Category: News and Views

The Galaxy Note Edge Is A True Cutting-Edge Phablet | TechCrunch

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Samsung either plays it entirely safe – see most of the Galaxy Tab line – or entirely gonzo. Whether it’s the chimerical Galaxy K Zoom or their curved TV, it’s as if the company has one floor dedicated to making vanilla ice cream an another dedicated to making unicorn-tear-flavored gelato. And it’s on that latter floor that the Galaxy Note Edge was born.

First thing’s first: this is essentially a Galaxy Note 4, one of the best mini-tablets available. While I remain an iOS user, I’ve turned to the Galaxy Note again and again over the past few weeks because of the bright screen and size. It is, to be clear, a definite iPhone 6 Plus competitor and, in some respects, beats that behemoth at screen clarity and usability.

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Billionaire Michael Bloomberg recommends being a plumber | Money Cnn

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Former New York City Mayor and billionaire Michael Bloomberg has some advice for high school seniors: forget college, become a plumber instead. “Today if your kid wants to go to college or become a plumber, you’ve got to think long and hard,” said Bloomberg Monday at the annual meeting of Wall Street trade group SIFMA.

“If he’s not going to go to a great school and he’s not super smart academically, but is smart in terms of dealing with people and that sort of thing, being a plumber is a great job because you have pricing power, you have an enormous skill set,” he said.

The founder of financial data and news services company Bloomberg L.P. even went as far as to say that students considering Harvard should do the math. You could pay $50,000 to $60,000 a year to Harvard or you could make that much as an apprentice plumber, he explained.

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Science shows how drummers’ brains are unique | Alternative Press

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baby drummerResearchers at Stockholm’s Karolinska Institute found a link between “intelligence, good timing and the part of the brain used for problem-solving,” reports PolyMic. In the study, drummers who were better able to keep a steady beat scored better on a 60-question intelligence test. After all, figuring out how to play in time is just a form of problem-solving in and of itself.

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Veteran | Jim Ely

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Veteran

vet-er-uh n, ve-truh n

a person who has had long service or experience in an occupation, office, or the like:

-a person who has served in a military force, especially one who has fought in a war:

-a Vietnam veteran.

-experienced through long service or practice; having served for a long period:

of, pertaining to, or characteristic of veterans.

From Latin veterānus mature, experienced, equivalent to veter- (stem of vetus) old

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TIP OF THE WEEK

U.S. military veterans can now save up to $69,062.50 on the SBA 7(a) loan guarantee fee.

SBA Policy Notice 5000-1319 declares that the SBA guarantee fee on SBA 7(a) loans is now reduced by 50% for small businesses that are 51% or more owned and controlled by a veteran.

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Indices:

PRIME RATE= 3.25%

SBA LIBOR Base Rate November 2014 = 3.16%

SBA Fixed Base Rate November 2014 = 5.28%

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SBA 504 Loan Debenture Rate for October

The debenture rate is only 2.740% but note rate is 2.787% and the effective yield is 4.15%.

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AHEAD OF THE YIELD CURVE

Veteran interest rate observers have noticed a flattening of the yield curve.

The slope of the yield curve—the difference between the yields on short- and long-term maturity bonds—has achieved some notoriety as a simple forecaster of economic growth. The rule of thumb is that an inverted yield curve (short rates above long rates) indicates a recession in about a year.  More generally, a flat curve indicates weak growth and conversely, a steep curve indicates strong growth.

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Internet Should Be Open, No Fast or Slow Lanes, Obama Says | Bloomberg

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President Barack Obama called for the “strongest possible rules” to protect the open Internet, advocating stricter controls than a regulator he appointed and causing shares of Comcast Corp. CMCSA and other broadband providers to drop.

“I am asking for an explicit ban on paid prioritization,” Obama said today in a statement, referring to so-called fast lanes for preferred Web traffic. His comments tilt the White House against positions advocated by broadband providers and Federal Communications Commission Chairman Tom Wheeler.

Companies led by Comcast, Verizon Communications Inc. VZ and AT&T Inc. T argue that only light regulation is needed to ensure providers don’t block or slow Web traffic, and they say strict rules would squelch investment. Public policy groups want tough regulations that guarantee all websites are treated equally and can be accessed by people increasingly reliant on the Internet.

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Global Web Crackdown Arrests 17, Seizes Hundreds Of Dark Net Domains | WIRED

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When “Operation Onymous” first came to light yesterday, it looked like a targeted strike against a few high value targets in the Dark Web drug trade. Now the full scope of that international law enforcement crackdown has been revealed, and it’s a scorched-earth purge of the Internet underground.

On Friday, the European police agency Europol along with the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security announced that the operation has now arrested 17 people in as many countries and seized hundreds of Dark Web domains associated with well over a dozen black market websites. In addition to the takedowns of drug markets Silk Road 2, Cloud 9 and Hydra revealed Thursday, it’s also busted contraband markets like Pandora, Blue Sky, Topix, Flugsvamp, Cannabis Road, and Black Market. Other takedown targets included money laundering sites like Cash Machine, Cash Flow, Golden Nugget and Fast Cash. And agents have taken from criminal suspects more than $1 million in bitcoin, $250,000 in cash, as well as an assortment of computers, drugs, gold, silver and weapons that they had yet to fully catalogue.

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The Dangers of “Free Fill” Programs | Gaebler

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In order to get your product into a new store or distributor, you are often asked to participate in a “free fill” program. Giving away product can be a high price to pay for a new customer. Make sure you’ve analyzed the cost-benefit before making this decision.

“Free fills” are programs in which suppliers provides a store or distributor free product to put on the shelf.

Stores and distributors expect their suppliers especially new suppliers to participate in these free fill programs. The idea is that the free product can be offered at a discount and entice customers to try a new product.

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