Despite reform, Turkmens told to exalt late autocrat's book

ASHGABAT (Reuters Life!) - The president of the Central Asian state of Turkmenistan on Wednesday suggested there were limits to his desire to reform, urging the nation to honor a book written by his predecessor, one of the world's most eccentric autocrats.

Seeking warmer ties with the West as he seeks alternative gas export routes to cut his country's dependence on Russia, Turkmen President Kurbanguly Berdymukhamedov has begun to slowly unwind his predecessor's policies amid some signs he is ready to gradually allow more freedom.

Turkmenistan holds the world's fourth-largest natural gas reserves and multi-national energy companies have assiduously tried to court its government for access in recent years.

But in a move that suggested radical political change may be some way off, Berdymukhamedov on Wednesday exhorted his nation to treasure the "holy book" authored by Saparmurat Niyazov, the country's first post-Soviet leader who was famous for renaming the months of the year after members of his own family.

Praising its take on Turkmenistan's "inimitable culture, peculiar way of life and rich spiritual world", he made it clear that the book - the "Rukhnama" - would still remain the centerpiece of Turkmen society.

"The Rukhnama has helped the world to learn about the numerous great states built by our nation throughout its history," he said in a written address to the nation marking "Rukhnama Day".

"The Rukhnama will continue to serve as a spiritual source that multiplies our energy and strength."

Berdymukhamedov, a 55-year-old qualified dentist with a penchant for sports cars and riding thoroughbred horses, is officially nicknamed "Arkadag" or The Patron and wields virtually unlimited powers.

But Niyazov, who died of heart failure in 2006 and ruled his reclusive Central Asian nation for more than two decades, was widely regarded as one of the world's most bizarre and strict autocrats.

Officially titled "Turkmenbashi", or Head of the Turkmen, he published the Rukhnama in 2001 and made it central to all aspects of life in the country.

It replaced history lessons in schools and knowledge of the book was even made mandatory for anyone who wanted to obtain a driving license.

The book, a mixture of folklore, morality, autobiography and history written in oracular style, glorifies the Turkmen as a 5,000-year-old nation which founded 70 states and empires.

Niyazov's reign was marked by a ban on opera, circus and ballet in the desert nation of 5.5 million people.

He renamed the months of the year after national symbols or family members, cut the length of school and university studies and banned studying abroad.

Berdymukhamedov has moved to gradually unwind some of his predecessor's policies.

He has allowed wide access to the Internet, let Turkmen citizens study abroad and restored the National Academy of Sciences abolished by his predecessor. Opera and circus - but not classical ballet - have also returned.

In the field of education, secondary school pupils study for 10 years, rather than nine under Niyazov, and undergraduate students spend five years, rather than three, at university.

Compulsory daily Rukhnama drills in schools have been reduced to one hour a week and school-leavers no longer have to pass exams on knowledge of the book. The month of September, renamed Rukhnama by Niyazov, has also been given back its original name.

(Writing by Dmitry Solovyov; Editing by Andrew Osborn)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/despite-reform-turkmens-told-exalt-autocrats-book-155743154.html

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Stock index futures rise; Apple, Facebook eyed

PARIS (Reuters) - U.S. stock index futures pointed to a higher open on Wall Street on Wednesday, with futures for the S&P 500 up 0.59 percent, Dow Jones futures up 0.46 percent and Nasdaq 100 futures up 0.67 percent at 0855 GMT.

European stocks rallied on Wednesday, led by Spanish, Italian and Greek shares after Germany's Constitutional Court said the country can ratify the euro zone's new rescue fund and budget pact as long it can guarantee there will be no increase in German financial exposure to the bailout fund without parliament's approval.

Apple Inc will be in focus on Wednesday as the company is set to unveil its newest iPhone, which is widely expected to offer 4G wireless technology for the first time, and a 4-inch display, up from the current 3.5 inches.

Shares in Samsung Electronics rose more than 3 percent to their highest intraday levels in more than three weeks on Wednesday, shrugging off rival Apple Inc's planned unveiling of its newest iPhone.

Facebook Inc will also be in the spotlight after CEO Mark Zuckerberg soothed investors in his first major public appearance since the No. 1 social network's rocky May IPO, breathing life into its struggling shares after hinting at new growth areas from mobile to search. His comments helped drive Facebook shares up more than 3 percent after hours to above $20, building on a 3.3 percent gain in regular trade on Tuesday. The stock is still well off its $38 debut price.

Ford Motor Co's board of directors will discuss this week a succession plan for Chief Executive Alan Mulally, who is expected to retire by the end of 2013, Bloomberg reported on Tuesday, citing a person familiar with the matter.

On the macro side, investors awaited wholesale inventories for July, while keeping an eye on the Federal Open Market Committee, which begins its two-day meeting on interest rate policy.

The Dow industrials closed at the highest level in nearly five years on Tuesday in a lightly traded session before the key decisions in Germany and the United States, which could give markets a further boost.

The Dow Jones industrial average ended up 69.07 points, or 0.52 percent, to 13,323.36. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index closed up 4.48 points, or 0.31 percent, to 1,433.56. The Nasdaq Composite Index gained 0.50 point, or 0.02 percent, to 3,104.53.

(Reporting by Blaise Robinson; Editing by Catherine Evans)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/stock-index-futures-rise-apple-facebook-eyed-090435783--finance.html

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0 - Real Estate Investing Facts

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Egypt is stunningly beautiful and is known as an interesting country with a coastline that is brushed by both the Mediterranean and Red seas. This country have some natural wonders such as The Pyramids, which is considered as a jewel in its crown and the river Nile, which is the longest river of the world. Architectural marvels of the country inspire the architects from various parts of the world and the Egypt real estate market is destined for massive growth. Egypt is considered as one of the most exciting and exotic country that is situated in close proximity to Europe that also provide massive potential to Egypt real estate investors. Moreover Egypt can genuinely boast year round sunshine on its Red Sea Riviera, which means it offers all the year round profit to the real estate investors.

investment properties at Real Estate Matchmaker

With its two architecturally brilliant properties Cairo and Gamsha Bay, Egypt has become a top real estate destination in the world. Famous for its sun drenched beaches, pleasant climatic condition; it is a land with a fine blend of modern and traditional architecture and arts. property in Egypt is a hot prospect as it offers lot of advantages such as low cost of living, unique atmosphere, government favourable policies for the overseas buyers and sound real estate investment. These factors have generated the interest of real estate investors in the property of Egypt.

Government of Egypt has also revised several policies governing the ownership of real estate and property by foreigners in the country. This has further help to attract the interest of global real estate players that are developing major residential townships in the cities of Cairo, Hurghada, and the Gamsha Bay. These townships are sure to bring in lots of investment to the region from every segment of investor. There is room and scope for every investor in Egypt, be it residential, commercial or industrial real estate investors. The government is also working towards making Egypt one of the top tourist destinations in the world by 2011. The all-round efforts by the government are visible from the collaboration of Egyptian government with the World Travel and Tourism Council.

Due to the sustained efforts of the government, the economy of the Egypt is on upswing and this stability and growth of the country is generating overall growth potential and driving real estate investors to invest in Egypt. It is a kind of place which the real estate investors look for immediate income and as a medium for long term growth. Recently in Egypt the property buying process has become more transparent, easy and affordable thus gaining the attention of more and more real estate investors.

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Source: http://realestateinvestingfacts.com/blog/6456/egypt-property-growth-potential-real-estate-investors/

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Wrestler, commentator Lawler in hospital

(AP) ? Professional wrestler and commentator Jerry "The King" Lawler is stable in the cardiac care unit of a Montreal hospital after collapsing during a World Wrestling Entertainment event.

The WWE posted an update on Lawler's condition Tuesday afternoon on both its webpage and on Twitter.

"WE will provide additional information as it becomes available. We continue to wish Jerry all the best for a full recovery," according to the statement.

The WWE said that Lawler suffered a heart attack at the announcers' table Monday night during "Raw" and was taken from the Bell Centre to a hospital. The 62-year-old Lawler of Memphis, Tenn., still wrestles and took part in a tag team match before joining Cole ringside for the rest of the program as a commentator. He collapsed ringside while a match continued in the ring and was carried backstage before being taken to a hospital.

His broadcast partner Michael Cole addressed the television audience and said that the situation is "serious," but that Lawler was breathing on his own."

Lawler wrestled WWE champion CM Punk in a steel cage match in the main event of "Raw" two weeks ago.

The wrestler shot to fame in the early 1980s when he feuded with comedian Andy Kaufman. The two wrestled in Memphis, and Lawler famously slapped Kaufman during an appearance on "Late Night With David Letterman." Lawler later appeared as himself in the Kaufman biopic "Man on the Moon," starring Jim Carrey.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/4e67281c3f754d0696fbfdee0f3f1469/Article_2012-09-11-Lawler-Collapses/id-23bea8d60e714cab95bdfe1572d97cd9

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Study: Facebook friends had huge impact on 2010 voter turnout

Do you "like" voting? Saying so on Facebook could influence your friends to hit the polls.

A single get-out-the-vote message sent to 61 million Facebook users on Election Day 2010 influenced 340,000 people to cast ballots when they otherwise would not have, according to the findings of a massive social experiment. The results, appearing tomorrow (Sept. 13) in the journal Nature, are the first to show that online actions can influence specific real-world behaviors, said study leader James Fowler, who researches social networks at the University of California, San Diego.

"A single message directly mobilized millions of acts of online political communication and information-seeking," Fowler said in a media briefing about the findings. "But even more important, people who saw the message were more likely to show up at the polls." ??

Not only that, Fowler said, but having a friend who saw the message ? bringing it to your attention either through Facebook or in the real world ? increased your chances of voting, too. For every one person directly affected by receiving the Facebook message, four were indirectly influenced to vote.

"If we had only measured the direct effect on recipients [of the message], we would have missed the whole story," Fowler said. "The network is key." [Top 10 Major Political Protests]

Getting out the vote

Voter turnout efforts usually manage to bring an extra 1 percent to 8 percent of people to the polls, according to previous studies, Fowler said. Electronic communication is usually the least effective way to encourage people to vote.

But voting behavior is correlated in social networks: If your good friends vote, it's more likely you will, too. What's difficult for researchers is teasing out whether that's the result of you and your friends being very alike, or whether their behavior truly influences your own.

To find out, the researchers collaborated with Facebook to send 61 million users an Election Day reminder on Nov. 2, 2010. These users saw a social message with the heading "Today is Election Day" and a link to find their polling place alongside pictures of up to six of their friends who had clicked an "I voted" button in the message. The user had the option to click this button as well.

An additional 611,000 people saw the same message, but without the faces of their voting friends. And 613,000 users who logged on that day saw no voting reminder at all.

Facebook protected user privacy by ensuring that the voting data was not linked to individuals in the study analysis, said Cameron Marlow, who works on the data science team at Facebook.

"The individuals who were being studied were being studied in such a way that their individual identifies were not being observed," Marlow said.

Socially contagious voting

The results revealed that a social message makes for a stronger influence than a purely informational one does. Users who saw the get-out-the-vote reminder emblazoned with the faces of their friends were 2.08 percent more likely to click "I voted," and 0.26 percent more likely to use the poll-finding link, than those who saw the reminder without their friends' faces. The social message group was also 0.39 percent more likely to actually go out and vote than the informational message group was, according to an analysis of publically available voting records.

In fact, getting an informational message without the social component didn't influence real-world behavior at all, the researchers found. People who got the informational message were no more likely to vote than people who got no message at all.

To study indirect effects of the message, the researchers classified users' close friends on Facebook. Those people in the 80th percentile of on-site interactions were labeled as "close." These pairs are likely to have in-person relationships as well as online ones, Fowler said.

"Only the 10 closest friends mattered for the spread of real-world voting," Fowler said. People with a close friend who was sent the social voting message were 0.224 percent more likely to vote than someone whose friends had not seen the message.

It's not clear exactly how the voting behavior spread, Fowler said. Clicking "I voted" was recorded on users' news feeds and walls, where friends could see it. Or the message could have spurred a real-world conversation about voting that influenced the friends.

In the end, the researchers calculated, the message directly influenced 60,000 people to vote and indirectly influenced 280,000 more to cast a vote.

The get-out-the-vote message had an equally strong effect on liberals and conservatives, Fowler said. [Life's Extremes: Democrat vs. Republican]

Spreading social networks

Fowler said voting behavior is only one way in which Facebook and other social networks might change the real world.

"In the future, I think it would be really interesting to do something similar not just for promoting an election, but for promoting better health, for example, or promoting better mental health," he said. "I think we could see the same kinds of spillover effects."

Marlow wouldn't say whether Facebook has any get-out-the-vote messages planned for the 2012 election. Still, the results of the experiment are bound to catch the eye of the political campaigns.

"What we have shown here is that those two worlds are not separate," Fowler said. "The online world and the real world affect one another. In this case, we find that this message that started online, that spread online, actually affected real-world behavior. It got a third of a million people to the polls."

Follow Stephanie Pappas on Twitter @sipappas?or LiveScience @livescience. We're also on Facebook?& Google+.?

Copyright 2012 LiveScience, a TechMediaNetwork company. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/facebook-friends-carry-huge-influence-voter-turnout-170947067.html

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Quora Adds Trending Topics (And No, They?re Not All Tech-Related)

quora-topics A year or two ago, it might have been easy to brush aside Quora for being another Valley water cooler with little mainstream crossover potential. But the content on the site has since diversified into other areas like food and entertainment, politics, and film. Content is actually fairly evenly divided between five different areas now -- four of which are outside tech (see the graph below). With that new breadth, Quora is rethinking how it displays and organizes topics today. The company is still quiet on numbers of active users, but Marc Bodnick, who handles business development and product marketing, said that there are 250,000 topics up from about 70,000 a year ago.

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Techcrunch/~3/iwP_k0cBTOI/

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New NPS Science Report Focuses on ... - The Wildlife Society News

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(Credit: NPS)

?

The National Park Service (NPS) Advisory Board released a report August 28th on the goals of resource management in the National Park System.? ?Revisiting Leopold: Resource Stewardship in the National Parks? recommends that management of natural and historical resources embrace an ever-changing world, rather than trying to recreate a pre-contact ecosystem, as was the recommendation from a famous 1963 report led by A. Starker Leopold, son of Aldo Leopold.

The new report recommends that in order ?to preserve [the]ecological integrity and cultural authenticity? of park system resources, management must accept and work within the context of a world changing in response to climate change, land-use change, habitat fragmentation, invasive species, and many other complex and interrelated factors. The report reemphasizes and reaffirms the role of science in management, and the use of a precautionary approach.

The original Leopold Report guided NPS policy for fifty years, and in many ways still does, but park officials say it needed updating.? It was extremely influential when it suggested that wildlife management be based on science, and that parks be managed for whole ecosystems rather than any particular, favored species of wildlife.

Sources: E&E Publishing (Greenwire August 28, 2012), NPS (August 24, 2012)

Source: http://news.wildlife.org/featured/new-nps-science-report-focuses-on-environmental-change/

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Shell begins petroleum drilling off Alaska coast

(AP) ? More than four years after Royal Dutch Shell paid $2.8 billion to the federal government for petroleum leases in the Chukchi Sea, a company vessel on Sunday morning sent a drill bit into the ocean floor, beginning preliminary work on an exploratory well 70 miles off the northwest coast of Alaska.

Drilling began at 4:30 a.m., said Shell Alaska spokesman Curtis Smith. Shell Alaska vice president Pete Slaiby called it historic.

"It's the first time a drill bit has touched the sea floor in the U.S. Chukchi Sea in more than two decades," Slaiby said in a prepared statement. "This is an exciting time for Alaska and for Shell. We look forward to continued drilling progress throughout the next several weeks and to adding another chapter to Alaska's esteemed oil and gas history."

Federal officials estimate Arctic waters in the Chukchi and Beaufort seas hold 26 billion barrels of recoverable oil and 130 trillion cubic feet of natural gas. Interior Secretary Ken Salazar announced Aug. 30 that Shell would be permitted to begin preparation work at the Chukchi site even though the company's spill response barge has not been certified and is not positioned nearby.

The company is authorized to drill narrow pilot holes 1,400 feet below the ocean floor and roughly 4,000 feet above a petroleum reservoir.

Shell has spent upward of $4.5 billion for Arctic Ocean drilling but had been thwarted from drilling by environmental lawsuit, regulatory requirements and short open-water drilling seasons. Despite the requirement to stay out of oil-bearing rock, they were elated to finally begin work.

"In the days to come, drilling will continue in the Chukchi Sea, and we will prepare for drilling to commence in the Beaufort Sea," Slaiby said.

Drilling is bitterly opposed by environmental groups that say oil companies have not demonstrated they can clean up a spill in ice-choked water. They say a spill of the magnitude of the Deepwater Horizon blowout in the Gulf of Mexico would be catastrophic in a region hammered by climate warming and home to endangered or threatened marine mammals such as bowhead whales, polar bear and walrus.

Shell officials say there's little chance of that happening. They are drilling in about 130 feet deep, versus 5,000 at the site of the gulf spill, and wellhead pressure is expected to be far less. Shell also claims its support vessels could quickly choke off and respond to a spill.

Smith said workers Friday completed mooring of the drill ship, the Noble Discoverer, in heavy seas with eight anchors that each weigh 15 tons and are staged on the seafloor in a circular pattern. The diameter of the anchor pattern, he said by email, was more than 6,500-feet.

A 20-by-40-by-40-foot mud-line cellar will allow a blowout preventer to be positioned below the seafloor, protecting it from ice scraping the bottom.

The oil spill response barge remains in Bellingham, Wash., and is expected to undergo sea trials over the weekend, he said.

Shell's other Arctic Ocean drill ship, the Kulluk, is in the Beaufort Sea waiting for the fall whale hunt to end before moving to the drill site.

___

Online:

www.shell.us/alaska

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/386c25518f464186bf7a2ac026580ce7/Article_2012-09-09-Shell-Arctic%20Offshore%20Drilling/id-cc281646669949bcb625c327b725ed15

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JEFF BEZOS: Amazon's Not Going To Launch A ... - Business Insider

There has been a lot of speculation that Amazon is going to start making and selling its own smartphone.

From time to time, this speculation gets "confirmed."

Last week, for example, one report suggested that Amazon would be rolling out its smartphone at the Kindle launch presentation.

Nope.

And, in fact, it doesn't sound like Amazon is going to be rolling out a smartphone (or anything else) for the rest of this year.

How do we know?

Because All Things D's Tricia Duryee asked Jeff Bezos about Amazon's future product plans in an excellent long interview posted here.

Bezos had this to say:

Q: What about extending the [product] roadmap beyond these devices that we saw today?

Bezos:?I can?t talk about our future roadmap, but we have some ideas about what we can do in the future. ? You are exhausting me now, come on, Tricia! We just finished this one! You are such a demanding customer! What else do you got?!

But you do have demanding customers!

Bezos: We will certainly ? not any time soon ? but next year. We have some more things that we hope people will enjoy. It?s premature for me to talk about them.

So, there you have it. Amazon's not going to be launching a smartphone this year.

That's good news for Apple. Because an Amazon smartphone, priced and built well, could be a big threat to the iPhone profit machine.

(Okay, fine. There's wiggle room there. Maybe Bezos was only talking about the future Kindle roadmap. You be the judge.)

What else did Bezos have to say?

He said that the Kindle Fire HD is the best tablet in the world--at any price. It will be interesting to hear what Apple folks have to say about that.

SEE ALSO: Sorry, Apple Fans, Amazon's Sucking The Profit Out Of Tablets -- Smartphones Next?

Source: http://www.businessinsider.com/jeff-bezos-amazon-smartphone-2012-9

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Google Drive mobile app updated, brings editing to iOS

Google Drive mobile app updated, brings editing to iOS

The mobile Google Drive app just keeps getting better and better. Are we ready to ditch the desktop web app for its iOS and Android package? Hardly, but with ever decimal point upgrade the disparity between the two keeps getting smaller. The latest round of updates finally delivers document editing to your iPad and iPhone, including the ability to format text and see live changes made by your collaborators. You can also now view presentations, including speaker notes. The Android version also got a few nice tweaks today, most notable being the ability to see and reply to comments on docs. Google is also promising that real-time updates will be coming to spreadsheets very soon -- which should excite on-the-go number crunchers. Check out the video after the break.

Continue reading Google Drive mobile app updated, brings editing to iOS

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