TopHouse

Top 10 Trailers of 2010

2010-12-27T16:36:00.000-08:00

As is tradition here at Yahoo! Movies, we tallied up the
most popular movie trailers of the year, according to video streaming numbers. And
it proved to be a big year; the ten most popular videos nabbed nearly 80
million views. Many of the expected flicks featuring imperiled wizards and
sparkly vampires and shiny superheroes made the list, but one movie about aging
action stars also did remarkably well. Check them out below:

Can't Wait To See Number 1? Click Here >>

10) Thor

9) Sex and the City 2

8) Pirates of the Caribbean:
On Stranger Tides

7) Shrek Forever After

6) Toy Story 3

What Trailer is Number 1? Click Ahead and Find Out >>

How to Use Xbox 360 Kinect

2010-12-15T14:13:00.000-08:00

For some, Kinect is just a neat new way to play games.

For others, it’s a challenge.

Packing a high-tech collection of cameras and sensors and attached to a tantalizingly universal USB plug, it was only a matter of time before imaginative hackers figured out how to talk to its hardware and unleash its full potential.
We didn’t expect it to be quite so quick, however. The first efforts at homebrewed Kinect-using systems came within days of its November release; a month later, the web is packed with a bewildering variety of insane tech-demos for Kinect applications we’re pretty sure Microsoft never even dreamt of. Here’s some of the most imaginative.

Minority Report
Tom Cruise sci-fi hit Minority Report featured a crime-predicting
computer with an awesome virtual reality interface. Here, an intrepid
Kinect hacker makes science fiction into science fact, browsing through a
stack of photographs with a flick of the wrist. Let us know when you
can forecast murders, OK?

Be the Predator
"The jungle...it just came alive." Here's your chance to live out your Predator fantasies, courtesy of the Kinect's two integral cameras. This optical camouflage effect is straight out of our 1980s nightmares.

Kinect quadrotor
But while Kinect's Predator camouflage is strictly a special effect, this guy's for real. Hailing from the Hybrid Systems Lab at UC Berkley, it's an autonomous "quad-rotor" -- or four-rotored helicopter -- that uses the Kinect sensor to avoid obstacles. Like, say, someone swinging a big stick at it.

Be a Jedi
Fschoom! Wrapang! Ftoosh! No Star Wars fan can claim, hand on heart, to never have waved around an imaginary lightsaber. This guy takes it to the extreme, using Kinect and a PC to overlay a lightsaber glow on a wooden stick -- and topping off the effect with those familiar sounds. Eat your heart out, Star Wars Kid.

Engage your autistic kid
This isn't precisely a "hack," but we’re pretty sure it wasn't part of Microsoft's design brief for the Kinect. GamingNexus.com editor John Yan wasn't too impressed with his new Kinect's games -- but for his four-year-old son, who suffers from autism and is frustrated with traditional gaming controllers, it was a different matter. As Yan put it, "The joy in his eyes as he was able to complete the tasks and move around in the menus is something I'll never forget."

Capture 3D video
Movie theaters are packed with hit 3D movies, but at the moment there's no affordable way to record 3D at home. Or there wasn't until Kinect came along. This hacker uses two Kinect sensors and a custom software rig to produce 3D video.

CSV to Graph - Convert Siege Log into Bar Graph

2010-10-25T22:07:00.000-07:00

CSV to Graph - Convert Siege Log into bar Graph - a simple perl script that reads a csv file and converts it into bar graph.

#!/usr/bin/perl

use strict;
use Text::ParseWords;
use GD::Graph::bars;
use Data::Dumper;

#my $file = 'siege.csv';
my $file  = $ARGV[0];
my ($output_file) = ($file =~ /(.*)\./);

my @data;
my @legends;

# parse csv
open(my $fh, '<', $file) or die "Can't read csv file '$file' [$!]\n";

my $countlines = 0;

while (my $line = <$fh>) {
    chomp $line;
    my @fields = Text::ParseWords::parse_line(',', 0, $line);

    my @field = (@fields[1],@fields[2],@fields[3],@fields[4],@fields[5],@fields[6],@fields[7],@fields[8],@fields[9]);
    push @data, \@field;

    if($countlines >= 1){
        push @legends, @fields[0];
    }
    $countlines++;
}

# max 7 day siege log
splice @data, 1, -7;
splice @legends, 0, -7;

# plot to graph

my $mygraph = GD::Graph::bars->new(1024, 768);

$mygraph->set(
    y_tick_number => 1,
    values_vertical => 1,
    bargroup_spacing => 10,
    show_values => 1,
) or warn $mygraph->error;

$mygraph->set_legend(@legends);

my $myimage = $mygraph->plot(\@data) or die $mygraph->error;

my $format = $mygraph->export_format;
open(IMG, ">$output_file.$format") or die $!;
binmode IMG;
print IMG $myimage->gif;
close IMG;

DotA 6.67b AI Rev2d Download

2010-09-28T04:41:00.001-07:00

Courtesy of PleaseBugMeNot

Here we go with 2 versions... one with the old BMP's defence and one with the new incomplete CIPD defense. Which is better... geez i don`t know :) hence the both links. Enjoy...

BMP Defence
DotA Allstars v6.67b Rev2d AI.w3x File size: 6.96 MB

CIPD Defence
DotA Allstars v6.67b Rev2d AI+.w3x File size: 6.96 MB

DotA Allstars v6.67b Rev2d AI Download mirror
DotA Allstars v6.67b Rev2d AI.w3x
DotA Allstars v6.67b Rev2d AI+.w3x

Changes in 6.67b Rev2d
===================
1. Fixed when typing -csx (x is an ai number) to show AI creep stats, it showed K:Y gg_Maintimer:Z ( Y and Z are values).
2. Treant Protector is now able to use Living Armor on towers, if he wants ofc (cipd)
3. Fixed the prices of some items for the AI knowledge:
- Phase boots decreased from 1500 to 1400
- Blades of attack decreased from 500 to 450
4. AI is now able to use some more items:
- Phase Boots: when running and blocked by creeps(cipd)
- Shiva's Guard(cipd)
- Orchid Malevolence
- Blade Mail
- Better Dagon Usage (AI will finish u with dagon more often)
5. Fixed some code in Bristelback`s skills... they were bugged (there is still a bug but it is from original map).
6. Added skills and items build to Kaldr, Ancient Apparition
7. Changed item numerous item builds.(tnx to the AI team)
8. Changed skills builds on many heroes.(tnx to the AI team)
9. AI should now be able to teleport to raxes if the third tower is dead and raxes are attacked
10. AI should properly defend the lanes now whether its specific third tower is dead or not
11. AI should no longer get stuck in the base after defending it(cipd)(removed that by request)
12. Some of the AI players use 3 tier skills learning system: every tier for EASY, NORMAL, INSANE levels (Axe).
13. Added some *basic* AI for Kaldr, Ancient Apparition(he can use now Cold Feet+Ice Vortex+Ice Blast+Chilling Touch added to his items usages)
14. Changed Rylai Crestfall, Crystal Maiden behavior(cipd)
15. Changed Axe`s use of BladeMail and Satanic for defence purposes
16. Changed some behavior for Luna and Morphling(better using of waveform for escape). (cipd)
17. Fixed modes: mc, sc and the orders from the AI UI for changing lanes (my mistake after deobfuscation)
18. I think i fixed some hero swap bug after correcting some errors after Harreke`s deobfuscation. Needs testing.
19. Changed the way AI choose its lanes at the beginning if there's no lane restriction. They go 2-1-2 at the start of the map. The heroes in the middle are picked up from a predefined Hero pool(cipd).
20. 2 new modes (Skillbuild View): when in game, write -osv XX or -osven XX for looking the skills trees of the AI heroes. XX == id of the hero. For ex.: -osv 2, -osven 6. (cipd)
21. Fixed Puck`s Dream Coil with Aghanims - it was not showing the cooldown on the scoreboard.
22. Fixed an old bug with command: All Ally push Left - just an old typo left from the BMP days
23. ADDED ENEMY AI COMMANDS: -osden (stay defense base) -oden (return to defense) -oaen (resume attacking)
24. Fixed Nerubian Weaver`s new skill The Swarm - now he uses it on enemies
25. Fixed Nerubian Assassin`s Urna swarm
26. Added AI for Nerubian Assassin`s scarabs - beware mages.. if scarabs see you, be prepared for silence galore. They are very aggressive when you are in range.
27. Syllabear`s bear now gets rabid effect but the thing is still bugged with random not growing stuff. Better -airepick that hero <- thats ok for Alchemist too... very bugged.28. Added Arcane Ring to support items usage when command in chat: -aid. U must but in atleast 650 range to the owner of the ring(not tested)29. Added *basic* AI skills usage to Tauren Chieftain.. needs more work (he doesn`t use them much )30. Fixed bug with AI buy outs when dead: sometimes they were buying but not respawning in base31. Fixed bug with empty bottle and storing runes.. before they didn`t expire after 2 minutes32. Magnataur should not initiate dagger blink without mana for at least one slam.33. Added Skewer to the skills usage of Magnataur (didn`t test it alot... maybe it will need later fixing). Also added Skewer as escape mechanism when low HP. (not using it very good)34. Added Scepter to Axe`s AI skills knowledge and updated his conditions level check of ultimate ability+ability with scepter.(needs testing that he is using his upgraded with scepter skill instead of unupgraded)35. Fixed inaccurate replay data for assists ("Assist"+AssistPlayerId,VictimPlayerId)(6.67c)36. Fixed Puck`s phaseshift (there is still a bug in IceFrog`s map when in phaseshift and Mirana`s ulti, sometimes Puck is moving in phaseshift form)37. Fixed scroll of teleport usage (new TP scroll demands Point usage instead of Target and AI couldn`t use the scrolls). Big thanx to Phaselock and i mean it VERY BIG!38. Obsidian, Enchantress, Silencer and Bone Fletcher got better management of mana when using orb skills... they should last hit with orb skills (cipd)39. Added Scepter to EarthShaker`s skill knowledge... need confirmation he uses the skill with 2 echoes instead of one.40. Added Midnight Pulse and Demonic Conversion to Enigma`s skills usage41. Added Warcry usage for Sven.42. When -aid typed near Sven or Kaldr, they`ll aid u with Warcry or Chilling Touch. I may add more supporting skills when i have the time to look over skills.43. Troll Warlord now should use Berserker Rage to switch from Range->Melle and vice versa
44. AI should buy sentry wards or gem when Slark is in the enemy team
45. Treant Protector now casts Nature`s Guise on him or allies. Use -aid if u need Guise or Living armor asap
46. Treant Protector now uses Sentinels to stun the enemies. NOTE: AI-Normal and AI-Insane Sentinels aim only for HEROES. THIS IS NOT A BUG so do NOT report as bug. That makes Treant 300% more effective supporter.
47. Made some changes which cipd posted in forum about last hitting - also i made a dynamic last hit value of creep`s HP. That needs testing.. if it`s not working good i`ll change it back.
48. Fixed Diabolic Edict considering invulnerable buildings as valid targets and wasting some hits
49. When distress call AI will look for third tower and raxes to TP... now it will also look for the Left and Right 4th towers or the Throne/Tree to teleport, if raxes are dead.(not tested)
50. AI Normal have 1/3 chance to pay for consumables like salves, AI Insane have 25% to pay for consumables. Easy should pay always. Also wards and gems are now free for AI. The reason i made that is... that wards and gems waste too much cash and AI just sticks without gold.
51. You can -airepick many times now.
52. Hakuna matata bug prolly fixed (cipd)
53. Removed cipd`s defense patch by his request. Old BMP`s defense is up again.
54. Added -cn mode - coolnames mode... all bots gets a "+" infront of their names.(cipd)
55. Removed a bug with Medusa`s moving.
56. Removed teleporting to side shops.
57. Changed teleporting with boots/scrolls from target to point use.
58. Added Aghanim`s scepter to the item`s build of Juggernaut.. also tried to make him use the upgraded skill.
59. Balanar will use Darkness during the night... that way he prolongs it much further.
60. Fixed Undying and Visage not learning all the skills. Some heroes may have that problem too.
61. Minor adjustment (+50) to the extra aoe XP bounty(6.68)
62. Added new enemy command: -oroshanen - send the enemy heroes to fight Roshan. If u send your allies too... they can make an orgy there
63. Added item and skill builds to Slark. Also added some _basic_ AI for skill usage. Don`t expect wonders. I`m not done with him.
64. Naix - Casting Open Wounds no longer loses attack focus + memory leak fixed (6.68)
65. New ingame command added: -rn BotNewName .... where should be: Blue -> 1, Teal -> 2, Purple -> 3, Yellow -> 4, Orange -> 5 | Pink -> 7, Grey -> 8, Light Blue -> 9, Dark Green -> 10, Brown -> 11. Names must be max 19 chars long. They also get their "+" infront. Should not be like any other name in the game. And you have 10 renames per game.(tnx to GetTriggerUnit-)
66. Decided to release an AI+ version with the CIPD`s Defence patch. Which is better... i don`t know... hence the both versions.

Known problems
=============

1. Crashes still going on. Maybe it is a skill or memory leak... we couldn`t track it... it`s just too random.
2. AI will use skills if Alchemist uses Concoction in their range
3. Kaldr`s Ice Blast is causing AI to use skills on the dummy unit.
4. Until level 11... AI will try to TP from fountain area... but sometimes will fail and they`ll buy another one... and sometimes they`ll have 2 slots with TPs. They`ll probably clear it the next time visiting fountain. That bug will be addressed for the next release.
5. There are still thousands of little incomplete and causing problems things... but that`s for now... until someone makes new AI framework from scratch!

List of Incomplete Ai:
Razor,Slark(basic AI),Admiral,Clockwerk,Invoker,Visage.
Here's also a list of Heroes that Ai uses and its worth making them to -airepick:
Alchemist,Spiritbreaker,Bristleback,Lycanthrope,Un dying,Lone Druid,Templar Assassin,Soul Keeper,Storm Spirit,Windrunner,Batrider,Tinker,Techies.

DotA 6.69 Map

2010-08-21T19:30:00.002-07:00

This is a dedicated post where you'll find the latest updates on upcoming DotA 6.69. Icefrog is now working on DotA 6.69 and gives us a quick update after the successful release of DotA 6.68.

DotA 6.69 Changelogs
- coming soon

DotA 6.69 Download links
DotA 6.69 download mirror 1
DotA 6.69 download mirror 2

Keep visiting this page and DotA 6.69 download links will be postd as soon as they become available.

DotA 6.69 AI Map

2010-08-21T19:30:00.000-07:00

We are expecting this DotA 6.69 AI since Icefrog is now working DotA 6.69 and gives us a quick update. It will become very successful just like DotA 6.68.

DotA 6.69 AI Changelogs
- coming soon

DotA 6.69 AI Download links
DotA 6.69 AI download mirror 1
DotA 6.69 AI download mirror 2

DotA v6.68c 6v6 Ver.2

2010-08-21T19:29:00.000-07:00

Play DotA Defence of the Ancients with two extra players.

Quoted from GoD-Tony:

It seems like we have an ambitious new developer in our midst. FuBaSh has been working on a 6v6 release for v6.68c and he believes it's ready, so here it is. Enjoy!

Release Notes

- A big thanks to FuBaSh for working on 6v6 DotA.
- I have not had the chance to test this map myself. It may or may not be missing features that I used to include.

Download Links
DotA v6.68c 6v6 Ver.2 mirror 1
DotA v6.68c 6v6 Ver.2 mirror 2

DotA 6.69 Quick Update

2010-08-16T15:11:00.000-07:00

Development is underway on the next patch. It won't take as long to release as the previous version did. Please send me your feedback on 6.68 along with what you'd like to see in 6.69! - Icefrog

How to View the Remote Desktop of a Headless Server

2010-08-13T01:02:00.000-07:00

This is applicable to those people who do most of their works on CLI. But how about if a certain task requires that your server has a running X windows which is frequently not available on most linux-based servers? The answer is a virtual X server together with VNC.

We'll not tackle what is X server nor what is VNC, instead you may use the power of Google or just visit Wikipedia.

Requirements

Xvnc
SSH client (e.g. PuTTY)
VNC Viewer (e.g. portable TightVNC)

Procedures

Before anything else, have a copy of an ssh client like PuTTY.

1. Install Xvnc

Using your ssh client, log in to the remote server and execute this command:

$ sudo yum install vnc-server

Or use this if you're using Ubuntu:

$ sudo apt-get install vnc4server

2. Start Xvnc

Once Xvnc is installed, start vncserver using the default display which is :0

$ sudo vncserver :0

Please note that Xvnc will ask for password on its first run. Better memorize it or write it down.

3. Start VNC Viewer

- On your local PC, lauch your VNC Viewer (which is portable TightVNC in my case)
- Enter the address of the remote server that you want to access
- Enter the passsword we used on step 2
- Then wait for VNC viewer to connect

You would see a gray background environment and that's it, you're now viewing your remote server's desktop.

To do a further test you may want to launch Firefox by issuing a command on your ssh client.

$ sudo export DISPLAY=:0

$ sudo firefox google.com

DotA 6.68c - DotA 6.68 Patch 2 Release

2010-08-04T07:40:00.001-07:00

DotA v6.68c released by IceFrog. New update just released. Read the detailed changelog for more information. It says "important bugs", but not important enough to share with the community.

Changelog:
* Fixed a few important bugs

Download link:
DotA v6.68c.w3x

DotA 6.67b AI Map

2010-06-07T17:48:00.001-07:00

Download the latest Dota 6.67b AI Map. Harreke finally made it but still not complete. After Dota 6.67b AI, we are waiting for DotA 6.67c AI and DotA 6.68 AI, so keep visitng this page for more updates. And by some notes, "... AI player cannot use new items. And because Magnus, Nerubian Weaver, Bone Fletcher and Spirit Breaker have some skill modifications, so AI player cannot use their new skills, too. Please use -repick to make AI player choose another hero.". read more...

Heroes and items were updated from BuffMePlz's 6.66b AI.

But this AI map is incomplete. Many bugs that IceFrog fixed in DotA 6.67b still exist here. However, I am unable to fix.

IceFrog did send me script changes files, but I'm afraid those didn't help, because the script changelog does not fit for the changes in 6.67b script.

For example, the script changelog said: line 679 - "trigger XXX_AAA=null" in war3map.j of 6.66b change into line 690 - "trigger XXXAAA=null" in 6.66b. When I open 6.66b war3map.j, I found "real ABCD" in 6.66b and "unit DEFG" in 6.67b. They are not even the same sentence!

So the directly help from IceFrog did not work, I have to choose another old, original way: find official 6.67b changelog, see what's different from 6.66b, then decode 6.67b script to look for corresponding code, and copy & adjust those code to 6.66b AI script.

This is not easy. IceFrog's scripts are not compatible with BuffMePlz's. A timer variable called "E0" in 6.67b, but it called "D" in 6.66b AI.

How did I know what those variables are? The answer is, I didn't know at all. Some variables like "set P2[1]=1095331188" in 6.67b, I could track 1095331188 (aka. 'AImt') and found "set Mx[1]='AImt'" in 6.66b AI. Other variables that both with meaningless names and have no data to track, like "set MJ0=O9O", oh hell, who knows what do "MJ0" and "O9O" stand for!

So I said this AI map is incomplete. I've tried my best to follow the official 6.67b changelog, make new stuff (skills, items) work, but I can not guarantee the map won't go error and jump back to windows. To tell the truth, I only fixed the things that with details given by official changelog, something that without detail but just one sentence like "* Fixed various rare exploits", I was unable to find out where those fixing code could be by myself. I'm sorry, I did not fix and let them stay.

If Dota 6.67b AI map was confirmed with no serious problem, I will write a guide about how to improve AI abilities.

By the way, AI player cannot use new items. And because Magnus, Nerubian Weaver, Bone Fletcher and Spirit Breaker have some skill modifications, so AI player cannot use their new skills, too. Please use -repick to make AI player choose another hero.

Download link:
Dota 6.67b AI Map Download Latest DotA Ai Map
Dota 6.67c AI Map Download (coming soon)
Dota 6.68 AI Map Download (coming soon)

DotA 6.67c AI Map Download

2010-05-29T06:10:00.000-07:00

DotA 6.67c AI map is soon to be released by Harreke and DotA 6.67c AI is going to be available to DotA community anytime from now. Then right after DotA 6.67c AI, Harreke will prepare for the DotA 6.68 AI map. Download links of DotA 6.67 AI and DotA... Read more »

New DotA AI Developer is Harreke

2010-05-25T19:54:00.001-07:00

Harreke will continue building DotA AI and expects to release DotA 6.67c AI soon. As we all know that BuffMePlz has retired on DotA AI creation and God-Tony refused to be a successor on DotA AI development. But thanks to BMP he never left us alone, he found Harreke which in past has been researching AI map technologies. read more...

Iglesia Ni Cristo will support Noynoy Aquino and Mar Roxas

2010-05-04T16:24:00.000-07:00

Iglesia Ni Cristo will support Noynoy Aquino and Mar Roxas this is a breaking news just released a while ago on Umagang Kay Ganda on ABS CBN channel. As reported by Anthony Taberna which is a member of Iglesia Ni Cristo, announced that the big religion Iglesia Ni Cristo will support Noynoy Aquino and Mar Roxas on their race on presidential elections. Iglesia Ni Cristo supports Noynoy Aquino and Mar Roxas based on different aspects.

INC also decided to support the following senatorial bets:

Biazon, Rozzano B.
Bong Revilla, Ramon Jr.
Cayetano, Pilar Juliana S.
Defensor-Santiago, Miriam P.
Drilon, Franklin M.
Enrile, Juan Ponce
Estrada, Jinggoy E.
Guingona, Teofisto III D.
Lapid, Manuel M.
Marcos, Ferdinand Jr. R.
Recto, Ralph G.
Sotto, Vicente III C.

Partylist : ALAGAD

Charice - Total Girl's Cover Girl

2010-04-26T15:23:00.000-07:00

Total Girl magazine puts the spotlight on international singing sensation Charice in their May 2010 issue.

Here’s an excerpt of the Charice interview by Maita de Jesus of Total Girl Philippines:

There’s no stopping 18-year old Charice from taking over the charts with her new album. After a long, tough journey, this proud Pinay can finally say “good riddance, haters!”

TG (Total Girl Magazine) : Your new album sounds amazing! How was it put together?

Charice: Most of the songs have a pop and r&b sound to it, but of course there are ballads in there too- we tried to have songs there that anybody would be able to like, no matter how old they are. It took me a year to make it, which they say is really fast for their standards. Sir david (foster) chose the best producers and composers to make a great album that will be a hit- well, I’m hoping it will be a hit! (laughs)

TG: We’re sure it will be! So what was it like to work with the best people in the music industry?

Charice: When we’d record a song, the producers or composers would be there teaching me how to sing the song. I’ve also been working with a dance instructor, Tony Michaels, to improve my dancing. I’m happy with him because he’s worked with one of my idols, Beyonce. At first I was naiilang [feeling awkward] to do the steps he was teaching, so when he noticed that, he played some music and asked me to do freestyle dancing. I did moves that I learned from watching Jennifer Lopez when I was growing up, so that’s the kind of style he’s been teaching me.

TG: Do you think working with all these big wigs sets you apart from the rest of the girls of your age? Most Pinay artists only dream of working with the people you’ve already worked with: Celine Dion, David Archuleta. . .

Charice: I dont think anything really sets me apart from everyone else. We all work hard and want to be successful. We all do our best. We all feel the pressure to perform well.

TG: What pushes you to do well?

Charice: It’s the negative comments I hear about myself that push me to keep on going. It’s like, if the haters annoy me, I’d annoy them even more by doing better! (laughs) But seriously, I want to prove that I can do it rather than tearing other people down, it should be really be more of giving support.

TG: That’s right! Who are your biggest supporters?

Charice: Of course (my fan club), the chasters are always there to support me. I’m so blessed that they’re so loyal and hardworking. My friends are also there for me- some of them I’ve only gotten to know recently, but it’s like I’ve known them for so long. My mom’s my biggest supporter and my best friend. It’s hard to find a real best friend who you can share anything with, and I’m glad I have her.

TG: Your mom was also the one who discovered your talent, right?

Charice: Yes, she taught me everything she knew about singing because she was a singer too. I know so many old songs because of her! The best advice she gave me about my singing is that I should always sing a song that people will remember.

TG: Looks like it works, since audiences break into tears after hearing you sing, including hollywood celebs! What’s it like to see and meet them?

Charice: It’s still a surprise to me when I see them around and I get introduced to them-and an even a bigger surprise when they say they love how I sing. Like when I met Justin Timberlake-they invited me to sing for him during an awards ceremony in his honor. After I sang, he came over and congratulated me! I also dream of meeting Beyonce one day. I’d love to follow in her footsteps when it comes to my career.. those are my two dream duets, with Justin and Beyonce!

TG: We’re sure your dream duets will come true someday! Any advice for our readers on how to make their own dreams come true?

Charice: Honestly, after losing in Little Big Star, I felt like my dreams were taken away. I was depressed for months. I kept on listening to sad emo songs. It’s true! (laughs) If it wasn’t for Falsevoice (note: a youtube user posted Charice’s videos online), I wouldn’t have made it out of my sadness. I couldn’t believe it when someone from the Ellen Show emailed me- I even had to check the email somewhere else then because we had no computer!

So my advice would be to find a way to keep on going, even if you feel like your dreams are moving away.. it’s never really the end-you just feel like it is. And usually, something good comes out of something bad, like if I didnt lose in Little Big Star, maybe I wouldn’t have gotten the opportunities I did, like going abroad and singing for audiences there. There will always be bigger, better things for you out there, you just have to keep on going!

Total Girl Philippines May 2010 issue with Charice on the cover is now available nationwide wherever magazines are sold!

What Does it Take to be a True Leader?

2010-04-23T22:04:00.000-07:00

What Does it Take to be a True Leader?
10 essential qualities of today's best leaders!
What is leadership? The dictionary defines leadership as, "a person who by force of example, talents, or qualities plays a directing role, wields commanding influence, or has a following in any sphere of activity or thought." Neale Donald Walsch writes that, "A true leader is not the one with the most followers, but one who creates the most leaders."

Jack Welch defines a leader as someone who knows that "Before you are a leader, success is all about growing yourself. When you become a leader, success is all about growing others." I personally believe the truest and best leaders were those who lead from the heart and who followed their own values. Leaders like Abraham Lincoln and Jesse Jackson. Leaders like Andrew Carnegie and even Bill Gates. They had a vision and were unafraid to follow that vision in accordance with their own spiritual, moral, and personal beliefs despite intense opposition, rejection, failure, and even personal hardship.

I believe a true leader is one who maintains an uncompromising adherence to an internalized, but otherwise generally accepted code of moral values; who adheres to utter sincerity, honesty, and candor in all communication; and who avoids deception, expediency, artificiality, or shallowness of any kind in all situations. Quite a tough ideal to live up to, I know. Then again, when you look around, how many TRUE LEADERS exist in today's world?

So what does it take to be a leader? Here are ten qualities of today's most successful leaders.

1. True leaders know who they are. They know their strengths so that they can maximize them, and they know their weaknesses so that they can surround themselves with colleagues that compensate for them.

2. True leaders are genuine. They do not use false facades or "poker faces." Instead, they say what they mean and mean what they say. They are aware of their own inner voices and selves, and strive to know themselves better everyday.

3. True leaders are responsible. They take total responsibility for themselves and for their behavior. They take responsibility for the results and consequences of their behavior. More than that, true leaders even take responsibility for their subordinates or others for which they feel accountable.

4. True leaders have integrity. They understand that the ONLY viable, marketable quality in today's global economy is CHARACTER. Merriam-Webster defines character as "a composite of good moral qualities typically of moral excellence and firmness blended with resolution, self-discipline, high ethics, force, and judgment." Every society and every culture values these qualities, which are core to a leader's integrity.

5. True leaders are caring. They know that their "purpose" as a leader is to SERVE those that they lead. Therefore, they have genuine concern for the people they lead. They never belittle or humiliate others; and they do not discount the opinions of others, even when they disagree with them.

6. True leaders have a vision. They translate the here and now, the immediate moment, into their vision of the future. They focus on the big picture and can describe that picture to their colleagues, subordinates, business partners, and customers. They understand the long-term effects of the tasks that need to be completed today, the desired outcomes of those tasks, and how to communicate the immediate needs of the business in terms of their future vision.

7. True leaders are open to change. They listen without ego or prejudice; and they know that THEIR idea does not need to be, and may not be, the RIGHT idea. They realize that new ideas and new perceptions are key to progress and improvement. This key trait keeps them, and their businesses, flexible, responsive, and innovative in today's ever-changing business environment.

8. True leaders value the contributions of others. Leaders understand the value of teamwork and the synergy created through the combined efforts of several talented individuals. They understand that their colleagues and subordinates must be valued, and they are secure enough in their own right to allow others the opportunity to contribute. More importantly, true leaders recognize that their contributions may not always be the best contributions!

9. True leaders are courageous! They understand that doing the RIGHT thing is oftentimes not the EASY thing. They are prepared to fight for their beliefs. They are not swayed by the judgements and arguments of others, merely to avoid conflict or confrontation; particularly when those judgements or arguments do not serve the greater good. Most importantly, true leaders will do what is right EVEN if it causes personal hardship!

10. True leaders create leaders! The best leaders treat each individual as unique. They teach, coach, advise, and even assist people who need it. They understand that the more they facilitate the improvement and advancement of others, the more they are fulfilled themselves and the better they and their business become.

Beyond this, true leaders are authentic. Nobody is perfect, and it is unlikely (if not impossible) that today's leaders have EACH and EVERYONE one of these traits. But go back to the first of these traits. True leaders KNOW WHO THEY ARE. They are honest with those around them, and more importantly, they are HONEST WITH THEMSELVES.

So, what does it take to be a leader? It takes the COURAGE to look at yourself in the mirror and truly see what qualities you have and what qualities YOU DO NOT HAVE! It means taking that inventory, acknowledging what you may need to work on, and then making the commitment to do the work!

So, what do you say? Do you have what it takes to be a true leader?

Noynoy’s mental sickness, True or False?

2010-04-23T18:49:00.000-07:00

Ninoy himself sought psychiatric help for Noynoy.

I did not want to write about Noynoy’s mental sickness. In a political campaign season, it looked like black propaganda from rival politicians.

That was before I received information I could trust that the allegations about Noynoy’s mental illness were true. My source is apolitical but she was moved by her responsibility to her country. She decided to do her part to stop the prevarication of others who also knew. The stories about Noynoy’s mental illness are not ‘concoctions’ she said. These should not be dismissed. It should be proved.

We must look at the issue closely and not be satisfied with mere gossip but seek to establish the facts.

My source has no reason to invent a story. She is a private person who received information she feels must be told. She is connecting a story many years ago when Noynoy was a young boy in Boston, not a presidential candidate but as the well-loved only son of a father frustrated that he will not be able to carry on with his legacy.

Were Ninoy alive today, he would have been shocked at the cruelty of those who would use his son for their personal ambitions. He would have been angered by the insensitivity of those who would stop at nothing to push Filipinos, herd them into a crying mob and then set up his sick son as a presidential candidate.

* * *

This is her story:

Ninoy was worried about his son and his future because he loved him. He expressed frustration that he could not rely on his son to take up his legacy but that was not his main concern. He was more worried about his happiness as a person. That is what led him to seek help from his doctor friend.

My source said that when she read about Tomcat’s (a classmate in Ateneo) letter and other stories about Noynoy’s mental problem her mind clicked and related it to Boston days. “Ay totoo pala yung sinabi sa akin many years ago.” Both the Aquinos and the doctor’s family were living in Boston. (Ninoy and his family lived in Newton, Massachusetts, a suburb of Boston in self-exile from 1980 until his assassination in 1983.)

The psychiatrist in question became a close friend of the Aquino family. The doctor is now dead but he still has relatives living in Boston. Ninoy sought the doctor and his exact words to him were: “Tingnan niyo nga si Noynoy, walang ka-drive drive (for a young boy he was lethargic). He must have a problem.” The doctor told the story to some close friends among them, the source of this story. When Tomcat’s letter came out in Manila and with Noynoy a leading presidential candidate, she thought her story ought to be known. She is not a politician. She is not indulging in malicious rumors or black propaganda. She is recalling a story told to her and a circle of friends in Boston.

* * *

Psychiatry is a tradition in the doctor’s family. His mother was also a known psychiatrist and at one time headed a top mental hospital. She wrote a paper on how family interaction in the Philippines can cause mental sickness. The paper was published in American medical journals.

His strange behavior has been told by those who knew him closely, like the classmate from Ateneo, who hid under the pseudonym Tomcat. His recollections give details and can be verified by others who knew Noynoy then. These plus how Ninoy sought help for his son can be the starting point for a serious investigation.

In Tomcat’s letter he mentions the name of a psychiatrist, Dr. Manuel Escudero. He is not the doctor in Boston to whom Ninoy talked to about Noynoy.

Noynoy’s mental illness was a recurring problem, exploding in bouts while a student in Ateneo and again when they lived in exile in Boston. That belies claims he has been cured.

(Aquino’s household help have said he regularly takes seroquel and abilify, both medicines for mental illness. It is alleged that he is suffering a variant of labile disorder. Dr. SamVaknin writes that the “main dynamic in the Borderline Personality Disorder is abandonment anxiety.”

Tomcat wrote that in Ateneo his temper was well known and he had puzzling sudden mood swings. “Isang minuto, nakikikain ka kay Brudda Francis, mamayamaya nagagalit ka na.”

There are other reports of aberrant behavior. Bel Cunanan of Inquirer wrote in her column, “Some mayors relate that at a Tarlac festival, Noynoy was enjoying some halo-halo with local officials and other guests when quite suddenly, he blew some of it over the face of a friend. To the shock of those around him, Noynoy then began to laugh, as if it were a big joke.”

* * *

As one columnist put it “If psychiatric and psychological tests are required for a judge or a soldier, how much more for a president who has in his hands the fate of 92 million Filipinos?”

We must save our country from vultures who will feast on the carcasses of a doomed country. They are willing to sacrifice everything and everyone for the sake of their ambitions.

In saving our country, we also save Noynoy. He has a right to a happy, quiet life and should not be derided because of his mental problems. He needs help but not to become president of the Philippines.

Only a psychiatric test and the results made public can resolve the issue. Until then, people will continue to doubt his mental stability.

The stories of his friends in Ateneo, his Jesuit teachers and colleagues in Congress and the Senate must be collated and verified — every one and each of them. It should not be treated as mere gossip.

* * *

The Liberal Party ought to be more responsible. When the results of the test are known he should be persuaded to withdraw as Missouri Senator Eagleton withdrew his candidacy for vice-president in 1972 just 18 days after his announcement as George McGovern’s running mate after his shock treatments for depression were known.

There are enough of us to stop the recklessness of those who persist in putting up Noynoy as president. They should have done their homework. We must support sources who are afraid to identify themselves in fear of the unthinking mob. There is enough time before May 10 to conduct psychiatric tests on him and all the other presidential candidates for the sake of fairness.

Source: http://www.philstar.com/Article.aspx?articleId=569244

Starcraft 2 Funny Commercials

2010-04-23T03:35:00.000-07:00

Starcraft 2 Funny Commercials - this Korean Starcraft 2 Commercials will surely make you laugh like I did. It also made me think how much the Starcraft 2 phenomenon have gone so far. On this Starcraft 2 Funny Commercials, we are being introduced to naughty Dark Templar, companionship with Hydralisk, and a great surprise on a Dropship. Hope you'll enjoy watching these Starcraft commercials. If you find any cool videos, please don't hesitate to tell us and we'll be glad to add it here. Leave us your comment.

Free Online Auto Repair

2010-02-09T19:10:00.001-08:00

Free Online Auto Repair - This is the most complete and comprehensive site where you can find everything to help you fix your car. They provide online car repair diagnostic tools, car

repair cost estimates, car repair shop finder and car repair guides and DIYs. Essentially all for the benefits of car owners which is set in minds of people who created AutoMD.

Online auto repair has never been this great.

Dubbed "Industry’s Most Complete and Unbiased Free Repair Resource Can Save American Car Owners Billions of Dollars in Yearly Car Repairs", AutoMD launching will soon revolutionize the car

repair process.

"Until today, car owners have not had access to a truly unbiased and comprehensive free auto repair resource that operates both as an advocate to assure that they’re not over-paying for repairs and are

finding the best, most affordable shop for their needs -- and as a DIY guide providing them with the information they need to do it themselves," said Shane Evangelist, President of AutoMD and CEO of US Auto

Parts.

What are their experiences

erikreyes
AutoMD diagnosed my car for free! I cant believe it! It actually works. They even have a section where I can ask a mechanic any question, for free, and get an answer in 24 hours! This is truly a

marvel. I feel educated and the Service shops will not rip me off anymore! I also like their forum, and maintenence reminders as well! Check it out. AutoMD diagnoses your car for free. They gave me

enough info so i didnt get ripped off anymore when I visited the service shop. This website also has a ton of data on cars, has a forum, can answer questions asked to a mechanic for free in 24 hours, and a

personalized page which helps you keep up with Maintanence.

islandjumper
I just wanted to let you all know AutoMD is pretty good with car repair help. I stumbled on here when I was searching for estimates on what it would cost to fix my car, and i was able to go through

there online diagnostic tool and found the problem in my car was opposite what the mechanics told me.

Where to go from here?

Go ahead and try their services, simpy visit their site AutoMD and find yourself saving lot of bucks.

Signos (2007)

2010-02-09T06:46:00.000-08:00

Signos (2007) - The film won the Bronze Prize for Best Foreign Language Film in the International Filmmaker Festival in Kent, England, 2008. The film won Best Foreign Film for the first annual Lone Star International Film Festival in Fort Worth, Texas, USA, 2007. Also, Ricky Davao won the Best Supporting Actor for the said event.

Naruto Shippuden Episode 146

2010-02-09T06:25:00.000-08:00

Title: The Successor's Wish
Watch Naruto Shippuden Episode 146 Online
OR
reminisce the previously shown Naruto Shippuden Episode 145
OR
watch the next episode Naruto Shippuden Episode 147

Naruto Shippuden Episode 145

2010-02-09T06:22:00.000-08:00

Title: Successor of the Forbidden Jutsu
Watch Naruto Shippuden Episode 145 Online
OR
reminisce the previously shown Naruto Shippuden Episode 144
OR
watch the next episode Naruto Shippuden Episode 146

Jose Rizal (1998)

2010-02-09T06:16:00.002-08:00

Jose Rizal's life and works are recounted through a series of non-linear flashbacks which reflect on various aspects of his life - as writer, propagandist, lover, friend, brother, doctor, and the man that inspired a revolution. Accused of treason, Dr. Jose P. Rizal awaits trial and meets with his colonial government-appointed counsel, Luis Taviel de Andrade. The two build the case and arguments for the defense as significant events in the central figure's life prior to his incarceration unfold. Upon hearing Rizal's life story, Taviel begins to realize that the accused is not only innocent but exhibits in fact all the qualities of an extraordinary man. When the mock trial unreels, Taviel is all set to act as the prime advocate for his client as Rizal himself is about to give an earth-moving speech to defend his honor and address his countrymen. Meanwhile, the Spanish authorities have worked out the vast political machinery to ensure a guilty verdict. A revolution awaits in the wings.

Ang padrino (1984)

2010-02-09T06:16:00.000-08:00

Ang padrino (1984) - With cast Fernando Poe Jr. Johnny Delgado Coney Reyes Gigi de la Riva Ruel Vernal Fred Montilla Lito Anzures Rez Cortez Zandro Zamora Michael Murray Ricky Davao Amay Bisaya. This movie won the following awards: Fernando Poe Jr., Best Director, 1985 FAMAS Award; Ang Padrino, Best Picture, 1985 FAMAS Award; Eddie Romero, Best Screenplay, 1985 FAMAS Award; Coney Reyes, Nominated Best Actress, 1985 FAMAS Award; Zandro Zamora , Nominated Best Supporting Actor, 1985 FAMAS Award.

DotA Allstars 6.66b AI 0.2141

2010-02-09T05:48:00.000-08:00

DotA Allstars 6.66b AI 0.2141 - Here are the latest updates on dota 6.66b ai map. Bugs and crashes while playing the said map were being reported. Yet these bugs won't stop us from playing yet it pushes us to support. Below are some reposrts based on user experience.

Bugs and crashes happen when:

Attacking Roshan
Playing 5 vs 5
Using Doom , Kladr , or Slark Sometimes
Using butcher
Using ursa
Using Raijin Thunderkeg - Storm Spirit Hero.
Hero reach lvl 11
Rygwarl try to use fan of knives after throwing slow on ursa

Changelog:

Rewrote Overpower and Summon Familiars to prevent AI crashes
Undid the fix added for Pounce in 6.66b that was causing the game to crash
Added a workaround for when AI attempt to attack a dropped Divine Rapier (item will be removed)
Fixed AI from destroying the Aegis after having them attack Roshan

Download link:
Dota 6.66b AI 0.2141 Map

UFC The Ultimate Fighting Championship

2010-01-22T18:02:00.000-08:00

UFC The Ultimate Fighting Championship

The Ultimate Fighting Championship - Get the UFC Latest News, Watch UFC Videos, Watch MMA Videos and Clips, Browse UFC Photos and Gallery, Read Top UFC Fighters Biography, Get UFC TV Program and Schedule.
UFC Ultimate Fighting Championship

Advertisements of Manny Villar

2010-01-07T19:24:00.000-08:00

Manny Villar is running for president of the Philippines republic. He's known for being an icon of poor people, from rag to riches and icon of hope.

He has lot of commercials and other advertisements being published all over the county's media network. I was not surprised when my friend told me that he also put ads on google adsense. By incident I was able to confirm this. Here is a sample of his name displayed on google ads:

I hope to see an image ads of Manny Villar. If ever, I'll post it immediately.

The Nexus One aka Googlephone

2010-01-04T19:46:00.000-08:00

The Nexus One aka Googlephone
Source: Wired.com

Google’s upcoming Tuesday press conference is likely to mark the debut of the Nexus One, the search company’s own Android-based smartphone.

Nexus One should showcase the latest generation of the Linux-based open source Android operating system. It’s also the first phone that is expected to be directly marketed by Google, setting higher expectations for the phone.

Here’s what we know about the phone so far.
Hardware

The Nexus One was designed by HTC, which has a close relationship with Google. HTC created the first Android phone, the T-Mobile G1, and has released at least five Android handsets since the operating system launched in October 2008.

Though packed in a big, white box with the Google logo printed prominently, the Nexus One clearly shows the stamp of HTC’s design sensibilities. Photos show a device similar to the HTC Droid Eris phone with its trackball and four buttons at the bottom of the phone.

The Nexus One has a 1-GHz Snapdragon CPU, a 3.7-inch 480 x 800 display, 512 MB of of RAM and an expandable 4-GB microSD card, says Engadget. The 1-GHz processor alone should make the Nexus one of the fastest smartphones available currently.

By contrast, the Palm Pre has a 600-MHz Texas Instruments OMAP3430 processor and the Motorola Droid runs a 550-MHz Arm Cortex A8 processor.

The Nexus One doesn’t lack in the bells and whistles either. It has a 5-megapixel camera with LED flash, Wi-Fi connectivity, accelerometer, compass and proximity sensors. The phone is also reportedly extremely thin — slimmer than the iPhone and HTC’s Droid Eris.
Operating System

Nexus One will run Android 2.1, the latest version of the operating system. That is a step up from the Droid’s Android 2.0.

Android 2.1 will likely be snappier and have an improved user interface. Among the enhancements are a new widget for weather and news, a power control widget and a redesigned media gallery, says HTC Source, an unofficial site that tracks HTC news. It also includes support for multitouch, but that’s a feature that’s reportedly missing in the Nexus One.

Still the 2.1 version has largely consisted of “bug fixes.” At this point, we hope there’s more to the latest version of the OS than what we know so far.
Pricing

The Nexus One will be available on the T-Mobile network. Leaked documents suggest that the device will retail for $530 unlocked (though according to Engadget, it will not work on AT&T’s 3G network). The subsidized price of the Nexus phone will be $180 and customers will have to commit to a two-year contract. T-Mobile is expected to offer just one monthly plan for the phone — $80 for 500 minutes, free weekend and in-network calls and unlimited text messages and data.

The phone could start retailing as early as Tuesday through either T-Mobile or the Google website.

Overall, the Nexus One seems underwhelming. Sure, the phone is likely to be sleeker and faster than its peers, but there’s little to suggest that it will set a new standard for smartphones. Unless Google has a few surprises up in its sleeve — either in pricing or device capability — the Nexus One could get lost in the flood of Android devices currently hitting the market.

Firefox Tricks and tips

2010-01-04T18:02:00.000-08:00

Source: Stepcase Lifehack

Everybody’s favorite open-source browser, Firefox, is great right out of the box. And by adding some of the awesome extensions available out there, the browser just gets better and better.

But look under the hood, and there are a bunch of hidden (and some not-so-secret) tips and tricks available that will crank Firefox up and pimp your browser. Make it faster, cooler, more efficient. Get to be a Jedi master with the following cool Firefox tricks.

1) More screen space. Make your icons small. Go to View – Toolbars – Customize and check the “Use small icons” box.

2) Smart keywords. If there’s a search you use a lot (let’s say IMDB.com’s people search), this is an awesome tool that not many people use. Right-click on the search box, select “Add a Keyword for this search”, give the keyword a name and an easy-to-type and easy-to-remember shortcut name (let’s say “actor”) and save it. Now, when you want to do an actor search, go to Firefox’s address bar, type “actor” and the name of the actor and press return. Instant search! You can do this with any search box.

3) Keyboard shortcuts. This is where you become a real Jedi. It just takes a little while to learn these, but once you do, your browsing will be super fast. Here are some of the most common (and my personal favs):

* Spacebar (page down)
* Shift-Spacebar (page up)
* Ctrl+F (find)
* Alt-N (find next)
* Ctrl+D (bookmark page)
* Ctrl+T (new tab)
* Ctrl+K (go to search box)
* Ctrl+L (go to address bar)
* Ctrl+= (increase text size)
* Ctrl+- (decrease text size)
* Ctrl-W (close tab)
* F5 (reload)
* Alt-Home (go to home page)

4) Auto-complete. This is another keyboard shortcut, but it’s not commonly known and very useful. Go to the address bar (Control-L) and type the name of the site without the “www” or the “.com”. Let’s say “google”. Then press Control-Enter, and it will automatically fill in the “www” and the “.com” and take you there – like magic! For .net addresses, press Shift-Enter, and for .org addresses, press Control-Shift-Enter.

5) Tab navigation. Instead of using the mouse to select different tabs that you have open, use the keyboard. Here are the shortcuts:

* Ctrl+Tab (rotate forward among tabs)
* Ctrl+Shft+Tab (rotate to the previous tab)
* Ctrl+1-9 (choose a number to jump to a specific tab)

6) Mouse shortcuts. Sometimes you’re already using your mouse and it’s easier to use a mouse shortcut than to go back to the keyboard. Master these cool ones:

* Middle click on link (opens in new tab)
* Shift-scroll down (previous page)
* Shift-scroll up (next page)
* Ctrl-scroll up (decrease text size)
* Ctrl-scroll down (increase text size)
* Middle click on a tab (closes tab)

7) Delete items from address bar history. Firefox’s ability to automatically show previous URLs you’ve visited, as you type, in the address bar’s drop-down history menu is very cool. But sometimes you just don’t want those URLs to show up (I won’t ask why). Go to the address bar (Ctrl-L), start typing an address, and the drop-down menu will appear with the URLs of pages you’ve visited with those letters in them. Use the down-arrow to go down to an address you want to delete, and press the Delete key to make it disappear.

8) User chrome. If you really want to trick out your Firefox, you’ll want to create a UserChrome.css file and customize your browser. It’s a bit complicated to get into here, but check out this tutorial.

9) Create a user.js file. Another way to customize Firefox, creating a user.js file can really speed up your browsing. You’ll need to create a text file named user.js in your profile folder (see this to find out where the profile folder is) and see this example user.js file that you can modify. Created by techlifeweb.com, this example explains some of the things you can do in its comments.

10) about:config. The true power user’s tool, about.config isn’t something to mess with if you don’t know what a setting does. You can get to the main configuration screen by putting about:config in the browser’s address bar. See Mozillazine’s about:config tips and screenshots.

11) Add a keyword for a bookmark. Go to your bookmarks much faster by giving them keywords. Right-click the bookmark and then select Properties. Put a short keyword in the keyword field, save it, and now you can type that keyword in the address bar and it will go to that bookmark.

12) Speed up Firefox. If you have a broadband connection (and most of us do), you can use pipelining to speed up your page loads. This allows Firefox to load multiple things on a page at once, instead of one at a time (by default, it’s optimized for dialup connections). Here’s how:

* Type “about:config” into the address bar and hit return. Type “network.http” in the filter field, and change the following settings (double-click on them to change them):
* Set “network.http.pipelining” to “true”
* Set “network.http.proxy.pipelining” to “true”
* Set “network.http.pipelining.maxrequests” to a number like 30. This will allow it to make 30 requests at once.
* Also, right-click anywhere and select New-> Integer. Name it “nglayout.initialpaint.delay” and set its value to “0″. This value is the amount of time the browser waits before it acts on information it receives.

13) Limit RAM usage. If Firefox takes up too much memory on your computer, you can limit the amount of RAM it is allowed to us. Again, go to about:config, filter “browser.cache” and select “browser.cache.disk.capacity”. It’s set to 50000, but you can lower it, depending on how much memory you have. Try 15000 if you have between 512MB and 1GB ram.

14) Reduce RAM usage further for when Firefox is minimized. This setting will move Firefox to your hard drive when you minimize it, taking up much less memory. And there is no noticeable difference in speed when you restore Firefox, so it’s definitely worth a go. Again, go to about:config, right-click anywhere and select New-> Boolean. Name it “config.trim_on_minimize” and set it to TRUE. You have to restart Firefox for these settings to take effect.

15) Move or remove the close tab button. Do you accidentally click on the close button of Firefox’s tabs? You can move them or remove them, again through about:config. Edit the preference for “browser.tabs.closeButtons”. Here are the meanings of each value:

* 0: Display a close button on the active tab only
* 1:(Default) Display close buttons on all tabs
* 2:Don’t display any close buttons
* 3:Display a single close button at the end of the tab bar (Firefox 1.x behavior)

Got any favorite Firefox tips or tricks of your own? Let us know in the comments.

Mars rover Spirit, stuck

2010-01-04T13:33:00.000-08:00

Mars rover Spirit, stuck
Source: Yahoo! News

LOS ANGELES – Spirit has always been the unluckier of NASA's twin Mars rovers.

Just weeks after landing in a Martian crater in 2004, it went haywire and transmitted gibberish to Earth. Engineers eventually nursed it back to health.

As if the near-death experience wasn't enough, Spirit was upstaged early on by its twin Opportunity, which landed in a geologic gold mine and was the first to determine that the frigid, dusty planet possessed a wetter past.

Bad luck has fallen again on Spirit. As the workhorse rover marks its sixth year on the red planet on Sunday, it finds itself stuck in a sand trap, perhaps forever. The six-wheel robot geologist has been in jams before, but this is the worst predicament yet.

With Martian winter arriving in several months, Spirit may not have enough power to keep going unless scientists can point the solar-powered rover toward the sun.

Spirit "has always been our drama queen," chief scientist Steve Squyres of Cornell University said.

The latest misfortune occurred in April when Spirit, driving backward because of a lame wheel, broke through the crusty ground like a person falling through a frozen pond and became bogged in fluffy sand. Little progress has been made to free Spirit since.

NASA was dealt a major setback recently when another wheel appeared to have stopped moving, leaving Spirit with only four working wheels to plot its great escape.

"With only four driving wheels, it doesn't look good," project manager John Callas of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory said.

It's been a particularly rough year for Spirit. Besides getting stuck in a sand rut, it suffered sporadic bouts of amnesia and other woes including sudden computer reboots.

Though the prognosis of getting Spirit out looks bleak, scientists are not ready to give up yet. But if they exhaust all escape options, they will switch to Plan B and try to tilt the rover to the north where it can get more sunshine to keep running so that it can continue to do science in one spot.

"If we can't get the rover unstuck, it will become a Mars lander," Callas said.

Unlike a rover, which performs science experiments as it roams, a lander studies its surroundings while stationary.

Fortunately for researchers, what may turn out to be Spirit's final resting spot looks like a scientific bonanza. The sand is rich in sulfate, a mineral that forms in the presence of water, researchers say.

Originally designed as a three-month mission, Spirit and Opportunity have operated past their warranty. Since Spirit landed on Jan. 3, 2004, followed by Opportunity three weeks later, the rovers have driven a total of more than 16 miles, cresting hills and peering into craters.

Spirit and Opportunity are also closing in on the record for longest-running Mars surface mission currently held by the Viking 1 lander, which operated on the planet for six years and 116 days.

From the start, Spirit has had hard luck. Squyres, the mission's chief scientist, attributes part of that to geography.

Opportunity didn't have to work hard to impress scientists because it parachuted to an ancient lakebed awash with minerals that pointed to geologic evidence of past water. Spirit, on the other hand, touched down in the rugged lava plains of a crater on the opposite side of the planet and had to trek toward the hills to make discoveries.

"In order to get the science, we simply had to push Spirit harder," Squyres said.

There's one feat that Spirit achieved on its own. In 2005, it became the first robotic craft to scale an extraterrestrial hill as tall as the Statue of Liberty.

With Spirit immobile, it's still snapping pictures of its surroundings and sending data back to Earth. Spirit's next challenge will be surviving the upcoming Martian winter. Meanwhile, Opportunity has been busy grinding into a dark-toned rock that scientists think may be a stony meteorite.

On the Net:
Mars rovers site: http://marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov/home

Top Blog Directories with Page Rank

2010-01-03T13:56:00.000-08:00

Just a follow up to his Top 100 Tips, Jijo Sunny also posted links of blog directories:

List of Top Blog Directories with Page Rank

http://www.bloglines.com 9
http://www.technorati.com 8
http://www.blogpulse.com/index.html 7
http://www.blogdigger.com/index.html 7
http://www.getblogs.com/ 7
http://www.blogarama.com/ 7
http://www.blogcatalog.com/ 7
http://www.blogrankings.com/ 7
http://portal.eatonweb.com/ 7
http://blogstreet.com/ 7
http://www.blogflux.com/ 7
http://www.bloghub.com/ 7
http://dmoz.org/Computers/Internet/On_the_Web/Weblogs/ 6
http://blogs.botw.org/ 6
http://www.bloghop.com/ 6
http://www.blogtoplist.com/ 6
http://www.bloggernity.com/ 6
http://www.bloggeries.com/ 6
http://www.lsblogs.com/ 6
http://www.blog-search.com/ 6
http://www.britblog.com/ 6
http://www.weblogalot.com/ 6
http://www.globeofblogs.com/ 6
http://www.diarist.net/registry/ 6
http://www.bloguniverse.com/ 6
http://www.search4blogs.com/bloggers/index.php 6
http://www.top100bloggers.com/ 6
http://findingblog.com/ 6
http://www.blogsweet.com/ 6
http://www.delightfulblogs.com/ 6
http://www.bloogz.com/ 6
http://sportsblogs.org/ 6
http://www.blog-directory.org/index.php 6
http://www.readablog.com/default.aspx 5
http://www.iblogbusiness.com/ 5
http://www.all-blogs.net/ 5
http://www.bloglisting.com/ 5
http://www.blogdup.com/ 5
http://www.blogcode.com/index.php 5
http://blogannounce.info/ 5
http://www.sarthak.net/blogz/index.php 5
http://www.blogdirs.com/ 5
http://dir.yahoo.com/Internet/World_Wide_Web/Weblogs/ 5
http://www.addurlblog.com/ 5
http://www.5starblogs.com/ 5
http://www.blogtagstic.com/ 5
http://www.industry-blogs.com/ 5
http://www.blogbib.com/ 5
http://www.kmax.ws/bloglinks.htm 5
http://www.blogs-collection.com/ 5
http://www.blog-watch.com/ 5
http://www.geekyspeaky.com/links/ 5
http://www.blogdup.com 5
http://www.photoblogdirectory.net/ 5
http://blogsforsmallbusiness.com/directory/ 5
http://www.findory.com/blogs/ 5
http://www.thevital.net/ 5
http://www.highclassblogs.com/ 5
http://emarketingblogs.com/listings/index.shtml 5
http://jenett.org/ageless/ 5
http://www.bestblogs.org/ 5
http://www.grokodile.com/ 5
http://www.topblogsites.net/ 5
http://www.worldtopblogs.com 5
http://www.blogscholar.com/component/ 5
http://www.misohoni.com/bba/ 5
http://blogs.tomstopsites.com/ 5
http://www.chinabloglist.org/ 5
http://directory.etalkinghead.com/ 5

How to become successful in blogging

2010-01-03T13:49:00.000-08:00

Want to earn money while doing your favorite hobby -- blogging?

Jijo Sunny provided us his Top 100 Tips of All Time to a successful career.

You can find the article here

Most Popular and Weird Stories of 2009

2010-01-02T02:55:00.000-08:00

Sharks, Zombies, Weird Clouds: The Most Popular Stories of 2009
Source: Wired.com

This has been Wired Science’s most successful year, by far. We like to think this is the result of a combination of your excellent taste and our efforts to learn what you like to read.

We have often joked that the perfect Wired Science story is about robot sharks with lasers in space. While we haven’t gotten a chance to write that one just yet, looking at this list of our most popular stories of the year, we’ve come pretty close. Golden-silk-spinning spiders, the mathematics of zombies and weird clouds were all among your favorites.

10. Mysterious, Glowing Clouds Appear Across America’s Night Skies

Speaking of weird clouds, number 10 on our 2009 hit list is the mysterious appearance of noctilucent clouds in the night skies over the United States and Europe. These night-shining clouds typically form closer to the poles, but more frequent sightings in lower latitudes could be the result of human-caused climate change.

Image: The sky over Omaha on July 14, snapped by Mike Hollingshead at Extreme Instability

9. Astronauts Spot Mysterious Ice Circles in World’s Deepest Lake

Apparently our readers love a good mystery, judging from numbers 9 and 10 on our list. In April, astronauts on the International Space Station took this photograph of circular formations in the ice on the surface of Lake Baikal. Scientists later determined the strange circles were caused by methane rising from the lake bottom.

Image: NASA

8. 35 Years of the World’s Best Microscope Photography

Every year Nikon gives out its Small World awards to some of the best photomicrography of the year. Our collection of the top photos from each of the last 35 years was a big hit. This photo of a mouse colon took top honors in 2006.

Image: Mouse colon (740x), 2-Photon. / Paul L. Appleton, University of Dundee, UK. Courtesy of Nikon Small World.

7. Stunning Views of Glaciers Seen From Space

Every one of our posts of images of the Earth from space has been a hit. Surprisingly, glaciers turned out to be more popular than impact craters, open-pit mines, islands and even erupting volcanoes. Some of the other galleries would be on this list as well, but we’re letting the glaciers represent the whole series for the year.

This image of Bear Glacier in Alaska highlights the beautiful color of many glacial lakes caused by light reflecting off the silt that is finely ground away from the valley walls by the glacier and deposited in the lake.

Image: GeoEye/NASA, 2005

6. Mathematical Model for Surviving a Zombie Attack

Oh, yes, somebody actually did a study on mathematics of a hypothetical zombie attack. So, while we still don’t know what to do if an asteroid takes aim at Earth, we’re ready for marauding zombies. This study, done by scientists who use epidemiological models to study the spread of disease, was irresistibly funny.

Image: Mark Lobo Photography

5. Biggest Meteor Shower of the Year Peaks Tuesday Night

The only way to explain why this story about a meteor shower that occurs every year was so popular is that our readers love space. A lot. Any time we post the latest image from Hubble or Spitzer or Cassini, you ask for more. This story was just a quick reminder to look up at the sky and catch some Perseids.

Image: Flickr/Tommy Huynh

4. Enormous Shark’s Secret Hideout Finally Discovered

The basking shark’s giant, gaping maw makes it look far more dangerous than it is, but it’s still a shark. And who doesn’t love sharks? This story also had a mystery solved by scientists who managed to find the sneaky shark’s winter hideout in the Caribbean after 50 years of not knowing where the sharks disappeared to every year.

Image: Chris Gotshalk

3. Mysterious Tubular Clouds Defy Explanation

This photograph of crazy-looking roll clouds in Australia sparked a lot of discussion and led us to a scientist who did actually have an explanation for their formation. We also learned how interested our readers are in strange clouds, so we followed up with a gallery of some of the weirdest, along with explanations from cloud physicists.

Image: Mick Petroff/APOD

2. To Run Better, Start by Ditching Your Nikes

This story about the benefits of running barefoot, or nearly barefoot, outran all but one story this year. We think its appeal stemmed largely from the first-person account, from our esteemed Gadget Lab editor Dylan Tweney, who abandoned his trusted running shoes for bare skin or minimal cover. And also, this creepy photo of his gorilla feet in a pair of Vibram FiveFingers.

Image: Jon Snyder/Wired.com

1. One Million Spiders Make Golden Silk for Rare Cloth

One million spiders! It’s no surprise that this story tops our list for 2009. These guys built a replica of a turn-of-the-century 24-spider milking machine. That’s crazy, man.

It should also be noted that our top story came from our awesome intern Hadley Leggett. Our readers’ reaction to this story led us to ramp up our coverage of spiders, which culminated in the Wired Science Spider Awards.

Image: Flickr/mushi_king

2009 Top Scientific Breakthrough

2010-01-02T02:30:00.000-08:00

Top Scientific Breakthroughs of 2009
Source: Wired.com

With so many incredible scientific advances and discoveries this year, Wired Science had a tough time choosing which 10 were the biggest. So, we went with the ones that stood out for us. From the amazing collective power of jellyfish, to a new human ancestor, to a cancer-detecting breathalyzer test, these stories made our list of kick-ass science in 2009.

No. 10 Element 114 Confirmed

In a cyclotron at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, a beam of calcium atoms slammed into a plutonium target, producing a pair of element 114 atoms for the second time in human history. Years earlier, a Russian team made similar claims, but their accomplishment remained in doubt.

It turns out that the Russians were right. But their results were somewhat disappointing. Each atom lasted for only tenths of a second. An older generation of scientists had hoped that humanity would someday find a way to make extremely heavy elements that last a long time. That search continues.

Image: The backside of the 88-inch cyclotron at Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory./LBNL

No. 9 Progress Toward a Vaccine for Dengue Fever

Several vaccines for dengue fever, a disease that strikes roughly 230 million people each year, showed promise in preliminary human trials. Larger scale tests began this year, and researchers should know just how effective they are by 2012.

The most promising experimental vaccine is made by combining a crippled yellow fever virus with proteins that are produced by each variety of dengue fever. In theory, those proteins can train the immune system to recognize and attack the deadly microbes. Four thousand children in Thailand will get the shot, which may offer protection from all four types of the virus.

Earlier this year, researchers prematurely announced the first successful test of an HIV vaccine. They claimed that two ineffective vaccines could offer a modicum of protection when combined. But their analysis was too optimistic. Other scientists were quick to tear down the findings.

Image: Flickr/dr_relling

No. 8 Breathalyzer Detects Lung Cancer

Researchers at the Israel Institute of Technology in Haifa built a sensor that can smell cancer. It uses gold nanoparticles to check for a telltale set of volatile organic chemicals that are emitted by malignant cells. The device could be used to give patients an early warning that they have the disease, which should increase their odds of survival.

Each sensor has nine sets of gold nanoparticles. When those sensing elements come in contact with a particular chemical, their electrical resistance changes in a predictable manner.

Other researchers have developed similar gadgets, but they do not perform well in high humidity, and human breath is pretty moist. Mass spectrometers can also detect the distinctive aroma of melanoma or lung cancer, but they are bulky and not very user friendly.

Image: Israel Institute of Technology

No. 7 Computer Program Predicts Drug Side Effects

If you have a rare disease, don’t count on big drug companies to find a cure. Your best shot is to find out whether drugs that are already approved by the FDA for other purposes might work as a remedy for your illness.

This year, a team of researchers from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and the University of California, San Francisco developed a computer program to do that. Their software compares the shape of each drug to thousands of other drugs and natural chemicals, and uses that information to predict which biological buttons the drug can push. By looking at the constellation of proteins the drug affects, they can predict how it may affect the body.

The program could help big pharma too. Drug companies often spend millions of dollars testing the safety and effectiveness of a chemical, only to learn that it has unacceptable side effects or is useless. With this simulation technique, they could catch those problems sooner and avoid costly mistakes.

Image: Flickr/hate

No. 6 Jellyfish Stir Oceans

Until recently, marine animals were thought to play but a small part in stirring Earth’s waters. Scientists thought that hydrological friction would absorb the forces of flippers and fins, just as desk fans can’t stir air in buildings across the street.

But geophysicists underestimated the power of induced fluid drift, or the tendency of liquid to stick to a body as it moves through water. In what is almost certainly the most poetic discovery of 2009, studies now suggest that jellyfish may stir the oceans with as much power as winds and tides.

Image: flickr/impactmatt

No. 5 Bisphenol A in Plastics Harms Humans

For years, the plastic additive Bisphenol A was the center of a bitter environmental health battle. Researchers pointed to studies showing that its estrogen-mimicking qualities caused cancer and developmental damage in laboratory animals, and might do the same in people. Plastic manufacturers said animal tests were no substitute for human studies, which didn’t exist. The U.S. public — of whom 90 percent have detectable levels of BPA in their bodies — was caught in the crossfire.

In November, epidemiologists produced a study of BPA in humans. In 164 male Chinese factory workers exposed to high levels of BPA, severe sexual dysfunction was rampant. Their exposures were far higher than most people, but it can no longer be argued that BPA affects only lab animals, not people.

Image: flickr/ajschu

No. 4 Life Extension Breakthrough (for Rodents)

In the first major pharmaceutical extension of lifespan in a mammal, scientists gave elderly mice Rapamycin, an immunosuppressant used to slow cell growth in cancer patients. After taking the drug, the rodents lived a mouse equivalent of 13 extra years. Even longtime longevity-enhancement skeptics were stunned by the results, which were duplicated independently in multiple laboratories on different mouse strains, showing that whatever was responsible for the results wasn’t an accident.

There’s no way of knowing whether Rapamycin could theoretically extend human lifespans. Because of the drug’s severe side effects, it’s unlikely that anyone will try it. But the drug will be used in lab animals to investigate as-yet-unknown cellular mechanisms of aging, raising hopes that the human lifespan will someday be lengthened.

Image: flickr/peteredin

No. 3 Schizophrenia in the Genome

When the Human Genome Project was roughly completed in 1999, citizens and scientists alike expected that genetic explanations of complex diseases would soon follow. When this didn’t happen, researchers predicted that genome-wide association studies, which compare the genomes of thousands of people at a time, would find the genetic clues.

In July, three separate teams of researchers returned the results of just such a study for schizophrenia, a disease that had defied other attempts at genetic analysis. The researchers analyzed more than 50,000 genomes in their search for clear disease patterns. They didn’t find them. Instead they found approximately 10,000 genetic variants, each responsible for a miniscule percentage of disease risk. Some commentators likened the results to a genomic Pearl Harbor, or the Battle of Dunkirk.

But though the findings set back the notion that complicated diseases have simple genetic explanations, they were not a scientific setback. If anything, they were the opposite. Researchers are now embracing the complexity of disease, treating those genes — and others found in similarly baffling genomic studies — as threads leading them to as-yet-undiscovered biological networks and interactions.

After all, an answer in the form of a puzzle is still an answer.

Image: National Human Genome Research Institute.

No. 2 Ardi Usurps Lucy

Ever since a 3.2 million-year-old Australopithecus afarensis skeleton named Lucy was unearthed from an Ethiopian riverbed in 1974, humanity imagined that its first bipedal steps were taken on the savanna.

But in October, paleontologists unveiled Ardipithecus ramidus, or Ardi — an upright-walking primate who lived in Ethiopia a full million years before Lucy. But rather than dwelling in the savanna, Ardi evolved in light woodlands

Moreover, Ardi — the closest creature we have to the last common ancestor of humans and chimpanzees — looked far less chimplike than expected. It’s not just Homo sapiens who’ve evolved, it’s the other great apes too.

Whether Ardi falls directly on the evolutionary branch that produced humans, or belongs to an early offshoot, is still being argued. But there’s no argument about Ardi’s importance.

Image: Science

No. 1 Gene Therapy Makes a Comeback

This year, four teams of gene-therapy researchers had major victories in finding ways to safely treat human volunteers. Their success is all the sweeter after the years of tragedy and failure the field has suffered.

In 1999, 18-year-old Jesse Gelsinger died after receiving an experimental treatment for a liver disorder that wouldn’t have been fatal otherwise. His loss became a symbol of recklessness by genetics researchers. Several years later, five children developed leukemia after receiving a gene that was meant to boost their immune systems. To top it off, the first doctor to perform a gene-therapy procedure, French Anderson, is serving a lengthy prison sentence for child molestation.

Despite those setbacks, many scientists continued their work in the tumultuous area of research. Nanotech researchers concocted dozens of tiny particles that may be able to carry fragile DNA and RNA through the bloodstream and into the cells where they’re needed. Biologists have refined a method for clipping disease-causing DNA sequences out of any genome with extreme precision. But the greatest success this year belongs to doctors who treated blindness, brain disorders, immune system deficiencies and a severe skin condition with an array of different gene-therapy techniques.

Two boys with X-linked adrenoleukodystrophy, a disease that ravages the brain, are doing well after French doctors gave them a gene that helps to maintain the delicate myelin coating on their nerve cells. A woman with Pachyonychia Congenita, a painful skin condition, watched one of her sores fade after doctors switched off the offending protein with a newer kind of gene therapy called RNA interference. Twelve patients who were blinded by Leber’s congenital amaurosis showed signs of recovery after getting a genetic treatment in one of their eyes. Italian researchers announced that most of the 10 patients who received gene therapy for severe combined immunodeficiency, or “bubble boy disease,” are doing very well eight years after the procedure that repaired their defenses against infection.

Also this year, researchers at the University of Washington cured two adult monkeys of colorblindness by giving them injections of a gene that produces pigments necessary for color vision. After the treatment, the animals scored higher on a computerized color blindness test.

In the coming years, gene therapy will be tested as a remedy for all sorts of inherited diseases, cancer, viral infections and even high cholesterol.

Image: University of Washington

Philippine's Mayon Volcano

2009-12-28T14:17:00.000-08:00

Philippine's Mayon Volcano
Source: Yahoo! News

Glowing lava continues to cascade further down the slopes of Mayon volcano is seen in Padang town, Albay province, south of Manila December 28, 2009. The Mayon Volcano, known for its near-perfect cone shape in the coconut-growing central Bicol region, has been spewing ash and burning mud and rocks for more than a week. Officials have evacuated nearly 50,000 residents from around the base of the volcano.

Volunteers stack plastic bags of rice and canned goods prior to distributing them to Mayon volcano evacuees at Salvacion Elementary School which serves as a temporary shelter Monday Dec. 28, 2009 in Salvacion, Albay province, about 500 kilometers southeast of Manila, Philippines. More than 47,000 residents living around the extended 8-kilometer danger zone around the restive Mayon volcano are now housed in different evacuation centers and is likely to stay beyond the Christmas holidays since it began spewing ash and continuing lava flow Dec. 14.

China unveiled the world's fastest train

2009-12-28T14:01:00.000-08:00

BEIJING (AFP) – China on Saturday unveiled what it billed as the fastest rail link in the world -- a train connecting the modern cities of Guangzhou and Wuhan at an average speed of 350 kilometres (217 miles) an hour.

The super-high-speed train reduces the 1,069 kilometre journey to a three hour ride and cuts the previous journey time by more than seven and a half hours, the official Xinhua news agency said.

Work on the project began in 2005 as part of plans to expand a high-speed network aimed at eventually linking Guangzhou, a business hub in southern China near Hong Kong, with the capital Beijing, Xinhua added.

"The train can go 394.2 kilometres per hour, it's the fastest train in operation in the world," Zhang Shuguang, head of the transport bureau at the railways ministry, told Xinhua.

Test runs for the service began earlier in December and the link officially went into service when the first scheduled train left the eastern metropolis of Wuhan on Saturday.

By comparison, the average for high-speed trains in Japan was 243 kilometres per hour while in France it was 277 kilometres per hour, said Xu Fangliang, general engineer in charge of designing the link, according to Xinhua.

Beijing has an ambitious rail development programme aimed at increasing the national network from the current 86,000 kilometres to 120,000 kilometres, making it the most extensive rail system outside the United States.

China unveiled its first high-speed line at the time of the Beijing Olympics in 2008 -- a service linking the capital with the port city of Tianjin.

In September, officials said they planned to build 42 high-speed lines by 2012 in a massive system overhaul as part of efforts to spur economic growth amid the global downturn.

The network uses technology developed in co-operation with foreign firms such as Siemens, Bombardier and Alstom.

Top 10 Box Office Movies of 2009

2009-12-28T13:56:00.000-08:00

Top 10 Box Office Movies of 2009
Source: Yahoo! Movies

In 2009, giant robots, teen wizards and high-flying houses dominated the box office, with moviegoers flocking to theaters to the tune of over $10 billion in ticket sales. Here are the top ten highest grossing films at the domestic box office this year.

10. THE BLIND SIDE
Total Gross: $184,387,000

Boasting no explosions, CGI robots or vampires, but propelled by good word-of-mouth, this inspirational drama climbed its way into the number ten spot over the Christmas holiday weekend.

9. Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs
Total Gross: $196,573,705

Not only did the prehistoric critter crew return for their biggest box office outing yet, the third 'Ice Age' adventure conquered the number 2 spot at the worldwide box office with a massive $883.7 million.

8. Monsters Vs. Aliens
Total Gross: $198,351,526

In a crowded field of animated titles this year, this monstrous adventure towered over the pack, stepping into the top ten with one of the biggest spring opening weekends ever.

7. AVATAR
Total Gross: $212,268,000

Arguably one of the most anticipated movies of the decade, director James Cameron's visionary sci-fi epic leaped into the top ten during the final weeks of the year.

6. Star Trek
Total Gross: $257,730,019

Live long and propser! Director J.J. Abrams' bold re-imagining of the classic sci-fi franchise proved popular with both old and new fans alike, easily grossing more than any previous Star Trek movie.

5. The Hangover
Total Gross: $277,322,503

Easily the surprise breakout hit of the summer, this tawdry tale of the ultimate Vegas bachelor party gone wrong defied all expectations to become the number one R-rated comedy of all time.

4. The Twilight Saga: New Moon
Total Gross: $280,924,000

Hot off the success of 2008's 'Twilight,' the second installment of Stephanie Meyers' supernatural romance saga wolfed down a record-breaking $72,703,754 for the highest opening day earnings of all time.

3. UP
Total Gross: $293,004,164

The animation wizards at Pixar did it again, soaring to number three, nabbing the studio its second highest grossing movie ever (behind Finding Nemo), and becoming the highest grossing 3D movie of all time.

2. HARRY POTTER AND THE HALF-BLOOD PRINCE
Total Gross: $301,959,197

The popular teen wizard returned for his sixth year at Hogwarts to grab second place, but cast a powerful spell on the worldwide box office, taking the top spot with a magical $929.4 million.

1. TRANSFORMERS: REVENGE OF THE FALLEN
Total Gross: $402,111,870

Autobots battled Decepticons to the top of the box office, not only becoming the top earning movie of the year, but also firmly planting itself at number 9 among the top ten highest domestic grossing films of all time.

Record-breaking box office

2009-12-28T02:17:00.000-08:00

Record-breaking box office
Source: Yahoo! Movies

NEW YORK - It was a memorable and merry Christmas in Hollywood as moviegoers shattered box-office records, responding in droves to a diverse array of high-profile releases over the holiday weekend.

The estimated $278 million in weekend box-office revenue broke the previous record of roughly $253 million set in July 2008, the weekend "The Dark Knight" was released.

A diverse group of films drew throngs to the multiplexes: James Cameron's "Avatar" pushed strongly into its second week while "Sherlock Holmes," "Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel" and "It's Complicated" all opened.

"Avatar," the 3-D epic, topped them all, earning $75 million for 20th Century Fox, according to studio estimates Sunday. Remarkably, that was only a 3 percent drop from its opening weekend total of $77.4 million. (Blockbusters typically drop 30-50 percent in the second weekend.) In its 10 days of release, "Avatar" has made $212 million domestically — and could be on its way to a worldwide gross of over $1 billion.

"This thing is going to be playing and playing, I can tell you that," said Bert Livingston, 20th Century Fox distribution executive. "There's a lot of business out there. Everybody's got good movies out."

In second was "Sherlock Holmes," Guy Ritchie's reboot of the franchise with Robert Downey Jr. starring as Arthur Conan Doyle's detective. The Warner Bros. film opened with a weekend total of $65.4 million, including a record Christmas Day debut of $24.9 million.

It was a start that seemed sure to pave the way for sequels. Dan Fellman, head of distribution for Warner Bros., called the result "sensational."

"Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel," which opened Wednesday, took in $50.2 million on the weekend and $77.1 million in its five days of release. The film, also from Fox, earned an impressive $18.8 million on Wednesday alone. The strong start suggested that "Squeakquel" was likely to surpass its 2007 original, which made $217 million.

Also opening was Nancy Meyer's "It's Complicated," the romantic comedy starring Meryl Streep, Alec Baldwin and Steve Martin. With an audience 72 percent female, the Universal film took in $22.1 million, a solid debut.

The sparkling Christmas weekend results spelled good things for all the films in release in the coming week — one of the most lucrative of the year.

"We all know what next week means to the industry. This is ... huge," said Nikki Rocco, head of distribution for Universal. "Christmas is past us. No more shopping, no more returning. College kids are home. ... I'm so optimistic about what the next weekend holds for us."

Said Livingston: "Starting this Monday, every day is a Saturday."

Two films with Oscar aspirations also released wide over the weekend: Jason Reitman's "Up in the Air" (Paramount) and Rob Marshall's "Nine" (Weinstein Co.).

"Up in the Air," which has some of the best awards momentum, grossed $11.8 million, bringing its cumulative total to $24.5 million — already nearly earning back its production budget.

"For us, this movie was always the movie that we felt was going to be a real focus during the awards season," said Rob Moore, Paramount vice chairman. "It feels like this should have a long run as awards season continues."

"Nine," the adaptation of the Broadway musical (which itself was a riff of Federico Fellini's classic film "8 1/2") earned $5.5 million in 1408 theaters.

"It's an absolutely fitting end to the biggest box office year of all time," said Paul Dergarabedian, box-office analyst for Hollywood.com. "It's just been a total roller coaster ride. It's like audience members are on board."

2009 still has several days to go, but the year is already a record for domestic ticket sales with more than $10 billion at the box office. That surpassed the $9.7 billion mark of 2007.

While some of the credit has to go the recession (movies historically do well in hard times when a trip to the movie theater is a relatively cheap form of entertainment and escapism), there was a feeling Sunday that Hollywood had put forth a better product this Christmas.

"People say it's the recession," said Dergarabedian. "It's the movies — it's really the movies. It seems like when people aren't at home, they're at the movies."

He added: "You're going to find a smile on the face of every studio chief out there today."

Hollywood also seemed to be offering good ol' spectacle to moviegoers. "Avatar" grossed $8.8 million in IMAX theaters, actually increasing from its opening weekend. IMAX chairman and president Greg Foster said they were operating essentially at capacity.

"There is no context," said Foster. "It's so far beyond where we've ever been. It's not eking past a record, it's shattering it."

Christmas weekend was also neatly organized around various demographics. There was science-fiction, romantic comedy, family fare, action-packed thriller and serious awards-contender.

"That's what fueled this Christmas, the diversity of the films," said Dergarabedian. "It was like a cinematic buffet line. If you can't find a movie that you like in the marketplace right now, you don't like movies."

Estimated ticket sales for Friday through Sunday at U.S. and Canadian theaters, according to Hollywood.com. Final figures will be released Monday.

1. "Avatar," $75 million.

2. "Sherlock Holmes," $65.4 million.

3. "Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel," $50.2 million.

4. "It's Complicated," $22.1 million.

5. "Up in the Air," $11.8 million.

6. "The Blind Side," $11.7 million.

7. "The Princess and the Frog," $8.7 million.

8. "Nine," $5.5 million.

9. "Did You Hear About the Morgans?" $5 million.

10. "Invictus," $4.4 million.

Baby funny video

2009-12-28T00:46:00.000-08:00

Funny baby video

Watch how this cute baby shows off her lips talent while making sounds and expressing herself! Have fun and enjoy!

How to embed ads within blogger post

2009-12-27T15:05:00.000-08:00

How to embed google adsense within blogger post

Scenario:
You have a blogger account and you want to insert google ads within the content or article, but you don't how to do it.

Solution complexity:
Very Easy!!!

Procedures:
1. Generate google adsense code. It is recommended to use large or medium rectangle.
2. Modify adsense code before embedding. Your code should look something like this:

Note: Replace the highlighted text with your own code.

3. Edit the blogger template. Open your Blogger HTML template editor, then click on "Expand widget template". Find "data:post.body" code on your Blogger HTML template and put your google adsense code before "<" or after ">".

Have fun and enjoy!!!!

De La Salle University

2009-12-26T15:31:00.001-08:00

De La Salle University
Source: Wikipedia

De La Salle University is a Catholic private university located in Taft Avenue in the district of Malate in Manila, run by the Brothers of the Christian Schools. It is the oldest campus of De La Salle Philippines, a system composed of 17 Lasallian institutions in the Philippines established in 2006 to replace the De La Salle University System. The university draws inspiration from the life and works of the institution's founder, Saint John Baptist de La Salle.

It is the first of only two private universities(the other one being Ateneo de Manila University) in the Philippines to earn a Level IV accreditation—the highest possible level—granted by the Philippine Accrediting Association of Schools, Colleges, and Universities (PAASCU).[4]

Twelve fields have been accredited by the Commission on Higher Education as Centers of Excellence, two of which are lone awardees. Additionally, four are accredited as Centers of Development. It is selected by ASEAN along with the University of the Philippines and the Ateneo de Manila University to be part of the ASEAN University Network. The university, together with the Ateneo de Manila University, established the Asian Institute of Management.

It offers programs in undergraduate and graduate levels covering various fields in business and economics, engineering, the sciences, liberal arts, education and computer studies.

University of Santo Tomas

2009-12-26T15:23:00.000-08:00

University of Santo Tomas
Source: Wikpedia

The Pontifical and Royal University of Santo Tomas, The Catholic University of the Philippines (or simply UST or affectionately, "Ustê". Filipino: Unibersidad ng Santo Tomas), is a private Roman Catholic university run by the Order of Preachers in Manila. Founded on April 28, 1611 by archbishop Miguel de Benavides, it has the oldest extant university charter in the Philippines and in Asia.[1][2] and is one of the world's largest Catholic universities in terms of enrollment found on one campus.[3][4] UST is also the largest university in the city of Manila. Having the distinction as the only Pontifical University in Asia,[5][6] UST is the only university, Catholic or not, to have been visited by two popes three times: once by Pope Paul VI on Nov. 28, 1970, and twice by Pope John Paul II on Feb. 18, 1981 and January 13, 1995.[7]

The University is composed of several autonomous faculties, colleges, schools and institutes, each conferring undergraduate, graduate and postgraduate degrees, and the basic education units. Several degrees have been accredited by the Commission on Higher Education as Centers of Excellence and Centers of Development.

The Patron of the University is St. Thomas Aquinas, while St. Catherine of Alexandria is the Patroness.[8]

Prominent Thomasians include saints, Philippine presidents, heroes, artists, scientists, professionals and religious figures, who have figured prominently in the history of the Philippines. The athletic teams are the Growling Tigers, members of the University Athletic Association of the Philippines and are consistent winners of the Overall Championship.

Britney Spears Music Video - I'm a Slave For You

2009-12-26T15:07:00.000-08:00

Britney Spears Music Video:

Im A Slave For You
Britney Spears
(Now Thats What I Call Music 9)

I know I may be young, but I've got feelings too.
And I need to do what I feel like doing.
So let me go and just listen.

All you people look at me like I'm a little girl.
Well did you ever think it be okay for me to step into this world.

Always saying little girl don't step into the club.
Well I'm just tryin' to find out why cause dancing's what I love.

Get it get it, get it get it (WHOOOA)
Get it get it, get it get it (WHOOOOOA) (Do you like it)
Get it get it, get it get it (OOOHHHH) (This feels good)

I know I may come off quiet, I may come off shy.
But I feel like talking, feel like dancing when I see this guy.

What's practical is logical. What the hell, who cares?
All I know is I'm so happy when you're dancing there.

I'm a slave for you. I cannot hold it; I cannot control it.
I'm a slave for you. I won't deny it; I'm not trying to hide it.

Baby, don't you wanna, dance upon me,
(I just wanna dance next to you)
To another time and place.
Baby, don't you wanna, dance upon me,
(Are you ready)
Leaving behind my name, my age.
(Lets go)

(Like that)
(You like it)
(Now watch me)

Get it get it, get it get it (WHOOOA)
Get it get it, get it get it (WHOOOOOA)
Get it get it, get it get it (OOOHHHH)
(Panting)

I really wanna dance, tonight with you.
(I just can't help myself)
I really wanna do what you want me to.
(I just feel I let myself go)

I really wanna dance, tonight with you.
(Wanna see you move)
I really wanna do what you want me to.
(Uh Uh Uh)

Baby, don't you wanna, dance upon me,
(I just wanna dance next to you)
To another time and place.
Baby, don't you wanna, dance upon me,
(Are you ready)
Leaving behind my name, my age.

I'm a slave for you. (Take that) I cannot hold it; I cannot control it.
I'm a slave (It just feels right) for you. (It just feels good)
I won't deny it; I'm not trying to hide it. (Baby)

Get it get it, get it get it (WHOOOA)
Get it get it, get it get it (WHOOOOOA)
Get it get it, get it get it (OOOHHHH)
(Panting)

Get it get it, get it get it (WHOOOA)
Get it get it, get it get it (WHOOOOOA)
Get it get it, get it get it (OOOHHHH)
(Panting)

I'm a slave for you. (Here we go now)
I cannot hold it; I cannot control it.
I'm a slave for you. (Here we go) I won't deny it, (Yeah)
I'm not trying to hide it.

(Like that)

7 Tipping Points That Could Transform Earth

2009-12-26T03:37:00.000-08:00

7 Tipping Points That Could Transform Earth
Source: Wired.com

Image: Earth’s Eastern and Western Hemispheres/NASA.

When the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change issue its last report in 2007, environmental tipping points were a footnote. A troubling footnote, to be sure, but the science was relatively new and unsettled. Straightforward global warming was enough to worry about.

But when the IPCC meets in 2014, tipping points — or tipping elements, in academic vernacular — will get much more attention. Scientists still disagree about which planetary systems are extra-sensitive to climate shifts, but the possibility can’t be ignored.

“The problem with tipping elements is that if any of them tips, it will be a real catastrophe. None of them are small,” said Anders Levermann, a climate physicist at the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research in Germany.

Levermann’s article on potential disruptions of South Asia’s monsoon cycles was featured in a series of tipping element research reviews, published December 8 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Also discussed were ocean circulation, polar icecaps, Amazon rainforests, seafloor methane deposits and a west African dustbowl. Each is stressed by rising planetary temperatures. Some are less likely than others to tip; some might not be able to tip at all. Ambiguities, probabilities a limited grasp of Earth’s complex systems are inherent to the science. But if any tip, it will be an epic disaster.

Wired Science takes you on a tour.

Polar Sea Ice

Dwindling Arctic sea ice and crumbling Antarctic ice sheets are now a common sight. Whether they signal an impending tip, with rapid melts causing Earth’s seas to inundate heavily-populated coastal plains, is debated.

The process appears to accelerate itself: Warming ice melts, which exposes darker areas, causing local temperatures to rise further. But in the Arctic, another feedback may stabilize the ice, wrote Max Planck Institute meteorologist Dirk Notz in PNAS. Though most of the ice “will disappear during summer,” much of it will re-freeze in the winter. Arctic sea ice loss “is likely to be reversible if the climate were to become cooler again.”

But Notz is less optimistic about Antarctic sea ice, its undersides heated by eddying Southern Ocean currents. And the West Antarctic and Greenland ice sheets have shrunk suddenly at least twice in the last several million years, a behavior that’s backed up by climate models. It’s “well possible that a tipping point exists for a possible collapse” for those sheets, wrote Notz. It could “render the loss of ice sheets and the accompanying sea-level rise unstoppable beyond a certain amount of warming.”

Amazon Rainforest

As one of Earth’s great carbon sinks, the replacement of Amazon jungles with savannah or forest would drastically accelerate global warming.

On their own, rising temperatures and changing weather patterns would not trigger jungle dieback, wrote researchers led by Oxford University ecosystem scientist Yadvinder Malhi in PNAS. But deforestation combined with intensified dry seasons leaves forests vulnerable to fire, producing more weather-altering deforestation.

“The dieback of the forests of East Amazonia in the 21st century is far from inevitable but remains a distinct possiblity,” they wrote.

Bodélé Depression, Chad

Winds whipping across the Bodélé, a 10,000 square mile Saharan plain covered by ancient lakebed sediments, carry 700,000 tons of dust into the atmosphere annually. It floats around the world, blocking sunlight and lowering temperatures in some regions, and causing rain and warming in others. Saharan dust influences Atlantic ecosystems, Caribbean coral reefs and the Amazon. Its full effects are unknown.

Small atmospheric changes “could profoundly alter the behavior of this feature,” wrote Richard Washington, a specialist in African weather African weather specialist at Oxford University, and colleagues in PNAS.

At one point in the last 10,000 years, dust ceased to flow altogether from the Bodélé. That doesn’t seem to be our problem. “Although subject to a great deal of uncertainty, some simulations of the 21st century indicate the potential for a substantial increase in dust production,” wrote the researchers.

South Asian Monsoons

Hundreds of millions of people depend on regular monsoon rains to nourish their crop, but the monsoons are historically capricious. In what is now India and China, they’ve have changed abruptly several times since the Last Ice Age ended.

Levermann’s studies suggest that monsoon systems amplify themselves. Rainfall releases heat, fueling winds that pull more moisture from the seas, producing more rainfall. Small changes can swell monsoons, or nip them in the bud.

The model is limited, but its simulations track with history. “We have a long paleorecord for precipitation, and you see that there was almost a switch. The monsoon was either on, or it was off, with very little in between,” said Levermann. Climate change can flip the switch, but it’s not the only cause. “If you turn a forest into a desert, it reflects more sunlight and makes it cooler. Strong air pollution reflects sunlight, and can trigger an event. Both exist in Indian and Chinese regions.”

The Gulf Stream

Formally known as the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation, or AMOC, the Gulf Stream starts in the Gulf of Mexico and follows the eastern contour of North America before flowing to northern Europe and western Africa. Sudden slowdowns in the circuation occurred repeatedly during the last Ice Age. They “were associated with large and abrupt changes in surface climate,” wrote Potsdam Institute climatologists Matthias Hofmann and Stefan Rahmstorf in PNAS

Argument exists over whether slowdowns are primarily wind-driven, or could be caused by an influx of fresh water from melting ice sheets. In its last report, the IPCC put the risk of Gulf Stream slowdown during the 21st century at 10 percent. The true figure could be higher, or lower. “Model deficiences make a risk assessment for AMOC changes very difficult at present and require urgent research attention,” wrote Hofmann and Rahmstorf.

Image: Models showing AMOC weakening from fresh water influx/National Center for Atmospheric Research

Image: Methane plumes rising from the Arctic Ocean floor/National Oceanography Centre, Southampton.

Seafloor Methane

Between 700 trillion and 10,000 trillion tons of methane hydrate, a powerful greenhouse gas, are trapped in the seafloor sediments where they’ve accumulated over millions of years. If the planet heats by 5.4 degrees Fahrenheit, well within the range of warming possible if greenhouse gas pollution levels remain high, seafloors could heat enough to release a small but significant fraction of the gases.

Methane bubbling slowly into the atmosphere could raise planetary temperatures by a full degree Fahrenheit for as much as 10,000 years. According to researchers led by University of Chicago geoscientist David Archer, methane-caused warming would persist even if fossil fuel emissions subsided.

“The modeling of methane hydrate is frankly in its infancy,” but it seems “robust to conclude” that mankind could “melt a significant fraction of the methane hydrates in the ocean,” they wrote.

Image: An ensemble of global temperature predictions contained in the last IPCC report/IPCC.

The Future

“What features establish the identity of a face; what distortions erase that identity beyond recognition?” asked Hans Schellnhuber, director of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Research and climate change advisor to German chancellor Angela Merkel, in PNAS.

By Earth’s face, Schellnhuber means the environmental conditions that prevailed for most of the last several thousand years. If there’s one dominant theme to the tipping element reviews, it’s that Earth’s face is prone to what he calls “singular transformations.” They’ve happened before.

Whether they will happen again, with mankind on board, is the “cardinal question of earth systems analysis [and] sustainability science,” wrote Schellnhuber.

How admittedly uncertain models should influence international climate policy is an open question. Levermann counsels caution.

“If you entered a plane and the captain said into the speaker, ‘There’s a 10 percent chance this plane will crash,’ you wouldn’t stay in it,” said Levermann. “This is the framework we have to think about when we talk about tipping elements.”

First Functional Molecular Transistor Comes Alive

2009-12-26T03:26:00.000-08:00

First Functional Molecular Transistor Comes Alive
Source: Wired.com

Nearly 62 years after researchers at Bell Labs demonstrated the first functional transistor, scientists say they have made another major breakthrough.

Researchers showed the first functional transistor made from a single molecule. The transistor, which has a benzene molecule attached to gold contacts, could behave just like a silicon transistor.

The molecule’s different energy states can be manipulated by varying the voltage applied to it through the contacts. And by manipulating the energy states, researchers were able to control the current passing through it.

The transistor, or semiconductor device that can amplify or switch electrical signals, was first developed to replace vacuum tubes. On Dec. 23, 1947, John Bardeen and Walter Brattain (who’d built on research by colleague William Shockley) showed a working transistor that was the culmination of more than a decade’s worth of effort.

Vacuum tubes were bulky and unreliable, and they consumed too much power. Silicon transistors addressed those problems and ushered in an era of compact, portable electronics.

Now molecular transistors could escalate the next step of developing nanomachines that would take just a few atoms to perform complex calculations, enabling massive parallel computers to be built.

The team, which includes researchers from Yale University and the Gwangju Institute of Science and Technology in South Korea, published their findings in the Dec. 24 issue of the journal Nature.

For about two decades — since Mark Reed, a professor of engineering and applied science at Yale, showed that individual molecules could be trapped between electrical contacts — researchers have been trying to create a functional molecular transistor.

Some of the challenges they have faced include being able to fabricate the electrical contacts on such small scales, identifying the molecules to use, and figuring out where to place them and how to connect them to the contacts.

“There were a lot of technological advances and understanding we built up over many years to make this happen,” says Reed.

Despite the significance of the latest breakthrough, practical applications such as smaller and faster molecular computers could be decades away, says Reed.

“We’re not about to create the next generation of integrated circuits,” he says. “But after many years of work gearing up to this, we have fulfilled a decade-long quest and shown that molecules can act as transistors.”

Photo: A benzene molecule can be manipulated to act as a traditional transistor
Courtesy: Hyunwook Song and Takhee Lee

Earthquakes on San Andreas Fault

2009-12-26T03:23:00.005-08:00

Tidal Forces Trigger Tremors on San Andreas Fault
Source: Wired.com

The subtle changes in stress caused by tides in Earth’s crust can trigger small, deep quakes along a seismically active portion of California’s San Andreas fault, a new analysis suggests.

sciencenewsThe same forces of attraction that cause ocean tides also cause tides in Earth’s rocks, says Amanda Thomas, a seismologist at the University of California, Berkeley. And although the continual variations in rock stress associated with those tides are minuscule, they apparently are big enough to trigger small tremors along some faults, Thomas and Berkeley colleagues Robert M. Nadeau and Roland Bürgmann report in the Dec. 24/31 Nature.

Evidence for the claim comes from earthquake data collected near Cholame, Calif., a tiny town near the southeastern end of a portion of the San Andreas fault where small, deep tremors are common. The study focused on a 110-kilometer-square area around the town where more than 1,700 minor quakes occurred between July 2001 and May 2008, Thomas says.

When analyzing these quakes, she and her colleagues found that the mini-temblors were much more likely to occur at times when tidal stresses tended to shear the fault in the direction that it normally breaks — that is, when the Pacific tectonic plate is being pulled to the north-northwest relative to the North American tectonic plate, which lies to the east of the fault. In a sense, the added stress on a fault poised to slip acts like the straw that breaks the camel’s back.

When tidal stresses act in the other direction and therefore tend to relieve stress on the fault, the frequency of small quakes drops substantially.

The fault’s extreme sensitivity to small changes in stress suggests that the deep portions of the fault where these small quakes occur is well lubricated, probably by water that is under exceedingly high pressure, the researchers suggest.

Previous studies bolster the notion that small changes in stress along faults can set off earthquakes. In December 2004, seismic waves spreading from the tsunami-spawning temblor that occurred off the west coast of Indonesia triggered a flurry of small quakes near Alaska’s Mount Wrangell, a quarter of the way around the globe (SN: 8/27/05, p. 136).

Image: USGS

How to focus a camera

2009-12-26T03:13:00.000-08:00

How to focus a camera
Source: Wired.com

There's more to focusing your camera than just making sure objects are sharp. In fact, focus is one of the primary ways to lead the viewer's eye through an image. Getting a scene focused just right depends on the scene and your camera.

While there are no hard and fast rules to focusing, we'll take a look here at some common situations and give you tips on how to make your photos draw the viewer in and give them a deeper connection to the image.

For simplicity, we'll assume you're using the auto-focus features on your camera.

Not all auto-focus is created equal

Auto-focus tools vary by camera manufacturer, but generally most include several modes like area, spot and continuous. Each has it's advantages and disadvantages:

1. Area (sometimes called multiarea)

Chances are this is default setting and what you've been using. With Area auto focusing the camera automatically focuses using multiple focus points. Think of this as the camera taking an average of your scene and then trying to find the focal point that holds most things in focus. Although it's the default, area focus tends to be the least accurate of auto focus modes. Recommended for: landscapes, scenes where there isn't a large of depth of field.

2. Spot focus

In this mode your camera will focus on a spot at the center of the screen. How large of a spot depends on the camera, but most offer a visual guide that shows the spot area when you look through the viewfinder (or the screen if your camera doesn't have a viewfinder). Spot focus allows for the most control and, when combined with a half-press of the shutter button, can be used the keep foreground objects in focus and blur the background for a nice effect. Recommended for: almost anything, spot focus is really the best option in most cases.

3. Continuous auto-focus

Generally used with moving subjects, continuous auto focus allows you to keep a primary subject in focus against a changing background. This mode can be very helpful, but is typically only found in high-end DSLRs. Still, if you have it continuous auto focus it's worth exploring. Recommended for: sporting events and other situations where your subject is moving.

Common photo situations

1. Portraits

The common wisdom of portrait photography is to make sure the subject's eyes are sharply in focus. In addition to focusing on the eyes, use a large aperture (f/2.8-f/1.4) to decrease depth of field and maximize the effect of the sharply focused eyes.

2. Landscapes

If you want the whole scene in sharp focus, chose a very small aperture (f/16 or higher if you have it) and focus on the middle or back of the scene. If you'd like a sharp foreground with a soft background, focus on the foreground and open up the aperture a bit more to allow the background to blur.

3. Combinations

Sometimes called an "environmental portrait" the combination of a portrait-style subject in a larger landscape is probably the most common situation you'll find yourself capturing. The trick here is to make sure that the primary point of interest is in focus. If that's a person against a landscape use a fast shutter to make sure the person doesn't blur through motion and again, try to keep the eyes in focus. If you want a softer subject against a sharp background, do the opposite, focusing on the background and using a middle of the road aperture to let the person soften a bit.

4. Macros

Macros are extreme close-ups -- the center of a flower, detail of wood grain and so on. Macros generally require either a special lens or a macro focus mode. Due to the extreme depth of field in such a small area you'll want to use a small aperture and probably use a tripod since the combination of close-up and small aperture mean less light and longer shutter times.

In the future

IntelAuto-focus keeps improving with each new round of cameras and new modes using ever more sophisticated algorithms are always trying to do the hard work for you. Still, no amount of technology will ever be able to exactly anticipate the way you want your photos to look. It will, however, be significantly easier and faster to get the focus you want out of tomorrow's cameras.

Manny Pacquiao vs. Floyd Mayweather Jr. fight

2009-12-26T02:22:00.000-08:00

Source: Yahoo! Sports

Negotiations to finalize a lucrative boxing match between Manny Pacquiao and Floyd Mayweather Jr. took another bizarre twist Friday as Pacquiao threatened libel lawsuits and the chief executive officer of Golden Boy Promotions was accused of telling a Filipino journalist that Pacquiao is using performance-enhancing drugs.

Pacquiao promoter Bob Arum said Friday that reporter Ronnie Nathanielsz of the Manila Standard told him that in September, Nathanielsz was in the Golden Boy offices in Los Angeles when Richard Schaefer accused Pacquiao of using PEDs.

Schaefer, whose company is representing Mayweather in a fight expected to be the largest-grossing in history, recalls meeting Nathanielsz in his downtown Los Angeles office but denied the allegations.

Popular Yahoo! Sports StoriesNFL player's shoe gaffe turns into big gift NBA star had guns in his locker More From Kevin IolePacquiao-Malignaggi match could stop superfight Dec 24, 2009 Fight flap puts spotlight on boxing's problems Dec 24, 2009 ADVERTISEMENT

Manny Pacquiao denies taking steroids.

(Ethan Miller/Getty)
Nathanielsz, whose newspaper has not reported the alleged conversation, declined via email to comment.

Talks to finalize the bout between the two best pound-for-pound fighters in the world hit a snag on Tuesday when Mayweather issued a statement demanding “Olympic-style drug testing” administered by the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency. Top Rank, on behalf of Pacquiao, declined and the sides have exchanged bitter words since.

On Friday, Arum said he spoke on the telephone late Thursday with Winchell Campos, a Pacquiao publicist. Arum said Campos told him Pacquiao planned to file a lawsuit against Mayweather, Mayweather Sr., Golden Boy Promotions and Schaefer for allegations Pacquiao says they made without evidence that he is on performance-enhancing drugs.

Arum said he tried to talk Campos out of issuing a statement from Pacquiao announcing plans for the suit. But Arum said Campos then put Pacquiao on the telephone and that Pacquiao was as angry as he has ever heard him.

“Manny is usually this mild-mannered guy, but he was unbelievably angry,” Arum said. “I never heard him like that. He told me to make it stop. This was a different Manny than I’d ever heard. When I hung up, I said, ‘What the hell was that about?’ ”

When he spoke to Nathanielsz by telephone 30 minutes later, Arum said Nathanielsz recounted a meeting in Schaefer’s downtown Los Angeles office in the buildup to the Sept. 19 fight in Las Vegas between Mayweather Jr. and Juan Manuel Marquez in which he alleged that Schaefer told him Pacquiao was using performance-enhancing drugs.

Arum, who flew to Mexico on Friday for a week-long vacation, said Nathanielsz’s comments clarified things for him. He said he had been puzzled by Mayweather Sr.’s public allegations against Pacquiao, but said they began to make sense after speaking with Nathanielsz.

“Ronnie said he came over early for the [Mayweather-Marquez] fight and he met with Schaefer,” Arum said. “He said they met for a half hour and that Schaefer went on and on and on that Manny is a cheater and that Manny uses steroids and that Manny was on performance-enhancing drugs.

“Ronnie asked him, ‘Why would you take this attitude with this young man?’ Ronnie told me he thinks Schaefer is pissed off that Manny chose us over Golden Boy, though Schaefer is happy to take the money.”

Pacquiao signed promotional contracts with both Golden Boy and Top Rank in 2006. Golden Boy president Oscar De La Hoya met Pacquiao at Los Angeles International Airport and gave him a suitcase filled with $250,000 in cash, which Pacquiao later was forced to return, as an inducement to sign.

Lawsuits were filed and the matter was eventually settled in arbitration by retired judge Daniel Weinstein. Weinstein ruled Pacquiao would be promoted by Top Rank, but that Golden Boy is entitled to a percentage of profits in perpetuity from all Pacquiao fights as long as Top Rank had Pacquiao under contract.

Arum said he has asked his attorneys to have the arbitration reopened and have Golden Boy eliminated since Schaefer’s actions were not in the fighter’s best interests.

Schaefer said Nathanielsz has had a good relationship with Golden Boy, particularly with its matchmaker, Eric Gomez. Schaefer admitted he hosted Nathanielsz in his office, but denied he made any accusations about Pacquiao and performance-enhancing drugs.

“I would never accuse anybody of anything and those who know me know that’s just not the way I am,” Schaefer said Friday. “I would never go and allege anybody is doing anything, so that is absolutely not true that I would have said to anybody that Manny is cheating. I didn’t.

“We have a pretty good relationship with Ronnie. I think Eric does. He came to see our offices, but there was no accusation of cheating. And in this process, over the last few days or weeks, not once did you hear me say, to you or to anyone else, that I am accusing Manny of taking anything or doing anything illegal.”

Schaefer also questioned why, if Nathanielsz had such information, that he had not reported it.

Mayweather Sr. began inferring that he suspected Pacquiao was on steroids or some other performance-enhancing substance in September, not long after Nathanielsz visited the Golden Boy offices.

After Pacquiao’s victory over Miguel Cotto on Nov. 14 in Las Vegas, Mayweather Sr. suggested to Yahoo! Sports reporter Martin Rogers that Pacquiao’s improvements were not natural.

“You know there is something going on with him,” Mayweather Sr. told Rogers. “If I was Floyd I wouldn’t fight him because of that. It just don’t add up. Take a look at them old pictures, man. That’s a different dude. And he got knocked out when he was 30 pounds lighter, but now he can stand there and take Cotto’s best shots? Come on.”

Arum reiterated Friday that Pacquiao is clean and said the fight can be salvaged if Mayweather backs off his insistence that testing be administered by USADA. USADA’s procedures demand random testing up to and including the day of competition.

Pacquiao has an aversion to giving blood close to an event, both Arum and his adviser, Michael Koncz, have said, believing it weakens him. Arum said Pacquiao would submit to testing if it were done under the auspices of the Nevada Athletic Commission.

“They’re corrupted in this thing; they’re complicit,” Arum said of USADA. “Both sides here know the people involved in the Nevada Athletic Commission. It can handle the testing and we can work out a protocol that will prove Manny is not on anything and that won’t interfere with the fight.”

Leonard Ellerbe, the CEO of Mayweather Promotions and the fighter’s closest friend, refused to say Friday whether his side would accept testing done by any group other than USADA, as it has demanded.

Ellerbe said he and Mayweather adviser Al Haymon came up with the idea to require the testing, not Mayweather Jr., as a way to protect their fighter.

“We’re waiting to see if Manny Pacquiao is going to do the Olympic-style drug testing,” Ellerbe said. “The bottom line is that neither Top Rank, nor Manny’s camp, nor Mayweather Promotions or Golden Boy Promotions are going to dictate how the blood and urine testing is conducted.

“I understand this could be the biggest fight in the history of the sport, but all money ain’t good money. You can’t put a price tag on anything when it comes to a man’s livelihood. The fighters are the only ones stepping up, putting their lives on the line. It’s the fighters who are putting their lives on the line, not me, not Top Rank, not Golden Boy, not Al Haymon. Our responsibility here is to protect the interests of our guy and that’s what we’re doing.”

In his statement in which he threatened to sue, Pacquiao denies taking steroids and said he didn’t sue Mayweather Sr. earlier because he didn’t want to create distractions during his preparations for Cotto.

“I maintain and assure everyone that I have not used any form or kind of steroids and that my way to the top is a result of hard work, hard work, hard work and a lot of blood spilled from my past battles in the ring, not outside of it,” Pacquiao said in his statement. “I have no idea what steroids look like and my fear in God has kept me safe and victorious through all these years.

“Now, I say to Floyd Mayweather Jr., don’t be a coward and face me in the ring, mano-a-mano and shut your big, pretty mouth, so we can show the world who is the true king of the ring.”

Arum said he plans to continue parallel negotiations with Lou DiBella, who promotes Paulie Malignaggi, and plans to resume those talks on Monday for a Pacquiao-Malignaggi fight on March 13.

Malignaggi has suggested Pacquiao may have taken performance-enhancing drugs and Arum said Pacquiao would agree to some type of testing administered by a regulatory agency like the Nevada Athletic Commission to quell those fears.

Charleen Abigail Cruz

2009-12-22T00:08:00.000-08:00

Charleen Abigail Cruz

List of Philippine government websites

2009-12-21T23:58:00.001-08:00

List of Philippine government websites

Links to other government websites

Executive Branch
Office of the President - http://www.ops.gov.ph
Office of the Vice President - http://www.ovp.gov.ph
Philippine House of Representatives - http://www.congress.gov.ph/
Department of Agrarian Reform - http://www.dar.gov.ph/
Department of Agriculture - http://www.da.gov.ph/welcome.html
Department of Budget and Management - - http://www.dbm.gov.ph/
Department of Education - http://www.deped.gov.ph
Department of Energy - http://www.pdx.rpnet.com/doe/index
Department of Environment Natural Resources - http://www.denr.gov.ph/
Department of Finance - http://www.dof.gov.ph/
Department of Foreign Affairs - http://www.dfa.gov.ph/
Department of Justice - http://www.asti.doj.gov.ph/
Department of Health - http://www.doh.gov.ph/
Department of the Interior and Local Government - http://www.dilg.gov.ph/
Depatment of Labor and Employment - http://www.dole.gov.ph/
Department of National Defense - http://www.dnd.gov.ph/
Department of Public Works and Highways - http://www.geocities.com/dpwh_cn
Department of Science of Technology - http://www.dost.gov.ph/
Department of Social Welfare and Development - http://www.dswd.gov.ph/
Department of Tourism - http://www.tourism.gov.ph/
Department of Trade and Industry - http://www.dti.gov.ph/
Department of Transportation and Communication - http://www.dtc.gov.ph/

Agencies
Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas - http://www.bsp.gov.ph/
Board of Investments - http://www.dti.gov.ph/boi
Bureau of Customs - http://www.boc.gov.ph/uboc/index2.htm
Bureau of Internal Revenue - http://www.bir.gov.ph/
Civil Service Commission - http://www.csc.gov.ph/
Commission on Audit - http://www.coa.gov.ph/
Commission on Elections - http://www.comelec.gov.ph/
Commission on Human Rights - http://www.chr.gov.ph/
Government Service Insurance System - http://www.gsis.gov.ph/
Metropolitan Manila Development Authority - http://www.mmda.gov.ph/
National Commission for Culture and Arts - http://www.ncca.gov.ph/
National Computer Center - http://www.ncc.gov.ph/
National Economic and Development Authority - http://www.neda.gov.ph/
National Food Authority - http://www.nfa.gov.ph/
National Statistics Office - http://www.census.gov.ph/
Other Executive Offices - http://www.oeo.gov.ph/
Office of the Press Secretary - http://www.news.ops.gov.ph/
Philippine Charity Sweeptakes Office - http://www.sweepstakes.gov.ph/
Philippine Atmospheric, Geophysicaland Astronomical Services Administration - http://www.pagasa.dyndns.org/
Procurement Service-Department of Budget and Management - http://www.procurementservice.org/
Social Security System - http://www.sss.gov.ph/
Supreme Court of The Philippines - http://www.supremecourt.gov.ph/
Securities and Exchange Commission - http://www.sec.gov.ph/
United Nations Development Program - UNDP - http://www.undp.org/

The 2007 Top 20 Schools in the Philippines, According to CHED

2009-12-21T23:46:00.001-08:00

The 2007 Top 20 Schools in the Philippines, According to CHED

1. University of the Philipines-Diliman
2. University of Santo Tomas
3. Saint Louis University
4. University of the Philippines-Los Banos
5. Xavier University (Ateneo de Cagayan)
6. Ateneo de Davao University
7. Ateneo de Manila University
8. Silliman University
9. University of San Carlos
10. Mindanao State University-Iligan Institute of Tech
11. University of the Philippines-Manila
12. De La Salle University-Manila
13. Pamantasan ng Lungsod ng Maynila
14. University of the Cordilleras(Formerly Baguio Colleges Foundation)
15. University of Negros Occidental
16. Mindanao State University
17. Polytechnic University of the Philippines
18. Mapua Institute of Technology
19. Central Mindanao University
20. Adamson University

Angel Locsin

2009-12-21T22:12:00.000-08:00

Angelica Colminares
Abril 23, 1985
Bulacan, Pilipinas

University of the Philippines Diliman Campus

2009-12-21T21:52:00.000-08:00

The University of the Philippines Diliman or U.P. Diliman, is the flagship campus, seat of administration, and the largest constituent university of the University of the Philippines System. It is located in Diliman, Quezon City in Metro Manila. It offers courses in Liberal Arts, Social Sciences, Law, Business and Economics, Natural Sciences, Engineering, Music,Archaeology and Fine Arts among others. It offers the largest number of graduate and undergraduate courses among all the universities in the Philippines.

The university has an Extension Program in Pampanga located at Clark Special Economic Zone, Pampanga, and an Extension Program in Olongapo located at Olongapo City, Zambales.

University of the Philippines
Diliman, Quezon City 1101, Philippines
(Trunkline) : 981-8500
(Directory) : 920-5302 to 03
Comments and feedback: webmaster@upd.edu.ph

AutoMD.com - Your Auto Repair Advisors

2009-12-17T15:40:00.000-08:00

AutoMD.com - Your Auto Repair Advisors

About AutoMD

AutoMD is the comprehensive online automotive repair resource designed to empower car owners with the best way to repair their vehicles.

Backed by a team of automotive data specialists and certified auto mechanics who are advocates for the car owner, AutoMD integrates unprecedented repair pricing transparency, easy-to-use diagnostics tools and how-to-guides, repair shop listings geo-customized for each issue and a Repair-apedia of consumer-contributed advice into a complete and unbiased online repair experience that shifts the power to consumer car owners.

Repair Cost Estimates

AutoMD's Fair Price estimates are calculated for both shop repair and Do-It-Yourself, and are formulated for specificity using average labor costs for each zip code, hours to complete and AutoMD's proprietary real-time market pricing data on millions of vehicle parts - down to engine size and sub-model.

Repair Diagnosis

AutoMD's intuitive "question tree" diagnostic process was developed by its team of certified mechanics and makes it easy for car owners to narrow down each repair issue by symptom, area, visual inspection and possible reasons for the problem.

Find a Repair Shop

AutoMD's Shopfinder has a database of over 400,000 shops across the country, each assessed by AutoMD's team of certified mechanics for capabilities and hourly rates. Only shops relevant to consumers' specific repair issues and zip code are listed. Each listing includes average hourly labor costs, contact, shuttle and payment information, map and directions, and consumer reviews and ratings.

Repair-It-Yourself

AutoMD's DIY library includes step-by-step how-to repair guides with difficulty ratings, tools needed and estimated length of time for each job, as well as 250,000 related articles, hundreds of DIY videos, and thousands of user postings from AutoMD's Repair-apedia, which is seeded by professionals and perfected by the community.

keywords: automd, automd.com, auto repair guide, auto maintenance, auto videos, auto how to

YouTube's Top 2009 Videos

2009-12-16T16:54:00.000-08:00

Commercials rounded out YouTube's top five videos for the year. A movie trailer for "The Twilight Saga: New Moon" attracted 31 million views, helped by co-stars, Robert Pattinson and Taylor Lautner, who have had teen girls swooning over them. Pattinson plays a vampire and Lautner takes a turn as a werewolf involved in a love triangle.

Evian water soaked up 27 million views with three different versions of a clip featuring diaper-wearing babies performing roller-skating stunts to a hip-hop beat.

YouTube compiled a separate list of the year's most popular studio-produced music videos. Rapper Pitbull's "I Know You Want Me" was the category's top draw with more than 82 million views, trailed by two music videos by teen star Miley Cyrus, "The Climb" (more than 64 million views) and "Party In The USA" (more than 54 million views).

Michael Jackson, whose shocking June 25 death made him the most searched subject on Google this year, also left his mark on YouTube in 2009. His name topped YouTube searches during the months of June and July and his 27-year-old music video, "Beat It," logged more than 25 million views.

Unusual Photos

2009-12-16T16:30:00.000-08:00

In this photo taken Nov. 23, 2009, Mary Joe Coady, of Methuen, Mass., displays an electric iron with residue on the bottom that she says resembles the face of Jesus Christ. She said the image has reassured her that "life is going to be good." (Grant Morris/The Eagle-Tribune/AP Photo)

Just what is that thing? This strange light show was photographed in the sky over Trondelag, Norway, Dec. 8, 2009. Local scientists speculated it might be exhaust from a Russian rocket test, but the Russian government denied it was doing anything. (Jan Petter Jorgensen/Rex Features)

Source: http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/slideshow?id=2729439

World's longest sea bridge to be built in China

2009-12-16T15:31:00.000-08:00

Barely 18-months after completing current record-holder, work begins on link between mainland, Macau and Hong Kong

Much of the bridge will be fabricated offsite and will be designed to withstand wind speeds of up to 201kmph (125mph)

China today announced it had begun construction of the world's longest sea bridge – barely 18 months after opening the current record-holder.

The Y-shaped link between Hong Kong, Macau and China will be around 50km (31 miles) long in total, 35km of which will span the sea, said the state news agency Xinhua. Due to be completed by 2015, the 73bn yuan (£6.75bn) cost of the bridge will be shared by the authorities in the three territories.

The structure also includes a 5.5km underwater tunnel with artificial islands to join it to bridges on each side. According to the engineering group Arup – which has helped with the design – it is the first major marine bridge-and-tunnel project in China. But the engineering firm described the structure as 38km in length; the reason for the disparity was unclear.

Source: guardian.co.uk and nce.co.uk

Auto Repair Guide: How to Check for Loose Steering System Parts

2009-12-15T21:08:00.000-08:00

Auto Repair Guide: How to Check for Loose Steering System Parts

ADMU Lady Eagles

2009-12-15T17:05:00.000-08:00

The Last Airbender, Avatar: The Legend of Aang the movie

2009-12-14T21:12:00.000-08:00

The Last Airbender is an upcoming 2010 fantasy film written, directed, and produced by M. Night Shyamalan. It is a live-action film adaptation of the first season of the animated television series Avatar: The Last Airbender created by Michael Dante DiMartino and Bryan Konietzko, which has its influences from Asian art, mythology, and various martial arts fighting styles. The first of a planned trilogy, the film, starring Noah Ringer, Nicola Peltz, Jackson Rathbone, and Dev Patel, will be marketed and released by Paramount Pictures and Nickelodeon Movies on July 2, 2010.

Directed by	M. Night Shyamalan
Produced by	M. Night Shyamalan Frank Marshall Sam Mercer
Written by	M. Night Shyamalan
Starring	Noah Ringer Nicola Peltz Jackson Rathbone Dev Patel
Music by	James Newton Howard
Cinematography	Andrew Lesnie
Editing by	Conrad Buff
Studio	Nickelodeon Movies Kennedy/Marshall Blinding Edge Pictures
Distributed by	Paramount Pictures
Release date(s)	July 2, 2010 (US) August 6, 2010 (UK)
Country	United States
Language	English
Budget	$100-130 million

Avatar: The Last Airbender

2009-12-14T21:10:00.000-08:00

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Avatar: The Last Airbender (also known as Avatar: The Legend of Aang)[1] is an American animated television series that aired for three seasons on Nickelodeon and the Nicktoons Network. The series was created and produced by Michael Dante DiMartino and Bryan Konietzko, who served as executive producers along with Aaron Ehasz. Avatar is set in an Asian-influenced world[2] of martial arts and elemental manipulation. The show drew on elements from East Asian, Japanese and Chinese culture, making it a mixture of an anime like and US domestic cartoons.

The series follows the adventures of the main protagonist Aang and his friends, who must save the world by defeating the evil Fire Lord and ending the destructive war with the Fire Nation.[3] The pilot episode first aired on February 21, 2005[4] and the series concluded with a widely-lauded two-hour television movie on July 19, 2008.[5] The show available from the following sources: on DVD, the iTunes Store, the Zune Marketplace, the Xbox Live Marketplace, the PlayStation Store, and its home on Nickelodeon.[6]

Avatar: The Last Airbender was popular with both audiences and critics,[7] garnering 5.6 million viewers on its best-rated showing and receiving high ratings in the Nicktoons lineup, even outside its 6–11-year-old demographic.[3][8] Avatar has been nominated for and won awards from the Annual Annie Awards, the Genesis Awards, the primetime Emmy awards and a Peabody Award among others. The first season's success prompted Nickelodeon to order second[9] and third[10] seasons. The first part of a movie trilogy titled The Last Airbender is expected to be released on July 2, 2010.

Merchandise based on the series includes scaled action figures,[11] a trading card game,[12][13] three video games based on the first,[14] second,[15][16] and third seasons, stuffed animals distributed by Paramount Parks, and two LEGO sets.[17]

Asteroid reports over Indonesia

2009-12-14T20:55:00.000-08:00

On October 8, 2009 about 03:00 Greenwich time, an atmospheric fireball blast was observed and recorded over an island region of Indonesia. The blast is thought to be due to the atmospheric entry of a small asteroid about 10 meters in diameter that, due to atmospheric pressure, detonated in the atmosphere with an energy of about 50 kilotons (the equivalent of 110 million pounds of TNT explosives). The blast was recorded visually and reported upon by local media representatives. See the YouTube video here:

A report from Elizabeth Silber and Peter Brown at the University of Western Ontario indicates that several international very-long wavelength infrasound detectors recorded the blast and fixed the position near the coastal city of Bone in South Sulawesi, island of Sulewesi. They note that the blast was in the 10 to 50 kT range with the higher end of this range being more likely. Assuming an estimated size of about 5-10 meters in diameter, we would expect a fireball event of this magnitude about once every 2 to 12 years on average. As a rule, the most common types of stony asteroids would not be expected to cause ground damage unless their diameters were about 25 meters in diameter or larger. A more extensive report by Elizabeth Silber and Peter Brown of the University of Western Ontario is here.

US AutoParts Christmas party at SMX Mall of Asia

2009-12-14T20:50:00.000-08:00

US AutoParts Christmas party at SMX Mall of Asia

Maja Salvador on magazine

2009-12-14T20:42:00.000-08:00

Maja Salvador is the cover of Cosmopolitan Philippine December 2009 Issue. Her sweet and natural filipina look really shows that she is one of the prettiest young celebrity of today’s generation.

Dubai steps to recovery

2009-12-14T20:39:00.000-08:00

Abu Dhabi feeds Dubai $10 billion to cover debt on deadline, calming financial worries for now.

he bailout was about more than petrodollar transfers from one United Arab Emirates sheikdom to the other. Dubai officials seized on the news to try to repair damage done by weeks of uncertainty stemming from their unwillingness to fully stand behind Dubai World as the conglomerate looked to restructure some of its $60 billion in debts.

Investors cheered Monday's news. Dubai's main index shot up 10.4 percent at the close and markets elsewhere rose modestly.

Prior to the crisis, most investors had assumed the Dubai government itself, possibly with Abu Dhabi's help, would guarantee debts amassed by its chief growth engine.

Dubai authorities are scrambling to reshape the business hub's battered image, vowing that the city-state is committed to "transparency, good governance and market principles." Officials outlined a new legal framework that promised to increase openness and protect creditors in future dealings with the conglomerate, offering lenders succor in a country where formal bankruptcy proceedings are largely untested.

"We are here today to reassure investors, financial and trade creditors, employees and our citizens that our government will act at all times in accordance with market principles and internationally accepted business practices," Sheik Ahmed bin Saeed Al Maktoum, chairman of the Dubai supreme fiscal committee, said in a statement.

Some $4.1 billion of the funds released Monday will go toward meeting a deadline to repay Islamic bonds issued by Dubai World's Nakheel property arm. The conglomerate, whose sprawling holdings range from the oceanliner Queen Elizabeth 2 to luxury retailer Barney's New York, will use the rest.

Source: Yahoo! Finance

UAAP Cheerdance Competition

2009-12-14T20:35:00.000-08:00

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

UAAP Cheerdance Competition

Sport: Cheerleading
Founded: 1994
No. of teams: 8
Country(ies): Philippines
Most recent champion(s): FEU Cheering Squad
TV partner(s): Studio 23

The UAAP Cheerdance Competition is an annual one-day event of the University Athletic Association of the Philippines for cheerleading. However, it does not count in the tabulation to determine the UAAP Overall Championship.

Studio 23 received the right to televise the UAAP Men's Basketball. Along with it came the coverage rights of the annual UAAP Cheerdance Competition. The hosts of the event usually start with an audience roll call. After each participating university's name is called, the audience from that school chants their most popular cheer along with their official drummers. However, the dancers of their respective pep squads are not yet shown to the audience and televiewers until their performance. The sequence of the roll call are random and solely the discretion of the hosts or producers. The sequence of the performance are determined by drawing of lots prior the competition.[citation needed]

Since 2006, side-court reporters of each participating universities join the main host of the event. Before the announcement of winners and after all squads have performed, a recap is shown during the telecast. Only the champion and first and second runners-up are announced at the end of the competition. Except in 2008, the host(s) reveal the average scores before announcing the winners.

University of Santo Tomas has the most championships (8) followed by University of the Philippines (5). Far Eastern University is the current defending champion.[1] From 2003 to 2008, only University of Santo Tomas, University of the Philippines, and Far Eastern University have landed on the top 3 spots. The University of Santo Tomas did not make it in the top 3 for the first time in 2009.

The 2008 Samsung UAAP Cheerdance Competition was the most attended UAAP event with a record-breaking 23,443 paying audience.

Participants

Adamson University (AdU)	Adamson Pep Squad
Ateneo de Manila University (ADMU)	Ateneo Blue Babble Battalion
De La Salle University (DLSU)	DLSU Animo Squad (DLSU Pep Squad: 1994-2007)
Far Eastern University (FEU)	FEU Cheering Squad
National University (NU)	NU Pep Squad
University of the East (UE)	UE Pep Squad
University of the Philippines (UP)	UP Pep Squad (Filipiniana Dance Troupe: 1994-1996)
University of Santo Tomas (UST)	UST Salinggawi Dance Troupe (with the UST Yellow Jackets)

The UST Salinggawi Dance Troupe

2009-12-04T22:08:00.000-08:00

Nikon D3000 Review

2009-12-04T21:56:00.000-08:00

Amsterdam, the Netherlands, 30th July 2009 – Nikon announces the simplest, most accessible DSLR to date, the D3000.

Jordi Brinkman, Product Manager for Nikon Europe says: “The D3000 dispels the view that DSLR cameras are complicated and makes taking great pictures simpler than ever before. You can really concentrate on having fun with photography and the Guide mode helps you to get the best results with the minimum of fuss.”

DSLR, pure and simple
The D3000 is designed for anyone who wants to take pictures without worrying about settings. You can select from a choice of subject parameters and the camera will do the rest, and the instant response time means you never miss a moment. The 11-point autofocus system ensures everyone is in focus, and the bright viewfinder means you get what you want, when you want it.

Great pictures, automatically
The 10.2 megapixel sensor, powerful EXPEED processing system and brilliant NIKKOR lenses ensure excellent pictures wherever you are, whatever you or your subject is doing. The comprehensive exposure metering system, ISO 1600 sensitivity and built-in pop up flash make light work of dark places.

Guide the way
For the DSLR first timer, the intelligent Guide mode helps you get the most from the potential DSLR photography offers. It simplifies the camera set up and shows you how to get better pictures. If you want to develop your picture taking, you can. If you want to concentrate on the subject, you can do that too. Either way, the D3000 does it effortlessly and automatically.

3-inch LCD screen
The 3-inch LCD screen means you can share your efforts with family and friends and makes retouching your pictures in camera great fun. Beyond the Guide mode, the GUI menus are larger and simpler to use thanks to extensive use of visuals instead of text. The wide variety of exciting in-camera processing effects means you can get really creative with your pictures and share them with friends and family.

Anytime and anywhere
Whatever you do, wherever you go, the D3000 is a must have for any family event or day out. The camera’s comprehensive technologies and tough exterior are ready to handle whatever your free time can throw at it. The exclusive dust reduction system with Airflow control minimises the impact of dust on the image sensor and its compact size and weight – and tough housing – on both body and lens make the D3000 impossible to leave behind.

Key features:

* 10.2megapixel CCD sensor. Even in low light the image resolution makes easy work of big prints and sharp enlargements.
* 11-point autofocus system. Keeps even the fastest moving subjects in focus, often the biggest challenge for compact cameras
* Fast response. The start up time and shutter lag means you can capture the shot almost instantly, without the delayed response time common of compact cameras
* Guide mode. Simply the easiest way to get great pictures, without having to read the manual
* 3-inch TFT. With pictures this good, you will need a great screen to share them with friends and family
* EXPEED image processing. Exclusive system to deliver rich, bright results close to what you saw with your own eyes
* Picture Controls. Lets you set the look and mood of your images before you shoot
* 3 fps continuous shooting allows you to capture fast-moving action at 3 frames per second
* Intuitive ergonomics. We challenge anyone to pick up a D3000 and it not to feel part of your hand
* Stylish discrete appearance. The D3000 does not become a barrier between you and your subject, resulting in natural looking expressions
* Compact, light and durable. It won’t fit in your pocket, but with pictures this good you will find a shoulder to hang it on

New Guide mode
In-camera guidance is provided by the new Guide mode, which employs an easy-to-use interface that makes it easy for first-time users to select shooting modes. Additionally, after selecting an item in Guide mode, camera settings can be further adjusted in order to obtain optimal results.

Nikon DX-format CCD sensor; 10.2 effective megapixels
At 10.2 effective megapixels, the D3000 produces high-resolution images that enable beautiful enlargements without loss of sharpness. Normal ISO sensitivity is ISO 100 to 1600 but for added shooting versatility, a Hi 1 setting increases sensitivity to ISO 3200.

EXPEED image processing system
The D3000 is equipped with Nikon’s EXPEED image processing system. EXPEED realises excellent resolution, long tonal scale, and superb colour while also making possible fast processing of the D3000’s advanced imaging functions such as Scene Recognition and Active D-Lighting.

Scene Recognition System
This feature improves accuracy for exposure, white balance, and autofocus by analysing colour and illumination over the entire scene milliseconds prior to shooting. It then adjusts the camera settings accordingly for optimal picture quality.

Active D-Lighting
The D3000 incorporates Nikon’s Active D-Lighting function which can vastly improve shadows and highlights of high-contrast scenes. Like the Scene Recognition System, Active D-Lighting utilises the 420-pixel RGB sensor to analyse a scene then adjust exposure to achieve images that closely resemble what the human eye sees. During processing, this function also restores details in the highlight and shadow areas of the image that may have been lost.

11-point AF system with Multi-CAM 1000 autofocus sensor module
Employing 11-point autofocus, driven by Nikon’s Multi-CAM 1000 autofocus sensor module, the D3000 delivers fast, precise focus over a wide area of the frame. Four versatile AF modes are available: single-point AF for stationary subjects, especially ones that are off-centre; dynamic-area AF for moving subjects; auto-area AF when you want the D3000 to automatically determine the proper focus method; and 3D-tracking (11 points) AF for maintaining focus on subjects even if the composition changes.

3.0-in. LCD monitor
Image playback and viewing menus is now easier than ever thanks to the 3.0-in., 230k-dot TFT LCD monitor. Text size is also 20% larger than on previous Nikon digital SLR cameras.

Picture Control System
The Picture Control System gives users the ability to customise key digital image capture characteristics to suit personal preferences.Six settings are available: Standard, Neutral, Vivid, Monochrome, Portrait, and Landscape.

In-camera photo editing
After shooting, the D3000’s photo editing functions allow for in-camera retouching, reducing the need for a computer to enhance or modify images. The D3000 introduces a new Miniature effect under its Retouch Menu that modifies images to look like pictures of miniature models. Each editing function is applied to a copy of the image, with the original left unmodified.

Nikon Integrated Dust Reduction System
Dust reduction is handled by the Nikon Integrated Dust Reduction System. This is a comprehensive solution that reduces the generation and accumulation of dust as well as measures to remove dust. A key element of the solution is the Airflow Control System, which directs dust away from the image sensor. The system also includes an image sensor cleaning function that activates automatically when the D3000 is powered on or off. This vibrates the low-pass filter (located in front of the sensor) to free it from dust.

Superb NIKKOR lenses
The D3000 opens up a wide range of possibilities for creative shooting thanks to full compatibility with the extensive lineup of NIKKOR AF-S and AF-I lenses. From ultra wide-angle and micro to super telephoto, NIKKOR lenses give users the means to explore their creativity to the fullest.

Nikon D3000 Other Features

* Extensive playback options that allow viewing of images one at a time or in batches of 4, 9, and 72 as well as Calendar view that organises images by shooting date and time. A histogram display is also available that shows exposure data for a magnified area of the image.
* Highly durable shutter unit tested to 100,000 cycles.
* Long-lasting Rechargeable Li-ion Battery EN-EL9a that provides up to 550 shots per charge. (CIPA standard, with AF-S DX NIKKOR 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6G VR and flash fired at full power once every other shot.)
* Built-in flash with a guide number of approx. 12/39 (ISO 100, m/ft., 20°C/68°F) and support for Nikon’s i-TTL flash control.
* Support for the Nikon Creative Lighting System when using SB-900, SB-600, or SB-400 Speedlights, or the SU-800 Wireless Speedlight Commander.
* Compatible with all NIKKOR AF-S and AF-I lenses that have an autofocus motor.
* Compatible with the optional Wireless Remote Control ML-L3. There are two shutter release modes available when using the control: Quick Response mode for immediate triggering of the shutter release and Delayed Remote mode, which delays triggering for two seconds.
* Viewfinder grid lines that aid in picture composition.
* Compatible with SD and SDHC memory cards
* Includes Nikon ViewNX image browsing and editing software, which lets you organize, label, and select images as well as perform NEF (RAW) image editing adjustments and conversions.
* Photos captured with the D3000 can be used with optional Nikon Capture NX 2 photo-editing software, which features patented U Point® technology and powerful tools for quick and easy photo editing, including enhanced NEF (RAW) Editing.

National Geographic Best Photos

2009-12-04T16:00:00.000-08:00

National Geographic Best Photos

Iron Man 2, War MAchine

2009-12-02T18:28:00.000-08:00

Towards the end of 2008's "Iron Man," James "Rhodey" Rhodes (played by Terrence Howard) looked at the early silver version of Tony Stark's high-tech armor and said to himself, "Next time, baby."

That "next time" is coming on May 7, when "Iron Man 2" hits theaters. And Rhodey will get his wish, donning the heavily-armored metallic suit that turns him into War Machine, a character that has been a part of the "Iron Man" comic books for 30 years. But getting superpowers isn't the only change for the character.
See the First Look at War Machine >>
Don Cheadle as Rhodey in 'Iron Man 2'

In a much-publicized contract dispute, Terrence Howard was dropped from the sequel and replaced by actor Don Cheadle. While the exact details of why Marvel Studios made the switch, Entertainment Weekly reported that Howard's original contract made him the highest-paid actor in the first film, and when the producers tried to scale back his paycheck for the sequel, Howard's representatives balked. Cheadle told IGN that he was approached for the role after Howard had already left the project, and he only had a few hours to decide if he wanted to step in.

A brief reference to the casting switch was revealed in footage director Jon Favreau screened for fans at this summer's San Diego Comic Con. In an early scene in the movie, Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.) is being questioned by a Senate panel about Iron Man and James Rhodes is called to testify. When Rhodes' face is revealed to be Don Cheadle, he says, "It's me. I'm here. Get over it."

Of course, the moment in the Comic Con presentation that got the biggest reaction from the crowd was the reveal of Rhodey in his full War Machine armor. In the film, Rhodes takes the silver Iron Man suit to Stark's rival, Justin Hammer (played by Sam Rockwell), who outfits it with an array of weapons, including a machine gun turret on the shoulder. The preview ended with a quick shot of War Machine in full attack mode, and the 6,500 fans in attendance burst out in cheers at the sight.

So far, no official footage of War Machine has been released, but the first image of the suit debuted Monday here on Yahoo! Movies. In this teaser poster, the War Machine suit stands behind the updated Mark IV Iron Man armor.

It raises the question: are Stark and Rhodes standing together, back-to-back, in solidarity against a common enemy, or are they in opposition to each other. In the comic books, conflict between the two escalated into a feud, but later they were able to work together as friends. To find out if the two are comrades or combatants, we'll have to wait for "Iron Man 2" to arrive in theaters on May 7.

Dubai's mega-tower

2009-12-02T18:22:00.000-08:00

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates – When work began in 2004 to build the world's tallest tower, Dubai's confidence also was sky high with a host of mega-projects on the drawing board or rising from the sands.

FILE- In this Sept. 11, 2008 file photo, the Burj Dubai, or 'Dubai Tower,' the world's tallest building, pictured at dusk, illuminated by a decorative fountain show at its base, in Dubai, United Arab Emirates. The exterior of the over 2600 foot structure is largely finished, and the tower is expected to be completed and ready for occupancy in the coming months.

That swagger seems positively old school these days. It's been tripped up by a debt crunch that has humbled Dubai's leaders and exposed the shaky foundations of the city-state's boom years — leaving the planned Jan. 4 opening of the iconic Burj Dubai with a double significance of hello and goodbye.

It will be both a debutante bash for a new architectural landmark and a farewell toast to Dubai's age of excess.

The Burj Dubai — a steel-and-glass needle rising more than a half-mile (800 meters) — may be the last completed work from Dubai's time of the giants. Most other of the unfinished super-projects announced in recent years, such as a second palm-shaped island or a tower to surpass the Burj Dubai, are either recession roadkill or being considered on a far smaller scale.

If they are still considered at all.

Dubai last week dropped what amounted to a financial bombshell — announcing its main government-backed development group, Dubai World, needed at least a six-month breather from creditors owed nearly $60 billion.

World markets had known a day of fiscal reckoning was creeping up on what was once the world's fastest-growing city, swelling from about 700,000 in 1995 to more than 1.3 million today. But the depths of Dubai's red ink seemed to surprise everyone, rattling stock exchanges from Hong Kong to New York and adding exclamation points to obits-in-progress on the death of Dubai's golden years.

The Burj Dubai gala is now a welcome diversion. And one without a direct political sting: the building was developed by Emaar Properties, a state-backed firm not linked to the current debt meltdown.

"This tower was conceived as a monument to Dubai's place on the international stage," said Christopher Davidson, a professor at the University of Durham in Britain who has written extensively about the United Arab Emirates. "It's now like a last hurrah to the boom years."

It's not the first time a skyscraper has gone up as the economy swooned.

New York's 102-story Empire State Building was designed as the world's tallest building just before the 1929 stock market crash and opened in 1931 as the Great Depression was taking hold. In 1999, the Petronas Towers in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, officially opened to claim the world-tallest crown — two years after the financial meltdown of the once-soaring Southeast Asian economies.

But the Burj Dubai, or Dubai Tower, occupies a special niche. Few cities have grown so far so fast — pushed along by runaway property speculation and the boundless ambitions of Dubai's ruler, Sheik Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum.

The recession barged in last year and quickly dried up the cash flow.

The brakes also were slammed on hundreds of Dubai projects — from residential towers that stand half-finished to a desert Xanadu that included a Universal Studios theme park and a "city of wonders" with full-size replicas of the Eiffel Tower, Taj Mahal and other famous sites.

Sheik Mohammed even has grown a bit testy over Dubai's dimming star power. In a meeting with international investors in November, he switched from Arabic to English to tell naysayers in the media to "shut up."

Dubai's boosters hope the opening of the Burj Dubai — which include offices, residences and a hotel _will give them at least some respite from the bad news. The Dubai PR machine is working overtime.

A barrage of statistics — vital and trivial — are pouring out as the $4.1 billion building gets its finishing touches: more than 160 stories topped by a spire that reaches a reported 2,684 feet (818 meters), well above the runner-up skyscraper, Taipei 101 in Taiwan, at 1,671 feet (508 meters). The Burj has even pushed past other giant structures taller than Taipei 101 such as the CN Tower in Toronto and the KVLY-TV mast in North Dakota.

The Burj — designed by the Chicago-based architectural firm Skidmore, Owings & Merrill — is billed to have the world's fastest elevator at up to 40 mph (64 kph) and can be seen as far as 57 miles (95 kilometers) away. It takes three months just to clean all the windows.

But there's some facts that are still closely guarded, including how much of the office and residential space is leased and whether the financial meltdown will make the Burj another tower of debt.

The current price for purchase or rent, too, is also unclear. It's certain, though, that it's gone down along with property prices across Dubai in the past year. A report in October by the Investment Boutique, a real estate advisory firm in Dubai, said asking prices in the Burj Dubai area had slumped by 77 percent since the peak a year earlier.

"Buildings like the Burj Dubai are born from the optimism of the moment," said Carol Willis, director of The Skyscraper Museum in New York. "That may not necessarily be the mood when the project is finished."

The Burj Dubai also faces some location drawbacks that didn't burden Dubai's other signature structures, such as the sail-shaped Burj Al Arab hotel and the Palm Jumeirah island that fans out into the Gulf. The Burj Dubai rises above a new annex of the city that was originally designed as a cluster of towers — which is now put on hold because of the economic crunch.

That leaves the Burj soaring above what amounts to high-priced empty lots.

But — for a moment at least — it will shift the spotlight back on Dubai from its oil-rich cousin, Abu Dhabi, the new boomtown of the UAE.

Abu Dhabi has already bailed out its debt-ridden neighbor once this year and is now watching from the wings as Dubai pleads for time with its global creditors. Dubai — without any oil resources — bankrolled its growth as a financial hub and a Mideast version of Las Vegas.

The rulers in more conservative Abu Dhabi, meanwhile, moved in other directions in their campaign to put the city on the world map in a generation.

In the past few months, Abu Dhabi hosted its inaugural Formula One race, won a global competition to host the headquarters of the new International Renewal Energy Agency and announced a $1 trillion plan to upgrade the city's roads, transportation and public venues. Also in the works are plans for branches of the Louvre and Guggenheim museums and a New York University campus.

Suddenly, Dubai is playing the unfamiliar role of second city.

Dubai opened its elevated metro line in September, but with only about a third of the stations opened. Last January, the state-owned builder Nakheel — which is part of the current debt crisis — said the fiscal crunch forced it to suspend plans for a Dubai skyscraper designed to top the Burj Dubai.

As Dubai's leaders try to calm markets and investors, Abu Dhabi planned a party.

A fireworks show on Wednesday for the UAE's national day was billed as the world's largest display, with 100,000 devices exploding over Abu Dhabi's biggest hotel.

Ring around the Moon

2009-12-02T18:15:00.000-08:00

Many folks who looked up at the sky last night were greeted with a very bizarre sight: a luminous ring surrounding the moon. Were aliens coming? Was the end of the world at hand? Fortunately, no.

Surrounded by trees and a building, the moonlight forms a ring over Macedonia's capital Skopje, in this Jan. 24, 2005 photo. This sight occurs when high thin clouds containing millions of tiny ice crystals cover much of the sky. Each ice crystal acts like a miniature lens. Because most of the crystals have a similar elongated hexagonal shape, light entering one crystal face and exiting through the opposing face refracts 22 degrees, which corresponds to the radius of the Moon Halo.

Though it looked ominous, the shiny ring around the moon last night was actually a rather common weather phenomenon. According to various weather-related blogs across the Buzz, this ring around the moon occurs when thin cirrus clouds, which contain ice crystals, refract the moonlight. A blog from the Goddard Space Flight Center explains that "the shape of the ice crystals results in a focusing of the light into a ring. Since the ice crystals typically have the same shape, namely a hexagonal shape, the Moon ring is always the same size."

Of course, in the moment, many sky watchers didn't know what the heck was going on, and the resulting avalanche of Web searches reflects their confusion. Queries on "ring around the moon," "why is there a ring around the moon," and "ring around moon pictures" all soared into the stratosphere. A news station in Cincinnati reported that they received calls from curious watchers.

Some folks say that if you count the number of stars within the ring, it'll let you know how many days until the next snowfall. Space.com doesn't confirm that tall tale, but it does explain that a ring around the moon in warm-weather months "usually foretells...a long, slow rain [that] should eventually arrive in about 12 to 18 hours."

But hey, even if nothing happens afterward, a ring around the moon is still cool to look at any time of the year.

Manny Pacquiao vs. Floyd Mayweather Jr. in March

2009-12-02T17:44:00.001-08:00

LAS VEGAS -- Promoter Bob Arum flew Wednesday to the Philippines with a proposed contract for a March 13 fight between Manny Pacquiao and Floyd Mayweather Jr.

The contract was agreed to by Mayweather's representatives, but the boxer has yet to sign. Arum was to present the proposal to Pacquiao, but there are no guarantees he will agree.

Still, the fact Arum would make the trip to the Philippines to try and get his fighter to sign for the bout was an indication that the megafight was moving forward. It would match the two fighters regarded as the best pound-for-pound in the world in a bout at 147 pounds.

The fight was originally projected for May, but Pacquiao's candidacy for Congress in the Philippines forced promoters to move it forward to March. The Philippine national elections are in May, and Pacquiao wanted to be at home to campaign.

Promoters for both fighters had agreed to a blackout on negotiations for the bout, so no one would comment on the record. A person close to the promotion spoke on terms his identity would remain confidential.

If the fight is made, there would likely be a Jan. 11 press conference in New York to announce it. The bout could be the richest ever, assuming pay-per-view projections are accurate.

Representatives of the Superdome in New Orleans and the new Dallas Cowboys' stadium have expressed interest in hosting the fight, as has the MGM Grand hotel-casino in Las Vegas, where the fighters have fought their biggest fights. There is also a proposal for a 30,000-seat temporary stadium on the Las Vegas Strip across from the Wynn resort.

Oddsmakers are already taking bets on the fight, with most making the undefeated Mayweather a slight favorite.

Manny Pacquiao funny photos

2009-12-02T00:05:00.000-08:00

Bakla nga ba si Piolo Pascual?

2009-12-01T23:43:00.000-08:00

So many news and rumors were heard about this popular hunk from Philippines.

What is the truth? you decide....

Funny Photos - Part 4

2009-12-01T23:22:00.000-08:00

Funny Photos - Part 3

2009-12-01T23:12:00.000-08:00

Funny Photos - Part 2

2009-12-01T23:07:00.000-08:00

Funny Photos - Part 1

2009-12-01T23:02:00.000-08:00

Ninja Assassin Contest

2009-12-01T22:31:00.000-08:00

You may win any of these:

Simply answer these questions.

NINJA ASSASSIN follows Raizo (Rain), one of the deadliest assassins in the world. Taken from the streets as a child, he was transformed into a trained killer by the Ozunu Clan, a secret society whose very existence is considered a myth. But haunted by the merciless execution of his friend by the Clan, Raizo breaks free from them…and vanishes. Now he waits, preparing to exact his revenge.

In Berlin, Europol agent Mika Coretti (Naomie Harris) has stumbled upon a money trail linking several political murders to an underground network of untraceable assassins from the Far East. Defying the orders of her superior, Ryan Maslow (Ben Miles), Mika digs into top secret agency files to learn the truth behind the murders. Her investigation makes her a target, and the Ozunu Clan sends a team of killers, led by the lethal Takeshi (Rick Yune), to silence her forever. Raizo saves Mika from her attackers, but he knows that the Clan will not rest until they are both eliminated. Now, entangled in a deadly game of cat and mouse through the streets of Europe, Raizo and Mika must trust one another if they hope to survive…and finally bring down the elusive Ozunu Clan.

The behind-the-scenes creative team includes director of photography Karl Walter Lindenlaub, production designer Graham “Grace” Walker, costume designer Carlo Poggioli and editor Gian Ganziano. The Wachowski brothers’ longtime stunt coordinators Chad Stahelski and David Leitch are also on board as second unit co-directors.

NINJA ASSASSIN is a Warner Bros. Pictures presentation in association with Legendary Pictures and Dark Castle Entertainment, and a co-production between Rocklock Films and Fünfte Babelsberg Film.

Best College JOkes

2009-11-30T23:23:00.000-08:00

What should an Atenean do when a La Sallite hurls a grenade at him?

The Atenean should pick up the grenade, pull the firing pin and hurl it back at the La Sallite

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Math Contest Examiner to La Sallite: Two plus two?
La Sallite: Por.

Math Contest Examiner to Atenean: Two plus two?
Atenean: Fivvvvvvvvehhh.

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How do Lasallites count to ten?

-- One, two, three, another, another, another ...
DLSU and ADMU Final Exams

Have you ever wondered how you would have fared as either a La Sallite or an Atenean? Here's your chance to find out! Take either the La Salle Final Exams or the Ateneo Final Exams. Or take both and find out what makes each one tick (or not tick...).

University of the Philippines Business Math

A logger exchanges a set "L" of lumber for a set "M" of money. The cardinality of set "M" is 100. Each element is worth one peso. Make 100 dots representing the elements of the set "M." The set "C," the cost of production, contains 20 fewer points than set "M." Represent the set "C" as a subset of set "M" and answer the following question: What is the cardinality of the set "P" of profits?

Ateneo de Manila Business Math

A logger sells a truckload of lumber for PHPesos100. His cost of production is 4/5 of the price. However, he mobilizes all loggers to claim profits were higher so that his logging company would be ranked number 2 in the country. What is his profit?

La Salle Business Math

A logger sells a truckload of lumber for PHPesos100. His cost of production is PHPesos80 and his profit is PHPesos20. Your assignment: Underline the number 20.

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La Salle University's Computer Science Program

COMP 101: RAON COMPUTER MANUFACTURING - How to buy antiquated computers in Raon, replace the motherboard, and resell the device for profit through deceptive classified advertising

COMP 102: WINDOWS 95 - Students will attempt to get Windows 95 running on LSU's computer system.

COMP 103: MEMORY LOSS - What to do when your RAM doesn't work or your hard drive crashes. Students required to provide their own hammers.

COMP 104: SOFTWARE INSTRUCTION MANUAL DIVINATION - How to translate software instruction manuals into plain English.

COMP 105: WAITING - Learning how to wait while on hold to a software company's technical assistance center is an extremely important aspect of modern computing.

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Question: Why is the sky blue?

Answer: Because God is an Atenean.

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Pasikatan ng Gradweyts

UP: A number of past Philippine presidents graduated from UP. Presidents Roxas, Quirino, Laurel, Garcia and Marcos, to name just a few!

ATENEO: Hah! That's nothing, a number of Ateneo graduates became national heroes like Jose Rizal, Gen. Gregorio del Pilar, Gen. Antonio Luna, Evelio Javier and many others.

UP: That just goes to show you, UP graduates become presidents and lead countries while Ateneans end up getting shot!

LA SALLE: Wala 'yan. Talo kayo sa mga gradweyt namin!

UP & ATENEO: Bakit sino ba ang mga graduates ninyo?

LA SALLE: Aba! Marami kaming sikat na gradweyts; si Gary Valenciano, Dingdong Avanzado, Ogie Alcasid, Monsieur del Rosario....

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Why did the La Sallite drive around the block 57 times?

Because his turn signal was stuck.

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A La Sallite walks into a MegaMall store and says: "Miss, I'd like a green parrot, please."

The salesgirl looks at him and asks: "Sir..., are you a Lasallite, by any chance?"

The La Sallite replies: "O... bakit mo naman natanong 'yan? If I ordered BLUE cheese, would you ask me if I were from Ateneo? I don't think so. If I bought a MAROON shirt, would you ask me if I were from UP? I' think not. So why then, when I want to buy a GREEN parrot, do you ask me if I'm from Lasalle???"

"Sir... kasi naman..." replied the salesgirl, "this is a flower shop, eh."

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Two La Sallites meet on the street and carry on a typical La Sallite conversation:

La Sallite #1: If you can tell me how many chickens I have in this bag, I'll give you both of them.
La Sallite #2: Uh, three?
La Sallite #1: Daya mo! You peeked!

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Nag-Hunting ang Barkada

Tatlong Magkaka-brakada: a La Sallite, a UPian, and an Atenean went on a hunting trip.

The first night, the guy from UP comes back to the cabin with a big deer. The others ask him how he did it, and he cooly replies: "I saw the tracks, I followed the tracks, and bang! I got the deer!"

The next night, the guy from Ateneo comes back also with a big deer. "I saw the tracks, I followed the tracks, and bang! I got the deer!" was the Atenean's story.

So the La Sallite decides to try it himself. But the next night, as he drags himself back to the cabin, his two companions find him bruised and bloody all over. "What happened?" they ask?

"Well," replies the La Sallite, "I saw the tracks, I followed the tracks, and bang! A train hit me."

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Sa Job Interview ng Bagong Gradweyt na Collegiala

Isang bagong-gradweyt na Collegiala ang nag-aaply para sa isang secretarial job...

Wika nung Collegiala: "Sir... I am willing to work under you in any entry level position..."

Tanong tuloy sa Collegiala ng prospective boss niya: "Alam mo ba ang kinaibahan ng... Hmmmmm... 'screw' sa 'xerox'?

Sagot naman nung Collegiala: "Naku, sir... hindi ko po alam... hindi pa po ako 'na-xe-xerox', e... hihihihi...

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POGINOMETRY

Definition

The mathematics of expressing the sum of a man's appeal to women. For more than a handsome pair of X and Y chromosomes, there are indeed many other factors that size-up male magnetism such as a very persuasive "Peso"-nality that attracts women like a giant lodestone drawing fine metals to its folds. Image thus becomes a configuration of various non-facila and nonphysical pluses and minuses which fine-tune the cyber-picture of the Ideal Man.

Note: For the sake of the clueless, *pogi* is Filipino slang for guapo (handsome).

Transpo

The shortest distance between two points is a straight line. The shortest time to reach a girl's house, er, heart is normally by flashing a car. Owning one is an automatic 10 pogi points. Chauffer-driven, plus 20 pogi points. Subtract 5 if it's the rinky-dinky type that regularly breaks down when going out on dates. Add 10 pogi points if brand new.

Add 20 more if it's a Japanese car and 50 if it's either a Benz or BMW. A Porsche is disqualified from earning points because anyone who owns one automatically becomes a Richard Gomez clone. No pogi points, sadly, for perennial pedestrians. Plus 30 pogi points, though, if you ride a mountain bike to school or work (health buffs are cool). If you happen to pedal through EDSA via pedicab, minus 50 pogi points.

Pedigree

Often suggests if the guy's gene pool has a tradition of success and excellence. If the family name smells of politics, add 10 pogi points. If it's a Marcos or crony-sounding name, subtract 50 pogi points. If the lineage could be traced to a Spanish friar, add another 10 pogi points (tisoy muy bien?).

If it's a taipan-sounding name, add 2 pogi points. No pogi points for ethnic-sounding family names.

Address

Where you live indicates how you live. If you're from Manila, you've got to be streetsmart. A Makati address suggests urbanidad. Alabang and Novaliches, a suburban, less stressful existence. Thus, a Makati address gets an automatic 5 pogi points, while an Alabang address an automatic 10 pogi points. If in Makati, Dasma, Magallanes or Forbes plus 20, San Lorenzo Village and San Antonio Village plus 10, Bel-Air plus 5, 10 pogi points for New Manila, Greenhills and Valle Verde. No pogi points for those who live in Corinthian Gardens because many houses there were reportedly built on hidden wealth. In QC, 10 pogi points for residents of White Plains, Blue Ridge, St. Ignatius, Xavierville, La Vista and Ayala Heights.

"Gillage (as in gilid ng village) people," no pogi points. No pogi points, too, for Looban, Gagalangin, Calumpang, San Andres Bukid, Tatalon Estate and Dasma (as in Cavite) residents.

High School

If we had a local Official Preppy Handbook, alumni of all-boys, old Catholic schools like La Salle and Ateneo would earn 30 pogi points. Graduates of UK and US prep schools, 20 pogi points (lamang lang sila sa Inglesan). Any other school abroad, plus 15 pogi points. Any other younger exclusive Catholic schools like Xavier, Don Bosco, Aquinas, and Southridge, 10 pogi points. Basta nakatapos ng high school, plus 5 pogi points.

Sports

If a guy is into soccer, plus 20 pogi points. Any racket sport (except pingpong and pelota), plus 15 pogi points. If engaging in not-so-popular sports like rowing, fencing and archery as well as sepak takraw, arnis, eskrima and sika-ran (indigenous sports are "in" dahil eksotik), plus 20 pogi points. For the golf enthusiast, plus 15 pogi points. Talent and skills in tong-its, minus 50 pogi points because it's too hoi polloi. No pogi points for basketball because three-fourths of men are PBA fanatics.

College Organization

Membership in AISEC and its local hybrids (like IBA and JMA) or any other socially-oriented org that has chapters in DLSU, Ateneo, Miriam, Assumption and UP, plus 5 pogi points because they have a conscience to speak of, now rare among college students.

Girlfriend

If the current squeeze or the former flame is a beauty titlist, an Absolut girl, or one of Manila's Five Prettiest, automatic 50 pogi points. A campus celebrity or a showbiz denizen, 40 pogi points. If the typical pretty colegiala, 30 pogi points. Any girl, plus 10 pogi points. A mainstay of "That's Entertainment," minus 100 pogi points.

A Collegial Nativity Scene

2009-11-30T23:19:00.003-08:00

A few days before Christmas, the Monsignor thought it would be a good idea if he solicited the support of a number of the Catholic Schools to get together to create a Nativity Scene in time for the Christmas Mass.

The day before Christmas, the Monsignor discovered that the Nativity Scene was still incomplete so he made a few inquiries on why this was so.

Ateneo reported it could come up with only two and not three wise men. La Salle reported it couldn't come up with even a single wise man. Maryknoll reported that it couldn't come up with even a single virgin.

Where to Go for College

2009-11-30T23:19:00.001-08:00

If you are smart but with limited means, go to UP.

If you are smart and with adequate means, go to Ateneo.

If your IQ is lower than your normal systolic blood pressure
but you have adequate means, go to La Salle.

If your IQ is lower than your normal systolic blood pressure
and have limited means, go to Guzman Tech.

If you are gay and wish to know the secrets
of how Alfie Lorenzo gets his way with young boys,
go to Karilagan School of Fashion. Aaaaayyyyyy diyos meh!!!!!!

3 College Buddies in front of the firing squad

2009-11-30T23:18:00.001-08:00

The guard brings the UP activist forward and the executioner asks if he has any last request. He says no and the executioner shouts, "Ready!... Aim!! ..." Suddenly The UP activist yells, "EARTHQUAKE!!!" Everyone is startled and looks around. He escapes.

The guard brings the Atenean student leader forward and the executioner asks if he has any last request. He says no and the executioner shouts, "Ready!... Aim!!..." Suddenly, remembering what the UP activist did, the Atenean yells, "TORNADO!!!" Everyone is startled and looks around. He escapes.

By now, the LaSallite has it all figured out. The guard brings him forward and the executioner asks if he has any last request. He says no and the executioner shouts, Ready! ... Aim!! ..." and the LaSallite yells, "FIRE!!!"

Choosing a Boyfriend

2009-11-30T23:17:00.003-08:00

Three Collegialas were discussing their choices in the kind of guy one should date.

1st Collegiala: "If you want someone who's really handsome, get someone from La Salle."

2nd Collegiala: "Yeah, but if you want a date who's smart, you'll want someone from UP."

3rd Collegiala: "Of course if you want both, you'd want an Atenean."

Nagpapalusot pa, ha...

2009-11-30T23:17:00.001-08:00

For summer, kumukuha ng Organic Chemistry yung magkabarkadang LaSallista at Atenista sa UP. Bright naman yung dalawa kaya akala nila, patok na "1" sila pagdating ng final exams. "Sobra ang 'overconfidence' " nung dalawa kaya nung weekend bago nung final exams, e nag party yung dalawa na akala mo e walang kinabukasan. Sobrang enjoy yung dalawa, hindi sila nakagising nung Lunes ng umaga, sa madaling sabi - hindi sila nakakuha nung final exams.

Lumapit sa Professor yung dalawa at nagpaliwanag kung bakit hindi sila nakakuha ng final exams sa Organic Chemistry. Wika nila, "Na-flat tire kami, Sir... e, wala pa naman kaming spare tire tapos e nandoon pa naman kami sa liblib na walang paraang humingi ng tulong... Pasensiya na kayo, Sir...

Pumayag naman yung Professor kaya't tuwang tuwa yung magkabarkada at nag-high five pa sa isa't-isa. O, sige, sabi nung Professor... bukas ang inyong make-up exams.

Kinabukasan, napansin nung magkabarkada na naka-assign sila sa magkaibang kuwarto.

Binigyan sila ng tig-iisang test booklet at pinayagan na silang magsimula.

Ang unang problem na 10 points worth: "Describe the tri-carboxylic acid cycle from a molecular standpoint."

Okay lang 'to! sabi nung magkahiwalay na magkabarkada sa kani-kanilang sarili. 10 points lang. Puwede na!

Ang ikalawang problem na 90 points worth: "Which tire got flat?"

Saan mahirap mag aral?

2009-11-30T23:16:00.001-08:00

Sa UP mahirap ang Math.
Sa Ateneo mahirap ang English.
Sa La Salle mahirap ang parking.
Sa Assumption, mahirap ang walang pera.
Sa UST, mahirap umuwi kapag baha.
Sa St. Scho, mahirap sumakay sa LRT.
Sa San Beda, mahirap maging lalaki.
Sa Don Bosco, para sa mahirap.

The Things We Learn in Grade School

2009-11-30T23:15:00.001-08:00

Chance had it that an Atenean and a La Sallite were peeing in the Men's Room at the same time. The Atenean finished first and after a quick shake, zipped up and was about to quickly exit.

The La Sallite finished peeing immediately after, approached the sink, turned on the faucet, started to wash his hands and hurriedly shot a remark at the departing Atenean - "You must be an Atenean!"

The Atenean replied, "Why yes... You're right... But aside from the obvious markings on my jacket, how did you know?"

To which, the La Sallite answered rather haughtily, "I noticed - you didn't wash your hands after peeing. You see, we, La Sallites, were taught, very early in Grade School, to always wash our hands after we pee!"

And the Atenean replied somewhat sheepishly, "Oh... Well.. You see, we Ateneans were taught, very early in Grade School, never to pee in our hands..."

A Murder Mystery (To be solved solely on the basis of pure logic)

2009-11-30T23:14:00.001-08:00

Mystery:

Who committed the murder?

Suspects:

The Humble Atenean

The Bright La Sallite

The Innocent Maryknoller

The Unaffected Assumptionista

The UP Graduate

Culprit:

The UP Graduate

Logic:

No such thing as a Humble Atenean or a Bright La Sallite or an Innocent Maryknoller or an Unaffected Assumptionista.

Limang Collegialas

2009-11-30T23:13:00.000-08:00

Limang Collegialas (Bohol Academy, St Theresa's, UP, Maryknoller, and Assumption) got together for lunch in a Filipino restaurant.

Common friends, not quite compleat gentlemen from Ateneo and La Salle, joined them momentarily and cracked a truly filthy joke with strong sexual overtones. Each one of the young ladies, in turn, reacted:

Bohol Academy

Sandali... pakiulit nga ulit, at paki-explain how did it became...

St Theresa's

Fainted...

Assumptionista

Blushed and giggled...

UP

"Elemental examples of a morally depraved society with anecdotes devoid of any socially or culturally redeeming value..."

Maryknoller

"Lumang luma na 'yan! Have you heard this one..."

Shortly after the dirty joke but before dessert and coffee were served, a "butiki" fell from the ceiling on to the table top. Each young lady, in turn, shrieked to their surprise:

Bohol Academy

Ayyyy! Butiki!

St Theresa's

Makes the sign of the Cross. Ohhhh, Lizard!

Maryknoller

Ohhhh, S**t... Lizard!

UP

Ahhhah! Piticus Lizardus!

Assumptionista

Hmmm! Lacoste!

How to install Huawei E220 on SliTAz Linux

2009-11-27T19:31:00.000-08:00

How to install Huawei E220 on SliTAz Linux

My primary objective is to resurrect my old laptop (Toshiba 1065cds) using SliTaz, an open source free operating system... and have an internet connection using Sun Broadband post-paid plan.

Installing SliTaz was very easy, because it is very small, light and easy to use. But now the challenge begins, how will I able to make the modem work on my newly resurrected laptop? I've been looking over the net for 3 days and yet no solution. read more...

Collect and collate

2009-11-24T23:44:00.000-08:00

The best thing in life is free.
The more the merrier.

I was thinking, these might be the principles in side the head of top sites and companies leaders today (facebook, google, youtube, linux, etc...). They offer free services, softwares, and tools, making our way of living easy and more flexible. Isn't it fun to connect with your long lost friends? How about searching tons of documents and in a matter of seconds you have the precise results? Have you ever wanted to be popular? Well, you may upload your video and have watched by millions of fans WORLDWIDE.. hahaha isn't it cool? Having a powerful Operating System at no cost, with large community based support, with huge tutorials and tips across the net. That is what we call Linux.

FREE really matters, while MORE builds strength, combined together result to contentment.

Earn while you write

2009-11-24T23:22:00.000-08:00

If you love to write, and you find it as your hobby, then this article is for you. There are lot of ways to earn money online and of course the most important thing to consider is time consumptions. Well, what is 2-4 hours per day sitting in front of your PC and hitting keys and clicking links.

I'm not talking about pay per click, but instead writing contents for companies or what we so called clients. Here is a sample of writer I adore most.

Different kinds of approach

1. Posting articles.

Some sites offers earnings by simply making you their authors of different articles, how to guides, tips, and tutorials. You will earn a decent amount of money depending on programs offered by the site. You may earn based on user reviews, user ratings, or share on ads earnings of the site.

2. Have your own blog.

Try to reach the world and attract visitors to read your blog, a blog with a unique and interesting contents. Time will come your traffic will increase and advertisers may ask you to have their ads posted on your site and in return they'll pay based on contract you agreed upon. Of course advertisers know who are their friends - and that is those blogs with high PageRank.

Through reading you gain knowledge, by sharing knowledge you gain friends.
-Chris

Google advance search tips

2009-11-23T23:01:00.001-08:00

The Basic search help article covers all the most common issues, but sometimes you need a little bit more power. This document will highlight the more advanced features of Google Web Search. Have in mind though that even very advanced searchers, such as the members of the search group at Google, use these features less than 5% of the time. Basic simple search is often enough. As always, we use square brackets [ ] to denote queries, so [ to be or not to be ] is an example of a query; [ to be ] or [ not to be ] are two examples of queries.

* Phrase search ("")
By putting double quotes around a set of words, you are telling Google to consider the exact words in that exact order without any change. Google already uses the order and the fact that the words are together as a very strong signal and will stray from it only for a good reason, so quotes are usually unnecessary. By insisting on phrase search you might be missing good results accidentally. For example, a search for [ "Alexander Bell" ] (with quotes) will miss the pages that refer to Alexander G. Bell.
* Search within a specific website (site:)
Google allows you to specify that your search results must come from a given website. For example, the query [ iraq site:nytimes.com ] will return pages about Iraq but only from nytimes.com. The simpler queries [ iraq nytimes.com ] or [ iraq New York Times ] will usually be just as good, though they might return results from other sites that mention the New York Times. You can also specify a whole class of sites, for example [ iraq site:.gov ] will return results only from a .gov domain and [ iraq site:.iq ] will return results only from Iraqi sites.
* Terms you want to exclude (-)
Attaching a minus sign immediately before a word indicates that you do not want pages that contain this word to appear in your results. The minus sign should appear immediately before the word and should be preceded with a space. For example, in the query [ anti-virus software ], the minus sign is used as a hyphen and will not be interpreted as an exclusion symbol; whereas the query [ anti-virus -software ] will search for the words 'anti-virus' but exclude references to software. You can exclude as many words as you want by using the - sign in front of all of them, for example [ jaguar -cars -football -os ]. The - sign can be used to exclude more than just words. For example, place a hyphen before the 'site:' operator (without a space) to exclude a specific site from your search results.
* Fill in the blanks (*)
The *, or wildcard, is a little-known feature that can be very powerful. If you include * within a query, it tells Google to try to treat the star as a placeholder for any unknown term(s) and then find the best matches. For example, the search [ Google * ] will give you results about many of Google's products (go to next page and next page -- we have many products). The query [ Obama voted * on the * bill ] will give you stories about different votes on different bills. Note that the * operator works only on whole words, not parts of words.
* Search exactly as is (+)
Google employs synonyms automatically, so that it finds pages that mention, for example, childcare for the query [ child care ] (with a space), or California history for the query [ ca history ]. But sometimes Google helps out a little too much and gives you a synonym when you don't really want it. By attaching a + immediately before a word (remember, don't add a space after the +), you are telling Google to match that word precisely as you typed it. Putting double quotes around a single word will do the same thing.
* The OR operator
Google's default behavior is to consider all the words in a search. If you want to specifically allow either one of several words, you can use the OR operator (note that you have to type 'OR' in ALL CAPS). For example, [ San Francisco Giants 2004 OR 2005 ] will give you results about either one of these years, whereas [ San Francisco Giants 2004 2005 ] (without the OR) will show pages that include both years on the same page. The symbol | can be substituted for OR. (The AND operator, by the way, is the default, so it is not needed.)

Exceptions

Search is rarely absolute. Search engines use a variety of techniques to imitate how people think and to approximate their behavior. As a result, most rules have exceptions. For example, the query [ for better or for worse ] will not be interpreted by Google as an OR query, but as a phrase that matches a (very popular) comic strip. Google will show calculator results for the query [ 34 * 87 ] rather than use the 'Fill in the blanks' operator. Both cases follow the obvious intent of the query. Here is a list of exceptions to some of the rules and guidelines that were mentioned in this and the Basic Search Help article:
Exceptions to 'Every word matters'

* Words that are commonly used, like 'the,' 'a,' and 'for,' are usually ignored (these are called stop words). But there are even exceptions to this exception. The search [ the who ] likely refers to the band; the query [ who ] probably refers to the World Health Organization -- Google will not ignore the word 'the' in the first query.
* Synonyms might replace some words in your original query. (Adding + before a word disables synonyms.)
* A particular word might not appear on a page in your results if there is sufficient other evidence that the page is relevant. The evidence might come from language analysis that Google has done or many other sources. For example, the query [ overhead view of the bellagio pool ] will give you nice overhead pictures from pages that do not include the word 'overhead.'

Punctuation that is not ignored

* Punctuation in popular terms that have particular meanings, like [ C++ ] or [ C# ] (both are names of programming languages), are not ignored.
* The dollar sign ($) is used to indicate prices. [ nikon 400 ] and [ nikon $400 ] will give different results.
* The hyphen - is sometimes used as a signal that the two words around it are very strongly connected. (Unless there is no space after the - and a space before it, in which case it is a negative sign.)
* The underscore symbol _ is not ignored when it connects two words, e.g. [ quick_sort ].

Google search tips

2009-11-23T23:00:00.001-08:00

Search is simple: just type whatever comes to mind in the search box, hit Enter or click on the Google Search button, and Google will search the web for pages that are relevant to your query.

Most of the time you'll find exactly what you were looking for with just a basic query. However the following tips can help you refine your technique to make the most of your searches. Throughout the article, we'll use square brackets [ ] to signal queries, so [ black and white ] is one query, while [ black ] and [ white ] are two.
Some basic facts

* Every word matters. Generally, all the words you put in the query will be used. There are some exceptions.
* Search is always case insensitive. Searching for [ new york times ] is the same as searching for [ New York Times ].
* With some exceptions, punctuation is ignored (that is, you can't search for @#$%^&*()=+[]\ and other special characters).

Guidelines for better search

* Keep it simple. If you're looking for a particular company, just enter its name, or as much of its name as you can recall. If you're looking for a particular concept, place, or product, start with its name. If you're looking for a pizza restaurant, just enter pizza and the name of your town or your zip code. Most queries do not require advanced operators or unusual syntax. Simple is good.
* Think how the page you are looking for will be written. A search engine is not a human, it is a program that matches the words you give to pages on the web. Use the words that are most likely to appear on the page. For example, instead of saying [ my head hurts ], say [ headache ], because that's the term a medical page will use. The query [ in what country are bats considered an omen of good luck? ] is very clear to a person, but the document that gives the answer may not have those words. Instead, use the query [ bats are considered good luck in ] or even just [ bats good luck ], because that is probably what the right page will say.
* Describe what you need with as few terms as possible. The goal of each word in a query is to focus it further. Since all words are used, each additional word limits the results. If you limit too much, you will miss a lot of useful information. The main advantage to starting with fewer keywords is that, if you don't get what you need, the results will likely give you a good indication of what additional words are needed to refine your results on the next search. For example, [ weather cancun ] is a simple way to find the weather and it is likely to give better results than the longer [ weather report for cancun mexico ].
* Choose descriptive words. The more unique the word is the more likely you are to get relevant results. Words that are not very descriptive, like 'document,' 'website,' 'company,' or 'info,' are usually not needed. Keep in mind, however, that even if the word has the correct meaning but it is not the one most people use, it may not match the pages you need. For example, [ celebrity ringtones ] is more descriptive and specific than [ celebrity sounds ].

Amazing shot of Kobe Bryant

2009-11-23T16:22:00.001-08:00

In the span of just two minutes, Los Angeles Lakers star Kobe Bryant(notes): (a) hit a shot from behind the backboard after being forced baseline by Thunder rookie James Harden(notes), (b) nailed a pretty up-and-under reverse layup, and (c) banked home a difficult runner — with his left hand — to beat the first quarter buzzer.

He will accept the My Little Pony/H-O-R-S-E trophy from inaugural winner Kevin Durant(notes), postgame.

Watch video here

How to Sign Up Paypal, the Safer and Easier for Online Payment

2009-11-10T16:18:00.000-08:00

Paypal is the safer and easier for online payment. I consider that most of business providers use Paypal for their payment transaction. The service allows anyone to pay in any way they prefer, including through credit cards, bank accounts, buyer credit or account balances, without sharing financial information. Here the step by step how to sign up paypal account.

1. Go to Paypal.com and click ’sign up’ menu or button. Choose your country, language and account type.

For first start, better you use Personal account type.

2. Fill the registration form with your true information in order to make all process then easily if there is a problem with your account. Don’t sign the “Link my credit card so I can start shopping right away” option because you can add the info later after signing up. After filling all information, click the button agreement and you have sign up the paypal successfully.

3. Become a verified user. To verify your paypal account, you can add your credit card number at form paypal given. Follow the instruction from them. I will share you how to verify it on next post for alternative if you don’t have a credit card.

How to download install Heroes of Newerth

2009-11-08T06:19:00.001-08:00

How to Download Install Heroes of Newerth

First, download your Heroes of Newerth Beta Keys.zip here then follow the instructions below:

1. Go to http://beta.heroesofnewerth.com/create_account.php and fill up the registration form.

2. Upon completion of the registration form, click `Create New Account` button.

3. On the next page http://www.heroesofnewerth.com/purchase_pref_beta.php, find and select `No Thanks, Start Beta Testing` then click `Continue` button

4. Go to Download page http://beta.heroesofnewerth.com/dl_beta.php

5. Carefully read `Terms of Service` then choose the right version of download which could be found at the bottom.

6. Wait for the download to finish then install it.

Have fun and enjoy!!!

keywords dota hon heroes of newerth download install instructions beta keys

beta key heroes of newerth

2009-11-08T06:18:00.000-08:00

Heroes of Newerth Beta Key

Please download the list of keys. Then you can find detailed instructions here on how to use these beta keys

Download Link.
Heroes of Newerth Beta Key.zip

About Google

2009-11-06T16:30:00.001-08:00

Company Overview

Our name

Founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin named the search engine they built
"Google," a play on the word "googol," the mathematical term for a 1
followed by 100 zeros. The name reflects the immense volume of information
that exists, and the scope of Google's mission: to organize the world's
information and make it universally accessible and useful.

When you visit www.google.com or one of more than 150 other Google domains,
you can find information in many different languages (and translate between
them), check stock quotes and sports scores, find news headlines and look up
the address of your local post office or grocery store. You can also find
images, videos, maps, patents and much more. With universal search
technology, you can often find all of these things combined in one query.

Of course, there is a lot of information in the world that is not yet
online, so we're also working to get more of it digitized, such as in Google
Books or the Google News Archive. We also know that whenever you search the
web you want it to be as fast as possible, with all your favorite websites
at your fingertips, so we offer software like Google Toolbar and Google
Chrome to help you browse the web quickly and easily.

Search is how Google began, and it's at the heart of what we do today. We
devote more engineering time to search than to any other product at Google,
because we believe that search can always be improved. We are constantly
working to provide you with more relevant results so that you find what
you're looking for faster. To that end, we've added services such as
personalized search, which tailors results for you if you are signed in to
your Google account.

Ads

As a business, Google generates the majority of its revenue by offering
advertisers measurable, cost-effective and highly relevant advertising, so
that the ads are useful to the people who see them as well as to the
advertisers who run them.

Hundreds of thousands of advertisers worldwide use our Google AdWords
program to promote their products and services on the web. Advertisers bid
in an open and competitive auction to have their ads appear alongside the
search results for particular keywords. They can specify the geographic
location and time of day for their ads to appear. As a result, people see
ads that are so useful and relevant that they become a valuable form of
information in their own right.

Since we believe you should know when someone has paid to put a message in
front of you, we distinguish ads from search results or other content on a
page by labeling them as "sponsored links" or "Ads by Google". We don't sell
ad placement in our search results, nor do we allow people to pay for a
higher ranking there.

In addition, hundreds of thousands of partners, from bloggers to major
online publishers, participate in our Google AdSense program. This program
delivers ads from our AdWords advertisers that are relevant to the content
or search results on partner sites. The AdSense program enables advertisers
to extend the reach of their ad campaigns, improves partners' ability to
generate revenue from their content, and delivers relevant ads for their
users.

In addition to our core AdWords and AdSense programs, we offer a number of
other services to advertisers, including various advertising formats on
YouTube, Google TV Ads, as well as online ad serving and management services
through DoubleClick. Finally, we aim to make advertising more measurable and
efficient with free tools for advertisers such as Google Analytics, Website
Optimizer, Insights for Searchand Ad Planner. These tools help advertisers
to analyze their campaigns, test them, and make them more efficient and
effective.

Apps

We build web applications, or "apps", to make it simpler for people to share
information and get things done together. Gmail, Google Calendar and Google
Docs help people communicate and collaborate more easily, whether planning a
wedding or building a business itinerary. The information is stored securely
online, accessible from any device with a web connection. And because it
lives online, it's easy to share with a group of collaborators. Everyone in
the group can work on the same material at the same time, even if they're
working in different buildings, countries or continents.

Today people want the same ease of use on their work computers that they
have on their increasingly powerful personal computers. This is why we offer
businesses a suite called Google Apps. It's powerful enough for large
enterprises (we use it across all of Google, in fact) but simple enough for
mom-and-pop businesses too. We're continually improving Google Apps, so you
always have the latest version without worrying about maintenance or
upgrades. And it's much less expensive than most traditional software.
Google Apps is designed to fit the way people naturally live, work and
socialize, so they can focus on what they're doing rather than worrying
about maintaining the software.

We built Google Apps from the ground up for today's connected world. Our
infrastructure is designed to keep our users' data safe and secure and to
make our apps fast and responsive. We firmly believe that on the web, your
data belongs to you, and should be portable: when you use Google Apps, you
can export your mail, documents, photos or calendar entries whenever you
like.

Mobile

You should be able to access all of Google's services wherever you are -
even if you don't have a computer nearby. We make it easy for you to use
your favorite Google products, from Google Maps to YouTube, right from your
phone. As mobile devices become increasingly central to people's lives, we
work hard to find new and better ways to help you get the information you
need when if you are on the go.

We're also focused on enabling others to innovate in the mobile space.
Working closely with the Open Handset Alliance, we developed Android, the
world's first fully open platform that any mobile developer can use and any
hardware manufacturer can install on a device. Android was built with the
web in mind, and we believe that it will help drive innovation so that more
people can use better and cheaper mobile devices to access the Internet.

The road ahead

A lot has changed since the first Google search engine appeared. We have
grown and expanded our offerings from a single service to dozens, often in
as many languages. We now have thousands of employees and offices around the
world. But some things haven't changed: our dedication to our users and our
belief in the possibilities of the Internet itself.

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