Jennifer Lopez is going strong with her new boyfriend, 24-year-old dancer Caspar Smart -- but that doesn't mean she's thinking about marriage again. At least not yet.
dolphin tale dolphin tale crock pot recipes crock pot recipes bob ward bob ward susan lucci
PARK CITY, Utah (Reuters) ? "Beasts of the Southern Wild" and "The House I Live In" won the top awards at the Sundance Film Festival on Saturday, making them likely favorites for independent movie audiences in 2012.
Directed by Benh Zeitlin and set in impoverished Louisiana, "Beasts of the Southern Wild" picked up the jury prize for best drama as well as best cinematography with its poetic tale of the bond between a father and a daughter.
The documentary winner, "The House I Live In," was one of many documentaries at Sundance 2012 that looked at a struggling America at Sundance 2012. It is an examination of America's long war on drugs and critiques of U.S. drug policies, its court system, prisons and their impact on minorities.
"The war on drugs is a terrible scar on America," said director Eugene Jarecki.
Special juries of industry professionals vote on winners, and those are considered the top prizes but audiences also vote for their favorites.
"The Surrogate," which stars Helen Hunt and John Hawkes and is about a man's quest to lose his virginity while mostly confined to an iron lung, won the Audience Award for best drama.
The film, based on the life of poet and journalist Mark O'Brien, fetched one of the highest selling prices at the festival -- a reported $6 million -- and with its mix of comedy and drama could turn out to be one of the bigger U.S. indie hits in cinemas to come out of the festival.
"Love is a journey, that's it," said director Ben Lewin when accepting his trophy, quoting a line from the film.
"SEARCHING FOR SUGAR MAN"
The Audience Award for documentary was given to "The Invisible War," about an epidemic of sexual assault in the U.S. military and shining a light on a little known problem.
Other documentary special jury prizes went to "Love Free or Die," about the Episcopal Church's first openly gay bishop, Gene Robinson; and "Ai Weiwei: Never Sorry," about the Chinese artist and activist who was detained for 81 days last year.
"Ai Weiwei: Never Sorry" director Alison Klayman took a picture of the crowd upon accepting the award and promised to send it to the Chinese artist, who was spent 81 days in government detention last year and felt it was too risky to attend the festival from China.
Sundance, which is backed by Robert Redford's Sundance Institute for filmmaking, is the largest U.S. gathering for independent movies. Festival winners go on to become some of the most talked about films in art houses.
Many of the more hyped fictional films for Sundance 2012 did not live up to their buzz, with many including "Red Lights" starring Robert De Niro and Spike Lee's "Red Hook Summer" disappointing critics, although films have still sold.
In addition to prizes for U.S. films, Sundance also gives awards in world cinema.
"Searching for Sugar Man," about the search for an obscure 1970s Detroit folk singer known as Rodriguez, won the audience award for best world documentary as well as a special jury prize. It was one of the most popular films of the festival, which served as the d3ebut for documentaries such as "An Inconvenient Truth."
Chile's "Violeta Went To Heaven," based on the life of Chilean folk singer Violeta Parra's journey from a poor upbringing to national hero, won the jury prize for best drama, and "The Law In These Parts" was the jury's pick for best documentary.
(Reporting By Christine Kearney; editing by Mohammad Zargham and Bill Trott)
herman cain accuser election day joe frazier where do i vote wheel of fortune today show smokin joe
Sorry, Readability was unable to parse this page for content.
Source: http://pjmedia.com/instapundit/136092/
zynga stock sam houston state university sam houston state university bradley manning whoopi goldberg tebowing tebowing
Despite all the hype and controversy, critics are pretty impressed by Del Rey's atmospheric music.
By Gil Kaufman
Lana Del Rey in "Born To Die"
Photo: Interscope
The now-infamous "Saturday Night Live" performance fail. All the hype about her looks, her path to the spotlight and the obligatory album leak a week before her debut dropped.
Lana Del Rey survived a lifetime's worth of slings and arrows before her major-label debut, Born to Die, was even released. But now that it's officially out, critics have had a chance to listen to the atmospheric tracks she's put together, and for the most part, they're pretty impressed.
The Chicago Tribune gave it two out of four stars and said the finished product is not always as interesting as the run-up to its release. "[The album] positions itself as a knowing retro commentary. It borrows heavily from B movies starring various second- and third-level 'Rebel Without a Cause' bad boys on motorcycles, string-drenched 'Last Kiss' pop tunes in which young lovers die in each other's arms, beehived teens-with-attitude declaring, 'He hit me and it felt like a kiss,' " music critic Greg Kot wrote. While Kot said Del Rey wishes to be taken seriously as "the bad girl in a gown, the cabaret singer with a masochistic streak," he said she's not always up to the task, even as he praised her distinctive, draggy vocal delivery and the dramatic, eerie arrangements from producer Emilie Haynie.
Over at BBC, the focus was squarely on the music, saying above and beyond the drama, Born to Die is about "something older and more mysterious than that; the extraordinary, resilient power of the pop song." The reviewer lamented that nothing on the 12-track album quite reaches the exquisite bummerness of lead single "Video Games," with several of the songs running "perilously close, while revealing there's more to her than the love-stunned torch singer [of that song]." What makes the album so fascinating and sets Del Rey apart from the typical "I'm hot, you're hot" pop tart is her "preoccupation with Hollywood archetypes of American femininity, and her ability to shape-shift between them."
MTV News' own James Montgomery believed the hype, writing that the album was "positively brimming with atmospherics — soaring, sonorous strings, echoing electronic boom-bap, morose, maudlin guitar crescendos — all of which imbue it with a truly epic (if not unnecessarily dramatic) scope." For him, the album is a "thrilling headphone experience" that sounds like the $1 million he suspected it cost to make.
The U.K.'s Guardian also praised the "sumptuous" orchestration and Del Rey's "fine" voice. But after being impressed by the "beguiling description of a mundane love" affair in "Video Games," the reviewer said the album's other lyrics are "incredibly heavy-handed in their attempts to convince you that Lana del Rey is the doomed but devoted partner of a kind of Athena poster bad boy, all white vest, cheekbones and dangling ciggie." If anything, the Guardian critic didn't buy the Del Rey tough-girl personality and said the best bet is to mostly ignore the lyrics and focus on "how magnificently most of the melodies have been constructed."
Leave your own review of Born to Die in the comments!
Related Videos Related ArtistsSource: http://www.mtv.com/news/articles/1678050/lana-del-rey-album-born-to-die-reviews.jhtml
jules verne als puppies miss universe 2011 contestants hells angels hells angels las vegas weather
FILE - In this Sept. 1, 2011 file photo, Senegalese President Abdoulaye Wade waves as he leaves the Elysee Palace in Paris, France. Senegal's highest court ruled Friday, Jan. 27, 2012, that the country's increasingly frail, 85-year-old president could run for a third term in next month's election, a deep blow to the country's opposition which has vowed to take to the streets if the leader does not step aside.(AP Photo/Jacques Brinon, File)
FILE - In this Sept. 1, 2011 file photo, Senegalese President Abdoulaye Wade waves as he leaves the Elysee Palace in Paris, France. Senegal's highest court ruled Friday, Jan. 27, 2012, that the country's increasingly frail, 85-year-old president could run for a third term in next month's election, a deep blow to the country's opposition which has vowed to take to the streets if the leader does not step aside.(AP Photo/Jacques Brinon, File)
Protesters set fires in a street after Senegal's highest court ruled that the country's increasingly frail, 85-year-old President Abdoulaye Wade could run for a third term in next month's presidential election, in Dakar, Senegal, Friday, Jan. 27, 2012. The ruling came as a deep blow to the country's opposition, which has vowed to take to the streets if the aging leader does not step aside. (AP Photo)
Protesters burn tires in a street after Senegal's highest court ruled that the country's increasingly frail, 85-year-old President Abdoulaye Wade could run for a third term in next month's presidential election, in Dakar, Senegal, Friday, Jan. 27, 2012. The ruling came as a deep blow to the country's opposition, which has vowed to take to the streets if the aging leader does not step aside. (AP Photo)
DAKAR, Senegal (AP) ? Senegal's highest court ruled Friday the country's increasingly frail, 85-year-old president could run for a third term in next month's election, a deep blow to the country's opposition, which has vowed to take to the streets if the aging leader does not step aside.
Minutes after the court's verdict, police opened fire with tear gas to disperse hundreds of young men who had gathered at a downtown roundabout. Protesters hid in side streets and in groups of five and six ran back out to lob rocks at the security forces.
The protests spread throughout the capital as demonstrators dragged wooden market tables into intersections and set them on fire. In the provincial capital of Kaolack, a mob set fire to the ruling party's headquarters, and in Thies, angry youths blocked the national highway, according to a private radio station.
The legality of President Abdoulaye Wade's candidacy is bitterly disputed because the constitution was revised soon after he assumed office in 2000 to impose a two-term limit. Wade argues the new law should not apply to him since he was elected before it took effect.
The court deliberated behind closed doors for hours before emerging and issuing a list of 14 approved candidates, including Wade. Senegalese pop star Youssou Ndour, arguably Africa's most famous musician, was not on the list ? another blow to the opposition, which had hoped that Ndour's candidacy would shine an international spotlight on the race.
"The fact that my candidacy was deemed unacceptable is a political matter. Those in power are afraid of me," said the Grammy-winning Ndour on the private TV station he owns. "I will not let go of this because when I decide to do something I do it all the way. This Saturday, I will draft an appeal."
Since early afternoon, hundreds of youths carrying cardboard signs calling for Wade's departure milled around a downtown square, where they vowed to spend the night in protest if the court approved the leader's candidacy.
Police wearing fiberglass helmets took up positions at strategic intersections in the capital. Businesses sent their employees home. Schools sent notes to parents asking them to pick up their children early.
A lawyer by training with multiple degrees from universities in France, Wade spent 25 years as the country's opposition leader. He ran and lost in four elections before his victory 11 years ago in an election hailed as a breakthrough for democracy on a continent better known for strongman rule. Former President Abdou Diouf stunned the world by calling Wade to concede defeat, a gesture unheard of in the region. Now many are wondering if Wade himself will step aside gracefully.
Since taking office, he has come under mounting criticism, first for delegating an increasing share of power to his son, as well as for the corruption scandals that have overshadowed his administration's achievements, including the building of numerous roads and bridges.
After winning a second term in 2007, Wade told reporters he would not seek a third term. He then reversed course, arguing that the term limits were imposed after he was elected, and that no law can be applied retroactively.
"I'm a lawyer too. And the constitution, it's me that revised it. All by myself. ... No one can interpret it better than me," Wade told the news portal Dakaractu.Com in an interview this week. "I was elected in 2000 on the basis of a law dating from 1963. After I was elected, I saw to it that a new constitution was adopted. Everyone knows that a law dictates the present and the future, but it cannot be retroactive."
Hours after the court's ruling, Wade addressed the nation. "Let us stop with this display of bad temper which leads to nothing," he said according to the state-owned news agency. "I did not ask for anything except the law. And the law is what was expressed."
Senegal is considered one of the most mature democracies in Africa, and unlike many of its neighbors, its democratic tradition dates to even before independence from France 51 years ago. Starting in the mid-1800s, France allowed its colony to elect a deputy who served in the French parliament.
And in his official biography, Wade traces his roots to the Cayor kingdom located in Senegal's central plains, where kings were elected by a committee of elders rather than through a hereditary system common in many other parts of Africa.
"What shocks people is that he would try to run for a third term," said the country's leading investigative journalist Abdou Latif Coulibaly, the editor-in-chief of The Gazette magazine who voted for Wade in 2000 but who is now supporting the opposition. "It's the problem of his age. It's the problem of the constitution. And to be frank, people are very scared that he will try to hand power to his son ? which is something that the population does not want at all."
Hours before the court was due to release its verdict, Pape Sy circled the city looking for an open gas station. For three days, a fuel strike had closed down gas stations, adding yet another point of applied pressure. Finally in the Medina neighborhood of the capital, he pulled in behind the 13 other cars lined up head-to-toe at a Total station, which had just reopened. His gasoline gauge had already dipped below 0.
"Things don't smell good," he said, summing up the mood in the capital. "There are economic problems, and these other issues are attaching themselves onto that like pieces of Scotch tape. People want change. ... To me this really feels like the end of a reign."
Unlike nearly all its neighbors, Senegal does not have history of violent demonstrations, or of military intervention in state affairs. The country was shaken, however, by the riots that shut down the capital last summer when Wade's party attempted to rush a law through parliament that would have created the post of vice president, a move that critics said was an attempt to create a mechanism of succession through which Wade could pass power to his son.
At Place de l'Obelisque, hundreds of youths gathered to protest before the court's decision, saying they planned to turn it into the equivalent of Egypt's Tahrir Square if the five judges presiding over the constitutional court validate Wade's candidacy.
"Everyone knows that Wade's candidacy is anti-constitutional. The court must play the role of referee," said 34-year-old Ibrahima Diop, who like many in the square is unemployed. "We placed a lot of hope in Abdoulaye Wade. He let us down. We deserve better."
Associated Pressnicki minaj barbie doll nicki minaj barbie doll black dahlia drew drew lady gaga marry the night video lady gaga marry the night video
GENEVA ? Switzerland's oldest private bank, Wegelin & Co., said Friday it is selling most of its business to Raiffeisen Group amid a dispute with U.S. authorities over tax-cheating allegations.
A majority of Wegelin's clients and staff will be transferred to a company called Notenstein Private Bank Ltd. That in turn will become a 100 percent subsidiary of Raiffeisen for an undisclosed sum, the two banks said in a statement.
Wegelin will remain in existence "to finalize the closure of all remaining U.S. client relationships and to continue the negotiations with the U.S. justice authorities," they added.
Earlier this month, the St. Gallen-based Wegelin said it was bracing for a battle with U.S. authorities after three of its staff were charged with conspiring to hide more than $1.2 billion in client assets from U.S. tax officials.
U.S. authorities announced Jan. 3 they had charged Urs Frei, Michael Berlinka and Roger Keller with helping Americans open secret accounts to hide money.
Wegelin said at the time that it had spent months meticulously examining its U.S. operations over the past decade and together with American lawyers it is "prepared for the expected quarrel." It said it never broke Swiss law during that period.
Wegelin's senior managing partner, Konrad Hummler, said Friday its managing partners with unlimited liability "will fulfill our responsibilities and stand by Wegelin & Co.'s obligations."
"We are determined to see the legal negotiations through to the end," he added.
Hummler acknowledged the sale was a "painful step" but said "the extraordinarily difficult situation and threat to the bank brought about by the legal dispute with the U.S." had forced him to make the decision.
"I never could have imagined that we, as owners of Switzerland's oldest bank, would ever have considered selling," he said. Wegelin was founded in 1741.
Raiffeisen CEO Pierin Vincenz said the deal was a "quantum leap" for his company that enables it to expand in private banking.
Switzerland has been gradually softening its banking secrecy rules in recent years amid pressure from cash-strapped foreign governments angry that their taxpayers are hiding money in Swiss banks.
how to make it in america how to make it in america schweddy balls schweddy balls hedy lamarr bill conlin kendall jenner
50 Cent reportedly won a $500,000 bet (!) on the Giants in the NFC Championship game. But that's only money. For the Super Bowl, he's making things really interesting.
After Tweeting throughout Sunday's nerve-wracking win ("just watched a $500,000 football game get on my level Chumps") 50 is uber-confident heading into February 5.
So much so that the rapper quickly accepted when a follower named MyBestAssets made him an offer regarding his hometown Giants and the New England Patriots:
Fiddy is betting something a little different this time around.
It's unclear who MyBestAssets is, what those assets are, and what the extent of her relationship with Chelsea Handler's ex is. But she's apparently a Pats fan.
"Lets bet. If the Giants lose the Superbowl, u must post ur d*ck on the twitter. If they win, I'll post my boobs & face. Bet?" she wrote. 50 quickly went all in on that.
"Ok It's a bet. See your d*ck on twitter Feb 5. Lol" she wrote.
LOL indeed. This is definitely the most unusual wager we've heard of, which is saying something, as certain THG staff members have bet on the coin toss. The coin toss.
Anyway, let's go Giants. We really don't need to see that.
oklahoma fall back time change when does daylight savings start when does daylight savings start earthquake in texas earthquake in texas
TAMPA, Fla. ? The Republican presidential race waded, at least for one night, into the grainy details of U.S. policy toward sugar.
Newt Gingrich's answer to a question about it during a GOP debate Monday night stood out in part for its wonkiness and downright oddity.
"I found out one of the fascinating things about America, which was that cane sugar hides behind beet sugar," the former college professor said, launching into a lecture of sorts on the U.S. industry when asked about subsidies for the sweet ingredient. "And there are just too many beet sugar districts in the United States. It's an amazing side story about how interest groups operate. In an ideal world, you would have an open market."
Mitt Romney, the former Massachusetts governor, followed up by saying "we ought to get rid of subsidies and let markets work properly." The other two candidates, Rick Santorum and Ron Paul, weren't given a chance to reply.
Blogs and Twitter feeds lit up with the exchange, with some observers using it to highlight similarities between Gingrich and beet farmer Dwight Schrute on "The Office." Gingrich, in his younger years, has been compared to the sitcom character.
Pop culture aside, the exchange shed light on a largely unknown facet of American policy: Congress' role in sugar dates to the birth of the country.
Import tariffs were imposed on sugar beginning in 1789 to give incentive to American-grown product. An added layer of complexity came in 1934, when controls on domestic sugar production were put in place.
In short, current sugar policies favor beet sugar growers in the Great Plains and Upper Midwest and cane sugar growers in Florida and Louisiana, keeping the prices of U.S.-grown sugar artificially high and limiting the amount of foreign sugar that can be imported.
"It's a Soviet system what we have for sugar," said Chris Edwards, director of tax policy studies at the libertarian Cato Institute. "It's not a market system."
The Government Accountability Office last looked into the issue in 2000 and found that U.S. sugar prices, at times, were three times the world market price. Critics say that fact hurts much larger industries such as cereal companies, bakers and candy companies, who rely on sugar for their products.
Those industries cheered at the mere mention of existing policy during the debate.
"I think it's time has come and gone," said Susan Smith, a spokeswoman for the National Confectioners Association, which represents candy, gum and chocolate makers and opposes current policy. "Sometime, 80 years ago, there might have been a reason. But now, not only does it hurt companies who have sugar as an ingredient but there's also a huge consumer cost."
The GAO estimated U.S. sugar policy cost consumers $1.9 billion in 1998 and resulted in $900 million in net losses to the U.S. economy. Nearly all the benefits, the report argued, went to the wealthy owners of U.S. sugar companies.
Both Republicans and Democrats have squandered chances to change the policy. An analysis by the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics, a Washington-based research group, shows the sugar industry has given about $2.1 million in campaign contributions in the 2012 election cycle.
"It's very much a bipartisan racket," Edwards said.
Judy Sanchez, a spokeswoman for U.S. Sugar Corp., the nation's largest cane sugar grower, said the policies in place keep American companies from going out of business. She said sugar policy has "zero cost" to taxpayers.
"Face it: Sugar is given away for free in restaurants, where they charge you for water, they charge you for an extra slice of cheese on your hamburger," Sanchez said. "The sugar is so affordable that it's given away for free. That's because American sugar policy works."
blagojevich rod blagojevich rod blagojevich harry morgan john lennon death john lennon death c.j. wilson
-Start the week by expanding your vocabulary and learning a bit about climatology with today?s Fresh iPhone Apps. Wordy brings a fresh word of the day your way each day, with all kinds of dictionary and thesaurus information from multiple sources, and Earth-Now uses NASA data to show the state of various types of information about the planet on a touch-controlled globe. In games, freemium title Triple Town combines match-3 and city-building gameplay, while platformer Niko uses physics-based controls and tricky levels to challenge players.
For the word-loving iOS user, Wordy is a nice addition to your app library. Every day, the app provides you with a new word of the day, providing the definition, thesaurus entries, synonyms and other information.
You?ll get lots of vocabulary words out of Wordy, and the app is specially designed just for the iPhone. It packs information from lots of different sources, including Websters, The American Heritage Dictionary and The Century Dictionary, and is great for users who want to expand their knowledge of the English language.
Education app Earth-Now brings all kinds of data about the planet to one place, casting it as a touch-sensitive globe that you can spin and zoom-in on. Earth-Now presents various bits of information laid out over the globe that show the state of the planet like carbon dioxide content in the atmosphere, global temperature, ozone density and ?vital signs.?
Earth-Now is full of climatology information and gets its information from science compiled by the Earth Science Communications and Visualization Technology Applications and Development Teams at NASA. It?s easy to get a space-eye view of the planet and see all the app?s information in just a few seconds.
Part match-3 game, part city builder, Triple Town is quite an addictive freemium title. The premise is similar to other games in the match-3 genre, such as Bejeweled.?You place three objects of the same type next to each other to score points, but in Triple Town, each group you make of an object creates a new, better object: grass groups make bushes, bush groups make trees, tree groups make houses.
The goal is to keep adding to your settlement for as long as possible by making groups, filling the grid with objects. If you get into a bind, you can use coins you accumulate through each round of the game to purchase objects you need, like extra trees or houses. Once you run out of moves, you can start all over again and see how big your city can become.
Niko is a platformer with some interesting physics-based gameplay mixed in. You play Niko, a cat-like character working to save his friends. You do that by heading through the game?s levels, leaping and sticking to walls and other platformers in order to reach things you can collect throughout the game. Your goal is to flip switches and collect as many coins as you can in order to track up a high score in each level.
A freemium title, Niko comes with its first six levels for free, with more available through an in-app purchase of $1.99. Each side-scrolling level has multiple paths through it, and you?ll need to explore thoroughly to discover each one?s secrets and get the best score you can on each stage.
andy williams andy williams nyc marathon nyc marathon coriolis effect coriolis effect giants patriots
ScienceDaily (Jan. 22, 2012) ? Analyzing all the genes of dozens of people suffering from a rare form of hypertension, Yale University researchers have discovered a new mechanism that regulates the blood pressure of all humans.
The findings by an international research team headed by Yale scientists, published online Jan. 22 in the journal Nature, may help explain what goes wrong in the one billion people who suffer from high blood pressure. The study also demonstrates the power of new DNA sequencing methods to find previously unknown disease-causing genes.
The team used a technique called whole exome sequencing -- an analysis of the makeup of all the genes -- to study a rare inherited form of hypertension characterized by excess levels of potassium in the blood. They found mutations in either of two genes that caused the disease in affected members of 41 families suffering from the condition.
The two genes interact with one another in a complex that targets other proteins for degradation, and they orchestrate the balance between salt reabsorption and potassium secretion in the kidney.
"These genes were not previously suspected to play a role in blood pressure regulation, but if they are lost, the kidney can't put the brakes on salt reabsorption, resulting in hypertension," said Richard Lifton, Sterling Professor and chair of the Department of Genetics at Yale and senior author of the paper.
The mutations had previously been difficult to find because there were very few affected members in each family, so traditional methods to map the genes' locations had been ineffective.
"The mutations in one gene were almost all new mutations found in affected patients but not their parents, while mutations in the other gene could be either dominant or recessive. The exome sequencing technology was ideally suited to cutting through these complexities," said Lynn Boyden of Yale, the first author of the paper.
The next step is to establish how these new components are involved in regulating sodium reabsorption in the kidney, in hopes of finding new ways intervene in hypertension, a major global health problem.
"We are finding all the individual parts to a complicated machine, and we need to understand how they are all put together to make the machine work," said Lifton, who is also an investigator of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute.
Physicians from 10 countries and 17 states in the United States recruited patients and families with this rare disease and participated in the research.
The work was funded by the HHMI and Leducq Transatlantic Network for Hypertension and from National Institutes of Health grants from a O'Brien Center and the Yale Clinical and Translational Science Award grant through the National Center for Research Resources.
Recommend this story on Facebook, Twitter,
and Google +1:
Other bookmarking and sharing tools:
Story Source:
The above story is reprinted from materials provided by Yale University.
Note: Materials may be edited for content and length. For further information, please contact the source cited above.
Journal Reference:
Note: If no author is given, the source is cited instead.
Disclaimer: This article is not intended to provide medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. Views expressed here do not necessarily reflect those of ScienceDaily or its staff.
Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/~3/7eUiI5yhRCA/120122152548.htm
verlander justin verlander pepper spraying cop pepper spraying cop somaya reece padma lakshmi juelz santana
top chef just desserts jamarcus russell sister wives st louis weather jack the cat frank lucas lego man
Danny Martindale / Getty Images
Reality-TV impresario Simon Cowell poses for photos with fans as "Britain's Got Talent" kicks off its annual talent search Friday with an event at the Lyric Theatre in Manchester.
By Alan Boyle
More than a decade after the first effort to blend reality TV with real-world spaceflight,?talent-show impresario Simon Cowell says the winner of "Britain's Got Talent" could go into outer space on Virgin Galactic's SpaceShipTwo rocket plane.
"I love the idea that if they are up for it they have the option of performing in space,"?Cowell told?Britain's Daily Star. The comment comes as Cowell is ramping up for a new season of the show that?inspired "America's Got Talent."
Cowell has already signed up for his own flight on SpaceShipTwo, which could start flying passengers beyond the 100-kilometer (62-mile) boundary of outer space on $200,000 suborbital rides as early as next year. The longtime record producer, who left an enduring mark on reality-TV history as the black-garbed, brutally frank judge on "American Idol," hinted that he's worked out a deal with British?billionaire Richard Branson, founder of Virgin Galactic.
Do you think Simon Cowell has a winning plan for reality TV in outer space?
173950
Yes, that'd be must-see TV.
36%
173951
No, this idea is sure to fizzle out.
47%
173952
It's a tossup.
16%
VoteTotal Votes: 129
"It's tens of millions of pounds, but Richard genuinely is up for doing it," Cowell told the Star. "I am being serious, I swear to God and on my mum?s life. Don?t worry about the details, we?ll make it happen."
If Cowell is to make it happen anytime soon, the winner would?most?probably have to travel to New Mexico to follow through on the flight plan. And it seems unlikely that going into space would be a requirement placed on the winner, whoever?he or she?turns out to be.
Producers have tried for years to put together a reality-TV show focusing on spaceflight. The highest-profile effort was "Survivor" executive producer Mark Burnett's plans?in 2000?for a?show that would follow contestants through?the training routine for spaceflight. The winner would have?been sent?to?Russia's Mir space station ? but that concept fizzled out even before Mir was deorbited in 2001.
Other proposed entertainment?projects have revolved around?pop singer Lance Bass and film director James Cameron. Just last week, Beyonce and Jay-Z were said to be interested in doing a music video aboard SpaceShipTwo.
No Hollywood space effort has yet gotten off the ground, but if anyone has the required combination of guts, glitz and gold, I suppose that'd be Branson. Like Cowell, Branson is a veteran of reality TV, having starred in "The Rebel Billionaire," a series that aired on Fox in 2004-2005.
Who knows? In the next year or two, there may be more than one way for reality-TV contestants to get into outer space. Andrew Nelson, chief operating officer for XCOR Aerospace, says his company is moving ahead with its own Lynx rocket plane ? and he's not shy about courting Cowell's attention.
"If Simon wants to take a more exciting ride at half the price, I'd take his call," Nelson told me today.
More about commercial space:
Alan Boyle is msnbc.com's science editor. Connect with the Cosmic Log community by "liking" the log's Facebook page, following @b0yle on Twitter and adding the Cosmic Log page to your Google+ presence. You can also check out "The Case for Pluto," my book about the controversial dwarf planet and the search for new worlds.?
Source: http://cosmiclog.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/01/20/10202380-britains-got-talent-in-space
chad ochocinco ed reed supercross football schedule carol burnett jo paterno dead south carolina
Boston ? Havely Taylor knows that her two children do not play the way she did when she was growing up.
When Ms. Taylor was a girl, in a leafy suburb of Birmingham, Ala., she climbed trees, played imaginary games with her friends, and transformed a hammock into a storm-tossed sea vessel. She even whittled bows and arrows from downed branches around the yard and had "wars" with friends ? something she admits she'd probably freak out about if her children did it today.
"I mean, you could put an eye out like that," she says with a laugh.
Related content: Little girls or little women? The Disney Princess effect
Her children ??? Ava, age 12, and Henry, 8 ??? have had a different experience. They live in Baltimore, where Taylor works as an art teacher. Between school, homework, violin lessons, ice-skating, theater, and play dates, there is little time for the sort of freestyle play Taylor remembers. Besides, Taylor says, they live in the city, with a postage stamp of a backyard and the ever-present threat of urban danger.
"I was kind of afraid to let them go out unsupervised in Baltimore...," she says, of how she started down this path with the kids. "I'm really a protective mom. There wasn't much playing outside."
This difference has always bothered her, she says, because she believes that play is critical for children's developing emotions, creativity, and intelligence. But when she learned that her daughter's middle school had done away with recess, and even free time after lunch, she decided to start fighting for play.
"It seemed almost cruel," she says. "Play is important for children ? it's something so obvious it's almost hard to articulate. How can you talk about childhood without talking about play? It's almost as if they are trying to get rid of childhood."
Taylor joined a group of parents pressuring the principal to let their children have a recess, citing experts such as the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which recommends that all students have at least 60 minutes of physical activity every day. They issued petitions and held meetings. And although the school has not yet agreed to change its curriculum, Taylor says she feels their message is getting more recognition.
She is not alone in her concerns. In recent years, child development experts, parents, and scientists have been sounding an increasingly urgent alarm about the decreasing amount of time that children ? and adults, for that matter ? spend playing. A combination of social forces, from a No Child Left Behind focus on test scores to the push for children to get ahead with programmed extracurricular activities, leaves less time for the roughhousing, fantasizing, and pretend worlds advocates say are crucial for development.
Meanwhile, technology and a wide-scale change in toys have shifted what happens when children do engage in leisure activity, in a way many experts say undermines long-term emotional and intellectual abilities. An 8-year-old today, for instance, is more likely to be playing with a toy that has a computer chip, or attending a tightly supervised soccer practice, than making up an imaginary game with friends in the backyard or street.
But play is making a comeback. Bolstered by a growing body of scientific research detailing the cognitive benefits of different types of play, parents such as Taylor are pressuring school administrations to bring back recess and are fighting against a trend to move standardized testing and increased academic instruction to kindergarten.
Public officials are getting in on the effort. First lady Michelle Obama and US Secretary of Education Arne Duncan, for instance, have made a push for playgrounds nationwide. Local politicians from Baltimore to New York have participated in events such as the Ultimate Block Party ? a metropolitan-wide play gathering. Meanwhile, business and corporate groups, worried about a future workforce hampered by a lack of creativity and innovation, support the effort.
"It's at a tipping point," says Susan Mag?samen, the director of Interdisciplinary Part?nerships at the Johns Hopkins Uni?versity School of Medicine Brain Science Insti?tute, who has headed numerous child play efforts. "Parents are really anxious and really overextended. Teachers are feeling that way, too."
So when researchers say and can show that "it's OK to not be so scheduled [and] programmed ? that time for a child to daydream is a good thing," Ms. Magsamen says, it confirms what families and educators "already knew, deep down, but didn't have the permission to act upon."
But play, it seems, isn't that simple.
Scientists disagree about what sort of play is most important, government is loath to regulate the type of toys and technology that increasingly shape the play experience, and parents still feel pressure to supervise children's play rather than let them go off on their own. (Nearly two-thirds of Americans in a December Monitor TIPP poll, for instance, said it is irresponsible to let children play without supervision; almost as many said studying is more important than play.) And there is still pressure on schools to sacrifice playtime ? often categorized as frivolous ? in favor of lessons that boost standardized test scores.
"Play is still terribly threatened," says Susan Linn, an instructor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School and director of the nonprofit Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood. But, she adds, "what is changing is that there's a growing recognition that the erosion of play may be a problem ... we need to do something about."
One could say that the state of play, then, is at a crossroads. What happens to it ? how it ends up fitting into American culture, who defines it, what it looks like ? will have long-term implications for childhood, say those who study it.
Some go even further: The future of play will define society overall and even determine the future of our species.
"Play is the fundamental equation that makes us human," says Stuart Brown, the founder of the California-based National Institute for Play. "Its absence, in my opinion, is pathology."
IN PICTURES: At play: Children worldwide taking part in some recreation
Can you define 'play'?
But before advocates can launch a defense of play, they need to grapple with a surprisingly difficult question. What, exactly, is play?
It might seem obvious. Parents know when their children are playing, whether it's a toddler scribbling on a piece of paper, an infant shaking a rattle, or a pair of 10-year-olds dressing up and pretending to be superheroes.
But even Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary definition, "recreational activity; especially the spontaneous action of children," is often inaccurate, according to scientists and child development re-searchers. Play for children is neither simply recreational nor necessarily spontaneous, they say.
"Play is when children are using something they've learned, to try it out and see how it works, to use it in new ways ? it's problem solving and enjoying the satisfaction of problems solv[ed]," says Diane Levin, a professor of education at Wheelock College in Boston. But Ms. Levin says that, in her class on the meaning and development of play, she never introduces one set definition.
"This is something that people argue about," she says.
Scientists and child advocates agree that there are many forms of play. There is "attunement play," the sort of interaction where a mother and infant might gaze at each other and babble back and forth. There is "object play," where a person might manipulate a toy such as a set of marbles; "rough and tumble play"; and "imaginative play." "Free play" is often described as kids playing on their own, without any adult supervision; "guided play" is when a child or other player takes the lead, but a mentor is around to, say, help facilitate the LEGO castle construction.
But often, says Dr. Brown at the National Institute for Play, a lot is happening all at once. He cites the time he tried to do a brain scan of his then-4-year-old grandson at play with his stuffed tiger.
"He was clearly playing," Brown recalls.
"And then he says to me, 'Grandpa, what does the tiger say?' I say, 'Roar!' And then he says, 'No, it says, "Moo!" ' and then laughs like crazy. How are you going to track that? He's pretending, he's making a joke, he's interacting."
This is one reason Brown says play has been discounted ? both culturally and, until relatively recently, within the academic community, where detractors argue that play is so complex it cannot be considered one specific behavior, that it is an amalgamation of many different acts. These scientists ? known as "play skeptics" ? don't believe play can be responsible for all sorts of positive effects, in part because play itself is suspect.
"It is so difficult to define and objectify," Brown notes.
But most researchers agree that play clearly exists, even if it can't always be coded in the standard scientific way of other human behaviors. And the importance of play, Brown and others say, is huge.
Brown became interested in play as a young clinical psychiatrist when he was researching, somewhat incongruously, mass murderers. Although he concluded that many factors contributed to the psychosis of his subjects, Brown noticed that a common denominator was that none had participated in standard play behavior as children, such as interacting positively with parents or engaging in games with other children. As he continued his career, he took "play histories" of patients, eventually recording 6,000. He saw a direct correlation between play behavior and happiness, from childhood into adulthood.
It has a lot to do with joy, he says: "In the play studies I'd find many adults who had a pretty playful childhood but then confined themselves to grinding, to always being responsible, always seeing just the next task. [They] are less flexible and have a chronic, smoldering depression. That lack of joyfulness gets to you."
Brown later worked with ethologists ? scientists who study animal behavior ? to observe how other species, from honeybees to Labrador retrievers, play. This behavior in a variety of species is sophisticated ? from "self-handicapping," so a big dog plays fairly with a small dog, to cross-species play, such as a polar bear romping with a sled dog. He also studied research on play depravation, noting how rat brains change negatively when they are deprived of some sorts of play.
Brown became convinced that human play ? for adults as well as children ? is not only joyful but neces?sary, a behavior that has survived despite connections in some studies to injury and danger (for example, animals continue to play even though they're likely to be hunted while doing so) and is connected to the most ancient part of human biology.
'Executive' play
Other scientists are focusing on the specific impacts of play. In a small, brick testing room next to the "construction zone" at the Boston Children's Museum, for instance, Daniel Friel sits with a collection of brightly colored tubing glued to a board. The manager of the Early Childhood Cognition Lab in the Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), he observes children at play with puppets and squeaky toys, rubber balls and fabulously created pipe sculptures. Depending on the experiment, Mr. Friel and other researchers record such data as the time a child plays with a particular object or what color ball is picked out of a container. These observations lead to insights on how children form their understanding of the world.
"We are interested in exploratory play, how kids develop cause and effect, how they use evidence," he says.
The collection of tubing, for instance, is part of a study designed by researcher Elizabeth Bonawitz and tests whether the way an object is presented can limit a child's exploration. If a teacher introduces the toy, which has a number of hidden points of interest ? a mirror, a button that lights up, etc. ? but tells a child about only one feature, the child is less likely to discover everything the toy can do than a child who receives the toy from a teacher who feigns ignorance. Without limiting instruction from an adult, it seems, a child is far more creative. In other words, adult hovering and instruction, from how to play soccer to how to build the best LEGO city, can be limiting.
Taken together, the MIT experiments show children calculating probabilities during play, developing assumptions about their physical environment, and adjusting perceptions according to the direction of authority figures. Other researchers are also discovering a breathtaking depth to play: how it develops chronological awareness and its link to language development and self-control.
The latter point has been a hot topic recently. Self-regulation ? the buzzword here is "executive function," referring to abilities such as planning, multitasking, and reasoning ? may be more indicative of future academic success than IQ, standardized tests, or other assessments, according to a host of recent studies from institutions such as Pennsylvania State University and the University of British Columbia.
Curriculums that boost executive function have become increasingly popular. Two years ago, Elizabeth Billings-Fouhy, director of the public Children's Place preschool in Lexington, Mass., decided to adopt one such program, called Tools of the Mind. It was created by a pair of child development experts ? Deborah Leong and Elena Bodrova ? in the early 1990s after a study evaluating federal early literacy efforts found no positive outcomes.
"People started saying there must be something else," Dr. Leong says. "And we believed what was missing was self-regulation and executive function."
She became interested in a body of research from Russia that showed children who played more had better self-regulation. This made sense to her, she says. For example, studies have shown that children can stand still far longer if they are playing soldier; games such as Simon says depend on concentration and rule-following.
"Play is when kids regulate their behavior voluntarily," Leong says. Eventually, she and Dr. Bodrova developed the curriculum used in the Children's Place today, where students spend the day in different sorts of play. They act out long-form make-believe scenes, they build their own props, and they participate in buddy reading, where one child has a picture of a pair of lips and the other has a picture of ears. The child with the lips reads; the other listens. Together, these various play exercises increase self-control, educators say.
This was on clear display recently at the Children's Place. Nearly half the children there have been labeled as special needs students with everything from autism to physical limitations. The others are mainstream preschoolers ? an "easier" group, perhaps, but still not one typically renowned for its self-control.
But in a brightly colored classroom, a group of 3-, 4-, and 5-year-olds are notably calm; polite and quiet, sitting in pairs, taking turns "reading" a picture book.
"Here are scissors, a brush...," a boy named Aiden points out to his partner, Kyle, who is leaning in attentively.
"Oh, don't forget the paint," Kyle says, although he's mostly quiet, as it's his turn to listen.
Aiden nods and smiles: "Yes, the paint."
When Aiden is finished, the boys switch roles. Around them, another dozen toddlers do the same ? all without teacher direction. The Tools classrooms have the reputation of being far better-behaved than mainstream classes.
"We have been blown away," says Ms. Billings-Fouhy, the director, comparing how students are doing now versus before the Tools curriculum. "We can't believe the difference."
Educators and scientists have published overwhelmingly positive analyses since the early 2000s of the sort of curriculum Tools of the Mind employs. But recently the popularity of the play-based curriculum has skyrocketed, with more preschools adopting the Tools method and parenting chat rooms buzzing about the curriculum. Two years ago, for instance, Billings-Fouhy had to convince people about changing the Children's Place program. Now out-of-district parents call to get their children in.
"I think we're at this place where everyone is coming to the conclusion that play is important," Leong says. "Not just because of self-regulation, but because people are worried about the development of the whole child ? their social and emotional development as well."
Today's kids don't know how to play
But not all play is created equal, experts warn.
The Tools of the Mind curriculum, for instance, uses what Leong calls "intentional mature play" ? play that is facilitated and guided by trained educators. If children in the class were told to simply go and play, she says, the result probably would be a combination of confusion, mayhem, and paralysis.
"People say, 'Let's bring back play,' " Leong says. "But they don't realize play won't just appear spontaneously, especially not in preschool.... The culture of childhood itself has changed."
For a host of reasons, today's children do not engage in all sorts of developmentally important play that prior generations automatically did. In her class at Wheelock College, Levin has students interview people over the age of 50 about how they played. In the 1950s and '60s, students regularly find, children played outdoors no matter where they lived, and without parental supervision. They played sports but adjusted the rules to fit the space and material ? a goal in soccer, for instance, might be kicking a tennis ball to the right of the trash can. They had few toys, and older children tended to act as "play mentors" to younger children, instructing them in the ways of make-believe games.
That has changed dramatically, she says. In the early 1980s, the federal government deregulated children's advertising, allowing TV shows to essentially become half-hour-long advertisements for toys such as Power Rangers, My Little Ponies, and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Levin says that's when children's play changed. They wanted specific toys, to use them in the specific way that the toys appeared on TV.
Today, she says, children are "second generation deregulation," and not only have more toys ? mostly media-based ? but also lots of screens. A Kaiser Family Foundation study recently found that 8-to-18-year-olds spend an average of 7.5 hours in front of a screen every day, with many of those hours involving multiscreen multitasking. Toys for younger children tend to have reaction-based operations, such as push-buttons and flashing lights.
Take away the gadgets and the media-based scripts, Levin and others say, and many children today simply don't know what to do.
"If they don't have the toys, they don't know how to play," she says.
The American educational system, increasingly teaching to standardized tests, has also diminished children's creativity, says Kathy Hirsh-Pasek, a professor of psychology and director of the Infant Language Laboratory at Temple University in Philadelphia. "Children learn from being actively engaged in meaningful activities," she says. "What we're doing seems to be the antithesis of this. We're building robots. And you know, computers are better robots than children."
Other countries, particularly in Asia, she notes, have already shifted their educational focus away from test scores, and Finland ? which is at the top of international ranking ? has a policy of recess after every class for Grades 1 through 9.
But as Dr. Hirsh-Pasek points out, children spend most of their time out of school. A playful life is possible if parents and communities know what to do.
The Ultimate Block Party, which Hirsh-Pasek developed with other researchers, is one way to involve local governments, educators, and institutions in restoring play and creativity, she says. The Ultimate Block Party is a series of play stations ? from blocks to sandboxes to dress-up games to make-believe environments ? where kids can play with their parents. Meanwhile, the event's staff helps explain to caregivers what sorts of developmental benefits the children achieve through different types of play.
The first Ultimate Block Party in New York's Central Park in October 2010 attracted 50,000 people; Toronto and Baltimore held parties last year. Organizers now say they get multiple requests from cities every month to hold their own block parties; Hirsh-Pasek says she hopes the movement will go grass roots, with towns and neighborhoods holding their own play festivities.
"It's an exciting time," she says. "We're starting to make some headway. It's time for all of us to find the way to become a more creative, thinking ?culture."
Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/health/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/csm/20120122/ts_csm/449876
gene kelly zoe saldana zooey deschanel and joseph gordon levitt andrew bailey debra messing ayaan hirsi ali rachel uchitel
NBC?s Tom Brokaw spoke with Ron Paul supporters at a "debate watch party" at Bailey?s Pub and Grille in Greenville South Carolina.? ?
Related Links:
http://twitter.com/nbcnightlynews
Source: http://video.msnbc.msn.com/nightly-news/46059435/
vanessa marcil frank gore frank gore drew brees drew brees nfl games nfl schedule
Chipotle Mexican Gril
20 mins total 0 mins prep
Source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/01/19/chipotle-mexican-grills-_n_1217499.html
port charlotte florida kit homes boxing day radio shack bethany hamilton bethany hamilton after christmas sales
Continue reading GM teams with Future Lab on interactive Windows of Opportunity, MI:4 tech lives on
GM teams with Future Lab on interactive Windows of Opportunity, MI:4 tech lives on originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 19 Jan 2012 03:02:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
Permalink |
GM | Email this | CommentsSource: http://www.engadget.com/2012/01/19/gm-teams-with-future-lab-on-interactive-windows-of-opportunity/
wiccan pumpkin carvings mcrib pumpkin seeds mark herzlich malawi malawi
In the Wednesday Morning Jolt, a look at the effort to recall Scott Walker in Wisconsin, George Lucas?s response to his critics, and then this suggestion that the season of Republican debates may be coming to an end?
Will Mitt Romney Start Vetoing More Debates?
The part of me that would like my evenings back is okay with the concept of debate season coming to an end. The part of me that hates seeing the likely 2012 Republican nominee back down from anything is not okay with the appearance that Mitt Romney has had enough of this.
Byron York: ?After a debate in which Republican frontrunner Mitt Romney faced attacks from all sides, the Romney campaign says it has not yet accepted invitations to participate in two high-profile debates leading up to the January 31 Florida primary, and a key Romney adviser is expressing fatigue and frustration over what he sees as a never-ending series of GOP debates. ?There are too many of these,? Romney strategist Stuart Stevens said after Monday night?s Fox News debate at the Myrtle Beach Convention Center.? ?We have to bring some order to it.? We haven?t accepted Florida?It?s kind of like a cruise that?s gone on too long.??
?Given?the news?this week, I?m not sure a ?cruise? analogy is a good choice,? quips Ed Morrissey.
Ace doesn?t think Romney will go through with this? yet: ?I don?t suppose that anyone can disagree too much that there have been too many debates. I wish he had skipped earlier ones, though, because most debates are about him, and you rarely get to hear other people except?vis a vis?Romney. Maybe his thinking is that, given an apparently wide lead?in Florida (Romney 46, Gingrich 20, Santorum 12),?he?s got Florida wrapped up and can afford to coast. The problem with that rationale is that the field may not be five-strong when he gets to Florida. Perry or Gingrich or Santorum may drop out by then, and the remaining candidates will get a bump from that. Prediction: He goes to both debates or at least one. Maybe he?ll skip one to make the point that he?s not required to attend every single one of them.?
At Hot Air, Ed Morrissey says that on the question of whether to continue holding them ?that is going to be out of Romney?s hands.? He might not like getting beat up on stage, but at least he?s there to defend himself.? The media will cover the debates whether Romney is there or not, so the only way he could successfully shut down the debates is if he gets the other Republican candidates to also withdraw.? They?re practically on life support as it is, so they are certainly not going to pass up an opportunity for national and state-wide coverage in Florida for free. If they show up, Romney has to participate as well, if for no other reason than to keep playing defense and push back a little himself.?
Bruce McQuain says he?s had enough, at least in the current format: ?I?m personally tired of the debates.? For the most part they?ve delivered more entertainment than information. They?ve devolved into scorekeeping about who got the best shot in on Romney.? This is something like the 15th Republican debate and we?re no more enlightened about the serious topics we should be addressing than we were after the 1st.
If we have to go through more of this debate nonsense, can we have one solely focused on jobs, the economy and the proposed policies each of the candidates would try to have implemented to turn this mess around??? Can we hear an intelligent discussion of what the European mess portends and how it will effect us?? ?And can we give them more than 90 seconds to answer??? I?m tired of hearing the same old stump speech for the umpteenth time, the usual fall back when there are time limits on answers.?? If the debate is 2 hours and that means only 2 to 3 questions get asked, but each candidate gets, say 5 to 7 minutes to answer, I?m fine with that.?
Eh, I?m not so certain that some candidates this cycle had a good five to seven minutes worth of thoughts to share on all topics.
To everything there is a season, including ?a time to keep silence, and a time to speak.?
Source: http://www.nationalreview.com/campaign-spot/288406/gop-debate-season-about-end-should-it
sam bradford nancy grace st louis rams charlie sheen roast dancing with the stars 2011 cast paz de la huerta julianna margulies
VantagePoint delivers 132 inches of multitouch to HP's business customers originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 17 Jan 2012 12:33:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
Permalink
SlashGear | HP | Email this | CommentsSource: http://www.engadget.com/2012/01/17/vantagepoint-delivers-132-inches-of-multitouch-to-hps-business/
news channel 5 the firm rob new york philharmonic chicago weather marines urinating on taliban critics choice awards
