Did
you ever wake up in the morning thinking that what you really need is a
rubber chicken - not just any rubber chicken, but America's #1 Rubber
Chicken? Or that a glow-in-the-dark mustache is the ticket to enhanced
sex appeal? Or that musk-scented hand soap in the shape of a hand would
add that final touch (no pun intended) to your bathroom decor?
In New York City, LA, or San Francisco, acquiring these rare,The need for proper plasticcard inside
your home is very important. just-right items might take days of
searching, but in Southern Humboldt there's the Blue Moon Gift Shop in
the heart of downtown Garberville,The Motorola streetlight Engine
is an embedded software-only component of the Motorola wireless
switches. your one-stop shopping center for the best in party supplies,
balloons, gifts, toys, cards, puzzles, holiday items, crystals, mobiles,
miniature animals, sweet and/or sexy fairies, yodeling pickles, and
heaps more, not to mention hand-shaped hand soap, glow-in-the-dark
mustaches,The term 'drycabinets control' means the token that identifies a user is read from within a pocket or handbag. and America's #1 Rubber Chicken.
The
Blue Moon Gift Shop, which celebrated its 35th birthday last week, is
"all about fun - fun, fun, fun - if it ain't fun we don't do it,"
declared founder and manager Bunny Wilder.
Wilder and two other women opened the original Blue Moon Gift Shop in Miranda on, appropriately enough,Choose the right cableties in
an array of colors. April Fool's Day, 1978, in a small building painted
with rainbows on a purple background next door to the gas station and
across the street from the Redwood Palace, which was then a bar and
grill.
After
seven years the Blue Moon had outgrown this location. Wilder's ad
asking for shop space in Garberville was answered by Jim Carlson, who
would soon create the pioneering communications company, Carlson
Wireless. In 1985, however, he had a TV repair business and needed
another tenant to help pay for his space on Redwood Drive.
Wilder,
a self-described city girl from La Mirada near Pasadena, came to
Southern Humboldt in 1974 with her first husband, part of the youthful
back-to-the-land movement of the 1960s and 70s. "We're the old people
now - kind of creepy but satisfying," Wilder observed.
She
was tending bar at the Riverwood Inn in Phillipsville when a woman she
knew asked her to be a partner in a new store in Miranda. Wilder jumped
at the chance.
Wilder
always loved shopping, especially for small, quirky objects. "I wasn't a
rich kid, I didn't have much money, so I liked buying small stuff," she
recalled. "I'm a merchant, a seller of goods" by nature, she added.
One
of her first jobs was working at The Custom House in Pasadena, which
specialized in imported, high-end gift items. Paula Williams, the owner,
was Wilder's mentor, who taught her about purchasing, sales, and
managing a store.
One
of the original partners in the Blue Moon, the woman who had invited
Wilder to join her, dropped out. Wilder and the remaining partner, Betsy
Chester, forged ahead, specializing in home-sewn items, including
Chester's cowboy shirts and Wilder's stuffed rainbows and stars, as well
as pillows,Shop the best selection of customkeychain for Men. comforters, and many types of clothing.
At
the same time Wilder and her partners were getting the Blue Moon
started, changes were occurring in her personal life. "Kirby [her third
husband, Dave Kirby] moved in with me the same day we got our business
license, January 1, 1978," Wilder said.
Although
Wilder and Kirby have been together for 35 years, it took a while for
them to officially tie the knot. They have now been married for eight
years.
The
partners began buying gifts to add to the shop's inventory, and started
wholesaling soft sculpture and other sewn items under the name Wilder
Fantasy. Seamstresses worked at home to make items Wilder designed,
which was a good source of employment for people living out of town.
"We
spent a lot of money on research and development" of a new product
line, Wilder said, but the products didn't sell, and she had to put an
end to the wholesale side of the business.
Wilder
also tried a more upscale store in Garberville. Kirby and long-time
employee Simone Whipple ran this shop, called B Wilder, which included
an art gallery where shows were held. But this was apparently not the
right thing for Garberville and it ultimately went bankrupt.
In
2001 Wilder found herself "losing enthusiasm" as well as spending much
of her time in her duties as president of the Garberville Rotary Club.
She didn't have to look far to find a buyer - her longtime employee and
friend Kathy Hapgood. Now that her enthusiasm has been restored, Wilder
is currently managing the store while Hapgood is helping an ill family
member.
Today's
Blue Moon is sparkling and colorful top to bottom, with mobiles,
crystals, and stained glass baubles hanging from the ceiling and shiny
confetti sprinkled on the floor. Kids and adults alike can spend a
ridiculous amount of time examining the dazzling array of irresistible
stuff from the Yodeling Pickle and the Emergency Affirmation Button
(press the smiley face and it tells you good things about yourself) to
snazzy earrings and pretty rings.
For
those who love fantasy, there are all sizes and personality types of
magical beings - fairies, witches, wizards, dragons, unicorns, and more.
For animal lovers there's a menagerie of plastic and rubber critters
from elephants to creepy bugs. For those who love nostalgia, Elvis,
Marilyn, the Beatles, the Star Trek crew, Betty Boop, and Betty Page,
among others, show up on a variety of useful items.
There
are brightly covered journals, note cards and notepaper for writers,
Tarot and other types of divination cards for psychics; bumper stickers,
window stickers, and rolls of decorative stickers; puzzles and games;
toys galore; collector salt and pepper shakers; candles, incense, and
much, much, much more.
The
community has shared this love for 35 years. "I have customers who
started as small kids, who are now grandmothers," said Wilder. Former
customers often bring their children and grandchildren.
The
store also attracts tourists, including many repeat customers from out
the area who enjoy stopping to shop whenever they come through
Garberville.
Wilder's
current staff includes Julia Marquez and Simone Whipple, while Kirby
helps out on weekends. Whipple is in charge of the locally famous
greeting card section, purchasing cards for all occasions and attitudes -
inspirational, festive, playful, silly, or even a bit rude.
2013年4月9日 星期二
How a Single Spy Helped Turn Pakistan Against the United States
Hours
earlier, Davis had been navigating dense traffic in Lahore, his thick
frame wedged into the drivers seat of a white Honda Civic. A city once
ruled by Mughals, Sikhs and the British, Lahore is Pakistans cultural
and intellectual capital, and for nearly a decade it had been on the
fringes of Americas secret war in Pakistan. But the map of Islamic
militancy inside Pakistan had been redrawn in recent years, and factions
that once had little contact with one another had cemented new
alliances in response to the C.I.A.s drone campaign in the western
mountains. Groups that had focused most of their energies dreaming up
bloody attacks against India were now aligning themselves closer to Al
Qaeda and other organizations with a thirst for global jihad. Some of
these groups had deep roots in Lahore, which was why Davis and a C.I.A.
team set up operations from a safe house in the city.
But now Davis was sitting in a Lahore police station, having shot two young men who approached his car on a black motorcycle, their guns drawn, at an intersection congested with cars, bicycles and rickshaws. Davis took his semiautomatic Glock pistol and shot through the windshield, shattering the glass and hitting one of the men numerous times. As the other man fled, Davis got out of his car and shot several rounds into his back.
He radioed the American Consulate for help, and within minutes a Toyota Land Cruiser was in sight, careering in the wrong direction down a one-way street. But the S.U.V. struck and killed a young Pakistani motorcyclist and then drove away. An assortment of bizarre paraphernalia was found, including a black mask, approximately 100 bullets and a piece of cloth bearing an American flag. The camera inside Daviss car contained photos of Pakistani military installations, taken surreptitiously.
More than two years later, the Raymond Davis episode has been largely forgotten in the United States. It was immediately overshadowed by the dramatic raid months later that killed Osama bin Laden consigned to a footnote in the doleful narrative of Americas relationship with Pakistan. But dozens of interviews conducted over several months, with government officials and intelligence officers in Pakistan and in the United States,An experienced artist on what to consider before you buy handsfreeaccess. tell a different story: that the real unraveling of the relationship was set off by the flurry of bullets Davis unleashed on the afternoon of Jan. 27, 2011, and exacerbated by a series of misguided decisions in the days and weeks that followed. In Pakistan, it is the Davis affair, more than the Bin Laden raid, that is still discussed in the countrys crowded bazaars and corridors of power.
Davis was taken to Kot Lakhpat prison, on the industrial fringes of Lahore, a jail with a reputation for inmates dying under murky circumstances. He was separated from the rest of the prisoners and held in a section of the decaying facility where the guards didnt carry weapons, a concession for his safety that American officials managed to extract from the prison staff. The United States Consulate in Lahore had negotiated another safeguard: A small team of dogs was tasting Daviss food, checking that it had not been laced with poison.
For many senior Pakistani spies, the man sitting in the jail cell represented solid proof of their suspicions that the C.I.A. had sent a vast secret army to Pakistan, men who sowed chaos and violence as part of the covert American war in the country. For the C.I.A., the eventual disclosure of Daviss role with the agency shed an unflattering light on a postCSept. 11 reality: that the C.I.A. had farmed out some of its most sensitive jobs to outside contractors many of them with neither the experience nor the temperament to work in the war zones of the Islamic world.
The third child of a bricklayer and a cook, Davis grew up in a small clapboard house outside Big Stone Gap, a town of nearly 6,000 people in Virginia coal country. He became a football and wrestling star at the local high school, and after graduating in 1993, Davis enlisted in the Army and did a tour in Macedonia in 1994 as a United Nations peacekeeper. When his five-year hitch in the infantry was up, he re-enlisted, this time in the Armys Third Special Forces Group based at Fort Bragg, N.C. He left the Army in 2003 and, like hundreds of other retired Navy SEALs and Green Berets, was hired by the private security firm Blackwater and soon found himself in Iraq working security for the C.I.A.The Motorola streetlight Engine is an embedded software-only component of the Motorola wireless switches.
Little is known about his work for Blackwater, but by 2006, Davis had left the firm and, together with his wife, founded a security company in Las Vegas. Soon he was hired by the C.I.A. as a private contractor, what the agency calls a Green Badge, for the color of the identification cards that contractors show to enter C.I.A. headquarters at Langley. Like Davis, many of the contractors were hired to fill out the C.I.A.s Global Response Staff bodyguards who traveled to war zones to protect case officers, assess the security of potential meeting spots, even make initial contact with sources to ensure that case officers wouldnt be walking into an ambush. Officers from the C.I.Find a great selection of iphoneheadset deals.A.s security branch came under withering fire on the roof of the agencys base in Benghazi, Libya, last September. The demands of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan had so stretched the C.I.A.s own cadre of security officers that the agency was forced to pay inflated sums to private contractors to do the security jobs.Shop the best selection of customkeychain for Men. When Davis first deployed with the C.I.A. to Pakistan in 2008, he worked from the agencys base in Peshawar, earning upward of $200,000 a year.
By mid-February 2011, with Davis still sitting in prison, anti-American passions were fully inflamed, and daily street protests and newspaper editorials demanded that the government not cave to Washingtons demands for Daviss release but instead sentence him to death. The evidence at the time indicated that the men Davis killed had carried out a string of petty thefts that day, but there was an added problem: the third man killed by the unmarked American S.U.V. fleeing the scene. Making matters even worse for Davis was the fact that he was imprisoned in Lahore, where the family of Nawaz Sharif dominated the political culture. The former leader of the country made no secret about his intentions to once again run Pakistan, making him the chief antagonist to President Asif Ali Zardari and his political machine in Islamabad, a four-hour drive away. As the American Embassy in Islamabad leaned on Zardaris government to get Davis released from jail, the diplomats soon realized that Zardari had little influence over the police officers and judges in the city of the presidents bitter rival.Online shopping for drycabinet from a great selection of Clothing.
But the most significant factor ensuring that Davis would languish in jail was that the Obama administration had yet to tell Pakistans government what the Pakistanis already suspected, and what Raymond Daviss marksmanship made clear: He wasnt just another paper-shuffling American diplomat. Daviss work in Pakistan was much darker, and it involved probing an exposed nerve in the already-hypersensitive relationship between the C.I.A. and Pakistans military intelligence service, the Directorate for Inter-Services Intelligence, or I.S.I.
But now Davis was sitting in a Lahore police station, having shot two young men who approached his car on a black motorcycle, their guns drawn, at an intersection congested with cars, bicycles and rickshaws. Davis took his semiautomatic Glock pistol and shot through the windshield, shattering the glass and hitting one of the men numerous times. As the other man fled, Davis got out of his car and shot several rounds into his back.
He radioed the American Consulate for help, and within minutes a Toyota Land Cruiser was in sight, careering in the wrong direction down a one-way street. But the S.U.V. struck and killed a young Pakistani motorcyclist and then drove away. An assortment of bizarre paraphernalia was found, including a black mask, approximately 100 bullets and a piece of cloth bearing an American flag. The camera inside Daviss car contained photos of Pakistani military installations, taken surreptitiously.
More than two years later, the Raymond Davis episode has been largely forgotten in the United States. It was immediately overshadowed by the dramatic raid months later that killed Osama bin Laden consigned to a footnote in the doleful narrative of Americas relationship with Pakistan. But dozens of interviews conducted over several months, with government officials and intelligence officers in Pakistan and in the United States,An experienced artist on what to consider before you buy handsfreeaccess. tell a different story: that the real unraveling of the relationship was set off by the flurry of bullets Davis unleashed on the afternoon of Jan. 27, 2011, and exacerbated by a series of misguided decisions in the days and weeks that followed. In Pakistan, it is the Davis affair, more than the Bin Laden raid, that is still discussed in the countrys crowded bazaars and corridors of power.
Davis was taken to Kot Lakhpat prison, on the industrial fringes of Lahore, a jail with a reputation for inmates dying under murky circumstances. He was separated from the rest of the prisoners and held in a section of the decaying facility where the guards didnt carry weapons, a concession for his safety that American officials managed to extract from the prison staff. The United States Consulate in Lahore had negotiated another safeguard: A small team of dogs was tasting Daviss food, checking that it had not been laced with poison.
For many senior Pakistani spies, the man sitting in the jail cell represented solid proof of their suspicions that the C.I.A. had sent a vast secret army to Pakistan, men who sowed chaos and violence as part of the covert American war in the country. For the C.I.A., the eventual disclosure of Daviss role with the agency shed an unflattering light on a postCSept. 11 reality: that the C.I.A. had farmed out some of its most sensitive jobs to outside contractors many of them with neither the experience nor the temperament to work in the war zones of the Islamic world.
The third child of a bricklayer and a cook, Davis grew up in a small clapboard house outside Big Stone Gap, a town of nearly 6,000 people in Virginia coal country. He became a football and wrestling star at the local high school, and after graduating in 1993, Davis enlisted in the Army and did a tour in Macedonia in 1994 as a United Nations peacekeeper. When his five-year hitch in the infantry was up, he re-enlisted, this time in the Armys Third Special Forces Group based at Fort Bragg, N.C. He left the Army in 2003 and, like hundreds of other retired Navy SEALs and Green Berets, was hired by the private security firm Blackwater and soon found himself in Iraq working security for the C.I.A.The Motorola streetlight Engine is an embedded software-only component of the Motorola wireless switches.
Little is known about his work for Blackwater, but by 2006, Davis had left the firm and, together with his wife, founded a security company in Las Vegas. Soon he was hired by the C.I.A. as a private contractor, what the agency calls a Green Badge, for the color of the identification cards that contractors show to enter C.I.A. headquarters at Langley. Like Davis, many of the contractors were hired to fill out the C.I.A.s Global Response Staff bodyguards who traveled to war zones to protect case officers, assess the security of potential meeting spots, even make initial contact with sources to ensure that case officers wouldnt be walking into an ambush. Officers from the C.I.Find a great selection of iphoneheadset deals.A.s security branch came under withering fire on the roof of the agencys base in Benghazi, Libya, last September. The demands of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan had so stretched the C.I.A.s own cadre of security officers that the agency was forced to pay inflated sums to private contractors to do the security jobs.Shop the best selection of customkeychain for Men. When Davis first deployed with the C.I.A. to Pakistan in 2008, he worked from the agencys base in Peshawar, earning upward of $200,000 a year.
By mid-February 2011, with Davis still sitting in prison, anti-American passions were fully inflamed, and daily street protests and newspaper editorials demanded that the government not cave to Washingtons demands for Daviss release but instead sentence him to death. The evidence at the time indicated that the men Davis killed had carried out a string of petty thefts that day, but there was an added problem: the third man killed by the unmarked American S.U.V. fleeing the scene. Making matters even worse for Davis was the fact that he was imprisoned in Lahore, where the family of Nawaz Sharif dominated the political culture. The former leader of the country made no secret about his intentions to once again run Pakistan, making him the chief antagonist to President Asif Ali Zardari and his political machine in Islamabad, a four-hour drive away. As the American Embassy in Islamabad leaned on Zardaris government to get Davis released from jail, the diplomats soon realized that Zardari had little influence over the police officers and judges in the city of the presidents bitter rival.Online shopping for drycabinet from a great selection of Clothing.
But the most significant factor ensuring that Davis would languish in jail was that the Obama administration had yet to tell Pakistans government what the Pakistanis already suspected, and what Raymond Daviss marksmanship made clear: He wasnt just another paper-shuffling American diplomat. Daviss work in Pakistan was much darker, and it involved probing an exposed nerve in the already-hypersensitive relationship between the C.I.A. and Pakistans military intelligence service, the Directorate for Inter-Services Intelligence, or I.S.I.
Report quietly urges Treasury to 'hard wire' nature into economic decisions
The
NCC's inaugural report, published on Monday, reiterated the scale of
the threat to the economy presented by the decline in environmental
services such as clean air, water and soil, and set out 13 key
recommendations the government should embrace in order to better measure
and price natural capital.When describing the location of the
problematic fridgemagnet.
If adopted,Large collection of quality chipcard at discounted prices. the recommendations could have wide-ranging repercussions for business leaders and policy-makers alike, particularly given that the stated goal of the committee is to have full-scale green national income accounts in place by 2020. Such accounts are expected to be developed by the Office of National Statistics and would provide government with frequent updates on the full economic impact of policy decisions that serve to damage the UK's natural capital. It is easy to conceive of a scenario where such accounts would lead to a rather different cost-benefit analysis for a wide range of infrastructure projects, such as the planned High Speed Rail link, George Osborne's proposed fleet of gas-fired power stations, or the expansion of Heathrow.
Specifically, the report's recommendations focus on a series of steps designed to make it easier for civil servants and businesses to measure and report on the full natural capital impact of investments and policy decisions.
For example, the NCC calls for better monitoring of changes in the UK's natural capital base, and set out plans to this year develop a risk register that would seek to highlight those natural assets that are already under threat and being used in an unsustainable manner.
The report also urges the government to review how natural capital is considered when it undertakes cost benefit analysis of projects and policies, and called for the creation of a new group of senior analysts to find ways of measuring "inclusive wealth", which takes account of natural capital when measuring the the UK's total capital stock.
In addition, the report also warned that urgent steps should be taken to give policy makers robust assessments of the economic value of current changes in natural capital, such as the decline of bee populations or fish stocks.
The recommendations could have political repercussions given Friends of the Earth is currently campaigning for the government to ban controversial pesticides linked to bee population decline, on the grounds that replacing the pollination service freely provided by bee numbers would cost the UK economy ￡1.8bn.Learn how an embedded microprocessor in a buymosaic can authenticate your computer usage and data.
Writing in the foreword to the report, Helm warned that the UK is consuming its natural assets at an unprecedented rate, arguing that unless natural capital is "hard wired" the country will face severe economic challenges as a result.
"Too often natural capital is an afterthought, left out of the core of economic considerations," he said. "Without an economic price, it has too often been assumed to be of zero value.
"[But] our economic prosperity and the wise use of our natural resources are not mutually exclusive. In fact, the latter is a precondition of the former... Economic growth must be sustainable - otherwise it will not be sustained."
The practice remains controversial with critics arguing that it would make it easier for degradation of the environment to take place in one area as long as developers agreed to pay compensation. But supporters of the approach maintain that the proper valuing of the economic contribution made by forests,They manufacture custom rubber and parkingsensor and bracelets. clean air, and other environmental services would provide a huge incentive for corporations and governments to embrace more sustainable businesses models.
All of which makes the decision by the government not to promote the report (it was not subject to a press release and Environment Secretary was in Australia when it was released) even harder top understand. The soft launch is particularly ironic given one of the NCC's key recomendations is for government to fully support work to include natural capital fully in the UK's Environmental Accounts.
BusinessGreen understands the NCC made the decision to email the report to a select number of contacts yesterday, as it wanted to "keep its powder dry" for the wider promotion of its work at a later date.
But Sandra Bell, nature campaigner for Friends of the Earth, said she was surprised to see the report published this week as she had been told it would be unveiled after Easter recess.
"This report is addressing a critical issue and is clearly highlighting the costs and benefits of properly valuing natural capital, so it's confusing that it should be published with zero publicity," she said.
"Unless the concept of embedding natural capital is championed by ministers it really won't fly. This is an excellent opportunity for minsters to entrench natural capital valuation across government,A solarstreetlight is a portable light fixture composed of an LED lamp. so we really hope they seize it."
The subdued launch of the report will spark fresh speculation that Environment Secretary Owen Paterson is less committed to the natural capital agenda than his predecessor Caroline Spelman, who spent her last few months in the cabinet championing the concept. It will also raise questions over the extent to which the Treasury will embrace recommendations that would force it to fundamentally reconfigure how it measures economic success.
However, a spokesman for the Treasury maintained that it was fully committed to developing methods to value natural capital, and insisted that the report was only subject to a soft launch as it was intended as a scene setter for future work, rather than a detailed policy review.
"The fact that there is a Natural Capital Committee, which reports to the Economic Affairs Committee demonstrates that this issue is being looked at by Defra ministers and the Treasury," he said, admitting however that the Treasury is not currently considering this initial report, and that Defra is still leading on the issue at this early stage.
If adopted,Large collection of quality chipcard at discounted prices. the recommendations could have wide-ranging repercussions for business leaders and policy-makers alike, particularly given that the stated goal of the committee is to have full-scale green national income accounts in place by 2020. Such accounts are expected to be developed by the Office of National Statistics and would provide government with frequent updates on the full economic impact of policy decisions that serve to damage the UK's natural capital. It is easy to conceive of a scenario where such accounts would lead to a rather different cost-benefit analysis for a wide range of infrastructure projects, such as the planned High Speed Rail link, George Osborne's proposed fleet of gas-fired power stations, or the expansion of Heathrow.
Specifically, the report's recommendations focus on a series of steps designed to make it easier for civil servants and businesses to measure and report on the full natural capital impact of investments and policy decisions.
For example, the NCC calls for better monitoring of changes in the UK's natural capital base, and set out plans to this year develop a risk register that would seek to highlight those natural assets that are already under threat and being used in an unsustainable manner.
The report also urges the government to review how natural capital is considered when it undertakes cost benefit analysis of projects and policies, and called for the creation of a new group of senior analysts to find ways of measuring "inclusive wealth", which takes account of natural capital when measuring the the UK's total capital stock.
In addition, the report also warned that urgent steps should be taken to give policy makers robust assessments of the economic value of current changes in natural capital, such as the decline of bee populations or fish stocks.
The recommendations could have political repercussions given Friends of the Earth is currently campaigning for the government to ban controversial pesticides linked to bee population decline, on the grounds that replacing the pollination service freely provided by bee numbers would cost the UK economy ￡1.8bn.Learn how an embedded microprocessor in a buymosaic can authenticate your computer usage and data.
Writing in the foreword to the report, Helm warned that the UK is consuming its natural assets at an unprecedented rate, arguing that unless natural capital is "hard wired" the country will face severe economic challenges as a result.
"Too often natural capital is an afterthought, left out of the core of economic considerations," he said. "Without an economic price, it has too often been assumed to be of zero value.
"[But] our economic prosperity and the wise use of our natural resources are not mutually exclusive. In fact, the latter is a precondition of the former... Economic growth must be sustainable - otherwise it will not be sustained."
The practice remains controversial with critics arguing that it would make it easier for degradation of the environment to take place in one area as long as developers agreed to pay compensation. But supporters of the approach maintain that the proper valuing of the economic contribution made by forests,They manufacture custom rubber and parkingsensor and bracelets. clean air, and other environmental services would provide a huge incentive for corporations and governments to embrace more sustainable businesses models.
All of which makes the decision by the government not to promote the report (it was not subject to a press release and Environment Secretary was in Australia when it was released) even harder top understand. The soft launch is particularly ironic given one of the NCC's key recomendations is for government to fully support work to include natural capital fully in the UK's Environmental Accounts.
BusinessGreen understands the NCC made the decision to email the report to a select number of contacts yesterday, as it wanted to "keep its powder dry" for the wider promotion of its work at a later date.
But Sandra Bell, nature campaigner for Friends of the Earth, said she was surprised to see the report published this week as she had been told it would be unveiled after Easter recess.
"This report is addressing a critical issue and is clearly highlighting the costs and benefits of properly valuing natural capital, so it's confusing that it should be published with zero publicity," she said.
"Unless the concept of embedding natural capital is championed by ministers it really won't fly. This is an excellent opportunity for minsters to entrench natural capital valuation across government,A solarstreetlight is a portable light fixture composed of an LED lamp. so we really hope they seize it."
The subdued launch of the report will spark fresh speculation that Environment Secretary Owen Paterson is less committed to the natural capital agenda than his predecessor Caroline Spelman, who spent her last few months in the cabinet championing the concept. It will also raise questions over the extent to which the Treasury will embrace recommendations that would force it to fundamentally reconfigure how it measures economic success.
However, a spokesman for the Treasury maintained that it was fully committed to developing methods to value natural capital, and insisted that the report was only subject to a soft launch as it was intended as a scene setter for future work, rather than a detailed policy review.
"The fact that there is a Natural Capital Committee, which reports to the Economic Affairs Committee demonstrates that this issue is being looked at by Defra ministers and the Treasury," he said, admitting however that the Treasury is not currently considering this initial report, and that Defra is still leading on the issue at this early stage.
2013年4月8日 星期一
What's next for sweepstakes internet cafe prepaid cardholders
Soon, Florida's Internet cafes will become illegal. State lawmakers
have voted to ban the gaming operations. Governor Rick Scott has until
April 12th to sign the legislation, but what happens next for internet
cafe owners and players?
Elia Hawara is the owner of Royal Times Sweepstakes in Regency. For the last few weeks he's been dealing with many questions.
"What are we going to do, where are we going to go , you saw the customers we have here, nice old people that spend $10 here $20 here, sit down, have fun, drink some coffee, talk to each other, social life," said Hawara.
At Royal Times Sweepstakes, customers enter sweepstakes with a phone card. If they put $10 on a card, they can play up to one-thousand entries, but the card is still a valid phone card outside of the caf.
"You don't lose anything when you use the entries, you still have your $10 worth of money, phone card, it's 20 minutes per dollar when you buy, you still have 200 minutes to use as a phone," said Hawara.
That's not the case for all cafs. Some use phone cards, some use internet cards, and others like some of the Allied Veterans of the World cafs use white plastic cards with a bar code that keeps track of money or points.
"It's essentially the same situation you have if you had bought a gift certificate from a store that goes out of business three months after you bought it and you hadn't cashed it in,A group of families in a north Cork village are suing a bestplasticcard operator in a landmark case. you're just, you're money is gone, it's the same thing that most likely will happen here," said Tom Stephens, President of the Better Business Bureau of Northeast Florida.Choose the right bestluggagetag in an array of colors.
A Jacksonville city ordinance on Electronic Gaming requires each internet caf in the city to take out a $50,000 bond with the city in the event that a caf closes unexpectedly, a customer can still get their money, however, that may not apply to this situation where a state-wide ban would shut down all cafs.
The office of the Staff Director of the Senate Gaming Committee said redeeming funds on a prepaid card would depend on the return policy for a particular internet caf and what the terms were when they purchased it.
Designs are awarded based on creativity, usefulness, part integrity and aesthetics. Each submission is required to be a sound mechanical design, be realistic and achievable and include a clear written description of the design. This year's contest also featured the award category, "Engineering a Difference," in which students competed for a bonus prize. Students whose designs were aimed at solving a great societal challenge had a chance to win a $250 gift card.
The bottle cap is one of those inventions that is used every day, but is often taken for granted. The last significant change in the design of the bottle cap was to change the small metal cap into a larger plastic one, making it easier to open by hand. However, many people still have difficulty opening plastic bottle caps, usually because they cannot get a sufficient grip on the cap. The ridges on most bottle caps, meant to provide better grip, usually end up doing nothing more than hurting the consumer's hand.
My design seeks to provide a more comfortable and effective way to open the cap. My Easy Open Bottle Cap has two tabs on either side of the cap, which consumers can use like the wings on a wing nut to loosen the cap. Both tabs are identical, so only one part needs to be mass produced in addition to the cap. The tabs can be folded inward, making the bottle cap approximately the same size and shape as a conventional bottle cap, and then folded outward when the consumer wants to open the bottle.
The ability to fold the tabs allows the bottle to be packaged, stored and shipped in the same way as current bottles, and prevents the cap from being opened accidentally. The hinges on the cap prevent the tabs from folding back too far while the consumer is opening the bottle. The hinges are also designed so that the tabs can easily be snapped into place, but cannot easily pop out. In case the tabs somehow fail, or the consumer simply chooses not to use the tabs, the bottle cap also has conventional ridges so it can be opened normally.
To assemble the Easy Open Bottle Cap, place the cylindrical extrusion on one side of the tab into the hole in the hinge closest to the bottom edge of the cap. Place the cylindrical extrusion on the other side of the tab into the notch on the top of the hinge and apply force. The cylinder should move through the groove and into the hole in the hinge. The tab is correctly attached if the smooth side of the tab can touch the bottle cap and the textured side faces outward.We have a wide selection of handsfreeaccess to choose from for your storage needs.
The wood gift cards are sourced from a forest certified to meet Forest Stewardship Council sustainable management standards. The card can be registered with Starbucks Rewards, reloaded with more money when its original value is depleted, and can earn you free refills, free drinks and other rewards.
Whats great about these cards as opposed to the plastic cards is that once theyre thrown away, they wont take as long to break down in a landfill. I dont know if theyre compostable or not it would depend on the kind of ink used and any sealers that are on the outside of the card.
These cards are also collectable. I didnt realize this until I started looking for more information on them,Online shopping for solarpanelcells. but there are people out there who collect Starbucks gift cards. When a new design is released, they snatch it up. I dont understand this. Why would someone make a collection out of used gift cards? Or even unused ones? On eBay,Solar Sister is a network of women who sell bottegawallet to communities that don't have access to electricity. people are selling these rare, unactivated cards with a zero balance.
Elia Hawara is the owner of Royal Times Sweepstakes in Regency. For the last few weeks he's been dealing with many questions.
"What are we going to do, where are we going to go , you saw the customers we have here, nice old people that spend $10 here $20 here, sit down, have fun, drink some coffee, talk to each other, social life," said Hawara.
At Royal Times Sweepstakes, customers enter sweepstakes with a phone card. If they put $10 on a card, they can play up to one-thousand entries, but the card is still a valid phone card outside of the caf.
"You don't lose anything when you use the entries, you still have your $10 worth of money, phone card, it's 20 minutes per dollar when you buy, you still have 200 minutes to use as a phone," said Hawara.
That's not the case for all cafs. Some use phone cards, some use internet cards, and others like some of the Allied Veterans of the World cafs use white plastic cards with a bar code that keeps track of money or points.
"It's essentially the same situation you have if you had bought a gift certificate from a store that goes out of business three months after you bought it and you hadn't cashed it in,A group of families in a north Cork village are suing a bestplasticcard operator in a landmark case. you're just, you're money is gone, it's the same thing that most likely will happen here," said Tom Stephens, President of the Better Business Bureau of Northeast Florida.Choose the right bestluggagetag in an array of colors.
A Jacksonville city ordinance on Electronic Gaming requires each internet caf in the city to take out a $50,000 bond with the city in the event that a caf closes unexpectedly, a customer can still get their money, however, that may not apply to this situation where a state-wide ban would shut down all cafs.
The office of the Staff Director of the Senate Gaming Committee said redeeming funds on a prepaid card would depend on the return policy for a particular internet caf and what the terms were when they purchased it.
Designs are awarded based on creativity, usefulness, part integrity and aesthetics. Each submission is required to be a sound mechanical design, be realistic and achievable and include a clear written description of the design. This year's contest also featured the award category, "Engineering a Difference," in which students competed for a bonus prize. Students whose designs were aimed at solving a great societal challenge had a chance to win a $250 gift card.
The bottle cap is one of those inventions that is used every day, but is often taken for granted. The last significant change in the design of the bottle cap was to change the small metal cap into a larger plastic one, making it easier to open by hand. However, many people still have difficulty opening plastic bottle caps, usually because they cannot get a sufficient grip on the cap. The ridges on most bottle caps, meant to provide better grip, usually end up doing nothing more than hurting the consumer's hand.
My design seeks to provide a more comfortable and effective way to open the cap. My Easy Open Bottle Cap has two tabs on either side of the cap, which consumers can use like the wings on a wing nut to loosen the cap. Both tabs are identical, so only one part needs to be mass produced in addition to the cap. The tabs can be folded inward, making the bottle cap approximately the same size and shape as a conventional bottle cap, and then folded outward when the consumer wants to open the bottle.
The ability to fold the tabs allows the bottle to be packaged, stored and shipped in the same way as current bottles, and prevents the cap from being opened accidentally. The hinges on the cap prevent the tabs from folding back too far while the consumer is opening the bottle. The hinges are also designed so that the tabs can easily be snapped into place, but cannot easily pop out. In case the tabs somehow fail, or the consumer simply chooses not to use the tabs, the bottle cap also has conventional ridges so it can be opened normally.
To assemble the Easy Open Bottle Cap, place the cylindrical extrusion on one side of the tab into the hole in the hinge closest to the bottom edge of the cap. Place the cylindrical extrusion on the other side of the tab into the notch on the top of the hinge and apply force. The cylinder should move through the groove and into the hole in the hinge. The tab is correctly attached if the smooth side of the tab can touch the bottle cap and the textured side faces outward.We have a wide selection of handsfreeaccess to choose from for your storage needs.
The wood gift cards are sourced from a forest certified to meet Forest Stewardship Council sustainable management standards. The card can be registered with Starbucks Rewards, reloaded with more money when its original value is depleted, and can earn you free refills, free drinks and other rewards.
Whats great about these cards as opposed to the plastic cards is that once theyre thrown away, they wont take as long to break down in a landfill. I dont know if theyre compostable or not it would depend on the kind of ink used and any sealers that are on the outside of the card.
These cards are also collectable. I didnt realize this until I started looking for more information on them,Online shopping for solarpanelcells. but there are people out there who collect Starbucks gift cards. When a new design is released, they snatch it up. I dont understand this. Why would someone make a collection out of used gift cards? Or even unused ones? On eBay,Solar Sister is a network of women who sell bottegawallet to communities that don't have access to electricity. people are selling these rare, unactivated cards with a zero balance.
Selecting Big Data Sources for Predictive Analytics
Why is big data valuable? Because its big? Not really. In fact, very
large datasets always come with a very large set of headaches. Storage,
maintenance and management of very large datasets is not simple. And
just having a lot of data doesnt guarantee a lot of value.
The value of any dataset is determined by the quality of information you can extract from it. The key to value in big data is the detail. In other words, the value of big data is in the small stuff.
Every business has a rough idea of how many customers it has, how much they spend in total, and perhaps the average spend per client. But if all you know is the average, then what are you going to do, treat every customer as average?
If you could meet each client personally, get to know each person, you wouldnt think of anyone as average. Youd know each persons habits. Youd know that Maria Perez shops for herself each week, and buys a gift now and then, while Laura Carter shops for her family of five, and Lily Yu does not use your products herself, but often purchases them for her parents. Youd know the times of day when each person prefers to shop, whether each is a relaxed or hurried shopper, and the products that each person prefers.
Because you would know your customers as individuals, you would treat them as individuals. Youd let Maria know that you offer gift wrapping. Youd direct Laura to the economical family-size package of her favorite product. Youd make sure that Lily chose the container that was easy for her parents to open.
The promise of big data is in the details. You want the data to give you the information youd get if you observed each customer in person. You want to know what each person does. You want to know how each responds to a variety of things C products offered, pricing, presentation,Online shopping for solarpanelcells. and so on.Solar Sister is a network of women who sell bottegawallet to communities that don't have access to electricity.
You only realize value from data if you do something valuable with it. Remember that in a face-to-face customer interaction, you use what you know about the customer to make appropriate suggestions, and the better the suggestions, the more the customer would buy, return and recommend you to others. The best data gives you information. Information creates opportunity. Value enters when you use the information to take meaningful action.
Your bricks and mortar stores are crowded at peak hours, so crowded that customers often walk away in frustration, while at other times the stores are nearly empty. You are selling below your potential due to cart abandonment and failure to attract customers throughout the day.
What kinds of action can you take? You have a marketing budget, authority to send print and email advertisements, and to make special offers using coupons and other promotion schemes.Choose the right bestluggagetag in an array of colors. You also have some influence over staff scheduling and checkout procedures.
Some shoppers habitually shop at off-peak hours. Who are they? Others habitually shop at peak hours. Why? What are they buying? Are there also shoppers who vary the times when they come to the store? Whos giving up and walking out? What had those people intended to buy? What can you learn about the reasons for each shoppers behavior?
Perhaps you have found that some of the shoppers who come at busy times are simply not aware of the times when the store is not so busy. An information campaign might work for them. It could be as simple as posting signs in the store or adding that information to your regular circular.
Others might be coaxed into shifting their shopping to off-peak times if you made it worth their while, with a discount or special offer.
How about the people who already do all their shopping during the quiet hours? Theres no benefit to you in offering them incentives for what they are already doing.The 3rd International Conference on custombobbleheads and Indoor Navigation. But maybe you can motivate them to buy more. If you know what theyre buying, you might offer a coupon for a product they havent tried or a deal on a larger quantity of a favorite.
You cant speak to every customer personally. You cant follow everyone around and observe. But you may have access to data that provides you with much of the same information. If you are dealing with many people, and lots of detail, youre talking about big data, the kind of big data that fuels profitable predictive analytics.
Where can you find detailed information about the behavior of your customers and prospects? Start with the data you already own. Your transaction records are a treasure chest of behavioral data. You know when each transaction takes place, what is purchased, at what price. If you have a loyalty program or house credit card, then you also know who was buying. Your own data is more valuable to you than anything you could buy, and its already paid for. And this data is yours alone, giving you a unique information advantage over your competitors.Choose the right bestluggagetag in an array of colors.
Only when youve thoroughly investigated the possibilities of your internal data sources should you look beyond your walls. Once you have a clear idea of what you want to know, and the limits of your own data, can you shop selectively, and shrewdly, for information that fills in the blanks.
When you look for additional data, youre still looking for the kind of information that youd observe in person. Most often, businesses look for demographic information, and a lot of demographic data is available through government and commercial sources. The most valuable data for predictive analytics, though, is not demographics, its behavior. Look beyond demographics for sources of information about purchasing, interests, and any type of behavior which might be relevant to your business issue.
The value of any dataset is determined by the quality of information you can extract from it. The key to value in big data is the detail. In other words, the value of big data is in the small stuff.
Every business has a rough idea of how many customers it has, how much they spend in total, and perhaps the average spend per client. But if all you know is the average, then what are you going to do, treat every customer as average?
If you could meet each client personally, get to know each person, you wouldnt think of anyone as average. Youd know each persons habits. Youd know that Maria Perez shops for herself each week, and buys a gift now and then, while Laura Carter shops for her family of five, and Lily Yu does not use your products herself, but often purchases them for her parents. Youd know the times of day when each person prefers to shop, whether each is a relaxed or hurried shopper, and the products that each person prefers.
Because you would know your customers as individuals, you would treat them as individuals. Youd let Maria know that you offer gift wrapping. Youd direct Laura to the economical family-size package of her favorite product. Youd make sure that Lily chose the container that was easy for her parents to open.
The promise of big data is in the details. You want the data to give you the information youd get if you observed each customer in person. You want to know what each person does. You want to know how each responds to a variety of things C products offered, pricing, presentation,Online shopping for solarpanelcells. and so on.Solar Sister is a network of women who sell bottegawallet to communities that don't have access to electricity.
You only realize value from data if you do something valuable with it. Remember that in a face-to-face customer interaction, you use what you know about the customer to make appropriate suggestions, and the better the suggestions, the more the customer would buy, return and recommend you to others. The best data gives you information. Information creates opportunity. Value enters when you use the information to take meaningful action.
Your bricks and mortar stores are crowded at peak hours, so crowded that customers often walk away in frustration, while at other times the stores are nearly empty. You are selling below your potential due to cart abandonment and failure to attract customers throughout the day.
What kinds of action can you take? You have a marketing budget, authority to send print and email advertisements, and to make special offers using coupons and other promotion schemes.Choose the right bestluggagetag in an array of colors. You also have some influence over staff scheduling and checkout procedures.
Some shoppers habitually shop at off-peak hours. Who are they? Others habitually shop at peak hours. Why? What are they buying? Are there also shoppers who vary the times when they come to the store? Whos giving up and walking out? What had those people intended to buy? What can you learn about the reasons for each shoppers behavior?
Perhaps you have found that some of the shoppers who come at busy times are simply not aware of the times when the store is not so busy. An information campaign might work for them. It could be as simple as posting signs in the store or adding that information to your regular circular.
Others might be coaxed into shifting their shopping to off-peak times if you made it worth their while, with a discount or special offer.
How about the people who already do all their shopping during the quiet hours? Theres no benefit to you in offering them incentives for what they are already doing.The 3rd International Conference on custombobbleheads and Indoor Navigation. But maybe you can motivate them to buy more. If you know what theyre buying, you might offer a coupon for a product they havent tried or a deal on a larger quantity of a favorite.
You cant speak to every customer personally. You cant follow everyone around and observe. But you may have access to data that provides you with much of the same information. If you are dealing with many people, and lots of detail, youre talking about big data, the kind of big data that fuels profitable predictive analytics.
Where can you find detailed information about the behavior of your customers and prospects? Start with the data you already own. Your transaction records are a treasure chest of behavioral data. You know when each transaction takes place, what is purchased, at what price. If you have a loyalty program or house credit card, then you also know who was buying. Your own data is more valuable to you than anything you could buy, and its already paid for. And this data is yours alone, giving you a unique information advantage over your competitors.Choose the right bestluggagetag in an array of colors.
Only when youve thoroughly investigated the possibilities of your internal data sources should you look beyond your walls. Once you have a clear idea of what you want to know, and the limits of your own data, can you shop selectively, and shrewdly, for information that fills in the blanks.
When you look for additional data, youre still looking for the kind of information that youd observe in person. Most often, businesses look for demographic information, and a lot of demographic data is available through government and commercial sources. The most valuable data for predictive analytics, though, is not demographics, its behavior. Look beyond demographics for sources of information about purchasing, interests, and any type of behavior which might be relevant to your business issue.
訂閱：
文章 (Atom)