| Mobile Shopping, Coupons Winning at DEMO
This morning I kept busy rating the first batch of demos presented here. Well, the second session of demos is just about to start. Before they did, we took a break to walk the DEMO "demo" floor, where all the companies that get just six minutes to show off their wares try and pigeonhole reporters to tack on another 10 minutes or so of face-to-face product explaining. One thing I did just learn is that the nifty Leapfrog Tag actually uses a grid of microdots spaced just .3 millimeters apart on each specially printed book to do its magic. Those dots give the pen's infrared camera exact coordinates that tell it which audio bit to pull from its on-board memory (and for which of the five books it has stored). Such a cool product. Well, let's see if the second session is as fascinating. Chris is back.
Don't cheer smoking ban; you may be next target
I want to add my opinion to the two letters published on Jan. 11 from Mike Lynch (``Stop bureaucrats from making decisions for us'') and Brian Thomas (``Don't let our government `protect' away freedom'').We are becoming a police country. Like Brian said, first it was seat belts, now a total smoking ban. I think the total ban went too far.Smoking is still legal. If the government wants to protect us from ourselves why not make smoking illegal? No, they won't do it because too much revenue is generated from cigarettes.What saddens me is to go to the VFW and watch our veterans who fought and died for the freedoms we used to enjoy, standing outside smoking at their private club.smoking police better wake up. One of your freedoms may be next and, believe, me you won't like it and there won't be anything you can do about it.Carol SylvesterBloomington .
Al Othaim Holding Selects Oracle(R) Applications to Help Drive ...
NEW YORK, Jan. 14 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- NRF 97th ANNUAL CONVENTION & EXPO -- Al Othaim Holding, the largest grocery retailer in Saudi Arabia, has selected Oracle as its strategic IT vendor to support the company's extensive expansion plans, as it aims to double its operations over the next five years and strengthen its local presence. The Oracle(R) E-Business Suite and a broad selection of Oracle Retail applications will provide a fully integrated retail solution that will serve as the backbone for the grocery chain, allowing Al Othaim to streamline business processes and focus on meeting the demands of the rapidly growing Saudi Arabian grocery market. Al Othaim owns and operates several different lines of business including retail, wholesale, real estate, shopping malls and a training academy.
The questions that come at Christmas
But this month of family gatherings and office parties also provides various grinches ample opportunities to pick at your ego with a variety of pointed, cloying comments. Aunt Marge might corner you and your spouse smooching under the mistletoe and ask "Are you ever going to have kids?"
A "concerned" cousin Kate could offer the always dubious "Did you lose weight" just as you're about to swallow a chunk of ham at dinner.
And don't be surprised by a saucy coworker who serves up this delightful inquiry during a seasonal party, "Hey, you still married?" In social settings among people who are just comfortable enough with you to say what they really feel, conversations can be booby-trapped with commentary bordering on personal directives.
Editor's Mailbag
We talk about safe sex. If there is such thing, why is AIDS on the rise? Why are STDs on the rise? Why are there abortions still being performed?People we don’t need guns and wars to destroy are selves.We can do it with our own selfishness of doing what we want to do and pushing the world to accept so we don’t have to feel bad about it.Questionable decisionBy NANCY L LEE, BelmondI was reading your special section Thursday on the new Cerro Gordo County jail and thought it was quite nice until I saw the picture of evidence being stored in a Bud Light beer box.I thought the Sheriff’s Department was supposed to be against youth drinking, drunk driving, etc., but there for all to see was a box of evidence in a beer box. Bud Light couldn’t have gotten better advertising if they had placed an ad themselves.
Population: 146,736,000
For the third year running, Bangladesh was the country with the largest number of journalists physically attacked or threatened with death. Four reporters were killed and 10 were arrested. The conservative government showed no interest in combatting the scourges of corruption and violence against the press. Protected by the authorities, Islamist groups stepped up their intimidation of independent news media. Prime Minister Khaleda Zia's ruling alliance of conservative and Islamist parties, which has been in power since October 2001, displayed criminal ill-will in refusing to acknowledge human rights violations, including press freedom violations. The prime minister said in March she did not want to silence journalists but press freedom could not be used to cause unrest or write libellous articles.
SFGate: World Views
Then, last summer, after the militant-Islamic organization Hamas seized control of Gaza, Israel sealed off the territory "to all but humanitarian aid and basic supplies. Last week, Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak ordered Gaza completely locked down in response to persistent rocket and mortar fire" coming from the territory into Israel. "Over the past [ten] days, Israeli army raids in Gaza have killed more than 40 people, most of them militants, while [on the Gaza side,] gunmen have fired more the 200 rockets and mortars into Israel, lightly wounding 10 people." (Agence France Presse) .
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