Snowboarding craze cools as new designs make skiing easier

At the height of the nation's snowboard craze, Rod Rice was a so-called blazin' raisin — an older dude who loved to bomb the slopes at breakneck speeds.

That is, until he wiped out and dislocated his shoulder on a trip to Canada. The 65-year-old engineer still loves to carve fresh powder, but now he does it on a pair of extra-wide skis.

"I'm not planning on going back to snowboarding," said the Lakewood grandfather.

Once the king of the mountain, snowboarding is on the down slope.

The rage that transformed the nation's ski resorts and planted such terms as "jib," "face plant" and "biff" into America's lexicon is cooling off partly because many older riders are shifting to new, easier-to-ride skis to preserve their aging bodies.

Sales of snowboards and snowboard equipment have slipped 21% over the last four years, while sales of skis have climbed 3% in the same period, according to SnowSports Industries America, a trade group that tracks the $3.5-billion snow sports and apparel industry.

Baby boomers aren't the only ones bailing. Last season alpine skiing replaced snowboarding as the most popular snow sport among kids ages 6 to 17, according to the trade group. That's the first time in nearly a decade and a troubling sign for snowboard makers battling for a key demographic.

The once hip, ultra extreme sport may have lost its lure when Mom and Dad began snowboarding a few years ago.

"Kids don't want to do what their parents do," said Chris Riddle, a spokesman for Snow Summit and Bear Mountain ski resorts near Big Bear Lake. He said he's seen an increase in skiers in the terrain park typically dominated by snowboarders.

A snow-loving member of the millennial generation, 17-year-old Arten Yegikyan from La Crescenta tried snowboarding on Bear Mountain a few months ago. He said he gave it up because he felt beat up and frustrated when he was done.

"It felt like you had no control over the direction you are going," said Yegikyan, who now prefers skiing. The limitations snowboarders face in powder and flat terrain are a reason Kristy Chocholaty, 35, of Truckee has given up on the sport.

She jumped on the snowboard bandwagon in the late 1990s. "I wanted to check it out because so many people were snowboarding at the time," she said.

But she said she gets frustrated when she tries to keep up with her skier husband and gets stuck in places that he can simply push through with his poles.

Ski and snowboard manufacturers acknowledge the factors weighing on snowboards. But they predict sales will rise again as manufacturers push new board designs that will make them easier and safer to ride.

"Like anything else, you will see the snowboarding trend wax and wane," said Nick Castagnoli, a spokesman for Rossignol Skis USA, a longtime manufacturer of skis, snowboards and other snow gear.

Meanwhile, new ski designs are making it easier than ever for ski fans of all ages to enjoy the sport. Thanks to so-called shaped skis, many beginners are gaining proficiency quickly, while some veterans are mastering tricks that would have been difficult on conventional skis.

Shaped skis are shorter than traditional straight skis. They're also wider at the front and back. That hourglass shape enables skiers to turn with less effort — and with fewer wipeouts. These wider skis are also better for schussing over powder and cruddy snow. Plus, skis with upturned tips on both ends can be ridden forward and backward, just like a snowboard.

As a result, powder hounds who want to try downhill skiing, backcountry trekking and terrain park tricks can do it all and save money by buying one set of skis.

Thanks to such new designs, skiers will compete for the first time in slopestyle and half pipe competitions at the 2014 Winter Games, the International Olympic Committee recently ruled.

"It's interesting where the industry is going now," said Josh Holm, who manages the ski rental shop at Squaw Valley Ski Resort. "You can ski on a half pipe and land backward just like a snowboarder."

Read More..

Student Appeals Suspension for Refusing to Wear RFID Tracker

A Texas high school student on Friday asked a federal appeals court to overturn a lower court’s order upholding her school suspension for refusing to wear around her neck an RFID-chip student ID she claims is the “Mark of the Beast.”

The Northside Independent School District in San Antonio began issuing the RFID-laden student-body cards when the semester began in the fall. The ID badge has a bar code associated with a student’s Social Security number. The chip monitors pupils’ movements on campus, from when they arrive until when they leave.

Sophomore Andrea Hernandez was notified in November by the Northside Independent School District in San Antonio that she would not be able to continue attending John Jay High unless she wears the badge around her neck like all students. The district said the girl, who objects largely on religious grounds, would have to attend another high school that does not employ the RFID tags.

The devout Christian sued, and on Tuesday a Texas federal judge concluded the 15-year-old’s right of religion was not breached. That’s because the district, the court ruled, eventually agreed to accommodate the girl and allow her to remove the RFID chip while still demanding that she wear the identification like the other students.

U.S. District Judge Orlando Garcia’s ruling gave the girl and her family until Jan. 18 to decide whether to go to a different school or comport. She appealed Friday, arguing that adorning herself with the ID card, even one without an RFID chip, amounted to discriminating against her “sincerely held beliefs.”

“To Andrea, this ‘accommodation’ is similar to allowing a religious adherent who must eat a pork-free diet to have his pork-free diet, but to require him to wear a shirt advocating pork,” the girl’s attorney, Jerry Lynn Ward of the Rutherford Institute, wrote the New Orleans-based appeals court. (.pdf) The lower court’s decision, Ward added, “unquestionably constitutes a substantial burden upon her free exercise of religion.”

David Kravets is a senior staff writer for Wired.com and founder of the fake news site TheYellowDailyNews.com. He's a dad of two boys and has been a reporter since the manual typewriter days.

Read more by David Kravets

Follow @dmkravets and @ThreatLevel on Twitter.

Read More..

TV anchorman Gregory won’t face charges over gun clip

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The District of Columbia has declined to prosecute NBC News anchor David Gregory for displaying an illegal high-capacity gun clip on a broadcast, a prosecutor said on Friday.

District of Columbia Attorney General Irvin Nathan said his office would not seek to charge Gregory for showing the 30-round magazine on the December 23 broadcast of “Meet the Press” in part because it was an element of the renewed debate about firearms.

His office “has determined to exercise its prosecutorial discretion to decline to bring criminal charges against Mr. Gregory, who has no criminal record, or any other NBC employee based on the events associated with the December 23, 2012, broadcast,” Nathan said in a letter to NBC’s lawyers.

He called the decision “very close.”

Gregory held up the magazine while hosting an interview with National Rifle Association Chief Executive Wayne LaPierre at NBC’s studios in the District. Law in the U.S. capital bars possession of high-capacity magazines whether or not they are attached to a weapon or loaded.

The “Meet the Press” show on firearms was part of a galvanized public debate on guns after the December 14 massacre of 20 schoolchildren and six adults in Newtown, Connecticut.

Nathan said the clip was returned to its owner outside the District after the show. It then was turned over to District police with NBC’s help.

He added that Gregory had displayed the magazine even though city police had told NBC that possession was illegal.

“We note that NBC has now acknowledged that its interpretation of the information it received was incorrect,” Nathan said.

(Reporting by Ian Simpson; Editing by Eric Walsh)

TV News Headlines – Yahoo! News

Title Post: TV anchorman Gregory won’t face charges over gun clip
Url Post: http://www.news.fluser.com/tv-anchorman-gregory-wont-face-charges-over-gun-clip/
Link To Post : TV anchorman Gregory won’t face charges over gun clip
Rating:
100%

based on 99998 ratings.
5 user reviews.
Author: Fluser SeoLink
Thanks for visiting the blog, If any criticism and suggestions please leave a comment

Read More..

Flu Deaths Reach Epidemic Level, but May Be at Peak

Deaths in the current flu season have officially crossed the line into “epidemic” territory, federal health officials said Friday, adding that, on the bright side, there were also early signs that the caseloads could be peaking.

Officials from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, speaking on a telephone news conference, again urged Americans to keep getting flu shots. At the same time, they emphasized that the shots are not infallible: a preliminary study rated this year’s vaccine as 62 percent effective, even though it is a good match for the most worrisome virus circulating. That corresponds to a rating of “moderately” effective — the vaccine typically ranges from 50 percent to 70 percent effective, they said.

Even though deaths stepped — barely — into epidemic territory for the first time last Saturday, the C.D.C. officials expressed no alarm, and said it was possible that new flu infections were peaking in some parts of the country. “Most of the country is seeing a lot of flu and that may continue for weeks,” said Dr. Thomas R. Frieden, the C.D.C.’s director.

New outpatient cases — a measure based on what percentage of doctor visits were for colds or flu — dropped off slightly from the previous week, to 4 percent from 6 percent. The trend was more pronounced in the South, where this year’s season began.

Dr. Frieden cautioned that the new flu figures could be aberrations because they were gathered as the holiday season was ending. Few people schedule routine checkups then, so the percentage of visits for severe illness can be pushed artificially high for a week or two, then inevitably drop.

Deaths from pneumonia and the flu, a wavy curve that is low in summer and high in winter, typically touch the epidemic level for one or two weeks every flu season. How bad a season is depends on how high the deaths climb for how long.

So far this season, 20 children with confirmed flu tests have died, but that is presumably lower than the actual number of deaths because not all children are tested and not all such deaths are reported. How many adults die will not be estimated until after the season ends, said Dr. Joseph Bresee, the chief of prevention and epidemiology for the C.D.C.’s flu branch. Epidemiologists count how many death certificates are filed in a flu year, compare the number with normal years, and estimate what percentage were probably flu-related.

Many people are getting ill this year because the country is also having widespread outbreaks of two diseases with overlapping symptoms, norovirus and whooping cough, and the normal winter surge in common colds. Flu shots have no effect on any of those.

Spot shortages of vaccines have been reported, and there will not be enough for all Americans, since the industry has made and shipped only about 130 million doses. But officials said they would be pleased if 50 percent of Americans got shots; in a typical year, 37 percent do.

Dr. Bresee said that this year’s epidemic resembles that of 2003-4, which also began early, was dominated by an H3N2 strain and killed more Americans than usual.

Nevertheless, more Americans now routinely get flu shots than did then, and doctors are much quicker to prescribe Tamiflu and Relenza, drugs that can lessen a flu’s severity if taken early.

The C.D.C.’s vaccine effectiveness study bore out the point of view of a report released last year by the University of Minnesota’s Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy. It said that the shot’s effectiveness had been “overpromoted and overhyped,” said Michael T. Osterholm, the center’s director.

Although the report supported getting flu shots, it said that new vaccines offering lifelong protection against all flu strains, instead of annual partial protection against a mix-and-match set, must be created.

“But there’s no appetite to fund that research,” Dr. Osterholm said in an interview Friday.

“To get a vaccine across the ‘Valley of Death’ is likely to cost $1 billion,” he added, referring to the huge clinical trials that would be needed to approve a new type of vaccine. “No government has put more than $100 million into any candidate, and the private sector has no appetite for it because there’s not enough return on investment.”

At the same time, he praised the C.D.C. for measuring vaccine effectiveness in midseason.

“We’re the only ones in the world who have data like that,” he said.

“Vaccine effectiveness” is a very different metric from vaccine-virus match, which is done in a lab. Vaccine efficacy is measured by interviewing hundreds of sick or recovering patients who had positive flu tests and asking whether and when they had received shots.

Only people sick enough to visit doctors get flu tests, said Thomas Skinner, a C.D.C. spokesman, so the metric means the shot “reduces by 62 percent your chance of getting a flu so bad that you have to go to a doctor or hospital.”

During the telephone news conference Friday, Dr. Frieden repeatedly described the vaccine as “far from perfect, but by far the best tool we have to prevent influenza.”

Most vaccinations given in childhood for threats like measles and diphtheria are 90 percent effective or better. But flu viruses mutate so fast that they must be remade annually. Scientists are trying to develop vaccines that target bits of the virus that appear to stay constant, like the stem of the hemagglutinin spike that lets the virus break into lung cells.

During the 2009 swine flu pandemic, many elderly Americans had natural protection, presumably from flus they caught in the 1930s or ’40s.

“Think about that,” Dr. Osterholm said. “Even though they were old, they were still protected. We’ve got to figure out how to capture that kind of immunity — which current vaccines do not.”

At Friday’s news conference, Dr. Bresee acknowledged the difficulties, saying: “If I had the perfect answer as to how to make a better flu vaccine, I’d probably get a Nobel Prize.”

Read More..

Greece Votes to Raise Tax On Its Higher Earners

ATHENS — Greek lawmakers voted late Friday to increase taxes on middle- to high-income earners, self-employed professionals and businesses despite vehement objections by the political opposition and several ruling coalition deputies who said austerity-weary citizens should not be subjected to further pain.

The change to the tax code, one of a long line of pledges Greece has made to international creditors in exchange for continued bailout money, passed comfortably with at least 162 of the ruling coalition’s 163 members backing the articles in a roll call that came after two days of heated debate in the 300-seat Parliament.

The fragile coalition government of Prime Minister Antonis Samaras hopes to raise 2.3 billion euros in much-needed revenue from the new law, which increases the amount of income tax paid by those earning more than 20,000 euros a year, trims tax benefits for having children, revokes tax breaks for farmers and increases corporate tax to 26 percent from 20 percent. The new law also increases the amount of income tax paid by self-employed professionals like doctors and electricians, who are widely perceived as not paying their share by understating their income. New rules abolishing a tax-exempt threshold means the self-employed would be taxed from the first euro they earn.

Defending the bill in Parliament, Finance Minister Yannis Stournaras called it “a vital fiscal reform” that would avert additional across-the-board cuts to workers and pensioners.

“Every euro collected in tax revenue is one euro saved from salaries, pensions and social benefits,” he said. He rejected a flurry of amendments from members of two junior parties in the coalition and the opposition, noting that such costly changes would throw Greece off the path to economic health and put further bailout money in jeopardy.

Calling Mr. Stournaras a “political terrorist,” Panagiotis Lafazanis, a lawmaker of the leftist party Syriza, which opposes the terms of Greece’s bailouts, said the tax bill was “the nail in the coffin of social justice,” adding that “Greek society is more important” than its creditors.

Other opposition lawmakers berated the government for planning to impose additional measures in the coming days, including tighter control of the budgets of ministries and state utilities, the reduction of parliamentary employees’ wages in line with cuts to the wages of other civil servants, and the revision of Greece’s second loan agreement with foreign creditors, in the form of special edicts that do not require parliamentary approval. The loan agreement amendment surrenders the country’s rights to protect its assets from creditors, Syriza complained.

Since 2010, the European Union and the International Monetary Fund have committed to two bailouts for Greece worth 240 billion euros in exchange for austerity measures that have hurt Greek living standards, pushed unemployment close to 27 percent and fueled angry street protests.

The new law is to be followed in spring by a thorough overhaul of the tax system that will introduce jail terms for large-scale evaders instead of the suspended sentences handed down now.

Greece’s failure to crack down on widespread tax evasion came into sharp focus over the holidays after prosecutors revealed that the names of three relatives of the former finance minister George Papaconstantinou had been removed from a list of some 2,000 wealthy Greeks with Swiss bank accounts. Parliament is to vote next Thursday on whether Mr. Papaconstantinou, and his successor as finance minister, Evangelos Venizelos, who leads the coalition’s Socialist party, will face a parliamentary inquiry on whether they should be indicted on charges of criminal tampering and breach of duty.

Read More..

Irvine City Council overhauls oversight, spending on Great Park

Capping a raucous eight-hour-plus meeting, the Irvine City Council early Wednesday voted to overhaul the oversight and spending on the beleaguered Orange County Great Park while authorizing an audit of the more than $220 million that so far has been spent on the ambitious project.

A newly elected City Council majority voted 3 to 2 to terminate contracts with two firms that had been paid a combined $1.1 million a year for consulting, lobbying, marketing and public relations. One of those firms — Forde & Mollrich public relations — has been paid $12.4 million since county voters approved the Great Park plan in 2002.

"We need to stop talking about building a Great Park and actually start building a Great Park," council member Jeff Lalloway said.

The council, by the same split vote, also changed the composition of the Great Park's board of directors, shedding four non-elected members and handing control to Irvine's five council members.

The actions mark a significant turning point in the decade-long effort to turn the former El Toro Marine base into a 1,447-acre municipal park with man-made canyons, rivers, forests and gardens that planners hoped would rival New York's Central Park.

The city hoped to finish and maintain the park for years to come with $1.4 billion in state redevelopment funds. But that money vanished last year as part of the cutbacks to deal with California's massive budget deficit.

"We've gone through $220 million, but where has it gone?" council member Christina Shea said of the project's initial funding from developers in exchange for the right to build around the site. "The fact of the matter is the money is almost gone. It can't be business as usual."

The council majority said the changes will bring accountability and efficiencies to a project that critics say has been larded with wasteful spending and no-bid contracts. For all that has been spent, only about 200 acres of the park has been developed and half of that is leased to farmers.

But council members Larry Agran and Beth Krom, who have steered the course of the project since its inception, voted against reconfiguring the Great Park's board of directors and canceling the contracts with the two firms.

Krom has called the move a "witch hunt" against her and Agran. Feuding between liberal and conservative factions on the council has long shaped Irvine politics.

"This is a power play," she said. "There's a new sheriff in town."

The council meeting stretched long into the night, with the final vote coming Wednesday at 1:34 a.m. Tensions were high in the packed chambers with cheering, clapping and heckling coming from the crowd.

At one point council member Lalloway lamented that he "couldn't hear himself think."

During public comments, newly elected Orange County Supervisor Todd Spitzer chastised the council for "fighting like schoolchildren." Earlier this week he said that if the Irvine's new council majority can't make progress on the Great Park, he would seek a ballot initiative to have the county take over.

And Spitzer angrily told Agran that his stewardship of the project had been a failure.

"You know what?" he said. "It's their vision now. You're in the minority."

mike.anton@latimes.com

rhea.mahbubani@latimes.com

Read More..

Top U.S. General Says Stopping a Syrian Chemical Attack Is 'Almost Unachievable'

If Syrian dictator Bashar Assad decides to use his chemical weapons, there won’t be a thing the U.S. military can do to stop him, America’s top military officer conceded on Thursday. Nor will the U.S. step into a “hostile” atmosphere, with or without Assad, to keep those chemicals under control.

It’s been a month since U.S. intelligence learned that Assad’s forces were mixing some of their precursor chemicals for sarin gas, as Danger Room first reported. The Syrian military even loaded aerial bombs with the deadly agent. Assad hasn’t used the weapons — yet. Should he change his mind, there’s little chance the U.S. would know it before it’s too late to stop the first chemical attack in the Mideast in over 20 years.

“The act of preventing the use of chemical weapons would be almost unachievable,” Gen. Martin Dempsey, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told reporters at the Pentagon. “You would have to have such clarity of intelligence, persistent surveillance, you’d have to actually see it before it happened. And that’s unlikely, to be sure.”

That explains the emphasis the Obama administration has given, from President Obama and Defense Secretary Leon Panetta on down, to publicly warning Assad that using his chemical weapons would cross a “red line.” Dempsey said that “messaging” seeks to establish a deterrent, since Assad might think it would prompt outright U.S. or international intervention leading to his downfall. But that’s different from preemption.

American officials began strategizing months ago for how it should operate in a post-Assad Syria. And that includes scoping out plans for disposing of Assad’s stockpiles of nerve and mustard agents.

Today, however, Panetta shot down a related preventive step: sending U.S. troops into the chaos of the Syrian civil war to secure the chemical stocks.

U.S. military officials have previously speculated that an intervention to take hold of an estimated 500 tons of chemical precursors would require 75,000 troops, a force larger than the one currently in Afghanistan. Panetta said the international community needs to establish a “process and procedure” for keeping the stockpiles under control — but only after Assad falls, which is an uncertain proposition. U.S. intervention to lock down the chemicals, Panetta said, would depend on the establishment of new regime willing to invite the U.S. military in — another uncertain proposition.

“We’re not working on options that involve boots on the ground,” Panetta said. If there’s a “peaceful transition,” then the U.S. might consider a request that a friendly successor government might make to secure the chemical stocks. “But in a hostile situation, we’re not planning for that.” It’s looking likely that the 400 U.S. soldiers sent to Turkey to man Patriot missile batteries could be the only uniformed troops that the Pentagon openly sends to handle the Syrian crisis.

The U.S. public has little appetite for throwing exhausted U.S. soldiers and marines into yet another bloody Mideastern conflict. But Panetta and Dempsey’s concession underscores the massive risks that the Syrian civil war poses for either the use or black market proliferation of chemical weapons. The revolution has  already claimed the lives of 60,000 Syrians. The longer it goes on, the greater the pressure Assad may feel to unleash his unconventional arms. Alternatively, various Syrian factions might be either unwilling or unable to secure the stocks, should they prevail, nor is there any guarantee they will give up the chemical weapons once victorious.

There is confusion about how long the sarin gas will remain usable once its precursors combine. Nerve agents are inherently unstable, but U.S. government sources have told Danger Room that Syrian sophistication with chemical weaponry may leave the combined, weaponized sarin deadly for up to a year. Dempsey and Panetta, however, believe that they’ll break down after 60 days. “That’s what the scientists tell us,” Dempsey said. “I’d still be reluctant to handle it myself.”

Disposing of (or “demilitarizing”) chemical weapons is extraordinarily difficult under any circumstances; Iraq’s former chemical bunkers are still toxic nearly  than a decade after Saddam’s overthrow, and the U.S. recently said it won’t be done disposing of its Cold War chemical weapon arsenal until 2023. Assad’s nerve agents will be no exception.

One of sarin’s main precursors – methylphosphonyl difluoride, or DF – can be turned into a somewhat non-toxic slurry, if combined properly with lye and water. The problem is that when DF reacts with water, it generates heat. And since DF has an extremely low boiling point — just 55.4 degrees Celsius — it means that the chances of accidentally releasing toxic gases are really high. “You could easily kill yourself during the demil,” one observer told Danger Room during the fall. That would explain Dempsey’s reluctance to touch it.

Naturally, this process could only begin once the DF and the rubbing alcohol (sarin’s other main precursor) was gathered up from Assad’s couple dozen storage locations. Then, they’d have to be carted far, far out into the desert — to make sure no bystanders could be hurt — along with the enormous stirred-tank reactors needed to conduct the dangerous chemistry experiments. And when it was all done, there would the result would be a whole lot of hydrofluoric acid, which is itself a poison.

It’s an operation that will take many months, many men, and many millions of dollars. No wonder the leaders of America’s overtaxed military won’t commit to the job until the Syrian civil war is done.

Read More..

Kimmel’s pot jokes earn invite from Calif. college

ARCATA, Calif. (AP) — Humboldt State University in California has invited Jimmy Kimmel to deliver the school’s commencement address after he joked about its marijuana research program.

The host of “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” devoted three minutes of his late-night show in November to poking fun at the new program.

Kimmel’s faux recruiting commercial said students could look forward to low-pressure careers such as dog walking, organizing drum circles and occupying Wall Street.

University spokesman Jarad Petroske said Thursday the school has not heard from Kimmel. The comedian’s publicist Alyssa Wilkins did not reply to an email from The Associated Press seeking a response.

Humboldt State President Rollin Richmond and student body president Ellyn Henderson revealed they sent Kimmel a letter last month saying they found parts of the skit funny but thought it unfairly portrayed the campus community as a bunch of pot-obsessed slackers.

Entertainment News Headlines – Yahoo! News

Title Post: Kimmel’s pot jokes earn invite from Calif. college
Url Post: http://www.news.fluser.com/kimmels-pot-jokes-earn-invite-from-calif-college/
Link To Post : Kimmel’s pot jokes earn invite from Calif. college
Rating:
100%

based on 99998 ratings.
5 user reviews.
Author: Fluser SeoLink
Thanks for visiting the blog, If any criticism and suggestions please leave a comment

Read More..

Children’s Flu Medicine in Short Supply

As influenza cases surge around the country, health officials say they are trying to stem a shortage of treatments for children.

Pharmacies around the country have reported dwindling supplies of liquid Tamiflu, a prescription flu medicine that can ease symptoms if taken within 48 hours of their onset. The drug is available in capsules for adults and a liquid suspension for children and infants.

“There are intermittent shortages of the liquid version (but not the capsule version) due to the supplier’s challenges to meet the current demand,” Carolyn Castel, a spokeswomen for CVS Caremark, said in an e-mail.

Pharmacies around the country are experiencing shortages of the liquid suspension “due to recent increased demand,” Sarah Clark-Lynn, a spokeswoman for the Food and Drug Administration, said on Thursday.

Ms. Clark-Lynn said the F.D.A. was working with the company that markets Tamiflu, Genentech, to increase supplies. The agency is also letting pharmacists know that in emergencies they can compound the adult Tamiflu capsules to make liquid versions for children.

A similar shortage of Tamiflu has hit Canada, which has also been gripped by widespread flu outbreaks, prompting the government there to tap into a national stockpile of the drug.

“That really unexpected increase in demand — far above other influenza seasons — has really depleted the usual stocks which in any other season would have been more than sufficient,” Dr. Barbara Raymond, director of pandemic preparedness for the Public Health Agency of Canada, told The Ottawa Citizen.

Read More..

2 Years Into Nokia Turnaround, Some Good News

Nearly two years ago, Stephen A. Elop, Nokia’s new chief executive, spoke of flaming ocean platforms and shark-infested waters to describe the problems he inherited as the company teetered on the brink of irrelevance.

Mr. Elop painted the bleak outlook as he prescribed a radical cure for the Finnish mobile phone pioneer: The rejection of the company’s own Symbian smartphone operating system for a shotgun wedding to Microsoft, itself stumbling badly with smartphone software. After that, sales slumped sharply, losses mounted and huge layoffs followed.

On Thursday, he delivered unexpected good news: a profit. Sales of its new smartphone line, the Lumia, powered by Microsoft’s Windows Phone operating system, soared more than 50 percent in the fourth quarter of last year, according to preliminary financial information.

In what was seen as a make-or-break quarter, Mr. Elop said Nokia would break even or turn a 2 percent profit rather than report a loss as large as 10 percent, as analysts expected.

Nokia will report its earnings on Jan. 24.

Wall Street reacted to the announcement by sending Nokia’s American depositary receipts up 18.67 percent, or 70 cents, to $4.45.

“While we definitely experienced some tough challenges in the first half of 2012, we are managing through these issues,” Mr. Elop said in a conference call with journalists.

What Nokia has accomplished under Mr. Elop is to produce a line of increasingly competitive smartphones that are starting to draw favorable comparisons with those from Samsung and Apple, the two companies most responsible for knocking Nokia from its lofty perch.

“The Lumia smartphones are night-and-day different from Nokia’s old Symbian handsets,” said Francisco Jeronimo, an analyst with the International Data Corporation in London. “I think what we are starting to see now is what will be a steady turnaround in Nokia’s fortunes.”

The company, which dominated the cellphone business until Apple introduced its iPhone in 2007, still has a long way to go to achieve its former stature. In the third quarter, Nokia held on to a 4 percent share of the global smartphone market, and was ranked a distant No. 10 in the sector, according to Strategy Analytics, a research firm.

Samsung and Apple, the No. 1 and No. 2 smartphone makers, together had 50 percent of the global smartphone market, and their sales were growing. While its competitors rose, Nokia has generated nearly 5 billion euros ($6.5 billion) in losses under Mr. Elop, and eliminated a third of its work force.

The key to its turnaround was the introduction in October of the top-of-the-line Lumia 920 and 820, which used the new Windows Phone 8 operating system. Since then, Nokia has spent heavily on advertising in Britain and Europe to promote the models. The company will not disclose how much it had spent on its campaign, but its television ads were ubiquitous over the holidays, said Neil Mawston, an analyst at Strategy Analytics in London.

The heavy promotion, which was aided by Microsoft’s own advertising, has helped the company recapture some of its lost glory, Mr. Mawston said.

But he warned that “Nokia still lacks the true killer phone that will enable it to compete with the iPhone 5 or Samsung Galaxy S III.” He expected Nokia’s share of the global smartphone market to rise to 6 percent by the end of the year.

The company’s financial position is likely to revive even more quickly as a result of the strict cost-cutting imposed by Mr. Elop, who ran Microsoft’s business software division before joining Nokia in late 2010.

Since then, Nokia has shut factories across Europe. Last month, the company sold its 540,000-square-foot glass-and-wood headquarters in the Helsinki suburb of Espoo to Finnish investors, and leased it back. The maneuver netted Nokia 170 million euros.

Besides a more competitive array of phones, Nokia has discarded its market-leader mentality. Employees are now routinely traveling in economy class and sharing rides to airports. Workers no longer use costly telephone conference calling but speak in group teleconferences using less expensive Internet calling services.

“The company is a lot smaller now but people are working better together,” said Susan Sheehan, a Nokia spokeswoman. “Everyone has been pitching in.”

Even at Nokia Siemens, the company’s long-suffering network equipment venture, the future is looking brighter than it was two years ago. On Thursday, Nokia said the unit, which contributes about 40 percent of total sales, would report an operating profit for the quarter, its third consecutive quarterly profit.

Nokia, in its announcement to investors, even revised the operating profit margin forecast at the venture to 13 to 15 percent of sales, up from a range of 4 to 12 percent.

Looking ahead, Nokia said it expected to return to an operating loss of 2 percent of sales because of the first-quarter postholiday buying lull and fierce competition. But the results for the coming three months could vary widely.

Pete Cunningham, an analyst at Canalys, a research firm in Reading, England, said that Nokia still faced challenges. “2013 could still turn out to be another very difficult year for Nokia. It is way too premature to say that the company has made a turnaround.”

Mr. Cunningham said he used the Lumia 920, Nokia’s newest smartphone, during the Christmas holidays and liked it.

“But the more I used the phone, the more apparent it became to me that there are big gaps between Lumia and its competitors in terms of the functionality and usability of its apps,” Mr. Cunningham said.

“I still think there is a lot of work to be done on Lumia.”

Read More..