| Family pets fall victim to subprime crisis
The Humane Society recently instigated a public-awareness campaign to offer tips on finding animal-friendly rental housing and remind people that pets are much better off in a shelter. In one of the more shocking stories, more than 60 cats were found abandoned in a foreclosed home in Cincinnati last May, shortly after the foreclosure rate began to spike nationally. Twenty of those cats are still being fostered while awaiting a permanent home, according to Foreclosurecats.org, a group which launched art projects to help finance the cost of caring for the kitties. Most are not as lucky. Shelters across the country are habitually overcrowded and underfunded. Even animals which stand a good chance of being adopted are often euthanised in order to free up much-needed space. That's why one pet rescue group which used to only deal with finding homes for hard-to-place strays has started temporarily fostering the pets of owners in distress.
NATPE Panelists Still Figuring Out Video On Demand
Matthew Strauss, senior vice president, new media for Comcast said he thought home improvement would be a strong category on free VOD, since consumers could pause the content. But no one anticipated that instructional programming wouldn’t have the same success as karaoke on VOD, he said. For premium services like Vongo, the challenge is consumer expectations that, if you’re a pay movie service, you will have every title known to man, said Bill Myers, president and COO, Starz Entertainment LLC. And people want things for free, and his company is a firm believer in the subscription model, he said. On demand users do seem interested in high-quality video, noted Gilles BianRosa, CEO of Vuze Inc. On his site, 20% of the professional and user-generated content is in high-definition, but represents 50% of downloads, he said.
Stock drop delays highest number of IPOs in 10 years
In the US, the S&P 500 dropped 14 percent from its record reached in October. Apax bought Hilfiger in 2005 for US$1.6 billion after its red-white-and-blue-splashed clothing lost favor with teenagers. Tommy Hilfiger, which first went public in 1992, had planned to return to the market by listing shares in Amsterdam. The market decline derailed the IPO of Dong Energy, which would have been Denmark's biggest in more than a decade, while Maoye cited "current turmoil in international capital markets" for its scrapped plans. Solargiga Energy Holdings Ltd and SFK Construction Holdings Ltd canceled Hong Kong IPOs worth as much as a combined HK$3.3 billion (US$423 million) after the stock market tumbled, four people familiar with the decisions said yesterday. Global Green Tech Group Ltd, a Hong Kong-based maker of personal-care products, canceled a planned HK$2.41 billion IPO by unit Bio Beauty Group Ltd because of "market conditions." In the US, the largest deal to get pulled was the US$345 million sale of Imperium Renewables Inc, a Seattle-based biodiesel producer, which withdrew due to "unfavorable market conditions." The window is still open to go public.
All-you-can-eat buffet bans ample appetites
A 265-pound man says a Louisiana restaurant overcharged him for his trips to the buffet, then banned him and a relative because of how much they consumed during their visits. Ricky Labit, a 6-foot-3 disabled offshore worker, said he had been a regular at the Manchuria Restaurant located in Houma, eating there as often as three times a week. But on his most recent visit, he said a waitress gave him and his wife's cousin, Michael Borrelli, a bill for $46.40, roughly double the buffet price for two adults. .
Emerson's friends recall 'that big heart of hers'
The day before she set out for her fateful hike, Meredith Emerson added another trifle to her Amazon.com wish list. This electronic keyhole to modern life gives hints of the 24-year-old's myriad interests. A "Harry Potter" book translated into French. A set of "Sex and the City" videos. A treatise on the power of Christianity. The ideas offered to those shopping for her came with this thoughtful tip: "If you want to buy me a book and can find a used one in good condition, more power to you! Save the money and the tree." As she typed away, adding some environmentally friendly power strips for her computer gear, she sat in the Spartan apartment she shared with a friend from the University of Georgia. The distinguishing features of the place were all about Emerson, said Julia Karrenbauer, her roommate in the Buford apartment.
Marks and The Turn
The high street boom is over. The symbolic manifestation is today's dour trading statement for the 13 weeks to the end of December from the totemic market leader, Marks & Spencer. Its chief executive, Stuart Rose, tells me that conditions in the clothing market are tougher than they've been for a decade – though he adds that there is a dual economy, with certain sectors like food faring better. The most worrying numbers from Marks are those relating to general merchandise, or clothing and homeware. In those areas, overall sales were down a fraction; and sales adjusting for new selling space, or like for like sales, were more than 3 per cent lower. To achieve even that uninspiring performance, Marks had to charge 6 per cent less than in the previous year.
Close to being un of a kind
I think what makes them unique is, Bill Belichick is exceptional at what he does. He's surrounded himself with people he's very comfortable with, and they've been very fortunate," said Ron Wolf, who helped build title teams with the Oakland Raiders in the 1970s and Green Bay Packers in the 1990s. "The (Philadelphia) Eagles did the same thing. No one wants to give the Eagles any credit. The only difference is, the Eagles lost. But they went four straight years to the NFC Championship Game (2001 to 2004 seasons), even if they only won it once. And it's the same era. They changed the personnel around and operated effectively. But New England has a pretty good thing going in that guys want to play there." And, Wolf added, in Tom Brady, the Patriots have the league's best quarterback, a huge key in the professional game.
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It was recently reported that 45,000 people die in the Democratic Republic of Congo a year largely because U.S and other multinational companies are stripping the country of resources and selling them for huge profits. Cabot Corporation, for example, out of Boston, Massachusetts, whose former CEO is Samuel Bodman, current Secretary of Energy in the Bush administration. The OM Group out of Cleveland, Ohio, is also compicit as is Freeport-McMoRan, which acquired mining rights from Phelps Dodge out of Phoenix, Arizona, who have been involved in copper exploitation in the Congo. And Global Witness said the copper mines, the Tenke Fungurume mine that Freeport-McMoRan has, represents one of the richest deposits of copper in the world. However, the Congolese government and Congolese people are not benefiting from the contracts that were established and that provided Freeport-McMoRan with those resources.So perhaps there should be a growing international campaign to brand the next Olympics that occur in the U.S.
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