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বৃহস্পতিবার, ৭ নভেম্বর, ২০১৩

Apple promises to restore some iWork features within six months

November 07, 2013

If you've been disappointed in the lack of certain features in the newly released iWork '13, don't worry: Apple is not sticking its fingers in its ears and humming as loudly as possible.

On Wednesday, the company posted a support document listing features that would return to the productivity suite within the next six months.

[ Also on InfoWorld: The must-have iPad office apps, round 7. | What you need to know about Apple's free apps policy. | For a quick, smart take on the news you'll be talking about, check out InfoWorld TechBrief -- subscribe today. ]

"In rewriting these applications, some features from iWork '09 were not available for the initial release," says Apple's support document. "We plan to reintroduce some of these features in the next few releases and will continue to add brand new features on an ongoing basis."

Many of the most common complaints from users of iWork '09 are addressed in the document, including improvements to AppleScript support for Numbers and Keynote, more presenter display options in Keynote, keyboard shortcuts for styles in Pages, and many more.

If you've been holding off upgrading to iWork '13, remember that the installers do not replace your current iWork '09 versions, so you can continue to rely upon those for any features that Apple hasn't yet integrated. As to whether subsequent upgrades will return all the missing features, it's too early to say, but it seems likely that Apple is looking to make sure that its productivity suite helps make its customers, well, productive.

Source: http://www.infoworld.com/d/mobile-technology/apple-promises-restore-some-iwork-features-within-six-months-230398?source=rss_mobile_technology
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Obama says he's sorry Americans losing insurance

FILE - In this Oct. 30, 2013, file photo, President Barack Obama speaks at Boston's historic Faneuil Hall about the federal health care law. Obama says he's sorry Americans are losing health insurance plans he repeatedly said they could keep under his signature health care law. But the president stopped short of apologizing for making those promises in the first place. "I am sorry that they are finding themselves in this situation based on assurances they got from me," he said in an interview Thursday, Nov. 7 with NBC News. (AP Photo/Stephan Savoia, File)

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Barack Obama says he's sorry Americans are losing health insurance plans he repeatedly said they could keep under his signature health care law. But the president stopped short of apologizing for making those promises in the first place.

"I am sorry that they are finding themselves in this situation based on assurances they got from me," he said in an interview Thursday with NBC News.

He added: "We've got to work hard to make sure that they know we hear them, and we are going to do everything we can to deal with folks who find themselves in a tough position as a consequence of this."

The president's apology comes as the White House tries to combat a cascade of troubles surrounding the rollout of the health care law often referred to as "Obamacare." The healthcare.gov website that was supposed to be an easy portal for Americans to purchase insurance has been riddled by technical issues. And with at least 3.5 million Americans receiving cancellation notices from their insurance companies, there's new scrutiny aimed at the way the president tried to sell the law to the public in the first place.

Much of the focus is on the president's promise that Americans who liked their insurance coverage would be able to keep it. He repeated the line often, both as the bill was debated in Congress and after it was signed into law.

But the measure itself made that promise almost impossible to keep. It mandated that insurance coverage must meet certain standards and that policies that fell short could no longer be sold except through a grandfathering process, meaning some policies were always expected to disappear.

The White House says under those guidelines, fewer than 5 percent of Americans will have to change their coverage. But in a nation of more than 300 million people, 5 percent is about 15 million people.

Officials argue that those people being forced to change plans will end up with better coverage and that subsidies offered by the government will help offset any increased costs.

"We weren't as clear as we needed to be in terms of the changes that were taking place," Obama told NBC. "And I want to do everything we can to make sure that people are finding themselves in a good position, a better position than they were before this law happened."

The president's critics have accused him of misleading the public about changes that were coming under the law, which remains unpopular with many Americans and a target for congressional Republicans.

Obama dismissed that criticism, saying "I meant what I said" and insisting that his administration was operating in "good faith." He acknowledged that the administration "didn't do a good enough job in terms of how we crafted the law" but did not specify what changes might be made.

Sign-ups for the new health care marketplaces opened Oct. 1. People have six months to enroll before facing a penalty.

Some lawmakers — including Democrats — have called on the White House to delay the penalty or extend the enrollment period because of the website woes that have prevented many used from signing up. Obama said he remains confident that anyone who wants to buy insurance will be able to do so.

"Keep in mind that the open enrollment period, the period during which you can buy health insurance is available all the way until March 31," he said. "And we're only five weeks into it."

Associated PressSource: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/89ae8247abe8493fae24405546e9a1aa/Article_2013-11-07-Obama-Health%20Overhaul/id-b04d8aa89e6842cc87fcb77ae9982d78
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Report: Apple Supplier Flextronics Used Indentured Employees

Bloomberg Businessweek has an in-depth report today alleging that electronics supplier Flextronics used recruiters who charged workers exorbitant fees to place them in Malaysian plants, confiscating their passports and deserting them in employee housing without food when production idled.

Arafat's mysterious death becomes a whodunit

FILE - In this May 31, 2002 file photo, Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat pauses during the weekly Muslim Friday prayers in his headquarters in the West Bank city of Ramallah. Al-Jazeera is reporting that a team of Swiss scientists has found moderate evidence that longtime Palestinian leader Arafat died of poisoning. The Arab satellite channel published a copy of what it said was the scientists' report on its website on Wednesday, Nov. 6, 2013.(AP Photo/Lefteris Pitarakis, File)

Swiss professor Francois Bochud, left, director of the Chuv Radiophysics Institute, IRA, and Swiss professor Patrice Mangin, right, director of the University Center of Legal Medicine in Lausanne, CURML, speak on a forensics report concerning the late President Yasser Arafat during a press conference at the Centre Hospitalier Universitaire Vaudois, CHUV, in Lausanne, Switzerland, Thurday, Nov. 7, 2013. Swiss, French and Russian teams took samples of the remains after exhuming Arafat's body in Ramallah, and submitted results to the Palestinian Authority on Nov. 5. (AP Photo/Keystone, Laurent Gillieron)

Swiss professor Francois Bochud, left, director of the Chuv Radiophysics Institute, IRA, and Swiss professor Patrice Mangin, right, director of the University Center of Legal Medicine in Lausanne, CURML, pose with a forensics report concerning the late President Yasser Arafat during a press conference on of the Centre Hospitalier Universitaire Vaudois, CHUV, in Lausanne, Switzerland, Thurday, Nov. 7, 2013. Swiss, French and Russian teams took samples of the remains after exhuming Arafat's body in Ramallah, and submitted results to the Palestinian Authority on Nov. 5. (AP Photo/Keystone, Laurent Gillieron)

A forensics report concerning the late President Yasser Arafat is presented during a press conference of the Centre Hospitalier Universitaire Vaudois, CHUV, in Lausanne, Switzerland, Thurday, Nov. 7, 2013. Swiss, French and Russian teams took samples of the remains after exhuming Arafat's body in Ramallah, and submitted results to the Palestinian Authority on Nov. 5. (AP Photo/Keystone, Laurent Gillieron)

Palestinian Hanadi Kharma, paints a mural depicting the late Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat in the West Bank city of Nablus, Thursday, Nov. 7, 2013. Swiss scientists have found evidence suggesting Yasser Arafat may have been poisoned with a radioactive substance, a TV station reported on Wednesday, prompting new allegations by his widow that the Palestinian leader was the victim of a "shocking" crime. (AP Photo/Nasser Ishtayeh)

RAMALLAH, West Bank (AP) — Yasser Arafat's mysterious 2004 death turned into a whodunit Thursday after Swiss scientists who examined his remains said the Palestinian leader was probably poisoned with radioactive polonium.

Yet hard proof remains elusive, and nine years on, tracking down anyone who might have slipped minuscule amounts of the lethal substance into Arafat's food or drink could be difficult.

A new investigation could also prove embarrassing — and not just for Israel, which the Palestinians have long accused of poisoning their leader and which has denied any role.

The Palestinians themselves could come under renewed scrutiny, since Arafat was holed up in his Israeli-besieged West Bank compound in the months before his death, surrounded by advisers, staff and bodyguards.

Arafat died at a French military hospital on Nov. 11, 2004, at age 75, a month after suddenly falling violently ill at his compound. At the time, French doctors said he died of a stroke and had a blood-clotting problem, but records were inconclusive about what caused that condition.

The Swiss scientists said that they found elevated traces of polonium-210 and lead in Arafat's remains that could not have occurred naturally, and that the timeframe of Arafat's illness and death was consistent with poisoning from ingesting polonium.

"Our results reasonably support the poisoning theory," Francois Bochud, director of Switzerland's Institute of Radiation Physics, which carried out the investigation, said at a news conference.

Bochud and Patrice Mangin, director of the Lausanne University Hospital's forensics center, said they tested and ruled out innocent explanations, such as accidental poisoning.

"I think we can eliminate this possibility because, as you can imagine, you cannot find polonium everywhere. It's a very rare toxic substance," Mangin told The Associated Press.

Palestinian officials, including Arafat's successor, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, had no comment on the substance of the report but promised a continued investigation.

The findings are certain to revive Palestinian allegations against Israel, a nuclear power. Polonium can be a byproduct of the chemical processing of uranium, but usually is made artificially in a nuclear reactor or a particle accelerator.

Arafat's widow, Suha, called on the Palestinian leadership to seek justice for her husband, saying, "It's clear this is a crime."

Speaking by phone from the Qatari capital Doha, she did not mention Israel but argued that only countries with nuclear capabilities have access to polonium.

Israel has repeatedly denied a role in Arafat's death and did so again Thursday. Paul Hirschson, a Foreign Ministry official, dismissed the claim as "hogwash."

"We couldn't be bothered to" kill him, Hirschson said. "If anyone remembers the political reality at the time, Arafat was completely isolated. His own people were barely speaking to him. There's no logical reason for Israel to have wanted to do something like this."

In his final years, Arafat was being accused by Israel and the U.S. of condoning and even encouraging Palestinian attacks against Israelis instead of working for a peace deal. In late 2004, Israeli tanks no longer surrounded his compound, but Arafat was afraid to leave for fear of not being allowed to return.

Shortly after his death, the Palestinians launched their own investigation, questioning dozens of people in Arafat's compound, including staff, bodyguards and officials, but no suspects emerged.

Security around Arafat was easily breached toward the end of his life. Aides have described him as impulsive, unable to resist tasting gifts of chocolate or trying out medicines brought by visitors from abroad.

The investigation was dormant until the satellite TV station Al-Jazeera persuaded Arafat's widow last year to hand over a bag with her husband's underwear, headscarves and other belongings. After finding traces of polonium in biological stains on the clothing, investigators dug up his grave in his Ramallah compound earlier this year to take bone and soil samples.

Investigators noted Thursday that they could not account for the chain of custody of the items that were in the bag, leaving open the possibility of tampering.

However, the latest findings are largely based on Arafat's remains and burial soil, and in this case, tampering appears highly improbable, Bochud said.

"I think this can really be ruled out because it was really difficult to access the body," he said. "When we opened the tomb, we were all together."

Polonium-210 is the same substance that killed KGB agent-turned-Kremlin critic Alexander Litvinenko in London in 2006.

"It's quite difficult to understand why (Arafat) might have had any polonium, if he was just in his headquarters in Ramallah," said Alastair Hay, a professor of environmental toxicology at the University of Leeds who was not involved in the investigation.

"He wasn't somebody who was moving in and out of atomic energy plants or dealing with radioactive isotopes."

___

John Heilprin reported from Lausanne, Switzerland. Associated Press writers Daniel Estrin in Jerusalem and Lori Hinnant in Paris and AP Medical Writer Maria Cheng in London contributed to this report.

Associated PressSource: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/3d281c11a96b4ad082fe88aa0db04305/Article_2013-11-07-Arafat's%20Death/id-b9f661e6e8964bfdaa3e6520d9adf400
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When Should an Academic Write for Free?

The old-model college professor could afford to write for free. Times have changed.

Should writers work for free? What if those writers are academics?

That is a real question up for debate in several media outlets this past week. But I’d like to ask why we work for free and why we don’t shame organizations that expect us to.

The Internet has created a bottomless void that requires content. In a classic case of how expansion breeds stratified access, an increase in platforms that require writing has resulted in fewer outlets that pay writers to write. In the New York Times recently, Tim Kreider argued that he cannot afford to write for free. He encourages other writers to reject the freemium culture for the benefit of all who make a living by penning the word. In a column for the Chronicle of Higher Education, Sarah Kendzior says that journalists may find it beneficial to write for free occasionally, but that academics should never do the same, even though “[p]ublishers like to evoke academics’ professional status to justify not paying them.”

Kendzior’s argument might seem like backward logic: Why shouldn’t privileged elite academics give back to the public good by writing for free? Her larger point is about the profit structure of academic publishers, and it is a good one; but there is another argument to be made that’s more specific to the structural change of labor occurring in higher education. It is a reality largely hidden in plain sight as wars, government spying, and rising inequality dominate our national attention span, but the life of the mind is not the elite gig it once was.

Nearly two-thirds of all those teaching in colleges and universities aren’t the tenured professors in corduroy sports coats familiar from pop culture, inoculated from layoffs and depressed wages. They are instead adjuncts—who work on piecemeal teaching contracts for an average of $2,700 per class, per semester/quarter—and other non-tenure-track instructors. Even among the less precarious professoriate, there’s a push to dismantle tenure and replace it with term-limit contracts. Academics who write for free under these conditions are not doing it to prove their superstar bona fides. Many are writing for free hoping to build a career path where increasingly there is not one, doing work for which they have trained for a decade or more only to find an economy that isn’t much interested in paying a premium for expertise.

Withholding our creative contributions from causes and organizations that reflect our values does little to challenge systematic abuse.

Let’s get this out of the way: I have written for free. My membership in the club of Real Academics is constantly being negotiated, but early in my doctoral career I wrote for outlets without payment. Like Atlantic writer Ta-Nehesi Coates, I made my calculation relative to how I understood my social position. I am a black woman with a non-elite higher-education pedigree. When you are at Harvard or Yale, you do not need much else to be considered an expert on anything, really, whether you have studied it or not. You are at an Ivy League institution. We assume you can comment with gravitas on everything from global warming to Michelle Obama’s fashion choices. Without those types of Ivy League status baubles, it is hard to cultivate gravitas. Contributing to public discourse is even more complicated for women and minorities, both of whom are underrepresented in both old and new media. The op-ed pages of major news outlets, which are overwhelmingly white and male, are gatekeepers to Sunday news shows where experts influence public opinion. With the recent exception of Up With Chris Hayes on MSNBC, the Sunday-establishment television punditry has been a near whitewash, with a minority view of white men representing the views of an America that gets browner every year.

Like many minority scholars, I accept responsibility for countering this imbalance in who is deemed “expert.” But, like money, it takes status to make status. And there are few mainstream venues that invite women and people of color to speak on more than “women’s issues” or “race issues” but on issues germane to their actual expertise in a field of study. In many ways, gender, race, and class issues in academia become pipeline issues for media gatekeepers and the professional pundit class. How can academics who already exist at the margins shape discourse that always comes first for women and minorities, and also buck the structural trend of publishers expecting them to write for free? There is no easy answer.

The economics of demanding free content, in a field flush with more producers than paying outlets, is a formidable barrier. So are the economics of higher education, which produces more experts than dignified, full-pay work for experts. Working for prestige without accompanying cash is, in the end, a Faustian bargain. But so too is hunkering down amid the crumbling academic labor structure, especially for minority scholars who have long been underrepresented and systematically denied tenure. For them, public scholarship can be less about exposure than indemnity. How do we expand access to these voices without further marginalizing them?

I no longer write for free … unless I do. After a solid track record of payment for my content, a local alternative newspaper approached me a few months ago. It is a nonprofit that raises hell in a conservative Southern media market. I like hell-raisers. I have, on occasion, raised a little myself. I also like insurgent media. This newspaper could not afford to pay me, something the editor said upfront. I gladly gifted the paper the content. I had published the original essay at my own website first, making my ownership of it clear. The editor asked for the content, rather than assuming that because it was on the Internet it could be borrowed without my explicit permission. He explicitly expressed an understanding of the value of the work and that he was unable, not unwilling, to compensate me for it. In short, he respected my professionalism and my work. That the outlet also shares my values made the contribution a no-brainer for me. Judging by the reader mail I received after the paper published the essay, it sparked a meaningful conversation about an emotionally laden subject.

My choice to publish that essay for free is not the same as writing for free. I had choice and control. How do we give other academics and writers that same kind of choice and control? Individually, we can manage our own spaces. Be it in the form of blogs or e-books, the adjunctification of academic labor and media means exerting control over what we write. And, as Kendozier argues, we should demand respect for our work, even if respect is not always indicated as payment. Withholding our creative contributions from causes and organizations that reflect our values does little to challenge systematic abuse. However, expecting that our work be respected and only valuing gatekeepers that respect us can resist exploitation. More than writing for free, it is the assumption by gatekeepers that one should write for free that needs to be disrupted. The editor at that alternative newspaper could not afford to pay me, but that he expected that I should be paid worked very much in favor of my decision to write for free.

Ultimately, though, systematic abuses require systemic change. With the economics of labor against us, we have to appeal to cultural norms. Children working in factories can absolutely maximize profit returns, but we’ve (mostly) decided that child labor is a moral violation. In the same way, for-profit organizations that abuse labor to maximize profits should pay a price in legitimacy. That requires organizing, agitating, and writing about the hard choices faced by so many—even if, on occasion, we write about it for free.

Source: http://www.slate.com/articles/life/counter_narrative/2013/11/academics_writing_for_free_when_is_it_ok.html
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Kanye West pleads not guilty in battery case

FILE - This Sept. 7, 2012 file photo shows Kanye West at the Alexander Wang collection during Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week in New York. West pleaded not guilty through his attorney to misdemeanor battery and attempted grand theft charges in a Los Angeles court on Thursday Nov. 7, 2013. (Photo by Dario Cantatore/Invision/AP, File)

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Kanye West has pleaded not guilty to misdemeanor battery and attempted grand theft in a case filed over a scuffle with a celebrity photographer earlier this year.

Attorney Blair Berk entered the plea on the rapper's behalf Thursday in a Los Angeles court. West was charged with two misdemeanors in September over a July altercation with paparazzo Daniel Ramos at Los Angeles International Airport.

Prosecutors declined to file felony charges against West, but decided to pursue the misdemeanors. Each carries a penalty of up to six months in jail or a $1,000 fine.

Ramos claims West punched him in an unprovoked attack and wrestled his camera to the ground on July 19.

West's case is due back in court on Jan. 23.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/kanye-west-pleads-not-guilty-battery-case-181751592.html
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Johnston files petition for custody of son Tripp

JUNEAU, Alaska (AP) — The father of Bristol Palin's son is seeking at least equal custody.

Levi Johnston filed a petition for custody last month saying he wants 4-year-old Tripp to be in his mother's and father's lives equally.

The couple had agreed in 2010 that Palin would have primary physical custody and the two would share legal custody, according to Thomas Van Flein, Palin's attorney at that time. Johnston was given visitation and had agreed to pay child support.

Palin's current attorney, John Tiemessen, said that as of Oct. 15, the Child Support Services Division reported that Johnston owed about $66,000 in back support.

Palin and Johnston were thrust into the national spotlight as expectant, unwed teenagers in 2008, when Palin's mother, Sarah Palin, was tapped as the Republican vice presidential candidate.

Johnston and Bristol Palin had an on-off relationship before splitting for good. He has since married and has a daughter.

Bristol Palin has appeared in several reality series, including one for Lifetime that documented her life as a single mom.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/johnston-files-petition-custody-son-tripp-224204344.html
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