PATERSON, N.J. -- Paterson officials are upset a former mayor received nearly $74,000 in severance pay when he left office in 2010.
Former Mayor Jose "Joey" Torres tells The Record (http://bit.ly/19z8jcB ) newspaper senior staff members provided the necessary special waivers to cash in on unused vacation and sick time.
Torres says he accrued the time during his eight years as mayor and 12 as councilman. He says the "demands of the job were so great," he couldn't find time for vacations.
Councilman William McKoy tells the newspaper Torres should have sought approval from the City Council.
City officials have not yet provided documents showing how many days Torres was paid for.
Philadelphia Eagles wide receiver Riley Cooper will not face supplementary discipline from the NFL in the wake of racist comments that were caught on camera.
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According to ProFootballTalk.com, NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell told ESPN's Mike Greenberg and Mike Golic that the league will not take extra disciplinary action against Cooper.
"We will not be taking action separately from the club," Goodell told Mike and Mike.
Deadspin originally posted cell phone video of Cooper (WARNING: video contains strong language), who is going into his 4th season with the Eagles, using a derogatory term about black people during a rant at a concert.
Cooper apologized on Wednesday after the video came out and said that the team had already fined him. He also issued a lengthy apology on Twitter.
I am so ashamed and disgusted with myself. I want to apologize. I have been offensive. I have apologized to my coach, Jeffrey Lurie, and
? Riley Cooper (@RileyCooper_14) July 31, 2013
Howie roseman and to my teammates. I owe an apology to the fans and to this community. I am so ashamed, but there are no excuses. What I did
It?s official: Australia isn?t the ?lucky country? in the IT sector. Consumers, government and industry down under are charged typically 50% more for software and hardware compared to their American counterparts.
Why is this the case and, more importantly, what can affected customers do about it?
On Monday, after a year-long investigation, the House of Representatives Standing Committee on Infrastructure and Communication finally reported on the state of IT pricing in Australia.
Microsoft products are typically 66% more expensive and Adobe products typically 42% more expensive than in the USA.
Even hardware is more expensive, with a typical markup of 46% above American prices.
Don Hankins
In March this year, the Australian House of Representatives committee took the unusual step of summoning representatives from Apple, Microsoft, and Adobe to explain these huge price differences.
Their explanations were quite weak, to say the least. Apple blamed local copyright holders, and Microsoft said prices were set and consumers could vote with their wallets and search for the best price where ever they could find it.
International trade
We have a free trade agreement with the US, established in 2005, which:
represents a landmark in improving Australia?s trade and investment relationship with the world?s largest and richest economy, and most significant merchandise and services exporter and importer.
With this in mind, you might think these massive IT price discrepancies must be illegal ? but sadly, this is not the case.
The Australia-US Free Trade Agreement does not set prices for goods and services provided by private parties.
han soete
In addition, Australian law supports price discrimination via the Copyright Act and the Competition and Consumer Act.
There was sufficient consumer outrage that the federal parliament undertook the IT pricing inquiry which has now recommended laws be changed to allow consumers to shop around for the best price anywhere in the world. Two recommendations are:
Recommendation 9: The Committee recommends that the Australian Government consider enacting a ban on geo-blocking as an option of last resort, should persistent market failure exist in spite of the changes to the Competition and Consumer Act and the Copyright Act recommended in this report.
Recommendation 10: That the Australian Government investigate the feasibility of amending the Competition and Consumer Act so that contracts or terms of service which seek to enforce geo-blocking are considered void.
In past years consumers could import goods themselves even if it was technically illegal, but recent advances in technology allow vendors to block both purchase of and operation of products based on the computer?s IP address, which is linked to the country where the computer sits.
Credit card numbers can also be linked back to a country so it is possible to block purchases made by credit card. The ability of vendors to ?geo-locate? means they can enforce any pricing structure they want.
Around the geo-block
halilgokdal
Is it possible to work around these barriers for Australian purchasers to get the same prices as Americans?
It may be possible but warranties may be voided, and it may be impossible to get software updates and security patches.
Some purchasers try to purchase from retailers rather than the parent company. Many retailers just want to make money and will ?forget? about rules such as not selling overseas, or checking the student status of the purchaser.
Another approach is to work through a proxy server. Proxy servers act as intermediaries between computers, and make it look like a computer is in the same country as the proxy server. For example, connecting from Australia to a proxy server in America which will make it look like the user resides in America.
Virtual private networks (VPNs) also reroute a computer?s network internet connection and change its IP address, but they provide an encrypted ?tunnel? so anyone checking out your online activities can only see that you have connected to the VPN server and nothing else.
Software purchased from the US can also be run ?in the cloud?. Using a cloud provider which looks like a US cloud causes US-bought software to happily think it?s in the US, and run properly.
Why pay at all?
Brad Stabler
A left-field approach may save a lot of money and is entirely legal: give up on expensive proprietary software and look for alternatives including free open source products.
Consumer pressure can dramatically affect how the big vendors work. Microsoft used to charged high prices for commercial use of its Internet Information Server (IIS) web server. But the free Apache web server was so good that Microsoft had to significantly reduce its price.
If enough of us start using open source products then the big manufacturers such as Microsoft will be forced to be more reasonable with their pricing.
There are some excellent free alternatives for many expensive packages. For example, a full professional Microsoft Office suite will cost you between $500 and $800 dollars. The Open Office package is rated as just as good by many reviewers and is totally free.
Personally, I know several small business owners who use Open Office throughout their enterprises. It has worked very well and saved them tens of thousands of dollars.
There are several good web sites dedicated to listing and evaluating open source software. As a start try Open Source Alternative and Open Source as Alternative.
Even governments are now looking at open source products to reduce costs, and put pressure on the big manufacturers to reduce prices. The UK government has clearly indicated a preference for open source software.
Given the huge savings to be made, other governments may follow this lead ? and maybe we should too.
STOCKHOLM (Reuters) - Budget fashion retailer Hennes & Mauritz launched an e-commerce operation in the United States on Thursday, taking on rivals in the world's biggest online market.
The launch is highly anticipated and follows successive delays. But retail experts say H&M may struggle to make the kind of profits from U.S. e-commerce enjoyed by pricier rivals.
H&M has prospered in the United States without a big online presence and is mindful of the likely impact on profit margins of the high shipping and return costs associated with such a vast country.
However, with more and more shoppers buying clothes from home, the Swedish firm is speeding up its online roll-out to capture a slice of the growing market.
H&M has grown fast in recent years in the U.S., it's second-biggest market, but has twice pulled back from announced dates for the online launch, blaming unexpected complexities in setting up an operation well integrated with its stores.
Meanwhile, its main rival Inditex and others such as online e-store ASOS have expanded in the market, while Amazon is pushing further into apparel after EBay prospered with its fashion offering.
"You don't want to lose out on being the port of call for younger shoppers. So H&M should really get in there," Planet Retail consultant Isabel Cavill said.
Apparel has become one of the fastest-growing online retail segments. H&M has e-stores in eight European countries and says they are now as profitable as its bricks-and-morter shops.
In North America, a quarter of clothing sales will take place on the internet in 2030, up from 7 percent in 2011, Goldman Sachs predicts. Researcher Euromonitor International sees the U.S. online apparel market more than doubling in a decade to $41 billion in 2017.
"Generations of shoppers are growing up for whom the multi-channel is a basic expectation," said Kantar Retail consultant Bryan Roberts.
MIND THE RETURNS
H&M has been struggling to work out a viable logistics model in the country, where many shoppers expect free deliveries.
"H&M is low-price, quite low-margin and makes it work by selling very high volumes. An issue with that is very high costs for shipping and, most significantly, returns. It's a particular problem in the U.S.," Conlumino consultant Neil Saunders said.
Up to half of fashion items sold online are returned. At H&M, a shopper may well buy up to three times as many items than at Zara or ASOS. Analysts place average prices at Zara at least 40 percent above H&M's, with ASOS in between.
H&M would be wise not to charge for shipments in the U.S., consultants have said. One more likely way for H&M to support margins is to focus the website on its pricier garments.
H&M's U.S. online store offers free shipping but charges for returns. All items on offer in stores will be available on the website, said Nils Vinge, head of investor relations at H&M.
There is pent-up demand for H&M online and the launch will make a buzz after the brand became well-known. But for a latecomer to an already crowded market, it may be a challenge to lure enough shoppers already used to other sites.
"H&M will need significant volume. That's absolutely key, and that is going to take time to build. It may take years to get to a good level of profitability, also because of the cost for the infrastructure," Conlumino's Saunders said.
Inditex and ASOS ship all goods straight from home markets Spain and Britain. H&M's model is one with regional hubs, meaning bigger costs when entering some markets, but shorter shipping distances. In the U.S., it has built a hub for the online business, the running of which it has outsourced.
Bank of America Merrill Lynch estimates H&M's online sales make up about 6 percent of group turnover, which last year amounted to 121 billion Swedish crowns ($18.5 billion).
Some consultants said that, for an even wider exposure online, H&M should also sell its clothes through one of the big one-stop online shops, along the lines of a recent deal between British discount retailer Primark and ASOS.
Vinge said the chain was focusing on rolling out its own online stores, but did not rule it out. "We are very very pragmatic. We want to be where our customers are," he said.
(This Corrects turnover in third paragraph from end)
(Reporting by Anna Ringstrom; editing by Niklas Pollard and Tom Pfeiffer)
If you thought things couldn't possibly get any more ridiculous than the catcopter, you were woefully gloriously wrong. Now, the same disturbed minds that brought you flying cats have an all-new monster. Enter the OstrichCopter.
By Kerry Grens NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - A new review of previous research links infection with human papillomavirus (HPV) to a three-fold greater chance of esophageal cancer. "This doesn't mean it is present in all (esophageal cancers), but it may be a factor in a certain proportion of cases," said Dr. Surabhi Liyanage, the study's lead author. HPV is a very common sexually transmitted virus that is known to cause cervical cancer, **** cancer and some cancers of the reproductive organs and the upper throat. ...
Source: slashdot.org --- Tuesday, July 30, 2013 freddienumber13 writes "In another patent surprise, a patent application by Apple for pinch-to-zoom has been rejected by the USPTO on the grounds that its claims were either anticipated by previous patents or simply unpatentable. This will be welcome news for Samsung, who back in April asked for a stay of the trial. However, Apple has a short period of time in which they can appeal this finding." Read more of this story at Slashdot. ...
