In today?s context, technological advancements and social platforms have rendered it essential for your website to be built upon three pillars ? social media, local search and mobile technology (hence the birth of concept, SoLoMo). These three elements have revolutionised the way business is done, and to not follow suite, is to be left far behind your competition.
In this newsletter we attempt to introduce you to these exciting technologies by simply scratching the surface of Social, Local and Mobile.
Social Media Integration
Source: Huffington Post?s ?100 Fascinating Social Media Statistics and Figures from 2012? by Brian Honigman http://istrategylabs.com/2012/12/infographic-huffpos-100-fascinating-social-media-statistics-2012/
In Australia, with over 70% of small businesses and 35% of medium sized businesses and almost all large companies are embracing some form of Social Media presence. Today, the value of Social Media channels is unquestionable. However, the question ishow efficiently the businesses are using social media to better aid to achieve their business objectives, be it increasing sales via followers? referrals or providing insights on the products and services you offer?
Despite Social Media evolving constantly, it must be noted that customer behaviour has not changeddrastically from the times before Social Media existed.In other words, the basic customer values such as dependency on word-of-mouth and referrals still remain the key factors to successfully closing sales. Social Media has paved way for this immensely. It has even been compared to ?word-of-mouth on steroids?.
With increased budgets allocated for Social Media, spending is expected to more than double by 2017 to 18.8 % of the total marketing expenditure (source:?http://cmosurvey.org/). However, today, only 6.8% of CMOs were content with the Social Media integration with their marketing strategy and thinks a very good job is being done in their respective businesses!
Social Media is a very useful tool towards expanding your business network, be it sharing useful updates about your organization or even spreading the news about your latest offer.? Direct communication too provides your customers to provide valuable feedback and just simply ?tell you what they want?. Thanks to Social Media, you can forget spending large amounts of resources on research because, now it?s possible for you to ?talk? to your target market audience and better meet their needs and even cater to the dissatisfaction. Here are a few amazing statistics on leading social media channels.
Locally Targeted Web Development
Is your business website targeting your local consumers who are the bread and butter of the business? As you may already be aware, most customers search online when trying to locate products/services that fulfil their needs. This makes it essential for your website to appear in the top tiers of search engine rankings (e.g. first page of Google search results and on location based searches). A clear understanding of localised web presence is essential for a successful online strategy.
Here are 4 ways you can optimise your local presence and their benefits:
Using appropriate keywords ? Identify the region of your target market audience (e.g. Sydney) and the key terms they use when searching online for the services your business provides (e.g. pest control services) and strategically use these? terms in your website content for search engines to recognise your business
Online presence under one domain name ? Recognition via several online sources for different purposes can be gained, but it may also lead to confusion among customers as to which parts of your business are to be found where.? Furthermore, having one domain name would also increase traffic towards one particular web place and also help with building a strong online brand.
Using local listings ?Registering your business under local, online listings is a great way to cater to local searches
Google places ?Registering your business withGoogle places enables Google and Google Maps to show your presence for free.? It also enables you to add your basic details which also includes your website and also provides a convenient way to receive customer feedback/reviews.
Source : Yesmail http://goo.gl/jGJfp
Mobile Friendly Web Presence
With more than 50% of mobile users on smart phones, it has become more important than ever that businesses ensure their websites are accessible via mobile devices. Today?s on-the-go lifestyle has deemed it essential that customers are able to access your website using their mobile devices. If your website is not accessible or appears distorted, they simply move on to your competitor?s website, and you?ve lost the customer forever!
Mobile-friendly websites allow your target audience to check out your products/services while on the move. Also mobilised websites are well streamlined, allowing for a clean, hassle-free browsing experience.
However, you must keep in mind that many organisations have gone mobile and keeping your target audience hooked on to your mobile website can be very advantageous in terms of building your brand and loyalty. You can achieve this by providing special offers via unique content, especially for new visitors, or by using QR codes which can be only redeemed by a smartphone.
In this week?s newsletter, we have merely touched the ?tip of the iceberg? when it comes to Social, Local and Mobile platforms. Keep a lookout for our upcoming newsletters and blog posts for useful information on the exciting world of digital marketing and awesome updates.
About solomoIT
SolomoIT?is a digital marketing agency, based in Sydney, Australia, offering fully integrated social, local and mobile marketing solutions.
The CEO of solomoIT, Logan has been an avid & passionate social media user since the advent of Facebook. ?As a Social Media Business Consultant he brings to the table over 30 years of experience in MNCs and SMBs, together with running?solomoIT?(formerly ICTIP) for the past eight years. Connect with Logan?here?.
WASHINGTON (AP) ? In a warning to fellow Republicans, Sen. John McCain said Wednesday that failure to pass comprehensive immigration legislation could mean continued election losses for the GOP and cause Republican-friendly states like Arizona to fall to the Democrats.
The Arizona Republican, his party's former presidential nominee and one of eight senators to sign onto a bipartisan immigration reform framework this week, said failure to act means the trend of Hispanic defections from the GOP would continue.
Latino voters supported President Barack Obama over Republican Mitt Romney 71 percent to 27 percent in November, helping to ensure Obama's victory.
McCain said that Republicans have failed to understand the importance of immigration to Hispanic voters and that's cost the party at the ballot box.
"If you have a large bloc of Americans who believe you're trying to keep their ... fellow Hispanics down and deprive them of an opportunity, obviously that's going to have an effect," McCain said.
The Senate framework would provide a path to citizenship for the estimated 11 million illegal immigrants already in the country, secure the border, attempt to simplify legal immigration, and add requirements for employers to prevent hiring of illegal immigrants.
If no bill passes, McCain said, the forecast for Republicans is that "the trend will continue of lack of support from Hispanic voters, and also as you look at the demographics of states like mine that means that we will go from Republican to Democrat over time."
McCain spoke alongside Democratic Sen. Charles Schumer of New York, his partner on the immigration proposals, at a breakfast hosted by Politico.
Many different tissues and organs form from pluripotent stem cells during embryonic development. To date it had been known that these processes are controlled by transcription factors for specific tissues. Scientists from the Max Planck Institute for Molecular Genetics in Berlin, in collaboration with colleagues at MIT and the Broad Institute in Boston, have now been able to demonstrate that RNA molecules, which do not act as templates for protein synthesis, participate in these processes as well. The scientists knocked down a gene for long non-coding RNA molecules (lncRNA) and thereby disrupted the development of the heart to an extent that was lethal to the embryos. Genesis of the ventral body wall was also impaired. It became apparent that the lncRNA participates in controlling transcription factors that themselves are responsible for controlling tissue- and organogenesis. The lncRNA itself thus acts as a modulating factor in these processes.
RNA molecules more than 300 nucleotides long and not exhibiting any protein-coding read frames are denoted as long non-coding RNA. They are known to interact with histone-modifying protein complexes that control the activation state of genes (activatable, active, or repressed), as well as influencing the level of their activity. This occurs, for example, through the transfer of methyl groups to histones, the DNA-packaging proteins. Modifications to the histones such as these can be copied during cell division and thus promulgate the activation state of genes from cell to cell across several stages of differentiation.
Max Planck scientists led by Bernhard Herrmann have proven for the first time that lncRNAs may also be indispensable for embryonic development. This was previously known primarily for transcription factors. They discovered an lncRNA, termed Fendrr, which is specifically formed in the progenitor cells of the heart and ventral body wall. After knocking down Fendrr in a mouse, the heart and ventral body wall were malformed, which was lethal to the embryos. The malformations first arose, however, several days after Fendrr had already been knocked down in the progenitor cells. In the case of transcription factors, the malformations appear, in contrast, after their inactivation for cells in which the gene is normally active.
This delay between the expression of the Fendrr-RNA and the appearance of the malformation can be explained by the specific effect of this new class of regulators. They influence the epigenetic control of target genes, including important transcription factors, namely by binding to histone-modifying protein complexes. Thus, they influence the fate of the descendants of cells in which they themselves were only briefly active.
The scientists now hope to locate further lncRNAs that control cardiogenesis and additional processes of embryonic development in mammals, and shed light on the mechanism of how they operate. Fendrr is probably only one of many lncRNAs that participate in epigenetic control of regulators for tissue- and organogenesis.
###
Grote P, Wittler L, Hendrix D, Koch F, W?hrisch S, Beisaw A, Macura K, Bl?ss G, Kellis M, Werber M, Herrmann BG. (2013) The tissue-specific lncRNA Fendrr is an essential regulator of heart and body wall development in the mouse. Developmental Cell, Vol. 24, No. 2. (28 January 2013), pp. 206-214, doi:10.1016/j.devcel.2012.12.012
Max-Planck-Gesellschaft: http://www.mpg.de
Thanks to Max-Planck-Gesellschaft for this article.
This press release was posted to serve as a topic for discussion. Please comment below. We try our best to only post press releases that are associated with peer reviewed scientific literature. Critical discussions of the research are appreciated. If you need help finding a link to the original article, please contact us on twitter or via e-mail.
The Twin Cities have some pretty awesome mayors. First, we have Rybak, who crowd surfs and declares Doomtree Day, then, we have St. Paul?s Chris Coleman playing bartender for a day to take away his constituents? mid-week blues. When, you ask? Tonight!
As if you Minneapolitans needed another reason to hop over to the other side of the river, there are some deliciously nonpartisan bar happenings this evening. Mayor Coleman will be pouring drinks at several St. Paul pubs tonight, starting with Bullpen Sports Saloon and Ward 6 before ending the night at the just-off-of-Snelling-standby,?Neighborhood Cafe, which now serves wine and beer. Coleman will begin his ?shift? at 5 p.m. tonight at Bullpen, just in time for happy hour, before continuing on to the other two locations. We?re most curious to see if Coleman will indulge in anything himself?perhaps one of Ward 6?s new ?Adult Milkshakes? or the cleverly-coined ?Don Draper Says ?What??cocktail . . .
(Reuters) - Canadian stock index futures pointed to a higher open on Monday, mirroring expected Wall Street gains, after recent global economic data suggested the world's biggest economies are on their way to recovery.
TOP STORIES
Caterpillar Inc reported a 55 percent drop in quarterly profit as customers sold off existing inventories rather than buy new machines.
Yield-hungry investors bought 6.63 billion euros of two new Italian bonds at an auction, just less than the top-targeted amount, shrugging off uncertainty ahead of next month's election.
Nordion said it has initiated a review of its strategic alternatives, almost four months after it suspended its dividend as an arbitration panel rejected its claim for damages from its main supplier.
Japan's government stepped in to give Boeing Co's now-grounded 787 Dreamliner and its made-in-Japan technology a boost in 2008 by easing safety regulations, fast-tracking the rollout of the groundbreaking jet for Japan's biggest airlines, according to records and participants in the process.
Toyota regained the crown as the world's top selling automaker in 2012, posting record-high sales and beating rivals General Motors and Volkswagen.
Loans to companies and households in the euro zone contracted for the eighth month running in December, showing low official borrowing costs are having little success in reviving investment and spending.
(Reporting by Chandrashekhar Modi; Editing by Jeffrey Hodgson)
Wellpoint Profits Jump 38%; Why Are Health Insurance Premiums Still Rising?
Published on Jan 28, 2013 - 6:39:15 AM
By: Consumer Watchdog
WASHINGTON, D.C. Jan. 25, 2013 - Health insurance giant Wellpoint today announced a 38% profit increase in the 4th quarter of 2012, as compared to last year, for a total $2.7 billion in net profits for 2012. The insurance company continues to pad its profits even as the growth of health care costs remains at record-low levels and the company is forcing double-digit premium increases on consumers and small businesses across the country, said Consumer Watchdog.
"Health insurers are talking out of both sides of their mouths when they preach austerity to their customers in order to raise premiums, then turn around and announce another banner year to shareholders. As federal health reform requires health insurance companies to disclose more and more information online, it will be harder for insurers to say one thing to customers and the opposite to Wall Street. Still, consumers remain unprotected in many states where no one has the power to reject an excessive rate hike, even when company profits exceed projections," said Carmen Balber, executive director of Consumer Watchdog.
New rules from the Department of Health and Human Services have begun to open health insurance companies' books, by requiring insurers to publicly file all proposed rate increases. However, because many states lack the power to require justification and approval of rate hikes, unreasonable rate increases continue to take effect, said Consumer Watchdog.
Anthem Blue Cross, Wellpoint's California subsidiary, recently imposed an unreasonable rate hike on more than 250,000 small business customers in that state according to an analysis by California's insurance commissioner that found, among other things, that the "company-wide rates of return on equity have been and remain excessive." California regulators do not have the power to reject excessive rates, so Anthem was able to impose the increase despite the commissioner's finding it was unreasonable.
In California, insurance reform law Proposition 103 regulates auto, home and business insurance rates, and requires insurers to open their books, publicly justify and get approval for rate increases before they take effect. That law was enacted by the voters in 1988 and has saved California drivers $62 billion on their auto insurance premiums.
An initiative measure that has qualified for California's 2014 general election ballot would require health insurance companies to public justify and get approval for rate increases before they take effect.
www.consumerwatchdog.org
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MONTREAL - Attention, all you people who are excited about the Steve Jobs biopic, starring Ashton Kutcher: First, you should have known better, considering Ashton?s involved. Second, Steve Wozniak, Jobs?s partner in the early days, says a clip from the movie gets it all wrong.
The picture is called jOBS (come to think of it, that annoying capitalization is another bad omen, isn?t it?), and this clip is floating around the interwebs. Woz, having seen it, told the website Gizmodo that he and Jobs ?never had such interaction and roles? as those shown in the excerpt.
?Not close ... I?m not even sure what it?s getting at ... (Our) personalities are very wrong although mine is closer ... Our relationship was so different than what was portrayed,? etc.
The movie is due out in April.
- - -
Spotlight couple: Tennis star Venus Williams is now seeing a Cuban model, Elio Alberto Pis, who is exactly three-quarters her age. On his Facebook page, People mag notes, he claims to be a ?constant thinker.? Well, on Facebook doesn?t everyone?
He?s 24. She?s 32.
- - -
Prince tells Billboard mag he?s not real pleased that Maroon 5 covered his song Kiss on their album Overexposed.
?I do pay performance royalties on others? songs I perform live, but I?m not recording these songs and putting them up for sale. Why do we need to hear another cover of a song someone else did?
?Art is about building a new foundation, not just laying something on top of what?s already there.?
Strange: this album has been out for about eight months, but he?s still mad.
Prince is 54.
- - -
I hear you asking: Why did model/actress Liberty Ross suddenly file for divorce from director Rupert Sanders? Weren?t they trying to reconcile?
Us Weekly asked Nameless Insider for the real story, and got this: After he was caught in a summer fling with Kristen Stewart, his star in Snow White and the Huntsman, Sanders ?did want to try to repair the relationship and didn?t want a divorce.? And indeed, ?they gave it a shot for the kids.? But Ross ? who also had a part in the picture ? just stayed angry, and now she has pulled the plug.
They were married for 10 years. Liberty, who?ll soon be at liberty, is reportedly seeing Jimmy Iovine, a music producer and exec.
Rupe is 41. Liberty is 34. Their kids are Skyla, a girl, age 7, and Tennyson, a boy, 5. KStew is 22. Iovine is 59.
- - -
Jennifer Lawrence was reported the other day to have pneumonia, but that didn?t keep her away from Sunday?s Screen Actors Guild awards show. She might have wished she had stayed home, though, when her gown malfunctioned as she walked to the podium to collect her hardware for Silver Linings Playbook.
This wasn?t as shocking as it might have been: she stumbled, and her floor-length navy blue Dior gown came apart at a horizontal seam or connection, at mid-thigh level. She fixed it, somehow, and did her acceptance speech.
Using Twitter to track the flu: A better way to screen the TweetsPublic release date: 28-Jan-2013 [ | E-mail | Share ]
Contact: Phil Sneiderman prs@jhu.edu 443-287-9960 Johns Hopkins University
Sifting through social media messages has become a popular way to track when and where flu cases occur, but a key hurdle hampers the process: how to identify flu-infection tweets. Some tweets are posted by people who have been sick with the virus, while others come from folks who are merely talking about the illness. If you are tracking actual flu cases, such conversations about the flu in general can skew the results.
To address this problem, Johns Hopkins computer scientists and researchers in the university's School of Medicine have developed a new tweet-screening method that not only delivers real-time data on flu cases, but also filters out online chatter that is not linked to actual flu infections. Comparing their method, which is based on analysis of 5,000 publicly available tweets per minute, to other Twitter-based tracking tools, the Johns Hopkins researchers say their real-time results track more closely with government disease data that takes much longer to compile.
"When you look at Twitter posts, you can see people talking about being afraid of catching the flu or asking friends if they should get a flu shot or mentioning a public figure who seems to be ill," said Mark Dredze, an assistant research professor in the Department of Computer Science who uses tweets to monitor public health trends. "But posts like this don't measure how many people have actually contracted the flu. We wanted to separate hype about the flu from messages from people who truly become ill."
Dredze, who also is a research scientist at the Johns Hopkins Human Language Technology Center of Excellence, led a team that in mid-2011 released one of the first and most comprehensive studies showing that Twitter data can yield useful public health information. Since then, this strategy has become so popular that the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services last summer sponsored a contest challenging researchers to design an online application that could track major disease outbreaks.
This winter, as the United States entered an unusually severe and early flu season, Twitter-based flu projections have drawn increasing attention. Many public tweets, such as, "I'm so sick this week with the flu," can indicate a rise in the flu rate. Collecting enough of these tweets can help health officials gauge the scope and severity of an epidemic.
But the reliability of many computer models can be weakened by too many tweets that point to flu-related news reports and other matters not directly linked to a specific flu case, said David Broniatowski, a School of Medicine postdoctoral fellow in the Department of Emergency Medicine's Center for Advanced Modeling in the Social, Behavioral, and Health Sciences.
"For example," he said, "a recent spike in Twitter flu activity was caused by discussions about basketball legend Kobe Bryant's flu-like symptoms during a recent game. Mr. Bryant's health notwithstanding, such tweets do very little to help public health officials prepare our nation for the next big outbreak."
To improve their accuracy when using tweets to track the flu, the John Hopkins team developed sophisticated statistical methods based on human language processing technologies. The methods are designed to filter out the chatter. The system can distinguish, for example, between "I have the flu" and "I'm worried about getting the flu."
Another advantage of the Johns Hopkins flu projection method is that it can produce real-time results. By comparison, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which record flu-related symptoms from hospital visits, typically take two weeks to publish data on the flu's prevalence.
To check the reliability of their enhanced system, the Johns Hopkins researchers recently compared their results to CDC data for the same period. The researchers said that during November and December 2012, their system demonstrated a substantial improvement in tracking with CDC figures as compared to previous Twitter-based tracking methods. "In late December," Dredze added, "the news media picked up on the flu epidemic, causing a somewhat spurious rise in the rate produced by our Twitter system. But our new algorithm handles this effect much better than other systems, ignoring the spurious spike in tweets."
The researchers have also used their Twitter data to produce United States maps that document the stark differences between last year's mild flu season and the much higher incidence of the virus in the winter of 2012-2013.
While their new method was only recently developed, the Johns Hopkins researchers chose to release information on the flu tracking system because of the higher incidence of illness this winter. Team members hope to share the enhanced flu tracking method with leading government health agencies.
"This new work demonstrates that Twitter posts can be used to guide public health officials in their response to outbreaks of infectious diseases," Dredze said. "Our hope is that the new technology can be used track other diseases as well."
###
Other Johns Hopkins researchers participating in the Twitter flu project are doctoral student Michael Paul and recent bachelor's degree graduate Alex Lamb, both in the Department of Computer Science.
The Johns Hopkins researchers noted that their enhanced Twitter flu analysis system looked only at public tweets in which all user names and gender information had been removed. The system was tested only on messages from the United States. The research was funded in part by the National Institutes of Health's Models of Infectious Disease Agent Study.
View a video produced by Twitter about Johns Hopkins' use of tweets to track public health trends here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HmDIh-YS0GI
Read an earlier news release about Johns Hopkins' use of tweets to track public health trends at: http://releases.jhu.edu/2011/07/06/tracking-public-health-trends-from-twitter-messages/
Color U.S. flu maps and video available; contact Phil Sneiderman.
Related links:
Human Language Technology Center of Excellence at Johns Hopkins:
http://hltcoe.jhu.edu
Mark Dredze's website: http://www.cs.jhu.edu/~mdredze/
Johns Hopkins Department of Computer Science: http://www.cs.jhu.edu/
Center for Advanced Modeling in The Social, Behavioral, and Health Sciences:
http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/emergencymedicine/center_for_advanced_modeling/
[ | E-mail | Share ]
?
AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
Using Twitter to track the flu: A better way to screen the TweetsPublic release date: 28-Jan-2013 [ | E-mail | Share ]
Contact: Phil Sneiderman prs@jhu.edu 443-287-9960 Johns Hopkins University
Sifting through social media messages has become a popular way to track when and where flu cases occur, but a key hurdle hampers the process: how to identify flu-infection tweets. Some tweets are posted by people who have been sick with the virus, while others come from folks who are merely talking about the illness. If you are tracking actual flu cases, such conversations about the flu in general can skew the results.
To address this problem, Johns Hopkins computer scientists and researchers in the university's School of Medicine have developed a new tweet-screening method that not only delivers real-time data on flu cases, but also filters out online chatter that is not linked to actual flu infections. Comparing their method, which is based on analysis of 5,000 publicly available tweets per minute, to other Twitter-based tracking tools, the Johns Hopkins researchers say their real-time results track more closely with government disease data that takes much longer to compile.
"When you look at Twitter posts, you can see people talking about being afraid of catching the flu or asking friends if they should get a flu shot or mentioning a public figure who seems to be ill," said Mark Dredze, an assistant research professor in the Department of Computer Science who uses tweets to monitor public health trends. "But posts like this don't measure how many people have actually contracted the flu. We wanted to separate hype about the flu from messages from people who truly become ill."
Dredze, who also is a research scientist at the Johns Hopkins Human Language Technology Center of Excellence, led a team that in mid-2011 released one of the first and most comprehensive studies showing that Twitter data can yield useful public health information. Since then, this strategy has become so popular that the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services last summer sponsored a contest challenging researchers to design an online application that could track major disease outbreaks.
This winter, as the United States entered an unusually severe and early flu season, Twitter-based flu projections have drawn increasing attention. Many public tweets, such as, "I'm so sick this week with the flu," can indicate a rise in the flu rate. Collecting enough of these tweets can help health officials gauge the scope and severity of an epidemic.
But the reliability of many computer models can be weakened by too many tweets that point to flu-related news reports and other matters not directly linked to a specific flu case, said David Broniatowski, a School of Medicine postdoctoral fellow in the Department of Emergency Medicine's Center for Advanced Modeling in the Social, Behavioral, and Health Sciences.
"For example," he said, "a recent spike in Twitter flu activity was caused by discussions about basketball legend Kobe Bryant's flu-like symptoms during a recent game. Mr. Bryant's health notwithstanding, such tweets do very little to help public health officials prepare our nation for the next big outbreak."
To improve their accuracy when using tweets to track the flu, the John Hopkins team developed sophisticated statistical methods based on human language processing technologies. The methods are designed to filter out the chatter. The system can distinguish, for example, between "I have the flu" and "I'm worried about getting the flu."
Another advantage of the Johns Hopkins flu projection method is that it can produce real-time results. By comparison, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which record flu-related symptoms from hospital visits, typically take two weeks to publish data on the flu's prevalence.
To check the reliability of their enhanced system, the Johns Hopkins researchers recently compared their results to CDC data for the same period. The researchers said that during November and December 2012, their system demonstrated a substantial improvement in tracking with CDC figures as compared to previous Twitter-based tracking methods. "In late December," Dredze added, "the news media picked up on the flu epidemic, causing a somewhat spurious rise in the rate produced by our Twitter system. But our new algorithm handles this effect much better than other systems, ignoring the spurious spike in tweets."
The researchers have also used their Twitter data to produce United States maps that document the stark differences between last year's mild flu season and the much higher incidence of the virus in the winter of 2012-2013.
While their new method was only recently developed, the Johns Hopkins researchers chose to release information on the flu tracking system because of the higher incidence of illness this winter. Team members hope to share the enhanced flu tracking method with leading government health agencies.
"This new work demonstrates that Twitter posts can be used to guide public health officials in their response to outbreaks of infectious diseases," Dredze said. "Our hope is that the new technology can be used track other diseases as well."
###
Other Johns Hopkins researchers participating in the Twitter flu project are doctoral student Michael Paul and recent bachelor's degree graduate Alex Lamb, both in the Department of Computer Science.
The Johns Hopkins researchers noted that their enhanced Twitter flu analysis system looked only at public tweets in which all user names and gender information had been removed. The system was tested only on messages from the United States. The research was funded in part by the National Institutes of Health's Models of Infectious Disease Agent Study.
View a video produced by Twitter about Johns Hopkins' use of tweets to track public health trends here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HmDIh-YS0GI
Read an earlier news release about Johns Hopkins' use of tweets to track public health trends at: http://releases.jhu.edu/2011/07/06/tracking-public-health-trends-from-twitter-messages/
Color U.S. flu maps and video available; contact Phil Sneiderman.
Related links:
Human Language Technology Center of Excellence at Johns Hopkins:
http://hltcoe.jhu.edu
Mark Dredze's website: http://www.cs.jhu.edu/~mdredze/
Johns Hopkins Department of Computer Science: http://www.cs.jhu.edu/
Center for Advanced Modeling in The Social, Behavioral, and Health Sciences:
http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/emergencymedicine/center_for_advanced_modeling/
[ | E-mail | Share ]
?
AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
BERLIN (AP) ? New movies from directors Steven Soderbergh and Gus Van Sant and a trio of films starring French divas will be competing this year at the Berlin International Film Festival.
A diverse selection of 19 movies, including films from Kazakhstan and Iran, will vie for the main Golden Bear prize at Europe's first major film festival of the year. The event runs from Feb. 7-17.
Van Sant's film about the shale gas industry, "Promised Land," starring Matt Damon, and Soderbergh's thriller "Side Effects," featuring Jude Law and Catherine Zeta-Jones, are the most prominent U.S. offerings.
There's a strong contingent from eastern Europe, including Oscar-winning Bosnian director Danis Tanovic's "An Episode in the Life of an Iron Picker," about a poor Gypsy family; Calin Peter Netzer's "Child's Pose," which highlights corruption in Romania; and Malgoska Szumowska's "In the name of," a film about a gay priest in Poland.
French actresses Juliette Binoche, Catherine Deneuve and Isabelle Huppert all star in separate competition entries this year ? Binoche in "Camille Claudel 1915," about the French sculptor's later years; Deneuve in "On My Way;" and Huppert in "The Nun," a movie about a convent.
From Iran comes "Closed Curtain," directed by dissident filmmaker Jafar Panahi and fellow Iranian Kamboziya Partovi. Panahi was sentenced to house arrest in Iran and banned from filmmaking after being convicted in 2011 of "making propaganda" against Iran's ruling system. Festival director Dieter Kosslick said Panahi's no longer confined to his home but still isn't supposed to make films.
Kosslick said Monday that organizers "tried to bring new people who are making films for the first or second time into the program," continuing a tradition of having less-heralded directors rub shoulders with established names. This year, there's an entry from Kazakhstan ? "Harmony Lessons," directed by Emir Baigazin.
The top prize will be awarded by a seven-member jury under Chinese director Wong Kar-wai, whose members include actor-director Tim Robbins. Wong's new movie about two kung fu masters, "The Grandmaster," is screening out of competition and will open the festival.
Last year's Golden Bear went to "Caesar Must Die," by Italy's Paolo and Vittorio Taviani, which showed inmates of a high-security prison staging Shakespeare's "Julius Caesar."
JERUSALEM (AP) ? Israel could launch a pre-emptive strike to stop Syria's chemical weapons from reaching Lebanon's Hezbollah or al-Qaida inspired groups, officials said Sunday.
The warning came as the military moved a rocket defense system to a main northern city, and Israel's premier warned of dangers from both Syria and Iran.
Israel has long expressed concerns that Syrian President Bashar Assad, clinging to power during a 22-month civil war, could lose control over his chemical weapons.
Vice Prime Minister Silvan Shalom said Sunday that Israel's top security officials held a special meeting last week to discuss Syria's chemical weapons arsenal. The fact of the meeting, held the morning after a national election, had not been made public before.
Shalom told the Army Radio station that the transfer of weapons to violent groups, particularly the Iranian-backed Lebanese Hezbollah, would be a game changer.
"It would be crossing a line that would demand a different approach, including even action," he said. Asked whether this might mean a pre-emptive attack, he said: "We will have to make the decisions."
Israel has kept out of the civil war that has engulfed Syria and killed more than 60,000 people, but it is concerned that violence could spill over from its northern border into Israel.
Israel deployed its Iron Dome rocket defense system in the northern city of Haifa on Sunday. The city was battered by Hezbollah rocket fire during a war in the summer of 2006. The military called the deployment "routine."
Iron Dome, an Israel-developed system that shoots down incoming short-range rockets, was used to defend Israeli cities during a round of hostilities with Hamas militants in the Gaza Strip, on Israel's southern flank, last November.
Yisrael Hasson, a lawmaker and former deputy head of Israel's Shin Bet intelligence agency, said Israel was closely following developments in Syria to make sure chemical weapons don't "fall into the wrong hands."
"Syria has a massive amount of chemical weapons, and if they fall into hands even more extreme than Syria like Hezbollah or global jihad groups it would completely transform the map of threats," Hasson told Army Radio.
"Global jihad" is the term Israel uses for forces influenced by al-Qaida. Syria's rebels include al-Qaida-allied groups.
Syria has rarely acknowledged possessing chemical weapons.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu referred to threats from Syria and Iran at a Cabinet meeting Sunday. Iran is Syria's main regional ally.
"We must look around us, at what is happening in Iran and its proxies and at what is happening in other areas, with the deadly weapons in Syria, which is increasingly coming apart," he said.
Israel views Iran as an existential threat because of its nuclear and missile programs and support for violent anti-Israeli groups in Lebanon and Gaza, as well as repeated references by Iranian leaders to Israel's destruction. Iran denies it is seeking to build atomic weapons, insisting its nuclear program is for civilian purposes.
On Friday, Israeli Channel 2 TV broadcast an interview with a former Iranian diplomat who defected to the West in 2010. He warned that if Tehran gets nuclear weapons, it would use them against Israel. He did not provide evidence.
Part of Mohammad Reza Heydari's job was to draft foreign scientists to work on Tehran's nuclear program and he brought many from North Korea into Iran, the report said.
Heydari spoke from Oslo, where he has received political asylum.
TUCSON, Ariz. (AP) ? Teams on the ground and in the air rescued dozens of hikers who were stranded in an Arizona canyon after heavy rains flooded trails, authorities said.
Forty to 50 adults and children were stranded Saturday along various sections of Bear Canyon northeast of Tucson as the waters rushed down mountainsides, the Pima County Sheriff's Department said.
A series of 911 calls from hikers sparked a rescue operation involving teams on the ground and in a helicopter,
The first group of hikers was led out of the canyon in the Catalina Mountains in the late afternoon and the last group well after dark, deputy Tom Peine told the Arizona Daily Star.
Some of the hikers said they were stranded when a river swelled to a raging torrent in a matter of minutes.
"I've never seen anything like this," hiker Jesse Boyd told KGUN-TV. "I've gotten caught in rain out here, but nothing to the point where I had to be rescued."
With some hikers, rescuers used a technique that involved roping them together with flotation devices to help get them through high water. Some of the hikers were flown out by helicopter.
"(A) rescue team member was behind us with a hand on that flotation device," Michael Rolland told KVOA-TV after being aided by rescuers. "They strung a rope across, and so we had to grab the rope and sidestep across the river."
Peine said that the hikers might not have realized that rains at higher elevations could cause canyon flooding long after the down pour ends.
Whether you should take out payment protection insurance can be a more difficult solution than it may seem. You may think that all PPI is bad and it should never be considered. It is not surprising that people do have this attitude in light of all the PPI scandal and PPI claims that are being made at the moment. However, they are not happening because there is something wrong with PPI but only the way that it was sold.
So if you have any sort of a loan, then you should consider whether you want to take out payment protection insurance. You should consider whether you would like to cover the risk of not being able to make your repayments. The policies do vary so you need to think if you want help if you are unwell, can?t work or whatever and make sure that the policy covers you for this.
It is worth considering how much the policy will cost you for the duration of the loan. Think about how much money you will spend in total and decide whether you think that this will be worth it. It is worth considering what else you could spend that money on as well as the likelihood that you would need to make a claim. Some people like the peace of mind that it gives them and would rather pay the money for that. Others are happy to take the risk, perhaps because they have savings they could use to cover the repayments or another income coming in to the household which would help.
Each person is different in how secure they feel and how much risk they want to take. It will also depend on the loan. If it is a mortgage and your house will be repossessed if you cannot keep up repayments due to losing a job, then you could be left with nowhere to live. However, you may feel you have enough money to cover a few months, you feel the bank would be happy to negotiate a few payment holidays and you have another income to help out with the household bills. However, if you are solely responsible, have family living in the house and no savings, then the idea of having the house taken away could be a lot more scary.
So it is worth thinking about your own personal circumstances when considering PPI rather than worrying about things that have happened to other people in the past.
Have you been wondering about how to get started with Internet marketing? Have you researched the topic so that you can make improvements in the promotion of your site? There are numerous resources available such as magazines, videos, books, shows, etc. How do you create your own plan then? The tips below may be a good start.
Getting listed in Google is essential in any Internet promotion strategy. There are thousands of people searching Google each and every day, and you will want to know when they do a search about something that your company has to offer. If your company comes up near the top of the list, you can dramatically improve your visibility.
Offering a freebie on your website is a great way to lure potential customers and visitors to your site. An excellent freebie to give to your customers is the ability to download a protected article that others may need to pay for. If you are employed in the construction industry, you should consider giving away a leaflet article about homeowner tips. This type of freebie shows customers that you care and want to assist them.
Even if your Internet marketing business is a success, continue to research the newest methods so you can make sure it stays that way. The Internet is changing all the time and it is important that you are aware of all that is going on.
Try to market without resorting to spam. The speed and breadth with which automated programs can post blog comments on your behalf can be very tempting, but the results of these programs leave much to be desired. If you do not personally connect with your customers, people will not trust you and your online business could fail.
Make sure that your website is secure at all times for your customers benefit and be sure they know you are protecting their information. People are concerned about their privacy online, so your goal should be to make your customers know your website and their information is safe.
Avoid making your website too flashy, as this can be distracting for visitors. You will have around five seconds to bring their attention to your website. Chances are good that they will move on if it takes any longer.
Take an international approach, and welcome visitors to your site from around the world. Try to create many variations of the same site in different languages. This will result in a larger, global audience. When the customer can read your site in their native language, they will be more likely to buy from you.
Online marketing can be a great way to network and make contact with your market and your competitors. Reaching out to bloggers and creating partnerships with mutual benefits is a great way to increase your presence. This helps build a sense of community between the bloggers and your brand, helping the bloggers feel more enthusiastic about continuing to write about your brand.
You can make a great impression by including a banner showing your business name, mission statement or slogan. Banners are generally displayed along the top of a website or just under the title. This can help new visitors get a quick idea of what your company is all about. Make it easy for customers to order products and services.
Reward those that are frequent buyers. It is helpful in customer retention, and the appearance of generosity is positive for your company. This will get you a great reputation.
Offer a freebie that is associated with your business. Then, submit it to be posted on sites that offer free items. If you choose to offer an e-book, you should then look for other websites to give it out for free. Many websites will provide free articles or e-books if you submit yours to them.
Think of a service or some way to help people out that come to your site. You will get visitors to your site due to your free offer and many may stay for a time if the site interests them. For instance, if your website offers financial services, you could provide a free program to help calculate tax returns.
Provide a button that allows others to quickly and easily links back to your site. Anyone who likes your site will be more than happy to provide a link back to your site, just as long as you provide a link to their site, too.
If you want to win over a customer have unique content. Content can include cartoons, e-books or even chat sessions. Offering something that is not readily available gives you an advantage.
A good strategy to use in internet marketing is to give your customers discounts if they purchase items over a certain price. One example is to give a 10% discount on purchases over $100. This is a good way to get your customers to buy more of your products.
Increase site traffic with original content. Although it may seem easier to simply post the information offered by the manufacturer, this will not help your SEO efforts. This will allow you to gain an advantage over your competitors.
Allow your customers to control the content that they get from you. It will be a breath of fresh air in a world filled with spam and unsolicited advice. Make sure you give your consumers the choice to participate.
To increase your income, you must generate more subscribers. You can do a split test, where you try different versions of an ad on different groups, to see which ad is best. You can make a more informed decision after looking at the number of subscribers each page generated.
Now, after you just read all these great ideas on Online marketing, do you think you?re capable of implementing your own plan? Are you prepared to use what you read about for your own business? This means you need to start improving your overall marketing plan strategically. If you have answered ?yes? to both of these questions, you are ready to begin brainstorming online marketing strategies.
MOSCOW (Reuters) - Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev used a prime-time TV interview on Saturday to dismiss concerns growing fallout from the 2009 death of anti-corruption lawyer Sergei Magnitsky would damage Russia's business interests.
Medvedev said the whistleblower's death in jail, for which no one has been brought to justice, was being used by Kremlin critics to score points but was of no import to business leaders.
The assurances seemed to contradict concerns aired by members of Russia's business elite this week on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, where Medvedev was Moscow's top representative.
The United States adopted legislation last month called he Magnitsky Act, which bars entry to Russians accused of involvement in his death or other grave human rights abuses and freezes any U.S. assets they hold.
"It does not interest anyone, except maybe certain citizens who are trying to use it to accumulate political capital," said Medvedev, who was president from 2008 until Vladimir Putin returned to the Kremlin last May.
"Not a single businessman raises this issue," he told state television in an interview focusing on his role in the forum. "But unfortunately it has become a factor in political life."
Russia responded to the U.S. legislation by imposing similar measures against Americans accused of violating rights of Russians and also banning adoption of Russian children by Americans, adding tension to ties already strained since Putin's Kremlin return.
Magnitsky was 37 when he died after nearly a year in pre-trial custody on tax evasion changes. He said he was denied proper medical care and members of Medvedev's own human rights council said he was probably beaten to death.
Authorities said he died of a heart attack, but his former employer, investment fund Hermitage Capital, says he was killed because he was investigating a $230 million theft by mid-ranking interior ministry and tax officials through fraudulent tax refunds.
POSTHUMOUS TRIAL
Magnitsky's death caused an outcry and underscored risks faced by Russians who challenge the state. In what Kremlin critics called a travesty of justice, Russia is trying him posthumously and preliminary hearings start on Monday.
Medvedev brushed off a question about the potential effects on investment in Russia, saying the issue had been politicized and had little relation to the economy.
At Davos, he said, "There was no business discussion (of the Magnitsky issue)."
For foreign executives, however, it is symbolic of broader concerns about operating in Russia, where perceived corruption and weak corporate governance add to the risks of investment.
A Russian billionaire at Davos expressed concern that the drive to punish Russians over Magnitsky could spread to the European Union and Britain, and some tycoons worry their cross-border money transfers will get hit by red tape. The billionaire asked not to be named.
Investigations with ties to the Magnitsky case have taken place in three European countries which are important conduits for fund transfers by Russian business.
Alexei Navalny, a Russian opposition leader, seemed to add a note of sarcasm when he posted a Russian news headline on Twitter: "Dmitry Medvedev believes the issue of Sergei Magnitsky is not of interest to Russian business."
Wow! 2nd-floor 3BR/2BA home with dramatic lake views & overlooking the park at 9 E Lexington Lane #E in Lexington Green at prestigious PGA National. The lushly-landscaped walkway with shade trees leads to the covered arched entrance & your spot in paradise. Once inside, the bright great room includes wraparound windows & sliders that lead to the screened lanai. The kitchen includes Italian granite countertops, stainless steel appliances, and a pass-thru to the dining room. The master has spectacular views & large walk-in closets. The master bath has His/Hers granite sinks & a tiled Roman tub. The spacious guest bedrooms share an updated Jack-n-Jill bath. The 3rd Bedroom/Office includes a built-in Murphy bed. The screened lanai is ideal for relaxing. Lots of light & newer flooring throughout. Includes a 1-car garage.
This entry was posted on Friday, January 25th, 2013 at 1:10 pm and is filed under PGA National, PGA National homes, PGA National homes for sale. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
German Shepherd Dog - Thor - Large - Young - Male - Dog
Our adoption fees are variable - see www.thssc.org/dogs.htm <http://www.thssc.org/dogs.htm> and scroll down page. Cost includes first shots, spaying/neutering, microchip with 24hourpetwatch, and 30 days free pet insurance. Dogs over 6 months are checked for heartworm. Senior Citizen Discount (age 60 or over) 15% on regular price, Prime Time Pets (dogs/cats over 5 years old) are discounted - dogs $55 and cats $35. Lonely Hearts (dogs/cats at shelter longer than 45 days) are discounted - dogs $55 and cats $35. All senior citizens can adopt one cat for FREE! Call for more information 812-268-4201.
Hey, my name is Thor and I am a shepherd mix about 11 months old. My family didn't want me...'change of life style' is what they told the ladies here at the shelter. It really hurt my feelings. The people here at the shelter are really nice and have introduced me to my new buddy Shagg. We hang out together in the play yard...but I would really like to have a furrever home. I am very faithful, loving and will always look out for you. Come check me out at the Sullivan Shelter...I promise to be furrever faithful.
Visit us at www.thssc.org <http://www.thssc.org> or call 812-268-4201. Also visit us on Facebook! http://www.facebook.com/pages/Humane-Society-of-Sullivan-County/324477917116?ref=ts <http://www.facebook.com/pages/Humane-Society-of-Sullivan-County/324477917116?ref=ts>
CHARACTERISTICS: Breed: German Shepherd Dog Size: Large Petfinder ID: 25105355
ADDITIONAL INFO: Pet has been spayed/neutered
CONTACT: The Humane Society of Sullivan County | Sullivan, IN | 812-268-4201
For additional information, reply to this ad or see: http://www.petfinder.com/petnote/displaypet.cgi?petid=25105355
Jan. 24, 2013 ? An international team of scientists confirms a surprisingly small proton radius with laser spectroscopy of exotic hydrogen.
The initial results puzzled the world three years ago: the size of the proton (to be precise, its charge radius), measured in exotic hydrogen, in which the electron orbiting the nucleus is replaced by a negatively charged muon, yielded a value significantly smaller than the one from previous investigations of regular hydrogen or electron-proton-scattering. A new measurement by the same team confirms the value of the electric charge radius and makes it possible for the first time to determine the magnetic radius of the proton via laser spectroscopy of muonic hydrogen (Science, January 25, 2013). The experiments were carried out at the Paul Scherrer Institut (PSI) (Villigen, Switzerland) which is the only research institute in the world providing the necessary amount of muons. The international collaboration included the Max Planck Institute of Quantum Optics (MPQ) in Garching near Munich, the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology ETH Zurich, the University of Fribourg, the Institut f?r Strahlwerkzeuge (IFSW) of the Universit?t Stuttgart, and Dausinger & Giesen GmbH, Stuttgart. The new results fuel the debate as to whether the discrepancies observed can be explained by standard physics, for example an incomplete understanding of the systematic errors that are inherent to all measurements, or whether they are due to new physics.
The hydrogen atom has played a key role in the investigation of the fundamental laws of physics. Hydrogen consists of a single positively charged proton orbited by a negatively charged electron, a model whose success in explaining spectroscopy data dates back to its proposal by Bohr in 1913. The energy levels of this simplest of atoms can be predicted with excellent precision from the theory of quantum electrodynamics. However, the calculations have to take into account that -- in contrast to the point-like electron -- the proton is an extended object with a finite size, made of three quarks bound by so-call 'gluons'. Therefore, the electric charge as well as the magnetism of the proton is distributed over a certain volume. The extended nature of the proton causes a shift of the energy levels in hydrogen. Hence the electric and the magnetic charge radii can be deduced from a measurement of the level shifts.
In 2010, the first results on the spectroscopic determination of the shift of the so-called 2S energy level in muonic hydrogen were published. The exotic atoms were generated by bombarding a target of regular hydrogen with muons from an accelerator at PSI. Muons behave a lot like electrons, except for their mass: muons are 200 times heavier than electrons. The atomic orbit of the muon is therefore much closer to the proton than the electron's orbit in a regular hydrogen atom. This results in a much larger sensitivity of the muon's energy level to the proton size and hence to a stronger shift of the energy levels. Measuring the level shifts is very technologically demanding: muonic hydrogen is very short-lived (muons decay after about two millionths of a second), so the light pulses for the excitation of the resonance have to be fired onto the hydrogen target only nanoseconds after the detection of a muon. The new disk laser technology developed by the Institut f?r Strahlwerkzeuge (IFSW) of the Universit?t Stuttgart was an important element to fulfil this requirement. The lasers necessary for exciting the resonance were developed by the Max-Planck-Institute of Quantum Optics in cooperation with the Laboratoire Kastler Brossel (Paris).
In the experiment described in the newly published Science article, the energy shift was determined for another transition. This leads to a new measurement of the electric charge radius of the proton. Its value of 0.84087(39) femtometres (1 fm = 0.000 000 000 000 001 metre) is in good agreement with the one published in 2010, but 1.7 times as precise. The discrepancy with existing radius measurements made in regular hydrogen or by electron-proton-scattering, the so-called proton size puzzle, has thus been reaffirmed.
In addition, the new measurement allows a determination of the magnetic radius of the proton for the first time by laser spectroscopy of muonic hydrogen. This results in a value of 0.87(6) femtometres, in agreement with all previous measurements. Though the precision is, at present, of the same order as in other experiments, laser spectroscopy of muonic hydrogen has the potential of achieving a much better accuracy in the determination of the magnetic proton radius in the future.
Physicists around the world are actively seeking a solution to the proton size puzzle. Previous measurements in regular hydrogen and by electron-proton-scattering are being reanalyzed and even repeated. Theorists of various disciplines suggested ways to explain the discrepancy. Very interesting proposals explain the discrepancies by physics beyond the standard model. Other explanations suggest a proton structure of higher complexity than assumed today which only reveals itself under the influence of the heavy muon. New measurements are needed to check on these possibilities. Muon-proton-scattering experiments are being developed at PSI, new precision measurements at the electron accelerator in Mainz are being considered, and the PSI team plans to measure, for the first time ever, laser spectroscopy of the muonic helium atom in the course of this year.
The required modifications of the current laser system are being investigated in the frame of the project "Thin-disk laser for muonic atoms spectroscopy" which (financed by the Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF) and the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG)) is carried out at the ETH Z?rich (Prof. Dr. Klaus Kirch, Dr. Aldo Antognini) and at the IFSW (Prof. Dr. Thomas Graf, Dr. Andreas Vo?). The Project "Muonic Helium" is also generously supported by the European Research Council (ERC) by an ERC Starting Grant held by Dr. Randolf Pohl from the MPQ in Garching.
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The above story is reprinted from materials provided by Paul Scherrer Institut (PSI). The original article was written by Olivia Meyer-Streng.
Note: Materials may be edited for content and length. For further information, please contact the source cited above.
Journal Reference:
A. Antognini, F. Nez, K. Schuhmann, F. D. Amaro, F. Biraben, J. M. R. Cardoso, D. S. Covita, A. Dax, S. Dhawan, M. Diepold, L. M. P. Fernandes, A. Giesen, A. L. Gouvea, T. Graf, T. W. Hansch, P. Indelicato, L. Julien, C.-Y. Kao, P. Knowles, F. Kottmann, E.-O. Le Bigot, Y.-W. Liu, J. A. M. Lopes, L. Ludhova, C. M. B. Monteiro, F. Mulhauser, T. Nebel, P. Rabinowitz, J. M. F. dos Santos, L. A. Schaller, C. Schwob, D. Taqqu, J. F. C. A. Veloso, J. Vogelsang, R. Pohl. Proton Structure from the Measurement of 2S-2P Transition Frequencies of Muonic Hydrogen. Science, 2013; 339 (6118): 417 DOI: 10.1126/science.1230016
Note: If no author is given, the source is cited instead.
Disclaimer: Views expressed in this article do not necessarily reflect those of ScienceDaily or its staff.
Spam! There is no single accepted definition, but I think most bloggers will agree, spam is unwanted commercially motivated electronic communication (not limited to email), that?s a likely a source of malware.
I think most bloggers will also agree on what isn?t spam. No commenter should be shut out of discussion on your blog because you disagreed with their point of view and inappropriately marked their comment as spam.
Dealing With Spam
Spam affects everyone involved with the Internet including, among others, network operators, ISPs, businesses, recipients and, at the most basic level, the infrastructure itself through burden that it places on the system. For that reason, fighting spam requires a multi-stakeholder approach. ??Combating Spam: Policy, Technical and Industry Approaches (PDF)
Over 80% of all so-called comments submitted to free hosted WordPress.com blogs every day is spam and we WordPress.com bloggers have Akismet, an excellent spam filter.
If you get spam that slips by Akismet then mark it as spam (do not delete it) and over time Akismet will learn it?s spam.
On the spam that Akismet sequesters it takes only seconds to click ?empty spam? and you don?t even have to click ?empty spam? if you don?t want to. Akismet will maintain comments it has caught for 15 days from the date of receipt and will delete the comment automatically.
Read more here > 5 things every blogger should know about spam
Develop a Commenting Policy for Your Blog
Freedom of speech comes with responsibilities. Develop and publish your own commenting policy. Then when a commenter does not parrot your own point of view back to you or states something you disagree with suck it up ie. deal with the comment appropriately.
In Blog Comment Policy Lee Odden five criteria for a comment policy include Comments are welcome and encouraged; Comments should add value; Keywords in the ?name? field are spam; Links must be relevant, No signature [links] in blog comments.
Mark Spam as?Spam
Sooner or later you will receive a dodgy commercially motivated comment that slips through the Akismet spamfilter and you will have to mark spam as spam. ? It may be either bot generated or human generated spam. It may or may not have a keywords in the ?name? field. It may amount to a shameless self promoting plug in very poor English, or it may contain insincere flattery.? It may or may not or be full of links to bad neighborhoods, etc.
Mark only spam as spam
Sooner or later you will receive a negative comment that does not violate your comment policy and it?s best to have a personal policy in place to deal with that too.? Approve the comment and refute the contents? or thank the commenter for sharing their point of view and blog on.?But, don?t pollute the spam filter with false information by marking comments you don?t like as spam. ??Mark only spam as spam.
Further reading: The Perfect Host: Comment?Moderation Say Something: Commenting?Etiquette How to Deal with Criticism And The Different Types of Critics
There are few annoying starship-to-planet commutes in Star Trek. Instead, the transporter turns you into energy and data, then instantly reassembles you into flesh and blood at your destination. The Fly depicts a somewhat less successful attempt at the same thing.
Theoretical physicist and unstoppable optimist Michio Kaku thinks humanity will achieve a version of teleportation in the real world. He predicts the transport of a molecule in the next 10 years, soon followed by DNA. But making it to Captain Kirk will take "centuries of work," he says. For now, teleportation is stuck at the quantum level.
In quantum teleportation, one of the more amazing quirks of quantum mechanics, an exact copy of a photon appears in a different location (the record distance is 100 miles) just as the old photon is destroyed. Scientists disembody the information about a particle, such as a photon, from that particle. They then apply it to another photon some distance away, creating a copy and destroying the original.
If you've seen The Prestige (spoiler alert if you have not), think of the final twist in which we learn that Hugh Jackman's "transported man" magic trick was really a cloning trick: When the "original" magician is transported, he is actually drowned. A clone appears in his place, leaving only one "Hugh Jackman." In quantum teleportation, you actually need three photons?the two entangled ones mentioned earlier, and a third to carry the qubit (the unit of quantum information) from one particle or assembly of particles to another. In the case of quantum teleportation, scientists direct the photon transport through fiberoptics or with lasers or satellites aimed at "detectors" that decode the info, but so far the technique only works at night because sunlight destroys the information carried in the photon.
"Quantum teleportation is not only a possibility?it's a reality, at least for single photon states," physicist Dave Goldberg says, "and there's no reason it couldn't be scaled up somewhat. I'm skeptical that it'll ever be practical to teleport people, but there's no fundamental reason why we couldn't do so. It's just mind-bendingly complex."
If you want to know why scientists can't teleport humans yet, just look at the numbers. Quantum teleportation takes one unit of information and makes its "appear" somewhere else. The body is made of 50 trillion units (cells), and each cell is much more complex than an individual photon. To disassemble such a complex system and reassemble it with absolute accuracy somewhere else is beyond even a theoretical understanding today. "Nothing in the physics of today describes how that would be possible," says David Allen Batchelor of NASA Goddard Space Flight Center .
While scientists once thought teleportation was impossible because of the uncertainty principle in physics, the quantum experiments of the last two decades have shown that's not true. But if you're waiting for a transporter to let you bypass the morning commute, keep waiting.
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Public release date: 28-Jan-2013
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Spam! There is no single accepted definition, but I think most bloggers will agree, spam is unwanted commercially motivated electronic communication (not limited to email), that?s a likely a source of malware.