MESA AZ COMPUTER REPAIR COMPANY USES LOCAL SEO TO PROMOTE HIS BUSINESS

When Computer Eze of Mesa AZ needed more customers they turned to a Local SEO company to generate a comprehensive local web presence. Mesa, AZ ( pr-usa ) May 19, 2011 – Daniel Kaufman handles Computer Repair Mesa AZ and is the owner of Computer Eze. Although he is a top computer repair specialist he wanted to find a way to generate more phone calls by presenting his low cost computer repair services in front of more people in the Phoenix metro area.

After seeing a decline in phone calls from the Yellow Pages, he realized that customers in need of low cost computer repair services in the Mesa Az area are going online to find the right service and save money.

So what does this Mesa AZ Computer repair specialist do? He searched online and found Local SEO Goldmine, a search engine optimization company specializing in local search marketing, to help potential customers looking for computer repairs in the Mesa AZ area find them when they use a search engine. Using state of the art local search technology, Local SEO Goldmine works to help local small businesses find more customers by achieving page 1 rankings in the Google search results.

With the steep declines in the effectiveness of traditional advertising outlets, marketing locally online is the key to success for local businesses trying to attract more clients in their local area. A top ranking in Google for the right keywords means more traffic and more phone calls.

As Google continues to dominate in local search, more and more small business owners realize that they need their website and Google Places listing to show up on page 1.

Jeffrey Taylor, a local SEO expert for Local SEO GoldMine, comments, “Over the past 2 years Google has upgraded their local search results and this has given local business owners a unique opportunity to garner top rankings in the Google local search results.

At Local SEO Goldmine we focus on helping local businesses achieve those goals. By using a locally focused SEO system, potential customers can search for a low cost computer repair company, and Computer Eze will be one of the businesses they can call. In reality, if your local business is not appearing on page 1 of Google for the right keywords, you are losing business to your competition.”

Daniel Kaufman the owner of low cost computer repairs in Mesa Az, commented, “I knew that we needed to reach more people and the Internet is very powerful, so I contacted Local SEO Goldmine to help Mesa AZ area searchers find our services when they need computer repair.” Kaufman go on to say, "We offer quite few computer services like virus removal, new computer set up, data recovery, wireless set up, and most computer repairs and knew we needed a comprehensive keyword strategy to cover all of our services. Local GoldMine offered everything we needed to get the job done."

By teaming up with Local GoldMine, Computer Eze of Mesa AZ can now be able to get in front of Mesa AZ area people that are using search engines to find low cost computer repairs by simply typing in 'computer repair mesa az' or 'low cost computer repair mesa az'.

Taylor also states, “We are excited to help Computer Eze of Mesa Az reach more people using search engines and also in helping Mesa AZ area residents find a low cost computer repair company when they need one. Daniel let us know that his competitive edge is offering low cost computer repair services and wanted us to get his message out to help people save money.”

Daniel Kaufman, owner of Computer Eze LLC specializes in most computer repair services and covers the entire Phoenix Arizona area.
Contact:
Computer Eze LLC
Daniel Kaufman
450 S. Acacia #1018 Mesa, AZ 85204
(480) 495-6176
http://www.computerezearizona.com
Source http://pr-usa.net/

The Best Search Engine Optimization Companies in Netherlands Ranked By topseos.co.nl for May 2011

topseos.co.nl, an independent authority on search vendors has named the Best Search Engine Optimization Services in Netherlands for the month of May 2011. Companies are already becoming serious about boosting the quality of traffic being directed to their site and have established an organic optimization campaign in place. Search engines are such an integral part of how visitors and potential clients find information on the internet, thus it becomes essential that websites are aligned with what the search engine is looking for. All the search engine marketing services next to hundreds of other SEO firms have gone through an evaluation system facilitated by a qualified and experienced team of researchers.
“Though there are many firms who engage in SEO Services, the process is by no means easy. Getting a link to the top of a search engine’s results page requires a great amount of strategizing and only a company who understand the intricacies of organic optimization will be able to accomplish that,” said Jeev Trika, Managing Partner of topseos.co.nl (http://www.topseos.co.nl).
The Top 10 Reputable SEO Companies in Netherlands for May 2011 are:
1.)                          Search Factory
2.)                          One To Market
3.)                          Offerti.nl
4.)                          Expand Online Ltd.
5.)                          Zicht online
6.)                          Integrace
7.)                          SEO Handleiding
8.)                          SEOGuru
9.)                          Companeo
10.)                        Maxlead
topseos.co.nl has designed an evaluation process that specifically identifies Organic SEO Companies in Netherlands that excel in their performance and output. An in-depth assessment looks at how the firm works and is able to achieve its objectives. Part of the assessment process includes gathering feedback from at least three of the firm’s clients to understand their performance better.
As part of their assessment, questions include both general and project specific queries such as, “What type of needs analysis was conducted before work initiated?”, “What type of a ROI were you anticipating, what was achieved and in what time frame?”, “What would be 3 things you would change about your experience?”, “What was your total investment?”, “Rate your overall experience (1-10; 10 being the highest).”, “What are the most competitive keywords you have been able to rank on the major search engines and how long did it take you to achieve those rankings?”, “Did the agency modify the way they achieved higher rankings for you based on the Universal Search model introduced by Google? How?”, “How comprehensive, specific, and useful are the reports that are offered to the client? What metrics do they cover?”, “Do the reports inform you what the next set of steps ought to be to achieve higher rankings and when you can expect to achieve the next set of goals by?” or “How many of your top industry keywords rank in the top 10? Which ones?”
Source http://pressmediawire.com/

Couple moving into new home find $45,000 hidden in box in attic… and give it back to family of previous owner

Moving into your first house is a nerve-racking and exciting experience -even more so if you stumble across a treasure trove of money.
Just an hour after picking up the keys to his new family home, Josh Ferrin found a staggering $45,000 in cash, old stamps and bond certificates.
It had all been squirrelled away and hidden in a tiny garage attic by the previous owner, who had died.

Honest: Josh and Tara Ferrin hand over bags full of money and tins filled with coins to Dennis and Kay Bangerter, whose father lived in their new home in Bountiful, Salt Lake City

But honest Mr Ferrin said that, even thought there was a brief moment of 'finders-keepers', he knew he had to hand it all back.
He said: 'You can't make plans for money that's found in a situation like this. It just doesn't feel right to do anything but give it back. I never considered the money mine.'
On his first trip to the new house, in the Salt Lake City suburb of Bountiful, Josh spotted a scrap of carpet peeking out of a small trap door in the ceiling of the garage.
He climbed up into the attic space and found several black metal boxes filled with cash, stamps, bond certificates and other memorabilia.
He closed it, locked it in his truck and called his wife Tara, who said she 'immediately knew' it had to be returned to its rightful owners.

Find: The haul of notes, coins and stamps were hidden away in boxes in the attic above the garage

But former owner Arnold Bangerter, a father-of-six fisheries biologist for the former Utah Department of Fish and Game, had died in November 2010.
His son Dennis had been charged with selling the house and said he wasn't surprised at the news as he had previously found cash taped to the bottom of furniture left in the house.
He added: 'He grew up in hard times and people that survived that era didn't have anything when they came out of it unless they saved it themselves. He was a saver, not a spender.'
Josh said he felt he had peek into Mr Bangerter's life when he went through the box.
He told the Deseret News, where he works as an artist: This is a beautiful outcome and it feels good to be a part of it. It's a rare opportunity to be able to do something extraordinarily honest.'
It took the Ferrins three hours to count the notes, which dated back to the 1970s and 1980s, and were meticulously coiled together and wrapped with tiny bits of twine.
And they had to remind their two young sons about 'honesty' after they kept pestering them to keep 'just one' of the bundles.
Josh added: 'The house needs some work. I could use the $45,000 for remodelling, but he didn't save that money for us. He saved it for his family.'

Source http://www.dailymail.co.uk/

Chris Arreola - A Force to be Reckoned with

The Two Feathers Gym, owned by promoter and cutman Willy “Indian” Schunke, sits hidden in an affluent suburb behind a large home atop a hill in Riverside, CA. nearby is a golf course that shoots through the neighborhood. Golf carts filled with retired rich folk cruise the street, the wind blows tranquilly in the quiet of suburban heaven. This is the last place you’d expect to find a heavyweight contender. This is also the last place you’d expect a heavyweight contender to find himself. 

On Saturday night at the Home Depot Center in Carson, CA, heavyweight hopeful Chris “the Nightmare” Arreola will continue on his ultimate quest to win the heavyweight quest. In the process, he hopes to win back the trust of fans whose numbers dwindled as the 6’4” Mexican-American’s waistline expanded. Most importantly, Arreola hopes to prove to himself the worth of hard work.

The gym is made of corrugated metal and is guarded by two English bulldogs (Tank and Holmes, named for the deceased pornstar John Holmes) once owned by Arreola and now gifted to Indian. The yard in front of the gym is a bit barren, patches of grass and dirt here and there. The way Tank and Holmes oversized bodies move slowly, snorting and grunting, they resembled the axe carrying guards outside Jabba’s Palace in Return of the Jedi. The wide door gym slowly sliding upwards to fold under the roof only added to the image. But strangely, the fighter who had grown from his early days’ career lows of 229 to a Jabba-like career high of 263 in 2009 against Brian Minto, was nowhere to be found. In his place was a fighter who on Friday’s weigh-in came in at a lean and ready 234 pounds.

“I never say this to another man but you look great,” I told him as the smiling Arreola strode into the gym and greeted myself, our cameraman Brian, Indian and trainer Henry Ramirez.

Arreola removed his shirt and revealed a body he has not had since I started covering him several years back. His face was tight and you could tell just by looking at it that he was in shape. But without a shirt I could see his arms had definition, he no longer had the appearance of breasts from being overweight, and the tire that sat around his waist in recent years was all but gone.

“You kind of have abs,” I remarked.

“I have a nice ass? Thank you,” Arreola joked and he set down to get taped up for the day’s workout.

If there is one thing about Arreola that stands out, beyond his fighting style or his apparent victory in his weight battles, it is his honesty and seeming lack of filter. Many athletes have that public mask or interview voice they put on when going on the record. Not Arreola. He thinks it, he says it and lets the chips fall where they may. The same can be said for his long time (in some cases long suffering trainer) Ramirez. Cameras on or off, recorder on or off, they are two open books.

Arreola’s troubles with weight have never been a secret. At times he has been known to disappear from camp altogether. But their beginnings can be traced to perhaps just after his win in June 2008 over Chazz Witherspoon. He weighed 239 for that fight and looked fast and strong with excellent combinations; a mainstay from his early fighting days as a junior middleweight amateur. But after that fight, which signaled Arreola’s arrival as a contender, the weight began to jump up. Just a few months later he was 259 and ½. The next year, in back to back fights with Travis Walker and Jameel McCline, he weighed in the high 250’s. There were signs of trouble as the hype train for Arreola to fight WBC champion Vitali Klitschko brother moved forward. The fight would end distatrsouly with Arreola losing and being stopped for the first time.

He would return at career high of 263 to stop Brian Minto in December of that year. In 2010, Arreola would hit a new low when he was set to fight Tomasz Adamek, a former light heavyweight and cruiser champ who was now campaigning as a heavyweight. Most everyone favored Arreola to win but again, his fear of success got the better of him and he lost a twelve round majority decision, was relegated to fighting on ESPN as opposed to HBO and left potentially millions on the table.

“In the seven week camp, I honestly probably trained like 3 weeks in total,” admitted Arreola.

Going into the fight, after having Arreola disappear for weeks at a time, Ramirez knew defeat was imminent.

“It was the worst feeling I had going into a fight,’ said Ramirez. “Like I was hoping for the best but deep down I knew we were going to lose. Not because I doubted [Chris] but because I what he didn’t put into training camp. Not that we didn’t tell him but the fight was the furthest thing from his mind. There was so much bullshit going on. We weren’t surprised. I knew if it got to seven, eight rounds, I knew we were done. It was the worst feeling.”

Looking back, Arreola believes the missing camp and the weight gain was a way of giving himself an out. If he did not train 100% and lost, he could always tell himself the opponent did not beat him at his best. And they’d be right.

“It feels real good, it feels great,” said Arreola of his newfound love for training. “You know what, when I wasn’t training, I gave myself an excuse to lose. And now I look back and I do have an excuse. ‘Why’d I lose? Ah, because I didn’t train. I don’t want to have no more excuses like that.” 

Not anymore. Especially losing to [Adamak],” said Arreola. “He owes me a gift. He needs to send me something in the mail for me giving him a title shot. I’m waiting on that.”

Following the loss, Arreola returned on ESPN at the Citizens Business Bank Arena in Ontario, CA, a stones thrown from his hometown. Arreola won a twelve round decision but this time he weighed 256 and put in a lackluster effort, leaving the fight bruised around the eyes and with two injured hands. Once again, a lackluster camp nearly proved Arreola’s undoing.

“Fighting Manny Quezada, no offense to him is not a fight that should have lasted twelve rounds,” explained Arreola. “It is not a fight where I should have come out with two black eyes and two fucked up hands. One I’ll give him. That’s it. That happens but two fucked up happens and a black eye? That stuff shouldn’t have ever happened.”

The lack of crowd showed that the audience that once loved his open interview style and devil may give a fuck attitude had grown weary of a man with so much doing so little with it.

“That shit just sucked, dude,” admitted Arreola. “Like I said, no offense to him, just some fights just should have not lasted that long. I am a lot better than what I showed that day. A lot better.”

Following that win, Arreola took the rest of the year off. An intervention of sorts occurred and a plan to partner up with veteran trainer Ronnie Shields in Houston was put into motion. Ramirez reluctantly joined Arreola though the relationship was strained.

“I’ve seen it all,” said Ramirez. “I’ve seen it all with this guy. There were times when I would sit at home and go ‘What the fuck Is wrong with this guy?’ It was just too much. I didn’t want to deal with it anymore. I was like ‘Fuckit. He don’t care. I don’t care.’ At this level, your whole team has to put the effort forth. Trainer, fighter. It hit a point where he was the only one who wasn’t. I was pretty much done. Even before the Ronnie Shields thing. I was telling Wes (Crockett, an associate of Arreola’s manager Al Haymon who discovered Chris) ‘I don’t think this is going to work. He don’t want to work. He don’t want to listen.’ It was a constant uphill battle. When we got to Houston, to be honest, I wasn’t going to go. But Wes said ‘Ride it out. Go to Houston. Couple weeks ain’t going to kill you.’ Went to Houston and at that point we weren’t even talking. We were distant. I’d leave him alone and everything. The Houston thing kind of, we started  . . .”

“It rekindled our relationship,” Arreola jumped in with a smile.

Arreola returned in January of 2011 and stopped stay busy opponent Joey Abell in just one round. The best part? Arreola weighed 249 ½ and seemed to have discovered his love for fighting again.

“We started hanging out every day,” said Ramirez. “Going to Houston for three weeks ended up being a positive. It made him realize  . . . I knew I wasn’t the problem. I knew he was the problem. I’m not trying to lay blame but with me, the sport has always been first as far as training. After the fight, I said ‘Well, looks like we are going back to Houston.’ And he said ‘Well, let’s see how it goes for a few weeks. If I start fucking off, we’ll just go back. And here we are.”

So what changed?

“Just realizing what I had, what I don’t have. Honestly just looking at the wall in December and knowing I fucked off all of 2010,” said Arreola. “I had fun doing it but I really fucked it off. I won’t lie I had a great time.”

But it had to be more than just that. Perhaps it was the paychecks that once had five zeroes but now had only four. Or maybe it had to do with being the butt of endless fat jokes.

“Oh hell yeah. The zeroes always matter,” said Arreola. “Like, no offense to fighting on ESPN but I am not an ESPN fighter. I know I am not an ESPN fighter. At all. And then before, the comments made didn’t get to me. They’d say “fat dude” I’m like ‘yeah whatever.’ But now they get to me. Now I’m like ‘Hey, I may be fat but I am better than what I was.”

Or maybe turning 30?

“The age doesn’t really matter to me,” said Arreola. “It doesn’t matter. I feel young as shit. But it really is just realizing I don’t have that much time. So I might as well do it while I have it.”

Perhaps it was a shift back to being a dad. Chris has a nine year old daughter who he dotes on.

“You know what? Really honestly, it doesn’t have to do with the family life,” said Arreola. “It has to do with I really don’t give a fuck. Like if I have problems at my house, I’m at the gym, I don’t care. Whatever it is, whatever my problem is, it doesn’t matter because whether I am with somebody or not, I gotta make my money. So either you are going to be with me and we’re going to make money together or you are not going to be with me and I’m going to make and I’m going to have fuckin’ fun. Regardless, I am going to make money. Ain’t nobody going to stop me from making my money.”

Does letting go like that feel good?

“It’s feel great!” said Arreola. “It feels great to just be like You know what? Fuckit.’ No matter what kind of fight I get in at home or what kind of argument I get in with my mom, brother, sister, girlfriend, wife, whatever, it doesn’t matter. I’m at the gym. I have to take care of what I have to take care of.”

Whatever the case, Arreola is refocused, in great shape and ready in his mind and body to face anyone. Along the way, he has fixed a few technique issues and rediscovered what he does best in the ring. One major change Shileds brought about was making Chris pay more attention to being balanced. Before, he used to push his jab and reach with his right hand, leaving him unbalanced and out of position to land anything but an awkward one-two. Now, he has hit hips under him more, balancing him out and leaving him free to let his hands go in the kind of combinations that he used to throw from back in junior middle days to when he was a 230’s size heavyweight prospect.

“[Balance] is one of the things when I was working with him is balance and making sure I followed through with my punches,” said Arreola. “That is one thing I never really thought of is balancing and making sure that I am ready to throw the other punch. I deviated from it and forgot how to do all that stuff. After one training camp, I thought ‘You know what? I can do all that stuff over here. Why the hell am I doing all this shit over there when I know what to do and just do it right. Just take care of it here.”

A big part of the reason Arreola can throw combos is that he no longer has a weight on his back. The day I visited him he was 242 pounds wearing sweaty shorts and socks. His hands were fast, the combos flowed and no longer was he a onw-two, conserve your low energy fighter.

“Yeah and the thing is, I am not a two punch fighter. I like throwing more than one punch,” said Arreola. “But I wasn’t doing it for awhile. Now it’s back to being a combination fighter. It is back to pushing the pace on someone because if they fight at my pace, they can’t. They won’t hang at all. The thing is I have one gear and that’s come forward and just go. Period. There is no reverse. There is no staying in a regular gear and going, going, going, going. ”

In previous camps, Arreola would come in very overweight and spend camp losing weight. Now, after jumping right back into camp after the Abell fight, he started at a reasonable 252 and spent camp working on fight mechanics.

He never left the gym. In addition, he has curbed his normal eating habits.

“It’s like I was at the gym, I didn’t work hard but I’d go play basketball and I didn’t drink. I don’t drink as much as I used to,” said Arreola. “Fast food? No more. [I eat] shit that I cook or when I go to a restaurant I order what I know ain’t fucked up. I’d rather get a good steak or a good piece of chicken than a salad that fuckin’ has bacon and ranch . . .”

And as for those missed camp days?

“Not one day,” said Ramirez.  

So where can he go from here should he beat his opponent, the beatable Nagy Aguilera? Not so fast, says Arreola. First things first; win and win well.

“This is not a fight that should last long, either. Period,” said Arreola. “I don’t mean to disrespect anyone. I respect anyone who gets in that ring. But it is a fight I need to win and win convincingly.”

“I think we have a five to seven year run,” said Ramirez. “Look at how many heavyweights are fighting at 35. We’d love a shot at Wladmir [Klitschko] said Ramirez. “We have always felt we would have a better shot with Wladimir but there are still other fights’ a fight with David Haye or Tomasz Adamek after his fight with Vitali.”

Whomever he fights, Arreola acknowledges it cannot be another Nagy Aguilera or Joey Abell. The time to make a move in the division is now.

“Of course. I have to step up in class,” said Arreola. “I want to prove myself and I want to fight one of European fighters to show that us Americans, we are a force to reckoned with, at least speaking for myself. I need to show people that I am a fucking force to be reckoned with. My two losses were to European fighters. One of them, I should have never lost to Adamek. I can’t stand that shit. He got a title shot because I gave it to him.”

Arreola expressed an interest in fighting a European fighter in particular.

“Povetkin at least he fought Chambers and Bird. And Helenius beat up old Sam Peter,” said Arreola. “I don’t call nobody out but I would love to fight somebody like that. Somebody they say is one of their best Europeans. Either one of them or [Denis] Boytsov or whoever it is. As far as me and a title fight or who I am fighting next, it could be Haye or Wlad, it does not matter who it is. It could Haye, Wlad or Vitali. Any of them. It doesn’t matter who has a title. I want it. It’s mine. That’s the main thing.”

In the meantime, how long does Arreola think it will take for the criticism and fat jokes to die down?

“It will be my whole career from now,” said Arreola of the constant weight jokes and criticism over his work ethic. “It has to be. It is going to be a constant thing with me. And it is going to be a constant battle within me, too. I love food. I’m not going to lie. That’s my weakness. It’s not beer because I can stop drinking. I don’t give a fuck about beer. But food is just . . . that’s my vice. I love food. There ifs, ands, or buts about it. But then again, if I want to treat boxing the way I feel about boxing, I have to act the part and be the part of a champion. Be the part of an athlete. After I retire I can balloon and be like Ricky Hatton. Except for the drugs.”

For now, it is all about maintaining this healthy streak and winning. Consistency is key.

“I think the heavyweight division, it’d about to get exciting,” said Arreola.

Source http://www.secondsout.com/

'I'm dead serious. Are you?' says Miami-Dade mayoral candidate Luther Campbell

Barack Obama he’s not. But Miami-Dade’s Luther "Luke" Campbell of "Me So Horny" fame is as serious about running for county mayor as Obama was about running for president.

COMPILED FROM STAFF
AND WIRE REPORTS
Former 2 Live Crew front man Luther Campbell is best known outside of Miami-Dade County for raunchy rap albums, mostly in the 1980s and 1990s, that were among the first to boast parental advisory stickers, as well as R- and X-rated videos. His legal battles defended freedom of speech, including a U.S. Supreme Court victory that secured an artist’s right to parody others’ material.
But it’s not his "Uncle Luke" rap persona that’s running for mayor in Florida’s most-populous county: Campbell’s campaign is built on decades of community involvement, primarily in predominately Black Liberty City and surrounding areas. He insists it isn’t a publicity stunt or vanity campaign.
"I’m dead serious. Are you?" reads Campbell’s campaign flyers.

Fed up
He wants voters to see him as a fellow angry taxpayer fed up with Miami-Dade politics as usual – money disappearing from the county agencies; poor community policing; mismanagement at publicly-funded Jackson Memorial Hospital; hundreds of millions of taxpayer money spent on a new Florida Marlins baseball stadium; and a lack of jobs in impoverished neighborhoods.
He touts his business experience as a record company executive to back up his plans to boost the county’s economy. The most headline-grabbing plan involves strippers, but not in a "Me So Horny" sort of way – Campbell wants to impose a license fee to dance in strip clubs to raise revenue.
Record label mogul
Campbell says that his Luke Records was the first Black-owned hip-hop label, releasing music from 2 Live Crew, H-Town, Poison Clan, among others. He also helped launch Trick Daddy and Pitbull.
"Right now the entertainment industry is a major economic boost for this city," Campbell said in an interview with MTV News. "These are some of the things that I created and I did, and I’m proud of that.
"So when I look at where we need to go as a community, who best has the ideas? Me. Some other guy who really is just in there just to take money from contractors and special interest groups, he’s in there to make money.
"I’m not in there to make money. I’m all right. I just want to make the haves and the have-nots all be able to participate in this beautiful city and get jobs and live comfortable."
Large field
Campbell is one of 11 candidates running in the May 24 special election to replace Carlos Alvarez, who was recently ousted in a recall led by billionaire car dealer and former Philadelphia Eagles owner Norman Braman. Voters outraged over a property tax rate increase and a salary raise for county employees in a struggling economy made Miami-Dade the most populous area – with more than 2.5 million people – ever to recall a local official.
If no one gets a majority, the top two candidates will have a June runoff.
If elected, Campbell promises a model of government transparency. His life has been open for the world to see, including a 2008 VH1 reality show that featured some of his six children, preparations for his wedding and the porn videos he was selling at the time (he says that was a mistake).
Bigger issues
Despite building his legacy by producing sexually explicit songs, R-rated music videos that set the benchmark for hip-hop, and even porn production, there has been little discussion made of Campbell’s past in the campaign, particularly in Miami-Dade’s Black communities.
Some voters who were among dozen or so audience members at a town hall in a predominantly Black neighborhood see Campbell for the 50-year-old man he is, especially when he complains about the same issues that concern them – jobs, gas prices, improving education opportunities in poor neighborhoods and the fatal shootings of seven Black men by Miami police officers in less than one year.
Effective mentor
A 2010 McClatchy Newspapers news story wrote glowingly about Campbell’s coaching duties at Miami Central High.
"On the football field, Luther Campbell wears a whistle around his neck, not a tangle of gaudy gold chains," the story read. "He has a Miami Central High green visor on his head, not a bandanna do-rag. Instead of grabbing his crotch, he grabs the shoulder pad of a teenage linebacker to explain tackling technique.
"When he talks, the players are rapt listeners. ‘Use your brain!’ he shouts. ‘You’re seniors.’
"Campbell...is known as Coach Luke at Central, where he coaches linebackers, and in his home neighborhood of Liberty City, where he coaches boys in the Optimist league he founded.
"The former rap star, one-time leader of 2 Live Crew, celebrated and loathed for its sexually explicit lyrics, is now a mentor to inner city kids... He was seen on album covers and in videos leering with that gap-toothed grin at half-naked women on the beach, in hot tubs, at parties...Freaky, decadent times, Campbell recalls with a weary look in his eyes.
Gives advice
"Now he gathers his players around him in a huddle to talk football and dispense advice. Seventy percent of his players are being raised by a single mother or grandmother. Each one is the man of the house.
"‘I don’t tolerate cursing or the N-word,’ he said. ‘I tell them, ‘Don’t ever disrespect a girl because that makes you less than a man.’ And ‘Pick the girl who is responsible, not the one with Fs on her report card. Easy to get in, hard to get out. I’ve lived that life.’
"Football players got the same rep I got – you think your stuff don’t stink, you’re the arrogant, spoiled star. I tell them, ‘Be nice to your teachers. Sit in the front row. Keep your grades up.’ "
"It’s working. Players greet a sideline visitor with, "Hello, ma’am," or "How you doing today?" the story concluded.
Which context?
If voters consider Campbell’s rap career at all, it should be in the context of his legal battles defending 2 Live Crew’s First Amendment rights, says Gary Johnson, executive director of political research for the Transportation Workers Union Local 291.
"It goes back to the heart of the man who fights for what he believes in, and you have the characteristics of a leader when someone will fight. Would he do that for the people of Dade County? That’s why he’s running for mayor, because he’s willing to fight for the people," says Johnson, who remains undecided about who will get his vote.
A name
Local elections such as the Miami-Dade County mayor’s race often come down to name recognition, and voters may cross ethnic lines to vote for Campbell because they remember him standing up for First Amendment rights, says George Gonzalez, a political science professor at the University of Miami.
But, he asks, will that be enough to sway voters struggling with school cutbacks, joblessness and the real estate market collapse? "Here we are talking about Luther Campbell only because he was a rapper 20 years ago," Gonzalez says.
At one candidates’ forum, Campbell was asked what headline about his leadership of county government would be after 18 months in office. Campbell’s response: "He brought respect back to county government.’’
When asked how that answer would fly with people familiar with Campbell’s vulgar exploits, and he said Miami-Dade residents know he has changed.
"The people here locally, they know me as a community servant. They know me as a disciplinarian, versus people outside of this community," Campbell said. "They’ll tell you, ‘He don’t play about his community.’"
Jennifer Kay of the Associated Press and Linda Robertson of McClatchy Newspapers contributed to this story.
Source http://www.flcourier.com

Like Clinton, Bush Raking In Big Money On Speaking Circuit

Former president George W. Bush is earning big bucks making speeches, with a fee of between $100,000 and $150,000 per appearance.

According to iWatch News, Bush has raked in about $15 million on a speaking circuit since vacating the Oval Office, while maintaining a relatively low public profile.
Bush’s spokesman David Sherzer told iWatch that Bush has made about 140 paid speeches both in the US and abroad since his presidential term expired – almost all of which are closed to the press.
iWatch reported that when Bush declined an offer from President Barack Obama to appear at Ground Zero in New York following the killing of Osama bin Laden was killed, he was actually preparing to make three private speeches during that week. 
Bush’s predecessor, Bill Clinton, has also made a mint making speeches around the world.
According to CNN, Clinton amassed $65 million in speaking fees from 2001 to 2009. In 2009 alone, he took home $7.5 million from 36 speeches.
Last year Clinton addressed his speaking fees.
"I never had any money until I got out of the White House, you know, but I've done reasonably well since then," Clinton said at a forum in South Africa.
Scholars and presidential experts are troubled by the practice of ex-chief executives making money this way.
“I find it puzzling,” UCLA history professor Robert Dallek told iWatch. “[Bush] says he wants to keep a low profile. What is he doing except enriching himself? It sounds like it’s self-serving. It’s following the good old American adage to make as much as you can.”
Similarly, Julian Zelizer, Professor of History and Public Affairs at Princeton University told iWatch: “It’s one thing to stay out of the public realm, which George Bush has said he wants to do. But then he goes on the speaking circuit and makes enormous amounts of money giving lectures mostly to corporate groups and other select audiences. Some Americans can find this distasteful.”
Zelizer further stated: “We’re in an era where there are countless fears about money and politics. I think former presidents have to be careful about what they’re doing with their speeches. For some people it’s another version of the revolving door between Capitol Hill and K Street.”
 Source http://www.ibtimes.com/

Up close & personal with Founder of Gift and author Chandran Nair

IT is difficult to pin down who Chandran Nair is, or to put in specific terms what he does for a living. Although born and having spent his teenage years in Kuala Lumpur, he is an internationalist. He is at home here in Malaysia, at peace in some remote Tibetan village and is able to thrive in any cosmopolitian city in Europe.
Professionally, much of his work and interests seem to revolve around social developments as he is a great believer in contributing to society, yet he neither considers himself an environmentalist nor a socialist. He helped build water and sanitation systems in poorer parts of the world and trained young people to be leaders. He founded a social think-tank in Hong Kong to advance thought leadership and was at one time, chairman of one of Asia's largest environmental consultancy. For more than 30 years, Chandran lived abroad - first in Britain where he studied chemical engineering, then in South Africa where he volunteered in development work building water and sanitation systems and living on a stipend.

The former La Salle student was recently in Kuala Lumpur, and took the opportunity to talk about his book Consumptionomics: Asia's role in reshaping capitalism and saving the planet, published by John Wiley & Sons.
Consumptionomics is a political book. It is a call to abandon the goal of realising consumption-driven capitalism across Asia and replace it with the objective of having an environment that we can pass on to future generations - one with rainforests, biodiversity and adequate resources, both renewable and non-renewable.
Yet, it is not just a book about saving the environment, nor is it merely about economics. “It is a book about the catastrophes - some of which are already upon us, and many more lie ahead - if the world, and particularly Asia, continues on its current trajectory,” which he says is not sustainable.
Chandran has condensed the art and economics of living in just over 200 pages. In many ways, his book epitomises all 54 years of his life. Because he has taken the less-travelled path, his perspective on many issues differs from many.
The seventh of eight children, his parents, like many Malaysians who belong to the first generation of migrants, had very humble beginnings. All eight children lived in one room but all of them had an education.
After completing his Form Six, he took a bank loan to study chemical engineering in Britain. One of his teachers had suggested that. At that time, that was a new field. He had some intereset in natural sciences and conservation and Britain and this choice of study seemed logical to a teenager.
“How many of us really know what we want to do, as a teenager? I was interested to get an education and hopefully everything would be okay,” he recalls. Chandran did not come home for four years. He neither had money to call home, nor to have a cup of tea during breaks. He did everything and anything semi-legal to survive in Britain and every summer he did all kinds of work, from sweeping the streets of East London, to cleaning toilets.
“I realised later that I was a lousy engineer. It is our education system; you have very little choices. The majority of young people are cajoled into wanting to be a doctor, a lawyer or an engineer. Many of these noble professions have been hijacked. Today, when I speak to young people around the world, I tell them to follow their heart. I tell them that the best job in the world has not been created. And the pursuit of education is not equivalent to the pursuit of salary. Education is the pursuit of knowledge and to satisfy one's curiosity. They should think about learning, enjoying life, making contributions and having fun.”
After his masters, Chandran founded the Global Institute for Tomorrow (Gift), an independent social venture think-tank to advance thought leadership. He wanted to redefine leadership beyond what he calls the hubris or arrogance from the business school of the world and the books produced by corporate leaders today, he says.
The whole subject matter of leadership and education hinges on three dimensions knowledge, the ability to communicate and empathy.
Education, for him, is about instilling knowledge while reaching out to the world around you and embracing values like respect and cultural sensitivities.
“In Malaysia, we have the opportunity to leverage upon this diversity. Unfortunately, not enough of this is being done in our education system. In my view, Malaysia is one of the most unique places in the world in terms of having three great cultures of the world (Malay, Chinese and Indian) and with that comes the great religions of the world (Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism and Christianity). We should be creating the most vibrant society in the world.”
In late April, a week prior to our meeting in Kuala Lumpur, Chandran was in Gansu, China which borders Tibet. He was with ethnic minority groups the Muslims, Tibetan Buddhists, Chinese Han, Taoist and Confucious Chinese groups. As he travelled along a 100-km stretch where scores of villages lie on both sides, he noticed that there were mosques every 2 to 3 km while the non-Muslim Chinese reared pigs. Different beliefs, but all co-exist.
“What struck me about the mosques was they had Chinese architectural features. We in Malaysia, should be the symbol of a multi-cultural society. Instead, we still seek to divide rather than to unite. The Chinese here need to learn from the Chinese in China, the Indians to learn from the Indians who live among Muslims, the Malays to learn from the Muslims of China, who live harmoniously with the non-Muslims and who adopt Chinese architectural features in their places of worship.”
“But Malaysians have become too rich too quickly, and with their wealth, they have become intolerant. Our education reinforces separateness. All of us are culpable and too many Malaysians complain. How many of us complain but don't do anything. If you do and you fail, then you can complain. This is the weakness of the middle class to take, to thrive and then to find seclusion in their little suburbia, usually based on race and religion. It is too easy to blame the government, we are part of the government, we are the people.”
Chandran's views are a result of the years abroad. He has seen and gone through the mill. After seven years in Europe, he was very clear he had no interest to live there. At 28, he joined the anti-apartheid movement in South Africa, building sanitation and water systems by day on a stipend and playing the saxaphone in his free time in an African band.
“My parents were utterly dejected that I was not making money. I sat in the train for blacks and went to the theatre for blacks. Looking back, those were the most informative years of my life. I saw and learned a lot of things and I was outraged. Some called us terrorist sympathisers. I was on Nelson Mandela's side, so that is okay. Today, terrorist sympathesizers has a different meaning.”
These days, the best and brightest Asians aspire to go to the West. Chandran says he is not an Asian nationalist, but there is a need for people to expand and contribute to society.
“Making money is not difficult, making meaning is difficult and ultimately we have to make meaning of the life we have.”
His mantra: reach out with the hand of humanity. Be humble, watch the body language, live the moment and don't be scared.
Often times, he finds himself reminiscing about his young life in Malaysia to prove a point brought up in a Hindu home, devoted Sanskrit prayers at 7am to Lord Hannuman and Lord Ganesha, educated in a missionary school and said The Lord's Prayer yet, he feels no contradiction.
After school, he would walk pass the mosque and the imam would come and talk with him. When he sees men in long gowns with a beard, he does not see a terrorist. At the Chinese shops, he enjoys his char siew pau (pork dumpling). When he is in Istanbul, he makes sure he is staying in a hotel near the Blue Mosque.
“You cannot deny the spiritual soul within and the call to prayer. Hearing that call is communication and communion with history and the rejection of fear.”
“My parents were open minded. My mother would have classical Indian music at home and I would ask, what is that? What were we brought up with? The Beatles, Cliff Richard and John Wayne's movies, where the cowboys are the good guys and the ethnic American Indians, the bad ones. But who writes the history? Only the victors write the history.”
In the world of music, there is reggae from Jamaica and so many other forms of music. One is not intrinsically superior to another.
“There is a lot more out there but the media is not controlled by the Chinese, nor the Indonesians, nor the Jamaicans. But is there good music in Indonesia? You better believe me that there is. We need to de-Coca Colaise', de-McDonalise' our mind. We can be true internationalists then, so don't make your enemies mine.”
 Source http://biz.thestar.com.my

Rose Prince: Sheep, lullabies and tomoto sauce

When my husband told me last week that he had bought three sheep, I admit I rolled my eyes skywards. He has Marie Antoinette tendencies which rear themselves from time to time. I imagine livestock, baying at the gate on a Sunday morning, wanting attention while he sips his tea in bed. “Proper farmers get up early,” I tell him, “and they make money.”

I am unconvinced about the economics of hobby farming and suspicious that a little light livestock rearing only gives second home dwellers something to chat about at dinner parties. There’s also the oft heard complaint that the meat gets left uneaten in the bottom of the freezer, because the children refuse to eat darling 'Matilda’.

He left for Dorset on Tuesday to take the delivery. Our flock will live in a small orchard opposite our rented cottage. “Can't we get a nice fat government subsidy?” I ask hopefully. Nope – there’s no grant to be had, since the farmer who owns the land gets the grant. “They are rather ugly,” confesses Dominic, when he telephones that night. It turns out that far from having three adorable young lambs to fatten up, we have bought three spinster ewes for £65 each. Newly shorn, they look like septuagenarian bovver girls. These older sheep are known as 'hoggets’. We appoint a neighbour as shepherd, giving one sheep to her as a 'gift’.

My scepticism over the venture deepening, I do some sums, determined to crow. They are due to be killed this coming October. Our local butcher, Gary Moen, says that by then, there should be between 21 and 23 kilos of cuts on each sheep. Slaughter and butchery costs come to £40 per sheep bringing our costs to £315.

From the roasting joints, various chops, forequarter (middle neck and shoulder), plus breast (belly) and offal, we estimate that there are over 55 helpings of meat per carcase. Add to this a good twenty servings of rich broth made from the roasted bones - especially delicious since hogget have more flavour and bone calcification than a young lamb - and (less the gift to the shepherd) there are 150 helpings to be had from the ladies in the orchard, at a cost of £2.10 each. There should even be shepherd’s pie to make from leftovers. Looking at the equivalent retail value of the lamb cuts if bought over the counter (£225 per carcase), we are paying less than half. The self-appointed sheep baron is triumphant. “It’s just as I expected,” he says. I almost smile as I give him the bad news. The winter cold snap killed off every sprig of mint in the garden.
We should all put our children through the school of rock, says a new parenting book, The Genius of Natural Childhood. Childcare expert Sally Goddard Blythe devotes a section of her book to the importance of traditional lullabies, explaining that they not only lull a child to sleep, but that the stories in Rock-a-Bye-Baby and By Baby Bunting give an infant an early lesson in structure, order and how to exercise their imaginations. The slow rhythm of a lullaby is thought to be similar to the sensations a baby feels in the womb and the natural vibrations of 'live’ singing are more effective for getting a child to sleep than a recording.
Both parents should share lullaby duties, she says, and it does not matter if you can’t sing or even hum in tune. “Your baby or infant will not judge your musical abilities. As far as he/she is concerned, you are the expert,” she says.
I am sure this is true - but when that little babe becomes an adult, how the appeal of a softly sung tune by a parent wanes. Your children fall asleep to the noise of their favourite rapper and the sound of you singing in any context makes them hot with horrified embarrassment. Get a teenager to sleep? No lulling needed. To wake them, though, you have to resort to reverse lullabies. We call it shouting up the stairs.
Don’t we love watching the sisterhood slug it out? This week I revelled in Bette & Joan, Anton Burge’s new West End play about Bette Davis and Joan Crawford’s tetchy backstage relationship while the two filmed Whatever Happened to Baby Jane, the 1962 horror film in which they play sisters. Greta Scacchi is especially uncannily superb as Davis; her authentic, rasping voice gets the finest of the bitchy lines in the play. Best of her taunts on Crawford, a woman she regarded as a 'movie star’ rather than an actress, was to drink coca cola on set. Crawford had just been widowed, by the creator of Pepsi cola. The children of both women wrote books about them, castigating their behaviour. In the end, it was one-all.
Lycopene is the wonder nutrient in tomatoes now believed to as good as statins for reducing cholesterol – it is also thought to help prevent cancer. The experts from the University of Adelaide who carried out the study advise it is best absorbed by eating cooked tomatoes, recommending tomato paste and readymade pizza or pasta sauces - astonishing, when such convenience foods often contain unhealthy levels of salt. But try this homemade sweet tomato sauce, which my family love: 1 kg fresh tomatoes cooked with 150ml virgin olive oil; three cans of chopped tomatoes; 4 garlic cloves and 3 sprigs of basil. Simmer for half an hour and then liquidise until smooth. It is quite unnecessary to sugar the pill.
Source http://www.telegraph.co.uk/

Sprucing up your new home

Be patient and wait: Like your house, the yard needs to settle first before you landscape

 

You've just moved into a new home and want to start turning the front yard from mud to a landscaped paradise. Don't do it, cautions Trevor Cullen, co-owner of Cullen Landscaping, which has been designing interlocking pathways and raised flower beds for Ottawa homes since 1999.
You'd think an entrepreneurial landscaper would be encouraging garden makeovers, but it's a bad idea to move too quickly, says the 31-year-old, who works with his father and company founder, Peter Cullen, overseeing crews that carry out 150 jobs a summer.
Soil settles and there are always problems with interlocking pathways shifting and dropping down if you move too quickly, Cullen says. "Usually people wait two to five years before landscaping after moving into a new home. The minimum wait is one year."
The problem is air in the soil that is used to build up levels close to a home after construction is finished. It takes one freeze and thaw session for the soil to compact and be stable to handle a walk or interlocking laneway.
Cullen has seen soil compact so much that it drops 20 to 30 centimetres, which plays havoc with steps leading down from a concrete porch pad. The porch pad is connected to the house so it won't drop; the steps, of course, are not attached and can drop, creating a hazard that can trip people up. and it also costs money to rip up and repair a heaving walkway or raised flower bed, he says.
Cullen Landscaping (cullenlandscaping.ca) will provide a design and shopping list for $199 to $299 to help avoid common landscape mistakes for those who want to save money and invest sweat equity.
Proper construction with enough excavation and a deep layer of granular gravel are key, Cullen says, adding material membranes, not plastic, aid in drainage and help make the transition between the gravel and underlying soil of Leda clay.
It's also vital to slope the soil away from the house when planning beds for flowers and shrubs, otherwise water will gather around the home's foundation, leading to possible flooding in the basement.
Gardeners should also pause before plunking new plants into the ground.
First prepare the soil, possibly cooperating with neighbours to invest in a load of soil. "It doesn't make sense to buy bags of soil for a new garden," he says.
You need enough nutrient-rich soil to mix with the Leda clay or soil left behind by the builder. "Plants will survive for a few years with a few inches of soil, feeding off the nutrients, but then they will fade as the root system looks for nutrients."
New beds should be dug down a minimum of 15 to 20 cm, with 25 cm of good soil mounded up.
The next step is to plan your selection of plants, starting with trees that suit the size of the lot. The worst possible choice would be willow trees because they suck up moisture and their root systems are invasive, damaging weeping tiles and playing havoc with foundations.
"They are evil," says Cullen, who also warns people away from putting maples too close to a house because they are way too big.
Instead, he prefers the Japanese Ivory Silk Lilac tree or the Canadian Serviceberry, which usually grow to a height of 4.5 metres (15 feet). You can also visit the City of Ott awa's website for their list of recommended of trees (ottawa.ca).
Source http://www.ottawacitizen.com/

Make an appointment for the emergency room

The Tenet hospitals, seeking to make money through their potentially profitable ERs, are betting that patients will prefer to rest at home instead of waiting in their crowded lobbies, filled with sick people and emotional family members. Emergency room wait times have become a point of contention, or pride, with hospitals using their websites, text messages and billboards on Interstate 95 and others throughout the state to display, in real time, how many minutes patients must wait.
Susan Flanagan, of Boca Raton, recently made an emergency room reservation at West Boca Medical Center, a participating hospital, when she had severe abdominal pain.
"There is nothing worse than sitting and being miserable in an ER for hours," said Flanagan, 50, a production manager for a catalog company. "When I got there, they knew what was wrong with me and I was in a bed in five minutes."
Surveys have shown that the average wait time in an American emergency room is four hours. Some South Florida hospitals appear to get their patients in quicker. The wait time at Delray Medical Center last week was 16 minutes; at North Shore Medical Center in Fort Lauderdale, it was nine minutes, according to the hospitals' websites.
The system has safeguards that officials say will ensure that a patient with a serious emergency, such as a heart attack, does not have to wait for an appointment. Patients enter their symptoms into the website, which forwards the information to nurses and paramedics at the emergency room front desks.
"We would call them on the phone and say, 'Tell me more about your pain,' " said Margaret Neddo, West Boca Medical Center's emergency room director. "If they have a history of aneurysms, we would say, 'Come in now.'"
Still, some doctors say the system could make some patients who want a reservation delay treatment when there's a true emergency.
Dr. Ryan Stanton, spokesman for the American College of Emergency Physicians, said he has seen many patients try to "sleep off" a stroke or a heart attack, and says they may do the same if they go online and see they can't make a reservation for a few hours.
"It needs to come with a lot of teaching about what an emergency is," said Stanton, an emergency room physician in Lexington, Ky. "With a heart attack, every minute you delay at home is another minute you lose heart muscle and can have permanent damage."
A 2009 General Accounting Office study found it was taking 37 minutes to see emergency room patients who had conditions that required care within 14 minutes. The reasons are complex, said Dr. Andrew Bern, attending emergency physician at Delray Medical Center, and include a shortage of beds for psychiatric patients; the closing of nearby hospitals in recent years, which has increased visits to remaining emergency rooms; and an insufficient number of beds for ER patients who need to be admitted to the hospital.
Only about 8 percent of emergency room visits are non-urgent, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The primary reasons for going to the ER: chest pain and abdominal pain. Emergency rooms are most crowded on weekends and at night, when doctors' offices are closed, according to ACEP.

Chris Song, marketing director for InQuickER, based in Nashville, said company founders noticed overcrowded emergency rooms were inefficient, with personnel communicating poorly and having trouble managing patient surges. The company started in 2006 and now has 37 participating hospitals, with 95 percent of registrants seen within 15 minutes, he said.
Flanagan said she sent her information to West Boca at 9 a.m. and got a 9:30 a.m. appointment, which the hospital changed to 11 a.m. Her diagnosis: a gall bladder stone and other complications, which landed her in the hospital for a week.
"When I got there, they knew my name, they had my paperwork and they were ready for me," Flanagan said. "The only downside is you have to pay 10 bucks."
Source http://www.sun-sentinel.com/

Far from home

LEBANESE businessmen in west Africa like to tell how in the 19th century their forefathers arrived by accident, disembarking from ships en route to South America. Making money there is no easy feat and few would come by choice, they say. The sweltering corner of the continent is marked by instability—most recently in Côte d’Ivoire—feeble infrastructure and rampant corruption.
But 250,000-odd Lebanese who live there—the largest non-African group in the region—are faring well. Since a second influx during the Lebanese civil war, their interests have expanded beyond small trading outlets. Today many oversee vast business empires involved in construction, telecommunications and industry which dominate import-export. Some have sidelines in diamond smuggling too.
Ezzad Eid, a businessman and community leader in Liberia, home to around 4,000 Lebanese, sits in his glassy office in Monrovia sipping Rim water, one of many imports from his home country. His businesses—which include a chain of hardware stores, an aluminium factory and a plush hotel—turn over millions of dollars a year in a country where the government's annual budget is just $369m. Mr Ezzad claims that 60% of Liberia's economy is in Lebanese hands. His boast is probably too high—no accurate figures are available—but it certainly a sizeable chunk.
Those in business say several factors have helped them to succeed. Most crucial are trade networks among the Lebanese diaspora and beyond, says Abdallah Shehny whose office-equipment business spans Sierra Leone, Liberia and Dubai. Contacts in countries Brazil to China—little trade is done with other African countries due to costs of overcoming poor infrastructure—are important for trade. But they also act as substitutes for the lack of local services such as access to finance. Family workers bring down costs.
Thousands Lebanese fled Liberia's long civil war; those who stayed found plenty of opportunities for reconstruction. Many educated and well-off Liberians also left. But competition from businessmen from India and China is now growing.
Flexible responses to the changing political and economical situation has been key to the diaspora's success, according to Mara Leichtman, an American academic who studies the Lebanese in Senegal.
Easy relations with the political elites and the money to pay bribes also help. Liberia's Lebanese are unable to buy property and are banned from 26 industries, but simultaneous patronage by officials is common. "I budget for bribes," admits a Lebanese restaurateur. "Anyone wanting to do business here does."
Widely visible success has fuelled local resentment. Protests over pay and job conditions in Lebanese-run companies occur. "The Lebanese mainly trade, sending money out of the country rather than investing," grumbles Sam Mitchell, the head of the Liberian Business Association. Others accuse the community of leaving little room for local businesses and collaborating to drive them out of the market.
New Lebanese immigrants are unlikely to be deterred. Business is booming. As one businessman puts it: "Anywhere is easier to make money than Lebanon."
Source http://www.economist.com/

Make Money Online Secrets Revealed

There is no doubt that internet is vast enough to accommodate everyone who dreams of making money. But a survey states that only 5% of online entrepreneurs take 95% of the profits, and the rest always fail despite hard work.

The main reason why people are not able to earn according to the work they do is because they lack knowledge. For instance, knowledge of the wrong strategies hinders business owners from becoming competent authority in their online business. 995Wealth.info is a report oriented marketing website that caters to information and resources about making money online, directing readers to websites and reports. The website also caters aspects such as secrets to online marketing, loophole, resources, making money online and just everything about internet marketing. 995wealth.info’s Volume 1 Report was a complete aid to individuals who wanted to acquire internet wealth.
A brainchild of Singapore-based Internet marketer Jerry Navarro, 995Wealth.info is home to Volume 1 of a collection of eight modules that work as home business, Internet marketing and make money online resources, tackling each topic intensively.
Mr. Navarro said that the report was not directed to any specific class of people, it was beneficial to all those who wanted to make money online, regardless of education, race, religion and age. Information present in the Report would help not only the job seekers, but also students, stay-at-home mums, part-time job seeker, retirees and make money online opportunity seekers.
The Report also teaches people how to raise funds online for whatever projects they can think of. It is basically a list of all the best tricks and trade secrets one would need to know to run his business online. The report also directs online entrepreneurs to a website where they can get a free report about setting-up a United States bank account for non-residents.
Source http://www.trcbnews.com/

Apple, Foxconn investigating factory explosion iPad

After a major fire at the production lines of factories iPad 2 Foxconn in Chengdu, China, Apple has spoken out about the incident and said working with contract manufacturers in Taiwan to find understand the cause.

 At least two people died and 16 people injured in explosion at Foxconn's factory in Chengdu. According to information, the explosion in the production line 2 of the Apple iPad.
 "We are really sorry for the disaster at the Foxconn plant, and from his heart, we would like to share with their families, " Apple shares journal All Things D. "We are coordinating closely with Foxconn to find out the cause of this terrible explosion. "

The victims in the explosion at the factory Foxconn being cared for in hospital.

Apple declined to comment on the impact of the production line for its business plan.

New York Website Marketing Firm Discusses the Marriage Between SEO and Usability

Website design, development and Internet marketing expert says that a delicate balance of usability and search engine optimization is required for successful website development.

Online PR News – 19-May-2011 –“When a small business wants to drive traffic to its website, there are quite a few factors that need to be considered, but the usability of the website and search engine optimization need to work hand-in-hand,” says Peter Crisafi, Vice President of dzine it, Inc., a leading New York website design and website development with clients throughout the United States. “An easy-to-use website is incredibly important, but website owners also need to consider that search engine optimization tools, like the proper use of keywords, are important too.”

According to Crisafi, many website designers that don’t typically work in search engine optimization (SEO) or aren’t skilled in SEO techniques often remove keywords from websites in an attempt to make them more user-friendly. In doing so, he warns, they are actually doing quite the opposite.

"When users click on a link to your website from a search engine results page based on the keywords that they typed, they often expect to see those keywords on the page,” Crisafi says. “As a result, it is important that the web page content appears at least somewhat focused on those very keywords. If it does not, the user is more likely to abandon the web page."

As a small business website owner, if you are lacking the targeted traffic you were hoping for or have lost targeted traffic that you once drew, there is most definitely a problem with your website, Crisafi says. If your website was recently redesigned, there is a strong possibility that the design company you hired is the culprit.

“Sometimes, a decline in traffic results from the removal of important keywords and other elements during a website redesign,” says Crisafi. “Without those key terms, a website will be much more difficult to find.”

A recent study found that a majority of companies with an Internet presence do not understand search engine optimization and more than half said that keyword stuffing is an effective strategy.

“Keyword stuffing is a great big no-no,” Crisafi concluded. “If you don’t understand proper search engine optimization techniques, it is important that you consider hiring a reputable Internet marketing firm that practices only white hat, organic SEO techniques.”

Established in 2003, dzine it, inc. is a leader in Custom web development, programming and design solutions for small and large business, agencies. The company offers a wide range of business-centered visual communication solutions, including web-based content management, web design, graphic design, custom web software applications, ethical white hat search engine optimization (Organic SEO), Video Encoding, and print media solutions. For more information, call 718.336.2660 or visit www.dzineit.net.

Source http://www.onlineprnews.com/