Federal and Foundation Assistance Monitor: Home Depot Starts ...

Federal & Foundation Assistance Monitor : Home Depot Starts Community Impact Grants Program

Foundation: Home Depot Foundation, the giving arm of the home improvement company; Opportunity: Community Impact Grants Program; Funding Focus: Housing, communities; Geographic Focus: National; Eligibility: 501(C)(3) nonprofits, public schools and public service agencies that are using the power of ...??

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Facebook buying photo-share app Instagram for $1B

Instagram is demonstrated on an iPhone Monday, April 9, 2012, in New York. Facebook is spending $1 billion to buy the photo-sharing company Instagram in the social network's largest acquisition ever. Instagram lets people apply filters to photos they snap with their mobile devices and share them with friends and strangers. (AP Photo/Karly Domb Sadof)

Instagram is demonstrated on an iPhone Monday, April 9, 2012, in New York. Facebook is spending $1 billion to buy the photo-sharing company Instagram in the social network's largest acquisition ever. Instagram lets people apply filters to photos they snap with their mobile devices and share them with friends and strangers. (AP Photo/Karly Domb Sadof)

An Instagram photo is shared with Facebook on an iPhone Monday, April 9, 2012, in New York. Facebook is spending $1 billion to buy the photo-sharing company Instagram in the social network's largest acquisition ever. Instagram lets people apply filters to photos they snap with their mobile devices and share them with friends and strangers. (AP Photo/Karly Domb Sadof)

Instagram is used on an iPhone Monday, April 9, 2012, in New York. Facebook is spending $1 billion to buy the photo-sharing company Instagram in the social network's largest acquisition ever. Instagram lets people apply filters to photos they snap with their mobile devices and share them with friends and strangers. (AP Photo/Karly Domb Sadof)

(AP) ? Facebook is spending $1 billion to buy the photo-sharing company Instagram in the social network's largest acquisition ever.

On the surface, that's a huge sum for a tiny startup that has a handful of employees and no way to make money.

But the lack of a business model rarely dampens excitement about hot tech upshots these days. As Facebook has shown, itself without ads or revenue in its early days, money goes where the users are.

Instagram lets people share photos they snap with their mobile devices. The app has filters that can make photos look as if they've been taken in the 1970s or on Polaroid cameras. Its users take photos of everything from their breakfast egg sandwiches to sunsets to the smiling faces of their girlfriends.

In a little more than a year, Instagram attracted a loyal and loving user base of more than 30 million people. Apple picked it as the iPhone App of the Year in 2011.

Instagram's fans, brand recognition and its potential are difficult to put a price tag on. Yet Facebook has ? and can afford it. The company is preparing for an initial public offering of stock that could value it at as much as $100 billion in a few weeks. What's $1 billion? A drop in the bucket, really.

"Facebook after this IPO is going to be in a position to be predatory. They can make sure no one steps in their way and buy anyone who gets in their way," said Wedbush analyst Michael Pachter, who follows social media.

Buying Instagram, he added, not only eliminates a rival but gives Facebook the technology "that is gaining crazy traction."

Facebook is paying cash and stock for San Francisco-based Instagram and hiring its dozen or so employees. The deal is expected to close by the end of June.

It's a windfall not just for Instagram's employees, but the venture capital firms backing the company. Last week, Sequoia Capital led an investment round that valued Instagram at $500 million, according to a person familiar with the matter. The person was not authorized to speak publicly and spoke on the condition of anonymity.

Going by the $1 billion price tag, Facebook is paying about $33 for each Instagram user. That's a fraction of the $118 that Facebook investors will be paying per Facebook user if the company gets its expected $100 billion valuation after going public. By that math, Pachter said, $1 billon "doesn't sound crazy."

Getting Instagram is a big win for Facebook as it works to harness people's growing obsession with their mobile devices and sharing every moment of their life. The company's own mobile application is not as easy to use as Instagram, and sharing photos can be downright clunky. Facebook's way, noted Pachter, has always been to buy technology if it's better than what it can build on its own.

Facebook, which is based in Menlo Park, Calif., said it plans to keep Instagram running independently. That's a departure from its tendency to buy small startups and integrate the technology ? or shut them down altogether just so it can hire talented engineers and developers.

"This is an important milestone for Facebook because it's the first time we've ever acquired a product and company with so many users," CEO Mark Zuckerberg wrote on his Facebook page Monday announcing the deal. "We don't plan on doing many more of these, if any at all."

He said Facebook plans to keep allowing people to post from Instagram to other social networks. Users will also be able to keep their Instagrams off of Facebook if they want to.

"We think the fact that Instagram is connected to other services beyond Facebook is an important part of the experience," Zuckerberg said.

Tech bloggers and analysts immediately began wondering whether Facebook's commitment will be eternal.

"There's a long history of companies acquiring other companies and saying that they are going to continue to support the service ? and then not," said Debra Aho Williamson, an analyst with research firm eMarketer.

One relatively recent example is Cisco Systems Inc., which killed off the much-loved Flip video camera less than two years after buying the company behind it.

There were some mutterings online about users leaving Instagram now that Facebook has bought it, though in reality Facebook will probably make it more popular.

There's a good reason for Facebook to keep Instagram going as a separate product, even if Facebook integrates some of its technology into its own service so that mobile photo sharing becomes easier. Google, for example, has kept YouTube separate even as it integrated some of its features into other products.

"Look at who Facebook is competing with ? the Googles, Apples, Microsofts of the world. They have to build a strong brand and strong consumer platform," Gartner analyst Brian Blau said. "Having a separate social network ... is something they needed to do a long time ago."

Associated Press

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Efficient and Affordable Business Communications

VoIP, or voice over IP (internet protocol) is an emerging technology that allows for voice communications, text messaging, and fax communications over an internet broadband connection. VoIP providers are able to offer these services to small and medium-sized businesses by taking advantage of cloud storage. They offer small and medium businesses voice, voicemail, fax, email, and web conferencing, all at a great savings on their phone bills. VoIP works with both PC networks and Linux.

VoIP providers offer several significant advantages over traditional phone wire systems. A major advantage is the lower cost with free local and national calls. Also, multiple phone calls can be transmitted via one broadband connection. Cloud storage represents simplicity in setup without complex networking infrastructure and on-site hardware and equipment that needs to be bought and periodically upgraded. Number portability means businesses can keep the same phone numbers even they move or upgrade. You can also access your network from any location. Finally, VoIP is flexible and scalable to grow and accommodate itself to meet your changing needs.

Instead of the business having a physical PBX or private branch exchange using circuited phone lines, which required staff on site to maintain, VoIP providers rather than small-to-medium businesses themselves, can now host a PBX system and route all your calls for you without having to install and store a complex array of equipment at your place of business. You don?t have to purchase all the hardware and pay a team to keep it running.

As businesses add more staff, VoIP providers can quickly and efficiently add in more extensions, and your team never needs to wait first for a technician to arrive and install any wiring first. The technology behind VoIP connections has improved such that you can now expect even better call quality with VoIP than previously with traditional phone lines. With VoIP, you?re up and running fast. With fast setup, portability of your existing phone numbers, scalability, minimal office space required, low costs in hardware, software, and technical know-how, with worldwide connections and low-cost communication, all supported with encrypted communications for security, it makes sense for small and medium-sized businesses to take advantage of reliable and low-cost VoIP.

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Self Improvement: The Early American Ideal | putnexusarticles.net

Author: Jonathan Gordon

Self Improvement is among the most widely read genres in bookstores. Therapists, clinicians, physicians, psychologist and psychiatrists make careers out of self-improvement by helping people improve their health and mind. Career counselors and financial planners help people improve their place in the world. There is something uniquely American about Self Improvement tips that transmits into the American Mindpower and has been passed on for generations.

It is widely considered that America?s self-improvement fixation started with Puritans and continued in wide form with Benjamin Franklin. The Puritan religious philosophy dominated American cultural ideology from colonization and into the early settling of the United States. The Puritans prized self-improvement as a connection with God and a constant goal to aspire to as a means to reach God and another world.

The Puritans believed in a core principal at the beginning of all their labors: work hard. The simple lesson and sticking to it served them well in laying the early roots for America and building early America into hard-working and industrious society by Mind Power.

One of America?s founding fathers, Benjamin Franklin is remembered in anecdotal stories for his efforts to save money, improve his handwriting and garner knowledge. He had a voracious appetite for knowledge and learning. He helped foster the notion in America of the self- made man or the person who becomes wealthy, successful and powerful by the means of self- improvement. Constant learning and repetition were the ways Franklin espoused. Key roots and approaches of self-improvement and mind growth can be understood through what might be the primitive processes utilized by Franklin and early Americans. Franklin is reported to have used a variety of techniques to improve his life by art of using mind power.

? Studying others: One of the best ways to learn is to learn from others. Whether it is reading similar or different works for writing style or learning their approaches, trying successful techniques used by others is a key method. Eventually, a person can find ways to improve the works of those before them, thus putting their own creative spin on a piece, which can help them later create their own work. These techniques have been used for centuries by writers, artists, musicians and craftsman and even Benjamin Franklin.

? Learning and sharing: The best ways to learn is to reach a competency where a person can talk about the knowledge learned. Franklin is said to have enjoyed learning and talking about what he learned with others to help reinforce and build on his knowledge.

Sometimes looking back at earlier techniques for self-improvement can yield new results and a new understanding for how self-improvement has evolved through the cent.

Article Source: http://www.articlesbase.com/self-help-articles/self-improvement-the-early-ame...

About the Author

MindCafe is a blog about mind power dedicated to offering you with news, discoveries and advice regarding Self Improvement tips, art of using mind power, Mind Power, Self Improvement, Mindpowerand tips on how to maximize your subconscious mind power to revolutionize your life. The prospects available to individuals when they recognize and exploit the powers of their mind are unlimited. In addition, individuals are neurologically wired for success and in discovering and fulfilling their potential, they contribute to the whole of humanity. MindCafe teaches you the art of using mind power for being healthy, wealthy and wise.

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Mood Drug Can Both Cause and Relieve Anxiety

If you have ever jumped at a loud noise and felt an adrenaline rush, you have experienced the effects of corticotropin-releasing hormone (CRH). In the body, this hormone triggers the familiar fight-or-flight response?racing heart, shortness of breath, sweaty palms. In the brain, however, it acts as a chemical messenger, playing a role in anxiety and depression. That role, a new study suggests, is more complex than anyone expected.

Because animal research from the past decade found that CRH contributes to anxiety and depression, drugs were developed that would block its actions in the brain. Clinical trials of these anti?anxiety and antidepressant drugs in human patients, however, have been disappointing. The new study, published last September in Science, shows why. Jan M. Deussing, a molecular biologist at the Max Planck Institute of Psychiatry in Munich, and his colleagues genetically altered mice so that some of their brain cells would be unable to detect the presence of CRH because they lacked the proper receptors. When the receptors were missing from neurons that produce the neurotransmitter glutamate, the mice displayed less anxiety, as expected. Yet when the receptors were missing from neurons that produce dopamine, the mice became more anxious.

These two different neuron types, when interacting with CRH, ?have exactly opposite effects in terms of anxiety-related behavior,? Deussing says. Be?cause the unsuccessful drugs limited the amount of the hormone available to all types of neurons, they ended up blocking its actions at neurons that both produce and prevent anxiety. The finding reaf?firms scientists? growing understanding that mood disorders do not result from a simple chemical imbalance?too much or too little of one neurotransmitter?but rather from subtle changes in many systems in the brain. ?The network is much more complex than we thought before,? Deussing says.

This article was published in print as "Double-Edged Hormone."


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Britney Spears Nears 'X Factor' Deal

Pop star would reportedly bank $15 million to join judges' panel on Simon Cowell's reality competition.
By John Mitchell


Britney Spears
Photo: Ethan Miller/ Getty Images

Britney Spears is closer than ever to joining "The X Factor" team.

News first broke in early March that the pop star was in negotiations to join the judges' panel on Fox's reality singing competition, and just as speculation seemed to be dying down, Deadline reports that Spears' team and show producers have reached agreements on several key contract details, including the star's salary.

It was reported that Spears was being offered $10 million for a season of the show, but the latest news is that her offer is actually closer to $15 million, which is $3 million more than Jennifer Lopez earns as a judge on "American Idol."

Several stars — from Janet Jackson and Mariah Carey to, at one time, the late Whitney Houston — have reportedly been discussed as possible replacements for Nicole Scherzinger and Paula Abdul, though no deals have been announced. The buzz surrounding Spears seems to be the most reliable, as sources close to the show report that her fiancé and former agent Jason Trawick is actively negotiating the deal.

Cowell reportedly reached out to Spears personally to gauge her interest in joining the show and has been singing her praises publicly, saying in a March conference call with reporters that he is "fascinated" by Spears and believes work on "The X Factor" will be easy for the hardworking singer.

"This girl has resilience. I would think that if she's managed to sustain a family, a career, which is tough, ["X Factor" would be] a walk in the park," Cowell said. "I would be fascinated to hear what she has to say. She's still hot, she's still having hit records and she's still controversial. There's a reason for that."

A point of conflict has reportedly been Cowell's insistence that Spears sign a two-year contract with the show, while she wants the option of opting out after just one season if she feels the gig is not a good fit. Whether Trawick and Cowell were able to reach an agreement on the issue has not been made public.

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Philadelphia Dentist Stresses Importance Of Oral Cancer ...

By John McDevitt

PHILADELPHIA (CBS) - It?s National Oral Cancer prevention month. As the number of cases in this country continue to climb, a local dentist stresses the importance of screening for the disease.

?Early prevention is what helps in preventing people unfortunately dying from this disease,? Dr. Leonard Tau with the Pennsylvania Center for? Dental Excellence in Northeast Philadelphia says.

drtau Philadelphia Dentist Stresses Importance Of Oral Cancer Screenings?A hundred new cases are diagnosed each day and one person passes away from oral cancer of every hour of every day. Studies show that 40,000 cases are expected in 2012. But when found early, there is an 80 to 90 percent survival rate.?

Dr. Tau says the non-invasive screening is $35 and he recommends regular oral cancer checks at least once a year, especially for those at high risk like people with a history of tobacco and alcohol use.

For screenings, he uses a wand like instrument called The Identafi 3000. A multi spectrum device that uses three different wavelengths of light to detect any abnormality.

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Why Health Insurance Isn't Broccoli, It's Mega Millions | Health ...

At the same time as millions of people raced to buy Mega Millions tickets in the hopes of striking it big last week, the Supreme Court was taking a gamble with the lives of millions of Americans in their deliberation over the constitutionality of the individual mandate that is the cornerstone of Obama?s signature health reform law.

The coincidence of the health reform hearings happening at the same time as the biggest mega millions pot in history got me thinking about the ways that health insurance more closely resembles the lottery than broccoli as Justice Scalia suggested in one of the hearings.

The central debate over the constitutionality of the so-called individual mandate concerns whether Congress, under its constitutional power to regulate interstate commerce, may compel individuals into engaging in commerce by buying health insurance.

First of all, the term ?individual mandate? is a misnomer and trope that has been trotted out by conservative opponents of the reform. The individual mandate is not a mandate at all. Individuals are more than welcome not to purchase insurance. They will simply be asked to pay a fine if they do not (and a rather too small fine by many accounts). Auto insurance works in a similar way.? Failure to have car insurance can result in stiff penalties, even imprisonment, and for the most part people comply with this ?mandate? without too much complaint.

On to why health insurance is more like the lottery than broccoli.? The case against the individual mandate rests on demonstrating that health insurance is a ?product? that people are being coerced into buying. Conservative Justice Scalia posed this as a slippery slope- if the government can force you to buy health insurance, what?s next? ?The response to this argument made by more liberal justices is rather weak ? the idea that health care is something we all pay for eventually so it is not a product. And yet other items, like food and potable water, are things we need to live and use eventually, and they are in fact products, not unlike broccoli.

Like the lottery, the more people contribute, the bigger the pot of money that can be distributed. Unlike the lottery, here the money is not distributed to one person, but to all who eventually need the system.

Health insurance is more like a lottery where everyone gets a winning ticket, because the more people that contribute, the lower the cost of premiums for everyone else, including yourself. Healthy people not paying into the system have made health insurance more expensive for everyone paying into the system. Not buying health insurance is also a bit like playing the lottery with your life and financial future, because you gamble on not needing to use it.

As the lottery jingle goes, ?you can?t win if don?t play?. In other words, you can?t get reimbursed if you don?t contribute. The lottery is also a means of the government to raise revenue to pay for public services, so although this is not usually what people have in mind when they play, the revenue from ticket sales not disbursed in prizes goes towards the public as a whole.

Thus what the conservative and liberal justices were arguing over was not so much whether or not insurance is a product, but whether it is a special kind of product, one that economists often refer to as merit goods. Merit goods are goods that that individual or society should have on the basis of some concept of need, rather than ability and willingness to pay. These goods are different because they have intrinsic value. Under these conditions, market forces fail to optimally provide these goods. In these instances of market failure, government intervention is generally deemed appropriate even by staunch free market advocates.

In sum, think of insurance like a social lottery where we all contribute and we all get back. We never know exactly when we will need it, but eventually we will and then we?ll be glad we had it.

P.S. This is how people in other advanced industrial countries have thinking about it for decades.

Ashley Fox is an Assistant Professor at the Mount Sinai School of Medicine, Department of Health Evidence and Policy.

Health Justice CT provides a public forum for conversations, ideas and collective action. The opinion expressed on this site are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of HealthJusticeCT or our funder.

Image credit by vvvracer?s under creative common license

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