Folders, Printing, and Email Coming to iBooks Soon? [TNW Apple]

Create, rename, or delete a collection: Tap Collections to display the collections list. Tap New to add a new collection. To delete a collection tap Edit, then tap and tap Delete. You can?t edit or remove the built-in Books and PDFs collections. To edit the name of a collection, tap its name. When you finish, tap Done.

Move a book or PDF to a collection: Go to the bookshelf and tap Edit. Tap each book or PDF that you want to move so that a checkmark appears, then tap Move and select a collection. An item can be in only one collection at a time. When you add a book or PDF to your bookshelf, it?s put in the Books or PDF collection. From there, you can move it to a different collection. You might want to create collections for work and school, for example, or for reference and leisure reading.

View a collection: Tap Collections, then tap an item in the list that appears.

You can use iBooks to send a copy of a PDF via email, or to print all or a portion of the PDF to a supported printer.

Email a PDF: Open the PDF, then tap and choose Email Document. A new message appears with the PDF attached. Tap Send when you finish addressing and writing your message.

Print a PDF: Open the PDF, then tap and choose Print. Select a printer and the page range and number of copies, then tap Print. For information about supported printers, see ?Printing? on page 39.

You can only email or print PDFs. These options aren?t available for ePub books.

via ?Collections?, PDF E-Mailing and Printing coming to iBooks | 9 to 5 Mac ?Collections?, PDF E-Mailing and Printing coming to iBooks | Apple Intelligence.

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Source: http://thenextweb.com/apple/2010/11/27/folders-printing-and-email-coming-to-ibooks-soon/

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Chrome extension and Kinect control the browser with gestures

A group of students at the MIT Media Lab Fluid Interfaces Group, devoted to move UI design past the typical keyboard-and-mouse interface, has turned the Kinect motion controller into a tool for Web browsing. They wrote an extension for Google Chrome called DepthJS (yes, it uses Javascript) so that surfers can manipulate the browser with just gestures.

The group has demonstrated fairly simple website navigation in their video, embedded below (via Engadget). Making a fist is for selecting while a swatting motion allows scrolling.

"DepthJS is a web browser extension that allows any any web page to interact with the Microsoft Kinect via Javascript," according to the video's description. "Navigating the web is only one application of the framework we built - that is, we envision all sorts of applications that run in the browser, from games to specific utilities for specific sites. The great part is that now web developers who specialize in Javascript can work with the Kinect without having to learn any special languages or code. We believe this will allow a new set of interactions beyond what we first developed."

For those of you that came here just to watch the video, here's a bonus one:

In the video above, the Munich-based software company Evoluce shows Windows 7 applications being controlled through Kinect. There's multitouch support, which we've seen before, based on the company's Multitouch Input Management (MIM) driver for Kinect. The user can easily zoom and resize images as well as draw using two hands at once.

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Source: http://www.techspot.com/news/41320-chrome-extension-and-kinect-control-the-browser-with-gestures.html

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G.O.P. and Tea Party Gains Are Mixed Blessing for Israel

But while Mr. Cantor and other newly empowered Republicans are eager to promote themselves as Israel?s staunchest defenders in Washington, the reconfigured American political landscape is a more complex and unpredictable backdrop for Middle East peacemaking.

Scores of Tea Party-backed candidates are entering Congress, many of whom favor isolationist policies and are determined to cut American foreign aid, regardless of its destination. Rand Paul, the newly elected Tea Party-backed senator from Kentucky, bluntly told the American Israeli Public Affairs Committee, an influential pro-Israel lobbying group, that they were going to disagree about the need for foreign aid and suggested that they move on to other topics, according to a person briefed on the meeting.

?One of the first things Congressman Cantor can do is to make sure that his colleagues vote for aid to Israel,? said Senator Charles E. Schumer, Democrat of New York, who also met with Mr. Netanyahu.

Mr. Schumer and others worry that support for Israel in Congress, long a bipartisan article of faith, could become politicized in a way that will end up harming Israel?s interests. In the recent election, the administration?s Middle East policy became a partisan issue, seized on by several Republicans who pointed out that President Obama had tended to take a tougher line against Israel.

Allen West, a black Republican, focused on it with great success in a heavily Jewish coastal district of Florida. Representative John A. Boehner, the Ohio Republican who is the House speaker-designate, sent out fund-raising literature aimed at Jewish voters, criticizing the administration for its pressuring of Israel on issues like settlements.

?That was the first time I had seen Israel used in a partisan political way,? said Representative Gary L. Ackerman, a New York Democrat and outgoing chairman of the House foreign affairs subcommittee on the Middle East and South Asia.

As a practical matter, lawmakers do not have the kind of leverage over Middle East policy that they have on matters that require Congressional approval, like the arms treaty with Russia currently being blocked by Senate Republicans, or big-ticket appropriations, like the health care law.

But Congress is far from powerless. Lawmakers can apply pressure on the margins, by attaching strings to financing for the Palestinian Authority; pushing for tougher sanctions against Israel?s hostile neighbor Iran; or by questioning weapons sales to Arab states.

And they can club the White House in the court of public opinion, as they did last April when nearly two-thirds of the members of Congress signed letters to Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton urging the administration to defuse tensions with Israel over settlement construction.

While the White House did not back down from its demands, Mrs. Clinton subsequently gave two conciliatory speeches to Jewish groups, reaffirming the American commitment to Israel?s security.

With powerful friends like Mr. Cantor, a Virginia Republican and one of the highest-ranking members of Congress, the Israeli government was viewed by some as one of the big winners of the midterm elections.

The Republican-controlled House, analysts say, will be more inclined to defend Mr. Netanyahu, even against Mr. Obama, who has repeatedly clashed with the prime minister over the president?s demand that Israel freeze settlements to advance peace negotiations with the Palestinians.

?The administration has to take into account that Israel now has a friendlier forum,? said Abraham H. Foxman, national director of the Anti-Defamation League, a Jewish advocacy organization. ?It will therefore think carefully about doing things.?

Mr. Netanyahu?s post-midterm election tour of the United States seemed to reflect his more powerful political backing. He delivered a speech calling on Mr. Obama to harden his policy toward Iran. And when the president voiced measured criticism of Jewish housing in contested East Jerusalem, Mr. Netanyahu?s office fired back a defiant response.

The night before Mr. Netanyahu met with Mrs. Clinton in New York to try to salvage Middle East peace talks, he sat down with Mr. Cantor in his hotel suite. The two men discussed the Republican triumph in the elections and the ?existential threat? that Iran posed to Israel, Mr. Cantor said.

?It is my strong belief that U.S. security goes hand in hand with Israeli security,? Mr. Cantor said in an interview. ?Whether this administration puts this into practice or not is another question, but that is the stated position of the administration.?

Yet the Tea Party-backed lawmakers remain something of a mystery. One of their brightest stars, Marco Rubio, went on a personal trip to Israel days after winning his Florida Senate race. But pro-Israel analysts point out that Mr. Paul once said he did not view an Iran with one nuclear bomb as a threat, though he has subsequently been more hawkish. Mr. Paul did not reply to a request for comment.

To be sure, there will be many other Republican voices staunchly in Israel?s corner. The incoming Republican chairwoman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, Representative Ileana Ros-Lehtinen of Florida, is likely to push the administration even harder than her Democratic predecessor, Representative Howard L. Berman of California, to put sanctions into effect against Iran for its nuclear program.

Ms. Ros-Lehtinen and Mr. Berman recently sent a letter to Mrs. Clinton and Secretary of Defense Robert M. Gates challenging a $60 billion sale of advanced fighter jets and helicopters to Saudi Arabia. The deal has aroused concern in Israel, contributing to Mr. Netanyahu?s intense focus on obtaining 20 F-35 planes as a condition for agreeing to a 90-day freeze on settlements in the West Bank.

If Mr. Obama achieves a Middle East peace deal, veterans of Capitol Hill say, it would be such a momentous achievement that it would transcend politics. But first Mr. Obama has to get there, and even his allies worry that by getting bogged down in squabbles with Mr. Netanyahu, the president is risking his credibility and opening himself to partisan attacks.

?The administration needs to choose its confrontational points wisely, and win them,? said Robert Wexler, a former Democratic congressman from Florida who runs the S. Daniel Abraham Center for Middle East Peace, a nonprofit organization in Washington. ?The president,? he added, ?is not a warm-up act; he?s the closer.?

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Source: http://feeds.nytimes.com/click.phdo?i=c977ca6dc50d65e85d18450418ba15d8

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Administration Is Bracing for Court Setbacks to Health Law

The judge, Henry E. Hudson of Federal District Court in Richmond, has promised to rule by the end of the year on the constitutionality of the law?s requirement that most Americans obtain insurance, which does not take effect until 2014.

Although administration officials remain confident that it is constitutionally valid to compel people to obtain health insurance, they also acknowledge that Judge Hudson?s preliminary opinions and comments could presage the first ruling against the law.

?He?s asked a number of questions that express skepticism,? said one administration official who is examining whether a ruling against part of the law would raise questions about whether other provisions would automatically collapse. ?We have been trying to think through that set of questions,? said the official, who insisted on anonymity because he was not authorized to discuss the case freely.

While many newly empowered Republican lawmakers have vowed to repeal the health care law in Congress, a more immediate threat may rest in the federal courts in cases brought by Republican officials in dozens of states. Not only would an adverse ruling confuse Americans and attack the law?s underpinnings, it could frustrate the steps hospitals, insurers and government agencies are taking to carry out the law.

?Any ruling against the act creates another P.R. problem for the Democrats, who need to resell the law to insured Americans,? said Jonathan Oberlander, a University of North Carolina political scientist, who wrote in The New England Journal of Medicine last week that such a ruling ?could add to health care reform?s legitimacy problem.?

So far, there has been only one ruling on the merits among nearly two dozen legal challenges to the health care act. Last month, a federal district judge in Michigan upheld the law. But another judge, Roger Vinson of Federal District Court in Pensacola, Fla., has joined Judge Hudson in writing preliminary opinions that seemingly accept key arguments made by state officials challenging the law.

Unlike the judge in Michigan, who was appointed by President Bill Clinton, both Judge Hudson and Judge Vinson were appointed by Republican presidents.

?We are not operating under the assumption that those two judges are inevitably going to rule against us,? the administration official said. ?But of course we?re planning for the possibility that judges will reach different conclusions.?

The novel question before the courts is whether the government can require citizens to buy a commercial product like health insurance. Because the Supreme Court has said the commerce clause of the Constitution allows Congress to regulate ?activities that substantially affect interstate commerce,? the judges must decide whether the failure to obtain insurance can be defined as an ?activity.?

Lawyers on both sides expect the issue eventually to be decided by the Supreme Court. But the appellate path to that decision could take two years. In the meantime, any district court judge who rules against the law would have to decide whether to block enforcement of one or more of its provisions, potentially creating bureaucratic chaos.

Such a decision would prompt a flurry of appeals, as the Justice Department almost certainly would ask the judge and then the appellate courts to stay, or delay, the injunction pending the outcome of higher court rulings.

Administration officials, as well as some lawyers for the plaintiffs, agree that Judge Hudson seems unlikely, based on his comments from the bench, to enjoin the entire law. The judge volunteered at a hearing last month that his courtroom was ?just one brief stop on the way to the Supreme Court.?

If he does not enjoin the law, the immediate impact of a finding against the insurance mandate would be limited because that provision, and others that might fall with it, do not take effect for more than three years.

Virginia?s attorney general, Kenneth T. Cuccinelli II, a Republican who filed the Richmond lawsuit, argues that if Judge Hudson rejects the insurance requirement he should instantly invalidate the entire act on a nationwide basis.

Mr. Cuccinelli and the plaintiffs in the Florida case, who include attorneys general or governors from 20 states, have emphasized that Congressional bill writers did not include a ?severability clause? that would explicitly protect other parts of the sprawling law if certain provisions were struck down.

An earlier version of the legislation, which passed the House last November, included severability language. But that clause did not make it into the Senate version, which ultimately became law. A Democratic aide who helped write the bill characterized the omission as an oversight.

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Source: http://feeds.nytimes.com/click.phdo?i=7060646b65027ec99a53ad6b31868745

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VaultPress goes beyond backups to include hacking protection too [TNW Apps]

How it works

VaultPress knows which version of WordPress your site is running. For each particular version of WordPress, we know what the MD5 checksum for each of the core files should be (an MD5 checksum is a kind of digital fingerprint for a file, that can be used to validate the integrity of that file).

Our new core file scanner scans your site and does the following:

Checks that each of the expected core files exists

Checks the MD5 checksum of each file

Stores information about each file from PHP?s stat() function

On our initial scan of your site, we perform all three of these steps for each of the 750+ WordPress core files. This scan creates a baseline that we can compare against in future scans. If the MD5 checksum of a core file doesn?t match, we notify you through an alert in the security tab of your VaultPress dashboard. A variation in the checksum means that the file has been modified from the original version that came with your WordPress install.

via New VaultPress security scanning | VaultPress Blog.

Right, VaultPress might not be able to prevent hacking, but they can certainly help to let you know as soon as possible that something might be amiss and where the problem might lie. As awesome as this might be, I think it also helps Automattic know what files hackers are going after and what server vulnerabilities hackers are using to get into sites. Not important data? Yeah, think again. This is crucial data in the fight against hackers. Like Akismet helping us all understand blog spam better, these data can help us understand hackers better. Not only that, say several blogs that share the same host are hacked, Automattic would then be in a position to inform the host that they might have an issue.

The one thing that I see as a drawback to VaultPress is the cost. The basic plan is $15/month/blog and the premium plan $40/month/blog (these will go up to $20 and $50 respectively after the beta period) and sure they aren?t exorbitant, but more than a few sites (I do have several) and that gets expensive. On the other hand, the first time it saves your tushie it would all be worth it.

So, VaultPress, a good idea that has gotten better with security checking. I did get a beta invite and didn?t use it because I didn?t feel I could justify the price. Though now that I think of it, I do have a lot of stuff on the server that should be backed up better?

What?s your feeling? $40/month/blog too much for backup with security checking? Or would you opt for the $15/month plan and live a (little) dangerously?

Hat tip to BlogHerald where I read it first.

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Source: http://thenextweb.com/apps/2010/11/27/vaultpress-goes-beyond-backups-to-hacking-protection/

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VaultPress goes beyond backups to include hacking protection too [TNW Apps]

How it works

VaultPress knows which version of WordPress your site is running. For each particular version of WordPress, we know what the MD5 checksum for each of the core files should be (an MD5 checksum is a kind of digital fingerprint for a file, that can be used to validate the integrity of that file).

Our new core file scanner scans your site and does the following:

Checks that each of the expected core files exists

Checks the MD5 checksum of each file

Stores information about each file from PHP?s stat() function

On our initial scan of your site, we perform all three of these steps for each of the 750+ WordPress core files. This scan creates a baseline that we can compare against in future scans. If the MD5 checksum of a core file doesn?t match, we notify you through an alert in the security tab of your VaultPress dashboard. A variation in the checksum means that the file has been modified from the original version that came with your WordPress install.

via New VaultPress security scanning | VaultPress Blog.

Right, VaultPress might not be able to prevent hacking, but they can certainly help to let you know as soon as possible that something might be amiss and where the problem might lie. As awesome as this might be, I think it also helps Automattic know what files hackers are going after and what server vulnerabilities hackers are using to get into sites. Not important data? Yeah, think again. This is crucial data in the fight against hackers. Like Akismet helping us all understand blog spam better, these data can help us understand hackers better. Not only that, say several blogs that share the same host are hacked, Automattic would then be in a position to inform the host that they might have an issue.

The one thing that I see as a drawback to VaultPress is the cost. The basic plan is $15/month/blog and the premium plan $40/month/blog (these will go up to $20 and $50 respectively after the beta period) and sure they aren?t exorbitant, but more than a few sites (I do have several) and that gets expensive. On the other hand, the first time it saves your tushie it would all be worth it.

So, VaultPress, a good idea that has gotten better with security checking. I did get a beta invite and didn?t use it because I didn?t feel I could justify the price. Though now that I think of it, I do have a lot of stuff on the server that should be backed up better?

What?s your feeling? $40/month/blog too much for backup with security checking? Or would you opt for the $15/month plan and live a (little) dangerously?

Hat tip to BlogHerald where I read it first.

Powered by WizardRSS | Best Membership Site Software

Source: http://thenextweb.com/apps/2010/11/27/vaultpress-goes-beyond-backups-to-hacking-protection/

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On Arms Treaty, White House Seeks a Republican?s Ear

WASHINGTON ? The White House might as well install a red-telephone hot line in Senator Jon Kyl?s house.

President Obama called last week. Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. phoned this week. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates have been on the line. Other officials dispensed with the phone to fly to Arizona to talk in person.

Suffice it to say, Mr. Kyl has the attention of the Oval Office these days. More than any other Republican in Congress, Mr. Kyl has become the target of administration energy as it seeks to persuade him to support a new arms control treaty with Russia ? or figure out how to circumvent him if he does not. ?They are much more focused now,? Mr. Kyl said in an interview.

Rarely has a single member of the minority party become so crucial to a president?s top foreign policy priority. By most accounts, Mr. Kyl, a burly, sober-minded lawyer and frustrated would-be scientist who has made himself into a nuclear expert, holds the key to whether the so-called New Start treaty will be approved this year as the president has demanded.

Mr. Kyl has played close to the vest since a statement last week declaring there was not enough time to consider the treaty in the lame-duck session of Congress. In his first interview since then, Mr. Kyl credited the administration with meeting many of his concerns, but said he was still not sure he could trust it to follow through.

He did not rule out a vote this year, but set conditions that might be hard for the administration to meet, including a long floor debate. ?If they try to jam us, if they try to bring this up the week before Christmas, it?ll be defeated,? he said. ?If they allow plenty of time for it, and I think it will take two weeks, then it?s a different matter.?

The attention represents a turnabout of sorts for Mr. Kyl, who has been overshadowed for years by his Arizona colleague, John McCain. A Nebraska native who moved to Arizona for college and law school, Mr. Kyl first won a House seat in 1986 and was elected to the Senate in 1994.

He has been a Senate workhorse and earned his way up to Republican whip, while compiling a more conservative voting record than all but four other senators, according to the American Conservative Union. By dint of his interest in nuclear issues, his caucus has deferred to his judgment on the New Start treaty and the nuclear modernization program he wants as a trade-off.

?He?s made it a passion of his, so when he talks, we listen,? said Senator Lamar Alexander, Republican of Tennessee. ?That doesn?t mean he persuades everybody. But he certainly has the attention of his Republican colleagues.?

The White House has been careful to treat him with respect. When some treaty advocates at a Nixon Center forum accused Mr. Kyl of playing politics, Gary Samore, the top White House arms control official, defended him, saying the senator was a ?great American? who genuinely cared about the issue. At a news conference where he warned against partisanship, Mr. Obama exempted Mr. Kyl. ?I believe that Senator Kyl wants a safe and secure America, just like I do, and is well motivated,? Mr. Obama said.

Privately, administration officials expressed anger and bewilderment at Mr. Kyl, contending that they had given him virtually everything he had sought. Arms control advocates have been more vocal. ?My conclusion is he?s acting in bad faith,? said Daryl G. Kimball, executive director of the Arms Control Association. ?He asked for more earlier in the fall and they have delivered.?

Mr. Kyl became interested in nuclear issues decades ago when one of his best college friends became a scientist at Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico. ?It was always just fascinating to me,? Mr. Kyl said. ?I?m an amateur scientist ? I?m no good at it, but I?ve always been very interested.?

In Congress, he delved into arms control and made himself a resource for fellow Republicans. In 1997, he voted against the Chemical Weapons Convention. Two years later, President Bill Clinton wanted the Senate to approve the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty. Senator Byron L. Dorgan, a North Dakota Democrat, vowed to ?plant myself on the floor like a potted plant? until the Republican majority allowed a vote.

Mr. Clinton and Mr. Dorgan underestimated Mr. Kyl, who had quietly rounded up votes against the treaty. Republicans called Mr. Dorgan?s bluff, brought the treaty to a vote and defeated it decisively, with just 48 senators supporting it, far from the 67 required. It was the first time since the Treaty of Versailles in 1920 that the Senate had formally rejected a major international security treaty.

?They played on people?s insecurities and they were able to get a pretty big vote,? Mr. Dorgan said in an interview. Mr. Dorgan said that he liked Mr. Kyl personally and that he must be taken seriously. ?He?s very smart and very relentless and determined,? Mr. Dorgan said.

Underlying Mr. Kyl?s views is a deep skepticism of Mr. Obama?s goal of eventually ridding the world of nuclear weapons, which he termed ?not realistic, not achievable and not wise.? He expressed concern that the New Start treaty would constrain missile defense and long-range conventional missiles, concerns the White House and Pentagon call unfounded.

Mr. Kyl finds unpersuasive Mr. Obama?s warnings that defeating the treaty would undercut the warming relationship with Russia while preventing nuclear inspections, calling it a conflicting argument since it presumes Russia is a partner and untrustworthy at the same time. Passing a nuclear treaty to secure cooperation on other issues is ?wrongheaded and foolish,? he said.

His priority, though, has been modernizing nuclear facilities at Los Alamos and elsewhere. The administration committed $80 billion over 10 years, but Mr. Kyl said most was not new money. After feeling ?essentially stonewalled? for months, the senator said the administration became more serious after Labor Day. This month, it increased the plan to at least $85 billion.

Mr. Kyl expressed satisfaction. ?We?ve probably got all we?re going to get out of them in terms of dollar commitments,? he said.

But he listed other concerns, including timing of construction and the composition of forces. ?I?ve come to the conclusion that the administration is intellectually committed to modernization now. No sane person could not reach that conclusion,? he said. ?Whether they?re committed in the heart is another matter. Suppose Start is ratified, and they no longer have to worry about that? Will they continue to press for the money??

The White House says yes, and will keep calling in hopes of convincing him.

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Source: http://feeds.nytimes.com/click.phdo?i=7d6fae1af6a521068950d020d403299d

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VaultPress goes beyond backups to include hacking protection too [TNW Apps]

How it works

VaultPress knows which version of WordPress your site is running. For each particular version of WordPress, we know what the MD5 checksum for each of the core files should be (an MD5 checksum is a kind of digital fingerprint for a file, that can be used to validate the integrity of that file).

Our new core file scanner scans your site and does the following:

Checks that each of the expected core files exists

Checks the MD5 checksum of each file

Stores information about each file from PHP?s stat() function

On our initial scan of your site, we perform all three of these steps for each of the 750+ WordPress core files. This scan creates a baseline that we can compare against in future scans. If the MD5 checksum of a core file doesn?t match, we notify you through an alert in the security tab of your VaultPress dashboard. A variation in the checksum means that the file has been modified from the original version that came with your WordPress install.

via New VaultPress security scanning | VaultPress Blog.

Right, VaultPress might not be able to prevent hacking, but they can certainly help to let you know as soon as possible that something might be amiss and where the problem might lie. As awesome as this might be, I think it also helps Automattic know what files hackers are going after and what server vulnerabilities hackers are using to get into sites. Not important data? Yeah, think again. This is crucial data in the fight against hackers. Like Akismet helping us all understand blog spam better, these data can help us understand hackers better. Not only that, say several blogs that share the same host are hacked, Automattic would then be in a position to inform the host that they might have an issue.

The one thing that I see as a drawback to VaultPress is the cost. The basic plan is $15/month/blog and the premium plan $40/month/blog (these will go up to $20 and $50 respectively after the beta period) and sure they aren?t exorbitant, but more than a few sites (I do have several) and that gets expensive. On the other hand, the first time it saves your tushie it would all be worth it.

So, VaultPress, a good idea that has gotten better with security checking. I did get a beta invite and didn?t use it because I didn?t feel I could justify the price. Though now that I think of it, I do have a lot of stuff on the server that should be backed up better?

What?s your feeling? $40/month/blog too much for backup with security checking? Or would you opt for the $15/month plan and live a (little) dangerously?

Hat tip to BlogHerald where I read it first.

Powered by WizardRSS | Best Membership Site Software

Source: http://thenextweb.com/apps/2010/11/27/vaultpress-goes-beyond-backups-to-hacking-protection/

idaho road conditions beaverton school district ina garten north korea bombs south korea

On Arms Treaty, White House Seeks a Republican?s Ear

WASHINGTON ? The White House might as well install a red-telephone hot line in Senator Jon Kyl?s house.

President Obama called last week. Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. phoned this week. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates have been on the line. Other officials dispensed with the phone to fly to Arizona to talk in person.

Suffice it to say, Mr. Kyl has the attention of the Oval Office these days. More than any other Republican in Congress, Mr. Kyl has become the target of administration energy as it seeks to persuade him to support a new arms control treaty with Russia ? or figure out how to circumvent him if he does not. ?They are much more focused now,? Mr. Kyl said in an interview.

Rarely has a single member of the minority party become so crucial to a president?s top foreign policy priority. By most accounts, Mr. Kyl, a burly, sober-minded lawyer and frustrated would-be scientist who has made himself into a nuclear expert, holds the key to whether the so-called New Start treaty will be approved this year as the president has demanded.

Mr. Kyl has played close to the vest since a statement last week declaring there was not enough time to consider the treaty in the lame-duck session of Congress. In his first interview since then, Mr. Kyl credited the administration with meeting many of his concerns, but said he was still not sure he could trust it to follow through.

He did not rule out a vote this year, but set conditions that might be hard for the administration to meet, including a long floor debate. ?If they try to jam us, if they try to bring this up the week before Christmas, it?ll be defeated,? he said. ?If they allow plenty of time for it, and I think it will take two weeks, then it?s a different matter.?

The attention represents a turnabout of sorts for Mr. Kyl, who has been overshadowed for years by his Arizona colleague, John McCain. A Nebraska native who moved to Arizona for college and law school, Mr. Kyl first won a House seat in 1986 and was elected to the Senate in 1994.

He has been a Senate workhorse and earned his way up to Republican whip, while compiling a more conservative voting record than all but four other senators, according to the American Conservative Union. By dint of his interest in nuclear issues, his caucus has deferred to his judgment on the New Start treaty and the nuclear modernization program he wants as a trade-off.

?He?s made it a passion of his, so when he talks, we listen,? said Senator Lamar Alexander, Republican of Tennessee. ?That doesn?t mean he persuades everybody. But he certainly has the attention of his Republican colleagues.?

The White House has been careful to treat him with respect. When some treaty advocates at a Nixon Center forum accused Mr. Kyl of playing politics, Gary Samore, the top White House arms control official, defended him, saying the senator was a ?great American? who genuinely cared about the issue. At a news conference where he warned against partisanship, Mr. Obama exempted Mr. Kyl. ?I believe that Senator Kyl wants a safe and secure America, just like I do, and is well motivated,? Mr. Obama said.

Privately, administration officials expressed anger and bewilderment at Mr. Kyl, contending that they had given him virtually everything he had sought. Arms control advocates have been more vocal. ?My conclusion is he?s acting in bad faith,? said Daryl G. Kimball, executive director of the Arms Control Association. ?He asked for more earlier in the fall and they have delivered.?

Mr. Kyl became interested in nuclear issues decades ago when one of his best college friends became a scientist at Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico. ?It was always just fascinating to me,? Mr. Kyl said. ?I?m an amateur scientist ? I?m no good at it, but I?ve always been very interested.?

In Congress, he delved into arms control and made himself a resource for fellow Republicans. In 1997, he voted against the Chemical Weapons Convention. Two years later, President Bill Clinton wanted the Senate to approve the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty. Senator Byron L. Dorgan, a North Dakota Democrat, vowed to ?plant myself on the floor like a potted plant? until the Republican majority allowed a vote.

Mr. Clinton and Mr. Dorgan underestimated Mr. Kyl, who had quietly rounded up votes against the treaty. Republicans called Mr. Dorgan?s bluff, brought the treaty to a vote and defeated it decisively, with just 48 senators supporting it, far from the 67 required. It was the first time since the Treaty of Versailles in 1920 that the Senate had formally rejected a major international security treaty.

?They played on people?s insecurities and they were able to get a pretty big vote,? Mr. Dorgan said in an interview. Mr. Dorgan said that he liked Mr. Kyl personally and that he must be taken seriously. ?He?s very smart and very relentless and determined,? Mr. Dorgan said.

Underlying Mr. Kyl?s views is a deep skepticism of Mr. Obama?s goal of eventually ridding the world of nuclear weapons, which he termed ?not realistic, not achievable and not wise.? He expressed concern that the New Start treaty would constrain missile defense and long-range conventional missiles, concerns the White House and Pentagon call unfounded.

Mr. Kyl finds unpersuasive Mr. Obama?s warnings that defeating the treaty would undercut the warming relationship with Russia while preventing nuclear inspections, calling it a conflicting argument since it presumes Russia is a partner and untrustworthy at the same time. Passing a nuclear treaty to secure cooperation on other issues is ?wrongheaded and foolish,? he said.

His priority, though, has been modernizing nuclear facilities at Los Alamos and elsewhere. The administration committed $80 billion over 10 years, but Mr. Kyl said most was not new money. After feeling ?essentially stonewalled? for months, the senator said the administration became more serious after Labor Day. This month, it increased the plan to at least $85 billion.

Mr. Kyl expressed satisfaction. ?We?ve probably got all we?re going to get out of them in terms of dollar commitments,? he said.

But he listed other concerns, including timing of construction and the composition of forces. ?I?ve come to the conclusion that the administration is intellectually committed to modernization now. No sane person could not reach that conclusion,? he said. ?Whether they?re committed in the heart is another matter. Suppose Start is ratified, and they no longer have to worry about that? Will they continue to press for the money??

The White House says yes, and will keep calling in hopes of convincing him.

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Crowdsourcing Jobs to a Worldwide Mobile Workforce

A few years ago, Nathan Eagle had a big idea. What if millions of people in poor countries?people who couldn't find work in their local economies?could become a remote workforce for organizations all over the world? And what if, instead of traveling to do such jobs at call centers or other outsourcing offices in big cities, they could do their work quickly, reliably, and easily through text messages on their mobile phones?

Eagle founded a small startup, Txteagle, in Cambridge, Massachusetts, to put the idea to the test. It has struck deals with mobile-phone carriers around the world to pay workers in credits for mobile airtime. In many places, that's as good as cash.

But while the concept sounds promising, expanding the business has proved difficult. Eagle told Technology Review this summer that his venture is "going to be binary?a huge hit or a spectacular failure."

One big challenge is to find valuable tasks that can be completed through text messages and phone calls. Eagle got the idea for the company after he created a service that let nurses in the coastal Kenyan village of Kilifi send text messages to tell central blood banks how much blood their hospital had on hand, so its supplies could be refilled more efficiently. Simply compensating the nurses for the cost of their text messages turned out to be the key to its success.

He launched Txteagle in Kenya and eventually had 10,000 people doing part-time tasks such as filling out surveys for international agencies, translating text, or collecting address data for business directories. One of his first partners was Nokia, which paid local people to translate mobile-phone menu functions into the 60 languages used in the country. But that task was quickly exhausted.

Now Txteagle needs to form several solid partnerships with multinational corporations that could supply a steady stream of small tasks. Eagle believes one promising idea is to use Txteagle as a market-research tool: workers could be paid to help companies learn what sorts of products would be desired in their rural corners of the world.

Txteagle recently announced a collaboration with the United Nations, which will use the mobile-phone platform to survey up to 500,000 people in 70 countries about their local governance. That brings the number of countries with Txteagle workers up to 80. The U.N.'s goal is to lay the foundation for future disaster-response efforts by learning how well communities and their governments communicate with each other. People who complete the survey will be paid about $1 and reimbursed for the cost of the text message.

For the U.N. initiative, Txteagle is working with the Global Network for Disaster Reduction, a nonprofit organization that influences policy in more than 90 countries. Most nonprofits operate on a relatively small scale, says Terry Gibson, a project manager at GNDR, but Txteagle allows them to reach a significantly larger audience.

Txteagle isn't the only company exploring ways to crowdsource small tasks to people all over the world. In 2005, Amazon launched its Mechanical Turk project, which sets up a way for a large group of distributed workers to participate in jobs like identifying elements in a set of photographs or performing data entry and transcription. A San Francisco-based startup, CrowdFlower, collaborated with nonprofit organizations this year to have people translate and map text messages that were sent from victims of floods in Pakistan and the earthquake in Haiti. Lukas Beiwald, CEO of CrowdFlower, says his company compensates its workers through PayPal and, in some cases, with virtual currency like the money used in Second Life.

The fundamental technology behind Txteagle includes algorithms for quality control, so that people who do consistently accurate work make higher wages. Workers who recruit others are paid small bonuses. To generate revenue, the company takes a tiny fraction of certain paid transactions.

To make real money with this business model, however, Eagle will need millions of workers using the platform. For now, he estimates, about 100,000 people will be using Txteagle to make money by the end of U.N. survey. And he hopes to find enough partners, with enough of the right sort of small tasks, to push those numbers even higher. "We'd like to be the largest knowledge workforce in the world," he says.

Kate Greene and Nathan Eagle are coauthoring Reality Mining: Using Big Data to Engineer a Better World, to be published by MIT Press.

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