analyze troupe: January 2013

Thursday, January 31, 2013

Israel Bombs Targets on Syria-Lebanon Border

Harriet Sherwood
guardian.co.uk
January 30, 2013

Israeli warplanes have attacked a target on the Syrian-Lebanese border, according to unconfirmed reports, after several days of heightened warnings from government officials over Syria?s stockpiles of chemical weapons.

The Reuters news agency cited a western diplomat and a security source as saying there had been ?a hit? in the border area. The Israel Defence Forces (IDF) said it had no comment on the report.

The report followed claims in the Lebanese media that IDF fighter planes had flown sorties over Lebanon?s airspace from Tuesday afternoon until Wednesday morning.

This article was posted: Wednesday, January 30, 2013 at 1:28 pm

Tags: foreign affairs

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Source: http://www.infowars.com/israel-bombs-targets-on-syria-lebanon-border/

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Wednesday, January 30, 2013

Here Are The Major Players In Mobile Advertising - Business Insider

We are in the post-PC era, and soon billions of consumers will be carrying around Internet-connected mobile devices for up to 16 hours a day.?Mobile audiences have exploded as a result.

Mobile advertising should be a bonanza, similar to online advertising a decade ago. However, it has been a bit slow off the ground, and its growth trajectory is not clear cut.

In a recent report?from?BI?Intelligence?on the mobile advertising ecosystem,?we?explain the complexities and fractures, and examine the central and dynamic roles played by mobile ad networks, demand side platforms, mobile ad exchanges, real-time bidding, agencies, brands, and new companies hoping to upend the traditional banner ad.

Access The Full Report And Data By Signing Up For A Free Trial Today >>

Here's an overview of some major players in the mobile advertising ecosystem:

Mobile ad networks:?Mobile ad networks aggregate advertising inventory and match it with advertisers, much as online ad networks do.?Networks soak up ad inventory, analyze its potential, and sell it by matching it to advertisers' needs.?Where networks differentiate is in value-added services, such as aggregating buying power to strike better deals, or improve targeting.?The largest ad networks have their own sales forces reaching out to advertisers, as well as their own campaign optimization technology.?
Demand side platforms (DSPs):?These function similarly to ad networks, in the sense that they help match advertisers with inventory, but tend to work hand-in-glove with brands.?DSPs are complementary to the ad network business because they more richly describe mobile audiences.?But once DSPs start hiring their own staff to sell ad inventory, the complementarity could end, and DSPs would compete more head-on with ad networks.
Mobile ad exchanges: ?Exchanges automate many parts of the mobile ad process, and can connect publishers with multiple ad networks.?Ad exchanges are primarily supply-facing at the moment, and have relatively few interactions with mobile ad agencies (even less so with brands).?Agencies are disincentivized from using exchanges because they threaten their lucrative role as the brands' media buyers.
Mobile Ad Agencies and Mobile Marketing: ?One of the gripes you often hear around the mobile ad industry is that agencies don't get it.?According to the U.K.'s Association of Online Publishers, 55 percent of publishers blamed "agencies' attitude" for low mobile ad revenues. That may be changing. Several people we talked to said agencies are doubling down on mobile, and competency is improving.
Natives:?Other companies are emerging that don't neatly fit the established categories.?They resemble ad networks in that they connect advertisers with publishers' inventory, but they express disdain for the traditional mobile advertising model.?These companies are trying to find a native approach to mobile advertising that will break through consumers' apparent disdain for mobile ads. We call them "the natives."

In full,?the?report:

To access BI Intelligence's full reports on The Mobile Advertising Ecosystem, sign up for a free trial subscription here.

Source: http://www.businessinsider.com/bii-report-here-are-the-major-players-in-mobile-advertising-2013-1

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Brian Schneider is retiring from baseball

Brian Schneider told Mandy Housenick of The Morning Call on Tuesday evening?that he is hanging up his catching equipment for good:

?It hasn?t been an easy decision, but there are a lot of factors,? said the 36-year-old free agent. ?You don?t want to retire, but you think of your family and I think more than anything it?s physically how you feel.?I?d kind of like to leave on my own terms and not have my last impression of baseball be someone telling me I can?t play. But there is a lot going on in my life and I?m very fortunate to have a great family and start being a dad and being around more often and being a good husband.?

Schneider registered a .247/.320/.369 batting line, 781 hits, 67 home runs and 387 RBI over the course of his 13-year major league career. He played for the Expos, Nationals, Mets and Phillies while earning a total of $22.4M.

Source: http://hardballtalk.nbcsports.com/2013/01/29/brian-schneider-is-retiring-from-baseball/

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CSN: #Awesome, Niners legend Montana joins Twitter

Really, he's a man of few words. We now have a chance to see exactly how few.?

Joe Montana is on Twitter.?

His Twitter page reads:

joseph montana

@joemontana

"Notre Dame 1977 National Champion 4 x Super Bowl Champion 3 x Super Bowl MVP HOF 2000"

Nice little summary for someone who we can safely say is the greatest 49ers quarterback of all time. Here's Joe's first ever tweet:?

Good luck @49ers Looking forward to a great Super Bowl #sb47
? joseph montana (@JoeMontana) January 29, 2013

It's unlikely that Montana would take the stage during Super Bowl week -- on Twitter or on camera -- ?to declare himself the greatest at his position like Randy Moss did earlier on Tuesday. ?But whatever Joe says, 49ers fans on Twitter know he's a must follow.?

And while we have you here... is Joe Montana the greatest quarterback -- for any team -- ?of all time? If not him, who? Brady? Elway? Bradshaw (he has four rings, too)? ?Favre? Marino??

Geoff James is the senior producer for CSNBayArea.com?

Source: http://www.csnbayarea.com/49ers/joe-montana-joins-twitter

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Tuesday, January 29, 2013

PFT: 61 percent of players disapprove of Goodell

We mentioned earlier today that 49ers wide receiver Randy Moss declared himself the best wideout in the history of the game.

You?ll likely see much more about him in the coming days, in many outlets, because he was so open and forthcoming and illuminating about many topics during his appearance at Media Day.

When Moss is on, he?s extremely interesting, he just chooses not to be on often.

But among the gems today was a candid admission that he didn?t particularly care for the way the 49ers used him this year.

In the past, it could have been a Keyshawn-level ?Just Give Me the Damn Ball? routine, but Moss said it so matter-of-factly it was easy to miss.

?I don?t like my role; I don?t,? he said. ?I like to be out there playing football. One thing that I?ve always had to really understand was being a decoy. It was put to me, Coach Dennis Green just said, ?Even though the football is not in your hand, you?re still out there dictating how the defense is playing the offense.? It took me awhile to really understand where he was coming from. Later on and now in my career, I understand that my presence out on the field, I don?t always have to touch the ball to be able to help the offense score touchdowns.

?Like I said, I don?t really like that, but it?s something that I?m used to. I have to grow to understand and grow to like it. I?ve always been a team player. I?ve never been about self. Anything that is going to push our team to victory and hopefully win a Super Bowl, I?m willing to do.?

No, that was Moss, who hasn?t always been accused to giving freely of himself for the greater good.

But 49ers offensive coordinator Greg Roman said Moss had been nothing but professional.

?He?s been great,? Roman said. ?I think he?s a great team player, and a mentor for all the guys, really.?

His love of competition has never been in doubt. Moss joked about past arguments, even fights, he?s had with coaches and players. But his role with the 49ers, as much as he might not like it, remains a valuable one, as Roman insisted Moss could still ?get behind a defense in a hurry.?

?When I hear people talk about how talented I am and how easy I make it look, I can honestly tell you people that it?s very hard work,? Moss said. ?I work out five times a week. I put the work in and for me to be able to go out there and have results it something I am proud of. It?s not always the individual results that I?m proud of. For me to be able to talk to a Michael Crabtree or talk to a Frank Gore or Percy Harvin and for them to go out there and have a good game that week, that?s something I can be proud of. That?s just me giving back to the NFL.

?I?ve always said, I don?t like what the NFL does for me because I?m very blessed. My family is blessed. I?ve always been the type of person to know what I can do to make the League better. At this point in my career, if I?m able to be vocal, to share a little knowledge and also to go out there and play, if that?s what it takes to win a championship, then I?m willing to do that. I?ve always been that way.?

Maybe so, but he hasn?t been quite the way he was Tuesday too often, or the perception of his career would likely be very different.

Source: http://profootballtalk.nbcsports.com/2013/01/28/poll-61-percent-of-players-disapprove-of-goodells-performance/related/

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Alaska Cruise Or CruiseTour? Either Can Be A Good Travel Value ...

An Alaska cruise offers unique options for adventure travelers, cruisers who just want to see what Alaska has to offer or frequent Caribbean cruisers who want to do something different. To really see Alaska and all its natural beauty up close, travelers head inland, to places that cruise ships cannot sail to via a cruisetour that can make a great cruise into an unbelievably fabulous trip of a lifetime.

There are basically three ways to do an Alaska cruise:

Seven-day round-trip- A popular option is a seven-day round-trip sailing from Seattle, Washington or Vancouver, British Columbia.
Southbound- Another way is to do a one-way sailing southbound, starting in a northern Alaska port like Fairbanks and ending in a southern port like Seattle or Vancouver.
Northbound- Cruise travelers might also choose to sail in the other direction on a northbound sailing.

Any of those cruise choices can be enhanced by taking that basic cruise and adding a pre- or post-cruisetour. There are also two types of cruisetour:

A standard cruisetour gives time for longer land experiences that can include flightseeing via float plane or helicopter, cruising mountains or landing on glaciers. This is a good choice for watching the budget while experiencing some of the best of Alaska.
An escorted cruisetour, the ultimate way to see Alaska, brings along a cruise line guide that stays with you all the time when on land. They keep things on track and make sure members of what is usually a small group are at the right place at the right time to see the best Alaska has to offer.

Most cruise lines offer Alaska cruises and cruise tours of some sort. Princess Cruises, Holland America Line and Royal Caribbean International do more of it than all other cruise lines combined, offering some unique advantages to travelers.Owning their own self-sufficient lodges in the wilderness, for example, gives Princess Cruises a unique advantage with their customers getting top accommodations located in the most pristine areas of the state. Considered the top cruise lines in Alaska, Princess Cruises and sister-line Holland America Line have more ships in Alaska service than any other lines.

Royal Caribbean is big in Alaska too, applying the principles of its Gold Anchor Service to all they do in Alaska, making the experience a familiar one to past-guests of the line. Their Adventure Specialists serve as concierge, traveling with guests throughout the land portion of their trip.

alaska cruise Cruisetours are perfect for families, provide a balance of included activities and independent time, allowing guests to maximize time spent sightseeing as well as the opportunity to explore at leisure.

Don't get me wrong, a seven-day round trip sailing from Seattle is also a good Alaska experience and probably a good choice for watching the budget while getting a good taste of what Alaska has to offer. Cruisetours are not inexpensive, but can yield an experience well worth the extra cost.

Right now, when many travelers are planning an Alaska vacation for this summer, prices are competitive. Cruise lines have limited-time promotions going on through February that can add real value by reducing the price while giving more. Princess, for example, has a Cruise and Air deal that can save thousands. Holland America Line has a One Week sale going on right now with reduced deposits and Alaska cruises starting at $499 per person + tax.

Regardless of which cruise line sailed, the important part about visiting Alaska is to do it.

Before I sailed in Alaskan waters for the first time, a friend told me, "No matter where you look there is something beautiful to take photos of," which sounded a bit unbelievable. Still, on the ground in Fairbanks, our first stop, I could not put my camera down ... well, I did once and missed a flock of American Bald Eagles flying overhead. Not one or two eagles, a flock of probably 50 or more.

Want to know more about what Alaska via cruise ship? Check this video from Royal Caribbean all about gold mining and canyoneering:

[Photo Credit- Flickr user DaveReichert]

Source: http://www.gadling.com/2013/01/28/alaska-cruise-or-cruisetour-either-can-be-a-good-travel-value/

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GameStick reveals final backer-aided design, dock for peripherals

Now that the Android-powered game console on a stick, GameStick, has been fully funded (five times over), another piece of the puzzle is falling into place: its final design. Taking suggestions from the Kickstarter backers that supported the device in the first place, the final design of the controller reflects, "a more ergonomic form with extended grips and a tapered shape to better sit in the hand." The HDMI stick that previous popped out from the bottom of the controller now rests around back -- it's now got a MicroSD slot built in as well, allowing up to 32GB of expandable memory (bringing the maximum of expandable memory up to 104GB -- that's a lot of Android games).

A docking station is also in the cards, which enables a whole mess of peripherals via USB, HDMI, and ethernet ports -- it's powered separately, so you can charge your GameStick controller without having to turn on the console. You can also charge your controller on it wirelessly, according to PlayJam. All said, it's got one ethernet port, a full size SD card reader, three USB ports, and three HDMI ports (one out, two in), and comes as part of an option $109 bundle on the Kickstarter page. As for its sale price separately from the GameStick, PlayJam's staying mum for now.

Gallery: GameStick (final)

Show full PR text

GAMESTICK UNVEILS FINAL DESIGN INSPIRED BY KICKSTARTER COMMUNITY

London & San Francisco; January 29th, 2013; As the GameStick Kickstarter campaign (http://kck.st/12SSvMO) enters its final few days, the team announce their final designs of the device as well as a new docking station for every peripheral conceivable.

GameStick; Kickstarter´s most recent success story, currently sits at over 500% of its original target with over $500K raised at the time of writing. The team waits on tenterhooks to discover the final figure to be revealed at 04:23 PST on Friday 1st February.

"It´s hard to believe that we launched GameStick just a few short weeks ago. The Kickstarter campaign has been a roller coaster of a ride and one which has given us more feedback than we could ever have possibly imagined." says PlayJam´s CMO, Anthony Johnson, "We have been able to take that input and literally better shape our product to give our backers a truly bespoke creation - one which has been designed by the Kickstarter community that backed it."

The new design sees subtle changes to the controller, which gets a more ergonomic form with extended grips and a tapered shape to better sit in the hand. The housing for the HDMI stick has been moved to the rear of the controller and the stick itself now supports an expandable 32GB MicroSD card slot in response to overwhelming demand. The finish has also been meticulously designed meet the highest of standards.

Additional requests from the backer community resulted last week in the GameStick team announcing support for peripheral hardware through a previously unspecified docking station. The dock brings on board a number of sought after features such as; wire-free charging for the controller, a number of USB and HDMI ports to support peripheral hardware such as keyboards, mice, microphones and cameras as well as support for yet more storage bringing the total potential capacity of the bundle up to 104GB.

"The GameStick Dock is a prime example of how we have moved rapidly to innovate while still in the pre-production phase," continued Johnson, "it has made for a 'hairy' 30 days but we think the results are worth it and we are delighted that we have been able to tailor the product as much as we have in such a short time-frame"

The GameStick Kickstarter campaign has reached its first two stretch goals with just under $60K to go to hit it´s third and final stretch which will add a number of colour options to its range; a target the team hopes to hit before close. Backers have been urged to vote for their favourite colours on the GameStick Facebook page (http://www.facebook.com/GameStickNews) in a poll to establish the final color.

To visit the Kickstarter page and pledge your support, please visit: http://kck.st/12SSvMO

To visit the GameStick website for more information or to apply for an SDK please go to: www.gamestick.tv

To follow GameStick news, join the conversation and give your opinion on Facebook or Twitter please go: www.facebook.com/GameStickNews and www.twitter.com/Game_Stick / @Game_Stick

To subcribe to YouTube,please go to: www.youtube.com/GameStickVideos

Filed under: Gaming, HD

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Source: http://feeds.engadget.com/~r/weblogsinc/engadget/~3/V44eSzCUQlQ/

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Monday, January 28, 2013

Netherlands' Rabobank draws on outsourced IT ?knowledge ...

Rabobank is based in the Dutch city of Utrecht

Dutch cooperative Rabobank has increased its outsourcing of banking software development and testing, via a five-year deal with technology specialist Cognizant that the cooperative hopes will provide it with the benefits of stronger technology.

Representing some 500 local Dutch and international banks, Rabobank has its origin as a federation of local credit unions, focused mainly on food and agribusiness. The company is a cooperative, so it is owned by the local branches, rather than the other way round.

Originally, Rabobank began outsourcing the testing of its corporate banking software to Cognizant, in around 2006/7. Now, according Robert Niesert, executive vice president GICT at Rabobank, the outsourcing agreement has been broadened enormously to include the software behind finance control, procurement, payment and pensions.

?The main reason for outsourcing in this area is knowledge,? Niesert told Banking Technology. ??Cost is not the main factor ? we are focused on the quality of service,? he said. ?If it saves us 10% doing this, that?s an advantage, but the real benefit is better applications. The IT market in the Netherlands is declining ? the number of qualified students who graduate in this area is poor. That is important for us, because IT is essential to what we do.?

Outsourcing solutions have become hugely popular among many businesses for their cost saving potential in recent years. In November, Norwegian broker Christiania?outsourced its execution to specialist company Neonet, in a move aimed at freeing up resources to concentrate on the broker?s core business in research. However, outsourcing occasionally draws criticism from some market participants, especially where there is a lack of local support on the ground for products that may have been developed in another market such as the US or Asia.

Under the deal with Cognizant, the maintenance of applications takes place offshore, but development of new systems takes place on-site in the Netherlands. Niesert is based at Rabobank?s offices in Utrecht, an inland city that was one of the country?s most important in the Middle Ages. Today, he says that he has high hopes that the deal with an outsource specialist can help drive innovation, especially in network technology.

?Cognizant has people on the ground in the Netherlands,? he said. ?We are developing new technology for banking software, and we view this as a long-term partnership that will provide long-term benefits for us and for our customers.?

In the Netherlands, the Dutch central bank De Nederlandsche Bank itself allows Rabobank Group to supervise the ?solvency, liquidity and administrative organisation of? the 500 local banks that are part of the group. The other two major Dutch banks are ING Group and ABN Amro, which are managed separately.

Source: http://www.bankingtech.com/59861/netherlands%E2%80%99-rabobank-draws-on-outsourced-it-knowledge/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=netherlands%25e2%2580%2599-rabobank-draws-on-outsourced-it-knowledge

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Real estate notes | TribLIVE

By Sam Spatter

Published: Saturday, January 26, 2013, 9:00?p.m.
Updated: Saturday, January 26, 2013

? Heartland Homes, which is now part of NVR Inc., plans a preview of its 14-lot residential subdivision, Waterford Place in MCandless, from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m. Thursday at its Pinecrest community in Pine. The new community will be off Ringeisen Road. The homes will feature HardiePlank siding, brick water tables, concrete driveways and upgraded landscape packages, said Kevin Oakley of Heartland.

? At a hearing Thursday before the Pittsburgh Zoning Board of Adjustment, Jacob B. Metz will seek an exception to operate a recycling processing center in 10,400 square feet of a two-story structure at 2235 Mary St., South Side. Kenneth Jeffrey Hanna Jr. wants to use 600 square feet in an attached garage of 919 N. St. Clair St., Highland Park, for brewery manufacturing as a home occupation.
E Squared Construction wants an OK for a 4,800-square-foot expansion of a restaurant and banquet hall in a three-story structure at 710 N. Homewood Ave. Melody Farrin wants to have four poultry birds as an urban agriculture accessory at a single-family dwelling, 1126 Winterton St., Highland Park. Waterford Land Partners LP will return to seek approval for 31 two-story single-family attached dwellings on Davison Street, Lawrenceville.

? Dan Jones of Precision Home Inspections Inc., based in Connellsville, was honored by the American Society of Home Inspectors for 15 years of membership. Jones, a ASHI certified inspector since 1998, does pre-listing and maintenance inspections in southwestern Pennsylvania. Precision conducts inspections of new and previously owned homes,

? A free seminar, ?Is Real Estate Your New Career?? will be held from 7 to 8 p.m. Wednesday at Northland Public Library, 300 Cumberland Road, off McKnight Road, by Howard Hanna Real Estate Services. Cindy Criss and Cathy Winghart will co-host the event. For reservations, call 412-934-3400 or 412-366-3100.

? The franchise owners of CMIT Solutions in Western Pennsylvania, a provider of managed services and other computer consulting services, will expand the number of offices by up to five over the next few months. Two offices are already in the region. Sam Gupta and his partner, Sunny Yalamarthy, are looking at Downtown, Monroeville and the South Hills, among other sites. Karen Stephens covers northern Allegheny and southern Butler counties. There is a North Hills office.

? Allegheny County and the county Parks Foundation will host two meetings on Wednesday to obtain public input on projects in North Park and South Park. At the North Park meeting in Rose Barn, Pearce Mill Road, GAI Consultants will show schematic designs for the Lake Trail Gateways and Municipal Row Path. At the South Park meeting in the Park Home Economics Building, Buffalo Drive, Pashek Associates will present design options for the Playgrounds Oval. Both meetings start at 7 p.m.

? America?s Best Contacts & Eyeglasses has opened in Town Marketplace, Monaca, its seventh store in the region.

Sam Spatter is a staff writer for Trib Total Media.

He can be reached at 412-320-7843 or sspatter@tribweb.com.

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Source: http://triblive.com/business/realestate/3335341-74/park-road-south

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2-D electronic devices, may be possible: Fine patterns made with single-atom-thick graphene and boron nitride

Jan. 27, 2013 ? Rice University scientists have taken an important step toward the creation of two-dimensional electronics with a process to make patterns in atom-thick layers that combine a conductor and an insulator.

The materials at play -- graphene and hexagonal boron nitride -- have been merged into sheets and built into a variety of patterns at nanoscale dimensions.

Rice introduced a technique to stitch the identically structured materials together nearly three years ago. Since then, the idea has received a lot of attention from researchers interested in the prospect of building 2-D, atomic-layer circuits, said Rice materials scientist Pulickel Ajayan. He is one of the authors of the new work that appears this week in Nature Nanotechnology. In particular, Ajayan noted that Cornell University scientists reported an advance late last year on the art of making atomic-layer heterostructures through sequential growth schemes.

This week's contribution by Rice offers manufacturers the possibility of shrinking electronic devices into even smaller packages. While Rice's technical capabilities limited features to a resolution of about 100 nanometers, the only real limits are those defined by modern lithographic techniques, according to the researchers. (A nanometer is one-billionth of a meter.)

"It should be possible to make fully functional devices with circuits 30, even 20 nanometers wide, all in two dimensions," said Rice researcher Jun Lou, a co-author of the new paper. That would make circuits on about the same scale as in current semiconductor fabrication, he said.

Graphene has been touted as a wonder material since its discovery in the last decade. Even at one atom thick, the hexagonal array of carbon atoms has proven its potential as a fascinating electronic material. But to build a working device, conductors alone will not do. Graphene-based electronics require similar, compatible 2-D materials for other components, and researchers have found hexagonal boron nitride (h-BN) works nicely as an insulator.

H-BN looks like graphene, with the same chicken-wire atomic array. The earlier work at Rice showed that merging graphene and h-BN via chemical vapor deposition (CVD) created sheets with pools of the two that afforded some control of the material's electronic properties. Ajayan said at the time that the creation offered "a great playground for materials scientists."

He has since concluded that the area of two-dimensional materials beyond graphene "has grown significantly and will play out as one of the key exciting materials in the near future."

His prediction bears fruit in the new work, in which finely detailed patterns of graphene are laced into gaps created in sheets of h-BN. Combs, bars, concentric rings and even microscopic Rice Owls were laid down through a lithographic process. The interface between elements, seen clearly in scanning transmission electron microscope images taken at Oak Ridge National Laboratories, shows a razor-sharp transition from graphene to h-BN along a subnanometer line.

"This is not a simple quilt," Lou said. "It's very precisely engineered. We can control the domain sizes and the domain shapes, both of which are necessary to make electronic devices."

The new technique also began with CVD. Lead author Zheng Liu, a Rice research scientist, and his colleagues first laid down a sheet of h-BN. Laser-cut photoresistant masks were placed over the h-BN, and exposed material was etched away with argon gas. (A focused ion beam system was later used to create even finer patterns, down to 100-nanometer resolution, without masks.) After the masks were washed away, graphene was grown via CVD in the open spaces, where it bonded edge-to-edge with the h-BN. The hybrid layer could then be picked up and placed on any substrate.

While there's much work ahead to characterize the atomic bonds where graphene and h-BN domains meet and to analyze potential defects along the boundaries, Liu's electrical measurements proved the components' qualities remain intact.

"One important thing Zheng showed is that even by doing all kinds of growth, then etching, then regrowth, the intrinsic properties of these two materials are not affected," Lou said. "Insulators stay insulators; they're not doped by the carbon. And the graphene still looks very good. That's important, because we want to be sure what we're growing is exactly what we want."

Liu said the next step is to place a third element, a semiconductor, into the 2-D fabric. "We're trying very hard to integrate this into the platform," he said. "If we can do that, we can build truly integrated in-plane devices." That would give new options to manufacturers toying with the idea of flexible electronics, he said.

"The contribution of this paper is to demonstrate the general process," Lou added. "It's robust, it's repeatable and it creates materials with very nice properties and with dimensions that are at the limit of what is possible."

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Story Source:

The above story is reprinted from materials provided by Rice University, via EurekAlert!, a service of AAAS.

Note: Materials may be edited for content and length. For further information, please contact the source cited above.

Journal Reference:

C. Drexler, S. A. Tarasenko, P. Olbrich, J. Karch, M. Hirmer, F. M?ller, M. Gmitra, J. Fabian, R. Yakimova, S. Lara-Avila, S. Kubatkin, M. Wang, R. Vajtai, P. M. Ajayan, J. Kono, S. D. Ganichev. Magnetic quantum ratchet effect in graphene. Nature Nanotechnology, 2013; DOI: 10.1038/nnano.2012.231

Note: If no author is given, the source is cited instead.

Disclaimer: Views expressed in this article do not necessarily reflect those of ScienceDaily or its staff.

Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/top_news/top_science/~3/Z5aTSo83LOQ/130127134208.htm

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Sunday, January 27, 2013

What the Dalai Lama said about the India rape case at the Jaipur Literature Festival

The Dalai Lama made his first ever appearance at Asia's biggest literary festival and was promptly pressed by reporters about the Delhi rape case.?

By Fahad Shah,?Contributor / January 25, 2013

The Dalai Lama speaks on the opening day of India's Jaipur Literature Festival in Jaipur, India, Thursday.

Deepak Sharma/AP

Enlarge

Crowds lined his path and leaned off arched terraces to catch a glimpse of the Dalai Lama at his first ever appearance at the Jaipur Literature Festival.?The annual gathering, Asia's largest, of literati in this city of desert palaces has begun to attract global celebrities in recent years,?with even Oprah Winfrey holding court here last year.

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Graph Search - Social Media Today

Facebook took another step toward becoming its own web universe when it launched a search engine for shared content. This move challenges the future relevance of search engines like Google, as well as review sites such as Yelp and Foursquare.

The aim of ?graph search? is to assist the Facebook community in finding information more easily about what other Facebook users have shared on the network. It uses the indexed information generated within the Facebook universe to generate search information. It will allow people to find others by their interests, location or career. So if you like water skiing you can find other people that live nearby that also like water skiing, which will in turn allow you to make new connections with other people who share similar interests with you. Alternatively you can search for people nearby who like Chinese food and see what restaurants they have ?liked,? and read their comments.

This graph search engine is designed to give Facebook users the ability to sort information by topics and interests with the added advantage of keeping its users within the Facebook community instead of sending them to search engines or review sites for the information they seek. "Graph Search is designed to take a precise query and return to you the answer, not link to other places where you might get the answer," Mark Zuckerberg explained, highlighting some of the issues of a typical Web search.

Graph Search (beta) version rolls out Tuesday on a limited basis to users. This version will be able to handle queries based on people, photos, places and interests.

It is anticipated that results will be displayed based on importance, so a restaurant with more likes could possibly show up toward the top of the list that is generated by the search. Check-ins could also have an impact on where a place is positioned on the list, emphasizing the importance and need for businesses to be actively involved on Facebook and ensuring that their Page is relevant, engaging and up-to-date.

Facebook also partners with Microsoft's Bing social search engine to fill in some of the gaps where Graph Search cannot supply the information. Facebook does stress that Graph Search is not a web search, but this can be seen as the first step in that direction, because when the product is fully operational it will give many Facebook users an incentive to stay within the Facebook community instead of spending time on other social media and search sites.

Source: http://socialmediatoday.com/social-tonic/1188841/facebook-graph-search-one-step-closer-becoming-its-own-internet-universe

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Saturday, January 26, 2013

Puppy Bowl IX: Coming February 3!

Source: http://www.thehollywoodgossip.com/2013/01/puppy-bowl-ix-coming-february-3/

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Daily Kos: Teachers' Lounge: You want to go to grad school?

First off, I loved graduate school, but not everyone is like me. ?Some of my students think grad school is a way of extending undergrad experiences. ?I have sat down with students several times to tell them I don't think they are good fits for an academic grad program (sometimes these are people who are good fits for professional programs, as they are ones who are interested in the utility of their studies, and want to have a job coming out of it -- I teach art history, and these students are sometimes the ones who should go into museum education or arts administration programs -- using their knowledge and learning how to apply it in a clear way along with apprenticeships/internships built into the program). ?Sometimes I think they might be but their undergraduate grades are not high enough for easy admission. ?In this case, I advise them to get some other experience (other than school) under their belts. ?Someone who has either worked at or volunteered at (in a substantial way) a museum or an arts organization has characteristics and a track record that makes her or him stand out when applying to graduate school, and getting a letter of recommendation from someone other than a professor who can speak to responsibility, reliability, drive, and interest can help a great deal to offset academic concerns. ?

That being said, undergraduate grades can at times be a predictor for graduate performance. ?These grades (particularly in the major) indicate knowledge in the field, dedication to research and writing components required in a discipline, time management abilities, and wiilingness to push through in the hoop-jumping that is a clear part of graduate school as in any job. ?And a letter from a professor who has had you in multiple classes is a good component of your application portfolio.

I write letters for anywhere between three and ten students a year. ?And I am lucky that there aren't more. ?I can thus talk about individual characteristics of a student. ?I don't have a generic letter -- each student gets a base letter that is specific to the skills and desires and strengths and concerns I have for him or her. ?If those concerns are so great that they prevent me from writing a strong letter, I will not agree to write one. ?I have only once told a student after having written several letters that I would not write another one -- that was someone who seemed to suddenly find it difficult to complete assignments in a timely manner (as far as I could tell this was a response to stress, and that is a problem in grad school -- you have to be able to handle adversity and stress that is potentially beyond anything you experience in undergrad). ?There was nothing I was able to find out by asking what was causing it (everything was fine, I was told) -- so I had to respond to what was in front of me.

So if I say I will write one, I will write a good one. ?I will be positive but honest. ?If you have a B average in my classes, I will not say you are the top student I have ever taught. ?It is my word and my university's reputation on the line; if I misrepresent you, it is every student who applies to that university in the future that my recommendation affects. ?I will, however, talk about specific details (papers, projects, interaction with other students, internships, research experiences) that make you particularly desirable as a graduate student in that program. ?

To help me do this, I ask for at least one month's warning for any letter, and preferably a listing of all the graduate schools to which you are applying, organized by deadline, and a brief description of why you want to apply to a specific school, what program you are applying to, and information about a link or a method of submission of the letter. ?I strongly prefer an on-line submission, and if necessary I will send a hard-copy one. ?I will almost never agree to give you a copy of the letter to send yourself. ?This is because I did that for students early on in my teaching, and one decided not to apply to one of the universities but did need a letter for a different one, and she told me about that by taking the letter out of the (sealed, signed across the seal) envelope, and attaching the open letter to my bulletin board along with a note saying "in case you forgot what you wrote, this will help you write me a letter to X university". ?It was a confidential letter (positive, but confidential), and I was furious. ?I wrote the letter, but since then have been really hesitant about handing a sealed letter to a student.

If the letters are to be submitted online, you need to get your application submitted a bit before the deadline because the online submission for letters of recommendation will often not be available to me until after your application is complete. ?And there will often be technical difficulties. ?This fall I did not get a letter submitted by the deadline because of this; I hope it is not held against the student. ?She was annoyed with me (or at least that is the way I read her last email, and she never let me know that the application was complete or anything about how it had been received, and she did not ask for any other letters of recommendation). ?I am sorry for the difficulty, but I didn't see it as my fault (nor was it hers), and I hope I do hear back from her eventually.

If I ask for a copy of your personal statement it means I want to see your personal statement. ?It may be because you are applying to do something that is not a clear outgrowth of your undergraduate work, or it may be because I want to be able to write a letter that supports you in a way that builds off your stated interests. ?What it doesn't mean is that you should send me a copy of your statement a month after the first letter deadlines. ?The letters I have written by that point are of necessity going to be a bit more generic. ?

As letters are written individually, the chance is that if you blow off the semester (usually the first semester senior year) it may be reflected in letters I write for you. ?As you ignore deadlines, stop coming to class, and don't come to meetings that are scheduled, these things reflect on you and may lead me to adjust my evaluation in such categories as "maturity" or "dedication to the field" -- if you show me that you are mature and dedicated to the field, chances are those ratings will be high; if you lead me to question such things, the ratings are almost certain to go down. ?Sometimes there are extenuating circumstances (health or yourself and your family, financial issues, etc.) but I can only evaluate what is before me, and that is what I base my recommendations on. ?

Finally, I would like some acknowledgement of my writing the letters. ?Thank you notes are nice, but not necessary. ?What is really necessary, however, is an indication of where you got in (or didn't) and what, if any, financial/scholarship/assistantship offers were made. ?It helps me to know where you go and why. ?If you decide to not take any graduate school place, even though you have been admitted, I do need to know that, and why you made that decision. ?If I have written 10-15 letters for you and you don't go to any grad school, then you come back to me the next year with a request for more letters, I need to know what is going on. ?That you have decided one year not to go to grad school is fine, and it doesn't prevent me from writing letters. ?But if you can't tell me a reason, it comes across as rather mercurial. ?It may not be, but again, I can only evaluate you by the information that is in front of me. ?And that evaluation is what grad schools are asking me to do in my letters of recommendation.

Oh, and one final final thing. ?If you choose to complain in a letter to the university (such as to the dean, or in the equivalent of an exit interview) how the class you took with me was the worst experience you had as a university student, do not expect that I will not hear about it, or remember it three years later when you want a letter of recommendation to a graduate program. ?And yes, that has happened. ?I chose not to write a letter or recommendation for this student, who had only had the one class with me. ?I said I did not remember her well enough to write that letter of recommendation. ?I figured it was much better for both of us to leave it at that. ?In other words, I was lying. ?I do that, sometimes. ?But I don't do it in letters of recommendation; in those I stand behind what I write.

Source: http://www.dailykos.com/story/2013/01/26/1182314/-Teachers-Lounge-You-want-to-go-to-grad-school

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roxy lawrence: Stress Management Tips for Relaxation - wise self ...

Stress is always going to always be in our lives, which can be both a good and bad thing. Some people say that stress is good for us because it gives is that extra push of energy to just get stuff done. For others, it can be a bit more complicated though. Many people aren't sure how to manage their stress and get it under control before it becomes a problem.

Stress can become physically or mentally anguishing when it consumes your life. This is the point where you should realize that it's time to take control over your stress instead of letting it control you.

Stress management techniques can be used to calm us down when we get stressed out. The next time you get stressed out, try to remember the following techniques and apply them to reducing your stress.

1.) Deep Breathing

When stress has you really wound up, try taking deep breaths through your diaphragm. Breathing will allow your body to calm down cause a direct stimulation of the parasympathetic nervous system, resulting in relaxation and a reversal of the changes seen with the stimulation of the sympathetic nervous system.

2.) Visualization

Instead of continuing to think about something that stresses you out, try changing your train of thought and visualize something makes you happy. Since it can usually be difficult to escape from the environmental stressors around us, trying escaping in your mind to a place that relaxes you. This doesn't mean that you're suppressing your feelings, you are calming and learning to control them.

3.) Meditation

Meditation may be one of the most calming and powerful stress management techniques there is. Meditating properly allows you to let go of your worries and go to your ultimate point of relaxation. Try meditating in a quiet area where you know there will be no distractions. Sit straight up on a flat surface and align your spine with the ground, keeping your feel flat on the floor. You want to focus strictly on your breathing from this point on, and maintain a deep breathing pattern from within your diaphragm. If done accurately, you will fully experience the power of meditation. This doesn't work for everyone on the first try, so remember to practice on a daily basis.

4.) Yoga

Yoga is a combination of physical activity and the three tips we have already discussed so far, and promotes and overall sense of well-being. Yoga strengthens body and mind health and allows you to become more in touch with yourself.

Don't give up after the first time if these techniques fail to work. Practice makes perfect, and practicing these techniques in your free time can put you one step closer to managing your stress.

Source: http://wiseselfimprovement.blogspot.com/2013/01/stress-management-tips-for-relaxation.html

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Source: http://roxy-lawrence.blogspot.com/2013/01/stress-management-tips-for-relaxation.html

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Friday, January 25, 2013

Calorie bombs wins 'awards' | obese, study, aspirin - Life - The ...

The average adult should consume about 2,000 calories, 20 grams of saturated fat and 1,500 milligrams of sodium a day.

Eating just one meal on a public advocacy group's new Xtreme Eating Awards list would wreck that diet in an instant.

A dish made for Homer Simpson: The Cheesecake Factory's Crispy Chicken Costoletta.

PHOTO POSTED TO FLICKR BY VANESSA CHETTLEBURGH

The Center for Science in the Public Interest has released its dishonor roll for 2013, and there are some doozies. IHOP's country fried steak and eggs are singled out for having more than a day's worth of food in one serving: gravy-slathered deep-fried steak with two fried eggs, fried potatoes and two buttermilk pancakes. The damage: 1,760 calories, 23 g of saturated fat, 3,720 mg of sodium and 11 teaspoons of added sugar.

Also noted are the Cheesecake Factory, with its 2,610-calorie Crispy Chicken Costoletta, and Johnny Rockets, with its bacon cheddar double burger (1,770 calories, 50 g of saturated fat, 2,380 mg of sodium) and the Big Apple Shake, which has 1,140 calories, 37 g of fat and 13 teaspoons of sugar. Mainly thanks to its main ingredient of a slice of apple pie.

"It's as if IHOP, the Cheesecake Factory, Maggiano's Little Italy and other major restaurant chains are scientifically engineering these extreme meals with the express purpose of promoting obesity, diabetes and heart disease," said center executive director Michael F. Jacobson.

For the full hit list, go to cspinet.org.

The obese at greater risk in crashes

The greater a person's body-mass index, the greater the likelihood he'll die in a car crash, compared with a more slender person in the same type of crash, according to a study in the Emergency Medicine Journal.

The journal, part of the BMJ Group, examined 57,491 vehicle collisions in the U.S. between 1996 and 2008. The research found that obese drivers are significantly more likely to die in a crash than people of normal weight. The benchmark for obesity was a BMI of 30, which is a 6-foot person weighing 221 pounds.

The report notes that people who are very obese often don't wear seat belts properly, or forgo them. Also, in a crash, the lap belt around an obese person takes longer to engage the pelvis, allowing the lower body to propel forward.

The study indicated that vehicle designs might have to be changed to accommodate obese occupants.

"The ability of passenger vehicles to protect overweight or obese occupants may have increasingly important public health implications, given the continuing obesity epidemic in the USA," the authors wrote. "It may be the case that passenger vehicles are well designed to protect normal-weight vehicle occupants but are deficient in protecting overweight or obese occupants."

Study links aspirin and vision loss

A new study has found a link between regular aspirin users and a heightened risk of a form of vision loss.

The study, published in JAMA Internal Medicine, examined 2,389 Australians age 49 or older. It found that the longer the subject took aspirin, the greater the risk of contracting neovascular age-related macular degeneration, a vision loss in the center of the eye attributed to retina damage. The neovascular type of degeneration, named for abnormal blood-vessel growth, is a leading cause of blindness among older people.

Regular aspirin use, defined as at least once per week, resulted in age-related macular degeneration incidence of 1.9 percent at five years, 7 percent at 10 years and 9.3 percent at 15 years.

The study noted that previous research has drawn a link between regular aspirin use and macular degeneration, while other studies have been inconclusive.

The new study's authors cautioned that the findings didn't show that aspirin caused macular degeneration, and that a decision about whether to discontinue aspirin use should be up to each patient and his doctor.

"From a purely science-of-medicine perspective, the strength of evidence is not sufficiently robust to be clinically directive," wrote two Cedars-Sinai Medical Center doctors in a commentary accompanying the paper.

Contact the writer: lhall@ocregister.com or 714-796-2221

Source: http://www.ocregister.com/articles/obese-409126-study-aspirin.html

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Conn. governor's Newtown panel meets for 1st time

HARTFORD, Conn. (AP) ? Gov. Dannel P. Malloy's panel charged with reviewing state laws and policies after the deadly Newtown school shooting was set to hear from experts who sat on similar commissions following mass shootings in Colorado and Virginia.

Malloy's Sandy Hook Advisory Commission, scheduled to hold its first meeting on Thursday, also was expected to be briefed by Danbury State's Attorney Stephen J. Sedensky III on the status of the investigation into the Dec. 14 shooting which left 20 first graders and six educators dead.

The 16-member panel of experts, headed by Hamden Mayor Scott Jackson, faces a March 15 deadline to provide Malloy with a preliminary list of recommendations pertaining to school safety, mental health and gun violence prevention.

In addition to Malloy's group, the General Assembly has formed a bipartisan task force that is examining the same issues. A subcommittee on school safety is holding a public hearing on Friday at the Legislative Office Building. A hearing on gun safety is planned for Jan. 28 and another hearing on mental health issues is scheduled for Jan. 29.

Members of Malloy's task force will hear Thursday from two former members of similar commissions created by governors following mass shootings.

Former Colorado Gov. Bill Ritter, Denver's district attorney at the time of the 1999 Columbine High School shooting, will make a presentation. He was a member of the Columbine Review Commission, which conducted a review for then-Gov. Bill Owens.

Ritter was elected governor of Colorado in 2007 and he served until 2011.

Also, Virginia Law Professor Richard Bonnie will discuss how his state reacted to the 2007 Virginia Tech shooting. He was a consultant to then-Virginia Gov. Tim Kane's Virginia Tech Review Panel. Bonnie is director of the Institute of Law, Psychiatry and Public Policy at the University of Virginia and is chairman of the Virginia Commission on Mental Health Law Reform.

Thursday's meeting, scheduled to begin at 10:30 a.m., was to be aired live by the Connecticut Network or CT-N.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/conn-governors-newtown-panel-meets-1st-time-072648316.html

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Tournament of THG Couples: Jay-Z & Beyonce vs. Blake Lively & Ryan Reynolds!

Source: http://www.thehollywoodgossip.com/2013/01/tournament-of-thg-couples-jay-z-and-beyonce-vs-blake-lively-and/

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Thursday, January 24, 2013

Steve Jobs biopic gets release date from Open Road

LOS ANGELES (TheWrap.com) - "jOBS," the biopic starring Ashton Kutcher as deceased Apple computers co-founder Steve Jobs, will be released April 19, Open Road Films said Wednesday.

The film which also stars Dermot Mulroney, Josh Gad, Lukas Haas, premieres at the Sundance Film Festival on January 25, the closing night of the festival.

Directed by Joshua Michael Stern and written by Matthew Whiteley, the film "details the major moments and defining characters that influenced Steve Jobs on a daily basis from 1971 through 2001."

Jobs died in 2011 at the age of 56, following a battle with cancer.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/steve-jobs-biopic-gets-release-date-open-road-225231449.html

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Shakira Gives Birth to a Boy!

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Female veterans cheer new era: ?It?s about time!?

By Bill Briggs, NBC News contributor

Women who rode into Iraq during the 2003 Coalition invasion or who withstood on-base mortar attacks that killed other U.S. troops raucously cheered news of the impending lift of the female-combat ban, shouting the same three spirited words.

?It?s about time!? said Laura Cannon, a 2001 West Point graduate who rolled into Iraq with the Army?s 3rd?Infantry Division, spending seven months there. ?Women have been on the ?front lines,? per se, for years. Now they're getting credit and authorization that is long overdue.?The landscape of combat has changed so much that front lines are ambiguous, and frankly, what I believe to be an obsolete concept.?

?Yes!? added Julie Weckerlein, a Air Force veteran who served in Afghanistan and Iraq. In 2007, she sought cover and was not far from Army Sgt. Trista Morietti, 27, who was killed when mortars exploded on their base in Nasir Lafitah, Iraq. ?There is definitely a sense of ?it's about time.'

?This decision means the military is finally removing that useless ?attached, but not assigned? verbiage that meant absolutely nothing on the field, with the boots on the ground,? she added. Weckerlein worked as an Air Force combat correspondent, traveling throughout Iraq and Afghanistan, documenting the missions of Air Force joint terminal air controllers and Army infantry soldiers at remote provincial reconstruction team locations and at forward operating bases. In other words, she shadowed military men who were doing ?male only? jobs.

Women now compose about 15 percent of the U.S. armed forces.?

Placing American women in combat is ?a great idea,? especially because "my gosh, women have served in the military since World War I," said Terri Kaas, an Air Force veteran who spent time in Bahrain and Germany.

?Women in the military should be able to do the same jobs as men, whatever the mission is. Though the military has desegregated, women are still treated differently,? in part because they have been held back from combat, Kaas said.

?I know, you still hear: 'It?s a man?s military.' But we are all service members,? she added. ?Look at the Marine Corps ? they have equal standards of fitness for both genders. If the men can?t respect women for the job they?re doing maybe these men shouldn?t be in the military.?

In fact, argued Cannon,?the policy and political path is now clear for Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta to eliminate ?gender-based restrictions on military jobs and career paths altogether.?

?I think every branch should have its own set of criteria and physical requirements, instead of the basic, existing standards that say: men need to do this and women need to do that,? Cannon added.

?Pilots in the aviation branch certainly don't need to physically perform to the same levels as that of infantrymen.?So have new standards applicable to every job.?Then, if a woman can achieve all of the requirements necessary to enter the infantry ? by all means ? let her!?

Related: Defense chief Panetta to clear women for combat roles

Source: http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/01/23/16665551-female-vets-cheer-new-era-for-women-in-combat-its-about-time?lite

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Quick Look: 2013 Lamborghini Gallardo New Car Detail & Full ...

The Gallardo has been the go-to, entry-level raging bull for many Lamborghini enthusiasts for nearly the last 10 years running. With numbers reaching into the 10,000s, the Gallardo stacks up as the most produced Lamborghini in the history of the company, and whether you?re a fan of the stocky little fighter or not, their is simply no denying its popularity among the masses. We?ve enjoyed a pretty fair share of Gallardos in our shop due in part to being right next door to one of the biggest Lamborghini retailers in the country, and even customized a Super Trofeo Stradale to look more like its new counterpart, the Edizione Tecnica.

The one thing we didn?t really expect though, was to receive a brand new 2013 Gallardo as one of our first New Car Details of the year!