Are Online Degrees as Valuable as Traditional College Diplomas?

Millennials are the first generation to grow up with constant technology and personal computers. That might explain why they see such a value in online education.

A recent poll by Northeastern University showed that 18 to 29 year olds had a more negative view about attending college because of the high cost, and a more positive opinion about online classes than their older counterparts. The survey also showed more than half of the millennials had taken an online course.

Online education is attracting hundreds of thousands of students a year. Perhaps this is why more brick-and-mortar universities are searching for an online identity.

This week Wellesley College announced that it will offer free online classes to anyone with an Internet connection as part of the nonprofit project edX. Earlier this year, Harvard University and Massachusetts Institute of Technology teamed up to fund and launch the online platform.

More: Harvard and MIT Want to Educate You for Free

Online education was even the talk in Washington this week when a group of panelists convened to discuss Massive Open Online Courses (MOOC), which is an open source network like edX. These courses are very much like correspondence classes in the early 20th century.

But there are still those universities that only exist in a virtual world and students pay to attend. Are they as beneficial to students as attending a two- or four-year college?

“It depends at what level and what subject,” says Isabelle Frank, dean of Fordham College of Liberal Studies. “In general, fully online degrees are not valued as highly as degrees from brick-and-mortar institutions. This is because online-only universities do not have the faculty quality and interaction that occurs with full-time faculty and secure positions.”

She says that Fordham has online master programs and some online courses, but the model is “that of a small seminar style class with a lot of faculty feedback and involvement.”

Just like a physical college, a quality online education depends on the institution.

For example, students at Arizona State University’s W. P. Carey School of Business take online classes and communicate with other students around the world—something students 25 years ago couldn’t have dreamed of doing.

“This affords the opportunity to learn leadership, team-building and managerial skills by solving problems and coordinating efforts for projects through the process of establishing real-time meetings, coordinating time zones and dealing with potential language issues,” Sher Downing, executive director of online academic services at the W. P. Carey School of Business at Arizona State University, said. “This value cannot be mirrored as easily in a traditional classroom, and for many companies with offices located around the world, this is a valuable skill, when the workforce is required to handle these types of situations.”

Downing said that students can save money by taking online classes because they no longer have to commute, live on or near a campus or relocate.

The millennials surveyed by Northeastern University are keen to take online courses. In fact, nine in 10 said online classes should be used as a tool and mixed with other teaching methods. The poll also found that students want flex­i­bility, which is exactly what online colleges offer.

Employers may not yet see an online degree in the same light as a traditional university but that is likely to change in the near future. It may just be that millennials, who don’t want to go in debt for an education like some of their parents did, are just a bit ahead of educators and employers.

Related Stories on TakePart:

• Top Universities Want You to Take Free Online Classes in Your Pajamas

• Military Gives ‘F’ to Online Diplomas

• 2012 List: The Most Expensive Colleges in America

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Suzi Parker is an Arkansas-based political and cultural journalist whose work frequently appears in The Washington Post and The Christian Science Monitor. She is the author of two books. @SuziParker | TakePart.com 

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Pfizer/Bristol drug cuts recurrence of blood clots – study

(Reuters) – A new blood clot preventer from Pfizer Inc and Bristol-Myers Squibb Co reduced the risk of recurrence of clots in veins and lungs and death by 80 percent with no increase in major bleeding in a study testing extended use of the drug.

In the year-long trial of 2,486 patients who had been previously treated for the condition known as venous thromboembolism (VTE) the drug, apixaban, met the combined primary goal by significantly reducing the recurrence of blood clots and death from any cause compared with a placebo, according to data presented at the American Society of Hematology (ASH) meeting in Atlanta, Georgia.

The rate of recurrence or death was 11.6 percent in the placebo group compared with 3.8 percent for those who got 2.5 milligrams of apixaban and 4.2 percent for the 5 mg dose of the drug. The results were also published in the New England Journal of Medicine.

The incidence of major bleeding, always a concern with blood thinners, was extremely low in all three arms of the trial, researchers said – 0.5 percent for placebo, 0.2 percent for the low dose of apixaban and 0.1 percent for the higher dose.

“Usually when you have an effective antithrombotic you have to pay a price in terms of bleeding. This was not the case in this study,” Dr. Giancarlo Agnelli, the study’s principal investigator, said in a telephone interview.

“There was no evidence at all of increased major bleeding and this is extremely important because you are comparing an active drug with placebo,” he said.

There was a slightly higher rate of clinically relevant nonmajor bleeding, such as nose bleeds that required medical attention, observed in patients taking the higher dose of apixaban at 4.2 percent compared with the low dose and placebo, researchers said.

Apixaban belongs to a new class of blood thinners that aim to replace decades old and difficult to use warfarin. The drug, which will be sold under the brand name Eliquis, is widely considered to be one of the most important new medicines for Pfizer and Bristol-Myers, both of which saw their top selling products lose patent protection in the past year.

AWAITING U.S. APPROVAL

It is approved in Europe and awaiting a U.S. approval decision for preventing blood clots and strokes in patients with atrial fibrillation – a type of irregular heart beat – and is also being tested against warfarin as a primary treatment for VTE with data expected next year.

A rival drug from Bayer and Johnson & Johnson called Xarelto is already approved for both conditions, but based on clinical data analysts have said they believe Eliquis is the best class.

An approval for extended use in VTE patients, during which they would take the drug for at least a year after initial treatment, could significantly boost future sales.

“The evidence is for one year. The next step would be to see whether this clinical benefit is extended after one year,” Agnelli said.

VTE consists of deep vein thrombosis, typically blood clots in the legs, and pulmonary embolism, which are dangerous clots in the lungs. Clots that begin in the extremities can travel to the heart and lungs and can be fatal. VTE is typically treated with warfarin for three to six months.

After that, “there is quite a remarkable level of uncertainty about whether to extend or not,” explained Agnelli, professor of internal medicine at the University of Perugia in Italy, who presented the data at the ASH meeting.

“Extended treatment might be clinically relevant because the recurrence rate after stopping treatment can be 10 percent in the first year,” Agnelli said. “Reducing the recurrence of VTE means reduced hospitalization costs and in some cases fewer fatal events.”

Physicians have been looking for alternatives to warfarin, which must be closely monitored to keep levels therapeutic but not toxic. The new drugs do not require monitoring or the dietary and lifestyle changes necessary with warfarin. But they still face an uphill battle as warfarin is far less expensive, and doctors have a comfort level using a drug that has been around for more than half a century despite the challenges.

Patients in the study had received treatment with warfarin for six to 12 months before starting the one-year extension trial that aimed to show further treatment could reduce recurrence rates and to see if the lower dose of apixaban was a viable option.

“It is quite clear that the lower dose is as effective as the higher. For the first time we showed that by reducing the dose of an antithrombotic agent in this clinical setting we can have the same efficacy with no major bleeding,” Agnelli said.

“This is actually something that could change clinical practice,” he added.

(Reporting by Bill Berkrot; Editing by Jilian Mincer, Berard Orr)

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Berlusconi says will run for Italian leadership again

ROME (Reuters) – Silvio Berlusconi said on Saturday he will stand to lead Italy for a fifth time, challenging the leftist frontrunner a year after being forced to resign amid a sex scandal and a debt crisis.

The 76-year-old media tycoon, facing possible jail time for tax fraud and a trial for having sex with an underage prostitute, had hinted for months he might make a comeback in an election in about three months’ time. He accuses technocrat Prime Minister Mario Monti of bringing the third-biggest euro zone economy to “the edge of an abyss” with austerity policies.

Berlusconi’s center-right People of Liberty Party (PDL) lags Pier Luigi Bersani‘s center-left Democratic Party (PD) by at least 16 percentage points in opinion polls, and also trails the anti-establishment 5-Star Movement.

While another Berlusconi victory looks almost impossible, the man who has dominated Italy’s center-right for 19 years may hope to help it win enough support to keep the center-left from winning a clear majority in both houses of parliament.

The question mark that remains over the election is whether the current prime minister will run. So far Monti has said he will step in only if the election result is unclear, but there has been speculation he could join forces with a centrist group.

Berlusconi’s comeback arrives slightly more than a year after he resigned as prime minister as collapsing market confidence pushed Italy’s debt costs to critical levels.

His international reputation had already been left in tatters by a lurid stories of “bunga bunga” parties with pole-dancing prostitutes at his home outside Milan. He is currently appealing a four-year jail sentence for tax fraud and faces a trial over paying for sex with an underage nightclub dancer.

Italians will probably vote in March with a recession that began mid-way through last year showing no signs of abating and unemployment at 11.1 percent, a record high.

“I race to win,” Berlusconi told reporters at the practice field for AC Milan, the soccer club he controls, after repeating criticism of Monti’s handling of the economy over the past year.

“To win, everyone said there had to be a tested leader. It’s not that we did not look for one. We did, and how! But there isn’t one… I’m doing it out of a sense of responsibility.”

His move may unsettle financial markets, whose loss of faith in Berlusconi’s guidance of the economy pushed the country to the edge of a Greek-style debt crisis last year and prompted President Giorgio Napolitano to ask the former European commissioner Monti to step in to restore confidence.

With the support of a right-left coalition including the PDL, Monti imposed austerity measures to bring borrowing costs under control, but Berlusconi said on Wednesday that the economic professor’s policies had left Italy facing a “recessive spiral without end”.

The PDL withdrew parliamentary support for Monti on Thursday, raising the specter of a snap election and driving up the difference between German and Italian benchmark bonds by about 30 basis points.

GOVERNMENT WILL NOT FALL

However, on Saturday Berlusconi said the PDL would pass legislation proposed by Monti’s government, including next year’s budget, and that March 10 was an acceptable date for the parliamentary election.

The media magnate has ample resources to back his bid – the country’s biggest TV network, its biggest magazine publisher, and a family-owned newspaper.

He will likely campaign against Monti’s tax increases, especially an unpopular housing levy, that were used to bring down the deficit, and against Germany’s role in enforcing European austerity.

Berlusconi has also criticized the single currency, echoing comments by fiery comic Beppe Grillo, leader of the 5-Star Movement, who says Italy should hold a referendum over whether to keep the euro.

In his blog, Grillo commented that Berlusconi, whom he calls the “psycho-dwarf”, is running for office again because he knows the average Italian “is literally terrified about the prospects of five more years of Monti-like rule”.

PD leader Bersani and the prime minister have yet to comment on Berlusconi’s decision. But Monti said on Saturday whoever takes over “must absolutely prevent Italy from going back into the situation” of last year, and he warned against “populism”.

Monti was scheduled meet President Napolitano later on Saturday to discuss the political situation.

The PD this week had 30.3 percent support, up from 30 percent a week earlier, higher than a 19.7 percent readout for the 5-Star Movement, a poll by the SWG institute showed.

A second poll by research group Demos and Pi gave the PD 37.8 percent, up more than ten points from a poll in September.

The PDL saw a slight drop in both polls, with SWG showing it at 13.8 percent and Demos at 18.2 percent.

In the Demos survey, Berlusconi emerged as one of the least popular leaders among 16 graded, with an approval rating of just 20.8 percent. With 50.1 percent, PD leader Bersani was among the most popular, as was Monti, with 47.3 percent.

(With additional reporting by Elvira Pollina in Milan, Giselda Vagnoni in Rome, and Lionel Laurent in Cannes, France; Editing by Sophie Hares and Jason Webb)

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Anger at Australian radio station over royal hoax

LONDON (AP) — It started out as a joke, but ended in tragedy.

The sudden death of a nurse who unwittingly accepted a prank call to a London hospital about Prince William‘s pregnant wife Kate has shocked Britain and Australia, and sparked an angry backlash Saturday from some who argue the DJs who carried out the hoax should be held responsible.

At first, the call by two irreverent Australian DJs posing as royals was picked up by news outlets around the world as an amusing anecdote about the royal pregnancy. Some complained about the invasion of privacy, the hospital was embarrassed, and the radio presenters sheepishly apologized.

But the prank took a dark twist Friday with the death of nurse Jacintha Saldanha, a 46-year-old mother of two, three days after she took the hoax call. Police have not yet determined Saldanha‘s cause of death, but people from London to Sydney have been making the assumption that she died because of stress from the call.

King Edward VII’s Hospital, where the former Kate Middleton was being treated for acute morning sickness this week, wrote a strongly-worded letter to the 2DayFM radio station’s parent company Southern Cross Austereo, condemning the “truly appalling” hoax and urging it to take steps to ensure such an incident would never happen again.

“The immediate consequence of these premeditated and ill-considered actions was the humiliation of two dedicated and caring nurses who were simply doing their job tending to their patients,” the letter read. “The longer term consequence has been reported around the world and is, frankly, tragic beyond words.”

The hospital did not comment when asked whether it believed the prank call had directly caused Saldanha’s death, only saying that the protest letter spoke for itself.

DJs Mel Grieg and Michael Christian, who apologized for the prank on Tuesday, took down their Twitter accounts after they were bombarded by thousands of abusive comments. Rhys Holleran, CEO of Southern Cross Austereo, said the pair have been offered counseling and were taken off the air indefinitely.

No one could have foreseen the tragic consequences of the prank, he stressed.

“I spoke to both presenters early this morning and it’s fair to say they’re completely shattered,” Holleran told reporters on Saturday.

“These people aren’t machines, they’re human beings,” he said. “We’re all affected by this.”

Details about Saldanha have been trickling out since the duty nurse’s body was found at apartments provided by the private hospital, which has treated a line of royals before, including Prince Philip, who was hospitalized there for a bladder infection in June.

The nurse, who was originally from India, had lived with her partner Benedict Barboza and a teenage son and daughter in Bristol, in southwestern England, for the past nine years. The hospital praised her as a “first-class nurse” who was well-respected and popular among colleagues during her four years working there.

Just before dawn on Tuesday, Saldanha was looking after her patients when the phone rang. A woman pretending to be Queen Elizabeth II asked to speak to the duchess, and, believing the caller, Saldanha transferred the call to a fellow nurse caring for the duchess, who spoke to the two DJs about Kate’s condition live on air.

During the call — which was put online and later broadcast on news channels worldwide — Grieg mimicked the Britain’s monarch’s voice and asked about the duchess’ health. She was told Kate “hasn’t had any retching with me and she’s been sleeping on and off.” Grieg and Christian, who pretended to be Prince Charles, also discussed with the nurse when they could travel to the hospital to check in on Kate.

Three days later, officers responding to reports that a woman was found unconscious discovered Saldanha, who was pronounced dead at the scene. Police didn’t release a cause of death, but said they didn’t find anything suspicious. A coroner will make a determination on the cause.

In the aftermath of Saldanha’s death, some speculated about whether the nurse was subject to pressure to resign or about to be punished for the mistake. Royal officials said Prince William and Kate were “deeply saddened,” but insisted that the palace had not complained about the hoax. King Edward VII’s Hospital also maintained that it did not reprimand Saldanha.

“We did not discipline the nurse in question. There were no plans to discipline her,” a hospital spokesman said. He declined to provide further details, and did not respond to questions about the second nurse’s condition.

The Australian Communications and Media Authority, which regulates radio broadcasting, said it has received complaints about the prank and is discussing the matter with the Sydney-based station, which yanked its Facebook page after it received thousands of angry comments.

Holleran, the radio executive, would not say who came up with the idea for the call. He only said that “these things are often done collaboratively.” He said 2DayFM would work with authorities, but was confident the station hadn’t broken any laws, noting that prank calls in radio have been happening “for decades.”

The station has a history of controversy, including a series of “Heartless Hotline” shows in which disadvantage people were offered a prize that could be taken away from them by listeners.

Saldanha’s family asked for privacy in a brief statement issued through London police.

Flowers were left outside the hospital’s nurse’s apartments, with one note reading: “Dear Jacintha, our thoughts are with you and your family. From all your fellow nurses, we bless your soul. God bless.”

Officials from St. James’s Palace have said the duchess is not yet 12 weeks pregnant. The child would be the first for her and William.

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iPad mini fails to draw crowds for China launch

Either Apple’s (AAPL) reservation-only system works better than anyone could have expected, or consumers in China have little interest in the company’s new iPad mini. Apple’s tiny tablet launched on schedule on Friday but according to IDG News Service, the turnout for Apple’s new slate was minimal. At Apple’s new flagship store in the well-trafficked Wangfujing district in Beijing, for example, turnout was “nearly nonexistent” according to the report, with no lines forming at all on Friday.

We’ve seen Apple rack up big numbers despite small launch-day turnouts in the past, but Apple’s reservation system does not appear to be responsible for the seemingly slow launch — according to IDG, many consumers who did turn up at Apple stores looking to purchase an iPad mini were unable to do so because they weren’t even aware that the reservation-only system existed.

Apple’s iPhone 5, which will presumably draw more of a crowd, launches in China next Friday.

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Supreme Court to hear “pay-for-delay” drug case

(Reuters) – The Supreme Court on Friday agreed to decide whether brand-name drug companies may pay money to generic drug rivals to keep their lower-priced products off the market, a practice estimated to cost consumers and the government billions of dollars each year.

The arrangements, known as “pay-for-delay” or “reverse payments,” have for more than a decade vexed antitrust enforcers including the Federal Trade Commission, which have been stung until recently by a series of court decisions allowing such practices.

In a typical case, a generic rival challenges the patent of a brand-name competitor, which then pays the rival a sum of money to drop its challenge. Defenders of the practice call it a legitimate means to resolve patent litigation.

The court accepted an appeal by the FTC, which had challenged annual payments of $ 31 million to $ 42 million by Solvay Pharmaceuticals Inc, now owned by Abbott Laboratories Inc, to stop generic versions of AndroGel, a treatment for the underproduction of testosterone, until 2015.

These payments went to such rivals as Watson Pharmaceuticals Inc, Paddock Laboratories Inc and Par Pharmaceutical Cos, and were intended to help Solvay preserve annual profits estimated at $ 125 million. The 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta upheld the arrangement in April.

(Reporting by Jonathan Stempel in New York; Editing by Kevin Drawbaugh)

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Employment ducks superstorm Sandy punch

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Companies kept up their steady but slow hiring pace in November, defying predictions that superstorm Sandy would deal a big blow to the labor market.

While the unemployment rate fell to a near four-year low of 7.7 percent, that was only because many Americans gave up the hunt for work, tempering the signal from the stronger-than-expected payrolls growth.

A big drop in consumer confidence in December also offered a cautionary note on the economy’s health.

Nonfarm employment expanded by 146,000 jobs last month after gaining 138,000 in October, the Labor Department said on Friday. The increase was well above the 93,000 expected on Wall Street.

“We are moving in a trend-like modest job-growth environment,” said Michael Hanson, a senior economist at Bank of Bank of America Merrill Lynch in New York. “We really need to see payroll numbers break above 200,000 for a while to think we have a more sustained recovery underway.”

The government said Sandy, which slammed the densely populated East Coast in late October, did not have a substantive impact on the data. Economists had thought it would, with some predicting it would cut up to 75,000 jobs off payrolls growth.

Nevertheless, the storm did hit the economy hard.

Sandy knocked retail sales and industrial output in October and led to a big spike in claims for jobless benefits, one of the reasons economists expected job growth to slow.

A Labor Department survey of households found 369,000 workers were unable to make it to work in the aftermath of the storm and a further 1.1 million ended up working only part time. However, the department still considered them employed.

U.S. stocks were little changed at mid-day, with the downbeat reading on consumer confidence largely offsetting the stronger-than-expected payrolls data. Prices for U.S. government debt fell, while the dollar edged up against a basket of currencies.

MODEST TREND

November’s job gains left them just below the monthly average of 151,000 that has prevailed since January.

Economists consider that pace just enough to push the jobless rate lower over time. But they say roughly 200,000 to 250,000 jobs per month would be needed to make noticeable headway in absorbing the 22.7 million Americans who are either jobless or underemployed.

The 0.2 percentage point drop in the unemployment rate, which took it to its lowest level since December 2008, was due to a decrease in the size of the labor force, a suggestion frustrated Americans were giving up the hunt for work.

The labor force participation rate, or the proportion of working-age Americans who have a job or are looking for one, fell back to near a 31-year low.

Heidi Shierholz, an economist at the Economic Policy Institute in Washington, said it could take more than 10 years for the unemployment rate to drop back to its pre-recession level around 5 percent at the current pace of job growth.

Last month, the retail sector accounted for more than a third of jobs gains, which economists tied to a brisk start to the holiday shopping season. Still, private hiring slowed to 147,000 from 189,000 in October, pulled down by a sharp decline in construction employment and weak manufacturing payrolls.

FISCAL CLIFF WORRIES

Employment continues to be held back by fears the government may fail to prevent the $ 600 billion in automatic tax hikes and government spending cuts set to take hold at the start of next year. The debt crisis in Europe has also weighed.

Worries about this so-called fiscal cliff hit consumer sentiment in early December. The Thomson Reuters/University of Michigan’s preliminary confidence reading plummeted to 74.5 from 82.7 in November.

“That confirms my belief that the only thing the economy has to fear is Washington itself,” said Joel Naroff, chief economist at Naroff Economic Advisors in Holland, Pennsylvania.

“There is some real underlying strength in the economy as the November jobs numbers indicate, but it could be wiped out by the games being played by our political representatives,” he said.

With the labor market far from full health, Federal Reserve policymakers, who meet on Tuesday and Wednesday, look certain to keep U.S. monetary policy on its current ultra-easy course.

Economists said an anticipated tightening of fiscal policy next year, even if a deal is reached to avoid completely going over the fiscal cliff, provides ample reason for the U.S. central bank to maintain its stance.

The retail sector added 52,600 jobs last month after rising 50,900 in October. The pace of retail hiring over the last three months was the fastest since 1995.

There were also increases in information and temporary help hiring. But transport, financial, education and health services employment slowed.

Manufacturing employment fell 7,000, marking the third month it has dropped this year.

Construction payrolls surprisingly tumbled 20,000, despite a surge in homebuilding, which is benefiting from the Fed’s effort to hold borrowing costs down. Economists said they expect construction jobs to rise in the coming months as the housing recovery returns full swing.

Average hourly earnings increased four cents. In the 12 months to November, average hourly earnings are up just 1.7 percent, underscoring the trouble workers are having keeping up with inflation.

(Additional reporting by Richard Leong in New York; Editing by Andrea Ricci, Tim Ahmann and James Dalgleish)

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Protesters surge around Egypt’s presidential palace

CAIRO (Reuters) – Tens of thousands of Egyptian protesters surged around the presidential palace on Friday and the opposition rejected President Mohamed Mursi‘s call for dialogue to end a crisis that has polarized the nation and sparked deadly clashes.

The Islamist leader’s deputy said he could delay a December 15 referendum on a constitution that liberals opposed, although the concession only partly meets a list of opposition demands that include scrapping a decree that expanded Mursi‘s powers.

“The people want the downfall of the regime” and “Leave, leave,” crowds chanted after bursting through barbed wire barricades and climbing on tanks guarding the palace of Egypt‘s first freely elected president.

Their slogans echoed those used in a popular revolt that toppled Mursi’s predecessor Hosni Mubarak in February 2011.

Vice President Mahmoud Mekky said in a statement sent to local media that the president was prepared to postpone the referendum if that could be done without legal challenge.

The dialogue meeting was expected to go ahead on Saturday in the absence of most opposition factions. “Tomorrow everything will be on the table,” a presidential source said of the talks.

The opposition has demanded that Mursi rescind a November 22 decree giving himself wide powers and delay the vote set for December 15 on a constitution drafted by an Islamist-led assembly which they say fails to meet the aspirations of all Egyptians.

The state news agency reported that the election committee had postponed the start of voting for Egyptians abroad until Wednesday, instead of Saturday as planned. It did not say whether this would affect the timing of voting in Egypt.

Ahmed Said, leader of the liberal Free Egyptians Party, told Reuters that delaying expatriate voting was made to seem like a concession but would not change the opposition’s stance.

He said the core opposition demand was to freeze Mursi’s decree and “to reconsider the formation and structure of the constituent assembly”, not simply to postpone the referendum.

The opposition organized marches converging on the palace which elite Republican Guard units had ringed with tanks and barbed wire on Thursday after violence between supporters and opponents of Mursi killed seven people and wounded 350.

Islamists, who had obeyed a military order for demonstrators to leave the palace environs, held funerals on Friday at Cairo’s al-Azhar mosque for six Mursi partisans who were among the dead. “With our blood and souls, we sacrifice to Islam,” they chanted.

“ARM-TWISTING”

In a speech late on Thursday, Mursi had refused to retract his November 22 decree or cancel the referendum on the constitution, but offered talks on the way forward after the referendum.

The National Salvation Front, the main opposition coalition, said it would not join the dialogue. The Front’s coordinator, Mohamed ElBaradei, a Nobel peace laureate, dismissed the offer as “arm-twisting and imposition of a fait accompli”.

Murad Ali, spokesman of the Brotherhood’s Freedom and Justice Party (FJP), said opposition reactions were sad: “What exit to this crisis do they have other than dialogue?” he asked.

Mursi’s decree giving himself extra powers sparked the worst political crisis since he took office in June and set off renewed unrest that is dimming Egypt’s hopes of stability and economic recovery after nearly two years of turmoil following the overthrow of Mubarak, a military-backed strongman.

The turmoil has exposed contrasting visions for Egypt, one held by Islamists, who were suppressed for decades by the army, and another by their rivals, who fear religious conservatives want to squeeze out other voices and restrict social freedoms.

Caught in the middle are many of Egypt’s 83 million people who are desperate for an end to political turbulence threatening their precarious livelihoods in an economy under severe strain.

“We are so tired, by God,” said Mohamed Ali, a laborer. “I did not vote for Mursi nor anyone else. I only care about bringing food to my family, but I haven’t had work for a week.”

ECONOMIC PAIN

A long political standoff will make it harder for Mursi’s government to tackle the crushing budget deficit and stave off a balance of payments crisis. Austerity measures, especially cuts in costly fuel subsidies, seem inevitable to meet the terms of a $ 4.8-billion IMF loan that Egypt hopes to clinch this month.

U.S. President Barack Obama told Mursi on Thursday of his “deep concern” about casualties in this week’s clashes and said “dialogue should occur without preconditions”.

The upheaval in the most populous Arab nation worries the United States, which has given billions of dollars in military and other aid since Egypt made peace with Israel in 1979.

The conflict between Islamists and opponents who each believe the other is twisting the democratic rules to thwart them has poisoned the political atmosphere in Egypt.

The Muslim Brotherhood’s spokesman, Mahmoud Ghozlan, told Reuters that if the opposition shunned the dialogue “it shows that their intention is to remove Mursi from the presidency and not to cancel the decree or the constitution as they claim”.

Ayman Mohamed, 29, a protester at the palace, said Mursi should scrap the draft constitution and heed popular demands.

“He is the president of the republic. He can’t just work for the Muslim Brotherhood,” Mohamed said of the eight-decade-old Islamist movement that propelled Mursi from obscurity to power.

(Additional reporting by Omar Fahmy; Writing by Edmund Blair and Alistair Lyon; Editing by Giles Elgood)

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Facebook might buy Microsoft’s Atlas Ad platform to compete with Google

Is Facebook (FB) preparing to compete with Google (GOOG) in online advertising? According to AllThingsD and BusinessInsider’s sources Facebook might be taking steps to build its own advertising network for online websites. AllThingsD says that rather than build a new advertising network from scratch, Facebook could just buy Microsoft’s (MSFT) Atlas Solutions platform “that already delivers billions of ad impressions a day.”

BusinessInsider reports that Facebook will reportedly pay a lower price than the $ 6 billion that Microsoft paid for aQuantive in 2007 that included Atlas Solutions. It’s estimated that Atlas is worth more than $ 30 million — a small price to pay to compete with Google’s DoubleClick ad network.

So why is Facebook interested in advertising now? Well, it’s got over 1 billion active users with emails, phone numbers, and unprecedented amounts of “likes.” As BusinessInsider puts it, Facebook has so much data it could “tell marketers whether or not a Facebook user saw, on Facebook.com, an ad for a product before going to the store and buying it.”

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Kristen Wiig may join “Anchorman: The Legend Continues”

LOS ANGELES (TheWrap.com) – Kristen Wiig is being eyed for a role in “Anchorman: The Legend Continues” for Paramount Pictures, a person familiar with the negotiations has told TheWrap.

Wiig would play opposite Steve Carell, as a love interest in the sequel. The script is still being written, and no cast beyond the principals has been set.

Adam McKay is directing the feature, which is being produced by Judd Apatow through his Apatow Productions banner. The film is a sequel to the 2004 hit, “Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy” and is due to be released in October 2013.

Best known for her work on “Saturday Night Live,” Wiig is one of the most in-demand actresses in Hollywood, since appearing in the film “Bridesmaids.” She could recently be seen at the Toronto International Film Festival in the indie feature “Imogene,” and has been busy filming a number of titles, including “The Secret Life of Walter Mitty,” and “Hateship Friendship,” with Guy Pearce.

“Anchorman: The Legend Continues” will see the original film’s cast return, including Will Ferrell, Christina Applegate, Paul Rudd and Carell. The story follows the on-set adventures of San Diego’s top newsman who is played by Ferrell. “Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy” made around $ 85 million at the box office.

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Why are People so Interested in the DSM-5?

There is a lot of internet buzz about the approval by the American Psychiatric Association‘s (APA) board of trustees of its fifth edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5.)

The APA press release notes “the trustees’ action marks the end of the manual’s comprehensive revision process, which has spanned over a decade and included contributions from more than 1,500 experts in psychiatry, psychology, social work, psychiatric nursing, pediatrics, neurology, and other related fields from 39 countries.”The approval was announced on Saturday, December 1 (was the APA trying to keep it quiet?) with publication of the DSM-5 scheduled spring 2013. For a book that has no plot or characters, its pending publication has caused great excitement. True, it is a sequel, but it is not the latest installment of Harry Potter or the Twilight Saga.Though the DSMs have not reached the volume of sales of a Harry Potter (so far), the paperback edition of the last version of the DSM had a sales rank of 261 on Amazon.com. This is remarkable for a book that is over 900 pages in length and written for professionals.Besides being bestsellers, the DSMs have inspired games and even music awards. DSM-IV the Game is available for free online. It is described as “beautiful way to engage and learn about yourself, family, and friends and as an ice breaker at your next holiday gathering.”Several years ago, Dr. Jill Squyres, a clinical psychologist in San Antonio, created the DSM-IV Music Awards for her professional society’s fall social. The DSM-IV Music Awards are modeled on the Academy Awards. She chooses categories based on a DSM diagnosis and then nominates songs that are reflective of disorders such as Major Depression (Jagged Little Pill by Alanis Morisette, King of Pain by the Police), Mania (Wake Me Up Before You Go Go by Wham, Life in the Fast Lane by the Eagles), Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (I’m In Love With My Car by Queen, Pinball Wizard by the Who), and Borderline Personality Disorder (Isn’t life Strange by Jim Morrison, Addicted to Love by Robert Palmer).How does a medical book about psychiatric disorders inspire games and awards let alone become a bestseller? There are not enough medical professionals or people with vested interests, such as the pharmaceutical or insurance industries, to account for these sales figures. What is behind the fascination with the DSM among the general public? I believe it is because our mental state goes to the core of who we are as human beings and our fascination with the link between mental illness and creativity.Mental illness went “public” long before cancer and AIDS. Although mental illness is still considered a stigma by the general public, writers and artists have been talking publicly about their bouts of depression and struggles with alcohol and drugs for hundreds of years. Ernest Hemingway, Virginia Woolf, Sylvia Path and Vincent van Gogh committed suicide. The poets T.S. Eliot and Ezra Pound were committed to mental institutions. The 27 club is comprised of musicians who died at age 27; Janis Joplin, Jimi Hendrix, Brian Jones, Kurt Cobain, and Amy Winehouse. The public breakdowns and rants of Mel Gibson, Alec Baldwin, Lindsay Lohan, Charlie Sheen and Mel Gibson have been televised and viewed by millions on YouTube.The style and language of the DSM is another reason for its popularity. Unlike most medical textbooks , there is relatively little medical terminology and diagnoses are described in terms that are easily understandable to the nonmedical reader. Each diagnosis includes a list of symptoms, referred to as criteria, that typify the disorder. The list of symptoms is exhaustive, but not all symptoms necessarily occur in the disorder. The format and clear non-technical language invite the reader to examine and apply this new knowledge to themselves and others. A parent who worries that his child might have Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) or a spouse concerned that their loved one is displaying symptoms of Alzheimer’s disease can easily look up these disorders and review the symptom check list.Psychiatric disorders consist of behaviors that are extreme. The same behaviors occur with less intensity or frequency in everyday living. A key symptom of Major Depression Disorder is anhedonia, a failure to find pleasure in everyday life. Anhedonia was the working title of Woody Allen’s movie Annie Hall, which won four Academy Awards including Best Picture. In mild or moderate degrees, most of us have experienced “mild anhedonia” (a.k.a being in a funk) at some point in our lives.Obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) is an anxiety disorder marked by obsessions, which consist of unwanted and repeated thoughts, or behaviors, and compulsions that make those with OCD feel compelled to perform a behavior to lessen their anxiety. Although most of us are not paralyzed by OCD, we all have some traits. We go back and check to see if we locked our doors or left the tea kettle on. And although we might wish to have the detective skills of Adrian Monk or the writing skills of Jack Nicholson in As Good As It Gets , these fictional characters inability to cope with OCD causes them great anguish and the inability to have significant relationships.I believe that today’s films and TV shows that portray mental illness are popular because they present characters we can relate to, unlike earlier films such as Psycho, a film that scared people so much they stopped taking showers. We laugh at the neurotic mother-son relationships portrayed in Everyone Loves Raymond and Seinfeld because we can relate to them. And we worry about our children. Are we pushing them so hard that they will end up like Natalie Portman’s crazed ballerina in the Black Swan?Brain scans have shown that that creativity and “madness” light up similar pathways in the brain. However, the overwhelming majority of mentally ill people are not artists and most artists are not mentally ill. Edgar Allen Poe, Vincent Van Gogh and Ernest Hemingway were gifted artists who happened to be mentally ill. Their mental illness did not make them artists. In fact, mental illness interferes with the artistic process. William Styron was not able to write in the throes of his depression. The mathematician John Nash did his greatest work before he was diagnosed with schizophrenia.I have no doubt that some gifted people are able to function by “throwing themselves into their art.” However, their legacy is their work, not their mental illness. People may fantasize about being able to play guitar like Jimi Hendrix, write like Hemingway, and sing and dance like Michael Jackson. But they don’t fantasize about being clinically depressed, overdosing on drugs, being homeless, or being institutionalized.To answer to my question of why we are so fascinated by the DSM, I believe it is because it presents and explains extremes of behavior, related to and connected with the more normal levels of behavior we experience. We read the DSM to find ourselves in its pages.Images: Vincent Van Gogh; Janis Joplin; MONK cover by author.

Follow Scientific American on Twitter @SciAm and @SciamBlogs.Visit ScientificAmerican.com for the latest in science, health and technology news.
© 2012 ScientificAmerican.com. All rights reserved.
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Intel CEO Otellini expects insider to replace him

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) – Intel‘s outgoing chief executive, Paul Otellini, said he expected to be replaced by a company insider and also signaled that the top chipmaker could open its factories to strategic customers.

Otellini’s comments at a Sanford Bernstein investor conference on Wednesday stoked speculation the top chipmaker may manufacture mobile chips for Apple and pushed Intel’s shares higher on Thursday morning.

“For the right types of products and not to enable my competitors, I would certainly consider it. There’s a lot of stuff in the pipeline,” Otellini said, according to a Thomson One transcript.

“As you know it takes a while to move your designs over, to design them under our process, for us to be able to bring them in-house and so forth and our foundry customers aren’t going to announce that they’ve moved until they’ve moved because it would hurt them at their current suppliers, Otellini said.

RBC analyst Doug Freedman said Otellini’s comments about the possibility of open Intel’s plants to customers were more direct than previous ones.

Apple currently depends on Samsung Electronics to manufacture its mobile chips but the two companies are in a war over patents and also compete in smarpthones and tablets. Apple is believed to be looking for alternative suppliers.

Intel raised eyebrows on Wall Street and in Silicon Valley in November when it said it will consider an outsider to take over after Otellini unexpectedly announced he will retire in May, potentially ending a four-decade tradition of internal succession.

Some analysts took that as a sign that Intel, which has struggled to jump from the personal computer market to mobile, might be considering a transformative hire. But Otellini he expects the board to choose from among the chipmaker’s own executives.

“It’s not up to me but I think that’s the most likely outcome. I’m very comfortable with the internal candidates and the track record of internal versus external in our industry shows pretty clearly you want to stay inside if you can,” Otellini said.

While the idea of an iconic visionary stepping in to lift Intel into the mobile market – its Achilles heel – may sound attractive, it could open the chipmaker to new risks should it waver from its traditional focus on hard-core manufacturing.

“Even if you brought in Mr. or Ms. Perfect, that person is going to take whatever it is, two years to figure out the culture and the people and how systems work and stuff like that,” Otellini said.

“In this environment, why take the risk and take the time? So I think they will stay inside.”

Shares of Intel rose 1.66 percent to $ 20.17.

(Reporting By Noel Randewich; Editing by M.D. Golan)

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Toronto mayor to stay in power pending appeal of ouster

TORONTO (Reuters) – Toronto Mayor Rob Ford can stay in power pending an appeal of a conflict of interest ruling that ordered him out of his job as leader of Canada’s biggest city, a court ruled on Wednesday.

Madam Justice Gladys Pardu of the Ontario Divisional Court suspended a previous court ruling that said Ford should be ousted. Ford’s appeal of that ruling is set to be heard on January 7, but a decision on the appeal could take months.

Justice Pardu stressed that if she had not suspended the ruling, Ford would have been out of office by next week. “Significant uncertainty would result and needless expenses may be incurred if a by-election is called,” she said.

If Ford wins his appeal, he will get to keep his job until his term ends at the end of 2014. If he loses, the city council will either appoint a successor or call a special election, in which Ford is likely to run again.

“I can’t wait for the appeal, and I’m going to carry on doing what the people elected me to do,” Ford told reporters at City Hall following the decision.

Ford, a larger-than-life character who took power on a promise to “stop the gravy train” at City Hall, has argued that he did nothing wrong when he voted to overturn an order that he repay money that lobbyists had given to a charity he runs.

Superior Court Justice Charles Hackland disagreed, ruling last week that Ford acted with “willful blindness” in the case, and must leave office by December 10.

Ford was elected mayor in a landslide in 2010, but slashing costs without cutting services proved harder than he expected, and his popularity has fallen steeply.

He grabbed unwelcome headlines for reading while driving on a city expressway, for calling the police when a comedian tried to film part of a popular TV show outside his home, and after reports that city resources were used to help administer the high-school football team he coaches.

The conflict-of-interest drama began in 2010 when Ford, then a city councillor, used government letterhead to solicit donations for the football charity created in his name for underprivileged children.

Toronto’s integrity commissioner ordered Ford to repay the C$ 3,150 ($ 3,173) the charity received from lobbyists and companies that do business with the city.

Ford refused to repay the money, and in February 2012 he took part in a city council debate on the matter and then voted to remove the sanctions against him – despite being warned by the council speaker that voting would break the rules.

He pleaded not guilty in September, stating that he believed there was no conflict of interest as there was no financial benefit for the city. The judge dismissed that argument.

In a rare apology after last week’s court ruling, he said the matter began “because I love to help kids play football”.

Ford faces separate charges in a C$ 6 million libel case about remarks he made about corruption at City Hall, and is being audited for his campaign finances. The penalty in the audit case could also include removal from office.

(Reporting by Claire Sibonney; Editing by Janet Guttsman, Russ Blinch, Nick Zieminski; and Peter Galloway)

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25 top-rated Facebook games from 2012

Games can be both a welcome and an annoying diversion on Facebook, the world’s most popular online social network. This year, Facebook crossed a big milestone — reaching 1 billion active users. Game companies such as “FarmVille” creator Zynga Inc. and Rovio Entertainment Ltd. of “Angry Birds” fame seek to tap into that vast base of users to gain more players for their games.

This week, Facebook Inc. issued a list of the 25 top-rated games that launched on Facebook in 2012. The company says the rankings are based on user ratings and engagement with the games. It’s the same methodology that Facebook uses to rank apps in its App Center.

Some of the games are played on Facebook’s website, while others are only on Apple Inc.‘s iOS or Google Inc.‘s Android devices using Facebook’s app.

Here’s the list:

1. “SongPop” (by FreshPlanet, on Facebook.com, iOS and Android)

2. “Dragon City” (by Social Point, on Facebook.com)

3. “Bike Race” (by Top Free Games, on iOS)

4. “Subway Surfers” (by Kiloo, on iOS and Android)

5. “Angry Birds Friends (by Rovio, on Facebook.com)

6. “FarmVille 2″ (by Zynga, on Facebook.com)

7. “Scramble with Friends” (by Zynga, on iOS)

8. “Clash of Clans” (by Supercell, on iOS)

9. “Marvel: Avengers Alliance” (by Playdom, on Facebook.com)

10. “Draw Something” (by Zynga, on iOS and Android)

11. “Hay Day” (by Supercell, on iOS)

12. “Baseball Heroes” (by Syntasia, on Facebook.com)

13. “ChefVille” (by Zynga, on Facebook.com)

14. “CSR Racing” (by NaturalMotion Games, on iOS)

15. “Candy Crush Saga” (by King.com, on Facebook.com and iOS)

16. “Matching With Friends” (by Zynga, on Facebook.com)

17. “Legend Online” (by Oasis Games, on Facebook.com)

18. “Jurassic Park Builder” (by Ludia, on Facebook.com)

19. “Dungeon Rampage” (by Rebel Entertainment, on Facebook.com)

20. “Pockie Ninja II Social” (by NGames Ltd., on Facebook.com)

21. “Jetpack Joyride” (by Halfbrick, on Facebook.com)

22. “Social Empires” (by Social Point, on Facebook.com and iOS)

23. “Bil ve Fethet” (by Peak Games, on Facebook.com)

24. “Ruby Blast Adventures” (by Zynga, on Facebook.com and iOS)

25. “Pyramid Solitaire Saga” (by King.com, on Facebook.com)

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Asthma symptoms may vary during menstrual cycle

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) – Some women may have more or fewer asthma symptoms, such as coughing and wheezing, depending on their time of the month, a new study suggests.

Researchers said spikes and dips in estrogen and other hormones likely affect the lungs and other physiological responses involved in breathing. However, it’s still unclear whether the findings could improve doctors’ treatment of women with asthma.

The menstrual cycle “is a very important cycle… with all the biological changes and physiological things that happen,” said Dr. Samar Farha from the Cleveland Clinic, who studies asthma and other respiratory diseases but wasn’t involved in the new research.

“(Some) asthmatics describe that just before their menses, they get a worsening of their symptoms,” she told Reuters Health – but more scientific assessments of what’s going on have come to conflicting conclusions.

For the new study, researchers surveyed close to 4,000 women in Northern Europe who had normal periods and weren’t taking birth control pills.

Along with other health and lifestyle questions, they asked women to report when their last period started, as well as whether they’d had any breathing-related problems in the past three days – such as wheezing or waking up with a coughing attack.

Just under eight percent of women in the study had been diagnosed with asthma. Between two and six percent reported recent wheezing, coughing and/or shortness of breath.

Dr. Ferenc Macsali of Haukeland University Hospital in Bergen, Norway, and colleagues found the number of women with of each of those symptoms changed depending on where they were in their menstrual cycle.

For example, wheezing spiked just before and just after mid-cycle (ovulation). The dip in between corresponds to peaks in estrogen, follicle stimulating hormone and luteinizing hormone, the researchers write in the American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine.

Complaints of shortness of breath and coughing both declined just after women got their periods, and shortness of breath was also more rare right before menses started.

Macsali’s team saw cyclical patterns in breathing symptoms in women with and without asthma.

What explains those patterns is still up for debate. Estrogen may affect the lungs directly, the researchers said. Insulin resistance and markers of general inflammation are known to vary during the menstrual cycle, which could also play a role in when breathing symptoms get better or worse.

“The observed patterns in our study are most likely a result of… complex hormonal processes,” the researchers wrote, “and it does not seem plausible that one sex hormone should explain the variation in respiratory symptoms during the menstrual cycle.”

Women with asthma should “be aware of a possibility that their symptoms are influenced by day in cycle,” Macsali told Reuters Health in an email.

Not all asthmatics will notice those changes, Farha pointed out.

For women whose symptoms do get a little worse at certain times of the month, it’s also unclear whether that ever puts them in serious danger, she added. But Farha said it may still be worth bringing up the issue with their doctor.

“It could lead to more personalized therapy, based on where their symptoms are getting worse, in which phases of their menstrual cycle,” Farha said. “You could change therapy and escalate therapy based on (those) phases.”

SOURCE: http://bit.ly/SGe7b0 American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine, online November 29, 2012.

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TSX ends higher as CP Rail gains on cost-cutting

TORONTO (Reuters) – Canadian stocks ended higher on Wednesday as optimism about Chinese economic growth boosted energy stocks and investors cheered a cost-cutting plan at Canadian Pacific Railway Ltd .

The Toronto Stock Exchange‘s S&P/TSX composite index <.gsptse> closed up 20.11 points, or 0.17 percent, at 12,157.29.</.gsptse>

(Reporting by Alastair Sharp)

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Death toll from Philippine typhoon nears 300

NEW BATAAN, Philippines (AP) — Stunned parents searching for missing children examined a row of mud-stained bodies covered with banana leaves while survivors dried their soaked belongings on roadsides Wednesday, a day after a powerful typhoon killed nearly 300 people in the southern Philippines.

Officials fear more bodies may be found as rescuers reach hard-hit areas that were isolated by landslides, floods and downed communications.

At least 151 people died in the worst-hit province of Compostela Valley when Typhoon Bopha lashed the region Tuesday, including 78 villagers and soldiers who perished in a flash flood that swamped two emergency shelters and a military camp, provincial spokeswoman Fe Maestre said.

Disaster-response agencies reported 284 dead in the region and 14 fatalities elsewhere from the typhoon, one of the strongest to hit the country this year.

About 80 people survived the deluge in New Bataan with injuries, and Interior Secretary Mar Roxas, who visited the town, said 319 others remained missing.

“These were whole families among the registered missing,” Roxas told the ABS-CBN TV network. “Entire families may have been washed away.”

The farming town of 45,000 people was a muddy wasteland of collapsed houses and coconut and banana trees felled by Bopha’s ferocious winds.

Bodies of victims were laid on the ground for viewing by people searching for missing relatives. Some were badly mangled after being dragged by raging flood waters over rocks and other debris. A man sprayed insecticide on the remains to keep away swarms of flies.

A father wept when he found the body of his child after lifting a plastic cover. A mother, meanwhile, went away in tears, unable to find her missing children. “I have three children,” she said repeatedly, flashing three fingers before a TV cameraman.

Two men carried the mud-caked body of an unidentified girl that was covered with coconut leaves on a makeshift stretcher made from a blanket and wooden poles.

Dionisia Requinto, 43, felt lucky to have survived with her husband and their eight children after swirling flood waters surrounded their home. She said they escaped and made their way up a hill to safety, bracing themselves against boulders and fallen trees as they climbed.

“The water rose so fast,” she told AP. “It was horrible. I thought it was going to be our end.”

In nearby Davao Oriental, the coastal province first struck by the typhoon as it blew from the Pacific Ocean, at least 115 people perished, mostly in three towns that were so battered that it was hard to find any buildings with roofs remaining, provincial officer Freddie Bendulo and other officials said.

“We had a problem where to take the evacuees. All the evacuation centers have lost their roofs,” Davao Oriental Gov. Corazon Malanyaon said.

The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies issued an urgent appeal for $ 4.8 million to help people directly affected by the typhoon.

The sun was shining brightly for most of the day Wednesday, prompting residents to lay their soaked clothes, books and other belongings out on roadsides to dry and revealing the extent of the damage to farmland. Thousands of banana trees in one Compostela Valley plantation were toppled by the wind, the young bananas still wrapped in blue plastic covers.

But as night fell, however, rain started pouring again over New Bataan, triggering panic among some residents who feared a repeat of the previous day’s flash floods. Some carried whatever belongings they could as they hurried to nearby towns or higher ground.

After slamming into Davao Oriental and Compostela Valley, Bopha roared quickly across the southern Mindanao and central regions, knocking out power in two entire provinces, triggering landslides and leaving houses and plantations damaged. More than 170,000 fled to evacuation centers.

As of Wednesday evening, the typhoon was over the South China Sea west of Palawan province. It was blowing northwestward and could be headed to Vietnam or southern China, according to government forecasters.

The deaths came despite efforts by President Benigno Aquino III’s government to force residents out of high-risk communities as the typhoon approached.

Some 20 typhoons and storms lash the northern and central Philippines each year, but they rarely hit the vast southern Mindanao region where sprawling export banana plantations have been planted over the decades because it seldom experiences strong winds that could blow down the trees.

A rare storm in the south last December killed more than 1,200 people and left many more homeless.

The United States extended its condolences and offered to help its Asian ally deal with the typhoon’s devastation. It praised government efforts to minimize the deaths and damage.

___

Associated Press writers Jim Gomez, Teresa Cerojano and Oliver Teves in Manila contributed to this report.

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Google updates Gmail for iOS to support multiple accounts, deliver autocomplete suggestions

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Disney, Netflix sign exclusive TV distribution deal

(Reuters) – Walt Disney Co agreed to give Netflix exclusive TV distribution rights to its movies, becoming the first major studio to stream its movies to TV viewers via Netflix instead of distributing them to HBO, Showtime or other premium TV channels.

The agreement begins in 2016, after Disney‘s current deal with Liberty Media’s pay-TV channel Starz expires.

The deal gives Netflix streaming rights to movies from Disney‘s live action and animation studios, including those from Pixar, Marvel, and the recently acquired Lucasfilms. Disney bought the famed studio founded by George Lucas and responsible for the “Star Wars” franchise for $ 4 billion on October 30.

Movies from Steven Spielberg’s DreamWorks studios are not included in the deal, as that studio distributes its movies through CBS’s Showtime on TV. Disney recently signed a deal to distribute DreamWorks’ films theatrically after the studio’s deal with Viacom’s Paramount Pictures expired.

Under the deal’s terms, Netflix can stream Disney movies beginning seven to nine months after they appear in theaters, as Starz had done in Disney’s prior agreement. The deal does not cover DVD rentals of Disney movies.

The agreement follows similar deals Netflix has inked with smaller studios, including Relativity Media, The Weinstein company and DreamWorks Animation.

Netflix shares were up 12.9 percent to $ 85.83 in afternoon trading following news of the agreement.

(Reporting By Ronald Grover; Editing by Peter Lauria and Tim Dobbyn)

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Baxter to buy Sweden’s Gambro for $4 billion

(Reuters) – Baxter International Inc said on Tuesday that it would buy privately held Swedish kidney dialysis product company Gambro AB for about $ 4 billion, a tie up that would put it in the No. 2 position in the dialysis market.

Baxter, whose shares were down more than 1 percent in afternoon trading, will finance the acquisition with debt and cash. The deal, which is expected to close in the first half of next year, marks Baxter’s biggest acquisition since Chief Executive Robert Parkinson took the helm in 2004.

Baxter manufactures kidney dialysis equipment, drug infusion pumps and blood therapy products. The Gambro acquisition will round out Baxter’s renal business, which accounted for almost one-fifth of the company’s 2011 revenue of $ 13.89 billion.

Gambro is one of the largest makers of equipment for hemodialysis, which is generally performed in a hospital or clinic. The dialysis from Baxter’s machines is called peritoneal and can be performed at home.

Gambro’s sales have been flat to weaker in recent years, undermined partly by capacity constraints, but Baxter executives voiced confidence during a conference call with analysts that the business can be turned around.

“It is a big market and it is going to continue to grow for a long time. There are only so many kidney transplants available in the world,” Parkinson told analysts.

Hemodialysis is a method that is used to remove waste products from the blood when the kidneys fail. Another method is peritoneal dialysis, a treatment for severe chronic kidney disease that uses the patient’s own membrane inside the body as a filter to clear waste. The third treatment option is a kidney transplant.

“At the end of the day, this is an acquisition that is not dependent on any one pathway for value creation. It is not dependent on a major new product launch or technological advancement, and is not dependent on commercial assumptions that our overly optimistic. This is an acquisition that is dependent on execution,” he said. “This is something we know we can do and do well.”

He said the planned acquisition did not represent a change in the direction for the company, which has invested in stem cell research and a treatment for Alzheimer’s disease.

Shares of Baxter were down 1 percent at $ 65.14 on Tuesday afternoon on the New York Stock Exchange.

TOO PRICEY?

Some analysts said they were concerned by the price tag and that the company will scale back its share buyback program in order to acquire Gambro.

“I think the deal makes sense. I think it does fit well with their existing renal business and I think there probably are synergies, but at the same time it is a lot of cash they are paying for this thing. They are taking on a significant amount of debt,” said Michael Matson, an analyst at Mizuho Securities USA.

Moody’s, the credit rating agency, said it put Baxter’s A3 rating on review for downgrade following Gambro announcement.

Derrick Sung, an analyst with Bernstein Research, noted that Baxter will be paying 2.5 times sales, which is not “unreasonable” but appears to be on the high end of comparable deals.

The Gambro deal marks further consolidation in the kidney dialysis market, where Gambro and Baxter compete against companies including U.S.-based DaVita HealthCare Partners Inc and Germany’s Fresenius Medical Care AG & Co KGaA, the biggest player in the hemodialysis market.

“I think in the longer term, the ambition is to try to challenge Fresenius,” currently the market leader, analyst Kristofer Liljeberg of Sweden’s Carnegie investment bank said.

However, he said, Gambro, which is owned by Swedish investment holding company Investor AB and its partly owned private equity company, EQT, had been struggling in recent years with slow growth and price competition.

Liljeberg said the deal was a good one for family-owned Investor, which controls several of Sweden’s top companies. Since they bought Gambro, Investor and EQT have sold off its clinics and a blood component business.

“This is a good long-term home for Gambro,” Borje Ekholm, CEO of Investor, said. “These two companies have a lot of things in common. They share similar values to improve the lives of patients. They have a very complementary geographic fit.”

A GROWING MARKET

More than 2 million patients globally are on some form of dialysis, and that has been increasing more than 5 percent annually, in part because of the rising rates of diabetes and hypertension.

Excluding special items, Baxter expects the Gambro transaction to reduce earnings per diluted share by 10 to 15 cents in 2013 and be neutral or add modestly to them in 2014. The deal is expected to close in the first half of next year.

Excluding the impact of special items and estimated amortization of intangible assets, the company said the deal should not affect earnings in 2013 and add 20 to 25 cents a diluted share in 2014.

Baxter said it expected the deal to add to earnings per diluted share, excluding special items, after 2014.

The suburban Chicago company said it expected over five years to increase sales by 7 to 8 percent, excluding the impact of currency fluctuations, on a compound annual basis, with earnings per diluted share, excluding special items, rising by 8 to 10 percent.

“Companies like Baxter can unlock a fair amount of value when they find strategic use for their overseas cash,” said Piper Jaffray analyst Matt Miksic.

Indeed, Baxter said it planned to finance the deal with cash overseas. Multinational companies that have large international sales often have difficulties moving that cash back to the United States where they can put it to use.

J.P. Morgan was Baxter’s financial adviser for the deal.

(This story has been corrected to remove ticker EQT.N that is not associated with EQT, the private equity firm, in paragraph 17. Also corrects paragraph two to add dropped word “down”)

(Reporting by Esha Dey in Bangalore, Debra Sherman in Chicago, Caroline Humer in New York, and Patrick Lannin and Mia Shanley in Stockholm; editing by Joyjeet Das, Lisa Von Ahn, Matthew Lewis and Marguerita Choy)

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American Air passenger service agents vote on unionizing

(Reuters) – American Airlines passenger service agents, the only major employee group at the carrier not unionized, began voting Tuesday on whether to be represented by the Communications Workers of America (CWA) union.

About 9,700 airport agents and reservations representatives are eligible to cast ballots in a vote being conducted by the National Mediation Board (NMB), said Chuck Porcari, a CWA spokesman. Voting ends January 15.

“All of the other work groups at American are unionized, and we’re not,” said Bridget Powell, a passenger service agent with American and union activist. “When it comes to negotiating with the company, we don’t have that option.”

The U.S. Supreme Court cleared the way for the vote last week when it denied American’s request for a stay of an earlier ruling that upheld the election.

“We’re encouraging all our eligible employees to vote,” American Airlines spokesman Bruce Hicks said. “It’s a very important election for them.”

American says it sought to block the union vote because at least half of the eligible workers didn’t show interest in joining a union, as required by a law that took effect this year.

The NMB said that the older, 35 percent standard should apply because the union had filed for an election before the law changed earlier this year, according to the CWA.

The CWA says a union is needed to protect American’s agents, who perform tasks such as checking in passengers and taking customer service calls, as the company has been outsourcing agent jobs and cutting pay and benefits.

American parent AMR , which has about 80,000 non-management employees, is reorganizing under Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in an effort to cut costs. Earlier this year it reached agreements with its unionized flight attendants and ground workers on contracts that it said cut costs by 17 percent.

American’s pilots are due to wrap up voting on a tentative agreement on Friday that offers an initial 4 percent pay raise and a 13.5 percent equity stake in AMR after it exits bankruptcy.

American offered equity stakes of 4.8 percent and 3 percent, respectively, in contracts it reached this year with unionized ground workers and flight attendants.

(Reporting by Karen Jacobs; Editing by Alwyn Scott and Leslie Gevirtz)

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WestJet embraces tech to woo business travelers

TORONTO (Reuters) – WestJet Airlines Ltd will use technological innovation, including a new Internet ticket booking system, to help it transform from a no-frills carrier to a lower-cost full-service airline courting lucrative corporate travelers, its chief executive said on Monday.

Canada’s second-biggest airline plans to launch a series of technology systems, most notably the new online booking engine, which will sell three tiers of tickets, in the next two months.

“Companies evolve or they die,” Chief Executive Gregg Saretsky told Reuters in a phone interview from the company’s Calgary head office.

“We’re 16 and going on 17 years old and we can’t stay just as we were 17 years ago. The world has changed. And we are changing to be more relevant for a broader segment of guests.”

The new Internet booking system, which WestJet hopes to launch in late January, will sell economy, mid-tier and premium tickets. That is a major shift from its current system, which sells only the lowest-priced ticket available.

Economy tickets under the new system will continue to sell the lowest available fare, but the cancellation fee for them will jump to C$ 75 ($ 75.48) from C$ 50. Mid-tier tickets will have a C$ 50 cancellation fee.

Premium tickets, unavailable until late March when WestJet finishes reconfiguring its 100 Boeing 737 planes to allow more leg room, will include priority screening and boarding, free cancellations and flexibility on ticket changes.

Pricing for those tickets, which may include free meals and drinks and an extra baggage allowance, has not yet been determined. Fares will be well below half the price for business class at WestJet’s bigger competitor, Air Canada, Saretsky said.

“It’s time for us to be more serious with respect to going after business travelers because frankly, they’re the ones who are booking last-minute and are happy to pay for the conveniences,” Saretsky said.

WestJet will launch its premium economy service with 24 seats per plane, but will consider expansion if it proves “wildly successful,” he added.

POISED FOR CHANGE

WestJet, which has spent about C$ 40 million over the past two years on technology projects, is poised for major changes in 2013 as it readies to launch a new regional airline, Encore.

Saretsky hopes that WestJet’s switch in coming weeks to a new Internet phone system will allow ticket reservation agents to work from home and help make room for Encore staff.

Some 750 reservation agents work at WestJet’s Calgary offices, which house about 2,400 staff. Space will be needed for Encore employees over the next 18 months while their office, hangars and maintenance stores are constructed at the WestJet campus.

Encore will be launch in the second half of 2013, “probably closer to July than December,” Saretsky said, with seven Bombardier Q400 planes.

While WestJet won’t announce Encore’s schedule until Jan 21, the carrier will initially serve only “a handful” of new cities, with ticket prices up to 50 percent below Air Canada’s, he added.

Over the next two months, WestJet will also roll out a guest notification system that alerts travelers via email about their flights, allowing them to check in remotely.

Such self-service technology will be critical as WestJet faces increasing labor costs, Saretsky said.

Wage and benefit costs, which represent about a third of operating costs, have climbed 50 percent since WestJet was founded in 1996.

“You can see that creates a little bit of drag on earnings,” Saretsky said. “We’ve got to find ways of reducing our component costs.”

If WestJet can increase self service options for travelers, that could limit the need for new employees, Saretsky said. Management also wants to improve attendance management, so that fewer employees book off sick around long weekends, and more quickly clean and process planes between flights, he said.

(Reporting By Susan Taylor; Editing by Peter Galloway)

(This story was corrected to show that WestJet is replacing its Internet booking engine, not entire reservation system, in the first and second paragraphs)

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Ericsson seeks U.S. import ban on Samsung products

STOCKHOLM (Reuters) – Swedish telecoms gear maker Ericsson has filed a request with the U.S. International Trade Commission to ban U.S. imports of products made by South Korean group Samsung,

The request from Ericsson, which said on Monday the products infringe on its patents, came after it sued Samsung for patent infringement in a U.S. court last week.

“The request for an import ban is a part of the process. An import ban is not our goal. Our goal is that they (Samsung) sign license agreements on reasonable terms,” spokesman Fredrik Hallstan said.

Ericsson said last week it was suing Samsung after talks failed to reach agreement on terms that were fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory (FRAND) over patents.

Samsung said it would defend itself against the lawsuit, adding that Ericsson had asked for “prohibitively higher royalty rates to renew the same patent portfolio”.

(Reporting by Sven Nordenstam; Editing by Dan Lalor)

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Turkey fines TV channel for “The Simpsons” blasphemy

ISTANBUL (Reuters) – Turkey‘s broadcasting regulator is fining a television channel for insulting religious values after it aired an episode of “The Simpsons” which shows God taking orders from the devil.

Radio and television watchdog RTUK said it was fining private broadcaster CNBC-e 52,951 lira ($ 30,000) over the episode of the hit U.S. animated TV series, whose scenes include the devil asking God to make him a coffee.

“The board has decided to fine the channel over these matters,” an RTUK spokeswoman said but declined further comment, saying full details would probably be announced next week.

CNBC-e said it would comment once the fine was officially announced.

Turkey is a secular republic but most of its 75 million people are Muslim. Religious conservatives and secular opponents vie for public influence and critics of the government say it is trying to impose Islamic values by stealth.

Elected a decade ago with the strongest majority seen in years, Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan and his Islamist-rooted AK Party have overseen a period of unprecedented prosperity in Turkey. But concerns are growing about authoritarianism.

Erdogan last week tore into a chart-topping soap opera about the Ottoman Empire’s longest-reigning Sultan and the broadcasting regulator has warned the show’s makers about insulting a historical figure.

“The Simpsons” first aired in 1989 and is the longest-running U.S. sitcom. It is broadcast in more than 100 countries and CNBC-e has been airing it in Turkey for almost a decade.

“I wonder what the script writers will do when they hear that the jokes on their show are taken seriously and trigger fines in a country called Turkey,” wrote Mehmet Yilmaz, a columnist for the Hurriyet newspaper.

“Maybe they will add an almond-moustached RTUK expert to the series,” he said, evoking a popular Turkish stereotype of a pious government supporter.

($ 1 = 1.7873 Turkish liras)

(Reporting by Ece Toksabay; Editing by Nick Tattersall and Paul Casciato)

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