SEOUL (Reuters) - Samsung Electronics Co said sales of the latest version of its flagship Galaxy S smartphone have reached 10 million since its launch in late April, making the model its fastest selling smartphone.
The S4, the South Korean firm's challenge to Apple Inc's iPhone, is already selling in 60 countries and Samsung plans to expand sales to 327 carriers in 155 countries by next month, the world's biggest smartphone maker said on Thursday.
Solid sales have come even as supply issues have snarled the U.S. rollout through some carriers.
Analysts expect strong sales of the fourth version of the Galaxy, which has propelled Samsung to the top of the $225 billion smartphone market since its debut in 2010, will help the firm report record earnings in the current quarter.
Despite mixed reviews of the S4 by gadget experts, Samsung is benefiting from heavy marketing as it bids to gain market share in the absence of new competing models from Apple.
Samsung won a record 33 percent of the smartphone market in the first quarter, and JP Morgan analysts expect its operating profit to top Apple's this quarter for the first time in years.
(Reporting by Miyoung Kim; Editing by Richard Pullin)
They?re an upstart political movement intent on ?taking back? the country from an out-of-touch political elite accused of ignoring opposition to immigration and threats to what they consider the nation?s Christian heritage.
The insurgents, many of them self-styled libertarians, have marched from one electoral success to another and are pushing the country?s dominant right-wing party even further to the right.
On one side of the Atlantic, that scenario might feel familiar to anyone who witnessed the rise of the Tea Party. Yet in this case it is Britain?s Conservative Party leadership, not Republicans, who are feeling the heat. The rise of the United Kingdom Independence Party (UKIP), which a poll on Tuesday put just two percentage points behind the Conservative Party itself, is on the rise and transforming British politics.
RECOMMENDED: Keep calm and answer on: Take our United Kingdom quiz.
The record high of 22 percent for the UKIP comes after the most important chapter in its transition from the political fringes to the mainstream, when it won more than 140 seats in the English county councils earlier this month, snatching many from the Conservatives and beating the centrist Liberal Democrats into fourth place nationally.
Although UKIP was established to campaign for a British withdrawal from the European Union, it is evolving into a magnet for discontent about a range of issues including immigration and moves by the government to legalize gay marriage and is establishing itself as the foremost port of call for voters seeking to give a black eye to Westminster's three largest parties.
"An exit from the EU is the start of the journey, the key in the door," says Ray Finch, the leader of a crop of new UKIP councillors who ousted Conservatives from the county council of Hampshire, a southern coast county that has traditionally been regarded as a heartland of Prime Minister David Cameron's party. "What we generally are looking towards as a party is to reduce the power of the state and the size of the state, get it out of people's lives as much as possible so that they can live without being continually harassed, spied upon, and continually taxed."
FROM PROTEST TO POWER
Few commentators expect UKIP to pick up large numbers of seats, if any, at the next election in 2015, primarily due to the way the mechanics of Britain's electoral system mitigate against parties whose support is spread out. Many also still view support for UKIP as a mid-term protest vote while opponents seize on what they regard as the ?false promise? of its manifesto ? which combines large-scale tax cuts with promises of investments in healthcare, education, and infrastructure along with dramatically increased spending on defense.
Nevertheless, its dramatic rise as a political force has rattled Conservative MPs, increasing the ranks pushing for Cameron to take a hardline position on future membership of the EU. This week saw the latest rebellion by MPs from his own party, who attempted to interfere with the legislative passage of the gay marriage plans, a central plank of Cameron's attempts to transform the party's image, but which are opposed by many activists, MPs, and even some Tory cabinet ministers.
Further pressure was heaped on his leadership when the Conservative Party's co-chairman, who is also a member of Cameron's inner circle, was forced to fend off allegations that he had dismissed his party's activists as ?swivel-eyed loons? during a conversation with journalists.
"Loongate," which fed a Tory rebel narrative seeking to depict the Cameron leadership as a metropolitan elite divorced from the needs and instincts of the grassroots, has been seized on by UKIP's own leader Nigel Farage, a gregarious former stockbroker seemingly seldom photographed without a cigarette and a pint in his hand.
In a bid to woo disenchanted Conservatives, he took out a full-page ad in the right-leaning Daily Telegraph on Monday in which he accused Britain's political class of being "completely out of touch with the thoughts of ordinary people."
"Only an administration run by a bunch of college kids, none of whom have ever had a proper job in their lives, could so arrogantly write off their own supporters," wrote Farage, describing the loon comment as "the ultimate insult."
LABOUR INROADS, TOO
It's not just the Tories who are being damaged by UKIP. Last week the party won a council by-election in a northern English area regarded as a stronghold of the Labour Party. Statistics also show that UKIP has tended to draw support from blue-collar workers and voters on low incomes ? all groups that are the traditional bedrock for the left-of-center opposition party.
Some analysts caution against reading too much into the UKIP by-election win in Labour's northern heartland.
?I would say they are less of a threat to Labour in the north than they are to the Conservatives the south," says Brendan Evans, professor of Politics at the University of Huddersfield. "The evidence suggests that, north and south, they take more votes from the Conservative Party. It?s true that they will eat into the Labour vote in the north because it is in many ways a protest vote, a vote of rejecting the political establishment and the way the current political agenda is going.... But I think that they are a bigger threat to Conservatives nationwide in that while UKIP probably won?t win parliamentary seats in the next general election they will deprive votes from the Conservatives and hand, in effect, seats over to Labour.?
It?s a nightmare scenario for senior Conservative Party strategists seeking centrist voters, and one which might draw sympathy from Republication counterparts who have long looked over their shoulders at the Tea Party.
For their part, UKIP activists don?t seem to be entirely unhappy with the US parallels.
?We come from slightly different cultures but we do understand particularly Ron Paul, who Nigel met recently and they got on famously together,? says Mr. Finch, the UKIP county councilor in Hampshire. ?We do believe as the Tea Party believes that people should be left, as far as is practicable, left to make the best of their own lives.?
Nor, like many Tea Partiers, does he believe that the movement is a temporary phenomenon.
?We are here to stay. The time for the Conservatives to have changed direction was 20 years ago when UKIP was formed. We see ourselves as a radical party. The Conservative Party is and have been for many years a part of the state, the EU, and big business, which are all linked together.?
RECOMMENDED: Keep calm and answer on: Take our United Kingdom quiz.
Robert Rozboril, Sun News, May 23, 2013 11:50 a.m.
PARMA - One bad inning. That is all it took to derail No. 1 seed Independence's hopes of a berth in the Division III District Finals.?
The Blue Devils found themselves up 5-0 after the top of the second and were feeling confident heading into the bottom half of the inning.?
No. 2 seed Elyria Catholic sent 13 batters to the plate in the second and brought nine of them around to score.?
?We had them rattled after our second at-bat up 5-0 but we just didn?t execute on defensive or pitchingwise that inning," said Independence Head Coach Mark Echstenkamper. ?As a team, we didn?t hit as well as we had in the past this season. It's hard to win when you don't play as well as you can. It?s not the best of three games, it comes down to one game and we know that as a tournament team."?
Independence went on to lose the contest by a final of 11-6.?
Elyria Catholic went on to lose to Keystone in the District Championship game by a final of 7-6 May 22.?
PHOENIX (AP) ? The judge in the Jodi Arias murder trial declared a mistrial in the penalty phase Thursday after the jury reported for a second time that it was deadlocked on whether to sentence her to life in prison or death for killing her boyfriend in 2008.
The judge scheduled a retrial for July 18. A new panel likely will be seated to try again to reach a decision on a sentence ? unless the prosecutor takes death off the table agrees to a life sentence.
The panel began deliberating Tuesday and first reported they had failed agree the next day. The judge instructed them to keep trying.
The same panel on May 8 found Arias guilty of first-degree murder in the death of Travis Alexander, who was stabbed and slashed nearly 30 times and nearly decapitated at his Mesa home. The jury later determined the killing was cruel enough to merit consideration of the death penalty.
Under Arizona law, a hung jury in the death penalty phase of a trial requires a new jury to be seated to decide the punishment. If the second jury cannot reach a unanimous decision, the judge would then sentence Arias to spend her entire life in prison or be eligible for release after 25 years. The judge cannot sentence Arias to death.
Former Maricopa County Attorney Rick Romley has said the case could drag on for several more months as the new jury reviews evidence and hears opening statements, closing arguments and witness testimony in a "Cliffs Notes" version of the trial.
However, if the prosecutor decides not to pursue the death penalty a second time, the judge would then sentence Arias to one of the life in prison options, and the trial would come to a conclusion.
The verdict came two days after Arias spoke directly to jurors and pleaded for her life. She said she "lacked perspective" when she told a local reporter after her conviction that she preferred execution to spending the rest of her days in jail. She displayed family pictures for the jurors and told them she could bring about positive change in prison by teaching inmates how to read and helping launch prison recycling programs.
That night, Arias gave a series of media interviews from jail, telling reporters out about her many fights with her legal team and her belief that she "deserves a second chance at freedom someday."
Arias, 32, contends she killed Alexander in self-defense when he became enraged after a day of sex, forcing her to fight for her life. Prosecutors say she attacked him in a jealous rage because he wanted to end their relationship and go to Mexico with another woman.
Her case became a sensation from the beginning as Arias gave a series of jailhouse interviews following her 2008 arrest in which she blamed the killing on armed, masked intruders.
She went on trial in January, and the case provided endless amounts of cable TV and tabloid fodder, including a recorded phone sex call between Arias and the victim, nude photos, bloody crime-scene pictures and a defendant who described her life story in intimate detail over 18 days on the witness stand.
The former waitress told jurors of an abusive childhood, cheating boyfriends, dead-end jobs, her sexual relationship with Alexander, and her contention that he had grown physically violent.
The trial was streamed live on the Internet and became a real-life soap opera to people around the globe. Some even traveled to Phoenix to attend the trial and became fans of the fiery prosecutor, Juan Martinez, who repeatedly tangled with Arias during her testimony. They sought his autograph outside court and had pictures taken with him, prompting the defense to argue for a mistrial. Their request was denied.
The verdict brings a close to the trial's penalty phase, which featured dramatic statements by Alexander's sister and brother as they described how their lives were shattered by the loss of their beloved sibling.
New imaging techniques used to help patients suffering from epilepsyPublic release date: 23-May-2013 [ | E-mail | Share ]
Contact: Julie Poupart info@can-acn.org Canadian Association for Neuroscience
Toronto, May 23 2013 - New techniques in imaging of brain activity developed by Jean Gotman, from McGill University's Montreal Neurological Institute, and his colleagues lead to improved treatment of patients suffering from epilepsy. The combination of electroencephalogram (EEG) and functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) leads to more precise localization of the areas generating epileptic seizures, giving neurosurgeons a better understanding of the optimal ways of intervention, if appropriate. These results were presented at the 2013 Canadian Neuroscience Meeting, the annual meeting of the Canadian Association for Neuroscience - Association Canadienne des Neurosciences (CAN-ACN).
Epilepsy is a brain disorder in which a person has repeated seizures. These seizures are episodes of abnormal brain activity, in which the brain sends out abnormal signals. Seizures can often be controlled using medication. In an estimated 40% of patients, however, drugs do not control seizures well, and for some of these people surgery to remove the abnormal brain cells that cause the seizures can be considered.
Before brain surgery can be performed, doctors and surgeons must determine if the point of origin of the seizures, which can be viewed as brain activity spikes, is discrete, and if it can be removed without damaging other important brain areas. Dr. Gotman and his colleagues developed a new imaging technique, combining EEG, which delivers excellent information on the timing of the spikes but is not always capable of precisely locating the source of the discharge, with fMRI, which allows to very precisely localize this activation in the brain.
EEG- fMRI, while technically challenging, since the strong magnetic field required for fMRI can interfere with the recording of the minute electrical currents emitted by brain cells, is useful for patients in whom precise localization of the focal point, or point of origin of seizures, was not well defined. It is also important for a better understanding of how epileptic discharges affect brain function.
Citation from Dr. Gotman: "Combing EEG and fMRi is a unique method to define non-invasively in the whole brain the regions involved in epileptic discharges. It is a complex tool but it is likely to play an increasing role among the methods currently used to localize the source of epileptic activity"
###
This research is supported by the Canadian Institutes of Health Research.
About the Canadian Association for Neuroscience:
The Canadian Association for Neuroscience is the largest association dedicated to the promotion of all fields of neuroscience research in Canada. The association has been organizing a yearly annual meeting since 2007. Learn more about our meeting at: http://www.can-acn.org/meeting2013
Please contact Julie Poupart, Communications Director for the Canadian Association for Neuroscience, for further information, to receive a press pack, or to request an interview with a neuroscientist
Facts:
Approximately 0.6% of the Canadian population has epilepsy. Each year, an average of 15,500 people learn that they have epilepsy. Seventy-five to eighty percent of patients are diagnosed before the age of 18, 55% before the age of 10, and 44% before age 5.
EEG: Electroencephalography is a test to measure the tiny electrical signals that brain cells use to communicate with one another. These signals are also called impulses.
fMRI: The functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging technique used by Dr Gotman relies on the fact that the magnetic properties of hemoglobin, the molecule carrying oxygen in blood, differ when it is carrying oxygen (a form called oxyhemoglobin, nonmagnetic) and after it has "delivered" oxygen to cells (a form called deoxyhemoglobin, magnetic). When a brain region is activated, it uses oxygen and the concentration of deoxyhemoglobin initially increases, before being compensated by an increase in blood flow, resulting in a decrease in deoxyhemoglobin. These differences can be very precisely localized by fMRI. This method is known as BOLD contrast, which stands for Blood Oxygen Level-Dependent contrast.
References:
Dr. Jean Gotman's website: http://apps.mni.mcgill.ca/research/gotman/
Recent publications by Dr. Gotman: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/?term=gotman+j%5BAuthor%5D
AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
New imaging techniques used to help patients suffering from epilepsyPublic release date: 23-May-2013 [ | E-mail | Share ]
Contact: Julie Poupart info@can-acn.org Canadian Association for Neuroscience
Toronto, May 23 2013 - New techniques in imaging of brain activity developed by Jean Gotman, from McGill University's Montreal Neurological Institute, and his colleagues lead to improved treatment of patients suffering from epilepsy. The combination of electroencephalogram (EEG) and functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) leads to more precise localization of the areas generating epileptic seizures, giving neurosurgeons a better understanding of the optimal ways of intervention, if appropriate. These results were presented at the 2013 Canadian Neuroscience Meeting, the annual meeting of the Canadian Association for Neuroscience - Association Canadienne des Neurosciences (CAN-ACN).
Epilepsy is a brain disorder in which a person has repeated seizures. These seizures are episodes of abnormal brain activity, in which the brain sends out abnormal signals. Seizures can often be controlled using medication. In an estimated 40% of patients, however, drugs do not control seizures well, and for some of these people surgery to remove the abnormal brain cells that cause the seizures can be considered.
Before brain surgery can be performed, doctors and surgeons must determine if the point of origin of the seizures, which can be viewed as brain activity spikes, is discrete, and if it can be removed without damaging other important brain areas. Dr. Gotman and his colleagues developed a new imaging technique, combining EEG, which delivers excellent information on the timing of the spikes but is not always capable of precisely locating the source of the discharge, with fMRI, which allows to very precisely localize this activation in the brain.
EEG- fMRI, while technically challenging, since the strong magnetic field required for fMRI can interfere with the recording of the minute electrical currents emitted by brain cells, is useful for patients in whom precise localization of the focal point, or point of origin of seizures, was not well defined. It is also important for a better understanding of how epileptic discharges affect brain function.
Citation from Dr. Gotman: "Combing EEG and fMRi is a unique method to define non-invasively in the whole brain the regions involved in epileptic discharges. It is a complex tool but it is likely to play an increasing role among the methods currently used to localize the source of epileptic activity"
###
This research is supported by the Canadian Institutes of Health Research.
About the Canadian Association for Neuroscience:
The Canadian Association for Neuroscience is the largest association dedicated to the promotion of all fields of neuroscience research in Canada. The association has been organizing a yearly annual meeting since 2007. Learn more about our meeting at: http://www.can-acn.org/meeting2013
Please contact Julie Poupart, Communications Director for the Canadian Association for Neuroscience, for further information, to receive a press pack, or to request an interview with a neuroscientist
Facts:
Approximately 0.6% of the Canadian population has epilepsy. Each year, an average of 15,500 people learn that they have epilepsy. Seventy-five to eighty percent of patients are diagnosed before the age of 18, 55% before the age of 10, and 44% before age 5.
EEG: Electroencephalography is a test to measure the tiny electrical signals that brain cells use to communicate with one another. These signals are also called impulses.
fMRI: The functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging technique used by Dr Gotman relies on the fact that the magnetic properties of hemoglobin, the molecule carrying oxygen in blood, differ when it is carrying oxygen (a form called oxyhemoglobin, nonmagnetic) and after it has "delivered" oxygen to cells (a form called deoxyhemoglobin, magnetic). When a brain region is activated, it uses oxygen and the concentration of deoxyhemoglobin initially increases, before being compensated by an increase in blood flow, resulting in a decrease in deoxyhemoglobin. These differences can be very precisely localized by fMRI. This method is known as BOLD contrast, which stands for Blood Oxygen Level-Dependent contrast.
References:
Dr. Jean Gotman's website: http://apps.mni.mcgill.ca/research/gotman/
Recent publications by Dr. Gotman: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/?term=gotman+j%5BAuthor%5D
AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
Amazon has announced that it is to offer its 7-inch and 8.9-inch Android-powered Kindle Fire HD tablets to customers to pre-order in over 170 additional countries, with the tablets shipping June 13.
The biggest online retailer has also expanded its app store to over 200 countries, allowing Kindle Fire owners to choose from tens of thousands of popular Android apps.
The Kindle Fire HD hardware is unchanged from the model currently shipping in the US and certain European countries. The 8.9-inch Kindle Fire HD comes with a 1920x1200 1080p HD display with in-plane switching, Advanced True Wide polarizing filter. The 254 pixels per inch, Amazon says, are "indistinguishable to the human eye" ? in other words, it's a retina display.?The 7-inch Kindle Fire HD features a 1280x800 screen resolution.?
Both screen sizes feature 10-point multi-touch support.
The 8.9-inch Kindle Fire HD is powered by the latest generation dual-core 1.5GHz OMAP4 4470 processor with an on-board Imagination SGX544 graphics engine that's capable of over 12 billion floating point operations per second ? or 50 percent more than Nvidia's Tegra 3 processor.
The processor in the 7-inch Kindle Fire HD is a dual-core OMAP4 4460 1.2GHz processor.
The Kindle Fire represents a real threat to the Android tablet landscape not because of the Amazon logo, or even the hardware spec, but because of its highly disruptive pricing. The 7-inch variant costs $214, while its 8.9-inch big brother is only $284.?
Amazon's goal was to put together a quality Android tablet at an eye-catching price, and it accomplished this with the Kindle Fire HD hardware. Its price is refreshingly accessible when compared to Apple's iPad, and even other Android tablet offerings. The only tablet to come close to the Kindle Fire HD family is Google's own Nexus 7 and 10 tablets.
Despite the Kindle Fire HD being an Android tablet, it's rather different from most Android tablets on the market. As opposed to being a one-stop-shop for Google services, the Kindle Fire HD runs a heavily customized forked version of Android Ice Cream Sandwich (4.0.4) that's been turned into a portal for all things Amazon. Even compared to newer tablets running Android "Jelly Bean," the Kindle Fire HD's custom operating system looks and feels ? to me at any rate ? like a better tablet OS.
There's no doubt that this expansion in availability of the Kindle Fire HD will give Android a boost, even if it is Amazon's vision of how Android should be.
Off the beaten path: Tannersville?s Last Chance Cafe is equal parts gourmet shop, antiques emporium, and restaurant ? oh, and there?s a tavern, too
By Lynn Hazlewood Published May 21, 2013 at 08:35 PM
Cheese it! Last Chance Cafe?s French onion soup is piled high with Swiss cheese melted on toasted garlic bread
Photographs by Teresa Horgan
(page 1 of 2)
During the week, Tannersville is a quiet little Greene County village that looks much as it did during its Catskills heyday, when the mountains were studded with Dirty Dancing-style resorts. On weekends in winter, the 500 or so residents are joined by swarms of skiers, snowboarders, snowmobilers and other snowy-activity enthusiasts who drift into town after disporting themselves at Hunter Mountain, which is a few miles up the road. On summer weekends, the town comes alive with bikers, hikers, and various outdoorsy types, along with a raft of low-key second-homeowners.
Among the local charms are Rip Van Winkle Lake, where you can boat, fish, or let the kids romp in the playground or zip around the skateboard park. There?s a nine-hole golf course; bike paths; hiking trails; and the Mountain Top Arboretum, where nature lovers can ramble over 23 acres of trees, shrubs, and plants tough enough to grow at high elevations. Cultural highlights run from music festivals to the Crazy Race, in which participants tear down Tannersville?s Main Street in homemade ?vehicles.?
In recent years, several buildings in the village have become tourist attractions themselves. Spruced up in vibrant pastels as part of the Paint Program ? a scheme dreamed up by a local artist and implemented by the Hunter Foundation ? they?ve drawn media attention as well as tourists, and give the village a lively look.?
One of those gaily painted buildings houses the Last Chance Cheese and Antiques Cafe, a quirky gourmet store and eatery that?s been a Main Street fixture since 1971. In its earliest incarnation, Last Chance was an antiques shop with a sideline in bongs and head-shop paraphernalia, opened by Brooklyn transplant Loren Kashman. Back then, Kashman was, as he puts it, ?a long-haired hippie? who soon realized that there wasn?t much demand for antiques and bongs among the apr?s-ski set doing much of the spending in town. But they did buy the snacks and munchies he offered. So he branched out with soups, sandwiches, and simple fare, and went on to add imported and specialty beers and cheeses. After the building was badly damaged in a fire in 1977, Kashman restored it and reopened using half the space as a gourmet shop specializing in cheeses, and the other half as a homey restaurant, decorated with antiques and bric-a-brac for sale. Fondue, all the rage in the 1970s, has been a staple all along, and remains a favorite.?
(Continued on next page)
? 10 Can?t Miss Dishes: the fondue at Last Chance Cafe ? Visit Last Chance Cheese and Antiques Cafe in Tannersville, NY ? Go to www.lastchanceonline.com ? Go to the Hudson Valley Restaurants Guide ? Go to the Hudson Valley Food & Drink Guide
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Public release date: 23-May-2013
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