Insuance

LendingTree Lenders Beat the National Average on Rates. Based on comparison of the APRs for offers made through LendingTree and offers reported in the 30-year FRM Primary Mortgage Market Survey® (PMMS®) compiled by Freddie Mac for the week of April 10, 2008 for the following consumer segment: 680+ FICO score, $150,000-$417,000 loan amount, less than or equal to a 80% loan-to-value ratio, single-family dwelling, primary home.

State Farm Life Insurance Company was founded in 1929. State Farm Life and Accident Assurance Company began operations in 1961 to meet special requirements for life insurance in New York, Connecticut, and Wisconsin. State Farm Life Insurance Company and State Farm Life and Accident Assurance Company have been marketing Variable Products to our customers through State Farm VP Management Corporation since 1998.

What is a Nationwide On Your Side Review?

A Nationwide On Your Side Review is a free consultation and insurance assessment that can help you learn how to:

• Save money on car insurance and other types of coverage with discounts and other programs
• Manage your deductibles
• Determine the insurance coverage options that are right for your needs, goals and budget

Comerica Bank

Comerica's Wealth & Institutional Management team consists of various divisions of Comerica Bank and also subsidiaries of Comerica Bank including World Asset Management, Inc.; Wilson, Kemp & Associates, Inc.; Comerica Insurance Services; and Comerica Securities, Inc. Securities products and services are offered through Comerica Securities, Inc., which is a broker/dealer and member FINRA and SIPC. Comerica Securities, Inc. is also a federally Registered Investment Advisor. Insurance products are offered through various licensed insurance agencies including subsidiaries of Comerica Bank. Comerica Securities, Inc. and Comerica Insurance Services are subsidiaries of Comerica Bank.

About US Comerica
Comerica is a multi-faceted corporation with an abiding sense of community. From investor relations and the latest information on our company to career opportunities and our commitment to community and diversity, you’ll find it all right here.

Trader Tech

We're so confident in our program's accuracy, we'll provide you with free up-to-date forecasts for the markets of your choice so you can see for yourself.

Simply fill out the short form on the left to receive your free recent forecast.

To get your free forecasts even faster, call us and tell one of our representatives which markets you like to trade. Mention Priority Code VP1 .

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* Universal international free phone number. The call is free for the caller. International Toll Free number not available in all areas.

Or email us at: info@tradertech.com

Kimberley BC Condo Vacation !!

Kimberley, BC is at the cusp of explosive growth with opportunities reminiscent of 'days gone by' in other similar resort destinations. Willow Vistas' development team consists of an experienced group of professionals with a track record of success in resort and residential developments within Western Canada.

Developer: WBB Properties / New Dawn Developments
Construction Management: New Dawn Developments
Project Marketing: Ultimate Properties
Rental Management: Canadian Mountain Lodging Co.

For all sales inquiries, please Register or contact Dave Fior at 1.403.852.1965.

http://www.willowvistas.com/index.html

Market Forecasts

Total level of demand for a product, across all brands, expected to result from a particular marketing effort by the competitors in the market. Environmental trends not under the control of the marketers, such as social trends or economic changes, can greatly impact the accuracy of the market forecast.

Consensus forecast-Definition

The forecasts for a given company, taken in aggregate, for all analysts who follow that company.

For a financial instrument whose price follows a Gaussian random walk, or Wiener process, the volatility increases as time increases. Conceptually, this is because there is an increasing probability that the instrument's price will be farther away from the initial price as time increases. However, rather than increase linearly, the volatility increases with the square-root of time as time increases, because some fluctuations are expected to cancel each other out, so the most likely deviation after twice the time will not be twice the distance from zero.

Trader Tech - Vantage Point Software

The Power of International Analysis Software

With nearly 80% accuracy*, VantagePoint Trading Software gives you the edge you need when trading Futures, Commodities, Forex, Stocks and ETFs. The VantagePoint forecasted indicators can be used to develop trading strategies that suit your personal trading requirements. When you use VantagePoint market forecasts, you will no longer need to spend countless hours buried in analysis without being rewarded for your efforts.

Software Reviews:

"Market Technologies claims an accuracy of approximately 80% on their website. We calculated the average accuracy of version 7.0 to be 82%."

"VantagePoint, with its predictive technology, could serve as a useful tool in the traders armory for short term spread betting, binary betting or straight futures trading. Highly recommended."

"VantagePoint offers the trader a number of new indicators that, unlike the lagging indicators that are prevalent in most trading programs, are instead designed to be leading indicators."

Bank of America Strategies & Services

Bank of America - Strategies & Services

A dedicated financial team committed to providing you with comprehensive financial strategies and access to customized credit, deposit and investment solutions from
Bank of America, N.A. and Banc of America Investment Services, Inc.

• Comprehensive financial strategies
• Investment solutions
• Mortgages and loans
• Checking and savings accounts
• Premier Visa Cards
• Online Banking
• Insurance

Forex Trading Books

Trading in the Global Currency Markets by Cornelius Luca

Text brings the complex machinations of the foreign currency markets to life, clearly and concisely analyzing the various currencies, market forces, and emerging technologies, and illuminating them with real-world examples and graphics.

Day Trading the Currency Market : Technical and Fundamental Strategies To Profit from Market Swings
by Kathy Lien

An inside look at how to successfully day trade the currency market. Written by Kathy Lien, the chief strategist from the number one online currency broker in the world, Day Trading the Currency Market reveals a variety of technical and fundamental profit-making strategies for trading the currency market. Lien describes everything from time-tested technical and fundamental strategies that individual traders can use to compete with bank traders, to a host of more fundamentally oriented strategies drawn from the author’s own experience with the somewhat secretive multi-billion dollar interbank currency market - involving intermarket relationships, interest rate differentials, option volatility, news events, and central bank intervention.

The future of chip technology

It was an inevitable declaration, a revision that fundamental physics was going to extort from Gordon Moore sooner or later. Silicon-based computers can't continue to double in speed every two years forever. Moore, who laid out that remarkably accurate roadmap 35 years ago, concedes to that point.

"Chip doubling will go from every couple of years to five years," he said without hesitation.

The revision is necessary. Experts in the semiconductor industry believe there are only about 10 to 15 years left before chipmakers run out of ways to pack more transistors on chip, the technique to make chips faster.

Experts know the numbers they use are speculative. High pointed to a 1989 research paper project that looked ahead at what microprocessors might look like today. "At that time, they worked at 25 to 40 MHz," he said. "The prediction was they would reach 250 MHz by 2000, but here we are, at the threshold of 2 GHz," eight times faster than the vision of 11 years ago.

If scientists lose miniaturization as tool to boost chip speeds, Moore believes new ways to speed up silicon chips will be found.

"We will have to push technology as far as we can by shrinking, then we will start making bigger chips," he said.

Chip engineers still face some difficult problems in getting there. As transistors get smaller, they need a high concentration of chemical impurities added to the wafer to help hold an electrical charge called dopants but, at high concentrations, dopants clump together and become electrically inactive. Engineers still have to solve this challenge.

Fluctuations in dopant concentration are also a factor. Chips with larger transistors are unaffected, but as transistors get smaller, they become more susceptible and could behave unpredictably.

And then, there are "gates", the tiny barriers - one or two nanometers - controlling the flow of electrons in a transistor. A gate denotes whether a chip counts one or zero. An open gate lets an electron through as zero. A closed gate blocks it to count as one. This is the basis for binary math, the engine for all computer calculations.

Investment Banking ?

From Wikipedia,

Investment Banks help companies and governments raise money by issuing and selling securities in the capital markets (both equity and debt), as well as providing advice on transactions such as mergers and acquisitions. Until the late 1980s, the United States and Canada maintained a separation between investment banking and commercial banks.

A majority of investment banks offer strategic advisory services for mergers, acquisitions, divestiture or other financial services for clients, such as the trading of derivatives, fixed income, foreign exchange, commodity, and equity securities.

Trading securities for cash or securities (i.e., facilitating transactions, market-making), or the promotion of securities (i.e., underwriting, research, etc.) is referred to as the "sell side."

Dealing with the pension funds, mutual funds, hedge funds, and the investing public who consume the products and services of the sell-side in order to maximize their return on investment constitutes the "buy side". Many firms have buy and sell side components.

An investment bank is split into the so-called Front Office, Middle Office, and Back Office.

The leading investment banks including

Merrill Lynch,

Salomon Smith Barney,

Morgan Stanley Dean Witter and

Goldman Sachs are said to be in the bulge bracket.

Careers in Accounting & Finance:- http://www.jobsinthemoney.com/index.php

FOREX-Dollar rebounds after Fed liquidity move

NEW YORK, March 7 (Reuters) - The dollar rebounded from record lows on Friday as a Federal Reserve liquidity injection fueled some speculation the central bank might hold off on cutting interest rates aggressively even after a sharp contraction in U.S. payrolls.

Profit-taking and short-covering also helped support the dollar, traders said, after three days of successive sharp gains in the euro, which brought the European currency to historic peaks.

The Fed announced a series of term repurchase operations totaling $100 billion to ease liquidity pressures in stressed financial markets, overshadowing a Labor Department report showing U.S. employers cut payrolls for a second month in February.

"The liquidity injections are key here," Firas Askari, head currency trader at BMO Capital Markets in Toronto, said of the dollar's climb. "Some people are thinking that the Fed may not be as aggressive (in cutting rates) and that they are going to inject liquidity in other ways."

Interest rate futures reflected reduced views of the chances of a 75-basis-points cut in the Fed's benchmark overnight lending rate at the March 18 meeting, to about 96 percent from about 130 percent earlier.

The fed funds rate target is currently at 3.0 percent after being lowered by 2.25 percentage points since mid-September.

After the February payrolls report the euro initially surged to as high as $1.5459 , according to Reuters data. The 63,000 jobs decline was the biggest monthly drop in nearly five years, the Labor Department said. Economists surveyed by Reuters had forecast 25,000 jobs would be added to payrolls last month.

Courtesy :http://www.reuters.com/article/usDollarRpt/idUSN0763095320080307

My New Nokia 6500

The Nokia 6500 is a stylish chunky feature-packed mid-range 3G mobile phone. Excellent build quality, stainless steel scratch-resistant body, nice big buttons and a real smooth spring-loaded mechanism.
The Nokia 6500 slide is thinner than a Sony Ericsson K850i and also the Nokia N95. If you don't mind a thicker than average slider mobile phone, then the Nokia 6500 Slide is highly recommended.

Design

The Nokia 6500 Slide has a stainless steel body (with scratch-resistant coating) - can be cold to touch. Black plastic is at the top and bottom of the phone. Slide the front panel up to reveal the glossy black plastic keypad.
The 6500 Slider weighs in at 123 grams - it helps give the phone a good solid feel. The build quality is excellent. The spring-loaded slider is smooth and solid.
Nice big keys: The stainless steel selection, navigation, end and call keys, are big. The central navigation OK key is surrounded by a rim. All the keys are very easy to use. Magic bonus points to Nokia. The black plastic keypad has big flat keys. Again, no problems using them. The number keys have white backlighting. The microphone sits in between the left of the 4 and 7 keys.
Stiff volume key: The volume key (also used for Push-to-talk (PTT) is stiff. The key is very flat too - a case of style over function.

Wrist strap eyelet: Remove the back cover to insert the strap through the hole (top-left).
Hot-swappable memory card: The microSD memory card slot sits beneath the battery cover above the battery. The microSD slot supports up to 4 GB. The battery cover is easy to remove - a battery cover release button sits at the top of the phone.

2.2-inch 240 x 320 screen: Good quality, up to 16 million colours. The screen has no brightness setting. Instead, the Nokia 6500 uses its ambient light sensor (top front, left of the earpiece). A rubber strip sits along the bottom of the screen offering a bit of grip when sliding the front up.
Connectors: A microUSB, 2.5 mm jack and charger connector are on the top of the phone.

3.2 Megapixel Camera:

Nokia describe the 3.2 MP camera as an "enthusiast quality" - an admission of pretty good quality, but not their best. The phone uses Carl Zeiss optics - there's no lens cover.
The 6500 has a double-LED flash. Not as bright as a Xenon flash, but brighter than the single LED flash found on most camera phones.
3.2 megapixel resolution gives photos of 2048 x 1536 resolution. The image quality is good. Likely not quite as good as one of Nokia's high-end N Series phones. Most consumers should be happy with the quality.

The camera has auto-focus - the camera button on the right side of the Nokia 6500 sets auto-focus. There's macro mode, 8x digital zoom, quality settings, self-timer, ISO, multi-shot and white-balance settings. Take photos in landscape mode.
640 x 480 Video Capture: Supports up to VGA video capture (15 frames per seconds (fps)). Other settings include 352 x 288 (CIF), 176 x 144 (QCIF), 128 x 96 (SQCIF).
Front-facing video call camera: The tiny 176 × 144, 15 fps video camera is located to the right if the earpiece (number 9 in the image).

Web browsing

OK. Decent download speeds on 3G networks. You can use the bundled Opera Mini browser to browse the Web. Text input is never great without a QWERTY keyboard, and there's no Wi-Fi support.

Tv-Out

You can view Nokia 6500 Slide content on a TV screen. The 6500 Slide package includes a Tv-out cable. Plug in the video and audio inputs, connect the TV-out cable to the enhancements connector (2.5 mm jack) at the top of the phone, then select the appropriate AV channel on the TV. Supports both PAL and NTSC.
View your videos and images, play games, browse the Web or make video calls using your TV screen.

Music player, FM Radio

The music player supports MP3, MP4, AAC, eAAC+ or WMA files. The music player offers all the standard stuff - playlists, artists, genres, albums, videos, loops, equalizers, favourites, playback and customize the player with skins.
The loudspeaker is fine, similar to Nokia's other phones. The supplied earphones are also acceptable. Plug in your own better quality earphones. Plug a 3.5 mm adapter into the 2.5 mm jack.
Visual Radio with RDS: Connect the stereo headset (earphones) to listen to the FM radio. As with most other mobiles, the headset contains the antenna. It's basic stuff. It does the job.

Messaging

As well as SMS, MMS and Email, the Nokia 6500 Slide also supports Nokia Xpress audio messages and flash messages (text messages are instantly displayed upon receipt.

Summary

The Nokia 6500 Slide is a very decent feature-packed, lower-cost alternative the Nokia N95. If you're looking for something more slender, consider the Nokia 6500 Classic candy bar phone.
Nokia 6500 - Slide vs Classic: The Nokia 6500 Classic is slimmer, has a candy bar form factor, has a 2 MP camera (the Slide has a 3.2 MP), and the Classic is also a little cheaper (£50 cheaper) on SIM free and PAYG.
The 6500 Slide has better video capture resolution, 0.2-inch larger display, and a memory card slot (no card slot on the Nokia 6500 classic - just 1 GB internal memory).

FEATURES

96.5 x 46.5 x 16.4 mm, 123 g
Talk time (6 hours), Standby time (320 hours)
2.2-inch 240 x 320 pixels, 16.7 million colour screen
Ambient light sensor
20 MB phone memory, microSD memory card slot (up to 4 GB)
Quad-band (850, 900, 1800 and 1900 Mhz)
Bluetooth 2.0, EDGE, PictBridge
2.5mm AV connector, Micro USB connector, Tv-Out
Games: High Roller Casino, Golf Tour, Rally 3D, Snake 3
3.2 megapixel camera with auto focus, 8x digital zoom and LED flash
Secondary camera (176 × 144, 15 fps)
Video capture: VGA (15 fps) and 176 × 144 (30 fps), 4x zoom
SMS, MMS, Email (Push Email), Instant messaging
Nokia Xpress audio messaging (AMS) - voice clip via MMS
3G TV video calling and TV conference via TV-Out
Music player: MP3, MP4, AAC, eAAC+, and WMA
Video streaming: H.263 & MPEG4 (up to QVGA, 15 fps), and H.264 (QCIF 15fps)
PIM tools, voice dialling, voice recording
Visual FM radio with RDS
WAP 2.0 browser, Opera Mini browser

Courtesy: http://www.mobilesift.co.uk/review/nokia-6500-slide

Friday's Movie Talk

JUMPER - 2.0 out of 5 Stars

• Director: Doug Liman
• Producer: Vince Gerardis, Ralph Vicinanza, Marc S. Fischer
• Screenwriter: David S. Goyer, Jim Uhls, Simon Kinberg
• Stars: Hayden Christensen, Samuel L. Jackson, Jamie Bell, Diane Lane, Max Thieriot, AnnaSophia Robb, Rachel Bilson
• MPAA Rating: PG-13

A genetic anomaly allows a young man to teleport himself anywhere. He discovers this gift has existed for centuries and finds himself in a war that has been raging for thousands of years between "Jumpers" and those who have sworn to kill them.

Fridays' Tech Talk - Sony Handycam HDR-SR1

Sony Handycam HDR-SR1

Rank: 8/10 - Excellent

Price range: $849.95 - $1,321.99

The good: Hard disk holds about four hours of best-quality HD video; sharp, saturated, low-noise video; excellent build quality; fast, smooth focus with effective image stabilization.

The bad: Mediocre still photos; frequent motion artifacts in video; lame but necessary bundled software; no windscreen filter for microphone.

The bottom line: The Sony Handycam HDR-SR1's combination of hard disk capacity, easy adapatability, great design, and a broad feature set make it the consumer HD model to beat for 2006.

Specs: Video input type: Camcorder; Optical zoom: 10 x; Media type: Hard disk drive

What are Green computers?

According to Greenpeace, computers had an average lifespan of just two years in 2005, down from six years in 1997. Electronics companies and consumers discard hundreds of thousands of old computers and electronic products each year, contributing to the 20 million to 50 million tons of e-waste generated annually. This electronic trash contains toxic chemicals and pollutants that wind up in the water we drink and the air we breathe. Thousands of old computers are illegally shipped to Asia, where they are dumped in scrap yards, leaving child laborers exposed to toxic chemicals and poisons.

Fortunately, an alternative exists: refurbishing companies. These companies can step in and restore machines to working order or at least ensure any unusable parts and materials are recycled rather than shipped to landfills.

Reader Comments:

Saba - November 5, 2007 05:17 PM

I completely agree with Ms. Siddiqui's comments. Eloquent and well thought out. We, the consumers, need to think about the effect our favorite toys have on the world, and funds should be directed toward research on the topic.

Hamilton - November 6, 2007 11:31 AM

Very sloppy journalism, unfortunately. Apple has committed to eliminate toxic substances by the end of the 2008, not 2010 as stated. This puts Apple at the front of the industry in taking the toxic elimination topic seriously.

Courtesy: www.businessweek.com

Today, the technology, innovation, & Introspection are leading the human mind into the high salary figures. When I was in my childhood, my Mom & Dad used to force me to read and spit in the exams to get marks, dreaming that Marks will give high ranks, high ranks will give good jobs. Probably they doesn't that, People are there earning high salaries with or without degrees.

This morning when I was skimming through an article in Yahoo homepage, found that these ten jobs prove that you can grow your salary to six figures without a law degree or a medical school diploma. In all ten cases, online career center training can help you learn the skills to pursue a career with megabucks potential while continuing to build experience at your current job.

I recommend to read this article :
10 Six figure Jobs

Courtesy: Yahoo.com

Presenteeism - How much does it make?

“Presenteeism is part of our culture of work,” said Vicky Lovell, director of employment and work/life programs at the Institute for Women’s Policy Research, a nonprofit group. “Some workers think the company is going to fall apart without them. But many simply fear being suspended or fired if they don’t show up.”

In a telephone survey of nearly 1,000 adults conducted by the National Foundation for Infectious Diseases, more than one-third of workers said they felt pressured to go to work when sick. About the same number reported that they had picked up the flu from a colleague in the workplace.

In a recent survey of 326 human resources executives by the research firm Wolters Kluwer, 56 percent said presenteeism had become a problem in their companies, up from 39 percent two years ago.

“We work in a Dilbert environment these days,” said Brett Gorovsky, an analyst at Wolters Kluwer. “We’re in closed office spaces, where germs are a bigger concern. And there’s downsizing. There are fewer people to backfill now, so workers more often feel they have to show up.”

Because of lost productivity, ill workers on the job account for as much as 60 percent of corporate health costs, according to researchers at Cornell University — more than absentee workers, and far more than companies pay in direct medical and disability costs.

Shapping CPU's @ AMD vs Intel

It's the epic, age-old battle that just keeps being resurrected. Chip-giant Intel and the underdog Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) go head-to-head for desktop dominance. So what will 2008 hold for desktop processors? We've uncovered both company's plans for 2008 to allow you to decide just which purchase will suit your home or small business.

The harsh reality for AMD is that over the past two years, Intel has absolutely dominated the market in terms of performance. But that's just one half of the price-performance ratio, and AMD's willingness to slash prices and aggressively pursue the low- and midrange tiers of the desktop-computing market cannot be overrated, despite the company's technological lag.

Intel's current CPU road map is a continuation of the company's "tick-tock" strategy. According to this approach, each year the company alternates its emphasis between shrinking its CPU fabrication process and implementing a new micro architecture.

AMD has been surprisingly candid about its issues and is hopeful that 2008 will tell a different story. At the end of 2007, AMD bid its Athlon series of CPUs adieu and finally released its next-generation Phenom processors, a product line that included the intriguing presence of a triple-core line of processors. One of the biggest advantages AMD has been able to claim over Intel is that Phenom processors are the first native quad-core CPUs on the market, meaning all cores are integrated on to a single die. A shared L3 cache and improved power management were also touted as key features in this new micro architecture.

Courtesy: PC World.com

Indian stock market falls

India’s stock market is coming down to earth and, along with it, the dreams of companies that planned big market flotations to raise funds for projects that are yet to happen. Emaar MGF Land, a real estate joint venture 42% owned by Emaar of Dubai, decided on February 8 to pull its float, which had originally been expected to raise nearly $2 billion, because of “adverse” market conditions. A day earlier, Wockhardt Hospitals, a leading healthcare company, pulled a smaller float.

The trend was underlined this morning when Reliance Power, which raised $3 billion last month in the country’s biggest ever initial public offering (IPO), listed on the markets. During the day, it dropped as low as 21% below the Rs450 issue price and closed 17.2% down at Rs372.50. That was a marked reversal of analysts’ talk a short time ago of it hitting Rs900 or at least Rs550-600.

Reliance’s debut helped to pull shares overall down by 4.78% to the lowest level in nearly three weeks. The Bombay Stock Exchange’s key 30-share Sensex fell to 16,630.91, its lowest close since January 22, and 21.6% below its record 21,206.77 on January 10.
Reliance - which is part of Anil Dhirubhai Ambani Group (ADAG) and is controlled by Anil Ambani, one of India’s richest businessmen - mobilized bids totaling an astronomic $180 billion last month for its IPO, even though it has yet to produce a revenue stream. The future of the company – and the stock - depends on Ambani’s ability to turn plans for 13 power projects totalling 28,200MW into reality.

The company drained so much money out of the stock market last month that it helped to trigger the slide at a time when the market was being buffeted by downward trends internationally. So the irony is that Reliance’s own poor performance today was triggered by its almost unreal success last month.

The link between the Reliance and Emaar flotations is that both are built on dreams for the future. Just as Reliance had to admit in its prospectus that “we cannot assure you that our power projects will commence operations as expected”, so Emaar’s prospectus admitted that “most of our projects are in the preliminary stages of planning and require approvals or permits.” The prospectus added that 83% of the land required was still zoned as agricultural – a problem that will also hit Reliance’s projects.

Anyone who knows anything about industrial and infrastructure development in India knows that substantial resistance is building up against rezoning agricultural land, and the country has an appalling history on planned power projects. So it is scarcely surprising that both companies have been hit now in the current international market gloom.

India’s fundamentals are still strong, even though economic growth forecasts are down below 9%. Investors are looking for comfort to the Budget that Palaniappan Chidambaram, the finance minister, will deliver on February 28. When Reliance hit its high spot last month, he said that “investors are investing in the future of India.” He was right of course, though they are now more choosy than they were a month ago.

And, as I wrote in my last post on this subject, many market professionals seem almost relieved the Sensex has fallen from the “absurd overvaluations” of its peak and that dreams are now being questioned.

Courtesy: money.cnn.com

Forwarding e-mails?

Employees who forward office documents and emails to personal email accounts pose the greatest security risk to an organisation, according to a report by Websense. The study notes that the problem is severe in the banking, financial and insurance services (BFSI) and IT-BPO sectors. The other disturbing trend is that despite security solutions and systems in place, 49 per cent of the employees receive spam mail on their official IDs. This implies that many official/corporate email IDs are available on the internet.

IDC, a market intelligence firm, has identified some key trends on the web that organisations need to be prepared for. These include web 2.0 technologies, blended web-based threats and data loss prevention. Analysts believe the threats are getting sophisticated by the day and are able to evade traditional security solutions.

Surendra Singh, regional director, SAARC and India, Websense, said,"While organisations deploy enough anti-virus and gateway-level security, not much is being done at the web security level.
"Awareness regarding web security is still very low. While some sectors such as the IT-BPO are proactive, others are not on par to tackle web 2.0 issues. The other problem is that patches are not updated regularly. In some cases, delays range from a few days to a month." The employee computing risk assessment (ECRA) study, which Websense conducts, highlights the security and financial risks faced by organisations due to web surfing by employees and also showcases the potential productivity loss and bandwidth abuse.

While conducting ECRA for a software development firm in India with 2,500 employees, Websense monitored almost 14,308 hits to sites that may create legal liability issues to the company. Categories that fall under legal liability include proxy avoidance, adult material, violence, militancy & extremism, hacking, gambling and weapons. The agency also monitored about 316,338 hits to sites that could pose a security risk. Categories under security risk are spyware, keyloggers, phishing and fraudulent sites, freeware and unwanted software downloads.
There are two reasons for this state of affairs. The first is that despite security threats and damages to organisations, budgets continue to be an issue. Ideally, organisations should reserve at least 10 per cent of their IT budget for security. Secondly, while most firms have security policies in place, it is not communicated to the employees in the right way. IT managers of over 450 organisations in India across verticals and representing almost 150 medium and small enterprises participated in the study, which was commissioned by Websense and conducted by the Nielsen Company.

Danger Zone Employees sending work documents to personal email IDs

Employees clicking on links within emails sent by unknown people

Employees using their work computer for personal activities

Employees mailing company information without appropriate authorisation

Courtesy: www.rediff.com

The character of question ?

A challenging piece of news for many politicians. You can imagine the briefing meetings:

“Hey,” says the consultant charged with the responsibility of molding the candidate. “It seems that the voters aren’t as interested in our positions on the issues like health care, the war in Iraq or even the economy.”

“No?” says the candidate. “What are they interested in?”

“Character.”

“What does that mean?” the candidate says, shifting nervously in their seat.

“Well, it means you have to have some.”

“What kind are they looking for?”

“It doesn’t matter,” says the consultant, growing somewhat impatient. “Character isn’t something you can triangulate based on polls. It’s something you have independent of other people’s demands. It’s inside you.”

There is a thoughtful silence. ”I’m sure I have some in there someplace,” the candidate says at last. “But you might want to check where I can get a little bit more, just in case.”

The good news for the candidates is that Character, having been absent from much of the business universe in 2007, is at this moment wafting around looking for anybody interested in anyone who wants to spend time with it.

There are many things that make up Character, but its most attractive features are well known:

• Character is honest, and always does what it has promised to do;
• Character is simple and straightforward and always means what it says;
• Character tries never to do things that will hurt people just to make a little bit of money or get a vote;
• Character is loyal to its friends and polite to its adversaries;
• Character has empathy for those less fortunate;
• Character is guided by principles that do not change with the weather or the polls, but is not so stiff-necked as to impose its views on others who are not persuaded;
• Character listens to other people and cares about what they say.

There are other qualities voters are ostensibly looking for today: experience, new ideas, a renunciation of the decades-long pattern of partisan stupidity. But none of them are as important, it appears, as the demonstration of this very precious and elusive entity.

My sense is that right now we can tell very clearly who’s got it and who ain’t.

I like Character and I think you do too. Let’s just hope it doesn’t blow it all today, and sticks around long enough to determine what happens in November.

Service sector contracted in Jan ?

For the first time in almost five years, the nation’s services sector — including restaurants, travel, banking, construction and retail — contracted in January, stoking rising worries of a recession.

The Institute for Supply Management reported that its index of service sector business activity declined to 44.6 in January from a revised reading of 54.4 in December.

Some economists agree, and undoubtedly, so do the nearly 1.3 million unemployed workers who face losing an average $282 a week in benefits before June.

Digg this interesting one !!

In an effort to offset tax payer costs for the operational costs of its organization, the IRS is introducing a line of products, beginning with this fantastic pencil sharpener.

http://digg.com/business_finance/IRS_Pencil_Sharpener_Now_Available_2

H1 B workers vs US-workers ?

A few years ago, Vishal Goel had high hopes of moving from his native India to the U.S. to work as a computer programmer. He approached Patni Computer Systems, a Mumbai company that provides tech services to many American businesses, and Patni agreed to apply for a U.S. work visa on his behalf. By 2004, Goel was in Bloomington, Ill., working for Patni at State Farm Mutual Automobile Insurance, the largest car insurer in the country.

But this was no dream job come true. Goel's base salary was $23,310, about half the $44,000 that Patni had said it would pay on the visa application, according to a lawsuit he has filed against the company. When Goel complained, one official said that Patni would brand him a "troublemaker" and that his parents in India would be harassed unless he stopped, the suit alleges. Goel, who left Patni in 2005, filed suit in November, 2007, in federal court in Illinois. He's suing along with a former colleague, Peeush Goyal, who alleges he was subjected to similar treatment. Patni declined to comment, though in court documents it denies the charges.

Goel's is not an isolated case. A number of the most active users of the work-visa program, for what are known as H-1B visas, have been accused of underpaying or otherwise mistreating workers. Last year, Patni paid $2.4 million to 607 H-1B visa workers after a Labor Dept. investigation uncovered systematic underpayment of wages. "I highly suspect that these employment practices are widespread among the tech-outsourcing firms," says Ron Hira, assistant professor of public policy at Rochester Institute of Technology, who will testify as an expert witness in the Goel case.

The Goel lawsuit is one of the first filed in U.S. courts by a visa worker against his employer, perhaps because of the murky legal status of such workers. The estimated 500,000 people in the U.S. on H-1Bs are by definition citizens of other nations, and they're usually beholden to employers that can transfer them home at will. The Goel case provides rare insight into how one outfit allegedly has treated workers it brings into the U.S.

SIMPLE GREED

In their case, Goel and Goyal say that Patni regularly underpays employees in the U.S. "This forces the same financially strapped individuals ... to incur the expense of retaining an attorney to try and obtain the money to which they are entitled," the suit charges. If workers complain, the plaintiffs say, Patni threatens to sue them. They charge that Patni's motivation is simple greed. "The more H-1B employees that Patni is underpaying, the more total profit that is made by Patni," the suit alleges.

Goel, Goyal, and their lawyer, Thomas J. Arkell, declined to comment for this article because the litigation is ongoing. Patni says in court papers it didn't promise Goel $44,000 and says he has no "right to action" because he has no claim under the laws cited in the case.

The Goel lawsuit raises questions for U.S. workers, too. The H-1B program requires companies that bring employees into the U.S. to pay the prevailing wage in that job, so as not to depress the salaries of Americans in similar occupations. Documents filed in the suit appear to show that Patni told the Labor Dept. it would pay Goel a base salary of $44,000, which it said was more than the $43,867 prevailing wage it determined for a midlevel programmer and analyst. Yet even after working the equivalent of 23 days of overtime at $11.72 an hour, Goel earned a total of $35,305 in 2004. "Patni's underpayment of wages not only harms its H-1B employees but also harms the wages of U.S. employees," the lawsuit charges.

Many prominent U.S. companies use outsourcers, especially for tech services and support. Patni's largest client is General Electric (GE). Others include MetLife (MET) and St. Jude Medical. GE and MetLife declined to comment on Patni and whether they monitor how it manages its workers. St. Jude says it advocates for contract workers who file complaints, although no Patni workers have done so.

State Farm has turned increasingly to Patni and is now its No. 2 client. Dick Luedke, a State Farm spokesman, says that visa workers receive fair treatment. "Working conditions at all our State Farm locations are monitored and maintained without distinction of State Farm or vendor employee," he says. "We of course negotiate how much we pay the vendor; what the vendor does to get the work done is up to the vendor." According to the Goel suit, State Farm paid Patni "in excess of" $100,000 per worker.

State Farm has had layoffs as it has brought in Patni workers. Outplacement specialist Challenger, Gray & Christmas says the insurer has let go 10,000 workers nationwide since 1995, though Luedke says only one quarter of those were "involuntary severances." He says Patni employees have not replaced staffers and the insurer's own IT staff has risen from 5,500 in 1995 to 5,900 in 2007. Luedke says State Farm doesn't track how many outsourced workers it uses.

George Moraetes is a U.S. worker who believes he was affected by the H1-B program. A specialist in info tech security, he worked at State Farm from 2002 to 2004, when the company declined to extend his contract. Now in Chicago, he's unable to find a staff position in his specialty. "The whole industry is being outsourced and contracted," he says. "The American IT worker is a dying breed."

Moraetes has empathy, not anger, for employees such as Goel who come to the U.S. on H-1Bs. "The workers are living in squalor," he says. "I feel sorry for them."

The H-1B program could get an overhaul later this year. Senators Richard J. Durbin (D-Ill.) and Charles E. Grassley (R-Iowa) have proposed reforms because of what they consider widespread abuse. "There are simply too many loopholes that companies can use to get around the original intent of the H-1B visa," says Grassley in an e-mail.

As for Goel, he hasn't given up on his dream of living in the U.S. He's in California with another employer serving as his visa sponsor. His case is expected to go to trial later this year.

Courtesy: Businessweek.com

India Inc., slowing down ?

At a time when all attention is focussed on the stock markets, India Inc seems to be headed for another rough quarter ahead. Companies are largely expected to report a slowdown in sales and reduced margins in fourth quarter, which is also the financial year end.

An analysis of the companies and consequent industries that represent the sensex show that there will be more industries that will struggle in the next three months than those who will sail through. A rapidly changing external enviroment, in US and in the commodities market is also expected to increase uncertainly in corporate performance in the near term.

The signs of a slowdown, of course, has been visible in the current financial year. Over the last two quarters, automobile companies Tata Motors and Mahindra & Mahindra which make commercial vehicles and tractors and more sensitive to ground realities, have seen their profits drop. Though, the companies have managed to sell more, they have had to cut prices, despite an increase in input costs. Says brokerage firm First Global's Shankar Sharma: "We continue to be negative on Tata Motors."

In the last couple of years, companies grew rapidly as there was a demand pull in nearly all sectors. Coming out of years of cost-cutting in the early 2000s, companies reported a big growth in profitability. In the last two years, a spurt in input prices like metals and fuel first ate into the margins.

Now, with demand growth tapering off, analysts expect companies to find the going tough. Says a Kotak Mutual Fund manager: "There was a pent up demand that saw numbers come in rapidly. From now on, it will be a more stable growth for companies."

The sectors that will be affected most will be automobiles, commodities and the IT sector. The overall global sentiment in markets across the world is expected to have an affect on metals, petrochemicals and even oil. Though, in the current quarter companies like Tata Steel and Hindalco have been more affected by large acquisitions, lower metal prices are expected to supress overall sales.

There could be a silver lining. Analysts expect that the slowdown in US will eventually have a bearing on oil prices. They expect global oil prices to ease in the coming months, leading to cut in input prices across industry. Says the Kotak Manager: "In that scenario, a slowdown in demand can be arrested in the near term."

The industries that are expected to beat the trend are telecom firms which are adding million of new subscribers. Companies who also have committed orders for building infrastructure like Bhel and L&T will also sail through and not be affected seriously.

Courtesy: Times of India

Gaints beat Pats ...

The Giants had the perfect answer for the suddenly imperfect Patriots: a big, bad defense and an improbable comeback led by their own Mr. Cool quarterback, Eli Manning.
In one of football's biggest shockers, New York shattered New England's unbeaten season as Manning hit Plaxico Burress on a 13-yard fade with 35 seconds left in the Super Bowl. Sunday's 17-14 win was the Giants' 11th straight on the road, and the first time the Patriots tasted defeat in more than a year.

It was the most bitter of losses, too, because New England (18-1) was one play from winning, but its defense couldn't stop a 12-play, 83-yard drive that featured a spectacular leaping catch by David Tyree, who scored New York's first touchdown.

Tom Brady, the league's Most Valuable Player and winner of his first three Super Bowls, was battered all game. He was sacked five times, hurried a dozen more, and at one point wound up on his knees, his hands on his hips following one of many poor throws.
Hardly a familiar position for the record-setting quarterback. And a totally strange outcome for a team that seemed destined for historic glory.

Healthy.. Talk!

Here’s how to begin

Choose the right diet.

Not every plan is right for every person—though some are wrong for everyone. Steer clear of fad diets that are too low in calories (below 1200 calories a day), that eliminate whole food groups or are too expensive or too strict to maintain.

Aim for balance.

Your diet should be composed of 40% healthy carbohydrates (whole grains, fruits and vegetables), 30% lean protein (chicken, fish) and 30% healthy fat (olive oil, nuts).

Don’t skip breakfast.

Studies show that people who miss breakfast often consume more calories later in the day. Try having unsweetened cereal with skim milk or an egg-white omelet with a slice of whole-wheat toast.

Fill up on fiber.

Eating fiber-rich foods such as apples, almonds and spinach helps you feel full. It also may prevent certain cancers, lower your cholesterol and reduce your risk of heart disease.

Don’t be afraid of fat.

A little fat provides satiety. Foods with omega-3 fatty acids—found in walnuts, salmon and soybeans, among others—are healthy sources of unsaturated fat.

Cut down on processed foods.

Sugar contains empty calories and can cause spikes in blood sugar that leave you feeling hungrier. Most processed foods also contain excessive amounts of sodium, which can lead to high blood pressure.

Techie ... Talk !

How Blu-ray Discs work?

the introduction of Blu-ray Discs (BD) in 2006. With their high storage capacity, Blu-ray discs can hold and play back large quantities of high-definition video and audio, as well as photos, data and other digital content.

A current, single-sided, standard DVD can hold 4.7 GB of information. That's about the size of an average two-hour, standard-definition movie with a few extra features. But a high-definition movie, which has a much clearer image, takes up about five times more bandwidth and therefore requires a disc with about five times more storage.

Disc structure

Laser and optics

Like its rival format HD DVD, Blu-ray uses a "blue" (technically violet) laser operating at a wavelength of 405 nm to read and write data. Conventional DVDs and CDs use red and near infrared lasers at 650 nm and 780 nm respectively.

The blue-violet laser's shorter wavelength makes it possible to store more information on a 12 cm CD/DVD sized disc. The minimum "spot size" on which a laser can be focused is limited by diffraction, and depends on the wavelength of the light and the numerical aperture of the lens used to focus it. By decreasing the wavelength, increasing the numerical aperture from 0.60 to 0.85 and making the cover layer thinner to avoid unwanted optical effects, the laser beam can be focused to a smaller spot. This allows more information to be stored in the same area. In addition to the optical improvements, Blu-ray Discs feature improvements in data encoding that further increase the capacity.

Hard-coating technology

Since the Blu-ray data layer is closer to the surface of the disk, compared to the DVD standard, it was at first more vulnerable to scratches. The first discs were housed in cartridges for protection. Advances in polymer technology eventually made the cartridges unnecessary.

Buy @ Amazon.com : Samsung BD-P1400 1080p Blu-Ray Disc Player

Microsoft bids Yahoo for $44.6bn !

In its boldest-ever acquisition move, Microsoft sent a letter to Yahoo's board on Thursday night, offering $31 per share for the Internet media company, a 62 percent premium over its Nasdaq closing stock price that day. The price is still below Yahoo's year-high of $34.08 in late October. Yahoo said on Friday its board will evaluate the offer.
Yahoo shares shot up 45.5 percent to $27.91.

“This is a decision we have — and I have — thought long and hard about,” Ballmer said. “We are confident it’s the right path for Microsoft and Yahoo.”

Coutesy: msnbc.com, reuters.com

How to start a business ?

Business Opportunity involves the sale or lease of any product, service, equipment, etc. that will enable the purchaser-licensee to begin a business. The licensor or seller of a business opportunity usually declares that it will secure or assist the buyer in finding a suitable location or provide the product to the purchaser-licensee. This is different from the sale of an independent business, in which there is no continued relationship required by the seller.

Examples of biz-opps classified ads are:

• $3500 Weekly! Work From Home!
• Real Results Now! $360k 1st Year! No Gimmicks!
• $$ Make $1000+ per week... EVERY WEEK! $$
• Hottest Opportunity Ever (Numbers don't lie)!!
• Get 96 sites for $7,795. Then Retire! Call 1-800-XXX-XXXX.
• Many People Earn $36,000/year in Income, But . . . Very Few Earn $30,000/year working only five-six hours per week.

Courtesy:
http://www.entrepreneur.com/business-opportunities/index.html?cam=msnbc&cid=LeftNav&size=Oppfinder#msnbc
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Business_opportunity

Starbucks coffee @ $1.00 only !

Yes, you heard it right !

Starbucks has tested with $1.00 coffee in its home town Seattle. In order to face the stiff competition the company has decided to change its business model and serve the customers at its best.

Courtesy: Starbucks
Coffee Company is the leading retailer, roaster and brand of specialty coffee in the world.

SBUX (STARBUCKS CORPORATION)
20.45 +0.36 (1.79%) Jan 24 4:00pm ET
Open: 20.09 High: 20.48 Low: 19.92		Volume: 20,851,560 Avg Vol: 17,397,000 Mkt Cap: 14.88B

Best Stocks for 2008 !!!

We'll say this for the U.S. economy: It can take a punch.

Annaly Capital Management
Berkshire Hathaway
Dick's Sporting Goods
Electronic Arts
Genentech
General Electric
Jacobs Engineering
Merrill Lynch
Petrobras
St. Joe

Lets cross our fingers and see what happens in another 345 days...

Excellent Planning comes with GPS Photos

If a picture is worth a thousand words, a picture with geotagging can add a few hundred more.

Now, naturalists can map their bird sightings or chart out seal populations. Archaeologists can mark where they unearth artifacts. Travelers can wow family and friends and bring life to slideshows.

"When you add a map to a presentation, you've added another dimension, especially if you say, ‘I took this great trip to China, and it was 5,000 miles over the course of a month’ and they see a route," said Andy Williams, general manager with the photo-sharing site SmugMug Inc.

Higham has used geotagging to help friends and family track his yearlong journey around the world and a rafting trip later down the Colorado River.

Courtesy: msnbc

Finally Super Bowl !!!

High Alert Action Packed between NY Giants & NE Patriots

Now comes Mission Impossible: beating the undefeated New England Patriots in two weeks in a Super Bowl match up hardly anyone saw coming.

“We haven’t been given a shot, but we’re here and I think we’re deserving of it,” Manning said.

“We’ll try to elevate our game for one last performance,” said Brady

Writer feels, "Go Pats ".

Apple vs Sony ' World's thinnnest laptop

Sony VAIO X505 Extreme in 2003

Product summary

The good: Beautiful design; extremely portable; above-average performance; solid software bundle.

The bad: Very expensive; terrible speakers; no built-in optical drive or modem; skimpy battery life.

The bottom line: Sony's elegant VAIO X505 is an eminently portable laptop with just enough features and performance, but like a fine work of art, it's too expensive for most people.

Specs: Processor: Intel Pentium M (1.1 GHz); RAM installed: 512 MB; Weight: 1.85 lbs

Apple Air








Tech Specs:

Intel Core 2 Duo processor with 4MB on-chip shared L2 cache running at full processor speed

• 800MHz frontside bus
• 2GB of 667MHz DDR2 SDRAM onboard

Storage

• 80GB 4200-rpm Parallel ATA hard disk drive²
• Optional 64GB solid-state drive²
• Optional external USB MacBook Air SuperDrive

Electrical and operating requirements

• Line voltage: 100V to 240V AC
• Frequency: 50Hz to 60Hz
• Operating temperature: 50° to 95°F (10° to 35°C)
• Storage temperature: -13° to 113°F (-24° to 45°C)
• Relative humidity: 0% to 90% noncondensing
• Maximum operating altitude: 10,000 feet
• Maximum storage altitude: 15,000 feet
• Maximum shipping altitude: 35,000 feet

Integrated 37-watt-hour lithium-polymer battery

45W MagSafe power adapter with cable management system

MagSafe power adapter port

Built-in AirPort Extreme Wi-Fi wireless networking (based on IEEE 802.11n draft specification); IEEE 802.11a/b/g compatible

Built-in Bluetooth 2.1 + EDR (Enhanced Data Rate)

Coutesy: CNET, APPLE.COM

India’s Tata Motor to launch $2,500 car

May be this one : "People's Car

the ’People’s Car’, it will determine Tata’s place in the global automotive arena, where the battle is increasingly being fought in emerging economies such as India, China and Russia.

“Small cars have always been popular in India, even when oil prices were low,” said Ashvin Chotai, Asian auto analyst based in London, who will be at Thursday’s unveiling in New Delhi.

Copyright 2008 Reuters.

$3 quadrillion Plaintiff ??

Hurricane Katrina's victims have put a price tag on their suffering and it is staggering — including one plaintiff seeking the unlikely sum of $3 quadrillion.

The total number — $3,014,170,389,176,410 — is the dollar figure so far sought from some 489,000 claims filed against the federal government over damage from the failure of levees and flood walls following the Aug. 29, 2005, hurricane.

"It's important to the person who filed it, so we're taking every single claim seriously," Corps spokeswoman Amanda Jones said.

Copyright 2008 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed

Extra 14 years

To get an extra 14 years of life,

Don't smoke,
Eat lots of fruits and vegetables,
Exercise regularly and
Drink alcohol in moderation.

Surveyed by: Kay-Tee Khaw of the University of Cambridge

Courtesy: Yahoo Inc.,