, nicknamed Ty, was said to come from a tyrannosaur-like species known as Tarbosaurus bataar. Fossil dealer Eric Prokopi sold it for more than $1 million in May, but experts claimed that the bones must have been smuggled out of Mongolia years earlier. Federal authorities seized the skeleton and filed criminal charges against Prokopi.
The civil and criminal proceedings yielded some surprises: Prokopi's lawyers said the skeleton was assembled from bones that were gathered up from various sources, leading to a new nickname: "Franken-saurus."?Government prosecutors, meanwhile, said they have photos and forms to back up their claims that the dealer was "a participant in the black market" in Mongolia. Just today, Prokopi pleaded guilty to the smuggling charges and agreed to give up the dinosaur skeleton. That means Ty will eventually be sent back to Mongolia. Prokopi could be sentenced to up to 17 years in prison, but today's plea may win him leniency from the court.?Status: Case essentially closed.
Pyramids on Google Earth:?Researcher Angela Micol made a splash in August with claims that Google Earth imagery appeared to show pyramid-type structures in the Egyptian desert. She suggested that these were previously unknown sites ? but it turns out that archaeologists have known about them for decades, and have studied them up close. The most intriguing formations are natural mounds, topped by structures that may have served as watchtowers and/or wells, said Italian Egyptologist Paola Davoli.
Another formation that Micol saw in the imagery is thought to be an oddly shaped natural butte.?Micol told me in September that she was working with contacts in Egypt to get a closer look, but there haven't been any new revelations lately. Status: Case close to being closed.
Cloning a woolly mammoth: Is it really possible to bring the woolly mammoth back to life, tens of thousands of years after the species went extinct? It's highly doubtful, but Korean and Russian researchers are still trying. The project, unveiled in March, would involve recovering viable cells from a mammoth specimen pulled from the Siberian permafrost, implanting the cells' genetic material into an elephant egg, creating a cloned embryo, then transferring the embryo to an elephant womb for gestation. Each of those steps is fraught with difficulty ??and the South Korea scientist in charge of the project is none other than Woo-Suk Hwang, who was disgraced several years ago in a scandal surrounding faked cloning results.
Last month, The Siberian Times reported that samples of mammoth bone marrow, hair, muscles and fat tissue were taken from Yakutsk to Seoul, to find out whether living cells could be extracted. Sources at the lab in Seoul did not respond to phone or email inquiries this week, but even if the cells turn out to be viable, don't expect to see a mammoth resurrection anytime soon. Russian researcher Semyon Grigoriev said it would be "years before we learn to choose the suitable cells or to re-create an extinct DNA molecule." Status: Case not yet closed. Or should that be, "not yet cloned"?
Dinosaurs ... and more: Science writer Brian Switek (a.k.a. @Laelaps) rounded up the year's top stories in paleontology at his "Dinosaur Tracking" blog, just before shifting over to Phenomena, National Geographic's new online science salon. In an email, he highlighted a few of his favorite stories:
"I was particularly interested by Nyasasaurus (confirming an earlier origin for dinosaurs), Yutyrannus (showing that feathers were not just for small dinosaurs)?and mammal bones adding new evidence that dinosaurs may have been endothermic," he told me. "In other fossil news, the two that jump to mind are: fossil turtles caught in the act of mating; and?a new fossil shark species which shows that Carcharocles megalodon was not a giant ancestor of today's white shark, but a member of a different lineage altogether."
I've included the fossil turtle-sex tale in our annual roundup for the Weird Science Awards, but here are 30 more ancient mysteries that should keep you clicking into the new year:
Ten top paleontology tales from Cosmic Log and NBC News:
Ten top anthropology tales from Cosmic Log and NBC News:
Top 10 discoveries from Archaeology magazine:
Alan Boyle is NBCNews.com's science editor. Connect with the Cosmic Log community by "liking" the log's Facebook page, following @b0yle on Twitter and adding the?Cosmic Log page to your Google+ presence. To keep up with Cosmic Log as well as NBCNews.com's other stories about science and space, sign up for the Tech & Science newsletter, delivered to your email in-box every weekday. You can also check out?"The Case for Pluto," my book about the controversial dwarf planet and the search for new worlds.
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Thursday, December 27, 2012
New York City faces $811 million budget gap in FY 2014: report
(Reuters) - New York City faces an $811 million budget shortfall in fiscal year 2014 and lowered revenue projections in part because of Superstorm Sandy, the city's Independent Budget Office said on Thursday.
The city's tax revenue collections are likely to grow by just 3.4 percent in fiscal 2014 to $44.8 billion. That figure is $347 million lower than the IBO projected in May, it said.
The dimmer outlook is due to slower expected economic growth, particularly in the banking and securities industries, the IBO said. Near-term losses from Sandy, which ripped into the East Coast on October 29, also dampened projections for the current fiscal year, which ends June 30, 2013.
In June, Mayor Michael Bloomberg and the City Council agreed on a $68.5 billion fiscal 2013 budget that spared 20 fire companies from closing and increased funding for day-care and after-school programs.
To close the projected budget gap, the city is likely to cut spending further and raise fees and fines, among other measures, according to a financial plan proposed by Bloomberg in November.
That plan includes cutting 1,340 jobs through 2014, mostly through attrition, the IBO said.
The city also expects to save $230 million in 2014 by borrowing and refinancing outstanding bonds at low interest rates.
GAP IS SMALL, BUT LABOR PROBLEMS LOOM
Even so, the gap -- which amounts to 1.6 percent of projected revenues -- is small enough to be closed largely through normal year-end accounting procedures, said IBO head Ronnie Lowenstein.
The city has not set aside money for a possible settlement in ongoing negotiations with organized labor, she said.
"There is, at this point, no money set aside in the city's labor reserve to pay retroactive wage and salary increases," she said.
Nearly all of the city's unions have been working without a current contract. The teachers' contract ran out in October 2009.
Under one settlement scenario, the city could owe wages and back pay of more than $5 billion through June 2013, the IBO's report said.
STORM COSTS UNCERTAIN
Before Sandy slammed into the U.S. East Coast, the IBO forecast the gross city product to grow at an annualized rate of 1.6 percent in the fourth quarter of 2012 and 1.2 percent in the first quarter of 2013.
Now, the city's economic output is likely to shrink by 1.0 percent at the end of 2012 and rebound with growth of 1.9 percent in the beginning of 2013 as storm victims repair homes and businesses, the IBO said.
It said Wall Street's importance as an economic driver for the city is expected to continue waning, as it has since the recession.
The financial sector will account for 26.1 percent of aggregate wage growth during from 2013 to 2016 -- compared to pre-recession levels of nearly 60 percent.
Yet New York City could be on track to gain nearly 480,000 payroll jobs from the end of 2009 through late 2016, which would be the greatest employment expansion since 1950, the IBO said.
Medicaid and public pensions cost increases are expected to slow. But spending on debt service payments and health and other benefits will rise, the IBO said.
The city's general obligation bonds are rated AA by Fitch Ratings and Aa2 by Moody's Investors Service.
(Editing by Leslie Gevirtz)
Source: http://news.yahoo.com/york-city-faces-811-million-budget-gap-fy-215747424.html
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2013 Ed Policy Wish: Change "Obama's Approach to Education"
I was also upset, because, what valuable messages could possibly be imparted to students at this assembly? The presentation was not about the importance of education in students' lives, something the President has done a good job speaking about to students and parents in the past. This was specifically about his education policy initiatives. ?
Students are?the primary recipients of education policies, but I'm having trouble seeing how recent education policies benefit students at all. What is Obama's Approach to Education? Based on the last four years, I can point to Race to the Top, an initiative based on competition for public funds (our tax money), with a requirement that a significant component of teacher evaluations are based on value added measures of standardized testing data. ?I know what?my students think of that! (See this post: Student Thoughts on Accountability for Teachers).
In Teacher Incentive Fund grants, another policy initative of the last 4 years, all over the country districts are experimenting with creating hybrid roles that pay lead teachers more (which could be good moves), but the government controls the definition of a great teacher and the focus of the lead teacher's work: again through value added measures of standardized test data. ?President Obama, do you really think tests measure what a good teacher is? ?Apparently, you do not actually think so!
Yet, these heavy hitting policies--that gift and deny public funding to kids and families who have no voice in the matter--have the entire country chasing test scores and a huge, publicly funded industry growing around the endeavor. Meanwhile, students are losing out on authentic learning experiences, which they absolutely must have to be prepared for the dramatically shifting professional world they'll enter. ?And with so much money supporting the new testing and data infrastructures that there is apparently not enough money for the essential elements of our children's education: foreign language classes, the arts, teacher retention programs, etc. How can we allow this to continue?
I've been nearly silent with my thoughts on these policies and how they reflect on president Obama's leadership when it comes to education. I've had my reasons--mainly, I didn't want to weaken Obama's chances of reelection, since I saw no better choice. ?I hope you know that was a big comprimise for me. I am a small voice in this debate, but I value my integrity. Now I will speak up. ?
President Obama, you are such an intelligent person, capable of the highest levels of leadership. You called on a highly articulate and experienced educator in Linda Darling Hammond to lead your education campaign in 2008, and you got my vote that year in large part because of that smart choice. I did not know enough about your leadership at that point to be certain you were the best person to lead our country, but I did know enough about Linda Darling Hammond's work to make a decision I knew would benefit children across America. Then you got elected and made a hard turn in a different direction. You have been nearly silent about this as well. ?It's as if you just handed "education" off to someone else. I know you have so many issues to take care of, but I implore you to stand closer to our country's public schools.
Secretary Duncan has said,?"We came out of the gates flying" in the first term..." and he plans to "replicate that as much as we can." (EdWeek, Duncan Sketches Out Second Term Agenda). ?Are you sure you're going in the right direction? The stakes for our country could not be higher. Education is becoming a support for big money at the expense of children's futures, and you have the opportunity to turn that around.?
My education policy wish for 2013 is that President Obama will change his "approach to education." ?For a great variety of thoughtful recommendations for how this might look, check out my colleagues at Teaching Ahead: Teachers' Advice to President Obama in His Second Term. ?These are teachers, who've committed their lives to our nation's youth, and their ideas deserve a chance.
?
[image credit:?5forcesofchange.com]
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A business plan? Start-ups need something else.
A business plan is great once entrepreneurs have tested the market and know what they're going to sell. But for starters, they really need to model their business.
In this December file photo, 12-year-old entrepreneur William Zsigo enjoys one of his own chocolate confections as he poses for photos at his home in Haslett, Mich. Before entrepreneurs write up a business plan, they should model their business visually.
Greg DeRuiter/The State Journal/AP/File
EnlargeWhen advising people about what they need to do as they get ready to launch a business, there are two distinct approaches recommended by experts.
Skip to next paragraph Dr. Jeffrey R. CornwallJeff is the Jack C. Massey Chair in Entrepreneurship and Director of the Center for Entrepreneurship at Belmont University in Nashville, Tenn.
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The first, which has been the traditional approach, tells aspiring entrepreneurs that writing a business plan is the first critical step.
In business schools the business plan was the core of our entrepreneurship curriculum for decades. ?Writing a business plan that?s thickness is measured in inches is still a rite of passage in many top entrepreneurship programs.
However, there is a growing chorus of experts questioning why business plans get so much attention.? After all, most entrepreneurs will tell you that once the business gets going it can quickly look fundamentally different than described in their original business plan.
Sunday, December 23, 2012
Can a Motorola X Phone keep up with Apple and Samsung?
The Wall Street Journal reported Friday that Motorola is hard at work on an 'X Phone,' a flagship smart phone that would stand out from handsets made by Apple and Samsung. But 'X Phone' development may be running into some early obstacles.
Google and Motorola are reportedly working on a flagship "X Phone" to rival the iPhone and popular Android smart phones. Here, a man raises his hand at Google's offices in Mountain View, California.
Mark Lennihan/AP/File
EnlargeWhen Google purchased Motorola last year for $12.5 billion, there was lots of speculation about what was behind the deal. Was Google only interested in Motorola?s portfolio of patents? Or did it hope to put the company?s engineers to work on its own projects?
Skip to next paragraph Jeff Ward-BaileyWriter
Jeff began writing for the Monitor's Horizons blog in 2011, covering product news and rumors, innovations from companies like Apple and Google, and developments in tech policy.
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New rumors suggest that it?s largely the latter: The Wall Street Journal reported Friday that Motorola is hard at work on a flagship Android phone known internally as the ?X Phone,? to be released some time in 2013. Citing ?people familiar with the matter,? the Journal says the X Phone is designed to stand head and shoulders above current handsets, although engineers are running into some early obstacles.
Motorola and Google apparently have big plans for the X Phone: Motorola is investigating materials that would make the display more flexible and less likely to crack or break under pressure, and the company wants to include better camera software and gesture recognition while simultaneously boosting battery life. It?s too early to speculate on the size of the phone or the features it will include, but the Journal?s sources say Motorola will also begin building an X Tablet once the phone has been completed.
The X Phone would run what?s known as ?vanilla? Android: a pure version of the OS that comes directly from Google. Right now only the Nexus line of phones, including Samsung?s popular Galaxy Nexus, run vanilla Android; all other handsets have extra code added by manufacturers, like Samsung?s ?TouchWiz? UI or HTC?s ?Sense.? Lots of users find these additional features helpful, but others prefer the flexibility of being able to use a version of Android that doesn?t have the manufacturer?s ?stamp.?
But along with developing the X Phone, Google and Motorola have to carefully navigate their delicate relationships with other companies that make Android handsets -- especially Samsung. Samsung has become the biggest smart phone maker in the world, thanks in no small part to a warm relationship with Google -- but it?s also a rival to Motorola. Google wants to boost Motorola?s sales (Motorola commands an anemic 3 percent of the Android phone market, compared to Samsung?s 40 percent) but doesn?t want to jeopardize its relationship with Samsung or other manufacturers.
By the way, if you own one of Motorola?s existing Droid phones, don?t worry: the company will continue to produce them for Verizon, its carrier partner, as well as devoting resources to developing the X Phone. In spite of poor sales, many of the Droid phones Motorola released in 2012 were well-received by critics.
What are your thoughts on the X Phone? Do you think Google and Motorola can design a handset that stands apart from everything else on the market? Let us know in the comments section below.
For more tech news, follow Jeff on Twitter:?@jeffwardbailey.
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