TOKYO ? Olympus Corp. vowed Wednesday to go after erring executives involved in an elaborate scheme to hide $1.5 billion of investment losses.
The Japanese camera and medical equipment maker said it will investigate some 70 people including former and current board members, auditors and other officials for their possible involvement in the deception that has become one of Japan's biggest corporate scandals.
President Shuichi Takayama bowed deeply in apology at a Tokyo hotel, a day after a third-party panel released the findings of an investigation that showed top executives who were "rotten to the core" had orchestrated the accounting cover-up spanning three decades.
The company said it hopes to avoid being booted off the Tokyo Stock Exchange by meeting the Dec. 14 deadline set by the bourse for reporting earnings, including its latest and revised reports going back five years.
Tokyo-based Olympus is also setting up panels of outsiders such as former judges and prosecutors to check on possibly faulty auditing, to reform management, and probe executive responsibility.
The company may target any wrongdoers in lawsuits, including possibly pursuing criminal charges, said Olympus official Nobuyuki Onishi.
The scandal burst into the spotlight after former Chief Executive Michael Woodford, a Briton, went public with his doubts about high fees for financial advice and expensive acquisitions. Woodford was fired in October.
Takayama said a decision on whether Woodford will return as head of the company will be decided at a shareholders' meeting, which will be held after the company releases its revised earnings. He did not give a date for the meeting.
"We do give some positive assessment to his action," he said.
Woodford has said he would like to see Olympus come clean, with him at the helm.
The independent panel found that as of 2003, Olympus had racked up 117.7 billion yen ($1.5 billion) in investment losses dating back to the 1990s.
A $687 million fee for financial advice and overvalued acquisitions of several companies had been part of the cover-up, which used overseas banks and several funds to keep the massive losses off the company's books.
"The management was rotten to the core and contaminated what was around it, creating in the worst sense a group mentality of the typical salarymen," the report said in a reference to Japan's culture of corporate loyalty.
It said it found no involvement of "anti-social groups," a euphemism for Japanese criminal gangs, as some news reports have speculated. The panel said it traced the money and the various funds used to cover up investment losses, and no underworld groups were involved.
Takayama said at least two former presidents knew about the scheme, Tsuyoshi Kikukawa and Masatoshi Kishimoto.
He said Olympus will beef up corporate governance and, after the investigation is over, operate under a new board. He did not elaborate on who the new members might be, and said shareholders will decide.
"We hope to be reborn as a renewed Olympus," said Takayama.
The company's bookkeeping is now under investigation in Japan, the U.S. and Great Britain. Woodford has met with authorities in all three countries.
The scandal has cast a harsh light on Japanese corporate governance, which has been criticized as lagging global standards.
Kikukawa, who tapped Woodford as his successor to lead Olympus, has since resigned from the board.
When questioned why Olympus had developed such a shady corporate culture, Takayama replied: "The management system had become too much about one man."
___
Follow Yuri Kageyama on Twitter at http://twitter.com/yurikageyama
MOSCOW (Reuters) ? Vladimir Putin's ruling party could see its vast parliamentary majority cut back on Sunday in elections widely seen as a test of his popularity ahead of an expected return to the presidency early next year.
Voters turned out from the Pacific to the Baltic coasts in the world's biggest country where Putin restored central control and revived the economy in a 2000-2008 presidency. He remains by far the most popular politician in the country but there are signs Russians may be wearying of a cultivated strong man image.
Some voters expressed disgust with a parliamentary poll they said was likely to be rigged. Others said they backed the United Russia party of Putin, who has continued to exert influence as Prime Minister since yielding the presidency to Dmitry Medvedev under a constitution forbidding more than two consecutive terms.
"I support United Russia. I like Putin. He is the strong leader we need in our country," said Nikolai, a 33-year-old customs officer in Vladivostok, a port city of 600,000 people on the Pacific and the biggest city in Russia's Far East.
Some said they would vote for Just Russia or the Communists, who retain support largely among poorer sections of the population two decades after the collapse of the Soviet Union and the advent of a free market system.
Polls show Putin's party is likely to win a majority but less than the 315 seats it currently has in the 450-seat lower house of parliament, known as the Duma.
"It is time for something to change so I am going to vote for the (nationalist party) LDPR. So far this seems the only party that can resist United Russia," 24-year-old event manager Yekaterina Makarova said in the Urals city of Yekaterinburg.
If Putin's party gets less than two-thirds of seats, it would be stripped of its so called constitutional majority which allows it to change the constitution and even approve the impeachment of the president.
HACKING ATTACK
Opposition parties say the election is unfair because the authorities support United Russia with cash and television air time. They also predict vote rigging to boost United Russia.
The independent Ekho Moskvy radio station said its website had been shut down by hackers early on Sunday morning.
"It is obvious that the election day attack on the site is part of an attempt to prevent publishing information about violations," the station's editor-in-chief Alexei Venediktov wrote on the radio's Twitter account.
Independent election watchdog Golos said it was excluded from several polling booths in the Siberian Tomsk region, according to Interfax news agency. Moscow prosecutors launched an investigation last week into Golos' activities after lawmakers objected to its Western financing.
Supporters say the former-KGB spy saved Russia during his presidency from the chaos of the immediate post-Soviet era and supplied the longest and steepest economic expansion in a generation. He also used military force to crush a rebellion in the southern Muslim region of Chechnya that tested the fabric of a federation spanning 9,000 Km (5,600 miles).
Russian customs officers held the director of an independent election watchdog for 12 hours at a Moscow airport on Saturday. The United States said it was concerned by "a pattern of harassment" against the watchdog.
PUTIN'S PARTY
Putin remains by far Russia's most popular politician and the 59-year old leader is the ultimate arbiter between the clans which control the world's biggest energy producer.
But his party has had to fight against opponents who have branded it as a collection "swindlers and thieves" and a growing sense of unease among voters at Putin's grip on power.
"I shall not vote. I shall cross out all the parties on the list and write: 'Down with the party of swindlers and thieves,'" said Nikolai Markovtsev, an independent deputy in the Vladivostok city legislature On the Pacific seaboard.
"These are not elections: this is sacrilege," he said, adding that the biggest liberal opposition bloc had been barred from the vote by the authorities.
Opponents say Putin has crafted a brittle political system which excludes independent voices and that Russians are growing tired of Putin's cultivated tough man image.
An outburst of boos and whistling at Putin by fans at a Moscow martial arts fight and a sharp fall in opinion poll ratings during the election campaign had raised concerns Putin may be losing his renowned political touch.
Putin is almost certain to win the March 4 presidential election but signs of disenchantment are extremely worrying for the Kremlin's political managers. Putin's self-portrayal as the anchor of Russian stability hinges on his popularity.
In an attempt to reinvigorate his party, which President Medvedev is leading into the election as part of a job swap announced in September, Putin has sent his closest allies to lead United Russia in some of Russia's 83 regions.
Russians in the Far East region braved temperatures as low as minus 41 degrees Celsius (minus 42 Fahrenheit) to vote eight hours before polls opened in Moscow.
Chukchi reindeer herders living across the Bering Sea from Alaska voted in late November as did some oil workers on rigs pumping the lifeblood of Russia's $1.9 trillion economy, with their ballots taken out by helicopter to be counted.
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People wait to be interviewed during a job fair in Phoenix, Ariz., held last month.
By msnbc.com news services
Employment growth picked up speed in November, pushing the nation?s unemployment rate down to 8.6 percent -- its lowest level since March 2009.
The Labor Department reported Friday that nonfarm U.S. payrolls increased by 120,000 last month, accelerating from October?s 80,000 gain and roughly matching analysts? expectations. The U.S. jobless rate fell sharply from the prior month?s 9 percent level.
Private employers added a net gain of 140,000 jobs in November, but governments shed 20,000 jobs, mostly at the local and state level. Governments at all levels have shed nearly a half-million jobs in the past year. The Labor Department revised up its job gains for September and October by 52,000 and 20,000, respectively.
?The labor market is gradually healing. It?s a glacial pace, but we are taking small steps in the right direction,? said Ryan Sweet, a senior economist at Moody's Analytics in West Chester, Penn.
More than half the jobs added last month were by retailers, restaurants and bars, a sign that holiday hiring has kicked in. Retailers added 50,000, the sector's biggest gain since April. Restaurants and bars hired 33,000 workers. The health care industry added 17,000.
Still, a worrisome drop in the size of the U.S. workforce means that even with a big decline in the unemployment rate in November, it's still not time to break out the champagne.
The fall in the jobless rate was aided by 315,000 people leaving the workforce. That pushed the participation rate, a ratio of the amount of the population in the labor force, down to 64.0 percent.
Those who exited the workforce, many of whom gave up on looking for work, outnumbered the 278,000 people who found jobs, according the Labor Department's household survey, which is separate from payrolls data.
Even with the recent gains, the economy isn't anywhere close to replacing the jobs lost in the recession. Employers began shedding workers in February 2008 and cut nearly 8.7 million jobs for the next 25 months. Since then, the economy has regained nearly 2.5 million of those jobs.
The jobs report is unlikely to take much pressure off President Barack Obama, whose economic stewardship will face the judgment of voters next November. The outlook for the U.S. economy is also being threatened by Europe's ongoing financial crisis.
Speaking at a Washington, D.C., press event to promote a $4 billion effort to increase the energy efficiency of government and private sector buildings, Obama noted Friday that, despite some ?strong headwinds,? the U.S. private sector has now added jobs for 21 months in a row.
?We need to keep that growth going,? he added.
The relative strength of the jobs report is in keeping with a recent trend, bolstered by upward revisions to the employment counts for September and October. But it is not seen as proving decisive for the U.S. Federal Reserve, which is weighing whether the recovery needs further monetary policy support.
Data ranging from manufacturing to retail sales suggest the pace of expansion could top 3 percent, in contrast to China, where growth is cooling and much of Europe, where growth has stalled.
While the economy's growth pace appears to have accelerated from the third quarter's 2 percent annual rate, Europe's festering debt crisis poses a big threat. At the same time, U.S. fiscal policy is set to tighten in the new year, even if lawmakers extend a payroll tax cut.
Taken together, some analysts believe the headwinds facing the U.S. economy will lead the Fed to ease monetary policy further by buying more bonds.
Though the economy emerged from recession two years ago, about 25 million Americans are either out of work or underemployed, a fact that is hurting Obama's chances of winning a second term.
Analysts say the economy needs to create at least 125,000 jobs every month just to keep the unemployment rate steady. So far this year, job growth has averaged 125,600 jobs a month. At that pace, it would take about 4-1/2 years for employment just to return to where it was when the recession started.
But there are reasons to be cautiously optimistic.
While the government's survey of employers has shown a still tepid pace of job growth, its separate poll of households that is used to calculate the unemployment rate has suggested more-robust jobs gains.
The Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report.
Omission of clinics doesn't indicate an anti-abortion stance, says Apple
Siri, the iPhone 4S's new voice assistant, can be?incredibly helpful and?incredibly silly, but one of the things it can't do is causing an uproar among abortion and women's rights activists around the country. The accusations have been flying around the internet for the past few days, as people point out that Siri will help you find a hooker or the closest bar, but asking it to find an abortion clinic or birth control will give you a big fat zero. Is Siri pro-life, people asked?
Not surprisingly, Apple has now?steadfastly denied any claim that Siri has any opinion on the subject. The voice assistant, Apple spokesperson Natalie Kerris points out, is still in beta release, which means that it still has many bugs to be worked out. "These are not intentional omissions meant to offend anyone. It simply means that as we bring Siri from beta to a final product, we find places where we can do better, and we will in the coming weeks," she said.
As?TUAW reporter Chris Rawson notes, one possible reason for the lack of responses is that Siri gets a lot of her business information from Yelp, rather than relying on competitor Google. A quick Google search for abortion clinics will yield several possibilities, depending on where you're searching, but they aren't the sort of businesses that tend to get reviewed on Yelp very often. A more targeted query ? requesting the location of the nearest?Planned Parenthood, for example ??tends to bring up results consistently through both Siri and Google.
Abortion is a touchy subject no matter how you look at it, so it's not surprising that Apple felt the need to respond to the accusations. The company was very careful not to hint at a stance for or against it; they simply pointed out that Siri is still a work in progress, and hopefully people won't overreact too much to issues which were coincidental at best.
(Source)
This article was written by Katherine Gray and originally appeared on Tecca
Bill McKinney, who played the hillbilly rapist in “Deliverance”,? has died, at the age of 80. The actor starred in Deliverance’s “Squeal like a pig” [...]
Rise of atmospheric oxygen more complicated than previously thoughtPublic release date: 1-Dec-2011 [ | E-mail | Share ]
Contact: A'ndrea Elyse Messer aem1@psu.edu 814-865-9481 Penn State
The appearance of oxygen in the Earth's atmosphere probably did not occur as a single event, but as a long series of starts and stops, according to an international team of researchers who investigated rock cores from the FAR DEEP project.
The Fennoscandia Arctic Russia - Drilling Early Earth Project -- FAR DEEP -- took place during the summer of 2007 near Murmansk in the northwest region of Russia. The project, part of the International Continental Scientific Drilling Program, drilled a series of shallow, two-inch diameter cores and, by overlapping them, created a record representing stone deposited during the Proterozoic Eon -- 2,500 million to 542 million years ago.
"We've always thought that oxygen came into the atmosphere really quickly during an event," said Lee R. Kump, professor and head of geosciences, Penn State. "We are no longer looking for an event. Now we are looking for when and why oxygen became a stable part of the Earth's atmosphere."
The researchers report in today's (Dec. 1) issue of Science Express that evaluation of these cores and comparison with cores from Gabon previously analyzed by others, supports the conclusion that the Great Oxidation Event played out over hundreds of millions of years. Oxygen levels gradually crossed the low atmospheric oxygen threshold for pyrite -- an iron sulfur mineral -- oxidation by 2,500 million years ago and the loss of any mass-independently fractionated sulfur by 2,400 million years ago. Then oxygen levels rose at an ever-increasing rate through the Paleoproterozoic, achieving about 1 percent of the present atmospheric level.
"The definition of when an oxygen atmosphere occurred depends on which threshold you are looking for," said Kump. "It could be when pyrite becomes oxidized, when sulfur MIF disappears or when deep crustal oxidation occurs."
When the mass-independent fractionated sulfur disappeared, the air on Earth was still not breathable by animal standards. When red rocks containing iron oxides appeared 2,300 million years ago, the air was still unbreathable.
"At about 1 percent oxygen, the groundwater became strongly oxidized, making it possible for groundwater seeping through rocks to oxidize organic materials," said Kump.
Initially, any oxygen in the atmosphere, produced by the photosynthesis of single-celled organisms, was used up when sulfur, iron and other elements oxidized. When sufficient oxygen accumulated in the atmosphere, it permeated the groundwater and began oxidizing buried organic material, oxidizing carbon to create carbon dioxide.
The cores from the FAR-DEEP project were compared with the Francevillian samples from Gabon using the ratio of carbon isotopes 13 and 12 to see if the evidence for high rates of oxygen accumulation existed worldwide. Both the FAR-DEEP project's cores and the Francevillian cores show large deposits of carbon in the form of fossilized petroleum. Both sets of cores also show similar changes in carbon 13 through time, indicating that the changes in carbon isotopes occurred worldwide and oxygen levels throughout the atmosphere were high.
"Although others have documented huge carbon isotope variations at later times in Earth history associated with stepwise increases in atmospheric oxygen, our results are less equivocal because we have many lines of data all pointing to the same thing," said Kump. "These indications include not only carbon13 isotope profiles in organic mater from two widely separated locations, but also supporting profiles in limestones and no indication that processes occurring since that time have altered the signal."
###
Working with Kump on this project were Michael A. Arthur, professor of geosciences, Penn State, and Christopher Junium, former graduate student in geosciences, Penn State, now at Syracuse University; Alex Brasier, postdoctoral fellow, and Anthony Fallick, professor of isotope geosciences, Scottish Universities Environmental Research Centre; Victor Melezhik, Aivo Lepland and Alenka E Crne, researchers at the Norwegian Geological Survey; and Genming Luo, State Key Laboratory of Biogeology and Environmental Geology, China University of Geosciences.
The National Science foundation and the NASA Astrobiology Institute supported the U.S. portion of this research.
[ | E-mail | Share ]
?
AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
Rise of atmospheric oxygen more complicated than previously thoughtPublic release date: 1-Dec-2011 [ | E-mail | Share ]
Contact: A'ndrea Elyse Messer aem1@psu.edu 814-865-9481 Penn State
The appearance of oxygen in the Earth's atmosphere probably did not occur as a single event, but as a long series of starts and stops, according to an international team of researchers who investigated rock cores from the FAR DEEP project.
The Fennoscandia Arctic Russia - Drilling Early Earth Project -- FAR DEEP -- took place during the summer of 2007 near Murmansk in the northwest region of Russia. The project, part of the International Continental Scientific Drilling Program, drilled a series of shallow, two-inch diameter cores and, by overlapping them, created a record representing stone deposited during the Proterozoic Eon -- 2,500 million to 542 million years ago.
"We've always thought that oxygen came into the atmosphere really quickly during an event," said Lee R. Kump, professor and head of geosciences, Penn State. "We are no longer looking for an event. Now we are looking for when and why oxygen became a stable part of the Earth's atmosphere."
The researchers report in today's (Dec. 1) issue of Science Express that evaluation of these cores and comparison with cores from Gabon previously analyzed by others, supports the conclusion that the Great Oxidation Event played out over hundreds of millions of years. Oxygen levels gradually crossed the low atmospheric oxygen threshold for pyrite -- an iron sulfur mineral -- oxidation by 2,500 million years ago and the loss of any mass-independently fractionated sulfur by 2,400 million years ago. Then oxygen levels rose at an ever-increasing rate through the Paleoproterozoic, achieving about 1 percent of the present atmospheric level.
"The definition of when an oxygen atmosphere occurred depends on which threshold you are looking for," said Kump. "It could be when pyrite becomes oxidized, when sulfur MIF disappears or when deep crustal oxidation occurs."
When the mass-independent fractionated sulfur disappeared, the air on Earth was still not breathable by animal standards. When red rocks containing iron oxides appeared 2,300 million years ago, the air was still unbreathable.
"At about 1 percent oxygen, the groundwater became strongly oxidized, making it possible for groundwater seeping through rocks to oxidize organic materials," said Kump.
Initially, any oxygen in the atmosphere, produced by the photosynthesis of single-celled organisms, was used up when sulfur, iron and other elements oxidized. When sufficient oxygen accumulated in the atmosphere, it permeated the groundwater and began oxidizing buried organic material, oxidizing carbon to create carbon dioxide.
The cores from the FAR-DEEP project were compared with the Francevillian samples from Gabon using the ratio of carbon isotopes 13 and 12 to see if the evidence for high rates of oxygen accumulation existed worldwide. Both the FAR-DEEP project's cores and the Francevillian cores show large deposits of carbon in the form of fossilized petroleum. Both sets of cores also show similar changes in carbon 13 through time, indicating that the changes in carbon isotopes occurred worldwide and oxygen levels throughout the atmosphere were high.
"Although others have documented huge carbon isotope variations at later times in Earth history associated with stepwise increases in atmospheric oxygen, our results are less equivocal because we have many lines of data all pointing to the same thing," said Kump. "These indications include not only carbon13 isotope profiles in organic mater from two widely separated locations, but also supporting profiles in limestones and no indication that processes occurring since that time have altered the signal."
###
Working with Kump on this project were Michael A. Arthur, professor of geosciences, Penn State, and Christopher Junium, former graduate student in geosciences, Penn State, now at Syracuse University; Alex Brasier, postdoctoral fellow, and Anthony Fallick, professor of isotope geosciences, Scottish Universities Environmental Research Centre; Victor Melezhik, Aivo Lepland and Alenka E Crne, researchers at the Norwegian Geological Survey; and Genming Luo, State Key Laboratory of Biogeology and Environmental Geology, China University of Geosciences.
The National Science foundation and the NASA Astrobiology Institute supported the U.S. portion of this research.
[ | E-mail | Share ]
?
AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
A move by the world's central banks to lower the cost of borrowing exhilarated investors Wednesday, sending Wall Street soaring more than 400 points and easing fears of a global credit crisis similar to the one that followed the 2008 collapse of Lehman Brothers.
Big U.S. banks were among the top gainers, jumping as much as 7 percent. Markets in Europe surged, too, with Germany's DAX index climbing 5 percent.
"The central banks of the world have resolved that there will not be a liquidity shortage," said David Kotok, chairman and chief investment officer of Cumberland Advisors. "And they have learned their lessons from 2008. They don't want to take small steps and do anything incrementally, but make a big bold move that is credible."
Wednesday's action by the banks of Europe, the U.S., Britain, Canada, Japan and Switzerland represented an extraordinary coordinated effort.
But amid the market's excitement, many doubts loomed. Some analysts cautioned that the banks' move did nothing to provide a permanent fix to the problems facing heavily indebted European nations such as Italy and Greece. It only buys time for political leaders.
"It is a short-term solution," said Jack Ablin, chief investment officer at Harris Private Bank. "The bottom line on any central bank action is that it papers over the problems, buys time and in some respects takes pressure from politicians. ... If nothing's done in a week, this market gain will disappear."
The rally pushed stocks sharply higher across the board. Materials makers and banks had the biggest gains. U.S. Steel jumped 11.5 percent. Only a handful of the 500 stocks in the S&P index fell.
European banks hold large amounts of European government debt and would have the most to lose in the event of a default in Europe, something investors around the world have been increasingly fearful of.
Those worries ? and the reluctance of the European Central Bank to intervene ? have caused borrowing rates for European nations to skyrocket. Wednesday's decision greatly alleviated fears by cutting short-term borrowing rates to banks, giving them much easier access to money. But borrowing costs remain extremely high for indebted countries such as Italy and Spain.
Big U.S. banks reaped some of the biggest gains. JPMorgan Chase & Co. jumped 6.6 percent, Morgan Stanley 6.9 percent and Citigroup Inc. 6 percent.
The euro and commodities prices rose sharply. U.S. Treasury prices fell as demand weakened for ultra-safe assets.
The Dow Jones industrial average rose 403 points, or 3.5 percent, to 11,959 in mid-afternoon trading. The Dow has more than gained back the 564-point slump it had last week and is up 6.6 percent so far this week. The last time it closed up more than 400 points was Aug. 11.
The Standard & Poor's 500 index added 41, or 3.5 percent, to 1,237. The Nasdaq composite index jumped 86, or 3.4 percent, to 2,601.
The move by the banks takes some pressure off the financial system, which has signaled in recent days that banks were losing faith in their trading partners. Banks need dollars to fund their daily operations, and they need to trust each other to maintain healthy flows of credit. Access to dollars has dried up as American money market funds reduced their lending to European banks.
But the banks' most recent steps do little to solve the long-term debt problem in Europe.
"People are taking comfort that it's globally coordinated," said Peter Tchir, who runs the hedge fund TF Market Advisors. "In itself, it does nothing. But the bulls are anticipating that this is just the beginning of central bank and other actions" to ease market pressures.
Any successful plan would have to reduce borrowing costs for Italy and other indebted nations, Tchir said. Italy's borrowing costs edged lower Wednesday, but the nation was still paying more than 7 percent interest for 10-year borrowing ? a dangerously high level.
European finance ministers in Brussels have been meeting since Tuesday but have failed to deliver a clearer sense of how the currency union will proceed. More leaders gather next week for a summit.
In another attempt to free up cash for lending, China on Wednesday reduced the amount of money its banks are required to hold in reserve. It was the first easing of monetary policy in three years, and analysts are expecting more.
Growth in China, which has the largest economy after the European Union and the U.S., could be crucial to sustaining any recovery after the debt crisis.
A string of positive U.S. economic news also propelled the market higher. An index measuring manufacturing in the Midwest surged to a seven-month high; private company hiring jumped in November to the highest level this year, according to payroll company ADP; and the number of contracts to buy homes jumped in October to the highest level in a year.
___
AP Business Writer Pallavi Gogoi in New York contributed to this report.
SAN FRANCISCO ? If Facebook is like hanging out at a banquet with a large buffet to feast on, then social network Path is an intimate dinner with close friends. Path is now getting new silverware and table decorations, so to speak, with the release of updated software.
CEO Dave Morin, a Facebook alum, says the dinner-party philosophy remains but users can now share their comings and goings with up to 150 friends, up from the original 50.
With the new version available this week, a year after its debut, Path aims to be more than a sharing application. It wants to be a digital journal that documents your days with a push of a button.
Morin describes it as "a slightly social experience." You're not just updating it to share your day with others; you're recording your life for yourself.
"The idea has always been to give you a trusted place to share with your close friends and family," Morin said. "Now that the (mobile phone) is the accessory you have in your hand all the time, it's become a journal."
Path began as an iPhone application for sharing photos and videos. Users later got the ability to add one of five emoticons to their friends' photos.
The new version lets users post music and tell everyone where they are, with whom and whether they are awake or asleep. It's also compatible with Android-running phones for the first time. And, it includes technology that allows the application to make updates on its own, as long as the user agrees to it, or opts in.
For example, if you fly to Minneapolis, the application can track you with GPS and post this when you land: "Arrived in Minneapolis, it's 6:06 p.m. Mostly cloudy and 50 degrees." The location updates are neighborhood and city specific but will not pin an actual location.
Morin says the auto-updates make it easier for users to share richer content without much effort. And, while the details may seem personal, your network is only of close friends and family.
The update retains strict privacy controls, which Morin says is key to making people comfortable with sharing, especially in the wake of high-profile debates over privacy issues at Facebook.
On Tuesday, the government announced a proposed settlement with Facebook over "unfair and deceptive" business practices. The pact requires the company to get people's approval before changing how it shares their data.
The new version of Path integrates larger social networks Facebook, Twitter and Foursquare, allowing status updates to those sites from the Path application.
Morin says the San Francisco-based startup has enough funding for its next stage and just hired its 20th employee. Path has more than 1 million users.
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Sunday Highlights: Residents of Maiden, North Carolina question the economic benefit? of Apple's massive data center; iOS 5 vulnerable when using iCloud restore according to new report; New York Times gets an inside look at Apple's "spot-the-shopper technology"; iOS device owners more loyal to their phone than banks; Digital Trends offers tips in getting Macs and PCs to get along well together; Kirk McElhearn shows how to get album artwork w/o using iTunes; and from Friday's highlights, Samsung pleading case in AU calling tablet ban "grossly unjust", judge questions fairness; Brazil's first in-country-produced iPhones on the street, Jonny Evans says the market could be massive; Black Friday deals abound throughout the site, find Apple's deals in our Hardware/Software section with comparisons over at 9 to 5 Mac; Macgamestore has 300 games on sale; beware fake iTunes freebies making the rounds; Flashback Trojan not letting up over the holidays; Adidas has an iOS-connected soccer cleat, reviewed at The Next Web; Macworld looks at the Apple TV and Roku devices helping you decide which is right for you; iPhone owners are most loyal according to new report; iPhone 4S launches in India, Siri having no big problems recognizing Indian accents; Macworld's gear guide for mobile users; BearExtender offering MacSurfer readers 40% discount on their WiFi antenna upgrade; rCube portable home speaker system reviewed by Macworld UK, called the speaker Apple should have designed.
This weekend's MacUpdate Promo offers 30% off BioShock 1.1. "BioShock...Welcome to Rapture. A city where opportunity awaits those brave enough to grasp it. A city where the artist need not fear the censor. Where the scientist is not bound by petty morality. Where the great are not held back by the weak."
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"The Flashback Trojan Horse Is Not Taking Time Off for the Holidays"?Intego?11/25
AppleCare/Troubleshooting
"I wonder if anyone else has experienced this problem, which I have reproduced on two different machines. If you have a Lion boot partition and a Snow Leopard boot partition, once you have booted into Lion, and then boot back to Snow Leopard, the Spotlight index on the Snow Leopard partition is unusable."?MacInTouch?11/26
"Bugs & Fixes: Three essential iTunes Match troubleshooting tips"?Macworld?11/25
Reviews/How-To/Tips
"How To Get iTunes Album Art Without Using iTunes"?Kirkville?11/26
"Best image editing apps from the Mac App Store"?TechRadar UK?11/26
"Review: Parallels Desktop 7 for Mac"?Computing?11/25
"Using Apple's Find My Mac Feature"?New York Times [Free/Paid Registration Required]?11/25
"McAfee protects your Mac without affecting performance"?Macworld?11/25
"Stellar programs for printing labels"?Macworld?11/25
"Gem Update: Printopia 2.1.5 offers major improvements to a Gems favorite"?Macworld?11/25
Op/Ed
"Lion - Recovery partition and backup/cloning; installing Snow Leopard on new Macs; MAMP Pro"?MacInTouch?11/25
"Virtualization discussion continues today in reader Reports, with more about VMware's on-again/off-again support for hosting the standard (non-server) version of Snow Leopard, plus notes on running Snow Leopard on VirtualBox, desktop icons, disk partitions and more."?MacInTouch?11/25
"Why doesn't iPhone wifi sync with iTunes work better?"?Vancouver Sun?11/25
Press Releases
"Today The Alchemist Guild announced the release of its latest app DockShelf for OS X."?The Alchemist Guild?11/26
"Type2Phone - Type Out Text For Your iPhone On A Mac"?App Advice?11/26
"MacScan Black Friday Sale - 80% OFF!"?SecureMac?11/25
"Enjoy Your Holidays! Pricepirates for Mac Now Available in the Mac App Store"?PRNewswire?11/25
"50% Savings on All Jumsoft Products for Black Friday"?prMac?11/25
"Softpress Discounts Popular Web Design App Freeway Pro for Black Friday"?prMac?11/25
"Ergonis Black Friday: Save up to 51% on PopChar, Typinator, and KeyCue"?prMac?11/25
"Macgamestore Black Friday Event - Over 300 Mac Games On Sale"?Inside Mac Games?11/25
"Total Video Converter 2.8.5 released on eTinySoft website"?prMac?11/25
"Web Confidential 4.0 for OS X - Store Passwords, PINs, User IDs, Serials"?prMac?11/25
"Former Microsoft evangelist builds accidental iPhone startup"?GeekWire?11/26
"Apple teases its new NYC store--oh, and what's this about 3D iPads?"?CNET News?11/26
"Man builds girlfriend $125 iPad"?CNET News?11/26
"Apple debuts new iPod touch TV commercial for Christmas shopping season (with Video)"?MacDailyNews?11/26
"Sales of Apple's iPhone 4S stall in South Korea as handset is deemed 'uncompetitive'"?BGR?11/25
"iOS Download Stats For China Show The Importance Of App Localization"?paidContent?11/25
"Apple's Siri works almost perfectly with unsupported Indian accent [Video]?The Next Web?11/25
"Smugglers Toast Apple in India as IPhone 4S Debut Still Late"?Bloomberg?11/25
"The Financial Times brings its iOS-only Web app to India"?The Next Web?11/25
"Siri can now control third party apps and even start your car via SiriProxy [Video]?TiPb?11/25
"10 iOS paid apps worth buying for the kids" [Slideshow]?The Globe and Mail [Free Registration Required]?11/25
"Foxconn Worker Commits Suicide for Boyfriend's Breakup"?M.I.C. Gadget?11/25
"Demon Currys iPad showered kids with Hard-Core smut: Bosses very, very sorry after shop web filter fail"?The Register?11/25
Non-Apple News
"Analysis: Sprint network upgrade may curb unlimited data"?Reuters?11/25
"Tablets need permanent Black Friday price slash to triumph"?Register Hardware?11/25
"Kobo Vox reaches the UK before Amazon's Fire"?ZDNet UK?11/25
"V3 announces winners of 2011 Technology Awards"?V3?11/25
"Asus Eee Pad Transformer Prime Available for U.S. Presale"?eWeek?11/25
"Google Product Search Refined for Black Friday Shopping"?eWeek?11/25
"Google begins shoehorning ads into Chrome browser"?ZDNet?11/25
"Tech Mahindra faces headwinds in North America"?MarketWatch?11/25
"Verizon Teases The Internet With $199 Galaxy Nexus"?TechCrunch?11/25
"Verizon Offering Black Friday Deals on Xoom, Galaxy Tab"?PC Magazine?11/25
"Amazon Reveals Cyber Monday Deals: Xbox 360 For $199, Nokia N8 For $299"?TechCrunch?11/25
"Amazon Black Friday Discounts Continue With Kindle DX Price Cut"?PC Magazine?11/25
"TV Deals Abound on Black Friday as Market Growth Slows"?eWeek?11/25
"Black Friday shoppers go gaga for TVs"?CNNMoney?11/25
Publications/Podcasts
"GeekWire Radio: Kinect on Windows, Apple on the rise, and Xconomy's Curt Woodward"?GeekWire?11/26
"Interview: Apple Employee No. 12 Dan Kottke on Company's Earliest Days and the College Steve Jobs"?KQED News?11/25
"Gene Steinberg meets commentators Peter Cohen, Kirk McElhearn and John Martellaro on The Tech Night Owl LIVE"?The Tech Night Owl LIVE?11/25
"HotHardware Holiday Gift Guide: Tablets"?HotHardware?11/25
"Gear Guide: The mobile Mac user"?Macworld?11/25
"Best Buy Completely Sells Out of iPad 2 Stock, Still Plenty of Android Tablets Left"?iDownload Blog?11/26
"WSJ: Sharp To Provide LCD Panels For Next iPad And iPhone"?App Advice?11/26
"Apple Getting Ready For Next Gen Processors"?AppleBitch?11/26
"Apple Proposes a Brand New Kind of iOS Interface"?iDownload Blog?11/26
"Apple Black Friday Price Guide ? Get the lowest prices, updated live"?9 to 5 Mac?11/25
"Apple Store Black Friday sale for 2011, $101 off MacBooks Pros, Airs, iMacs, $61 off iPads, iPods"?MacPrices?11/25
"Apple Black Friday Deals Include Discounts on iPad, Mac"?PC Magazine?11/25
"Apple's Black Friday savings by the numbers: 7% to 16%"?Fortune?11/25
"Apple Black Friday Sale Seeks Recovery From September Swoon"?eWeek?11/25
"Apple's Black Friday sales prices"?ZDNet?11/25
"At 6 a.m., Apple Discounts Lure Early Risers"?WSJ Blogs?11/25
"First Brazilian Built iPhones Make Their Way Out Of Foxconn Factory"?Cult of Mac?11/25
"Photos of Brazilian-Made 8 GB iPhone 4 Surface"?MacRumors?11/25
"Apple removes Big Fish service from store"?Seattle Times?11/25
"WSJ: Apple investing in Sharp plant for iPad 3 displays"?AppleInsider?11/25
"The iPad's Next LCD Panels could be Supplied from Sharp"?MacStories?11/25
AppleCare/Helps
"Power Mac G5 and Mac Pro: How To open the CD/DVD tray"?Apple Support?11/25
Price Trackers/Deals
"MacMall Cyber Monday deals: MacBook Air, $799"?FairerPlatform?11:40 AM
"MacBook Air still starts at $849"?9 to 5 Mac?9:33 AM
"Macintosh Cyber Monday deals"?Appletell?11/26
"TopXNotes Black Friday Sale Still On and Expanded"?prMac?11/26
"PadGadget Daily App Deal ? 14 iPad Apps on Sale"?PadGadget?11/26
"Race After 1977 For iPhone And iPad Is Free Today (Was $0.99)"?Apple Sliced?11/25
"Going Nuts For iPhone And iPad Is Temporarily Available For Free (Previously $0.99)"?Apple Sliced?11/25
"Sentinel 2: Earth Defense For iPhone Is Free Right Now (Normally $0.99)"?Apple Sliced?11/25
"The BearExtender team is proud to offer MacSurfer readers a 40% Off coupon code for Black Friday, with Free Shipping and a Free 5 dBi Antenna upgrade. Use code MACSURFER2011BLACKFRIDAY during checkout."?BearExtender?11/25
"Black Friday through Cyber Monday at DEVONtechnologies"?prMac?11/25
"Sprightly Software Announces Black Friday Sale on Solitaire Apps for iOS"?prMac?11/25
"Black Friday deals: iHome trims 25% on select items"?FairerPlatform?11/25
"We are pleased to announce a great range of discounts across many of Aspyr's greatest games, including Duke Nukem, Call of Duty and their latest offering, Civilization V - Game of the Year Edition."?Application Systems London?11/25
"Black Friday deals: MS Office, $79; Toast, $70; Adobe, save up 40%"?FairerPlatform?11/25
"More Confirmation of Sharp Supplying iPad 3 Displays"?MacRumors?11/25
"Microsoft Doesn't Get It, Episode 65,536: TellMe versus Siri | TUAW - The Unofficial Apple Weblog"?TUAW?11/25
"More Back Story on Steve Jobs's Biological Father"?New York Times [Free/Paid Registration Required]?11/25
"Hacking Siri on the iPhone"?Forbes?11/25
"The Macalope Daily: Hotter than Fire"?Macworld [Paid Membership Required]?11/25
"Why I'm Dropping The iPhone And Switching To A BlackBerry"?Business Insider?11/25
"The Future of Siri is Now: Start a Car, Adjust Home Thermostat, and More [Videos]?OS X Daily?11/25
"Why Steve Jobs, Bill Gates, Sergey Brin, and Larry Page are overrated"?Forbes?11/25
"Felix Salmon: Why Apple's Customers Cripple Its User Experience"?Wired?11/25
"Schneier on iPhone security"?ZDNet?11/25
"Apple has tablet 'monopoly' says judge as Samsung appeals ban"?SlashGear?11/25
"The never ending pursuit of perfection: the parallel universes of Steve Jobs, management guru Peter Drucker, operatic composer Giuseppe Verdi, ancient Greek sculptor Phidias, and economist Joseph Schumpeter -lessons to be learnt about learning lessons applied to professional development and presentation skills"?Les Posen's Presentation Magic?11/25
"iPad or Kindle Fire: Which should you buy?"?GigaOM?11/25
"Help! Santa can't afford the iPad. Will the Kindle Fire do?"?CNET News?11/25
"Apple's smart TV project - what we (think we) know so far"?Macworld UK?11/25
Non-Apple
"IPCom injunction has potential to force HTC out of German market for years, possibly until 2020"?Foss Patents?3:37 PM
"Galaxy Nexus and Android 4.0 gains fans; including me"?GigaOM?4:29 PM
"Kids ask, 'What's a netbook?' as Intel delays Cedar Trail"?Tech.Blorge?11/26
"IPCom (patent holding firm) to relentlessly enforce 3G-essential patent against HTC's German business"?Foss Patents?11/25
"USB sticks still being used insecurely, Ponemon study finds"?Techworld?11/25
"Nokia Lumia Coming To AT&T?"?Forbes?11/25
"Amazon's New Data Center Could Save You Money: With Oregon data center, Amazon Web Services gives West Coast infrastructure-as-a-service customers a 10% price break."?InformationWeek?11/25
"Consultants in the Cloud"?New York Times [Free/Paid Registration Required]?11/25
"Cyber Monday will see more mobile shoppers: New smartphones and tablets are making it easier for consumers to part with dollars, survey finds"?Computerworld?11/25
"Security tips for Black Friday and Cyber Monday shopping"?CBS News?11/25
"Ultimate Guide to Black Friday 2011: We've rounded up all of PCMag's Black Friday coverage to help you prepare for the big day."?PC Magazine?11/25
"Best tech gifts for under $50"?CNET News?11/25
"HotHardware Holiday Gift Guide: Tablets"?HotHardware?11/25
"Laptop holiday gift picks"?CNET News?11/25
"Samsung Galaxy Tab 7 Plus Tablet Updated With Android Honeycomb" [Video Report]?TheStreet?11/25
"Partners not riding the winning side of Android"?TheGadgetClub?11/25
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Public release date: 1-Dec-2011
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