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Laptops versus Netbooks. What I think of the two.

If consumers can't decide between a netbook and a low-priced laptop this holiday season, manufacturers certainly aren't helping matters.

When I see the season's top netbook, the 12-inch Acer Aspire Timeline, has dimensions, memory (3 gigabytes) and pricing (around $600) that's similar to a 14-inch Toshiba Satellite dual-core laptop, it's little wonder that buyers are having an increasingly difficult time telling the two apart. In fact, according to a NPD Group report issued earlier this year, almost 60% of consumers who bought a netbook instead of a notebook thought they would have the same capabilities. Roughly the same percentage was satisfied with its netbooks, compared to 70% of those who planned on buying a netbook all along.

The notion of the netbook was that it was small, cheap and light, but because of profit margins, they started to creep into the 12-inch category without beefing up the internal components I say

I agree Netbooks were once featherweight, Linux-equipped toys with puny Atom processors and sub-$300 price tags. Even as bigger manufacturers like Hewlett-Packard and Samsung Electronics entered the market and Microsoft's Windows operating systems became prevalent, netbooks still remained small, affordable and long on battery life.

Samsung's N120, for example, has Windows XP, but it's only 10 inches wide, costs as little as $320 and maintains a charge for six hours. Toshiba's Satellite U505 is small and only has 1 gigabyte of memory, but its $400 price tag nets consumers Windows 7 and 9.5 hours of battery time. Though the battery on Acer's Timeline holds a charge for 10 hours, and its Pentium processor offers 3 gigabytes of memory, its size and $550 price tag delete its benefits.

"You want a small netbook that's a little underpowered, which is the tradeoff for price and size and weight," Fox says. "If you're getting up around $500, there's little value in getting an oversized netbook if you're losing the advantages of a netbook. It's the worst of both worlds."

Pasta myths--debunked

I'm blown away that people don't know this. It doesn't get any better than a bowl of pasta, right? But too often cooks ruin a great dish by following one (or more) of these myths. Avoid them, and you'll be licking your plate clean in no time.

Myth: Breaking long pasta into shorter pieces makes it easier to eat.
If spaghetti were better short, it would have been made that way! Plus, broken strands are hard to eat since they’re not long enough to twirl onto a fork.
More: 12 pasta shapes and their best sauce matches »

Myth: Add olive oil to the cooking water to keep the pasta from sticking.
Pasta shouldn’t stick when properly cooked. If it’s cooked with olive oil, it will actually coat the noodles and prevent sauce from sticking.
More: 3 golden rules for cooking pasta »
Myth: Throw the pasta against the wall—if it sticks, it’s done.
The only way to know if it’s done is to taste it! It should be al dente, or firm to the bite. The more pasta cooks, the gummier it gets, so if it sticks to the wall it’s probably overdone.
More: 4 tricks to time it just right, from Marcella Hazan »

Myth: Rinse pasta after cooking and draining.
This will make the pasta cold and rinse away the starch that helps bind the sauce to it.
More: 15 easy sauce-shape pairings and recipes »

Myth: It’s all about the sauce.
Italians will tell you it’s pasta with sauce—not sauce with pasta! Too much sauce buries the flavor of the pasta and overwhelms it.
More: 5 every day pasta sauce recipes »

Vator Splash Event

On the evening of February 4, 2010, 10 seed- to early-stage companies selected by their peers, and vetted by judges will have the opportunity to present onstage to a high-profile group of entrepreneurs, investors and media.

In addition, Mark Pincus, CEO and Founder of Zynga, will talk about how he built the hottest social gaming company in just a few years, and Jeff Smith, CEO and co-founder of Smule, will talk about how he built some of the most popular and highest-grossing iPhone apps. Both executives have founded and taken companies public in the past. We expect more than 300 attendees, including industry peers, investors and media. Investors from August Capital, Google Ventures, Greycroft Partners and Norwest Venture Partners have committed to attending.

Vator members only can reserve a 50% discounted ticket or a demo table: Click here and enter "splash50” as the discount code to buy your ticket for 50% off. Only a few discount tickets are available. Get the tickets now before the offer expires on Monday, December 7th. Submit or nominate an early-stage company to pitch and don't forget to cast your vote: Vator Splash Competition.

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Top Ten Tips for 2009 Hurricane Season Planning from SunGard Availability Services

Top Ten Tips for 2009 Hurricane Season Planning from SunGard Availability Services

Steps Outline How to Stay on Top of Disaster Recovery Plans WAYNE, Pa., June 3 /PRNewswire/ -- With the onset of the 2009 hurricane season, SunGard Availability Serviceshas outlined its top ten tips for disaster preparedness. By following these steps, organizations will be better prepared to keep their systems, processes and people up and running during and after a major storm. "Today, many organizations are focused on short-term pressures to reduce spending, and because of this, may not be properly testing their recovery plans," said Robert DiLossi, director of crisis management at SunGard Availability Services. "We have seen all too often organizations neglect key elements of their information availability programs only to realize the grave consequences when it's too late. As hurricane season approaches, it is imperative that companies reexamine and re-test existing plans, making sure they align with the current state of the business - from both IT and business process perspectives - in case a major storm should occur. For those organizations facing travel restrictions due to budget constraints, new modes of testing - such as remote or virtualized testing - provide cost-effective alternatives to more traditional methods." SunGard Availability Services recommends companies follow these proactive steps to help ensure readiness for the 2009 hurricane season: Regularly test your disaster recovery plan. Simply having a plan in place is not enough. Develop andregularly test your crisis communication plan so that the first time it is executed is not during an emergency. Remember to test under realistic conditions and make the plan robust enough to address extended recovery that may require utilization of new facilities, relocation of staff and involvement of outside personnel. Revisit and reassign responsibilities. Factor in changes to your organization caused by recent layoffs and restructurings. Assign new responsibilities to employees based on the current organizational structure and available resources. Test this updated plan to ensure all tools and protocols are in place to operate during a disaster, reaching out to all parts of the organization and employee family members as well as vendors, government agencies and emergency responders. Make sure your notification system is up-to-date. Critical during any potential interruption, notification should be an integral part of an organization's disaster recovery plan. Make sure all contact numbers are up-to-date, allowing the organization to get in touch with key personnel in the event of an emergency. This will also help prioritize methods of communication and track which employees have received messages. Put your people first. Employees are the heart of an organization; however, many human resources aspects are frequently overlooked in disaster recovery planning. Businesses must identify alternate locations where employees can go in the event a primary work location is unavailable and address the physical safety and psychological well-being of employees. Assign backup roles for the inevitable times when key players are not available or missing, and time-sensitive actions need to be taken. Employ cross training to have alternative contacts ready to go. Don't wait to relocate. If an organization has access to hot or cold back-up sites, a common mistake is to wait too long before declaring an emergency and relocating personnel. If an organization is located in an area for which a government evacuation order has been issued, it should declare and relocate immediately. Don't forget about your technology. Develop procedures for technical recovery scripts that will be deployed to help get your IT infrastructure up and running. Make the scripts comprehensive and easy to understand so people who are not familiar with them can easily follow along. Keep your vendor list current. Strictly enforce change management and control processes to help ensure vendor contacts are current so vital services will be quickly available when needed. Consider the impact outside of your organization. In the event of a disaster, will your vendors be able to perform their roles in supporting your critical technical infrastructure and business processes? Consider looking at secondary providers as a precaution. Take time to evaluate whether support or maintenance contracts need to be extended or have levels of support modified. Evaluate readiness and completeness of offsite data storage. Paper records and backup tapes may be totally lost, destroyed or unavailable. Develop contingencies in the event delivery of offsite-stored data is delayed. Investigate using electronic media - through disk to disk backup - to help safeguard and provide backup information. Take the guesswork out of server recovery. Should a disaster occur, re-building servers from the ground up consumes time and stretches internal IT resources. Consider working with a third-party provider that can simplify these processes by rebuilding your operating systems on its own servers - enabling a speedy and more cost-effective recovery. "Just because hurricane season has begun does not mean there isn't time to prepare," said Mr. DiLossi. "Organizations often get overwhelmed by disaster recovery planning but in the short-term they can take the first steps of updating notification systems, coordinating with outside vendors/agencies and testing current plans. It cannot be said enough times - test the way you recover, recover the way you test." SunGard Availability Services provides disaster recovery process expertise and automation combined with an enterprise-class IT infrastructure - a protocol-independent network, hardened facilities and redundant power systems. In addition, the company has a 100 percent success rate helping customers to recover in its 30-year history.

Very sexy pictures

Very Tech Brings You Technology with and Edge - Sexy Pictures

Japanese manga series "Death Note" has been acquired for an English language film adaptation. Warner Bros. is developing the series into a live-action movie.

One in 5 teenagers say they've electronically sent or posted online nude or semi-nude images of themselves, which may be fueling a more casual attitude toward sex, according to a "Sex and Tech" survey released this week by The National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy and CosmoGirl.com.

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Sexy Images

Seeking Alpha3X Leveraged ETFs

Seeking Alpha3X Leveraged ETFs Immediately Popular with TradersMonday November 10, 11:25 am ET By Index Universe
IndexUniverse submits: By Matthew Hougan
Contrary to expectations (including mine), the Direxion 300% leveraged and inverse ETFs are rapidly gaining traction in the marketplace.
The company launched eight super-leveraged ETFS last week:
Fund
Ticker
Index
Large Cap Bull 3x Shares
BGU
Russell 1000 (300%)
Large Cap Bear 3x Shares
BGZ
Russell 1000 (-300%)
Small Call Bull 3x Shares
TNA
Russell 200 (300%)
Small Cap Bear 3x Shares
TZA
Russell 2000 (-300%)
Energy Bull 3x Shares
ERX
Russell 1000 Energy (300%)
Energy Bear 3x Shares
ERY
Russell 1000 Energy (-300%)
Financial Bull 3x Shares
FAS
Russell 1000 Financial Services (300%)
Financial Bear 3x Shares
FAZ
Russell 1000 Financial Services (-300%)
The funds are designed to deliver 300% and -300% of the daily return of their benchmark indexes, and follow in the success of the wildly successful ProShares ETFs, which provide 200% and -200% exposure to the market.
I must admit: I was very skeptical of these funds' prospects?at first. I worried that the funds were not appropriate for real "investors." 300% is a lot of leverage, particularly when volatility is as high as it is today. Investors could easily lose half their money in a single day.
Moreover, I was concerned about the issue of compounding. I have written extensively about how compounding causes the long-term returns of leveraged funds to deviate from their expected goals. These ETFs are designed to deliver 300% or -300% of the daily returns of their benchmarks. Over a week, month or year, however, they won't come close to that 300% return, because compounding (particularly in volatile markets) will have an enormous impact on the results.
I was also skeptical that these ETFs would attract much of a trading audience. The ProShares ETFs have enormous liquidity, which is one of the reasons they appeal to the trading community. I doubted that these ETFs could attract enough liquidity to convince the trading community to switch from the ProShares ETFs, despite the higher leverage rate offered by Direxion.
But since they launched on Wednesday, the Direxion ETFs have attracted significant trading volume and activity.
On its first day on the market, for instance, the Large Cap Bear 3x Shares (NYSEArca: BGZ) traded just 13,000 shares. On day 2, it traded 123,000 shares. Today, it traded 334,000 shares.
Its twin, the LargeCap Bull 3x Shares ETF (NYSEArca: BGU) has done even better, trading 19,000 shares, 361,000 shares and 581,500 shares, respectively.
That's certainly not anywhere near what the ProShares funds trade. The ProShares Ultra S&P 500 (NYSEArca: SSO) traded 80 million shares today.
But hitting half a million shares traded on just the third day on the market is pretty darn good for an ETF. A lot of funds that I consider fairly liquid trade less than 500,000 shares per day, such as the Rydex S&P 500 Equal Weight ETF (NYSEArca: [[RSP]]) and the PowerShares Dynamic Market ETF (NYSEArca: [[PWC]]).
I still don't think the Direxion ETFs make sense for investors, but it looks like the trading community might well embrace them.
More on choosing the right ETF

The “Great Unwind” of 2008 continues, and it looks as though it is trampling
every sector in its path. Next week promises to be another high-stakes week
for stocks, especially with a Federal Reserve meeting and the release of the
much-anticipated GDP number, which could certainly come in a whole lot worse
than the 0.50% decline most economists are expecting. The gloom and doom is
pervasive, and we all know that it is that type of fear-laden atmosphere that
lays the groundwork of a new bull market. We all also know that the stock
market is NEVER that simple, and it has always had a tendency to barbeque
those that expect the conventional wisdom to occur!

One thing the bulls have going for them, though, is the fact that we have now
had WEEKS of fear, panic, and loathing! Markets might not have a gut-wrenching
crash-like bottom, but they do eventually become exhausted! The low we saw in
October of 2002 was followed by two subsequent bottoms, which ultimately
formed a loose-looking triple bottom. The subsequent rally lasted for FIVE
years; so again, remember that markets do eventually change! The current route
is as bad as any the Gorilla can remember, and he does clearly remember the
big dive in October of 1987! They were not nationalizing banks back then, so
chalk that one up as a big worry for this current selloff!

Credit Crunch Rocks Bain, as Funds Fall Up to 50%

essica Marie Alba (born April 28, 1981)[1] is an American television and film actress. She began her television and movie appearances at age 13 in Camp Nowhere and The Secret World of Alex Mack (1994). Alba rose to prominence as the lead actress in the television series Dark Angel (2000–2002).[2][3] Alba later appeared in various films including Honey (2003), Sin City (2005), Fantastic Four (2005), Into the Blue (2005), Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer and Good Luck Chuck both in 2007.
Alba appears on the "Hot 100" section of Maxim and was voted AskMen.com's number one on their list of "99 Most Desirable Women" in 2006, as well as "Sexiest Woman in the World" by FHM in 2007. The use of her image on the cover of the March 2006 Playboy sparked a lawsuit by her, which was later dropped. Alba has won various awards for her acting, including the Choice Actress Teen Choice Award and Saturn Award for Best Actress (TV) for her acting in the series Dark Angel, though her acting has also been criticized, as she has been nominated for numerous Razzie Awards as well.


Some high-profile Bain Capital credit-investment funds are choking on losses of as much as 50%, said people familiar with the matter, the latest revelation in a day of shake-ups across the hedge-fund business.

The private-equity firm's credit affiliate, Sankaty Advisors LLC, has lost between 40% and 50% across two funds that bought up highly secured corporate loans, these people said. The two vehicles had roughly $4 billion in assets just a few weeks ago, and used a relatively low amount of borrowed money to fund their investments.

Steep losses have also hit London hedge fund Centaurus Capital LP, which Wednesday offered its investors a chance to cut their fees. And, at Tudor Investment Corp., one of the oldest and best-regarded hedge funds, fund manager James Pallotta finalized a plan to run his own firm separate from longtime colleague Paul Tudor Jones.

The developments at Bain, meanwhile, are a blow to a group of top-tier institutions that long have been investors with the Boston-based firm. Harvard University, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the University of Notre Dame all have some money invested in Bain's loss-making credit funds. Two of the problem funds include Sankaty's Special Situations and Prospect Harbor.

As market conditions have deteriorated, Sankaty has had to seek new, but more expensive, financing for some of its key borrowing facilities. It recently obtained longer-dated terms to stave off margin calls, which typically kick in if asset values fall below a certain price. The funds have not seen significant redemptions, according to a spokesman.

The market for leveraged loans -- senior loans issued by banks largely to fund buyout deals -- has plummeted in the last month. A Standard & Poor's index of leveraged loans now trades at 70 cents on the dollar, down from 88 cents one month ago. Until last summer, these senior loans rarely traded below par, or 100 cents on the dollar. In recent weeks numerous "bid lists" have flooded the market, creating overwhelming supply and further damping prices.

Money managers such as Bain, Blackstone Group LP and Carlyle Group have piled into this business in recent months, hoping to scoop up low-priced credits of high-quality companies. In many ways, these credit investments were supposed to fill a hole created by the greatly diminished market for private-equity buyouts. Sankaty's Special Situations fund, for instance, was raised in August 2007.

To fund these new transactions, loan investors typically borrowed some money to amplify returns. Many used facilities called total return swaps, known on Wall Street as TRS. Under these facilities, if the value of a loan declines to a certain price, the bank can secure more collateral or unwind the contract.

The Sankaty funds averaged about a dollar of leverage, or borrowed money, for each dollar of capital that belonged to investors. That level of borrowing was relatively low compared with many other investors, but it shows how even seemingly low-risk bets have suffered as the credit markets have virtually frozen.