Researchers At Harvard Discovered A Potential New Treatment For Ebola | ||
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A Developer Says Apple Sent Him Screenshots Of Porn In Order To Confirm How Easy It Is To Search For Porn With His App (AAPL) | ||
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This is weird. In a Medium post, developer Carl Smith has a detailed story about how his app was denied access to the Apple Store because of how easy it was to search for porn (and find it) using the app. In order to prove this to Smith, Apple allegedly sent him a screenshot of a man masturbating. And, there was no warning to the app developers before they opened the attachment from Apple. Let me start by saying Apple’s policy to make sure people can flag inappropriate content is a good thing. We had a flagging process but they thought it could be better and we are improving it. But that’s not the point. Apple sent us pornography without trying to mask it and with no warning of what we were going to see. This means they exposed employees of my company to things Apple themselves said was objectionable. How is this acceptable? You can read Smith's Medium post here. Via: Daring Fireball Join the conversation about this story »  | ||
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15 Must-Have Apps For Your New iPad (APPL) | ||
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When Apple unveiled its new iPads earlier this month, the company boasted that there are now 675,000 apps optimized for the iPad in Apple's App Store. That's a lot to choose from. And, of course, some apps are better and more useful than others. Whether you're planning on buying a new iPad soon or are just looking for something different for your current iPad, this list will help you sort through the hundreds of thousands of apps Apple has to offer. Monument Valley ($3.99) Monument Valley is an incredibly relaxing puzzle game with captivating imagery. In fact, it won a design award from Apple earlier this year. The gameplay is extremely simple: Rotate each map to guide Princess Ida through mazes and optical illusions. It's a brief game, so you won't find yourself accidentally spending hours exploring Monument Valley's puzzles. Paper (free) Paper is a must-have app for artists. The sketching app comes with a variety of brushes and pencils to choose from, although you'll need to buy others within the app if you get tired of the current tool set. You can also store tons of pictures and sketches in different virtual notebooks within the app. Evernote (free) Evernote is certainly among the best apps out there for taking notes. If you use your iPad in class or for work, Evernote will neatly organize and index all of your content. In fact, Business Insider's Nicholas Carlson wrote an entire 93,000-word book using Evernote. In addition to taking notes, you can also store photos, Web pages, PDF files, and more. See the rest of the story at Business Insider  | ||
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Designer Transforms Old Apple Computers Into Modern Furniture | ||
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Technology evolves quickly. Old designs are discontinued to make way for the new, but for designer Klaus Geiger, this is where the fun begins. Charmed by the industrial design of Apple's Power Mac G5 computer, Geiger has taken Apple's old powerhouse of a computer and transformed it into sleek, modern furniture. The collection, appropriately titled BENCHMA(®)C features a set of tables, seats, and cabinets that are simple and utilitarian. Each piece of furniture does a great job of showing off the G5's anodized aluminum chassis, and Geiger's use of wood and glass feels like it would be right at home at an Apple store. We first saw Geiger's collection over at The Verge. The Power Mac G5 was first introduced in 2003, and was a favorite for filmmakers and photographers due to it being the most powerful computer in Apple's lineup at the time. The G5 has since been discontinued and replaced by the Mac Pro, which has undergone its own transformation last year. You can see a few photos from the BENCHMA(®)C collection below, but head on over to Geiger's website for the entire collection.
SEE ALSO: This App Scans Your Proportions And Mails You A Custom-Fitted Shirt Join the conversation about this story »  | ||
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Here’s A Reminder Of Just How Important AWS Is To Amazon (AMZN) | ||
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But every cloud has a silver lining, and there’s one in Amazon’s earnings report, too: the continued growth of its “other” revenue. Amazon doesn’t specify what the “other” revenue is composed of, but it is generally understood that the vast majority of it comes from Amazon Web Services (AWS), its cloud computing service platform. Amazon recorded $1.38 billion in “other” revenue in the third quarter, which is a 37% growth year-over-year. That makes it Amazon’s fastest-growing source of revenue, according to BI Intelligence. Moreover, Amazon CFO Tom Szkutak said the AWS usage had grown nearly 90% year-over-year, which is in line to the growth from last quarter. Considering the size of AWS’ business, a near 40% growth rate is quite amazing. It’s also worth noting how the “other” revenue has been over a billion dollars for five straight quarters now. Granted, as the graph below suggests, the “other” revenue’s growth rate has been slowing in recent quarters. But when you’re talking about a billion-dollar business, and when you reach the scale of that size, there’s only so much you could do to keep growing at such a torrid pace. Here’s how “Other (AWS)” revenue compares to other business units of Amazon: SEE ALSO: Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella Shows Why Azure Is A Serious Threat To Amazon And Google Join the conversation about this story »  | ||
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Amazon’s Q3 earnings 
We Tried Apple Pay At A Bunch Of Major Retailers In One Of New York's Busiest Shopping Areas — Here's What We Found | ||
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Apple Pay launched earlier this week on iPhone 6 devices as part of the iOS 8.1 update. Three members of the BI Intelligence team tested out Apple Pay at 11 major retailers around Union Square in Manhattan on launch day. We used an iPhone 6 and linked both a Chase and Bank of America credit card to the system. We had five main findings:
Access All Of BI Intelligence's Research, Data, And Analysis On Mobile And Payments Today >> 1. THE SETUP PROCESS WAS EASY AND SEAMLESS Users first have to download the iOS 8.1 update, and after that's completed, users have to open up the Passbook app to find the Apple Pay setup link. The instructions were clear and simple. (See image at the top of this note.) 2. RETAIL EMPLOYEES WERE UNINFORMED ABOUT APPLE PAY, BUT THE SYSTEM IS SIMPLE ENOUGH THAT WE WERE STILL ABLE TO USE IT TO BUY THINGS We visited 11 brick-and-mortar retailers that have been mentioned in the press or on the Apple Pay site as partners. We did so in one of Manhattan's busiest commercial districts, Union Square. At eight of these retailers, store clerks either did not know whether they accepted Apple Pay or said they did not yet accept it. At all of the locations, the store clerks also reported not receiving prior instruction by their management on Apple Pay going live or how to use it. Apple says 22,000 retailers are ready to accept Apple Pay.
Despite the lack of information and confusion about Apple Pay, that did not turn out to be a major hurdle. The shopper is the party that initiates an Apple Pay-based transaction by holding the phone near the payment terminal. In most cases, we were able to carry out the transaction on our own, without directly communicating with the store clerk. But if shoppers explicitly ask to use Apple Pay, they could mistakenly be dissuaded from doing so by uninformed store personnel. 3. WE ENCOUNTERED CONSIDERABLE DIFFICULTY WHEN TRYING TO INITIATE A REFUND At American Eagle Outfitters, a clerk was not able to lead us through an Apple Pay refund, because cashiers had not been instructed on how to do so. There was a bit of confusion because Apple Pay's virtual number for each credit card does not match the physical credit card number (this is an intentional security feature). We were able to claim a refund only after a period of trial-and-error. 4. OVERALL, THE EXPERIENCE FEELS SIMPLER AND SAFER THAN USING A CREDIT CARD OR CASH Many analysts observe that Apple Pay is not any easier than using a credit card. We disagree. Apple Pay is not a particularly revolutionary experience, but assuming a knowledgeable user, the number of steps required to pay with an iPhone are fewer than those involved in using cash or a card (no change needs to be given, no receipt needs to be signed) and does not even require cashier interaction. All users do is place their iPhone on the store's keypad, wait for the image of their credit card to appear, and authenticate with their thumb.
From the consumer's point-of-view Apple Pay — with fingerprint authentication and "virtual" credit card numbers — feels very secure. 5. IN-APP PURCHASE FUNCTIONALITY FEELS VERY LIMITED Apple Pay is not just for in-store mobile payments. It can also be used to purchase things within apps. The list of apps that currently integrate Apple Pay's in-app purchase feature is very small, and as a result the feature feels tacked-on for now. Furthermore, iPhone users can opt-in to using Apple Pay on these apps only after updating participating apps to their latest version. According to Apple, 16 apps currently accept Apple Pay. These include Target, Lyft, and Hotel Tonight. This note first appeared earlier this week on BI Intelligence, Business Insider's premium subscription service covering the tech industry. For full access to our coverage on mobile computing, payments, digital media, and e-commerce, sign up for a subscription today. Digital Media Analyst Mark Hoelzel contributed to this report. Join the conversation about this story »  | ||
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Here are some highlights:
The iPhone vibrates when the sale is successfully completed, adding a satisfying tactile feel to the experience. Users can opt to receive a notification from Passbook following a completed Apple Pay transaction. (See image at right). Microsoft's Surface Found A Lifeline (MSFT) | ||
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Microsoft's Surface tablet business got a nice boost last quarter, thanks mostly to the Surface Pro 3 launch. The company doesn't break out unit sales in its earnings reports, but it does give revenue for its Surface business, which includes the tablets and accessories like the optional (but essential!) keyboard cover. On Thursday, Microsoft said the Surface division brought in $908 million in revenue last quarter. That's up from $400 million a year ago. We'll never have an exact number, but since we know Surface tablets start at $300 and go all the way up to $2,000 or more fully loaded, we can guess that Microsoft likely didn't even sell 1 million units. That's nothing compared to the 12.3 million iPads Apple sold last quarter, but it is still very significant growth. That at the very least gives Microsoft reason enough to keep chugging along with tablets, despite mediocre reviews and puny market share. The Surface will be especially important when Windows 10 launches next year. It has always served as a reference design for other PC makers to get the most out of Windows. And Windows 10, which fixes the many of the problems people had with Windows 8, will be right at home on a device like the Surface. It may not be a blockbuster device, but for now the Surface's growth in the last year has given it the lifeline it needs to stick around for a bit longer, at least until Windows 10 makes up for the disaster that is Windows 8. Join the conversation about this story »  | ||
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Microsoft Cloud Was A Ray Of Sunshine This Quarter With Revenue Up 128% (MSFT) | ||
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Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella says the company's cloud computing business is on track to generate $4.4 billion in revenue this year, if sales keep up the way they've been going. Another way of saying that: Microsoft's cloud appears to have hit over $1 billion this quarter. The company just released its first quarter results and reported that commercial cloud revenue from business customers (not consumers), grew by $662 million, or 128%. Microsoft doesn't break out the actual cloud revenue. It lumps that into a category called "commercial other," which includes both cloud services and consulting services. (It's not alone. Amazon doesn't report its cloud revenue, either, but lumps it into an "other" category.). In any case, the whole "commercial other" unit is growing: It generated over $2.4 billion last quarter, up from $1.6 billion in the year-ago quarter. This includes Azure, Microsoft's Amazon competitor; Office 365, it's Google Apps competitor; and its Dynamics CRM Online, its Salesforce.com competitor. Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella insists that the growing numbers show, "it's no longer for debate whether we get the cloud." Now, $1 billion, or even $4.4 billion, is still peanuts compared to the money Microsoft generates from selling software to businesses the old-fashioned way, through licenses. Commercial revenue from that was nearly $9.9 billion for the quarter, particularly helped by sales of Microsoft's database, SQL Server. And there's a trickle effect when companies buy something like a database. They also have to buy Windows licenses to run the database on PCs and servers. And if there is a dark cloud, it's this: half of that cloud growth came at the expense of regular Microsoft Office licenses. Office Commercial revenue declined $322 million, or 7%. Ultimately though, moving companies from regular software to the cloud is good news for Microsoft. Microsoft should make more money over time with cloud versions of Office. Businesses are willing to pay more because they automatically get security updates and the latest features. And they save money overall because they don't need to buy computer servers and other hardware. The losers, for now in this switch to the cloud are the hardware makers like IBM and HP, who are working hard to nab customers for their own clouds. SEE ALSO: Apple And IBM Hope To Change The Way People Work, Starting Next Month SEE ALSO: Steve Ballmer On His Relationship With Bill Gates: 'We've Dusted Up Many Times' Join the conversation about this story »  | ||
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7 Coming Technologies That Will Radically Transform Sex | ||
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Sex has been getting an assist from technology ever since the first condom was invented some hundreds of years ago. But until recently, the role of electronics in our erotic lives has been relatively modest; a sext here, a vibrator there, mostly minor variations on the classic sex act, or masturbation, or the transmission of images or videos of ourselves engaging in one of the above. That's about to change. The coming decades will bring innovations in intercourse that will make even the seasoned among us blush. Scroll down for 7 of the most unbelievable inventions that could transform sex as we know it, from the imminent to the fantastical: 1. Oculus Rift + Leap Motion
Combining a VR headset with a technology called Leap Motion, which allows the user's hands to interface with the virtual world instead of using a controller, will elevate the experience to the point that it's indistinguishable from reality. The Daily Beast reports that such immersive, realistic, customizable porn could be available as early as 2015. 2. Tactile feedback suits
Also known as haptic suits, wearable garments that simulate touch are already being developed for gaming purposes, and more lurid applications can't be far behind. It's not difficult to imagine two lovers, wearing full-body haptic suits and VR headsets, exploring each other's bodies while hundreds of miles apart in reality. 3. Robotic exoskeletons
Panasonic plans to release the first commercial exoskeleton next year, with a price tag of about $5,000. While early models will no doubt be clunky and decidedly unsexy, future versions will become streamlined and lightweight, offering would-be sexual cyborgs the greatest stamina enhancer since Viagra. Scientists at the Harvard Biodesign Lab are already working on a soft exosuit that can be worn under the clothing; if it succeeds, there's no reason one couldn't make one for wearing in lieu of clothes. 4. Extra robotic limbs
Istvan also predicts that robotic fingers will soon be equipped with sensors that will make them far more sensitive than their biological counterparts. 5. Brain implants
Compared to the Pentagon's ongoing project to create brain implants to aid in the recall and processing of memory, a sexual pleasure implant seems like a trivial accomplishment. But if such a thing is possible, and can be done safely, there's no reason to think it won't happen. 6. Bioports
But that's not discouraging in the least to Alex Lightman, futurist and executive director of Humanity+, an international transhumanist organization. He looks forward to a world in which "men and women will interpenetrate each other, multiply, and, as with USB 2.0 daisy-chaining, so will men, women, and androids be able to multiply-interpenetrate, locally or remotely." 7. Group minds
If that's possible — and to be fair, it's a big if — DaSilva thinks that virtual lovers could merge wholly with one another, becoming one ideal entity. If so, the idea of marriage, in which two become one, will become rather more literal. Although, for her part, DaSilva doesn't expect monogamy to persist as a norm that far into the future. SEE ALSO: 7 Technologies That Changed The Way We Think About Sex READ MORE: 10 Amazing Superpowers Humans Will Be Able To Get From Brain Implants Join the conversation about this story »  | ||
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The Oculus Rift could transform the way we experience a lot of things, including 
Virtual reality will bring a new level of visual immersion to the pornographic experience, but even that thrill will wear off without the experience of touch. So much of the sensuality of sex comes from touching and being touched — and soon, we'll be able to experience that virtually, too.
Tactile feedback is great for virtual reality, but some people will always prefer the real thing. For the sexual adventurer who has everything — except superhuman stamina and flexibility — a tactile feedback-equipped exoskeleton might come to the rescue.
Here's where things get very strange indeed. 
It's been said that 
As far as ideas sure to trigger visceral revulsion in some, bioports are pretty high on the list. The idea of using bioports to interface directly with machines has been floating around in science fiction for a few decades, and it doesn't appear it's likely to become a reality in the near future.
Although collective minds are invariably portrayed as sinister in science fiction, futurist and Second Life resident Extropia DaSilva Don't Get Used To Mobile Apps — Their Days Are Very Obviously Numbered | ||
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A few years ago, everyone was creating desktop-first startups. Now you're behind if you're not building a mobile application first, and a website second. Apple blogger and Google Ventures partner MG Siegler believes the first app you open in the morning is the equivalent to the new homepage on a web browser. But apps are very clearly not going to be around forever. Certainly not in their current, bulky square form. There isn't enough mobile homepage real estate for the web's 500 million+ active websites to each have its own app and for everyone to download them. Mobile apps are popular right now because mobile search is terrible and they lay out content in a small-screen-friendly way. If apps do stick around, they may transform more into bookmarks, where people only have a few favorites on their home screens, and all other mobile content can be accessed some other way.
"There is no doubt what we have today — screens of apps — is going to dramatically change," Former Googler and Facebooker Paul Adams writes on Intercom, where he's now VP of Product. "The idea of having a screen full of icons, representing independent apps, that need to be opened to experience them, is making less and less sense." Intercom thinks that apps might still exist in the future, but they'll serve as notification systems that push content as necessary, not big bulky apps that take up prime homepage real estate on our phones. Notifications are getting more interactive, too, letting you text message someone back or take an action without fully firing up the app.
How could simple notifications fulfill all the needs of current apps? Adams thinks they'll morph into content cards, which will allow users to see more information and take more actions straight from a pop-up. Adams believes you'll be able to book a table, send an email, or post to Facebook all without unlocking your phone. The cards could eventually become personalized and ordered by favorite sources, most important contacts, etc. This will become increasingly important as screen sizes decrease to the size of a watch face or glasses, or even jewelry. "In a world where notifications are full experiences in and of themselves, the screen of app icons makes less and less sense," Intercom concludes. "Apps as destinations makes less and less sense. Why open the Facebook app when you can get the content as a notification and take action — like something, comment on something — right there at the notification or OS level." Join the conversation about this story »  | ||
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Madeleine Albright Had The Perfect Response To Conan's Dirty Joke About Her | ||
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Don't mess with Madeleine Albright unless you can take the heat right back. Conan O'Brien made a joke at the former U.S. Secretary of State this afternoon, and Albright had the perfect biting response. Business Insider reached out to a rep for O'Brien who said he wasn't immediately available to respond to request for comment. "He is in rehearsals for tonight's show, won't get to him for a few hours," the spokesperson said. Update (6:51 p.m.): O'Brien made another joke about his "twitter war" with Albright. Join the conversation about this story »  | ||
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This Man Claims His iPhone 6 Burned A Hole Through His Pants (AAPL) | ||
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A Phoenix man is claiming his iPhone 6 burned a hole through his pants, causing second-degree burns, according to a FOX 10 report. Phillip Lechter says he was on a rickshaw with his family when his iPhone hit a bar inside the cart, causing it to bend. When Lechter got out of the rickshaw, he felt a burning sensation on his leg. His iPhone was on fire. Lechter says he thinks the burning was caused by the iPhone's lithium-ion battery, which bent when the phone hit the rickshaw. Stories of exploding and burning smartphones crop up from time to time. Most, if not all of them, are totally bogus. For example, here's a story about a girl who claimed her Samsung Galaxy S4 exploded underneath her pillow. So take these kinds of stories with a grain of salt. As long as you're using approved chargers and accessories for your phone, you won't have to worry about anything like this happening to you. SEE ALSO: Apple Will Find Jobs For Employees At Its Bankrupt Supplier Join the conversation about this story »  | ||
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Slack Defends Facebook Rooms, Says Their Apps Are Not The Same (FB) | ||
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Facebook on Thursday released a new standalone app, called Rooms. At first blush, Rooms might seem pretty similar to Slack. The latter application is used for groups and companies to communicate: You can talk in a group chat room, dropping in text, pictures, videos, and links, and you can also privately message people. Facebook’s Rooms is also about chatting with groups of people, but it's more casual than that. The evolution of Josh Miller’s group blogging platform Branch (purchased by Facebook for ~$15 million in January), Rooms lets users create forums for content they’re interested in, and you invite people to groups by sharing a QR code with them, which they use as a key into the chat room by taking a screenshot with their phone.
Like Slack, Rooms can be public or private, and you can post similar content. Their purposes might be a bit different — Slack is for true group collaboration, whereas Rooms is for informal chatting with friends and strangers about topics you're all interested in — but there are several parallels between the two apps, both visually and conceptually. We’re happy to see the release of any product that helps people communicate. From the introduction to Rooms, it seems focused on personal communications. Slack is focused on team communication – pulling it all together into one place, making it instantly searchable and available wherever you go. Companies and enterprises may not look to Rooms in the same way they depend on Slack for communication anytime soon. Slack is a proven product that might soon achieve a $1 billion valuation, while Facebook's Rooms has no current connection to Facebook, and it requires group members to scan QR codes to access a room. There's no telling how Rooms might evolve, but two group messaging applications with similar functions and really similar icons seems like a grand coincidence. SEE ALSO: Facebook's Newest App Wants To Make Old-School Internet Forums Sexy Again Join the conversation about this story »  | ||
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I Just Tried Uber's New Delivery Service 'Rush' And It Got Me My Package In 20 Minutes | ||
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In the future, Uber may not just be an on-demand car service. Instead, it could be a logistics company that delivers all sorts of products to your doorstep quickly. Uber has already run on-demand tests for ice cream, roses, helicopter rides, flu shots and most recently, deliveries of small packages with its New York launch of Uber Rush. Uber Rush uses bike messengers to bring small items from point A to point B. It launched in April and competes with other delivery services like Postmates. Finally this week, I had a reason to try it. I forgot a raincoat at a downtown meeting in Manhattan last week, and it wasn't convenient for me to retrieve it. I logged on Uber and saw a biker was 8 minutes away from my rain coat.
So I hailed one. It was 10:45 a.m., and the person holding my coat for me needed it to be retrieved before an 11:30 meeting. After hailing the Uber Rush biker, I started crafting a text message to him with instructions. He beat me to it.
I told him what to do once he arrived at the downtown building, from whom to get my coat, and where to drop my coat off. At 11 a.m., I received an email from the friend who had my coat, saying he had given it to the biker. And within 10 minutes, I had a text from the bike messenger saying he was downstairs.
The coat delivery cost me $11. Taking the subway there and back would have cost half the price, but it was a totally reasonable price to pay for the convenience.
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Amazon Is Taking A $170 Million Charge For Unsold Fire Phones (AMZN) | ||
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It looks like Amazon's first smartphone hasn't been a hit. The company announced during quarterly earnings Thursday that it would take a $170 million charge for unsold Fire Phones and other related costs. The Fire Phone is sold exclusively through AT&T in the US. Amazon said it had $83 million worth of unsold Fire Phones at the end of the third quarter this year. The Fire Phone went on sale this summer, but all indicators pointed to disappointing sales. Reviews were pretty bad across the board. Business Insider also stopped by several AT&T stores during the Fire Phone's first few weeks and found that very few customers were buying the device. Finally, Amazon and AT&T also slashed the Fire Phone's price to $0.99 with a two-year contract in September, a sign that it wasn't selling well. It originally sold for $200 with a contract. SEE ALSO: Amazon misses Q3 earnings Join the conversation about this story »  | ||
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The Genius Behind The Apple Store Wants To Help You Choose Your Next Gadget (AAPL) | ||
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Former J.C. Penny CEO and Apple retail chief Ron Johnson has a new startup that hopes to help you buy new things, according to the Wall Street Journal's Daisuke Wakabayashi. Johnson said Enjoy, as the startup will be called, wants to help consumers find the right product for them. Enjoy may fill a much-needed gap in technology retail. Big-box stores like Best Buy offer the advantages of live customer service and the opportunity to see a product in action before buying it, but are getting crushed by online competitors like Amazon. Amazon, on the other hand, offers lower prices but does little in the way of customer service outside product ratings and reviews. Enjoy hopes to bridge that gap in retail by giving online purchases a personal touch, though Johnson is mum on how the startup will accomplish this. Johnson said he's raised $30 million for Enjoy, including a buy-in from Andreessen Horowitz. Last month The Information said Johnson was launching a delivery startup, though he put more emphasis on Enjoy's customer service elements in his interview with the Journal. SEE ALSO: The Genius Behind The Apple Store Has A New Startup That Hopes To Ease Your Gadget Woes Join the conversation about this story »  | ||
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CHART OF THE DAY: Amazon's Growth Is Waning (AMZN) | ||
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Amazon reported earnings for its fiscal third quarter of 2014 on Thursday. Revenue hit $20.58 billion, which is a 20% increase year-over-year, but it fell short of analysts' expectations at $20.84 billion. Earnings per share also missed: Amazon reported -$0.95, while analysts were only expecting a loss of $0.74. The company's stock took a hit as a result: Investors know Amazon's revenue is still on the rise, but its growth is slowing down. Based on company data charted for us by BI Intelligence, the company's growth peaked in the second quarter of 2011, when its year-over-year revenue saw a massive jump of 50%. But the company has made numerous investments, particularly in the last quarter: It's been trying to push its AT&T-exclusive Fire Phone to customers, it spent almost $1 billion to buy the streaming service Twitch, it expanded its Prime Fresh delivery service to New York City, it's spent almost $100 million on original video content (including the critically acclaimed show "Transparent"), and it's also trying to get into mobile payments with its mobile card reader called Local Register. So most of Amazon's profits are going back into the company, hence the not-so-explosive growth.
SEE ALSO: CHART OF THE DAY: Here's A Snapshot Of Apple's Monster September Quarter SEE ALSO: This One Chart Explains Why eBay Is Spinning Off PayPal Join the conversation about this story »  | ||
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Microsoft Surface More Than Doubled In Revenue To $908 Million, And It's Sorta Profitable (MSFT) | ||
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There's lots of good news in Microsoft's earnings report and one piece is that Surface revenue hit $908 million for the quarter. A year ago, Surface revenue was a modest $400 million and even last quarter, revenue was only $409 million. And Microsoft tells us that Surface became profitable for the first time this quarter, on a gross margin basis. Gross margin is revenue minus the cost to build the Surface. When you factor in marketing costs, and other stuff, the Surface is still losing money. Still! The Surface had never been gross margin positive before. Microsoft says the boost is thanks to the new Surface Pro 3. This is the back-to-school quarter which is usually a good one for PC sales. So if Microsoft hadn't reported improved revenue for its PC line-up, that would have been concerning. But, to put it in perspective, Apple said it sold a record 5.5 million Macs, about $6.6 billion in revenue. So Microsoft still has some work to do in chasing Apple, as was its intention when former CEO Steve Ballmer opted to start making Microsoft-branded tablets. Still, sales are trending up, way up, and that's a good start. Join the conversation about this story »  | ||
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Work At BI — Front-End Developer / Web Design Opening - CLONE | ||
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Business Insider is looking for a highly skilled front-end developer / web designer to help us create new story experiences and solve business/design/tech problems. Ideal candidates will have a passion for design, a command of HTML and CSS, experience using Bootstrap, and knowledge of Less and/or Sass. Proficiency in Sass, Bootstrap, Javascript and JQuery are a plus. You will play a central role in designing and developing new forms of digital storytelling and exceptional interactive experiences. We face exciting challenges every day due to the demands of our growing audience and the 24/7 news cycle. Business Insider is the largest business news publication in the U.S. and Australia, as measured by monthly unique visitors. Nearly 50 million people read BI every month, globally, so your hard work will reach the masses. The tech team is a close team that works hard and has fun. Responsibilities:
Requirements:
Pluses:
This role is based in our New York office on Fifth Avenue. We offer a competitive salary and good benefits. Please apply online and let us know why you're a good fit for the role.
Join the conversation about this story »  | ||
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Microsoft Reveals Total Xbox Sales For Last Quarter (MSFT) | ||
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Microsoft reported Q1 earnings on Thursday, and it's looking pretty good for the company across the board. The company said that total Xbox console sales were 2.4 million, growing 102%. However, Microsoft didn't specify how many were Xbox 360s and how many were Xbox Ones. It also noted that the Xbox One was released in 28 new markets. We don't know yet how that compares with Microsoft's biggest competitor, Sony, and its PlayStation consoles. Sony will release its earnings next week. NPD reported that in September, and for the past nine months in a row, the PlayStation 4 was the top-selling console, according to GameSpot. Xbox sales booming could be in part because of a free-game promotion Microsoft was offering with new Xbox One purchases. SEE ALSO: Major Players In The Video Game Industry Are Telling GamerGate Supporters To Cut It Out Join the conversation about this story »  | ||
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An Internet Entrepreneur Listed His San Francisco Apartment For $6.25 Million — And He's Giving It All Away To Charity | ||
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Lorry Lokey, founder of media-relations site Business Wire, has listed his stunning San Francisco apartment for $6.25 million, the Wall Street Journal reports. Lokey bought the home for $4.6 million in 2006, but he isn't looking to turn a profit on his real estate. A signer of the Giving Pledge, Lokey plans to donate the money the apartment fetches in an effort to get closer to his goal of donating $1 billion. The 2,200-square-foot apartment is gorgeous, with views of the Golden Gate Bridge, the Bay Bridge, and downtown San Francisco. Located in San Francisco's Russian Hill neighborhood, the apartment has incredible views of the Bay. Lokey makes his primary residence in Atherton, but he often used this space for entertaining guests. He told the WSJ that he'll miss seeing his guests' reactions to the view. Source: Wall Street Journal You can't really blame them for having that kind of reaction — the view is amazing. See the rest of the story at Business Insider  | ||
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Watch Mark Zuckerberg In China Surprise The Audience By Speaking Fluent Mandarin | ||
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Facebook's CEO wowed a crowd in Beijing by breaking out his newly-learned Mandarin. Produced by Matt Johnston. Video courtesy of Associated Press. Follow BI Video: On Facebook Join the conversation about this story »  | ||
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Potential NYC Ebola Patient Took An Uber Before Going To The Hospital | ||
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The doctor who treated Ebola patients in Guinea and is currently being tested for the virus at New York City's Bellevue Hospital may have taken an Uber yesterday to a Williamsburg bowling alley, according to CNN reporter Vaughn Sterling. Since Ebola is only transmitted by direct contact with bodily fluids or contaminated surfaces and the doctor reportedly self-quarantined himself as soon as he became symptomatic, the risk of transmission via the Uber car is very low. Still, the city's disease investigators may reach out to those who took the same car if they decide there is even a small risk. Sterling tweeted about the patient's Uber ride this afternoon. The doctor is reportedly 33-year-old Craig Spencer, who was working in West Africa with Doctors Without Borders and returned 10 days ago. EMS workers took Spencer from his 147th Street apartment to the hospital on Thursday afternoon. Spencer was reportedly wearing a protective suit when he left the apartment. Health workers expect to have Spencer's test results within 12 hours. | ||
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These Stunning Videos Of Chemical Reactions Will Take Your Breath Away | ||
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Aside from its depiction in the hit series Breaking Bad, chemistry has long gotten a bad rap as the least sexy of the sciences. A new digital media project aims to change all that, starting with a series of eerily alluring videos that capture what happens when two chemical substances combine. The scientists behind the project, which they've aptly named Beautiful Chemistry, used a special camera to zoom in on some of the most common chemical reactions — and provide a new perspective on what's really going on inside those beakers. Say, for example, a researcher were to run a typical precipitation reaction — a run-of-the-mill test typically used to uncover a hidden element in a solution. Here's what she'd normally see in her test tube: A clear solution would turn cloudy when a few drops of another solution were added. Snore. So, Chinese researchers thought, what would happen if someone were to take that everyday reaction and run it outside of a test tube, with a camera lens that could zoom in on all the action taking place at a super small scale? That's precisely what they did, and the results are stunning. Here's what happened when the researchers put a bit of iron chloride, a compound lab researchers often use to jumpstart other reactions, in a solution of corrosive sodium metasilicate.
Congrats, team Beautiful Chemistry — you've hooked this one. To watch the researchers' full videos, check out Beautiful Chemistry. SEE ALSO: 7 Things We're Learning About At The Bottom Of The World SEE ALSO: In Honor Of National Chemistry Week, Here Are 15 Jokes Only Chemists Will Get Join the conversation about this story »  | ||
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The next time you boil an egg, think of this video. It's the surface of an egg surrounded by tiny bubbles of carbon dioxide. Instead of boiling water, the scientists popped an egg in some hydrochloric acid, a substance used frequently in the lab to adjust the pH of a solution. The acid is shown here reacting with the calcium carbonate in the egg shell.
It's not just falling snow that shapes compounds into beautiful, delicate crystals. When the researchers dropped zinc — a brittle, abundant metal found in Earth's crust — into a solution of corrosive silver nitrate, delicate flakes of zinc nitrate began to take shape.
Color is all about chemistry. Tiny pigment molecules give plants and flowers the vibrant reds, purples, blues, and yellows we see. Those same molecules can transform when they interact with an acid or a base, sometimes shifting into other, very different colors. The researchers put a piece of purple cabbage in a dish of the acidic compound sodium hydroxide and watched its purple flesh give way to a yellowish covering.
Here's what they captured after recording corrosive sodium metasilicate reacting with deep blue cobolt chloride.
"If our effects could get more kids and students interested in chemistry and change people's negative opinion towards chemistry," write the researchers on their website, "we would be extremely satisfied." Microsoft Cofounder Paul Allen Has Pledged $100 Million To Fight Ebola | ||
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Microsoft cofounder Paul Allen announced Thursday that he would be donating at least $100 million to fighting Ebola, The New York Times reported. "Everybody feels called sometimes to really pursue a certain thing that resonates with them, and this has resonated with me," Allen told the Times. "We’re up against an extremely tough opponent here. The exponential nature of the growth of this disease is really a challenge — we’ve already seen in the U.S. where one case quickly became two." The gift makes him one of the largest individual donors to contribute to the cause. He had previously pledged $26 million to nonprofits and government agencies fighting the disease, including the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The $100-million pledge also doubles his Microsoft cofounder's gift — the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation announced in September that it would donate $50 million toward fighting the Ebola outbreak. Allen's donation will go to several different organizations, including the World Health Organization, the United States State Department, and the University of Massachusetts Medical School, which funds lab equipment in Liberia. Allen has also created a website, www.TackleEbola.com, to direct smaller donors towards projects they can help fund. "I got a taste when I was in Kenya a while ago of what medical care was in rural Africa," Allen said. "I was in a town of about 10,000 people, and a shipping container with a rusty microscope was their medical clinic." Allen confirmed the news of his donation via Twitter. SEE ALSO: At $50 Million, Bill Gates Just Made His Largest Donation Ever To Fight Ebola Join the conversation about this story »  | ||
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The 10 Most Important Things In The World Right Now | ||
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1. The US military said Thursday that forces in Iraq are "months away from being able to start waging any kind of sustained ground offensive against the Islamic State" while a similar campaign in Syria will take even longer, Reuters reports. 3. Canadian authorities said the gunman who killed a solider at Ottawa's war memorial before being shot dead in the Parliament building was not identified as a threat, "despite his criminal record in three cities, embrace of extremist ideas and intent to travel to Syria," The New York Times reports. 4. The 58-year-old guard credited with killing the man who opened fire in Canada's parliament on Wednesday morning recieved a hero's welcome when he returned to work the following day. 5. North Korea has banned tourists from entering the country over concerns about the spread of Ebola. 6. The UK has been ordered to pay an extra €2.1 billion to the EU budget by December "because the UK economy is doing better relative to other European economies," The Guardian writes. 7. Venezuela has placed fingerprint scanners in grocery stores to ration food as shortages of basic goods, like cooking oil and milk, worsen. 8. Following a four-day plenary meeting, China's Communist Party unveiled a blueprint for legal reforms as part of its push to stamp out government corruption. 9. The European Central Bank will release stress test results for 130 eurozone banks on Sunday, with many banks expected to fail. 10. Chinese housing prices fell for the fifth consecutive month in September, continuing the country's real estate decline. And finally ... These seven innovations will radically transform sex. SEE ALSO: The 10 Most Important Things In The World Archives Join the conversation about this story »  | ||
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Good morning! Here's what you need to know for Friday. Australian doctors transplant 'dead' hearts in surgical breakthrough | ||
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Sydney (AFP) - Australian surgeons said Friday they have used hearts that had stopped beating in successful transplants, in a world first that could change the way organs are donated. Until now, doctors have relied on using the still-beating hearts of donors who have been declared brain dead, often placing the recovered organs on ice and rushing them to their recipients. But Sydney's St Vincent's Hospital and the Victor Chang Cardiac Research Institute have developed a technique which means hearts which had been still for 20 minutes can be resuscitated and transplanted into a patient. So far three people have received hearts in this way, with two recovering well and the third and most recent recipient still requiring intensive care. "They are the only three in the world," surgeon Kumud Dhital, who is an associate professor at the University of New South Wales in Sydney, told AFP. "We know that within a certain period of time the heart, like other organs, can be reanimated, restarted, and only now have we been able to do it in a fashion whereby a heart that has stopped somewhere can be retrieved by the transplant team, put on the machine... and then (surgeons can) transplant it." The technique involves donor hearts being transferred to a portable machine known as a "heart in a box" in which they were placed in a preservation solution, resuscitated and kept warm. Professor Peter MacDonald, medical director of the St Vincent's Heart Transplant Unit, said the use of hearts "donated after circulatory death" would make far more available for transplant. "This breakthrough represents a major inroad to reducing the shortage of donor organs," he said. Michelle Gribilas, the first patient to receive one of the three hearts, said she was very sick before her operation. "Now I'm a different person altogether," the 57-year-old said. "I feel like I'm 40 years old. I'm very lucky." The second recipient, Jan Damen, who had the surgery about two weeks ago, said he felt "amazing". "I'm not religious or spiritual but it's a wild thing to get your head around," he said. Dhital said reanimating hearts using the machine could increase safety for patients because it gave surgeons confidence that the organ was functioning. "I would suggest that in the next five years or so we will be shifting more and more towards machine preservation of hearts," he said.
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US automaker Ford starts luxury Lincoln sales in China | ||
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Shanghai (AFP) - US automaker Ford has launched its first vehicles under the luxury Lincoln brand in China, the company said, as it seeks to make inroads into a market dominated by German cars. Ford announced in April that it would begin Lincoln sales in China in the autumn, adding to its other passenger car and commercial vehicle offerings in the country -- the world's largest auto market. Lincoln on Thursday launched a mid-sized sedan, the MKZ, priced from 315,800 yuan to 395,800 yuan ($51,770 to $64,885), according to a news release. It also started offering the MKC, a small utility vehicle, for 339,800 yuan to 438,800 yuan, the release said. Both were designed for the Chinese market, it added. Management consulting firm McKinsey has estimated that German automakers -- including Audi, BMW, Mercedes and Volkswagen -- account for 80 percent of the "premium" market in China, which it defines as cars costing upwards of 200,000 yuan. Chairman and chief executive officer of Ford China, John Lawler, said the start of Lincoln sales marked a "significant" step. "We now will begin serving luxury customers in China," he said in the release. Lincoln will launch three more vehicles in China by 2016: a mid-sized utility vehicle, a full-size sedan and a large SUV, according to the statement. Ford plans to open specialised Lincoln stores in Shanghai, Beijing and the eastern city of Hangzhou early next month, to be followed by five more locations by year-end, it said. It aims to have 60 Lincoln stores in 50 Chinese cities by 2016. Ford sold 813,412 vehicles in China during the first nine months of the year, up 26 percent from the same period last year, according to the company. Its US rival General Motors (GM) is also trying to beef up luxury sales in China with its Cadillac brand. GM launched a Chinese-produced luxury sedan, the XTS, in the country last year and is steadily adding more vehicles to its Cadillac range. Join the conversation about this story »  | ||
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Italian PM vows to publish cost of EU institutions in budget row | ||
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Brussels (AFP) - Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi on Thursday announced his intention to make public the cost of the European institutions, as a row exploded over his country's budget plans. European Commission head Jose Manuel Barroso sharply criticised Italy earlier Thursday for publishing a letter from the EU requesting clarifications on Rome's rule-breaking budget. Renzi, attending an EU summit in Brussels, responded with his promise to shed light on Brussels' own spending. "We will publish data on everything that is spent by these palaces. We're going to have some fun," he said on the margins of the summit. He added that he was surprised at Barroso's response to the publication of the EU letter, as the details had already published by the Financial Times and an Italian daily. "The Italian budget poses no problems," he insisted. Hours before the EU summit, the Italian finance ministry released a letter from the EU's Economic Affairs Commissioner Jyrki Katainen, marked "strictly confidential", drawing the fury of Barroso. The president of the EU's executive said the Commission was against this "unilateral" decision by the Italian government, preferring that negotiations on its budget take place behind closed doors. Barroso, who steps down on October 31, said the Commission was "in consultations" with several countries over infringement of the rules and "it's better this happen in a context of trust". French President Francois Hollande said his country had also received an EU Commission letter requiring a reply by the end of the week. The dialogue with Brussels continues "in very good conditions", he said, stressing France's commitment to EU budgetary rules but "with the maximum flexibility". French officials said that there was no intention to publicise the details of the "a private letter". France's budget forecast shows a 4.3 percent GDP deficit in 2015, far above the expected three percent. Last week, member states which use the euro currency submitted their spending plans for next year to the Commission, which won vast new powers of oversight from member states at the height of the eurozone debt crisis. The Commission has so far refused to confirm or deny that France and Italy, along with Austria, Slovenia, Malta and Finland have all been notified that their submissions are problematic. In Italy's case, the budget squarely misses structural reform commitments, even though it forecasts a deficit well within the EU's three percent of output ceiling. The Commission has until Wednesday to decide whether Italy and the other countries are in "serious" breach of the rules, and the letter was the official warning that it may do so. But admonishing France and Italy, the second and third-biggest eurozone economies, and formally demanding a change to their budget would be a huge political risk. The fallout in France, with soaring unemployment and a stagnant economy, is especially a worry with the anti-EU far right becoming a dominant force. Join the conversation about this story »  | ||
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Giants' Hudson hungry for baseball World Series start | ||
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San Francisco (AFP) - San Francisco pitcher Tim Hudson takes the mound on Friday as the Giants host Kansas City in game three of the World Series, a chance on baseball's biggest stage he once feared might never come. The 39-year-old right-hander has 16 seasons in Major League Baseball -- making 457 career starts for Oakland, Atlanta and San Francisco. In the early years, when playoff appearances were plentiful, he never doubted that he would one day pitch in a World Series. But as post-season trips dried up, he admits doubts began to creep in. "You see the window start to gradually shrink," Hudson said Thursday. When his 2013 season ended with a broken right ankle in July "things looked bleak for a little bit there," Hudson said. But he inked a $23 million two-year contract last November with the Giants, joining up with a contender that won the World Series in 2010 and 2012. Now he finds himself tasked with leading their bid to rebound from a game-two loss to the Royals in Kansas City on Wednesday that knotted American baseball's best-of-seven championship showcase at one game apiece. "Obviously it's the biggest stage, it's the pinnacle of baseball," he said. "This is what everybody hopes and dreams for throughout their career. It's obviously a bigger, brighter stage, but at the end of the day it's the same game we've played all year. "It's the same game we've played our whole lives. It's just going out there and controlling those emotions and understanding that it's still a simple game. You've got to go out there and make pitches, have a solid game plan and be mentally and physically prepared." He's prepared not only to take on Kansas City hitters, but also to try to inhibit the Royals' aggressive baserunning style. The Royals' 31 stolen bases in the regular season were the most in the American League. Royals manager Ned Yost, whose team is back in the post-season for the first time since winning their only title in 1985, believes speedy runners can put pressure on opposing pitchers, pulling them out of their rhythm as they try to hold runners on base. "That's the idea behind it," he said. "You want to try to divert some of the attention away from the pitcher's main focus, which is concentrating on getting that hitter out, and having some of that focus go over here. It helps the hitters." Said Hudson of the challenge: "You obviously have to be concerned with it. "You have to vary your times. You have to be a little quicker to the plate than you normally are. You can't have the same cadence every pitch to the plate. They'll take second, third on you every time."
- Pivotal game three -
Hudson is well aware what's on the line on Friday. In World Series that have been tied at one game each, the team winning game three has gone on to win the series 66 percent of the time. "It's all of a sudden essentially a five-game series right now," he said. Giants hurler Madison Bumgarner baffled Kansas City hitters as San Francisco won the opener in Kansas City 7-1. Yost said bouncing back with a 7-2 game-two triumph was crucial for the Royals. "For me, it wasn't necessarily a must-win game, but it was as close to a must-win game as you can get," said Yost, who gives the ball to pitcher Jeremy Guthrie on Friday. Guthrie, a 10-year veteran, is playing in his first post-season. In his one prior playoff start, he allowed one run in five innings against Baltimore in game three of the American League final. "Our guys are really confident," Yost said. "We feel pretty good where we sit right now." Join the conversation about this story »  | ||
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From David Beckham to Sting: UN reaches for the stars | ||
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United Nations (United States) (AFP) - The United Nations is throwing a party on Friday for its 69th birthday and guests can expect to be dazzled by Sting and piano sensation Lang Lang at a New York concert hosted by Alec Baldwin. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon will be hand, as will Sam Kutesa, president of the General Assembly, but getting the world to notice the work of the United Nations these days requires more than savvy diplomacy. A long list of celebrities are shining a spotlight on just about everything that the global body does, from fighting Ebola to the struggle against stunting -- a condition caused by malnutrition in which children fail to grow. The campaign against stunting just got a boost from Indian mega-star Aamir Khan, who put his star power to work for the UN children's agency UNICEF as an ambassador in South Asia with special focus on the condition, which affects nearly four out of 10 children in the region. Two weeks ago, it was David Beckham's turn to appear in a UNICEF video to encourage people in Ebola-hit Sierra Leone to seek medical help and to make a pitch for donations. But the UN's biggest publicity coup came at the UN climate summit last month when Leonardo DiCaprio turned up in a ponytail and suit to deliver his appeal to save the planet. The video of DiCaprio's speech has been watched by more than 1.5 million viewers -- an all-time record for a UN video -- while his tweets, and retweets, from the summit reached his 11.3 million followers. By contrast, the United Nations Twitter account has a mere 3.3 million followers. "Sometimes an issue is not on a map until a celebrity puts it on a map," said Maher Nasser, the head of the UN's public information department. "You are talking about amplifying and giving access to people who become interested in an issue because it's their celebrity of choice." UN officials approached DiCaprio two years ago to discuss a linkup with the climate campaign and his appointment as a UN messenger of peace was announced just ahead of the summit to maximize impact, said Nasser. The star of "The Wolf of Wall Street" and "Titanic" has been active on the climate front through his foundation and UN officials say they were impressed by his knowledge of the issues.
- Driving web traffic -
Critics however say stars who endorse UN campaigns are self-serving, seeking to cultivate an image as caring individuals and global citizens -- far removed from the vacuous world of superstardom. For the United Nations, the challenge has been to pick celebrities that have a track record of engagement and can speak with some authority to avoid cheapening the UN brand. The UN refugee agency, UNHCR, scored success when it took Lebanese-born singer Maher Zain -- and his massive global digital fan base of 22 million Facebook followers -- on a recent trip to his home country to meet Syrian refugees. Over a month, Maher's social media remained the third biggest driver of traffic to UNHCR's website, said Claire Lewis, a private consultant who finds "high-level supporters" for charities including the UN. "The public and the media can be cynical about relationships between NGOs and celebrities that can look self-serving and PR hungry, and you need to find a balance where the people you work with have a genuine and often personal commitment to the issue," said Lewis. Few celebrities have done more to raise the profile of a UN agency than Angelina Jolie, who was named UNHCR goodwill ambassador in 2001 and special envoy in 2012. "She still creates for UNHCR their greatest source of web hits," said Lewis. The first celebrity to bring glamour to the UN was actor Danny Kaye, who was named UNICEF goodwill ambassador in 1954 to boost the agency's recognition. Join the conversation about this story »  | ||
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China launches first mission to moon and back | ||
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Beijing (AFP) - China launched its first space mission to the moon and back early Friday, authorities said, the latest step forward for Beijing's ambitious programme to one day land a Chinese citizen on the Earth's only natural satellite. The unnamed, unmanned probe will travel to the moon, fly around it and head back to Earth, re-entering the atmosphere and landing, the State Administration of Science, Technology and Industry for National Defence (SASTIND) said in a statement. "The first stage of the first return journey test in China's moon probe programme has been successful," it said after the launch, from the Xichang space base in the southwestern province of Sichuan. The module will be 413,000 kilometres from Earth at its furthest point on the eight-day mission, it added. The official Xinhua news agency said it would re-enter the atmosphere at 11.2 kilometres per second (25,000 mph) before slowing down -- a process that generates extremely high temperatures -- and landing in northern China's Inner Mongolia region. The mission is intended to test technology to be used in the Chang'e-5, China's fourth lunar probe, which aims to gather samples from the moon's surface and will be launched around 2017, SASTIND said previously. Beijing sees its multi-billion-dollar space programme as a marker of its rising global stature and mounting technical expertise, as well as evidence of the ruling Communist Party's success in turning around the fortunes of the once poverty-stricken nation. The military-run project has plans for a permanent orbiting station by 2020 and eventually to send a human to the moon. China currently has a rover, the Jade Rabbit, on the surface of the moon. The craft, launched as part of the Chang'e-3 lunar mission late last year, has been declared a success by Chinese authorities, although it has been beset by mechanical troubles. Join the conversation about this story »  | ||
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IS attack on Syrian border town Kobane stalls amid US air assault | ||
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Mursitpinar (Turkey) (AFP) - A bid by Islamic State fighters to seize the flashpoint Syrian border town of Kobane has stalled, American officials said, with the help of air strikes reported to have killed over 500 jihadists. US and allied aircraft have flown nearly 6,600 sorties in the air war against the Islamic State (IS) group and dropped more than 1,700 bombs, the American military said Thursday. The latest tally was released one month since the US-led coalition extended its air campaign from Iraq into Syria in a bid to counter the advance of the jihadists. The effect of the open-ended air campaign remains the subject of debate, with the White House saying the militants have been damaged by the strikes but critics pointing to the group's battlefield successes despite the raids. In Washington, Pentagon chief Chuck Hagel acknowledged "mixed" results in the war effort but said: "We believe that our strategy is working." IS, which declared in June a "caliphate" over territory it seized in Iraq and Syria, was meanwhile described as the world's wealthiest "terror" group, earning $1 million a day from black market oil sales alone.
- 'Kurdish defenders can hold Kobane' -
The Kurds in Kobane, which has become a crucial battlefield for both the IS jihadists and their opponents, have been holding out for more than a month, buoyed by a promise of Iraqi Kurd reinforcements and by US air drops of weapons. "I think the Kurdish defenders... are going to be able to hold," a defence official at US Central Command said, speaking on condition of anonymity. Kurds say their fighters are exhausted and anxious for promised reinforcements from Iraq's autonomous Kurdish region. Lawmakers there agreed Wednesday to send their peshmerga fighters after Turkey said it would allow 200 of them to travel through its territory to Kobane, where IS has an estimated 1,000 militants. On the ground, the jihadists made fresh advances in and around Kobane, said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. The IS group had also taken control of a string of villages west of Kobane, after days of trading territory with the Kurds. US military officials delivered sobering news from Iraq, saying the Iraqi army is still months away from staging a major offensive to retake ground lost to the IS jihadists and is regrouping after suffering battlefield defeats this year. Iraqi security forces are currently able to stage small-scale attacks against the IS group, but needed time to plan and train for a larger operation, even with the aid of US-led air strikes, one military official told reporters. "It's well within their capability to do that (counter-attack), on the order of months, not years," said the official. But he added: "It's not imminent." The Iraqi capital Baghdad has also seen a wave of bomb attacks against Shiite targets in recent days, with IS militants claiming responsibility for some. The month-old US-led aerial campaign on Syria has killed 553 people, all but 32 of them jihadists mostly drawn from overseas, the Observatory said. The jihadist toll included 464 IS militants and 57 fighters from the Al-Qaeda affiliated Al-Nusra Front, said the Britain-based Observatory, which relies on a wide network of sources inside Syria.
- 'World's richest terrorists' -
David Cohen, the US Treasury undersecretary for terrorism and financial intelligence, said that IS group's "primary funding tactics enable it today to generate tens of millions of dollars per month". Oil has also been sold to Kurds in Iraq, and then resold to Turkey, as the group has "tapped into a long-standing and deeply rooted black market connecting traders in and around the area", said Cohen. Even Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's regime has "made an arrangement to purchase oil" from the jihadist group, he said. Marwan Muasher of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace said the IS group was now "considered the world's wealthiest and most financially sophisticated terrorist organisation". In Iraq, IS fighters killed a Yazidi commander after surrounding Mount Sinjar in the country's north, where they had trapped thousands of civilians this summer -- a key moment in the conflict which helped prompt Washington to begin air strikes against the jihadists. The civilians, mostly members of the Yazidi religious minority, eventually escaped via Syria with the help of Kurdish fighters from Iraq's neighbour to the west, but that route has now been cut. The renewed assault began Monday when some 300 militants seized nearby villages and then turned their sights on the mountain itself. IS jihadists gained more ground west of Baghdad, further reducing the government's shaky hold on Anbar province, a day after car bombs in the capital killed at least 28 people.
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The desperate struggle of Pakistan's polio 'martyrs' | ||
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Badaber (Pakistan) (AFP) - Nadia Khan treasures two photos of her sister Sumbal: one showing her bright-eyed and smiling, the other blank-faced in death after she was gunned down by militants, a "martyr" in Pakistan's desperate fight against polio. It was May 2013 and Sumbal and her friend Shirafat were vaccinating children against the crippling disease at a rough mudbrick house in the village of Badaber in the country's militant-plagued northwest. Suddenly a motorbike pulled up and the man on the back opened fire, killing Shirafat on the spot and putting 18-year-old Sumbal into a coma. For 10 days Nadia kept a bedside vigil, to no avail. "I remember her last moment when she lost her breath in hospital, lying silently," Nadia told AFP ahead of Friday's UN World Polio Day. "She could not talk. We wished that at least she could have had her last words with us before passing away." Pakistan is one of only three countries, along with Afghanistan and Nigeria, where polio is still endemic, and efforts to stamp it out have been badly affected by attacks on vaccinators like Sumbal. In the 2000s Pakistan looked on course to wipe out polio after a series of vaccination drives brought the number of cases down to just 28 in 2005, from more than 18,000 in 1993, according to UNICEF data. But from 2008 the epidemic rebounded and in 2014 hit a 15-year high, with 210 cases -- 80 percent of all the polio cases in the world. The problem is concentrated in the northwest, wracked since 2007 by a homegrown Taliban insurgency, and the main city Peshawar has gained an unenviable reputation as the "world capital" of polio. A Taliban ban on vaccination in North and South Waziristan tribal areas, on the Afghan border, has left hundreds of thousands of children unprotected from the virus. Adding to the problem, many of the poorly-educated population believe unfounded rumours about the vaccine containing pork or being a Western plot to sterilise Muslims. Suspicions grew after the CIA used a Pakistani doctor in 2011 to stage a hepatitis vaccination programme as cover to try to find Al-Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden. Since December 2012, at least 30 polio vaccinators have been killed in Pakistan, along with nearly 30 police and security personnel guarding them. Like Sumbal, Nadia too takes part in polio vaccination drives, but after her sister's murder their parents begged her to quit. "I told them that I will continue my sister's mission and will keep on working until I complete her mission," said Nadia from behind her veil. - 'Jihad against polio' - The other victim of the attack, Shirafat Bibi, was gunned down just a few weeks before she was to be married. She had carefully saved the $6 a day she earned for giving out polio drops to pay her dowry. That fateful May morning, after getting a call asking her to vaccinate some children near her home, the 28-year-old embraced her mother Gul Khubana, who pleaded with her to stay at home. "I told her that day not to go, even her father told her, but she said 'It will be my last visit and then I will quit this job and will not work'," Khubana told AFP. After her death, the family was paid compensation and Shirafat's brother Bilal was taken on by the local authorities to do the same job. Now it is Bilal who swallows his fear and tours poor villages on what the health teams in the area call the "jihad against polio". The health workers and police guards killed in the fight against polio are hailed as "martyrs" in Pakistan. They work at the mercy of fate, just as the main victims of polio, the children left unvaccinated, live at the mercy of fate. A year ago, little Shakirullah used to run happily around his neighbourhood in Peshawar, but then at the start of the year the diagnosis came like a hammer blow: polio. The disease has left his legs flaccid and useless, and now, aged just two and a half, he can no longer stay upright without support. "Other children can play but our poor little boy can only crawl about like a toddler," laments his uncle Rafiullah, who fears what the future holds for his nephew. Life in Pakistan is tough for people with disabilities, and beggars with limbs ravaged by polio limping from car to car at traffic lights are a common sight. Already this year, 350,000 young Pakistanis in the northwest have missed out on vaccination because of the perilous security situation, according to local authorities. Even in the cities, resistance remains -- last week in Peshawar 10 percent of children visited by vaccination teams refused the drops, set dead against this supposedly "un-Islamic" vaccine. The UN says Pakistan has made "notable progress" in the fight to halt polio transmission, but the struggle remains a daunting one. Join the conversation about this story »  | ||
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Researchers At Harvard Discovered A Potential New Treatment For Ebola | ||
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US Stock Futures Fall After Ebola Case Confirmed In New York City (DIA, SPY, QQQ, TLT, IWM) | ||
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US stock futures are trading lower after the first case of Ebola in New York City was confirmed on Thursday night. Near 10:00 pm ET, Dow futures were down about 65 points, S&P 500 futures were down about 10 points, and Nasdaq futures were down 23 points. On Thursday night, The New York Times reported that a doctor who recently returned Guinea tested positive for Ebola. The patient, Dr. Craig Spencer has been placed in isolation at Bellevue Hospital as health workers attempt to find others he may have been in contact recently, according to the Times' report. News that a patient was being monitored for Ebola-like symptoms broke on Thursday afternoon, and dinged the markets a bit late in the day. Stocks still finished Thursday with big gains, as the Dow gained more than 200 points. Initial news that a patient was being monitored for Ebola also sent shares of hazmat suit maker Lakeland Industries, which has been rallying in recent weeks amid Ebola cases in the US, sharply higher. Here's the chart of Dow futures on Thursday night.
And S&P futures.
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A Developer Says Apple Sent Him Screenshots Of Porn In Order To Confirm How Easy It Is To Search For Porn With His App (AAPL) | ||
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This is weird. In a Medium post, developer Carl Smith has a detailed story about how his app was denied access to the Apple Store because of how easy it was to search for porn (and find it) using the app. In order to prove this to Smith, Apple allegedly sent him a screenshot of a man masturbating. And, there was no warning to the app developers before they opened the attachment from Apple. Let me start by saying Apple’s policy to make sure people can flag inappropriate content is a good thing. We had a flagging process but they thought it could be better and we are improving it. But that’s not the point. Apple sent us pornography without trying to mask it and with no warning of what we were going to see. This means they exposed employees of my company to things Apple themselves said was objectionable. How is this acceptable? You can read Smith's Medium post here. Via: Daring Fireball Join the conversation about this story »  | ||
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US tobacco giant Reynolds bans smoking in its offices | ||
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Washington (AFP) - The second largest tobacco producer in the United States, Reynolds American said Thursday it will ban smoking in all indoor office spaces, bowing to smoke-free social norms. The manufacturer of Pall Mall and Camel cigarettes said starting from January 1, 2015 smoking cigarettes, cigars and pipes in conference rooms and elevators will be prohibited. Designated smoking rooms will be opened by 2016 at the company's headquarters in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, and at its two other offices in Tennessee and New Mexico. Until then, employees can still light up in hallways and in closed offices. The company said the new regulations respect the rights of smokers and non-smokers alike, and make more sense in an increasingly smoke-free world. "We recognize that indoors restrictions are the norm today, so most people expect a smoke free business environment," Reynolds American spokesman David Howard. "We respect the rights and personal choices of employees who choose to smoke or use other tobacco products and those who don't." E-cigarettes and chewing tobacco are still permitted. Smoking is already banned in the company's production factories, cafeterias and fitness centers, and the move to extend the no-smoking zone was in line with the public standards, according to Howard. "We are simply better aligning our tobacco use policies with the realities of what we're seeing in the general public today," he said. Around 20 percent of Reynolds American employees smoke, the spokesman noted, compared to 20 percent of American adults who have not kicked the habit. Smoking is banned in most public spaces in North Carolina, including bars and restaurants, but Reynolds America's offices are exempt from the law, Reynolds said. The company announced in July it will acquire tobacco behemoth Lorillard, the number three US firm and manufacturer of the Blu e-cigarette. The merger, will make Reynolds American the country's largest tobacco firm, with about 50 percent of the market. It is looking to conquer the growing e-cigarette and cigar market as smoking cigarettes declines. Reynolds American currently holds 25 percent of the US tobacco market, while Lorillard holds 15 percent, and Altria, producer of the iconic Marlboro cigarettes, controls about 50 percent. Join the conversation about this story »  | ||
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South Africa 282-9 in second New Zealand ODI | ||
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Mount Maunganui (New Zealand) (AFP) - South Africa made 282 for nine after losing the toss and being sent into bat in the second one day international against New Zealand at Bay Oval on Friday. Opener Hashim Amla top-scored for the Proteas on 119, with Faf du Plessis contributing 67 and AB de Villiers 37. Trent Boult, Tim Southee, Mitchell McClenaghan and Corey Anderson all took two wickets apiece for New Zealand. Join the conversation about this story »  | ||
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First Ebola case hits New York: report | ||
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New York (AFP) - A doctor who recently returned to New York from treating Ebola patients in Guinea tested positive for the deadly virus Thursday, US news reports said. The doctor, Craig Spencer, was taken to Bellevue Hospital and placed in isolation, The New York Times said, calling it New York's first diagnosed case of the deadly disease. He had been rushed by ambulance from his home in Harlem to Bellevue suffering from a 103-degree Fahrenheit (39.4 degree Celsius) fever and nausea, The New York Post reported before his case was confirmed as Ebola. Bellevue is one of three hospitals in Manhattan and eight in the state of New York equipped to handle patients diagnosed with Ebola. Join the conversation about this story »  | ||
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15 Must-Have Apps For Your New iPad (APPL) | ||
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When Apple unveiled its new iPads earlier this month, the company boasted that there are now 675,000 apps optimized for the iPad in Apple's App Store. That's a lot to choose from. And, of course, some apps are better and more useful than others. Whether you're planning on buying a new iPad soon or are just looking for something different for your current iPad, this list will help you sort through the hundreds of thousands of apps Apple has to offer. Monument Valley ($3.99) Monument Valley is an incredibly relaxing puzzle game with captivating imagery. In fact, it won a design award from Apple earlier this year. The gameplay is extremely simple: Rotate each map to guide Princess Ida through mazes and optical illusions. It's a brief game, so you won't find yourself accidentally spending hours exploring Monument Valley's puzzles. Paper (free) Paper is a must-have app for artists. The sketching app comes with a variety of brushes and pencils to choose from, although you'll need to buy others within the app if you get tired of the current tool set. You can also store tons of pictures and sketches in different virtual notebooks within the app. Evernote (free) Evernote is certainly among the best apps out there for taking notes. If you use your iPad in class or for work, Evernote will neatly organize and index all of your content. In fact, Business Insider's Nicholas Carlson wrote an entire 93,000-word book using Evernote. In addition to taking notes, you can also store photos, Web pages, PDF files, and more. See the rest of the story at Business Insider  | ||
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Lakers guard Nash to sit out NBA season | ||
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Los Angeles (AFP) - Los Angeles Lakers guard Steve Nash may have played his last game in the NBA after being ruled out of the upcoming season because of a recurring back problem. The Lakers said Nash, 40, who has been strongly tipped to retire after the 2014-15 campaign, had been sidelined after meeting with team doctors who advised him to sit out the season. "As disappointed as we are for ourselves and our fans, we're even more disappointed for Steve," said Lakers general manager Mitch Kupchak on Thursday. "We know how hard he's worked the last two years to try to get his body right for the rigours of the NBA, and how badly he wants to play, but unfortunately he simply hasn't been able to get there up to this point in time. Steve has been a consummate professional, and we greatly appreciate his efforts." The Canadian has said previously he expects this to be the final season of his brilliant career but he has not formally announced his retirement. This would be his 19th NBA season. "Being on the court this season has been my top priority and it is disappointing to not be able to do that right now," said Nash. "I've worked very hard to stay healthy and unfortunately my recent setback makes performing at full capacity difficult. "I will continue to support my team during this period of rest, and will focus on my long-term health." Join the conversation about this story »  | ||
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British police pay £425,000 to mother of spy's child | ||
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London (AFP) - British police are to pay compensation to woman who had a child with a man she did not know was an undercover agent, the Guardian and BBC reported. The £425,000 ($681,000, 539,000 euros) payment follows a legal battle by several women who say they were tricked into having relationships with officers sent to spy on political activists. Known only as "Jacqui", the woman said she had received psychiatric treatment since discovering the true identity of her child's father in a newspaper in 2012. "He presented himself as Bob Robinson, a long-haired leftwing radical," the woman known as "Jacqui" told the Guardian. "In reality he was a member of a secret police unit, the special demonstration squad, and was embarking on a five-year mission to infiltrate environmental and animal rights groups." The man disappeared from her life when the child was two years old, going back to his original wife, children and identity. Now an academic, he was one of several officers who had undercover roles as part of the now-defunct special demonstration squad between 1968 and 2008. He was confronted in 2012 at a conference by members of London Greenpeace, who said he had infiltrated their group in the 1980s as it campaigned on nuclear and environment issues. Police later acknowledged that he had been an undercover officer. A Scotland Yard spokesman said the force "unreservedly apologises for any pain and suffering that the relationship" caused. However, it added that it "never had a policy that officers can use sexual relations for the purposes of policing". In August, four former officers in the squad were told they would not face criminal charges for forming sexual relationships with women while undercover. Several other legal claims relating to undercover officers are ongoing. Join the conversation about this story »  | ||
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Ebola Case Confirmed In New York City | ||
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A doctor who had recently returned from Guinea has tested positive for the deadly Ebola virus, The New York Times reported Thursday evening. Dr. Craig Spencer has been placed in isolation at Bellevue Hospital as health workers attempt to find others he may have been in contact recently, The Times reported. Spencer, 33, returned from Guinea ten days ago after a stint working with the humanitarian group Doctors Without Borders. According to a statement from the group, the doctor notified them Thursday morning he had developed a fever. The New York health department was immediately notified. "There is no reason for New Yorkers to be alarmed," said Mayor Bill de Blasio in a press conference from the hospital. "We've been preparing for months for the threat posed by Ebola ... [it] is very difficult to contract. Being on the same subway car or living near someone with Ebola is not enough to put someone at risk."
The doctor took the subway to a bowling alley in Williamsburg, Brooklyn on Wednesday, then returned home via taxi, according to NY Daily News. He self-quarantined himself at his apartment soon after he became symptomatic. New York City health officials have been preparing for the possibility of Ebola patients in the city for quite some time. The hospital where Spencer is being treated, Bellevue, has four isolation rooms already and was designated as the go-to place for dealing with the virus. "CDC already had a team of Ebola experts in New York City who can offer immediate additional support," the Centers for Disease Control said in a statement. "The CDC experts were in New York City this week assessing hospital readiness to receive Ebola patients, including Bellevue hospital. CDC’s Ebola hospital assessment teams are designed to make sure that hospitals that have volunteered to take Ebola patients are Ebola ready." Health officials have already identified all four people Spencer came in contact with "during the relevant period," according to New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo. "I feel confident that we're doing everything that we should be doing and we have the situation under control," Cuomo said. Ebola is spread only through direct contact with blood or bodily fluids of infected patients, according to the CDC. This post was updated with comments from the press conference at 7 p.m. PDT. NOW WATCH: Researchers At Harvard Discovered A Potential New Treatment For Ebola | ||
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Designer Transforms Old Apple Computers Into Modern Furniture | ||
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Technology evolves quickly. Old designs are discontinued to make way for the new, but for designer Klaus Geiger, this is where the fun begins. Charmed by the industrial design of Apple's Power Mac G5 computer, Geiger has taken Apple's old powerhouse of a computer and transformed it into sleek, modern furniture. The collection, appropriately titled BENCHMA(®)C features a set of tables, seats, and cabinets that are simple and utilitarian. Each piece of furniture does a great job of showing off the G5's anodized aluminum chassis, and Geiger's use of wood and glass feels like it would be right at home at an Apple store. We first saw Geiger's collection over at The Verge. The Power Mac G5 was first introduced in 2003, and was a favorite for filmmakers and photographers due to it being the most powerful computer in Apple's lineup at the time. The G5 has since been discontinued and replaced by the Mac Pro, which has undergone its own transformation last year. You can see a few photos from the BENCHMA(®)C collection below, but head on over to Geiger's website for the entire collection.
SEE ALSO: This App Scans Your Proportions And Mails You A Custom-Fitted Shirt Join the conversation about this story »  | ||
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Here’s A Reminder Of Just How Important AWS Is To Amazon (AMZN) | ||
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But every cloud has a silver lining, and there’s one in Amazon’s earnings report, too: the continued growth of its “other” revenue. Amazon doesn’t specify what the “other” revenue is composed of, but it is generally understood that the vast majority of it comes from Amazon Web Services (AWS), its cloud computing service platform. Amazon recorded $1.38 billion in “other” revenue in the third quarter, which is a 37% growth year-over-year. That makes it Amazon’s fastest-growing source of revenue, according to BI Intelligence. Moreover, Amazon CFO Tom Szkutak said the AWS usage had grown nearly 90% year-over-year, which is in line to the growth from last quarter. Considering the size of AWS’ business, a near 40% growth rate is quite amazing. It’s also worth noting how the “other” revenue has been over a billion dollars for five straight quarters now. Granted, as the graph below suggests, the “other” revenue’s growth rate has been slowing in recent quarters. But when you’re talking about a billion-dollar business, and when you reach the scale of that size, there’s only so much you could do to keep growing at such a torrid pace. Here’s how “Other (AWS)” revenue compares to other business units of Amazon: SEE ALSO: Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella Shows Why Azure Is A Serious Threat To Amazon And Google Join the conversation about this story »  | ||
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Microsoft's Surface Found A Lifeline (MSFT) | ||
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Microsoft's Surface tablet business got a nice boost last quarter, thanks mostly to the Surface Pro 3 launch. The company doesn't break out unit sales in its earnings reports, but it does give revenue for its Surface business, which includes the tablets and accessories like the optional (but essential!) keyboard cover. On Thursday, Microsoft said the Surface division brought in $908 million in revenue last quarter. That's up from $400 million a year ago. We'll never have an exact number, but since we know Surface tablets start at $300 and go all the way up to $2,000 or more fully loaded, we can guess that Microsoft likely didn't even sell 1 million units. That's nothing compared to the 12.3 million iPads Apple sold last quarter, but it is still very significant growth. That at the very least gives Microsoft reason enough to keep chugging along with tablets, despite mediocre reviews and puny market share. The Surface will be especially important when Windows 10 launches next year. It has always served as a reference design for other PC makers to get the most out of Windows. And Windows 10, which fixes the many of the problems people had with Windows 8, will be right at home on a device like the Surface. It may not be a blockbuster device, but for now the Surface's growth in the last year has given it the lifeline it needs to stick around for a bit longer, at least until Windows 10 makes up for the disaster that is Windows 8. Join the conversation about this story »  | ||
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The Genius Behind The Apple Store Wants To Help You Choose Your Next Gadget (AAPL) | ||
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Former J.C. Penny CEO and Apple retail chief Ron Johnson has a new startup that hopes to help you buy new things, according to the Wall Street Journal's Daisuke Wakabayashi. Johnson said Enjoy, as the startup will be called, wants to help consumers find the right product for them. Enjoy may fill a much-needed gap in technology retail. Big-box stores like Best Buy offer the advantages of live customer service and the opportunity to see a product in action before buying it, but are getting crushed by online competitors like Amazon. Amazon, on the other hand, offers lower prices but does little in the way of customer service outside product ratings and reviews. Johnson said he's raised $30 million for Enjoy, including a buy-in from Andreessen Horowitz. Last month The Information said Johnson was launching a delivery startup, though he put more emphasis on Enjoy's customer service elements in his interview with the Journal. SEE ALSO: The Genius Behind The Apple Store Has A New Startup That Hopes To Ease Your Gadget Woes Join the conversation about this story »  | ||
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Microsoft Cloud Was A Ray Of Sunshine This Quarter With Revenue Up 128% (MSFT) | ||
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Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella says the company's cloud computing business is on track to generate $4.4 billion in revenue this year, if sales keep up the way they've been going. Another way of saying that: Microsoft's cloud appears to have hit over $1 billion this quarter. The company just released its first quarter results and reported that commercial cloud revenue from business customers (not consumers), grew by $662 million, or 128%. Microsoft doesn't break out the actual cloud revenue. It lumps that into a category called "commercial other," which includes both cloud services and consulting services. (It's not alone. Amazon doesn't report its cloud revenue, either, but lumps it into an "other" category.). In any case, the whole "commercial other" unit is growing: It generated over $2.4 billion last quarter, up from $1.6 billion in the year-ago quarter. This includes Azure, Microsoft's Amazon competitor; Office 365, it's Google Apps competitor; and its Dynamics CRM Online, its Salesforce.com competitor. Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella insists that the growing numbers show, "it's no longer for debate whether we get the cloud." Now, $1 billion, or even $4.4 billion, is still peanuts compared to the money Microsoft generates from selling software to businesses the old-fashioned way, through licenses. Commercial revenue from that was nearly $9.9 billion for the quarter, particularly helped by sales of Microsoft's database, SQL Server. And there's a trickle effect when companies buy something like a database. They also have to buy Windows licenses to run the database on PCs and servers. And if there is a dark cloud, it's this: half of that cloud growth came at the expense of regular Microsoft Office licenses. Office Commercial revenue declined $322 million, or 7%. Ultimately though, moving companies from regular software to the cloud is good news for Microsoft. Microsoft should make more money over time with cloud versions of Office. Businesses are willing to pay more because they automatically get security updates and the latest features. And they save money overall because they don't need to buy computer servers and other hardware. The losers, for now in this switch to the cloud are the hardware makers like IBM and HP, who are working hard to nab customers for their own clouds. SEE ALSO: Apple And IBM Hope To Change The Way People Work, Starting Next Month SEE ALSO: Steve Ballmer On His Relationship With Bill Gates: 'We've Dusted Up Many Times' Join the conversation about this story »  | ||
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EU agrees landmark climate change deal: Van Rompuy | ||
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Brussels (AFP) - European Union leaders agreed Friday a landmark climate change deal, including a headline commitment to cut greenhouse gas emissions by 40 percent by 2030, EU head Herman Van Rompuy said. "Deal! At least 40% emissions cut by 2030. World's most ambitious, cost-effective, fair climate energy policy agreed," Van Rompuy said, adding that the European leaders also adopted 27 percent targets for renewable energy supply and efficiency gains. Join the conversation about this story »  | ||
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