Archive for March 30th, 2008 This post was updated at 11:51 AM PT in order to correct a misstatement that was made in the announcement. The winning artwork from the Etsy-NASA contest, not the artists, will make a trip into space. Read the correction post here. NEW YORK–What does a marketplace for handmade crafts …
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The employement figures for the brokers is way down similar to the period 1988-1991.Posted by: admin in Investment NewsWhat’s the gross decline in total investments in US retail brokerage accounts over the past year? How many accounts from above are up, how many down in value? How many individual accounts have changed their funds from mainly stocks to Treasuries? In other words the employement figures for the brokers is way down similar to the period […] For more visit Source:www.investment-blog.net
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2008
‘Rickrolled basketball game’ video is ’80s pop fictionPosted by: admin in Social Media and Tech
This post was updated at 9:19 AM PT on Thursday to reflect the correction issued by the New York Times. Wow, we all fell for this one. An NBC affiliate in Spokane, Wash., reported Tuesday that one of the Web’s most popular viral videos of late was a fabrication, …
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2008
How gas guzzlers could help pay for more efficient carsPosted by: admin in Investing WorldNatalie Mims is a consultant with the Energy and Resources Team, and Noah Buhayar is a fellow at Rocky Mountain Institute. Concern over energy security, rising oil prices, and global climate change has put car fuel efficiency on the agenda for many lawmakers in recent months. In December, President Bush signed into law an energy bill that’ll increase the Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) to 35 miles per gallon by 2020. That means U.S. automakers will have to increase the average fuel economy of the cars and light trucks they produce in the next 12 years. While the new CAFE standard is a landmark event — U.S. fleet efficiency has been relatively flat since 1985 — this command-and-control style of regulation oppresses market forces and requires car manufacturers to install fuel economy technology, regardless of the cost. Fortunately, there’s an alternative to this costly and ineffective approach to regulating fuel economy. It’s called a feebate. What’s a feebate? A feebate is a policy that provides a one-time rebate on fuel-efficient vehicles and places a surcharge on vehicles that are inefficient. New light automobiles that exceed a defined fuel economy benchmark, called the “pivot point,” qualify for a rebate. The logic is that people who choose to drive more efficient automobiles deserve a rebate, because they are working to reduce social costs such as pollution and oil dependence, congestion, health problems, and climate change. The amount of the rebate would depend on where the vehicle’s fuel economy falls in relation to the pivot point for vehicles in the same class. A Honda Civic, for instance, would qualify for a rebate because it’s more efficient and consumes less fuel than comparably sized vehicles. Conversely, new cars that are less fuel efficient than others in the same class would be subject to a fee. Why feebates work A feebate is a better approach to regulating the automotive industry because it allows manufacturers to install as much fuel economy technology as is cost-effective, as opposed to requiring manufacturers to install technology regardless of the cost. Feebates also help consumers to consider the long-term impacts of a vehicle’s fuel economy when they purchase the vehicle. Better yet, a well-designed feebate can be self-financing. Fees could pay not only for the rebates, but also the administrative costs of running the program. Feebates in action There are a number of factors that affect both how the feebate works, as well as the success of the policy. These include where the pivot point is set, the number of vehicle classes, and the size of rebates and fees. RMI recently examined these factors in a white paper. In principle, though, feebates are gaining acceptance. Canada has had a feebate law in effect since 2007. Last month, several European countries adopted feebates: Finland and Ireland changed their automobile tax structure to vary based on greenhouse gas emissions, and France just implemented what’s being called the “bonus-malus” law last month. California’s State Assembly recently considered a feebate bill to reduce vehicle greenhouse gas emissions after the EPA denied the state a waiver to regulate tailpipe emissions. Feebates and you So how would a feebate affect the average American? For starters, it would create an incentive program for manufacturers to produce more efficient vehicles, offering more fuel-efficient car choices to consumers. By setting a pivot point for each size class, it would allow consumers to select the type of car that fit their needs-be it a compact vehicle, sedan, SUV, or light truck. There would be a financial incentive, however, to select the more efficient automobiles within each class. Best of all, people who opt for an efficient automobile would know that their choice will contribute to a better environment for future generations.  Zoho is preparing to announce the public release of Zoho Invoice, yet another Web-based app in the company’s growing suite of paid business-focused services. Lately we covered Zoho People, a robust app for managing HR tasks. Zoho Invoice is a clean, straightforward, and flexible invoicing service. I gave it a quick spin and was creating estimates and invoices within minutes after entering in customer data and product lines (which also took only minutes). There is a good collection of attractive invoice templates for goods and services, or you can create your own. It was simple to take an estimate and convert it into an invoice, and the app has a solid template system that sends form e-mail cover letters with an invoice or estimate attached as a PDF file. The system tracks payments and has aging reports; it will send dunning letters and apply flat or percentage-rate fees for late transactions. 
Zoho Invoice makes and sends PDF invoices. The app lets customers pay via PayPal, but it does not process credit cards as far as I could tell. It supports multiple currencies and tax rates, however, this early version does not come with auto-populated tax rates for different states or regions. Rather than offer its own full business record-keeping app to go with the invoicing service, Zoho will “probably” at some point integrate with Intuit Quickbooks, Zoho’s Raju Vegensa told me. Intuit, of course, also sells an invoicing add-on for Quickbooks, and offers Invoicing in its Web-based QuickBooks On the internet Edition. But Zoho’s full suite of business apps might help to push it into the primary app role in a business, while Quickbooks gets relegated to the supporting, accounting-only function. It’s a bit early to see how this will shake out, and if Zoho will be able to win the trust of customers in small businesses, where Intuit currently has a dominant market position. There are dozens of Web-based invoicing services, some of which we’ve reviewed on Webware (Blinksale, Simplybill, Freshbooks; also the full small business suite Netbooks). Most are easy to recommend: They’re easy to use and reasonably priced. So is Zoho’s. But Zoho has more than just another invoice app. The company is building a full suite of business apps, which at some point will connect together at the logical places: CRM to invoicing to project management to HR, for example. 
Zoho Invoice is easy, but not too simple. We still believe that Zoho’s 200-programmer-strong developer team is releasing apps a bit too fast, and we have noticed some with light feature sets, inconsistent interfaces, or missing integration points. However, it appears that Zoho is improving with each new app. Invoices is an attractive online product, well worth trying out if you’ve got the problem it’s designed to solve. Zoho Invoice is open at the moment and will remain free if you run five or fewer invoices a month. When the company turns on the subscription service it will promise 99.9 percent uptime to paying users. There will be four service levels, but they’re ridiculously tightly-grouped. The most expensive will cost only $35 a month and will grant up to 1,500 invoices per period. See also: Working Webware: Can Zoho steal Microsoft’s customers?
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2008
Report: Hong Kong gazillionaire increases stake in FacebookPosted by: admin in Social Media and Tech Li Ka-shing, the Hong Kong telecom mogul who invested $60 million in Facebook last year, has upped his stake to $100 million and might invest even more, MarketWatch reported Thursday. Facebook was valued at an eyebrow-raising $15 billion when Microsoft bought a 5 percent stake at $240 million. According to … By MICHAEL SCHUMAN/HONG KONG For years, Americans have reveled in profligate, load-up-the-back- of-the-SUV-at-Target excess, much of it paid for by credit cards, home equity or other loans. The binge has produced some supposedly healthy economic growth and provided everyone lots of nice stuff. But now debt collectors from around the world are knocking. That’s why today’s […] For more visit Source:www.investment-blog.net
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2008
Report: New Apple product will give your workouts that magic touchPosted by: admin in Social Media and Tech
A peek at an Apple patent filing that seems to indicate the company is working on a 'digital lifestyle' product. (Credit: AppleInsider) Are you disappointed that your iPhone still hasn’t made you sexier in the eyes of potential mates? Hey, don’t give up yet. AppleInsider has unearthed … |
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