Apple lead designer Jonathan Ive knighted for the New Year, how's your 2012 looking? originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 31 Dec 2011 01:06:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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(Reuters) ? The Boston Red Sox acquired All-Star pitcher Andrew Bailey and outfielder Ryan Sweeney from the Oakland Athletics on Wednesday in exchange for outfielder Josh Reddick and two minor league prospects, the teams said.
Bailey, a two-time All-Star, converted 24 of 26 save opportunities for Oakland last season to rank as the second-most successful closer in the American League (AL).
The 27-year-old, the AL Rookie of the Year in 2009, posted a 3.24 ERA in 42 relief appearances with the A's in 2011, compiling 41 strikeouts.
"I love the Bay Area, but if you're going to get traded, I can't think of a better situation for myself and my family to be in," Bailey, who lives in Connecticut in the offseason, told Boston's website (http://boston.redsox.mlb.com/).
"It's a big market, a big team, and I'm excited about the opportunity to win over there."
In exchange for Bailey and Sweeney, Oakland have acquired Reddick along with minor league pitcher Raul Alcantara and first baseman Miles Head.
(Reporting by Mark Lamport-Stokes in Los Angeles; Editing by Julian Linden)
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LITTLE ROCK, Ark. ? Arkansas cannot cut off millions of dollars in funding for desegregation programs in Little Rock-area school districts until the state asks a federal judge for permission to do so, an appeals court ruled Wednesday.
The 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals decision comes after U.S. District Judge Brian Miller ordered an end to most of the payments, calling them counterproductive. He accused the districts of delaying desegregation to keep getting state money.
The appeals court ruled that Miller decided to end the payments without the state specifically asking him to do so. The court said the state must ask, in a separate court action, before a judge could make such a ruling.
A spokesman for Attorney General Dustin McDaniel said Wednesday that no decision has been made about whether the state would file such a request.
Arkansas is required by a 1989 settlement to fund magnet schools, transfers between districts and other programs to support desegregation and keep a racial balance in the North Little Rock, Pulaski County and Little Rock school districts. Those costs currently add up to about $38 million a year, according to the appeals court's ruling.
State lawmakers have long wanted to end the desegregation program funding, though the districts say they're still necessary.
Battles over school desegregation in Little Rock date back to 1957, when nine black teenagers needed the protection of federal troops to integrate Central High School. Little Rock sued the state and its two neighboring districts in 1982, and two years later a judge agreed that the districts hadn't done enough to help the city schools desegregate.
Miller issued his order to end the payments earlier this year, after hearings about whether two of the three school districts in question ? North Little Rock and Pulaski County ? should be declared unitary, or substantially desegregated.
"That came kind of out of the blue," Stephen Jones, the lead attorney for the North Little Rock district, said Wednesday about Miller's ruling.
Miller wrote that the payments should end in order to avoid "an absurd outcome in which the districts are rewarded with extra money from the state if they fail to comply with their desegregation plans and they face having their funds cut by the state if they act in good faith and comply."
But the appeals court said Miller did not make "specific findings of fact" to support his decision.
Miller, who referred to himself as "a middle aged black judge," instead wrote: "After reading the briefs, the transcripts from the various hearings, and the scores of exhibits filed herein, it is very easy to conclude that few if any of the participants in this case have any clue how to effectively educate underprivileged black children."
The appeals court also reversed Miller's decision to deny the North Little Rock district's request to be declared unitary. Miller had denied the request in part because he said the district offered only anecdotal examples of its efforts to recruit black teachers.
The 8th Circuit disagreed, noting that more than 16 percent of the district's educators are black, compared to 9 percent statewide.
Miller didn't return a phone message left at his chambers Wednesday. But he removed himself from the desegregation case earlier this year, saying he could no longer make unbiased decisions after the state took over his hometown's school district in eastern Arkansas.
Jones, the North Little Rock district's lawyer, said he was pleased with the appeals court's decision to deem the district unitary.
"In a sense, it's anticlimactic because I don't think it really changes how we're going to conduct our day-to-day business," he said.
Another federal judge had previously declared the Little Rock district unitary, but Miller refused to declare the Pulaski County district entirely unitary in his May order. The appeals court upheld that part of Miller's ruling, which found the Pulaski County School District lacking in nine areas in which it had to make changes to be considered desegregated.
Wednesday's opinion notes that Miller found the Pulaski County district "has given very little thought, and even less effort to complying with its desegregation plan. Complying with its plan obligations seems to have been an afterthought."
The appeals court "found no reason to disagree" with Miller's conclusion.
The Pulaski County Special School District's lead attorney, Sam Jones, declined to comment Wednesday.
The Little Rock district's lead lawyer, Chris Heller, praised the appeals court's ruling, adding that part of Miller's decision in May "concerned issues that had not been presented to the district court."
McDaniel said in a statement that Arkansas is moving toward ending the legal action surrounding the decades-old desegregation case and in turn, "taking the courts out of the classrooms" in the county.
___
Follow Jeannie Nuss at http://twitter.com/jeannienuss
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Thomas Busco, better known to the world as "Epic Beard Man" or Tom Slick, or Vietnam Tom, gained fame after he turned up in a YouTube video taken while he was riding an Oakland bus.
Busco is shown getting into an altercation with another man, while wearing a shirt that says "I AM A MOTHERF-----." As Busco tries to walk away, the other man continues hurling taunts, and a fist. Busco, beats the other guy to the ground, and gets off the bus. The vid goes viral and he is dubbed "Epic Beard Man."
Epic Beard Man's epic-ness has just become more epic with a Hollywood feature starring Danny Trejo as the Epic Beard Man character.
The film called "Bad Ass" appears to be based on the viral video, and Busco.
Check out the trailer.
Source: http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/45800063/ns/today-entertainment/
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Call it entrepreneurial spirit or call it?overdue enlightenment, but Heidi Holmes?was in the mood for something different?when she founded Adage, a specialist?recruitment agency for mature-age?workers, early last year. Having left a 10-year career?to start her own business, it was a time for major?changes; little wonder that she also picked the time to?make the jump from Windows to a Mac.
It wasn?t a completely smooth transition: Although?she ?adjusted? to Mac Mail and the Mac OS X?environment, Holmes says she drew the line at the?Mac version of Microsoft Office.
?I?m happy with the Mac, and the way it syncs?and looks after itself,? she explains. ?It took a period?of adjustment to get used to Mac Mail and not using?Outlook, although that works both ways: I don?t visit?Gmail anymore and I love that it?s all in the one spot.
?But I was entrenched in the Microsoft way, and?didn?t really see the advantage of learning the Mac?Excel and Word. It?s kind of the same, but I was more?proficient in the Windows version.?
Her ideal solution came quickly and easily: Her?web developers loaded her MacBook with VMware?s?Fusion tool, which would let her run Offi ce 2010 ? the?main applications in which she works ? alongside her?Mac applications on the same desktop.
The setup has served her well ever since, allowing?her to manage her business while enjoying the benefits?of the Mac platform. ?I?ve had no issues, and found it?really easy to run everything I need,? she says. ?I?m?quite functional with my laptop and my phone.?
With most Australians getting exposure to the?Windows world well before they potentially branch?out and get their own Macs, backwards compatibility?remains as popular now as it did, five years ago,?when Apple announced it would shift its architecture?to run on Intel CPUs that were equally capable of?running Windows.
Numerous upgrades later, the two market-leading?Windows-on-Mac applications ? VMware Fusion?and Parallels Desktop ? have progressed by leaps and?bounds, long ago cementing their position as must have?accessories for Mac switchers who want to bring?one or more key Windows applications over the wall?with them.
If you?re unfamiliar with the two applications, take?a moment to learn how they work: Both combine some?well-established technology ? desktop virtualisation ??with quite a lot of programming magic.
Desktop virtualisation creates a single logical?file on disk (although it may be physically split into?pieces to facilitate easier backup via Time Machine,?and faster loading) called a ?virtual machine? (VM).?The VM is, for all intents and purposes, a Windows?computer that is managed by a ?hypervisor? built into?Fusion or Parallels.
When Windows queries the environment it?s in?for information about the system it thinks it?s running?on, the hypervisor intercepts the calls and provides?the correct answers. As long as it?s kept happy and?gets enough CPU cycles and information when it?needs them, Windows keeps ticking along; think about ?how the stars of Inception worked to delude their?subconscious defences, and you?re not too far off.
The magic comes in the form of custom-written?drivers that tweak Windows to perform better in its?VM than it might normally do. Progressive updates?to both Fusion and Parallels have added ever-moresophisticated?drivers that do things like providing?smoother 3D graphics support; allowing the Windows?VM to access Mac resources like the iSight/FaceTime?camera and other USB-connected devices; delivering?seamless network access by piggybacking onto the?Mac?s internet and network connections; and more.
One nice trick is that the hypervisors enable drag-and-drop file sharing that transcends the boundaries?of the virtual machine to link the two environments.?For this reason, of course, it?s imperative that?Windows VMs be loaded with an updated antivirus?and security suite, so nasties can?t find their way?into your Mac through the hypervisor?s integration?features; if you?re concerned, you can also set up a?VM so it has no connections whatsoever with the?operating system it?s running on.
Opening Windows. Virtual machines such as VMware Fusion give you the ability to run Windows-only programs like Microsoft Project, Access and Internet Explorer.
Basic VM functionality was nailed down several?versions ago, and subsequent versions have focused?on adding new features that make Windows apps?behave more like Mac apps. For example, Parallels???Coherence? mode or Fusion?s ?Unity? mode make?the Windows desktop disappear, letting individual?Windows applications run in Mac-like windows on?the desktop. These features allow users to focus on?the task at hand regardless of whether they?re using?Mac or Windows apps.
The latest versions of the products ? Fusion 4?and Parallels 7 ? have been optimised for Mac OS X?10.7 Lion, adding support for features like full-screen?mode and Multi-Touch swipes, as well as the addition?of Windows applications to Lion-only features like?Launchpad and Mission Control. These are usability?more than functionality improvements, but they?burnish the edges of the Win-on-Mac environment?and offer an ever-so-carefully-integrated solution.
By erasing the arbitrary lines that used to make?Windows VMs stick out from the Mac desktop like a?sore thumb, these features maintain the appearance?of equity between Windows programs and Mac?applications. They can, however, have unintended?side effects: Since Windows programs are indexed?in Spotlight and can be launched with one click, it?s?entirely possible to inadvertently launch a Windows?application ? and find yourself ticking away the?minutes while the hypervisors load and Windows boots.
As the latest step in their never-ending quest to?justify repeated upgrades, the latest versions know?a few more tricks that may or may not be useful?for you. Windows? ?Aero? rich user interface is now?fully supported, as is Mac OS X?s underlying 64-?bit architecture. Backed with a legion of tweaks,?hypervisor performance is now said to impose nearly?no processor burden ? making many Windows games?run at or near full speed.
?It?s very much full of performance-driven?enhancements,? says Parallels ANZ general manager?Kevin Greely. ?Exhaustive benchmarking has shown?that virtualisation has come down to the point where?there?s so little (hypervisor) overhead that the word??overhead? doesn?t even matter anymore.?
The new version also offers a host of other?accoutrements: Parallels 7, for example, can now?run a guest instance of Mac OS X ? allowing for?testing of new applications in a secure, separate?environment that?s isolated from the host computer.?There?s support for 7.1 surround sound, faster pausing?and resuming of VMs and an interesting add-on in?the form of the Parallels Mobile application, which?lets users access their Mac and Windows desktops ??including streaming Flash video with sound ? from?their iPad, iPhone, or iPod touch.
Flash on an iPad. The $5.49 Parallels Mobile application lets users access their Mac and Windows desktops ? including streaming Flash video with sound ? from iOS devices.
For its part, VMware claims 90 new features in?Fusion 4, including optimised graphics drivers that?provide a 2.5x boost in 3D graphics speed. It can?also load Lion as a guest operating system in a VM,?resume suspended VMs faster than before, offers a?new App Unity feature for tight Lion integration,?updates USB and Bluetooth support to the latest?versions and provides an additional layer of security?through encryption and password protection of VMs.
?We?ve focused Fusion 4 generally around usability,??says David Wakeman, senior product line manager for?end-use computing with VMware. ?The overhead of?using desktop virtualisation is now quite low, so a lot of?features are designed around slick integration with Mac?OS X, so the apps look and feel and smell as much like?a Mac app as you can possibly get.
?That?s really important ? especially for new users?to Macs who are struggling to grapple with something?new. You don?t have to be a virtualisation geek to use?this product; you can be a mere mortal and make it?happen quickly.?
Because they provide both Windows compatibility?and better performance than ever, current Windows?virtualisation solutions offer far more appeal than?their earlier versions. This would seem to make them?more acceptable within corporate environments,?where employers continue to dance a curious line?between sticking with their Windows bias and?embracing Macs.
Fitting In. Sally Farrow uses Parallels Desktop so her Mac fits into a Windows-only office environment.
Many businesses have found a compromise by?buying iMacs for their great form factor, then running?Windows on them using Boot Camp or by completely?wiping the drive and installing the operating system?from scratch. This provides Windows environments?with access to the iMac?s excellent and large screen,?and integrated form factor ? making it particularly?useful in space-constrained or public-facing?locations.
Yet just because you can run Windows on your?Mac doesn?t mean your employer will be too happy?about it: Despite their Windows-friendly nature,?recent figures suggest Macs are still pariahs in many?businesses. A recent study by Forrester Research,?for example, found that fully 41 percent of North?American and European companies still don?t allow?Mac-wielding users access to company resources.
Around half of the companies surveyed allowed?Mac users to access web-based email, with just?37 percent OK-ing internet access via Mac and?around one in five allowing use of Macs for hosted?application access, internal network access and native?email access. And just six percent said they would?install key corporate applications onto users? Macs.
Such results confirm?there?s still a long way?to go before Macs shake?off their reputation as?being incompatible?with the corporate?environment ? even as?growing normalisation?of bring-your-own?(BYO) computing?concepts have increased?the acceptability and?popularity of Macs within?the business world.
Sally Farrow found?out just how hard it can?be to overcome executive?scepticism when she?joined financial-services?firm YourShare.com?.au and suggested to the?directors that she would?prefer to use a Mac for?work. In a Windows-only?company, this was a hard?sell ? but Farrow leaned?on the availability of?dual-platform capabilities?to push her case over the?line.
At first, she used Boot?Camp to switch between?the two platforms ? and?was starting to regret her?decision.
?It really slowed?the machine down?massively,? she recalls,??because I had to change?so often. I was having to boot in and out of my?design programs on the Mac side, then load other?apps on the PC side. It was really messing with my?computer, which was so slow with Boot Camp that it?struggled.?
Parallels universe. Social media consultant Kate van der Voort moved to Parallels after becoming disillusioned with running Windows via Boot Camp.
Her solution was to invest in a copy of Parallels?Desktop ? and since then, she says, ?things have been?brilliant. I use both at the same time, all day?.
Sticking with the Windows version of Office not?only ensures she can exchange documents with?banks and other financial-services companies, but?has proved to be cheaper as well since the company?already had a site license for the Windows version;?the Mac one would have had to be bought separately.
Although the dual-OS technology is up for?it, these sorts of considerations can often lend?convincing weight to those who want to make the?case for bringing their own Macs to work. Some big?companies still maintain their opposition on any of?a number of grounds ? some of them rooted more?in policy and governance than legitimate technical?objections ? but Macs are continuing to grow in?popularity within small businesses, where sole traders?and small-business operators are often long-time Mac?users, or are steered to MacBooks by well-meaning?friends and associates.
For most, the transition is strange for a while?but quickly becomes a non-event. But it doesn?t?always go well, as Kate van der Voort of social-media?consulting firm Social Mediology found out.
A lifetime PC user, Van der Voort moved to?Macs last year after a client bought her the new?system. Things were rocky at fi rst: She had ?all sorts?of problems? syncing mail to her phone through?Outlook, for example, and had just bought Windows-only?applications including MYOB and GoToMeeting?s?GoToWebinar hosting software, which meant she?couldn?t really make the switch as she might have?liked to.
Van der Voort ended up installing a Windows?configuration using Apple?s Boot Camp, the third?and increasingly clunky option for those wanting to?run Windows on their Macs. Although it worked, she?quickly grew tired of rebooting her system between?Windows and Mac environments.
?I love the fact that I?ve got both Windows and?Mac on the same computer, but find it a hassle to?have to shut down and restart,? she says. ?Inevitably?I?ll be doing data entry in MYOB through Boot Camp,?then there are things I need from my email on the?Mac OS X side.?
Support through the local Apple Store has left?her ?blown away by their level of dedication and?willingness to help?, and she has stuck with her new?system despite the initial hurdles. Her recent purchase?of Parallels promises easier co-existence between?the two environments, although Van der?Voort has had other troubles including?the search for a replacement for Mac Mail?and sync problems with Outlook 2011.
?The only downfall with the Apple?Store is that if you ask how to do?something that uses anything that?s not?an Apple product, they?re not interested,??she says. ?I would love to be on a full?Mac solution, but for now I?m in this?precarious it?s-all-working situation.?
One category of user that?s been?particularly eager to embrace Windows-on-Mac solutions is software developers,?among whom MacBooks have become?massively popular because they deliver the everyday?benefits of the Mac OS X environment but allow?multiple versions of Windows to be run within?VMware or Parallels VMs.
This facilitates development and testing of?applications for corporate Windows desktops, where?compatibility issues must be identifi ed and dealt with?long before applications are actually rolled out. With?a Windows-on-Mac solution in place, for example,?it?s possible for designers at web development house?Loud & Clear Creative to test their creations in all of?the desktop operating system configurations in which?they?re likely to be used.
?We use Parallels extensively for cross-browser?testing on the websites we build,? says Ben Beath, a?web developer with the Sydney and Melbourne-based?design house. Loud & Clear coders run two screens?side by side ? one with their Mac desktop, and the?other with Windows XP, Vista or 7 depending on the?application.
?We?re able to identify and replicate bugs quickly,?fix them in the code and then review the applied?updates instantly,? Beath says. ?Cross-browser testing?used to take us days; now, we simply have the different?test environments ready to deploy as required.?
This approach is particularly important when it?comes to Internet Explorer 9 ? the Windows-only?browser that is, despite declining popularity, still?used by about half of all Windows computers. Unlike?rivals Safari, Firefox and Opera, IE9 is a Windows-only?solution ? and it runs at a healthy clip in a?Windows VM thanks to the latest tweaks in Parallels?and Fusion.
Websites aren?t the only thing being developed?better thanks to Windows-on-Mac setups; developers?of complex applications are increasingly finding them?invaluable as they warm to the benefi ts of Mac OS?and its development tools.
MEX, a Queensland-based developer of?maintenance management software with 30 staff, has?embraced the Mac and now develops its tools ? which?include both Windows and Microsoft Silverlight-based?front ends as well as an iPad application ? on?Macs running Windows via VMware Fusion.
The development of the iPad application earlier?this year was the catalyst for the change, says R&D?manager Matt Calcutt, but developers have quickly?warmed to the dual-operating system as they realised?it made them both more effi cient and more effective.
?Using Fusion, we can just jump between Mac and?Windows, grabbing, copying and pasting straight out?of Visual Studio on the Windows side, and doing a?straight paste into XCode on the Mac side,? Calcutt?explains. ?By changing just a bit of syntax, we?re up?and running, and debugging, straight away.?
Fusion power. Matt Calcutt says VMware Fusion has made his team of software developers both more efficient and more effective.
Cross-platform compatibility has also helped at a?functional level, since the iPad application ? which?must be developed using XCode on Mac OS X ??runs and must be tested against back-end Windows?applications such as Microsoft SQL Server and OData?middleware.
MEX developers have also found much to love in?the broad support for development by like-minded?firms around the world.
?We had been a Microsoft shop through and?through, but we found the Apple development?community was just so much more friendly and?happy to help,? Calcutt says. ?Wrapped up with?Fusion it just made our development cycles so simple?and quick. Now, I tell every Microsoft person and?partner I meet about the comparisons between our?development community and Microsoft?s.?
Perhaps the only issue MEX has had is when?the two development platforms are running at the?same time: both are computationally intensive, and?heavy compiling jobs can slow performance if run?simultaneously. But this is an expected symptom?of heavy CPU usage, and a small trade-off for a?development tool that?s changed the way MEX?operates ? in the office and out.
?Our developers work from home about 90 percent?of the time,? says Calcutt, ?and this has been a huge?boon for us because we can cover all the bases on the?one machine with minimal effort.?
Multi-OS setups are proving valuable to other types of?developers, too. As well as delivering convenience to?new converts and easy jumping between platforms for?developers, many users are fi nding they need to keep?Windows around mainly because Microsoft Office for?Mac simply isn?t good enough for their requirements.
Peter Riches, principal consultant with technical?writing group Red Pony, says he and others within his?group have adopted VMware Fusion for exactly this?reason. In their line of work, having perfect fidelity of?documents is absolutely essential ? and this becomes?impossible when a not-exactly-perfect translation of?technically demanding features means formatting-heavy?documents look just that little bit different in?Windows than they do on the Mac.
?A lot of the documentation we do for clients?involves setting up an application to work with a?variety of users,? Riches explains. ?These might, for?example, be specific instructions for how to use a?piece of machinery. Some clients are using different?versions of Word and we?ve found we need to run?both a Mac and PC environment to set up templates?and formatting correctly ? so users can just pick them?up and use them properly.?
The problem isn?t as severe with current versions?of Office under Mac (2011) and Windows (2010) as it?was between old versions, such as the 2004 Mac and?2003 Windows versions ? but it?s still there. And in a?three-man operation that depends on its presentation?to survive, even the small differences can make a?difference. For this reason, the firm runs a number?of Mac and Windows versions of Office and switches?between them as necessary.
Lack of add-on support in prior Mac versions was?another sticking point: Intelligent Editing?s PerfectIt,?for example, applies a range of rules for consistency?to Word documents but only runs under Windows?versions of Office. Running so many different?versions ensures the team can tap into its capabilities?even when running in the Mac version.
Riches is also a big fan of Daylite, the Mac-only?personal organiser on which he ?basically? runs his?business. ?It?s harder to fi nd as much good software?for the Mac,? he explains, ?but if you can fi nd an?app that does what you need, it seems they make the?effort to really make it work well.?
VMWARE FUSION 4
Pica
www.picastore.com.au
RRP: $54.95
?
PARALLELS DESKTOP 5 FOR MAC
Parallels
www.parallels.com/au
RRP: $89.95
Source: http://www.macworld.com.au/features/polishing-windows-on-your-mac-41682/
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By Randee Dawn
Bruce Beresford-Redman, the former "Survivor" producer accused of murdering his wife Monica, will not fight extradition from the United States to be put on trial in Mexico for that April 2010 crime, TODAY's George Lewis reported Tuesday. The decision comes after a federal judge in Los Angeles ruled there was enough compelling evidence to warrant the extradition.
This came as unexpected good news to Beresford-Redman's sister, Carla Burgos and the family attorney Alison Triessel, who spoke with TODAY's Savannah Guthrie.
"We were surprised because given the vigor with which he has fought this, tooth and nail every step of the way, we were really surprised that now he has decided to waive extradition and go back to Mexico," said Triessl. "I had prepared the Burgos family for another fairly long battle."
The Beresford-Redman family had been vacationing at a Cancun, Mexico, resort when Monica went missing; three days later she turned up in a hotel sewer. After being asked by officials to remain in the country, Beresford-Redman returned home to the U.S. and has been held in a federal detention center since Nov. 2010.
The entire orderal, said Burgos, has been "really painful ... my parents, my father, he was always a really happy man, easygoing and stuff, and he's been so sad and angry about this situation."
Burgos says there's been no contact between the her family and Bruce Beresford-Redman, and she objects to having the 7- and 4-year-old children living with his parents. "That's not what we want, we don't think that's the best for them," said Burgos.
Juanita Beresford-Redman proclaimed her belief in her son's innocence last week on TODAY: "I know he is innocent, he is a good man, and of course I trust him completely."
By not fighting the extradition, Triessl said that Beresford-Redman could be headed back to Mexico within 60 days. He is expected to face charges of aggravated homicide.
And Burgos says she has faith in the Mexican legal system to handle the case once Beresford-Redman arrives back in that country. "They've been really fair during all this process, and we really hope they keep doing it," she said. "Because we need justice for (Monica). She didn't deserve to go like that."
Will Bruce Beresford-Redman get a fair trial in Mexico? Share your thoughts on our Facebook page.
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PYONGYANG, North Korea ? North Korea's next leader burnished his diplomatic skills, welcoming a private South Korean mourning delegation as state media called Kim Jong Un a "sagacious" leader and revealed a new title that gives him authority over political matters.
Kim Jong Un has rapidly gained prominence since the death of his father, Kim Jong Il, on Dec. 17, and his brief meeting with a group led by a former South Korean first lady and a prominent business leader shows Seoul that he is assured in his new role.
State media have showered Kim with new titles. On Saturday, the North referred to him as "supreme leader" of the 1.2 million-strong armed forces and said the military's top leaders had pledged their loyalty to him. On Monday, the Rodong Sinmun newspaper described him as head of the Central Committee of the Workers' Party ? a post that appears to make him the top official in the ruling party.
Pyongyang's official Korean Central News Agency also called Kim Jong Un a "sagacious leader" and "dear" comrade while reporting that he paid respects Monday to his father, whose body is lying in state at Kumsusan Memorial Palace. State media have already dubbed him as a "great successor" and an "outstanding leader."
It was the fourth time the North's media reported that the younger Kim had visited the memorial palace since his father's death, according to Seoul's Unification Ministry.
Also on Monday, a South Korean delegation stood in a line on a red carpet and bowed silently during their visit to the Kumsusan palace, where Kim's bier is surrounded by flowers and flanked by an honor guard.
Kim Jong Un gave the South Koreans his thanks after they expressed condolences and sympathy, KCNA said. Seoul's Unification Ministry confirmed the meeting in a statement but didn't elaborate.
The lead delegates were the widow of former South Korean President Kim Dae-jung, who engineered a "sunshine" engagement policy with the North and held a landmark summit with Kim Jong Il in 2000, and Hyundai Group Chairwoman Hyun Jeong-eun, whose late husband had ties to the North.
Their meeting with Kim Jong Un could be intended to push South Korea to pursue previously agreed upon cooperative projects that would give North Korea much-needed hard currency, said Yang Moo-jin, a professor at Seoul-based University of North Korean Studies.
Footage from AP Television News in North Korea earlier showed the South Koreans being greeted by North Korean officials during a stop at a factory park in the North Korean border town of Kaesong. North Korea sent delegations to Seoul when the women's husbands died.
Monday's meeting appeared to be Kim Jong Un's first reported meeting with South Koreans since his father's death.
The Kim family has extended its control over the country of 24 million people to a third generation with Kim Jong Un, who is in his late 20s and was revealed last year as his father's choice among three sons for successor.
Kim Jong Il, who ruled North Korea for 17 years, wielded power as head of three main state organs: the Workers' Party, the Korean People's Army and the National Defense Commission. His father, North Korea founder Kim Il Sung, remains the nation's "eternal president" long after his 1994 death.
Kim Jong Un was named a vice chairman of the Central Military Commission of the Workers' Party last year, but was expected to ascend to new military and political posts while being groomed to become the next leader.
Monday's reference to his new title was in a commentary in the Rodong Sinmun newspaper, the mouthpiece of the Workers' Party, urging soldiers to dedicate their lives "to protect the party's Central Committee headed by respected Comrade Kim Jong Un." Rodong Sinmun has also called on the people to become "eternal revolutionary comrades" with Kim Jong Un, "the sun of the 21st century."
The language echoed slogans used for years to rally support for Kim Jong Il, and made clear that the son is quickly moving toward leadership of the Workers' Party, one of the country's highest positions, in addition to the military.
North Korea refers to Kim Il Sung as the "sun" of the nation, and his birthday is celebrated as the "Day of the Sun." State media have sought to emphasize Kim Jong Un's role in carrying out the Kim family legacy throughout his succession movement.
His titles are slight variations of those held by his father, but appear to carry the same weight. It was unclear whether the nation's constitution had been changed to reflect the transfer of leadership as when Kim Jong Il took power after his father's death.
Mourning continued, meanwhile, despite frigid winter weather, in the final days before Kim Jong Il's funeral, which is set to take place Wednesday, and a memorial Thursday.
People continued lining up Monday in central Pyongyang's Kim Il Sung Square, where a massive portrait that usually features Kim Il Sung has been replaced by one of Kim Jong Il, to bow before his smiling image and to lay funeral flowers. Heated buses stood by to give mourners a respite from the cold, and hot tea and water were distributed from beverage kiosks.
___
Associated Press writers Foster Klug, Hyung-jin Kim and Jiyoung Won in Seoul, South Korea, and AP Korea bureau chief Jean H. Lee contributed to this report. Follow AP's Korea coverage at twitter.com/newsjean and twitter.com/APKlug.
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Andy Reid is flat out huge. While not big enough to take the crown as the fattest coach in football, he's certainly very close. Reid is a brilliant coach, and I think the future is bright in Philly despite a down year. Hopefully, Andy won't eat away his sorrows due to the team's poor play this season.?
To get an idea of how big Reid is, take a look at the above video. This is when Reid was 12 years old, competing against other 12-year-olds in the Punt, Pass and Kick competition in California. Just take a look and you'll know what I mean.?
Source: http://bleacherreport.com/articles/997197-the-fattest-coaches-in-football
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WASHINGTON ? House Republicans on Thursday caved to demands by President Barack Obama, congressional Democrats and fellow Republicans for a short-term renewal of payroll tax cuts for all workers. The breakthrough almost certainly spares workers an average $20 a week tax increase Jan. 1.
After days of wrangling that even Speaker John Boehner acknowledged "may not have been politically the smartest thing in the world," the Ohio Republican abruptly changed course and dropped demands for immediate holiday season talks with the Senate on a full-year measure that all sides said they want. Senate leaders had insisted on the two-month extension to buy time for talks next year.
The House and Senate plan to act on the two-month extension Friday.
House Republicans were under fire from their constituents and GOP establishment figures incensed that they would risk losing the tax cut issue to Democrats at the dawn of the 2012 presidential and congressional election year. House GOP arguments about the legislative process and the "uncertainty" a two-month extension would mean for business were unpersuasive.
"In the end House Republicans felt like they were reenacting the Alamo, with no reinforcements and our friends shooting at us," said Rep. Kevin Brady, R-Texas.
The compromise legislation would renew the tax break through Feb. 29, along with jobless benefits and a "fix" to prevent doctors from absorbing a big cut in Medicare payments. Its $33 billion cost would be covered by an increased fee on mortgages backed by Fannie Mae, and Freddie Mac.
The developments were a clear win for Obama. The payroll tax cut was the centerpiece of his three-month campaign-style drive for jobs legislation that seems to have contributed to an uptick in his poll numbers ? and taken a toll on those of congressional Republicans.
"Because of this agreement, every working American will keep his or her tax cut - about $1,000 for the average family," Obama said in a statement. "That's about $40 in every paycheck. And when Congress returns, I urge them to keep working to reach an agreement that will extend this tax cut and unemployment insurance for all of 2012 without drama or delay."
If the cuts had expired as scheduled, 160 million workers would have seen a 2 percentage point increase in their Social Security taxes. And up to 2 million people without jobs for six months would start losing unemployment benefits averaging $300 a week.
The GOP retreat ends a tense standoff in which Boehner's House Republicans came under great pressure to agree to the short-term extension passed by the Senate on Saturday. The speaker was initially open to the idea, but rank-and-file Republicans revolted, and the House instead insisted on immediate talks on the year-long measure passed by the House, which contains curbs to unemployment insurance and other ideas backed by conservatives ? as well as deeper spending cuts to pay for the full-year cost.
After Senate leaders tried but failed to match the House's goal for a full-year pact, the chamber on Saturday instead gave sweeping approval for the two-month extension of the payroll tax cut, jobless benefits and doctors' Medicare fees that otherwise would have been cut 27 percent. The House had just days before passed a full-year extension that included a series of conservative policy prescriptions unpalatable to Obama and congressional Democrats.
Obama, Republicans and congressional Democrats all said they preferred a one-year extension but the politics of achieving that eluded them. All pledged to start working on that in January.
"Has this place become so dysfunctional that even when we agree to things we can't do it?" Obama asked. "Enough is enough.".
The top Senate Republican, Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, was a driving force behind Thursday's agreement, imploring Boehner to accept the deal that McConnell and Senate Democratic Leader Harry Reid had struck last week and passed with overwhelming support in both parties.
"There remain important differences between the parties on how to implement these policies, and it is critical that we protect middle-class families from a tax increase while we work them out," Reid said after Boehner's announcement.
The breakthrough emerged as a firewall erected by tea party-backed House Republicans crumbled Thursday.
"I don't think that my constituents should have a tax increase because of Washington's dysfunction," said freshman Rep. Sean Duffy, R-Wis.
The Republican establishment, too, put new pressure on House Republicans to compromise.
The 2008 GOP presidential nominee, John McCain, former Bush administration confidant Karl Rove and The Wall Street Journal editorial page were among conservative voices urging House Republicans to retreat.
Just hours before he announced the breakthrough, Boehner had made the case for a year-long extension. But on a brief late afternoon conference call, he informed his colleagues it was time to yield.
"He said that as your leader, you've in effect asked me to make decisions easy and difficult and I'm making my decision right now," said Rep. Jack Kingston, R-Ga., paraphrasing Boehner's comments.
Kingston said the conference call lasted just minutes and Boehner did not give anyone time to respond.
There was still carping among tea party freshmen upset that GOP leaders had yielded.
"Even though there is plenty of evidence this is a bad deal for America ... the House has caved yet again to the president and Senate Democrats," said Rep. Tim Huelskamp, R-Kan. "We were sent here with a clear set of instructions from the American people to put an end to business as usual in Washington, yet here we are being asked to sign off on yet another gimmick."
Almost forgotten in the firestorm is that McConnell and Boehner had extracted a major victory last week, winning a provision that would require Obama to make a swift decision on whether to approve construction of the Keystone XL oil pipeline, which would bring Canadian oil to the U.S. and create thousands of construction jobs. To block the pipeline, Obama would have to declare that is not in the nation's interest.
Obama wanted to put the decision off until after the 2012 election.
House Republicans did win one concession in addition to a promise that Senate Democrats would name negotiators on the one-year House measure: a provision to ease concerns that the 60-day extension would be hard for payroll processing companies to implement.
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MOSCOW ? A Soyuz spacecraft safely delivered a Russian, an American and a Dutchman to the International Space Station on Friday, restoring the permanent crew to six members for the first time since September.
But just as concerns over the reliability of the Soyuz have eased, a different version of the Soyuz rocket failed Friday during an unmanned launch. It was the latest in a string of spectacular launch failures that have raised questions about the state of Russia's space industry.
The craft carrying mission commander Oleg Kononenko, NASA's Don Pettit and European Space Agency astronaut Andre Kuipers had traveled through space for two days after blasting off from Baikonur, the Russian-operated cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. The ship docked at the orbiting station at 5:19 p.m. (1319GMT) Friday.
About two and half hours later, the three new crew members floated through an opened hatch to join NASA's Dan Burbank and Russians Anton Shkaplerov and Anatoly Ivanishin, who had arrived on the station in November.
"I can't think of a prettier picture than seeing all six back on board the space station," NASA's William Gerstenmaier told the assembled crew during a video linkup with Russian Mission Control outside Moscow.
Families of crew members, who had joined space officials to watch the docking, also sent their greetings, with Kuipers' young child singing him a song in Dutch.
The six crew members will work together on the International Space Station until mid-March.
The failed launch of an unmanned Progress cargo ship in August had raised doubts about future missions to the station, because the Soyuz rocket that crashed used the same upper stage as the booster rockets carrying Soyuz ships to orbit.
The next manned launch was delayed until Russian space officials could determine the cause of the Progress failure and it went off without a hitch in November. The crew on that mission overlapped for eight days with the three crew members remaining on the station, who then returned to Earth later that month.
However, on Friday, a newer version of the Soyuz failed to put a Meridian communications satellite into orbit when launched from Russia's Plesetsk cosmodrome. Space agency head Vladimir Popovkin said the cause was engine failure.
"What happened today was a highly unpleasant situation," Popovkin was quoted by state news agencies as saying. "It confirms that the (aerospace) industry is in crisis and its weakest link is engine building."
The failures Friday and during the Progress launch in August both took place during the third stage. The Soyuz-2.1b that crashed Friday, however, has a different third-stage engine, the ITAR-Tass news agency said.
Friday's failed launch was the sixth in the past year.
Last December, Russia lost three navigation satellites when a rocket carrying them failed to reach orbit. A military satellite was lost in February, and the launch of the Express-AM4, described by officials as Russia's most powerful telecommunications satellite, went awry in August.
In November, Russia sent up its ambitious Phobos-Ground unmanned probe, which was to go to the Phobos moon of Mars, take soil samples and return them to Earth. But engineers lost contact with the ship and were unable to propel it out of Earth orbit and toward Mars. The craft is now expected to fall to Earth in mid-January.
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wwltv.com
Posted on December 19, 2011 at 12:42 PM
Updated Monday, Dec 19 at 12:42 PM
Chelsea Gaudin / Eyewitness News
SLIDELL, La. ? Two female college students, in town for the holidays, met for dinner on Dec. 13 to catch up and ended up being carjacked, kidnapped and robbed at gunpoint, according to the Slidell Police Department.
On Tuesday at 11:30 p.m., the women were sitting in a car in the parking lot of Main Street Centre?, located near Gause Boulevard and I-10, when a masked gunman approached the car and demanded they open the door.
They obliged out of fear for their lives and the man jumped into the back seat, demanded their cell phones so they couldn?t call 911 and forced them to drive to an ATM, police said.
An undisclosed amount of cash was withdrawn from the ATM at ASI Credit Union at 1322 Gause Blvd.
The women, who were unharmed, were then forced to drive to a dark, remote location on Powell Road where the suspect exited the car and fled, police said.
They drove to a nearby gas station and called the police.
The suspect is described as a black man in his mid to late 20s with a black ski mask, black jacket with a hoodie, and black jeans. The gun is described as a black semi-automatic pistol.
If anyone has any information, call the Slidell Police Department at 985-643-3131 or CrimeStoppers at 504-822-1111
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Feeding young babies solid foods such as crackers, cereals and bread, which tend to be high in salt, may set them up for a lifelong preference for salt, researchers reported Tuesday.
The study, published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, suggests that efforts to reduce salt intake among Americans should begin early in life.
It is even possible, the authors said, that infancy contains a "sensitivity window" in which exposure to certain foods and tastes programs the brain to desire them in the future.
Americans' fondness for salt, a source of dismay for health experts, is well known. A 2010 report from the Institute of Medicine concluded that the average intake of 3,436 milligrams a day for Americans over age 2 is more than double what is recommended, and that new government standards are needed to reduce the salt content in processed and restaurant food.
But little is known about the biology behind our love affair with salt. Researchers don't even know what receptors are involved in tasting it. And though babies are born with a clear preference for sweet foods and an absolute distaste for bitter foods, they appear indifferent to salt in the first few months of life, said Leslie Stein, the lead author of the study and a senior research associate at the Monell Chemical Senses Center in Philadelphia.
"When you give 2-month-old babies salt water, they have no facial expression," Stein said. "This could mean that the baby doesn't detect the salt or just doesn't give a hoot about it."
To get at the issue, Stein and her colleagues first gave 61 healthy 2-month-old infants a mild solution of salt water: Based on facial expressions and how much they drank, the authors concluded the infants indeed were indifferent to the taste.
When the babies were 6 months old, they were brought back to the Monell clinic by their parents. They were presented with three bottles containing water, a mild salt solution or a slightly saltier solution. Researchers recorded how much fluid they drank from each bottle during a one-minute period ? an indication of how much they preferred each solution.
Parents were also asked what, if any, baby food and table foods the children received. Table food is considered regular food that other members of the family might eat.
Almost half of the infants ? 26 ? had been exposed to starchy foods such as crackers, soft bread or cereal, which are often high in salt. During the bottle test, those babies consumed 55% more salt compared with babies who had not yet been exposed to these kinds of foods.
The scientists also reexamined 26 of the children at preschool age and surveyed their mothers about the children's salt preferences, such as whether they licked salt from foods, ate plain table salt or added salt to food before eating it. Children who had been exposed early to the starchy, salt-rich foods clearly had a greater liking for salt, they found.
"It's absolutely possible that exposure early on in life could change the way the salt taste signal is transmitted to the brain," said Dr. James F. Battey Jr., director of the National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders, which funded the study. "The brain is very plastic at that time of life."
The study doesn't prove this, however ? it merely shows a correlation between early exposure and a taste for salt later on, Battey added. But if it turns out to be true, "then parents have a way of reducing the risk," he said.
Research on infant feeding practices has shown that babies will learn to like a food if exposed to it at least 10 times. But that doesn't mean they prefer a food, Stein said; they just learn to tolerate it.
And, Stein said, studies have also shown that babies are learning about the flavors in Mom's diet even before birth, in the uterus, as well as afterward through the taste of their mother's breast milk.
"This very early exposure helps them learn to like those flavors as well," Stein said.
The American Academy of Pediatrics recommends mothers breast-feed exclusively for the first six months and continue to breast-feed even after introducing solid foods. Doctors usually recommend introducing solid foods to babies about 6 months of age, but there are few rules over which foods to introduce first and which to offer later.
A 1990 Dutch study showed persistently higher blood pressure for children whose early sodium consumption was highest, said Dr. Stephen R. Daniels, chief of pediatrics at Children's Hospital Colorado, who was not involved in the new study.
"We don't have as much science as we want or need about the best way to introduce babies to solid food," Daniels said. "There's a tremendous opportunity to think of the period during which a baby is being introduced to solid foods as a time to get babies and toddlers on the road to the most healthful diet."
shari.roan@latimes.com
Times staff writer Melissa Healy contributed to this report.
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MANILA, Philippines ? A Philippine court rejected on Wednesday requests by arrested ex-President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo to celebrate Christmas at home and use her cellphone and computer in detention, underscoring recent stunning reversals for a woman once considered among the world's most powerful.
Judge Jesus Mupas of the Pasay Regional Trial Court cited security reasons for denying Arroyo's request to leave a military hospital where she is detained on electoral fraud charges. She wanted to celebrate Christmas and New Year at her upscale home in the capital.
But she obtained small concessions. Mupas allowed her family, children and grandchildren to celebrate the holidays with her in her heavily guarded hospital suite from Dec. 24 to 26 and Dec. 31 to Jan. 2. She will also be allowed to watch TV and listen to the radio.
"The court is not inclined to grant (Arroyo) a Christmas furlough," Mupas said in his order. He said he was allowing her family to visit because "the court is fully aware of the fact that everybody wants to be with his loved ones during Christmas."
Arroyo's Nov. 18 arrest curtailed her rights even though she remains a member of the House of Representatives, Mupas said.
Mupas had ordered Arroyo's arrest on Nov. 18 in her hospital room, where she had sought treatment for a bone ailment, on suspicion of ordering the rigging of 2007 senatorial elections to favor her candidates. She has denied any wrongdoing and has hired a battery of lawyers.
Last month, the Supreme Court lifted a travel ban on her, and she attempted to leave the country with her husband. President Benigno Aquino III's justice secretary, however, defied the Supreme Court order and directed airport authorities to stop her from leaving, fearing she might try to escape from prosecution.
Aquino, who won election on a promise to uproot corruption, blames Arroyo for a decade of graft and corruption scandals that eroded public trust in government and held back foreign investment.
Arroyo, however, accused her successor of resorting to "demagoguery to completely destroy my reputation."
Aquino has accused Supreme Court Chief Justice Renato Corona, a former Arroyo chief of staff whom she appointed shortly before her term ended last year, of obstructing Arroyo's prosecution. Although Corona has denied favoring Arroyo in his rulings, Aquino's allies in the House of Representatives impeached the chief justice last week.
Arroyo, a 64-year-old former economics professor and daughter of an ex-president, survived four opposition impeachment bids and four attempted coups during her nine stormy years in power.
Arroyo once landed near the top of a Forbes magazine list of the 100 most powerful women in the world.
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FILE - In this Nov. 27, 2009 file photo, Zhu Zhu Pets are quickly claimed at Toys "R" Us by holiday shoppers in Camp Hill, Pa. Cepia LLC was relatively unknown until mommy bloggers made its robotic Zhu Zhu pets a hit in 2009. Laura Kurzu, Cepia's senior vice president of marketing, works with bloggers every step of the way to develop toys, including a Zhu Zhu building set that it tweaked due to blogger comments. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster, File)
FILE - In this Nov. 27, 2009 file photo, Zhu Zhu Pets are quickly claimed at Toys "R" Us by holiday shoppers in Camp Hill, Pa. Cepia LLC was relatively unknown until mommy bloggers made its robotic Zhu Zhu pets a hit in 2009. Laura Kurzu, Cepia's senior vice president of marketing, works with bloggers every step of the way to develop toys, including a Zhu Zhu building set that it tweaked due to blogger comments. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster, File)
This Feb. 14, 2011 product image provided by LeapFrog Enterprises, Inc., shows the LeapPad Explorer. Emily Vanek is not buying up a bunch of LeapPad Explorers herself, but she may be at least partly to blame for some stores selling out of the $99 children's tablet this holiday season. ?The LeapPad is incredible,? the Denver mother of three boys wrote to the 650 followers of her ColoradoMoms.com blog. ?Not only do kids get to have a toy resembling their parents' tablet, it's durable and my favorite part?! It's not just mindless games they are playing.? (AP Photo/LeapFrog Enterprises Inc.)
Emily Vanek is not buying up a bunch of LeapPad Explorers herself, but she may be at least partly to blame for some stores selling out of the $99 children's tablet this holiday season.
"The LeapPad is incredible," the Denver mother of three boys wrote to the 6,000 readers of her ColoradoMoms.com blog. "Not only do kids get to have a toy resembling their parents' tablet, it's durable and my favorite part?! It's not just mindless games they are playing."
These days, mommy bloggers don't just gab about spilled milk and poopy diapers. In fact, they've become so influential in the $22 billion toy market that toy makers go to great lengths to get their seal of approval. Their thumbs-up is particularly important during the holiday shopping season when toy makers hope to create the next hit toy.
It's a major shift for toy companies, which have always given out samples of new dolls, games and other playthings to drive sales. Five years ago, they handed out 98 percent of those products to TV stations, newspapers and magazines. But today, as much as 70 percent go to bloggers.
Mattel Inc., the world's largest toy company, has a database of about 400 mommy bloggers and their location, interests and the children's ages. Canadian toy maker Spin Master, which makes the trading card game Redakai, hired a dedicated staffer whose only job is to reach out to mommy bloggers. And small toy maker Cepia Inc., which makes robotic Zhu Zhu pets, gets feedback from mommy bloggers before its toys hit shelves.
It's hard for toy makers to ignore the monstrous number of mommy bloggers. Nationwide, there are about 4 million or so mommy bloggers who influence millions of other parents around the world.
"Mommy bloggers started because they wanted to share things about a new baby, but the most influential ones got into social media and realized they could make a difference," says Maria Bailey, whose BSM Media firm helps companies pick mommy bloggers with the most reach on the Twitter and Facebook social media websites. "Sometimes that difference is as simple as directing a mom to a toy that will save money."
That's why when LeapFrog Enterprises wanted to roll out its LeapPad Explorer kid-size tablet, it reached out to 200 of the top mommy bloggers. The goal? To get them to generate buzz for the tablet by throwing "mommy parties."
The Emeryville, Calif.-based company sent each blogger a kit that included a LeapPad, a game for it and coupons. LeapFrog also sent tips on how many people to invite (about 5 adults and 15 kids) and suggested recipes (ice cream sundaes).
For bloggers like Vanek, the Denver mom who bills herself as the "go-to answer for all things mom and kids in Colorado," it was a chance to be a hero of sorts to other parents and their kids.
"It not only lets my own children get to try out the newest/hottest toys, it allows them to share them with their friends," she says. "It allows me to get to have my own friends over for something better than a Tupperware party where I'm doing a hard sales pitch."
But for LeapFrog, it was an opportunity to get word-of-mouth going early.
It was the first time the company had hosted "mommy parties," but it seems to have paid off. The company declined to give sales numbers, but the LeapPad has been selling out online and in stores across the country this holiday season.
Earlier this year, SpinMaster also used mommy bloggers to get the word out about its reformulated Moon Dough, a non-sticky PlayDoh-like moldable substance. Within weeks of the company sending samples to more than 500 bloggers, there were thousands of postings about the new product online.
"After playing with our other Moon Dough set just a few days before, I could immediately tell that this Moon Dough was much less flaky," blogged ohsosavvymom.com, a mom in San Antonio, Texas with more than 3,600 Twitter followers.
Harold Chizick, vice president of global communications at Spin Master, says in part because of reviews like that, the product had a double-digit increase in sales, though he declined to give details. If the company had used traditional ways to get the word out, Chizick says, the roll out would have taken several months or longer.
"It was much faster than expected," he says.
Sometimes, buzz from bloggers can backfire.
"If they like something word gets around very quickly, if they don't like something, word will also get around quickly," says Timetoplaymag.com's Jim Silver, a long time toy expert who works with mom bloggers to review products on his website.
In 2009, after Mattel released a silhouette of its new "tween" Dora the Explorer that seemed to deviate from the tomboy-esque look of the original doll, a number of bloggers complained. A Cafemom.com blogger wrote: "Can't they leave anything to the imagination these days?"
Mattel, which had hoped the silhouette would generate excitement ahead of the launch of the new doll, decided to release the full image of the Dora early to reassure moms that the doll wasn't too fancied up.
Crayola also faced scrutiny from mom bloggers this year when its Crayola Colored Bubbles, a product with a wand that kids can blow colored soap bubbles through, caused stains. After bloggers gave it negative reviews, Crayola made some changes, including updating the packaging and adding a warning about the possibility of stains.
"It's just like handing kids a bunch of fabric dye and telling them to throw it around," a blogger on Mommybrunchtales.com wrote.
Still, most toy makers find the risk is worth the reward.
Cepia LLC was relatively unknown until mommy bloggers made its Zhu Zhu pets a hit in 2009. Laura Kurzu, Cepia's senior vice president of marketing, works with bloggers every step of the way to develop toys, including a Zhu Zhu building set that it tweaked due to blogger comments.
"Bloggers can be really great evangelists for the brand, but you have to be invested in listening to what they say to you," she says. "You can't just throw something out there and expect gratuitous support."
_____
Mae Anderson reported from New York.
Follow AP retail coverage at http://www.twitter.com/AP_Retail and Mae Anderson at http://www.twitter.com/Maetron.
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